Month: August 2007

Could the Stars Align?

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I’m liking the news I’m seeing right now. There is lots being said of Mike Huckabee’s second place finish in Ames. It’s too early to say if it will continue, but for now he is getting more of the press coverage that he deserves. I endorsed Mitt Romney before, and I don’t back off from that endorsement at all, but at the time I was not sure that Huckabee could become a serious contender for the nomination. If things continue like they are, with him getting more coverage than he was getting before, then I am sure that his message can be heard and appreciated enough to give him a legitimate shot at the nomination.

I would love to be able to choose between multiple candidates that I would be comfortable with. In the republican primaries I now have such a choice so long as Mitt and Mike are both still there. I guarantee that I am not going to vote for any of the other candidates (no matter who jumps in) if either of them is still running come February. (I’m sure that one of them will still be running by then if not both.) In the democratic primaries I could have had two if Tom Vilsack were still running – I still think he was the best candidate they have offered. Obama comes in second to Tom for me, and I am still not sure which Bill Richardson I believe in – the capable one who I think might be better than Obama, or the one who stumbles along with a long resume but too many gaffes to be taken seriously. I’m hoping for the capable one so that come general election time in 2008 I might conceivably have candidates from both major parties that I would be willing to vote for.

Unsaid in all this is that the two candidates I have listed who are considered major candidates by the media (Mitt and Obama) both have one flaw (the same one) that I am becoming less and less comfortable with. I’m saving that concern for a separate post so I can do it justice.

Tags 2008, endorsements, national candidates

General

Economies of Scale

This news is disturbing but hardly surprising – our existing entitlement programs are unsustainable in the long term. The more I think about it the more I realize that this is like a lesson I learned as a child about ants. There’s an old movie that depicts 25-foot tall ants attacking people. What I learned as a child was that ants could not exist at that scale.

Ants at their existing scale are extremely strong. They can carry many times their body weight with their little exoskeletal bodies. Ants at the scale depicted in the movie would collapse under their own weight. As it turns out, people are the same way. I remember watching a documentary on giants and one thing that really caught my attention is that they have extra health problems because of their size. In fact, their life expectancy is decades shorter society as a whole because their organs tend to fail trying to maintain bodies that are larger than human organs are meant to support.

What I am realizing now is that the same principles of scale hold true for governments as well. Large, intrusive governments are unsustainable over time. The larger a government is, meaning the more it tries to do for citizens, the shorter it can remain stable. Either it must be scaled back or it will collapse. In our case we are staring at the possibility of economic collapse, but sometimes the collapse is a societal collapse.

If you want more proof that there exists a natural law of scale just remember that all the largest elements that have been “discovered” in the last few decades have actually been manufactured in labs. Without exception they rapidly decay into smaller elements because atoms larger than Uranium (weight 238 au) are not sustainable.

Tags economics, Elevated, insights, politics

One Year

Post author By David
Post date August 14, 2007
3 Comments on One Year

Today marks one year since I started this blog. Considering that I had done significant blogging in the three years before that you would have thought it would be stable, but I have been through 2 blogging platforms, 3 name changes, and a variety of styles. In that year this blog has had:

311 posts
360 comments
1355 spam comments caught

That’s an average of 6 posts per week. I’m hoping for one per day in the future. I don’t anticipate any name changes or platform changes in the future, but I am working on making a new style that will not have the major bugs with Internet Explorer that this one has. Hopefully it will have all the functionality of my current style when I get it up but I expect it to have a nicer layout and improved navigation. I look forward to an even better second year than this first year was.

Tags history, site, themes

General

Only 18 Days Left

Karl Rove is leaving the Bush administration. This proves that dreams can come true. I would have liked to see this happen years ago, but I commented positively on the first reports that Rove had lost his iron grip on the GOP. I have always viewed his approach to politics as being destructive for society. I doubt that anybody who fills his vacancy could have a negative impact on the administration.

Tags current events, parties, political figures

General

Ames Results

The results of the straw poll in Ames were just what I would have wanted. Mitt Romney won, as predicted, but Mike Huckabee came in second as I had hoped. His second place finish was called a surprise, but I can’t imagine a better candidate in that spot. Unlike many better known candidates I would have no reservations with seeing Huckabee in the White House. The only thing I could have hoped for in Ames that didn’t happen would have been if Huckabee had garnered all the votes from those candidates who received less than 5% so that there was more distance between him and Sam Brownback in third place.

Tags 2008, elections, national candidates

General

Civic Communication 101

I went to a Planning and Zoning Commission meeting last night and learned a whole lot about communication between government and citizens. I also found it interesting this morning to see that some similar lessons were learned by a Tyler who attended a Truth in Taxation hearing in Davis County last night. The lessons that Tyler talks about are good for citizens and officials. I would like to list some other lessons that I learned – which may be a result of the fact that the meeting I attended was really a different type of meeting than the hearing he attended.

Citizens: Take yourself seriously

There was a group of neighborhood residents who came to present their concerns with elements of a specific development near them. Unfortunately many of those residents were attired in shorts, sandals, and baseball hats. While I accept the fact that we live in a very laid-back society these residents combined their casual dress with with a casual and subtly belligerent attitude which left them looking sophomoric when contrasted with the professionalism of the developer as he addressed their concerns. His professionalism is almost certainly the kind of professionalism that most of them display in their places of work. I don’t know if they really did not expect to accomplish anything or if they really did not understand that their cocksure demeanor would make it less likely that their concerns would be fairly considered.

Officials: Make meeting format flexible

The basic meeting format was to have an overview of the issue, any comments by the proposing party, and then public comment followed by response by the proposing party concluding with committee action. This format was adequate for most items, but there were two items where I noticed myself and others of the public who might have comments come to mind based on the response of the proposing party or the committee after the committee or proposing party responds to the initial public comments. The format of the meeting should be flexible enough to allow the committee to open up a second period of brief public comment as appropriate prior to committee action.

Citizens: Come prepared

The same group of residents who had been too casual had appointed a spokesperson (who was more appropriately attired) and had done their homework before the meeting. They knew their concerns and made sure that they got a say. Others who came for various issues were not so well prepared. When questioned by the committee they were left saying “I think . . .” or “I’ll have to get back to you on that” which could only result in their requests being tabled or else ignored. Certainly you cannot be prepared for every contingency that might arise, but doing your homework will make a big difference.

Officials: Make it possible for us to prepare

I think that officials do a lot of work to make this happen most of the time but on an issue of a new zoning category being proposed there was a resident who had concerns but who was unable to prepare adequately for the meeting because the committee had not made the text of the proposed ordinance available for review. Citizens do not need to have everything available to them that the committee members have to prepare for a meeting, but on a proposed ordinance they should have access to the proposed content of the ordinance even if it will undergo revision before it is passed. A one sentence description on the agenda is not usually sufficient for that kind of issue.

I sincerely believe that most involved citizens and most public officials are trying to work together in a positive way. This is not meant to be a criticizm against those efforts, but merely an effort to add my insights into the process.

Tags communication, community, government, Lehi

General

Approaching Ames

I’m looking forward to the results of the Ames, Iowa straw poll this weekend. Because of the candidates who are skipping it I am not sure if it will have much effect on the top tier of the Republican field, but I am hoping that it will be beneficial to my favorite second tier candidtae among the Republicans, Mike Huckabee. In an interview for the Washington Post he took my preferred position on one issue where I disagree with Mitt Romney by endorsing John McCain’s stance regarding torture (or enhanced interrogation).

I would love to see Governor Huckabee in the top tier instead of someone like Rudy Giuliani who is well known but has not convinced me that he has anything more going for him than being in the right position at the right time to gain that fame. If the Ames straw poll plays out right for Huckabee, he might have a shot at breaking into the top tier and getting the exposure that he deserves in the media.

Tags 2008, elections, national candidates