Woody Holton: Liberty Is Sweet

Woodie Holton is a historian who has been active in defending the 1619 Project, which led me to read his new book: Liberty Is Sweet,  If I don't write further on it (it's good), I want to note this nice quote from Ben Franklin, which the Democrats could use:

All Property indeed, except the Savage’s temporary Cabin, his Bow, his Matchcoat, and other little Acquisitions absolutely necessary for his Subsistence, seems to me to be the Creature of public Convention. Hence the Public has the Right of Regulating Descents & all other Conveyances of Property, and even of limiting the Quantity & the Uses of it. All the Property that is necessary to a Man for the Conservation of the Individual & the Propagation of the Species, is his natural Right which none can justly deprive him of: But all Property superfluous to such purposes is the Property of the Publick, who by their Laws have created it, and who may therefore by other Laws dispose of it, whenever the Welfare of the Publick shall demand such Disposition. He that does not like civil Society on these Terms, let him retire & live among Savages.— He can have no right to the Benefits of Society who will not pay his Club towards the Support of it.

From Benjamin Franklin to Robert Morris, 25 December 1783 

[Updated-corrected the author's name.  See this Hogeland post on the related issue.'

Things Change--Biden and Demographics

 

This is the president signing an executive order on customer service. Just a semi-routine ceremony, but I thought the demographics of the attendees were interesting, especially in contrast with the prior administration.

Thanks to Republicans

 Though I may never have voted for a Republican, I think we should acknowledge the principled Republicans who did the right thing--VP Pence for resisting the former guy's pressure and his mob; the representatives and senators who voted to accept the state results on Jan 6; and most of all the mostly Republican administrators of elections in WI, PA, GA, NV and AZ who affirmed the counts.

Vietnam Photos--Street Scene

 This would be another photo from somewhere in Saigon.

Suicides and War

This fact was noted in one of the newspapers but I found this at the USO site. 

In 2021, research found that 30,177 active duty personnel and veterans who served in the military after 9/11 have died by suicide - compared to the 7,057 service members killed in combat in those same 20 years. That is, military suicide rates are four times higher than deaths that occurred during military operations.

Hand Milking

 A while back I ran across a reference to "hand milking", which turned out to what dad would have called "machine milking".  Now the distinction is whether it's a robot putting the teat cups onto the cows or whether it's a human.

I was reminded of this by a Newshour piece on the advance of robots in dairying. 

Inflation Strikes Pizza

 My wife and I order the occasional pizza from Dominos.  For years our usual order was about $17 plus tip.  These days it's up to $31.  Part of that is the inclusion of a delivery charge, part is a more generous tip.  I suspect not only are the ingredients a bit more costly, but salaries for the help are up and management has been scared by the ups and downs of operating through the pandemic, thus becoming more cautious.  And the reality is that demand likely has stayed strong because of the pandemic. 

Rules of the Road in Space

 We've seen reports that the International Space Station has had to maneuver to reduce the chances of being hit by debris.  That's pretty straightforward--ISS can maneuver, the debris can't.  

What happens if ISS  and one of Elon Musk's satellites are on a collision course, or any set of two active satellites, each of which can maneuver?  (My guess is that such a collision is less likely than the debris/satellite scenario, but it must be possible.) If both maneuver there's the possibility they will increase the likelihood of a collision. On the sea, or on the road we have well-established conventions to minimize collisions. But in space? 

The Value of Consistency: Civilian Lawsuits

 Reading "Public Citizens: The Attack on Big Government and the Remaking of American Liberalism". 

I may write more about it, but I want to note that "civilian lawsuits" were proposed by Ralph Nader and his followers to enforce stronger standards for clean air and water.

Can we see this delegation of authority to sue as paving the way for the Texas SB 8 legislation on abortion?  Is there a difference in them? 

Social Security Administration and FSA

Washington Post yesterday had an article on the difficulties caused by SSA's switch to remote service.  The agency has over 1200 field offices. 

I'd love to see a comparison of SSA and FSA operations during the pandemic.  FSA would, I think, come out better, mostly because farmers have a history of interacting with their local office because farm programs are annual while usually people only need SSA once.  That may be oversimplification, but that's my guess.

But I'd also expect other differences, partly due to the county committee structure, partly the clientele, partly different histories and norms. 

SSA does have unions, as opposed to the NASCOE and farm loan groups.  They also have at least one Facebook group, as with FSA restricted to active and retired employees.