Bad car analogy. Software fixes don't take up warehouse space like auto parts, and the incremental cost to patch another computer is so close to zero that computing it be pointless.
At home I have four computers that I use that run XP. I keep them around because they have serial ports to talk to my network equipment. Should they die I'd have to obtain serial adapters and software to replace them. What I have is paid for and works so I keep the 15 year old computers working.
At work we have CNC machines that run XP. They use serial and/or parallel ports to talk to the computer. The software that runs everything is one of a kind. Replacing all of that would cost tens of thousands of dollars that we don't have. They are behind a firewall to keep the shop workers from surfing porn on the computers but the system has to have some access to the internet for some functions.
Microsoft might want to consider extending support for XP because if we cannot get what we need from Microsoft I might be asked for alternatives from the people that run the shop. Considering the cost of Microsoft products I will offer solutions to the powers that be that do not include Microsoft. You may not be bothered by that. I won't be bothered by that. Microsoft should be bothered by this if they are not already.
At work Windows 7 is tolerated. Windows 8 and Vista makes the boss's eye twitch, the GUI bothers him as does the price. No XP could mean no Windows. I'm the new guy on the crew and I'd be happy to suggest Macintosh and Linux solutions. With this coming up my recommendation may come up today. If Microsoft doesn't mind our getting Apples instead of Dells then all is well. If Microsoft wants our money then they will produce a fix so we can keep going.
I'm talking 100+ desktops running XP. If Microsoft says we need to buy Vista or 8.1 to fix our problems then we must look at alternatives. That might mean replacing the Server 2003 systems too. I imagine we are not unique. Microsoft can patch this and keep our business, or not and lose our business.
I'm not demanding they provide a fix, just showing the problems they have if they don't.
Yep, that sucks. Problem is that the tighter the government squeezes with taxes the more trucks will slip between the fingers. Right now the government gets something. If the fuel taxes get too high then the trucks switch to natural gas and they get nothing. If they tax by the mile-ton then prices for commodities go up. If they tax too much then the trucks stop, then what? Those grocery stores only hold enough food for a day or two, maybe a week. No trucks means no food.
Trains work only so far, they don't take things that last mile. We subsidize the roads because that is how we get our food. Taxes, asphalt, and congestion are the prices we pay. That's not fair but not many things in life are fair.
Not sure where I heard this but I recall that light vehicles produce no wear on roads. All the wear seen on roads is from weather and heavy vehicles like buses and trucks. If that is true, and I have no reason to doubt it, taxing gasoline to pay for roads does not follow. Taxing diesel fuel might make sense since it's the heavy vehicles that tend to burn that fuel, not the light vehicles.
Taxing diesel fuel at a rate that would make sense for the wear the vehicles that burn it cause on roads would be political suicide, any elected official that proposed such a tax would be run out of town by all kinds of groups. Taxing miles driven would be political suicide from the "greenies" out there that want to see everyone in an electric powered (which means coal powered) car.
Fuel taxes to control congestion also makes little sense since people over time just get used to how much fuel costs, the cost of the fuel does not suddenly go up because it is rush hour or because the car entered city limits. The cost of the fuel alone, without the taxes, should be enough to discourage unnecessary driving. Taxes on fuel at some point just punish people for driving to work. I've heard of people moving closer to work so they drive less, which means denser populations, which means more traffic. That's counterproductive IMHO.
To me there really isn't a fair way to tax people for road use. Some people drive big trucks because they want to, some drive them because their line of work requires it. Some people don't buy any fuel, or no fuel with a road use tax, because they have electric or natural gas cars. Some get around the tax by burning corn oil or heating fuel, it's illegal but they do it.
I think it would be easier, and more "fair", to get rid of road use taxes. That way we don't have to worry about "red" diesel (off road, agricultural, heating, etc.) finding it's way into road vehicles. In essence we all benefit from roads even if we don't drive because that is how food, clothing, and building materials get to where we need to feed, clothe, and shelter ourselves.
I know a lot of people will be upset at the thought of reduced prices for fuel because it's not taxed like it is now, people might drive more than they would otherwise. Well, if these people that want us to drive electric cars get what they want then this tax revenue is going away anyway. I suspect the government is addicted to gasoline as much as anyone because of the taxes it brings in. What real incentive does the government have to get everyone to drive electric cars if the taxes on road fuels is near 50%?
I believe it is a city thing. Police chiefs are appointed by city councils, mayors, or city managers. They are separated from the people they supposedly serve by several layers of bureaucracy. A sheriff is elected and the deputies serve at his or her pleasure, the level of accountability to the people is quite high. A sheriff that misbehaves will not be in office for long, and a deputy that misbehaves will have to answer to the sheriff.
Who profits more from the "war on drugs" than the government?
The way the laws are written the government can seize everything you own if they can so much as hint that any portion of it was purchased with drug money. So the police go looking for stuff they can take. They love to take cash because it's really hard to prove that the cash was not made in an illegal sale of drugs. They love to take cars because those can be sold for good money at auction even at pennies on the dollar of its real value. But the cost to them is pretty small in comparison because few people actually go to prison. Those accused of dealing drugs just give the government all their stuff, plead guilty in exchange for being "allowed" to go free, and the government officials get a pay raise and a pat on the back for "being tough on crime".
What do we get out of it? A government that thinks the Fourth Amendment is just words on parchment.
I'll expand on your thought and show how far we have gone down this road of lunacy. The "logic" is that consuming drugs tend to lead people to do harm to themselves and others so we ban the drugs. Consuming drugs is bad so therefore possessing drugs is bad. Possessing drugs is bad so therefore having drug related items is bad. Dealing in these drug related items then must be real bad because you are causing others to get the items to consume or create the drugs. Since dealing in drug related items is bad then therefore advertising that you sell these items is bad.
So where does this line of "logic" lead us? Tommy Chong (of Cheech and Chong) does nine months in federal prison for advertising water pipes on a website. The crime was "conspiracy to transfer drug paraphernalia" or something like that. The crime wasn't that he sold them, it's that he offered to sell them.
With logic like that everything is a crime. Anything that burns is potentially a heat source to distill moonshine or cook meth. Paper could be used to roll a joint or take a hit of LSD. Shoelaces could be used to help find a vein to inject heroin. Anything even related to agriculture could be used to grow marijuana or poppies. Anything related to cooking or chemistry could be used to make all kinds of drugs. Medical equipment could be illegal because it aids in consuming drugs, or cleaning up the mess after.
We didn't learn from alcohol prohibition so we are doomed to repeat it. The cure has become worse than the disease. It's because of crazy drug laws that I have become a minarchist. The government should exist to build roads, maintain the armed forces, and that's about it. No drug laws, no gun laws, no public schools.
Are you in favor of rolling back the anti-Klan laws?
Yes. So long as it also means rolling back the anti-self defense laws.
The KKK got away with what they did by first disarming their victims. Those laws come primarily from the Jim Crow era, an effort to keep Blacks effectively slaves. An armed Black man did not have to be concerned about hooded characters invading his property, because they'd be dead and the hood removed in short order.
I don't care if people wish to wear masks so long as I'm not disarmed. If the masked people don't want to get shot then don't go busting down my door. Masked people in a shopping mall, making every purchase with cash, I have no problem with that. If it doesn't pick my pocket or break my leg it bothers me none.
Disarming and unmasking people puts the government in a very powerful position. I have the right to associate as I please without the government knowing. I have the right to defend myself as I see fit. The government need not know what weapons I own. If the government fears me because I am anonymous and armed then perhaps it is because the government is doing something they should not.
This is supposed to be a government of the people, for the people. We should be partners, not adversaries. That means the government needs to trust the people with being unnamed and armed. If they cannot do that then we have tyranny.
That only works so long as the wind blows. I had a windmill outside my window at work, it didn't always spin. But the wind always blows somewhere you say? Are you willing to bet your life on it? If the wind stops then the lights go out, refrigeration stops, no more food gets cooked, and we starve.
I like wind. I think it can make a lot of people a lot of money. I think it can add value to a power grid but it cannot do it alone. We'll still need natural gas, nuclear, hydro, something else to make up for when the wind does not blow.
Store the wind power? Not likely. I've seen the math on storing electricity from wind power and the batteries or whatever to make it work would take so many resources that we'd have nothing left to build houses from. We just can't store enough wind power.
You are correct, no one cares much where the electricity comes from so long as the lights go on when the switch is thrown. Wind is good, nuclear is better. There's a technology called "waste annihilating molten salt reactor" that eats the so called "spent" fuel from the reactors we have now. Once we eat up that waste then we can just give it thorium or natural uranium, and we have enough of that on Earth to last millions of years.
Even if global warming is a hoax, is it fair that our generation uses more than its fair share of the planet's resources so a few super rich multinational corporations can get super richer?
Do we not owe it to our children to give them a better life than we had? Claiming that there is some sort of "fair share" of Earth's resources implies some sort of scarcity. There is enough of everything to go around and more. We have enough energy and raw materials for everyone to live a first world lifestyle if we only develop nuclear energy. Any claim against nuclear energy is based on 1950s technology. We have designs of nuclear reactors that will eat waste from the old reactors and give us vital materials for industry, medicine, and research.
Also, what is so bad about corporations getting "super richer"? I assume you work for one of those "super richer" corporations. Claiming that they are evil means that you are evil for working for them. I've never worked for a poor man. Rich people pay other people to work, and those people get richer for it. Profit is not evil, it is necessary.
If the corporations did not make a profit from hiring people then they would not hire people. If the people did not make a profit from working for the corporations then they would not take the job. I bought a gallon of milk today, I made a profit from that transaction because I wanted that milk more than I wanted that money. The grocery made a profit. The truckers made a profit bringing it to the store. The dairy farm made a profit by producing the milk. Everyone wins and no one lost.
I like it when super rich corporations get "super richer" because that means jobs. Jobs mean people got paid. People getting paid means that they got food, shelter, and clothing. That means demand for more food, shelter, and clothing. That means more jobs.
All those materials consumed in creating the food, shelter, and clothing comes from the Earth in some manner and the Earth is huge. There is enough energy in the sun, wind, and especially radioactive material to last well beyond when the sun consumes the earth. We can mine the earth, water, and air for everything we need if only given enough energy to do so.
I'm not a big believer in man made global warming but I'll go along with it so long as it means developing nuclear energy. If we could only get past this irrational fear of all things nuclear then we'd not only not have to worry about our "carbon footprint" but also create a better life for ourselves and every generation to follow.
Without fossil fuels or nuclear energy we'd be living a life of scarcity, a life not much better than cavemen. Wind and sun alone will not drive a modern economy. Refining aluminum and iron for modern vehicles and buildings needs a lot of energy. Transportation and communications takes energy. We can have it all and still have plenty for our children so long as we develop nuclear power. It would also mean a lot of people will get "super richer", and that's a good thing.
Pointing out that the greatest security threat comes from the inside is first day stuff in any training on security. This is effectively scaremongering over nuclear power. Nuclear power plants are the most secure places in the USA outside of a military base or prison.
I was once invited to take a tour of a nuclear power plant. I thought that would be fun. Problem was that I was told I'd have to go through a background check to go on the property. That was a buzz kill. It's not that I thought I would not pass the background check but that it was a reminder of the paranoia that surrounds anything nuclear. I doubted I would see anything remotely interesting at that point. I've toured power plants before. I didn't feel the need to be strip searched to see another turbine hall, electric switching yard, and the outside of the reactor building.
That brings me to why the security inside a nuclear power plant is largely irrelevant. Anyone that wanted to bring down a nuclear power plant can do so without getting near the fence on the property. The electricity wires that go to the power plant are unguarded, it's impossible to guard them all. So, if someone brings down enough power lines the plant will have to shut down. Recent attacks on the electric infrastructure are speculated to be tests of our ability to react. If true then we could see a coordinated attack on the electric grid soon.
The other reason why security around nuclear power plants is irrelevant is because accessing anything actually fissile is dangerous. The radiation from the fuel would kill anyone that got within a few feet of it without gobs of gear. Getting it off site in time before National Guard battle tanks got there would be near impossible. It would be much easier to extract the nuclear material from seawater than try to get it from an active nuclear reactor.
Or, it'd be easier to pay off the people that have access to it. Which is what the article gave as an unsurprising point.
If we want nuclear power to be safe what we need is actually less of a veil of secrecy around it. People notice stuff, and they report it to law enforcement if the stuff is worthy of it. More people around the nuclear power plant means more people to see what is going on. Let people tour the plants without having to provide fingerprints. All that does is reduce the number of eyeballs watching things.
Getting into a nuclear power plant should not be more difficult than, for example, visiting a county courthouse. People get in line for a metal detector and a deputy keeps an eye out for odd behavior. If a guy in a long overcoat shows up sweating profusely on a hot day then that person might need another look. It'd probably be someone that forgot to take their meds that day, either way that person should have a chat with law enforcement before going further. Terrorists are not out to get us that bad. If they were we'd have constant blackouts from power lines getting blown up. That's easier to do and there's no metal detectors.
Another way to improve nuclear power plant security is with better designs. Don't use reactors that need refined fuel. Use reactors that dilute fissile material with short half life isotopes. Anyone that tries to steal any will get a deadly dose of radiation for their troubles. Use thorium reactors. Use denatured uranium reactors. Use molten salt reactors. With a good design there is nothing worth stealing and little radiation hazard if there is a successful attack. We'd still need security, of course, but no more than any other industrial location.
How many of those prescriptions are not traversing state or international borders?
A vast majority of them I imagine. I see my prescribing physician downtown, I pick up the prescription at the pharmacy on my way home, at no point did I cross a state or national border.
If the federal government feels it necessary to regulate the purity, labeling, and what not of the prescribed medication from the place of manufacture in one state to a pharmacy in another that is one thing. To place regulations on the manner that my physician can prescribe medications to me is another matter. One transaction crosses state lines, the other does not. Regulating a product at all phases of its use because it MAY have crossed state lines at one point is absurdity and an abuse of the authority granted to the federal government.
We need the states to stand up to the federal government. I believe we are just starting to see that with marijuana legalization. The federal government may regret not acting on marijuana legalization earlier, it is going to set precedent for all controlled substances.
I recall a federal prosecutor wanted to charge a man with assault for cutting off another man's beard. The argument used for having federal jurisdiction? The scissors used crossed state lines.
Does that mean public intoxication is a federal crime because the beer consumed came from Canada?
Would that be the graph that you said was so old as to be useless or the other graphs that you have ignored? Did you ignore the other graphs because they show a peak at 6PM as I stated it would be found?
I'm not even sure what you claim that you see any more, all I see is peak electric demand at around 6PM.
The linked image clearly shows a peak load at 6PM. I even used a ruler.
All you've done is say that I lied but provided nothing to show what you said is true. So what if the peak demand is at 3PM instead of 6PM. Unless solar power output coincides with demand its worthless for anything other than a nuisance or curiosity.
If the peak demand for electric power was at 3PM instead of 6PM that only means that solar power is mostly worthless instead of completely worthless. So, do you still want to claim the peak demand is at 3PM?
The sooner people realize how worthless solar power is the sooner we can move on to something that actually works, like nuclear power.
Perhaps I'm wrong, I was going by memory from the reactions from the nuclear power incidents in Japan. I remember all those nations having decided to shutdown all nuclear power by some future date to prevent what happened in Japan. Quite likely most if not all changed their mind since.
Germany seems to want to replace nuclear with wind and solar, good luck with that. UK and France have not built a new nuclear plant in decades. Either way the USA has plenty of oil, coal, and natural gas to sell them if they need it. If the USA builds more nuclear power then we'd have even more to sell.
I thought killing endangered species was a bad thing. I believe in conservation. We should conserve our resources so future generations have places to hunt, farm, and ranch. Can't do that if productive land is covered with solar panels. Won't have crops and forests if windmills break up and burn from high winds or lightning strikes.
If you want to see an environmental disaster then lets keep burning "crop waste" instead of tilling it into the soil for fertilizer and erosion control.
Like I said, I did the math. Much of the so called "green energy" sources will end up turning forests and crop land into a dust bowl. We need crop rotations, not corn, corn, and more corn. We need large grazing animals to complete the carbon cycle. That means eating meat. We need to control predators, that means hunting.
We are part of the environment, not separate from it. We need to act like it or we won't have anything "green" to worry about.
In other words you have no data to support your claim.
Peak electric load does not coincide with peak solar power production. Even if it did there is still the matter of cost. Wind and natural gas are still cheaper.
If the federal government ever gets up off their thumbs then maybe we'll see cheap nuclear power. Nuclear power that burns the waste from the old inefficient reactors. Then we'd get somewhere. No carbon, no foreign energy, and no more windmills killing our national bird.
It amazes me how many people in the survey doubt that human activity is causing climate change. We have big corporate conglomerates that conveniently own both wind and solar companies as well as big TV broadcasters and newspapers. These people have "green week" once a month to show just how badly we are ruining the environment with our air conditioning, fast food, SUVs, and "throw away" lifestyle. All this bombardment of AGW and 37% of people are doubters. How can this be?
I have an idea. The scientists that have shown support for AGW have been caught cooking the numbers. We've just come out of an extended winter, one of many in the last decade or so. Every tornado, hurricane, earthquake, disease outbreak, or lightning strike is blamed on AGW. The "scientists" that support AGW are a bunch of cheaters and quacks.
Despite this overload of AGW hysteria from every news outlet the world around us does not reflect the hysteria. Things are pretty much like they were since the AGW "pause" that began in 1998. How long is a "pause" a "pause" and not a "stop"? AGW stopped being anthropogenic global warming when the globe stopped warming. It's rather difficult to claim we're warming the globe if there is no warming to show for it.
I've been playing along with the AGW thing so long as it supports my cause of an energy independent USA. It's hard to make that case when recent climate data does not show warming. This means I have to make my case for nuclear power by other means. I propose we use nuclear power to drill for natural gas and oil, and mine coal, so that we can sell it to other nations that lack the means to build up a nuclear power infrastructure.
Germany, France, and the UK all decided they would do away with nuclear power. It's going to get real cold and dark there this winter with no nuclear and no Russian natural gas. I say the USA can provide their power cheaper and without the guilt of supporting communists and dictators. Well, we'll get rid of the communists in November. The dictators will be gone in 2016.
Not only would the USA be producing cheap energy for the world with nuclear power we can burn up their nuclear waste in our waste annihilating molten salt reactors. Go shut down those nuclear power plants in Europe. The USA will buy your nuclear waste and sell you energy.
After you've been caught out in a lie why should I waste my time?
I could ask you the same thing. You said power load peaks coincide with solar power production. I called out your lie with data but you didn't even have the courtesy to provide where you get your data.
you are effectively grooming the kiddies to join up with the politics you are pushing.
What politics am I pushing? I've made no mention of elected officials, political parties, or candidates. I did mention disagreement with policies that subsidize any energy sources. What does that make me then?
There's all kinds of data on the internet showing load profiles, it's just that most of it is in Excel spreadsheets. I'm not in the mood to download them to see what I already know. If you have data that shows otherwise then please share rather than make unsubstantiated claims.
Solar power is a boondoggle. It produces no real power since it requires backups for when the sun does not shine. If we have to build the backups for solar power then why not just run the backups all the time? Given that natural gas is cheaper than solar that is precisely what the utilities are doing.
Even if solar power were free it is still worthless since we do not have the means to store that electricity for a price cheaper than producing it from natural gas, wind, coal, and nuclear. Running power lines to where the sun is shining won't help either since I2R losses would be huge, as would be the cost to build and maintain those lines.
I'm not "green bashing", I just did the math. Solar power is worthless for grid power. If you are off the grid then the math changes but that is not what is being discussed here. The only reason anyone buys solar panels when grid power is available is because the government paid them to. That means the government took my money to give to some wealthy person with a big house so they can buy solar panels, then they take more of my money through more solar power subsidies because they have the solar panels on their roof.
If you think "big oil" is some evil lobby then what about "big solar"? The solar power business model is based on continued government subsidies. Without the government propping them up none of them would be in business. "Big oil" and "big coal" would still be around without government money because they actually produce something useful.
Does "big oil" make a lot of money? Yep, that's because you and I gave it to them. We got energy in return but we still gave them that money without a gun to our head. Does "big solar" make a lot of money? Yep, but they do it with the threat of government force.
There is a peak in usage at about 8:00AM, another peak at about 6:00PM, a valley at about noon, and power use hits its lowest at about 3:00AM.
I searched for the video I saw on that explained power usage peaks and solar power production and I could not find it again. The link above shows an image from the USGS and the talk I saw was based on data from the Texas power grid. The guy went into depth about how the peak of power usage is about when solar power is unavailable for the rest of the day, and that solar power peaks right when usage hits the lunch time valley.
The difference between peak power use and peak solar power output makes solar power a very low value power source. This means that solar power has to be cheaper than its competitors to be of value to utilities, which it is not. Solar power is not profitable to utilities. Solar power will not be profitable until we get a means to store or transport that power cheap enough to compete with its lowest fruit competitor, wind.
I will admit that I'm no expert on electric power production but don't tell me I didn't see what I saw. The electric power profiles I saw were from the federal government and from American utilities, I would consider those trustworthy sources.
I was surprised when I was shown that peak power happened in the late afternoon or early evening. One would think that power consumption should taper off at 5:00 as factories shut down but it doesn't. Why this peak happens later in the day has a lot to do with our everyday habits, not something that can be summarized here.
What surprised me about one of the YouTube talks I saw was that even if solar power were free it would not make economic sense to have more than 20% solar on the grid. He had charts and a lengthy explanation as to why. It comes down to that we do not have a cheap way to store electricity. If we cannot consume it as we need it then it gets thrown away. Electric capacity that is unused costs the utility money.
Solar power that is free at noon means throttling back cheap base load power. That base load power cannot be brought back up to speed in time the evening peak arrives, so the more expensive peak power generators would have to be used. Averaged out over the day and that means the price of electricity goes up.
But solar power is not free. Solar power is very expensive except in the most ideal locations. That is why solar power makes up less than 1% of the electricity produced in the USA. Solar power and the electric storage capacity to go with it will have to come down in price by orders of magnitude before utilities will consider it anything other than a nuisance or curiosity.
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Bad car analogy. Software fixes don't take up warehouse space like auto parts, and the incremental cost to patch another computer is so close to zero that computing it be pointless.
At home I have four computers that I use that run XP. I keep them around because they have serial ports to talk to my network equipment. Should they die I'd have to obtain serial adapters and software to replace them. What I have is paid for and works so I keep the 15 year old computers working.
At work we have CNC machines that run XP. They use serial and/or parallel ports to talk to the computer. The software that runs everything is one of a kind. Replacing all of that would cost tens of thousands of dollars that we don't have. They are behind a firewall to keep the shop workers from surfing porn on the computers but the system has to have some access to the internet for some functions.
Microsoft might want to consider extending support for XP because if we cannot get what we need from Microsoft I might be asked for alternatives from the people that run the shop. Considering the cost of Microsoft products I will offer solutions to the powers that be that do not include Microsoft. You may not be bothered by that. I won't be bothered by that. Microsoft should be bothered by this if they are not already.
At work Windows 7 is tolerated. Windows 8 and Vista makes the boss's eye twitch, the GUI bothers him as does the price. No XP could mean no Windows. I'm the new guy on the crew and I'd be happy to suggest Macintosh and Linux solutions. With this coming up my recommendation may come up today. If Microsoft doesn't mind our getting Apples instead of Dells then all is well. If Microsoft wants our money then they will produce a fix so we can keep going.
I'm talking 100+ desktops running XP. If Microsoft says we need to buy Vista or 8.1 to fix our problems then we must look at alternatives. That might mean replacing the Server 2003 systems too. I imagine we are not unique. Microsoft can patch this and keep our business, or not and lose our business.
I'm not demanding they provide a fix, just showing the problems they have if they don't.
Yep, that sucks. Problem is that the tighter the government squeezes with taxes the more trucks will slip between the fingers. Right now the government gets something. If the fuel taxes get too high then the trucks switch to natural gas and they get nothing. If they tax by the mile-ton then prices for commodities go up. If they tax too much then the trucks stop, then what? Those grocery stores only hold enough food for a day or two, maybe a week. No trucks means no food.
Trains work only so far, they don't take things that last mile. We subsidize the roads because that is how we get our food. Taxes, asphalt, and congestion are the prices we pay. That's not fair but not many things in life are fair.
Not sure where I heard this but I recall that light vehicles produce no wear on roads. All the wear seen on roads is from weather and heavy vehicles like buses and trucks. If that is true, and I have no reason to doubt it, taxing gasoline to pay for roads does not follow. Taxing diesel fuel might make sense since it's the heavy vehicles that tend to burn that fuel, not the light vehicles.
Taxing diesel fuel at a rate that would make sense for the wear the vehicles that burn it cause on roads would be political suicide, any elected official that proposed such a tax would be run out of town by all kinds of groups. Taxing miles driven would be political suicide from the "greenies" out there that want to see everyone in an electric powered (which means coal powered) car.
Fuel taxes to control congestion also makes little sense since people over time just get used to how much fuel costs, the cost of the fuel does not suddenly go up because it is rush hour or because the car entered city limits. The cost of the fuel alone, without the taxes, should be enough to discourage unnecessary driving. Taxes on fuel at some point just punish people for driving to work. I've heard of people moving closer to work so they drive less, which means denser populations, which means more traffic. That's counterproductive IMHO.
To me there really isn't a fair way to tax people for road use. Some people drive big trucks because they want to, some drive them because their line of work requires it. Some people don't buy any fuel, or no fuel with a road use tax, because they have electric or natural gas cars. Some get around the tax by burning corn oil or heating fuel, it's illegal but they do it.
I think it would be easier, and more "fair", to get rid of road use taxes. That way we don't have to worry about "red" diesel (off road, agricultural, heating, etc.) finding it's way into road vehicles. In essence we all benefit from roads even if we don't drive because that is how food, clothing, and building materials get to where we need to feed, clothe, and shelter ourselves.
I know a lot of people will be upset at the thought of reduced prices for fuel because it's not taxed like it is now, people might drive more than they would otherwise. Well, if these people that want us to drive electric cars get what they want then this tax revenue is going away anyway. I suspect the government is addicted to gasoline as much as anyone because of the taxes it brings in. What real incentive does the government have to get everyone to drive electric cars if the taxes on road fuels is near 50%?
I believe it is a city thing. Police chiefs are appointed by city councils, mayors, or city managers. They are separated from the people they supposedly serve by several layers of bureaucracy. A sheriff is elected and the deputies serve at his or her pleasure, the level of accountability to the people is quite high. A sheriff that misbehaves will not be in office for long, and a deputy that misbehaves will have to answer to the sheriff.
It's just a theory but it makes sense to me.
Who profits more from the "war on drugs" than the government?
The way the laws are written the government can seize everything you own if they can so much as hint that any portion of it was purchased with drug money. So the police go looking for stuff they can take. They love to take cash because it's really hard to prove that the cash was not made in an illegal sale of drugs. They love to take cars because those can be sold for good money at auction even at pennies on the dollar of its real value. But the cost to them is pretty small in comparison because few people actually go to prison. Those accused of dealing drugs just give the government all their stuff, plead guilty in exchange for being "allowed" to go free, and the government officials get a pay raise and a pat on the back for "being tough on crime".
What do we get out of it? A government that thinks the Fourth Amendment is just words on parchment.
I'll expand on your thought and show how far we have gone down this road of lunacy. The "logic" is that consuming drugs tend to lead people to do harm to themselves and others so we ban the drugs. Consuming drugs is bad so therefore possessing drugs is bad. Possessing drugs is bad so therefore having drug related items is bad. Dealing in these drug related items then must be real bad because you are causing others to get the items to consume or create the drugs. Since dealing in drug related items is bad then therefore advertising that you sell these items is bad.
So where does this line of "logic" lead us? Tommy Chong (of Cheech and Chong) does nine months in federal prison for advertising water pipes on a website. The crime was "conspiracy to transfer drug paraphernalia" or something like that. The crime wasn't that he sold them, it's that he offered to sell them.
With logic like that everything is a crime. Anything that burns is potentially a heat source to distill moonshine or cook meth. Paper could be used to roll a joint or take a hit of LSD. Shoelaces could be used to help find a vein to inject heroin. Anything even related to agriculture could be used to grow marijuana or poppies. Anything related to cooking or chemistry could be used to make all kinds of drugs. Medical equipment could be illegal because it aids in consuming drugs, or cleaning up the mess after.
We didn't learn from alcohol prohibition so we are doomed to repeat it. The cure has become worse than the disease. It's because of crazy drug laws that I have become a minarchist. The government should exist to build roads, maintain the armed forces, and that's about it. No drug laws, no gun laws, no public schools.
Are you in favor of rolling back the anti-Klan laws?
Yes. So long as it also means rolling back the anti-self defense laws.
The KKK got away with what they did by first disarming their victims. Those laws come primarily from the Jim Crow era, an effort to keep Blacks effectively slaves. An armed Black man did not have to be concerned about hooded characters invading his property, because they'd be dead and the hood removed in short order.
I don't care if people wish to wear masks so long as I'm not disarmed. If the masked people don't want to get shot then don't go busting down my door. Masked people in a shopping mall, making every purchase with cash, I have no problem with that. If it doesn't pick my pocket or break my leg it bothers me none.
Disarming and unmasking people puts the government in a very powerful position. I have the right to associate as I please without the government knowing. I have the right to defend myself as I see fit. The government need not know what weapons I own. If the government fears me because I am anonymous and armed then perhaps it is because the government is doing something they should not.
This is supposed to be a government of the people, for the people. We should be partners, not adversaries. That means the government needs to trust the people with being unnamed and armed. If they cannot do that then we have tyranny.
That only works so long as the wind blows. I had a windmill outside my window at work, it didn't always spin. But the wind always blows somewhere you say? Are you willing to bet your life on it? If the wind stops then the lights go out, refrigeration stops, no more food gets cooked, and we starve.
I like wind. I think it can make a lot of people a lot of money. I think it can add value to a power grid but it cannot do it alone. We'll still need natural gas, nuclear, hydro, something else to make up for when the wind does not blow.
Store the wind power? Not likely. I've seen the math on storing electricity from wind power and the batteries or whatever to make it work would take so many resources that we'd have nothing left to build houses from. We just can't store enough wind power.
You are correct, no one cares much where the electricity comes from so long as the lights go on when the switch is thrown. Wind is good, nuclear is better. There's a technology called "waste annihilating molten salt reactor" that eats the so called "spent" fuel from the reactors we have now. Once we eat up that waste then we can just give it thorium or natural uranium, and we have enough of that on Earth to last millions of years.
Even if global warming is a hoax, is it fair that our generation uses more than its fair share of the planet's resources so a few super rich multinational corporations can get super richer?
Do we not owe it to our children to give them a better life than we had? Claiming that there is some sort of "fair share" of Earth's resources implies some sort of scarcity. There is enough of everything to go around and more. We have enough energy and raw materials for everyone to live a first world lifestyle if we only develop nuclear energy. Any claim against nuclear energy is based on 1950s technology. We have designs of nuclear reactors that will eat waste from the old reactors and give us vital materials for industry, medicine, and research.
Also, what is so bad about corporations getting "super richer"? I assume you work for one of those "super richer" corporations. Claiming that they are evil means that you are evil for working for them. I've never worked for a poor man. Rich people pay other people to work, and those people get richer for it. Profit is not evil, it is necessary.
If the corporations did not make a profit from hiring people then they would not hire people. If the people did not make a profit from working for the corporations then they would not take the job. I bought a gallon of milk today, I made a profit from that transaction because I wanted that milk more than I wanted that money. The grocery made a profit. The truckers made a profit bringing it to the store. The dairy farm made a profit by producing the milk. Everyone wins and no one lost.
I like it when super rich corporations get "super richer" because that means jobs. Jobs mean people got paid. People getting paid means that they got food, shelter, and clothing. That means demand for more food, shelter, and clothing. That means more jobs.
All those materials consumed in creating the food, shelter, and clothing comes from the Earth in some manner and the Earth is huge. There is enough energy in the sun, wind, and especially radioactive material to last well beyond when the sun consumes the earth. We can mine the earth, water, and air for everything we need if only given enough energy to do so.
I'm not a big believer in man made global warming but I'll go along with it so long as it means developing nuclear energy. If we could only get past this irrational fear of all things nuclear then we'd not only not have to worry about our "carbon footprint" but also create a better life for ourselves and every generation to follow.
Without fossil fuels or nuclear energy we'd be living a life of scarcity, a life not much better than cavemen. Wind and sun alone will not drive a modern economy. Refining aluminum and iron for modern vehicles and buildings needs a lot of energy. Transportation and communications takes energy. We can have it all and still have plenty for our children so long as we develop nuclear power. It would also mean a lot of people will get "super richer", and that's a good thing.
I was thinking more about this -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...
Pointing out that the greatest security threat comes from the inside is first day stuff in any training on security. This is effectively scaremongering over nuclear power. Nuclear power plants are the most secure places in the USA outside of a military base or prison.
I was once invited to take a tour of a nuclear power plant. I thought that would be fun. Problem was that I was told I'd have to go through a background check to go on the property. That was a buzz kill. It's not that I thought I would not pass the background check but that it was a reminder of the paranoia that surrounds anything nuclear. I doubted I would see anything remotely interesting at that point. I've toured power plants before. I didn't feel the need to be strip searched to see another turbine hall, electric switching yard, and the outside of the reactor building.
That brings me to why the security inside a nuclear power plant is largely irrelevant. Anyone that wanted to bring down a nuclear power plant can do so without getting near the fence on the property. The electricity wires that go to the power plant are unguarded, it's impossible to guard them all. So, if someone brings down enough power lines the plant will have to shut down. Recent attacks on the electric infrastructure are speculated to be tests of our ability to react. If true then we could see a coordinated attack on the electric grid soon.
The other reason why security around nuclear power plants is irrelevant is because accessing anything actually fissile is dangerous. The radiation from the fuel would kill anyone that got within a few feet of it without gobs of gear. Getting it off site in time before National Guard battle tanks got there would be near impossible. It would be much easier to extract the nuclear material from seawater than try to get it from an active nuclear reactor.
Or, it'd be easier to pay off the people that have access to it. Which is what the article gave as an unsurprising point.
If we want nuclear power to be safe what we need is actually less of a veil of secrecy around it. People notice stuff, and they report it to law enforcement if the stuff is worthy of it. More people around the nuclear power plant means more people to see what is going on. Let people tour the plants without having to provide fingerprints. All that does is reduce the number of eyeballs watching things.
Getting into a nuclear power plant should not be more difficult than, for example, visiting a county courthouse. People get in line for a metal detector and a deputy keeps an eye out for odd behavior. If a guy in a long overcoat shows up sweating profusely on a hot day then that person might need another look. It'd probably be someone that forgot to take their meds that day, either way that person should have a chat with law enforcement before going further. Terrorists are not out to get us that bad. If they were we'd have constant blackouts from power lines getting blown up. That's easier to do and there's no metal detectors.
Another way to improve nuclear power plant security is with better designs. Don't use reactors that need refined fuel. Use reactors that dilute fissile material with short half life isotopes. Anyone that tries to steal any will get a deadly dose of radiation for their troubles. Use thorium reactors. Use denatured uranium reactors. Use molten salt reactors. With a good design there is nothing worth stealing and little radiation hazard if there is a successful attack. We'd still need security, of course, but no more than any other industrial location.
How many of those prescriptions are not traversing state or international borders?
A vast majority of them I imagine. I see my prescribing physician downtown, I pick up the prescription at the pharmacy on my way home, at no point did I cross a state or national border.
If the federal government feels it necessary to regulate the purity, labeling, and what not of the prescribed medication from the place of manufacture in one state to a pharmacy in another that is one thing. To place regulations on the manner that my physician can prescribe medications to me is another matter. One transaction crosses state lines, the other does not. Regulating a product at all phases of its use because it MAY have crossed state lines at one point is absurdity and an abuse of the authority granted to the federal government.
We need the states to stand up to the federal government. I believe we are just starting to see that with marijuana legalization. The federal government may regret not acting on marijuana legalization earlier, it is going to set precedent for all controlled substances.
I recall a federal prosecutor wanted to charge a man with assault for cutting off another man's beard. The argument used for having federal jurisdiction? The scissors used crossed state lines.
Does that mean public intoxication is a federal crime because the beer consumed came from Canada?
Would that be the graph that you said was so old as to be useless or the other graphs that you have ignored? Did you ignore the other graphs because they show a peak at 6PM as I stated it would be found?
I'm not even sure what you claim that you see any more, all I see is peak electric demand at around 6PM.
Still you provide no data to support your position.
The linked image clearly shows a peak load at 6PM. I even used a ruler.
All you've done is say that I lied but provided nothing to show what you said is true. So what if the peak demand is at 3PM instead of 6PM. Unless solar power output coincides with demand its worthless for anything other than a nuisance or curiosity.
If the peak demand for electric power was at 3PM instead of 6PM that only means that solar power is mostly worthless instead of completely worthless. So, do you still want to claim the peak demand is at 3PM?
The sooner people realize how worthless solar power is the sooner we can move on to something that actually works, like nuclear power.
Perhaps I'm wrong, I was going by memory from the reactions from the nuclear power incidents in Japan. I remember all those nations having decided to shutdown all nuclear power by some future date to prevent what happened in Japan. Quite likely most if not all changed their mind since.
Germany seems to want to replace nuclear with wind and solar, good luck with that. UK and France have not built a new nuclear plant in decades. Either way the USA has plenty of oil, coal, and natural gas to sell them if they need it. If the USA builds more nuclear power then we'd have even more to sell.
Where's your data that shows I've lied?
I thought killing endangered species was a bad thing. I believe in conservation. We should conserve our resources so future generations have places to hunt, farm, and ranch. Can't do that if productive land is covered with solar panels. Won't have crops and forests if windmills break up and burn from high winds or lightning strikes.
If you want to see an environmental disaster then lets keep burning "crop waste" instead of tilling it into the soil for fertilizer and erosion control.
Like I said, I did the math. Much of the so called "green energy" sources will end up turning forests and crop land into a dust bowl. We need crop rotations, not corn, corn, and more corn. We need large grazing animals to complete the carbon cycle. That means eating meat. We need to control predators, that means hunting.
We are part of the environment, not separate from it. We need to act like it or we won't have anything "green" to worry about.
In other words you have no data to support your claim.
Peak electric load does not coincide with peak solar power production. Even if it did there is still the matter of cost. Wind and natural gas are still cheaper.
If the federal government ever gets up off their thumbs then maybe we'll see cheap nuclear power. Nuclear power that burns the waste from the old inefficient reactors. Then we'd get somewhere. No carbon, no foreign energy, and no more windmills killing our national bird.
It amazes me how many people in the survey doubt that human activity is causing climate change. We have big corporate conglomerates that conveniently own both wind and solar companies as well as big TV broadcasters and newspapers. These people have "green week" once a month to show just how badly we are ruining the environment with our air conditioning, fast food, SUVs, and "throw away" lifestyle. All this bombardment of AGW and 37% of people are doubters. How can this be?
I have an idea. The scientists that have shown support for AGW have been caught cooking the numbers. We've just come out of an extended winter, one of many in the last decade or so. Every tornado, hurricane, earthquake, disease outbreak, or lightning strike is blamed on AGW. The "scientists" that support AGW are a bunch of cheaters and quacks.
Despite this overload of AGW hysteria from every news outlet the world around us does not reflect the hysteria. Things are pretty much like they were since the AGW "pause" that began in 1998. How long is a "pause" a "pause" and not a "stop"? AGW stopped being anthropogenic global warming when the globe stopped warming. It's rather difficult to claim we're warming the globe if there is no warming to show for it.
I've been playing along with the AGW thing so long as it supports my cause of an energy independent USA. It's hard to make that case when recent climate data does not show warming. This means I have to make my case for nuclear power by other means. I propose we use nuclear power to drill for natural gas and oil, and mine coal, so that we can sell it to other nations that lack the means to build up a nuclear power infrastructure.
Germany, France, and the UK all decided they would do away with nuclear power. It's going to get real cold and dark there this winter with no nuclear and no Russian natural gas. I say the USA can provide their power cheaper and without the guilt of supporting communists and dictators. Well, we'll get rid of the communists in November. The dictators will be gone in 2016.
Not only would the USA be producing cheap energy for the world with nuclear power we can burn up their nuclear waste in our waste annihilating molten salt reactors. Go shut down those nuclear power plants in Europe. The USA will buy your nuclear waste and sell you energy.
Where's your data? You gripe about the quality of what I gave you but you gave me nothing.
After you've been caught out in a lie why should I waste my time?
I could ask you the same thing. You said power load peaks coincide with solar power production. I called out your lie with data but you didn't even have the courtesy to provide where you get your data.
you are effectively grooming the kiddies to join up with the politics you are pushing.
What politics am I pushing? I've made no mention of elected officials, political parties, or candidates. I did mention disagreement with policies that subsidize any energy sources. What does that make me then?
Here's some other images then:
http://www.mpoweruk.com/electr...
California 1999, peak load at 6PM.
http://www.hawaiianelectric.co...
Hawaii, peak load at 7PM. Also shows insolation, which shows the sun has set by 7PM.
There's all kinds of data on the internet showing load profiles, it's just that most of it is in Excel spreadsheets. I'm not in the mood to download them to see what I already know. If you have data that shows otherwise then please share rather than make unsubstantiated claims.
Solar power is a boondoggle. It produces no real power since it requires backups for when the sun does not shine. If we have to build the backups for solar power then why not just run the backups all the time? Given that natural gas is cheaper than solar that is precisely what the utilities are doing.
Even if solar power were free it is still worthless since we do not have the means to store that electricity for a price cheaper than producing it from natural gas, wind, coal, and nuclear. Running power lines to where the sun is shining won't help either since I2R losses would be huge, as would be the cost to build and maintain those lines.
I'm not "green bashing", I just did the math. Solar power is worthless for grid power. If you are off the grid then the math changes but that is not what is being discussed here. The only reason anyone buys solar panels when grid power is available is because the government paid them to. That means the government took my money to give to some wealthy person with a big house so they can buy solar panels, then they take more of my money through more solar power subsidies because they have the solar panels on their roof.
If you think "big oil" is some evil lobby then what about "big solar"? The solar power business model is based on continued government subsidies. Without the government propping them up none of them would be in business. "Big oil" and "big coal" would still be around without government money because they actually produce something useful.
Does "big oil" make a lot of money? Yep, that's because you and I gave it to them. We got energy in return but we still gave them that money without a gun to our head. Does "big solar" make a lot of money? Yep, but they do it with the threat of government force.
A picture of the load profile from the US government -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F...
There is a peak in usage at about 8:00AM, another peak at about 6:00PM, a valley at about noon, and power use hits its lowest at about 3:00AM.
I searched for the video I saw on that explained power usage peaks and solar power production and I could not find it again. The link above shows an image from the USGS and the talk I saw was based on data from the Texas power grid. The guy went into depth about how the peak of power usage is about when solar power is unavailable for the rest of the day, and that solar power peaks right when usage hits the lunch time valley.
The difference between peak power use and peak solar power output makes solar power a very low value power source. This means that solar power has to be cheaper than its competitors to be of value to utilities, which it is not. Solar power is not profitable to utilities. Solar power will not be profitable until we get a means to store or transport that power cheap enough to compete with its lowest fruit competitor, wind.
I will admit that I'm no expert on electric power production but don't tell me I didn't see what I saw. The electric power profiles I saw were from the federal government and from American utilities, I would consider those trustworthy sources.
I was surprised when I was shown that peak power happened in the late afternoon or early evening. One would think that power consumption should taper off at 5:00 as factories shut down but it doesn't. Why this peak happens later in the day has a lot to do with our everyday habits, not something that can be summarized here.
What surprised me about one of the YouTube talks I saw was that even if solar power were free it would not make economic sense to have more than 20% solar on the grid. He had charts and a lengthy explanation as to why. It comes down to that we do not have a cheap way to store electricity. If we cannot consume it as we need it then it gets thrown away. Electric capacity that is unused costs the utility money.
Solar power that is free at noon means throttling back cheap base load power. That base load power cannot be brought back up to speed in time the evening peak arrives, so the more expensive peak power generators would have to be used. Averaged out over the day and that means the price of electricity goes up.
But solar power is not free. Solar power is very expensive except in the most ideal locations. That is why solar power makes up less than 1% of the electricity produced in the USA. Solar power and the electric storage capacity to go with it will have to come down in price by orders of magnitude before utilities will consider it anything other than a nuisance or curiosity.