Peace, Order, and Not Wiping out the Middle and Working Class.

The Middle Class is an endangered species as is the Working Class, the people who once made things, and were thus the basis of our productive economy. For both groups, the discretionary income which formed the basis of our consumer society is on a curve that not only approaches zero, but with credit and inflation can cross well into negative territory.

It's not an original thought, but the production/manufacturing base of our economy is very likely not going to recover. Of course the Americans have been hit even harder than we have, which will compound our problems. Just saying we'll trade more with the Pacific Rim countries doesn't make it happen since geography does count.

This means a reduced tax base for governments, which means less services and/or more debt. That typically leads to more taxes as they try to wring more blood from the stones, which is a vicious circle of increased costs to businesses and individuals leading to less start-ups and innovation, as well as the flight of talent and capital to less oppressive regulatory locales.

Now, belt tightening and retrenchment can happen with reasonably clever government and there is some sign of that happening in Canada overall, although the power shift from Ontario to Alberta is noticeable. Ontario is a good example of the creeping collapse of the tax base, and here's the worm's eye view of how.

It's a one-two punch of taxes (HST) and energy costs. It can be hard to separate the other two, as anything the government does that costs you money is a tax in my books, but I'll try to maintain some separation.

Like any tax amalgamation (think GST) the price savings that are supposed to come to consumers are never passed on, thus the HST increased the cost of pretty much EVERYTHING in Ontario, gasoline in particular. Besides jacking the cost of personal transportation, this increases the cost of everything that needs to be transported which is, well, everything. So everything costs more, but most people aren't making more. This equals less spending of less disposable income which squeezes businesses, who are facing increased costs of their own.

Now for energy costs (as far as they can be separated from straight taxes), and Ontario will be the case in point. The Provincial government's "Green energy" agenda is hitting below the belt, and it also affects everyone. By subsidizing inefficient wind and solar projects this policy has raised electricity costs across the province.

Some of this is being realized (of course) belatedly by the provincial government, but my crystal ball for the future continues to function best as a paperweight or doorstop. One does not however need a clairvoyant to see unintended secondary and tertiary consequences; it just takes some thinking it through.

Idealists are by nature pretty much incapable of thinking past what they'd like to see happen, with dire consequences for us all. It's not even necessary to pull the precise outcome from something; if you can deduce a point where something bad happens due to "good intentions" you have a grasp of the process.

Going into 2011 I hope to be able to keep my family fed and the lights on, but like a lot of other people there won't be a whole lot else going on. Modest goals are the key to survival, as taking things in bite-sized chunks is sustainable, and should disaster befall a chunk or two, survivable. The idiots I've encountered who wished for $3/L gas may eventually get their wish, and if they do God help us all because the pie-eyed idealists in government will have hell to pay when the former middle class can't afford food.

First though, it'll flatten the working poor who are already being priced out of living space by rapacious condo development in many urban centres as well as ever-rising electricity and fuel costs. Can't have food riots here you say? Tax revolts and overstretched food banks and soup kitchens are more likely in the medium term, but there is still hope to avoid being pushed even that far.

You make your own luck with governments and I have some hope that things can still get better, at least at home. Another key to maintaining some control over your life is knowing that things can almost ALWAYS be worse than they are. We need leaders who can remember their mission statement: Peace, Order, and Good Government. Prosperous citizens are happy citizens, so I hope to see policies that encourage that in the New Year. The best of 2011 to anyone who still reads AotF.

Curtain coming down on Security Theatre?

That which has long been the elephant in the room of airline security is now stepping on enough toes it seems. I am seeing more calls for profiling, which of course turns into "racial profiling" in the media and nattering classes, but some people are far more likely to cause certain types of problems than others.

The incoming head of Germany's airport industry association has called for Israeli-style passenger profiling to be introduced. Christoph Blume said that grouping passengers into different categories of risk could put an end to the ever-growing number of security checks. Detection equipment would, he argued, "at some point... reach its technological and operating limits". But the country's justice minister said there was a risk of stigmatisation.

The usual response to that is "Racism!" and there are those lines showing up in this BBC article, but the shift in tone is noticeable. This is fairly even-handed, something I haven't seen enough of from the BBC the last several years. No security is perfect is it's not going to bring processes to a grinding halt, so a bit of brainpower will tilt the odds in your favour while speeding things up.

The harsh truth is that young Muslim males are most likely to try to take down an airliner; there has been no example that I am aware of of elderly women or toddlers making the attempt. The argument can be made that the parents could smuggle things onto the plane using the kid, but the same risk assessment applies to the parents. If they seem dangerous, their kids warrant some more attention too.

High-risk passengers - those deemed more likely to carry out terrorist or illegal activity, such as organised crime, drug trafficking or espionage - would undergo more stringent security checks. This could mean anything from a bag search to a full body search.

"This way [through profiling], control systems could be more effectively employed for the well-being of all participants," the new head of Germany's airport industry association ADV said.

Here's the key takeaway though (emphasis mine):

Joerg Handwerg, a pilot for Lufthansa and spokesperson for the German pilots' association Cockpit, told German broadcaster Deutsche Welle that current security procedures were not working and profiling was common sense. "The current controls are foolish, because we waste resources by doing things that feign security but don't actually bring security," he said. Mr Handwerg suggested a points system could be employed to determine which passengers might pose a higher security risk.

I am not so optimistic to think that things will change quickly, or indeed at all, but it's nice to see some cracks in the slap-dash edifice of airline security. Still, until this calms down a bit and I can go somewhere without being treated like a criminal all of my vacations will be within driving distance.

I'd love it if a plan came together...

This makes so much sense, but of course it will never happen:

The meetings between Saudi General Intelligence Director Prince Muqrin bin Abdaziz and Meir Dagan, most of which were held in the Jordanian capital Amman, dealt extensively with clandestine cooperation between the two agencies and plans for attacking Iran. Arab and Western sources reported that they reached agreement in the course of the year for Israeli fighter-bombers to transit Saudi air space on their way to bombing Iran's nuclear facilities. The Saudis were even willing to build a new landing strip in the desert with refueling facilities for the use of the warplanes en route to their mission.

What would really work and show that the Saudis will put (for once) more than their money where their mouth is, would be a joint IDF/Saudi AF strike on Iran. Pull the Americans and the Gulf states in, and you have most of the interested parties, and indeed a grand coalition.

Any serious attempt to cripple all of the Iranian factions which are causing or looking to cause trouble around the world will require the USAF, and a lot of it. The key is to hit all of the Revolutionary Guards assets, while leaving the regular Iranian Army (the Artesh) and air force alone. The Americans do that, the Israelis hit the nuclear stuff, and the Arabs hit the navy and the coastal missile/artillery units which could threaten them and oil moving through the Straits of Hormuz.

There has been lots of time to plan, so it's workable, and I bet it's mainly the economic fallout that's stopping the Americans. Oil at $150/bbl is about right immediately after the strikes, and all bets are off when it would come back down. The best time to do this may have passed, but if the Iranian clerics are sufficiently weakened the opposition could take over if they get the Artesh on side.

I can't see all of this coming together, especially with Obama in charge. That's not because he's a Dove, but because he dithers. I'm also not certain that Iran having nukes is worse than Pakistan having them, but taking out that particular government would be reason enough to hit them. There are millions of Iranians who think so too, because a lot of force is the only thing that can help them.

Wikileaks and Info Freedom

Having given this a few days to settle out, I've some more reflections on it. Today Julian Assange turned himself in to UK police, which will probably keep him from dying "accidentally" somewhere. I have read some twaddle about him now being a "martyr" or underdog, but I'm sure the shift in public opinion would barely register.

I admit I'm a bit conflicted about the concept of this leak, though the original acquisition was blatantly illegal. Wikileaks has been described (by someone whose opinion I respect) as "the Press" as in freedom thereof. I am very much in favour of transparency and accountability whenever possible, but I am troubled by Assange/Wikileaks agenda. If their intent is only to hurt the USA, that isn't in my interest, therefore I'm suspicious of them. Keeping the Americans from thinking they're infallible is another mission though, and one I can get behind.

This doesn't mean that there can be no secrets, but sometimes the priorities that people set for security are questionable. In other words, save your effort for the critical stuff where blood and treasure are on the line. This has exposed a critical weakness in US info security and brought a lot into the open, much of which I think belongs there. That said, Assange is still a pompous ass and I won't regret his downfall IF he's broken some serious laws. OK, even if things are trumped up a bit, but it sets a bad precedent; at this time all of this remains to be proven.

So much of what I've seen to date of these "cables" was about a millimetre from open source anyway. It was stuff that anyone who was paying attention would have at least suspected, the interesting part is getting it confirmed. That said, I suspect that the legions of Assange fans, especially the new ones, are not in the class of people who actually put much effort into understanding what happens in the world. Deconstructing it, bitching about narrowly defined parts of it yes, but digging into it? I doubt it, especially parts that didn't agree with their worldview.

That's why I read things like Slate. It's not the most moonbattish thing out there, but it is a useful snapshot of the liberal view of the world and one that I can stomach, mostly. You go too far in either direction and the nutbars emerge, but I'm definitely more in tune with conservatives. Doesn't mean I should read only that though.

In any event, the Americans came off pretty well overall, and their diplomacy is less clueless than I had suspected. Results still count though, and if they can't execute the intel they have their stock doesn't go up that much. My hope is that a lot of what the Arab governments are doing that has been brought to light makes their populations think a little harder about how they'd really like things to work in their part of the world. It's too much to hope that they'll open embassies in Israel, but some more pragmatism about relations with Israel and the West would be valuable fallout from this.

I'm sure there'll be more; this isn't over by a long shot even if you dismiss the conspiracy theories.

Taxpayer status

I've taken the title for this from some of Jerry Pournelle's old books. Essentially, it was an alt-history where relatively small groups of taxpayers supported a parasitic Welfare class. not too different from real life so far, but with a key wrinkle: Taxpayers had rights that Welfare types didn't, including voting.

Unconstitutional you say? Most likely (though I'll not look it up just now) but I would really like someone to convince me that people who don't contribute to the finances of the nation should have any say in how that money is administered. I don't really want that to happen of course since I don't believe it, but if you're not at least open to being convinced that you're wrong you're not worthy of expressing serious opinions.

This is a step down from the old democratic model that only (male) property owners could vote and seems logical to me; you don't contribute, you don't get a say. As a corollary I would make voting obligatory for Taxpayers (punishable by a fine of a day's pay) in order to ensure that rights come with Responsibilities.

Who would this affect? People on Social Assistance, in prison, or sheltering offshore from Canadian taxes. It would largely (but not exclusively!) affect the very poor, but I'd like to know how many people on Welfare make an effort to vote. I'll stick my neck out and say a low percentage with little risk of losing my head over it.

This system introduces a few democratic safeguards too. "Machine politics" would be limited in effect, simply because the poor and disaffected who are usually the backbone of these systems would not be a voting bloc. If everyone is forced to vote, more of them will feel compelled to take a real interest in who/what they're voting for, further weakening the ACORNs of the world. None of this is utopianism, just human nature; you can't force people to care but they can be encouraged, and it will take with at least a few of them.

The biggest defence against Tammany Hall/ballot box stuffing/dead people voting, etc. is the voter's list. It will be the same as the Tax agency's list and can't (easily or convincingly) be subverted by community organizers. One person, (on the Taxpayer list) one vote. The list will of course change, but since the government really likes it's money that list will be kept up-to-date. And they know everything about you already...

It's not immune to gerrymandering, but that's a separate problem and one that's much more obvious and thus easily dealt with. Anyway, all a bit off my usual beaten path, but that's a good thing since I'm feeling a bit tapped out on the geopolitics right now. When I have something new (for me at least) to say about that stuff it'll be back.

Wikileaks II, the early days.

At this time everyone not living under a rock (without a sat phone, anyway) has heard about the c> 250K documents released on Wikileaks. I don't intend to get down in the weeds about it, but there are a few fundamental things.

Firstly, the US serviceman who compiled and released all of this to Wikileaks is going to go away for a LONG time, and this is as it should be. An example needs to be made and it'll be this guy who richly deserves a long stint in Leavenworth for having betrayed the trust of the organization who paid him, if nothing else.

Secondly, this Julian Assange can run, but he can't hide. As of this writing he's still on the lam from the U.S. and InterPol, but with those two groups looking for you good luck finding a place to hide unless you're buddies with Bin Laden. He thinks he's really clever, and I'm sure there are a lot of fellow travelers who think he's great, but if anything good comes from this it won't be by Assange's design.

Thirdly (a big one) the revelations. The Saudis wanting the Yanks to attack Iran are not surprising to anyone who pays attention to what goes on in the world (some history helps too), but there are a few things that are at least unconsidered. I like that the Israelis told Abbas about Op CAST LEAD, but he didn't bother to tell Hamas. No love lost between those factions to be sure, but more co-operation between Israel and the West Bank than I had supposed.

Lots of stuff, none of it super secret (basic security clearance in the forces is Secret) and I'll wait for the dust to settle some more before I comment further. Feel free to speculate amongst yourselves...

For my 200th post, hair shirts all round!

A milestone of sorts for my little blog, this being the 200th of my sproadic rantings to be granted qualified electronic immortality on the web. Now done patting myself on the back for a number that could be twice that were I more motivated, on to the latest bit of stupidity to grab my attention, the context being the latest climate change fiasco in Cancun:

In one paper Professor Kevin Anderson, Director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, said the only way to reduce global emissions enough, while allowing the poor nations to continue to grow, is to halt economic growth in the rich world over the next twenty years. [emphasis mine]
This would mean a drastic change in lifestyles for many people in countries like Britain as everyone will have to buy less ‘carbon intensive’ goods and services such as long haul flights and fuel hungry cars. [snip]
This could mean a limit on electricity so people are forced to turn the heating down, turn off the lights and replace old electrical goods like huge fridges with more efficient models. Food that has travelled from abroad may be limited and goods that require a lot of energy to manufacture.

If these people feel so strongly about all of this, they can feel free to cut off their electricity and walk everywhere. Bicycles you say? Those take a lot of energy to produce... Complete cluelessness, leaving out the fact that their Global Warming hysteria has been pretty thoroughly debunked leading into this wasteful, hypocritical, and self-deluding winter getaway in sunny Mexico.

Economic growth in the developed world is the only hope for this planet, as only the advanced technologies can support the booming populations of the "poor" countries and, more importantly, clean everything up so that we don't poison ourselves. That is the only real threat we pose to the environment, and a concentration on ways to develop our tech to get off of fossil fuels to BETTER energy sources (I'm looking at you, wind and biofuels!) might be a worthwhile expenditure of all of this hot air. Of course Talk - Action = Zero so we need money in research that actually produces something other than soundbites.

I encourage you to read the article I linked to; the comments are particularly interesting, being almost exclusively (as of this writing) dismissive of the tripe this conference is producing. The "experts" keep selling, but less and less people are buying it.