Author Archives: skipper

In Search of the Southwest Passage

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Van dropped anchor in El Paso19:15 hours. Two reasons are behind this effort to sail the Southwest Deserts: Most important is gathering together a widely distributed set of our children. The long weekend has been an astounding success with good bonding and family renewal sure to provide confidence as all of us begin new adventures.

It has been a good shakedown cruise for Van and her crew. Van behaved remarkably well but the crew discovered it had a lot to learn about stowage.

The second reason, a very strong one albeit second to gathering the family, is the search for warmth. Mariner’s idea of warmth is Cancun, Mexico. In this respect, the cruise has been a dismal failure. Heavy snow, cold, sunless days overcast such that running lights were required. From Oklahoma to Flagstaff, the high was 34°F. Dropping down into the Phoenix basin did not improve things much with highs running 38° to a best of 50°F and a stiff cold wind to boot.

Arizona and New Mexico host three very large desserts; the flora and fauna is outstanding – the weather did not pass muster. Even as we steered Van into lower latitudes, El Paso offered 41°F with the coldest wind yet. Mariner is aware that San Antonio sits astride two biomes: to the north, one can expect weather very similar to our experience so far. To the south, there is a remarkable change in flora suggesting that it is virtually always warmer and does not experience hard frosts. It is in this more pleasant clime that the crew will dock Van for two days before we cruise to relatives and friends in Wylie, Texas and Havana, Arkansas – then back to home port for even colder weather.

Iowa caucuses grow near. Vote at any cost – but vote wisely. The US culture has come to a standstill that requires significant, visible commitment mostly from voters.

Ancient Mariner

 

Sailing On

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The mariner disembarks for El Paso tomorrow. Bearing I-10 all the way.

Today, we visited a chocolate factory. It was difficult not to buy out their stock. Clemson lost. Phoenix provided a pleasant sunny day.

The January/February Atlantic is dedicated to the 2016 election. It provides a broad view of trends and discusses American shifts in culture regardless of the outcome of the election. Online, you can read the magazine at www.atlantic.com

Mariner often uses the phrase “old school” politician. The criminal abuse allowed by Michigan Governor Rick Snyder toward the city of Flint is an atrocity typical of old school politicians who protect status quo and destructively manipulate budgets to minimize budget overruns. In an article, CNN states “This had been the status quo for nearly two years and until September, city and state officials told worried residents that everything was fine. Former Flint Mayor Dayne Walling even drank it on local TV to make the point.

“When our team (Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, pediatrician) saw that it was getting into children and when we knew the consequences, that’s when I think we began not to sleep,” Hanna-Attisha said.

At first, the state publicly denounced her work, saying she was causing near hysteria. They spent a week attacking her before reversing their narrative and admitting she was right. See full article at:

http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/11/health/toxic-tap-water-flint-michigan/index.html

It is important to know your incumbent’s voting history as a guide. Use your search engine to retrieve specific information. For example, mariner typed “Steve King voting record gun legislation” and had King’s whole history regarding his votes on the gun issue. One can search several voting topics by changing the words behind ‘voting record.’

The reason this is unusually important is that you must vote for a cause of your choice and let that dictate whether you will vote for an incumbent. In the past, one would say “The Congress is terrible” but would reelect their own Congressman on very forgiving, general principles. Not so, this time. Vote for an issue, not a person.

Try to identify the candidate as ‘old school’ (stability and fiscal conservatism) versus ‘new school’ (identifying current and future issues with declared policies about the future).

Ancient mariner

In Port Day 2

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It’s a lay about day; no events scheduled save a visit to a hamburger place to have lunch. Team members are spread about the house, each doing independent things.

Mariner watched TV. He watched CNN for twenty minutes with no gain in information except for the relative non-event about Chapo. Twenty minutes…..

The youngsters are preparing a delicious pulled pork supper. Outstanding.

Of course, the entertaining talk is about the lottery. The team is trying to work out compromises for how to split winnings. The mariner and his mate have read horror stories about how lottery winners aren’t happier. In fact, they are less happy, pursued endlessly by conmen and marketers like most are pursued by hornets, and often end up stone broke in a few years.

Mariner received two tickets as a birthday gift. We’ll see. He’s not holding his breath. Odds: 292,000,000/1. Rand Paul could win the Presidency 292 thousand times at these odds.

In a recent post, mariner offered an excellent book, How Not To Be Wrong, the Power of Mathematical Thinking by Jordon Ellenberg. Ellenberg’s book has a chapter called ‘What to expect when you expect to win the lottery.’

Two quotes, the first by Ellenberg, the second by Adam Smith, author of The Wealth of Nations:

“Should you play the lottery? It’s generally considered canny to say no. The old saying tells us lotteries are a “tax on the stupid” providing government revenue at the expense of people misguided enough to buy tickets.”

“…The world neither ever saw, nor will ever see, a perfectly fair lottery, or one in which the whole gain compensated the whole loss… [Meaning the amount played is always greater than the amount paid out]”

Lotteries, at least in the western world, began in Genoa during the seventeenth century as a method to determine which two of 120 lower house members would move to the upper chamber council for a year. It wasn’t long before gamblers started betting on which two would be selected. Eager for more betting than once each year, gamblers created an independent lottery very similar to today’s Powerball without lesser payoffs for nonwinners. Ellenberg covers other tales of government lotteries including the Michigan and Massachusetts “Cash Winfall” lotteries where unwon cash – millions of dollars – was rolled down to nonwinner pools to increase sales. Unbeknownst to the two states, on the occasion that cash was rolled down, three groups, MIT students, an Asian community, and a neighborhood group each pooled to buy 10,000 tickets or more. The enlarged cash pool made payoffs profitable, indeed guaranteed. More was won with one or two winners than the cost of all 10,000 tickets. Many in each group became independently wealthy by the time the government caught on and stopped Cash Winfall.

Is there a lesson to be learned by governments and Powerball players? Is there a more rational and predictive way to fund governments and healthy libidos? Of course, but neither will admit it. The truth is it takes stupid government officials who don’t know how to run government income and budgets properly to depend on lotteries as well as the stupid ticket buyers. Historical fact shows neither bode well in the long run.

Ancient Mariner

A Day in the Sonora Desert

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The primary event today is to visit the renowned Phoenix Botanic Gardens – a first in every travel guide. Mariner has waited a long time to explore a desert biome. While not out in the wilderness, it is a rich accumulation of cactus and succulent of every variety. Watching carefully, one can glimpse the roadrunner of cartoon fame (Geococcyx), Gambels Quail, (Callipepla gambelii), and the Mourning Dove (Zenaida macroura). Needless to say, mariner purchased many small samples of desert plants to start his own Sonora Desert.

It was promised that there would be an update of the ‘morning line,’ that is, today’s list of betting odds for the next President.

 

Two Weeks Ago 1-09-2016
Hillary Clinton 8/11 72% 8/11 72%
Marco Rubio 11/2 18% 11/2 18%
Donald Trump 8/1 12½% 6/1 16%
Ted Cruz 10/1 10% 10/1 10%
Bernie Sanders 20/1 5% 18/1 5½%
Jeb Bush 22/1 4½% 22/1 4½%
Chris Christie 33/1 3% 28/1 3½%
Ben Carson 200/1 ½% 200/1 ½%
John Kasich 250/1 2/5% 250/1 2/5%
Martin O’Malley 250/1 2/5% 250/1 2/5%
Mike Huckabee 500/1 1/5% 500/1 1/5%
Carley Fiorina 500/1 1/5% 500/1 1/5%
Rand Paul 200/1 ½% 999/1 1/100%

Everyone has held their position except Rand Paul, who fell to the bottom. Otherwise, bettors have seen nothing that would require hedging their bets.

Some readers asked the meaning of “hold the lay line.” There are times when sailing a line (direction) there is close clearance. The helmsman must assure that the boat does not fall to the close side. If that happens, the helmsman will be forced to tack away to be on the open side of the line. See diagram.

LAY LINE

Mariner uses this term to represent driving. The driver must be sure to be in the correct lane, take the correct exit, hold speed, and stay in a direction that will provide successful arrival.

Tomorrow has a trip to a special zoo displaying desert wildlife.

Ancient Mariner

In Port

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The recently purchased van bids well on our journey. It is treated as any vessel of passage would be: as in traditional sailing, it is a she, and named for a notable. It is called “The Honorable Van Heflin” and we refer to her as ‘the Van.’

It is a wonderful event to have young, bright children and partners visit the Phoenix home rented for our reunion. They are full of energy, participating in life as each day comes to them, and brimming with the chutzpa necessary to succeed professionally and personally. We have the next three or four days together to create a permanent bond to hold us together until whenever.

Each couple is at a turning point in their lives; marriage, career and new home await their return to their homes. We will meet again in spring for a Hollywood style wedding and reception.

But other issues crowd in as the mariner enjoys his family. The news has bristled with many significant events that have occurred as mariner was in passage to Phoenix.

It is an unexpected abuse that recently accepted Middle East immigrants have generated a significant rash of sexual assaults in several European and Nordic countries. Strict, routine checks for terrorist associations cannot screen for intentional abuse of local women. Perhaps cultural behavior is more an issue than “terrorist incursions.”

Mariner spoke to his alter ego Guru to understand the Donald issue. It seems that the 2016 election will not be the pristine change of direction one imagined. Given that many cultural and political issues are in turmoil, and that there remains an intransigent resistance to future change, one must perceive that a step of cleansing must occur which may or may not extend beyond 2016 to 2024.

In his role, Donald may play a significant role as a reagent. A reagent is any chemical that loosens dirt and washes it away as soap may do to laundry. It may be a benefit for the extreme right to cast its votes for Donald only to see the votes emulsified and washed down the drain. Of course, as many reagents do, Donald could win the election and further scrub the old school politic away at the cost of four years and unnecessary conflict. However, whether or not Donald quickly performs his role as cultural reagent and loses in 2016, the paradigm shift in American politics will be well under way.

Mariner will produce the bettor’s sense of all this in the next post.

Ancient Mariner

 

Ship’s Log Day 3

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Given the weather, one may as well be on the 40th parallel (every stop from Denver to Philadelphia). The temperature lingers between 30°F and 34°F. Rain is spotty, ranging from mist to deluge. As we gain altitude, the rain turns to heavy snow. Fortunately, we visited a chandlery before we left – a nice lunch is onboard as we hold the lay line.

Flagstaff AZ is a waypoint about midday. Flagstaff is buried under a foot of snow with another 8 inches predicted today. Fortunately, Flagstaff is our bearing to change our course to the southwest for the final leg to Phoenix.

The terrain is a series of mountain ridges slowly dropping in altitude. Eventually an occasional palm tree can be spotted and the landscape fills with Saguaro cactus and other interesting desert plants. Sailing into Phoenix, an overnight motel is welcome. Docked 18:00 hours local time.

Ship’s Log Day 4

A cold wind blows through Phoenix; the temperature hovers around 45°F with light rain. The mariner’s first thought is that Phoenix (a) is too far to travel for a temperature increase of 15°F above that in Iowa. (b) Phoenix is a large, overgrown city with poor commercial zoning and a monolithic housing architecture. It is not the warm idyllic retreat the mariner had in mind. However, he will refrain from final judgment; mariner and his wife look forward to greeting their children and their partners – Altogether, a rare event.
It is likely mariner will depart Phoenix following the Mexican border into Southern Texas in search of a bone warming retreat.

Ancient Mariner

 

 

Cruising the Southwest

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The mariner and his first mate are cruising toward Albuquerque, our second port. We are passing through the Texas Panhandle. Hour after hour, there is no sign of human life, no notable elevations other than some that remind the mariner of ocean swells. There is nothing to do except hold the lay line. As time rolls by, one becomes aware that the Panhandle has permanence – a stillness. It is a forgotten land while the rest of the world sails into an unknown future.

Suddenly, a very tall structure looms on the horizon. Quickly, one discovers it is a giant Christian Cross. It stands easily 120 feet tall – a proselytizing presence by itself. Mariner has a new understanding for the gargantuan, hyperbolic nature of the divine symbols of kings and gods typical of the ancient Abyssinian, Babylonian and Egyptian religions. Perhaps that is a weakness in Islamic and Christian religions today: their God denies images – let alone 120-foot images.

We cruise into New Mexican waters. The deserts seem more amenable to sharing with humanity – though barely. Occasionally, there are signs of managed fields and abandoned wooden huts. A new phenomenon occurs called a mesa. The mesa fires the imagination of travelers, realizing that, at the top of these flat, seemingly displaced forms, was the bottom of a body of water large enough to be a small ocean.

Before that, though, it was a mountainous region that collapsed when tectonic activity drew away the deep magma. The land we cross today is older than the Rocky Mountains – 80 million years old. The mesas resist erosion longer than surrounding surfaces, sustaining a fascinating, somehow historically obligated role to remind humans that they are indeed a short term renter of Earth’s sphere.

The mariner sails into an expected front of rain and snow that will encompass us all the way to Albuquerque. Hold the lay line.

Ancient Mariner

 

Travel may be Broadening but it’s also Different

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Ship’s Log Day 1

In his newly acquired vessel, a van of recent vintage, the mariner set sail for Phoenix, Arizona, USA. When his first mate took the helm, he decided to lounge luxuriously aft in the Captain’s quarters. Opening his laptop to write to his readers – note the mariner’s skill at hitting both the right key and only the right key is already challenged – typing while moving has a fail rate approaching 75%. It is wise that programmers have provided voice-driven software. Now, if the mariner can reduce road noise enough for the software to hear his voice, things will be fine. Another tip for typing while moving is to turn off the mouse and use the inboard pad; all the mouse wants to do is escape.

The first day’s course is set for Oklahoma City; it involves foregoing the fastest course, due south, to avoid rain and flooding. At Leon, IA, we changed bearing to southwest; without incident docked in Oklahoma City 20:30 hours. 

Ship’s log Day 2

In the morning, as we ate our free breakfast, we encountered the first sign that we were traveling in foreign waters: the restaurant TV is on FOX channel. Regular readers know the mariner, on occasion, is not wholly conservative. Nevertheless, he considers himself a tolerant soul. It’s simply that he is unaccustomed to traveling abroad. Things are different.

The first impression, as we sail further into Southwest waters, is the tone of the media – not just TV but newspapers and advertising. Conversation, too, is less tolerant – or perhaps more judgmental about unaccustomed topics. It makes mariner think about chicken and egg relationships: what came first, the media or the people? Thinking about it, the people came first but what sustains public opinion? Would folks anywhere have more thoughtful opinions if the media didn’t harp on headline grabbing interpretations that induce separatism as a way of life? The mariner decides the same undue influence is universal but different in each region.

Since communication corporations decided that news is also a profit center and not just a public service, the public has been abused in its desire to know just the facts, ma’am. News departments are now required to obtain market share; not only does the public not receive important but unentertaining news, it receives altered news focused on market share at the cost of encouraging close-mindedness. It is not hard to know why there will never be another Ed Murrow, Walter Cronkite or Huntley-Brinkley.

It is time for the mariner to take a turn at the helm. Today our course takes us to the port of Albuquerque.

Ancient Mariner

 

The Western States – Independence versus Federal Management

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Everyone who follows the reality of our times is aware of the complex priorities surrounding the nurturing of the Earth and its biosphere. The priorities range from global issues like chemical contaminants that destroy the ozone layer and the destructive effects of excessive Carbon on the environment, to more political and philosophical issues like international agreements to slow Carbon discharge and whether the Federal Government has the right to own and manage land in behalf of a balanced biome in the western states of the US. To understand the scope of this issue, the Federal Government owns fifty percent of the land in eleven western states; Federal Government owns over fifty percent of Nevada land – the State where Cliven Bundy took issue with the Federal Government over his “right to use Nevada’s land.”

This last issue, an argument today about the right of a national government to seize and hold land in behalf of a larger objective, provides an unusually clear dialogue about a person’s right to pursue life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness versus global values required to sustain human wellbeing in a global context. Right now, a test case is playing out – regarding the Cliven and Ammon Bundy confrontations with the Federal Government over the right to use Federally preserved property for farming and other private enterprises and, in Ammon’s case, the right of the Federal Government’s justice system to prosecute individuals for abusing “Government property.”

Beside the conflict between private enterprise and Federal control, this case provides a clear picture of the cultural shift in Federal objectives over time. Originally, very large sections of land were acquired by the Federal Government to assure that it would not be divided into disorganized uses that would prevent using the land for its natural resources, primarily lumber and grazing. The original intent, as the west became settled, was to sell off the Federal land in large acreages to private owners who would continue to pursue renewable practices for lumber and grazing. Later, around 1880-1890, there was a fear that private enterprise would strip the western resources of a ready supply of wood – as important then as oil is today – that would lead the nation into a natural resource crisis. As a result of this concern, the Federal Government’s attitude toward a sell-off faded.

In 1947, the Federal Government created The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) – the agency that attempted to seize Cliven Bundy’s cattle in 2014. The BLM is tasked with multiple and different interests, many of which conflict with each other. Objectives managed by the BLM include commodity production, grazing, recreation, ecological functioning, endangered species habitats, and revenue.

Fed Land west

In Cliven Bundy’s case, he refused to honor the rights of the Federal Government as owners of the land where he grazed his cattle and never paid over one million dollars in fees for the right to graze there. Fees began in 1993 when the BLM moved to reduce grazing to protect the endangered Desert Tortoise. When the BLM began removing cattle to be auctioned to pay overdue fees, the situation became an armed standoff as militant groups arrived ready to defend Bundy with weapons if necessary. BLM did not want this kind of escalation so they withdrew. Currently, the BLM plans to move through the Federal Court system. This is a slow process. The Bundy family, including Ammon, who is leading a takeover of a firehouse in Oregon, feels they won in Nevada and plan to expand their resistance as opportunities arise.

However, the case has much broader ramifications than a family feud with the Federal Government. Does the Federal Government have the right not only to seize and manage property, but to threaten citizens/businesses with confiscation of property if they fail to comply with Federal regulations? Substitute cap and trade for coal burning companies; can the Federal Government enforce environmental policy with the threat of a takeover? Hugo Chavez thought so when he nationalized Venezuela’s oil industry. Can the Federal Government take over power companies like Duke Electric in Georgia because of blatant and severely damaging abuse to local water resources? Can the Federal Government stop production of automobiles outright if Carbon standards and miles per gallon are in violation of Federal regulations? There are several precedents for government takeover in one form or another; remember prohibition? Remember the Keystone pipeline?

The Bundys have turned over a huge rock! The mariner suspects our capitalist-dominant culture is not ready for this much governmental authority. Nevertheless, science and technology are defining a path that leads to catastrophic disruption of Earth’s biome within a comparatively short time.

Who can make unbiased – and enforceable – decisions in this increasingly chaotic situation?

Ancient Mariner

Data is Free – Insight, Logic and Deduction is Not

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Occasionally, a reader may comment to the mariner that he must know a lot to be able to post so frequently and about so many different subjects. That is a nice compliment but the truth is the Internet is only a click away; the Internet has not failed mariner in providing voluminous detail about even the most arcane and obscure subject. The reader’s compliment should go to the Internet.

A common term is that we live in the information age. This is true. As Ed McMahon used to say, “The [Internet] has everything a person would ever want to know….” If all human data were on paper, as it used to be, we would be living between mountainous hills of paper that would put an old fashioned dump to shame. The amount of electronic information collected today has outpaced the places to store it. Here is a quote from Economist Magazine:

“Hal Varian, Google’s chief economist, predicts that the job of statistician will become the “sexiest” around. Data, he explains, are widely available; what is scarce is the ability to extract wisdom from them.” (Note that mariner did not know this quote until he looked for related information on the Internet. Incidentally, the whole article will explain more about information than mariner chooses to cover in this post – thanks to Economist Magazine online – a magazine mariner recommends for every household coffee table. See:

http://www.economist.com/node/15557443 ).

Not too long ago, the best search engine was a sharp reference librarian at the local library. Sometimes, customers had to wait a week or more if the information were complex or obfuscated or had to be retrieved by inter-library loan. The function of a reference librarian still is needed but more at assisting with the relationship between subjects and sorting and the data that may link the subjects together. When a strategy has been mapped, everyone goes over to the Supreme Master and God of Reference – the computer and the Internet.

Traditionally, one would marvel at memory gurus, people with photographic memories and lots of education. Now, one can still marvel – would we all be blessed with photographic memory – but the Internet is a classic example of cybernetic symbiosis. Anyone can collect large amounts of data in a dozen different ways without having to memorize the data; the Internet memorizes data for us. What is difficult is the ability to know what specific data one needs and how that data can be used to achieve the goal; further, how does one draw meaning from raw data?

Just having a ton of data in a database does not make one knowledgeable or more functional. Even if one could memorize the entire table of data, it would be of no use unless one can process the data properly. The simplified steps for leveraging our symbiotic relationship are:

  1. Why do you need data? This step assures that you have a specific need that requires data. This step sharpens focus; identifies the topic, subject, or problem that will be resolved.
  2. What don’t you know that would be known if you had specific data? This step clarifies data element requirements.
  3. At the end, what objective will be resolved? This step uses answers to the first 2 steps and often is the source of the query posted with your search engine.

In the information age, there is plenty of data. What does it imply? Which data is important to provide the values for many different types of decisions? How does one invent ancillary data to augment the data table? We may be able to generate enough data to match the number of grains of sand on the planet but if we don’t know the definition of ‘beach,’ all the sand in the world is useless.

Responding again to the compliment at the beginning, mariner knows little about where data comes from; what mariner contributes is the question and subsequent reasoning. Once having the data to support comparative reasoning, the mariner will offer the reader his reasoning of the objective.

REFERENCE SECTION

Religion – While scanning the news of the day, mariner came across some interesting issues. An article in the Denver Post covered a labor dispute between Muslims and Cargill. The Muslims walked off the job and were subsequently fired because eleven wanted to pray together. What the mariner found interesting is that this situation is quite similar to that of Kim Davis, the county clerk who went to jail rather than approve homosexual marriage licenses. In both cases, workers chose religious principles over economic opportunity. See:

http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_29330180/cargill-tried-resolve-issues-before-firing-colorado-muslim

Other religious news is a poll taken by the Christian Science Monitor on the issue of freedom of religion (protected by the First Amendment). The poll says 82% of Americans believe it is important for Christianity to practice freely but only 61% say the same is true for Islam – an oxymoron it seems to mariner. See:

http://www.csmonitor.com/

Ancient Mariner