The SATs

 Emi Nietfeld had a disastrous adolescence.  Her two parents had mental health problems, she took psychiatric drugs, and she attended a number of  different schools, including a locked facility.  She learned about a SAT prep book, however, and studied and studied.  She thought she hadn’t done well, but when she sent in her scores, she was actually recruited and accepted by Harvard.  She also received financial aid.

Needless to say, she is a big fan of standardized tests.  She points out that they really do level the playing field, and she says it is one of the reasons so many schools are again requiring applicants to submit their test scores.  

She’s written a book about her experiences.  It’s entitled “Acceptance” and it has received favorable reviews.

Warehouses in Kidder Township

Many residents of Kidder Township in the northern part of Carbon County are upset by large truck terminals, a.k.a. distribution centers, which have been built or have been approved by the Kidder Township Board of Supervisors.  The terminals are huge, ugly, noisy, environmentally destructive, and completely inappropriate for an area that has recreation as its main source of revenue.  I’ve been to a number of township meetings to oppose the warehouses, and I’ve attended a fundraiser to fight them.

There are two main reasons these distribution centers are being constructed in addition to the greed of the landowners and investors.  One is that under Pennsylvania law, every municipality must zone for every use.  There are some exceptions; for example the tiny borough of Weissport cannot physically host an airport.  However, if there is space in the municipality, the land use plan must permit that use.  When I was on the Towamensing Township Planning Commission, I was surprised to learn that the township, traditionally rural and agricultural, had to provide space for heavy industry.  It’s on the zoning map.  Nobody wanted it, but it is state law.

The second reason the truck terminals are being built is because people no longer go to stores to buy things.  They order goods on line.  My message to people is simple:  Don’t buy goods on-line.  You have agency.  You have power.  Don’t patronize Amazon or its ilk.  Make it your policy not to order things on-line unless you really like truck terminals. 

A decline of courage

In an opinion piece today on the enemies of liberal democracy, David Brooks quoted Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.  In a commencement address at Harvard, Solzhenitsyn said “A decline in courage may be the most striking feature that an outside observer notices in the West today.”

Most Republican Senators in Washington know that Trump is unfit to be president.  Certainly McConnell knows that.  Lindsey Graham knows that.  Marco Rubio knows that.  Ted Cruz or J.D. Vance might not know, but there must be others.  Yet of all those Republican Senators, I only know of two who have publicly announced they will not vote for Trump–Murkowski and Romney.  

It doesn’t even take courage.  Nobody is going to poison a Senator or put a Senator in the gulag.  The worst that can happen might be a lost election.  

Do Democrats practice voter suppression?

If Ralph Nader had not run in 2000 Al Gore would have been elected President.  If Jill Stein had not run in 2016 Hillary Clinton would have been elected president.  I understand the anger Democrats feel at 3rd party candidates who help elect Republicans.  I can even understand why Democrats might wish to support weak Republican candidates in primaries to make it easier to beat them in November, as they recently did in Ohio.

Nonetheless, it is wrong.  If Robert Kennedy , Jr., runs and takes votes away from Biden, that is not the fault of democracy  It is the fault of voters who vote for an idiot.  In a democracy you don’t suppress the votes of your opponents; you convince voters not to make stupid mistakes.  Voter suppression is wrong, even if done for a supposedly good cause.

By the way, my wife, whose hero is Nancy Pelosi, completely disagrees with this post and thinks I am naive.

Chicken feed

Chick-fil-A is dropping its policy of serving only chickens that had no antibiotics in their feed.  It will now serve chicken treated with animal antibiotics.  The reason is because it is difficult to find chickens in the U.S. that are antibiotic-free.  

Feeding antibiotics to chickens helps them grow faster.  It also means that people who eat chickens treated with antibiotics might not respond to the antibiotics used to to treat bacterial infections.

Readers may be pleased to note that none of my 15 chickens are fed mash with antibiotics, although as they roam around they do sometimes eat bugs and worms.

The Anthropocene

Last week the International Geology Commission voted 12-4 that we should not name the present geological age the “Anthropocene Era.”  That name has been proposed for the human disturbance in the earth’s geology.  Humans have been messing with the planet to the point that we have changed the geology.

Some people have tried to put an actual year on the label change.  One suggestion is 1952 when plutonium residue fell from tests of the H-Bomb.  The present era, currently labeled the Holocene, began about 11,000 years ago, a very short period in geological history.  Most of the geologists felt that name should continue.

I am all in favor of labeling the present age the Anthropocene.  When you can see changes in the surface of the earth from space, when you can see the Amazon rain forests or the Canadian pine forests burning, when you can see the Aral Sea drying up, or the Antarctic ice cap melting, or plastic floating on the ocean in state-sized mats, we have changed the planet, we continue to change the planet, and none of it is improving.  I cannot think of a single species in all of geological time that wreaked planetary destruction as much as the one that is supposed to be the pinnacle of the evolutionary process. 

Cryptocurrency superpacs

Interestingly, when I typed in the title of tonight’s post, it autocorrected to “superbad.”  The computer is wise.

Crypto superpacs, with $83 million in the bank, have targeted John Tester and Sherrod Brown for defeat.  The crypto industry has already used its money to win primary elections in Alabama and Texas for potential House members who are pro-crypto.  The industry is pushing for favorable regulations.

I don’t understand the fascination with crypto currency.  It seems to be used almost exclusively by crooks and young guys who hope to strike it rich.  In the meantime it is a drain on the electrical grid and a major contributor to greenhouse gases.  China has banned it.  Here it is buying its way into power.