More Recalls

On Thursday Ford recalled 1.3 million vehicles, mostly because of steering problems. So far this year, Ford has recalled more than 2.9 million vehicles in the United States, far surpassing last year’s 1.2 million vehicles.

By March, Nissan had recalled 990,000 vehicles in the United States, about 30,000 more than in all of last year. 

Toyota is already more than halfway to exceeding its total from last year, when it led all automakers with 5.3 million vehicles recalled.

All come several years after the automaker first knew of problems, and in three cases, only after investigations by either the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration or its counterpart Transport Canada.

Casting the first stone

Democracy Now will have an interview next week with former National Coordinator for Security, Infrastructure Protection, and Counter-terrorism Richard Clarke, who resigned in 2003 after Iraq was invaded. Clark was asked if “President Bush should be brought up on war crimes [charges], and Vice President Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, for the attack on Iraq.” His response, “I think things that they authorized probably fall within the area of war crimes. Whether that would be productive or not, I think, is a discussion we could all have.”...“It’s clear that things that the Bush administration did — in my mind, at least, it’s clear that some of the things they did were war crimes.”

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell, agrees with Clarke, "I'd be willing to testify, and I’d be willing to take any punishment I’m due.

Rise

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may tread me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise. 

Maya Angelou

The Youngest Conductor in the World

Whistling Parrot

You really should read the June issue of The Atlantic

The lead article by Ta-Nehisi Coates makes a strong argument for our paying reparations to the blacks in America. He contends that we would not have achieved our greatness had we not penalized the blacks. He asserts, "Until we reckon with our compounding moral debts, America will never be whole."

The article got me thinking how prevalent the discrimination was in our history. In Coates' telling just about everybody in this country hurt and profited from the blacks. For the past 25 years John Conyers has introduced a bill in Congress to create a Commission to Study Reparation Proposals for African Americans. Coates wants the bill enacted now.

Have we paid the Indians enough for what we did to them?

Another no vote re the F-35

I've been writing about the F-35 since 2010, so readers know my feelings on the issue. It was good to see another article by someone who has extensive experience with the Air Force. Col Michael W. Pietrucha thinks that the program should be stopped now.  He cites the usual reasons of program delays, low payload, short range, unmet performance requirements, and spiraling costs. But he argues that the assumptions that led to its birth are no longer relevant; they were based on the Cold War. The issues today are the Pacific theater and a China with very strong air defense capabilities 

Don't violate public morality in Iran

Many in Iran are in a tither about an Iranian actress being kissed in public at the Cannes Film Festival. In their eyes she has violated public morality and should be flogged. Flogging is not a trifling matter in Iran. The sentence can vary from 10 to 100 lashes across the back with a three-foot whip. The pain is so severe that offenders often faint after seven or eight strokes. Crimes that violate public morality include adultery, kissing in public, theft, homosexual acts, drinking or selling alcohol, and blasphemy. Even foreigners may be flogged if they have sexual relations with a Muslim.

Amnesty International has declared flogging to be a form of torture; it is banned by international law. 

Levin is trying

Senator Carl Levin is trying to do something about situations where companies use offshore tax havens to minimize the taxes they owe the U.S. Levin has proposed a bill to eliminate a process known as the Double Irish, in which a company sets up a subsidiary in Ireland and cedes to the subsidiary the company's intellectual property rights. The subsidiary then charges royalties to the parent, so that the parent's expenses are increased but are offset by the subsidiary's revenues. It would be a wash except that the parent pays taxes to us on its profits, which are now less because of the royalties. So, overall the company's total expenses, including taxes, are less.

Oops

France has a very good train system and has had for years. The country's 8,700 stations probably exceed the number we have in the U.S. A few years ago they decided to add almost 2,000 more trains to their system at a cost of $20.5 billion. But, there was a slight error in analyzing the platforms the trains would use.

They only considered platforms built less than thirty years ago. However, there are about 1,000 platforms built more than 50 years ago when trains were a little slimmer. Thus, the platform edges are too close to the tracks in about 1,000 stations; hence,the trains cannot get in. Thus far they've spent almost $70,000,000 rectifying the problem.

Thanks to our Suffield correspondent.

Climate Change or ET?

What's more likely - the earth gets ravaged by climate change or extraterrestrials? The House Science, Space, and Technology Committee thinks it would be extraterrestrials. It has held 15 hearings on space exploration alone, at least three of which have involved the search for extraterrestrial life. By comparison, the committee has held just two hearings devoted to climate change.

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee has held three hearings this session on climate change, while the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee has not had a hearing devoted to the topic since 2012. The Senate Commerce Science and Space Subcommittee has had one hearing about climate change and four about space.

Our tax dollars at work.

Hummus made with love and chickpeas

That's the new slogan for Tribe, a major manufacturer of hummus owned by Nestle. Gabriel Collazzo, a former worker of the Tribe plant in Taunton, Ma., would question that slogan. Gabriel's brother, Daniel, was killed in December 2011 while cleaning the hummus-making machines at the Tribe plant.  

It looks as though Daniel's death could have been prevented had the plant followed a standard safety practice known as "lock out/tag out." It requires employees to be trained to cut power to industrial machinery before cleaning activities begin. In 2009 the company had been fined for failing to follow this procedure in another of its plants. Tribe's own consultant had warned that failing to train cleaning workers in lock out/tag out created "an extreme safety risk," and said "the probability that a fatality could occur is likely certain within a year's time frame."

I had thought that Tribe was a local company and a rather small one. It was a surprise to me that it is owned by Tivall 1993 Ltd., a subsidiary of OSEM Investments Ltd., one of the largest food companies in Israel. Last year, it generated $109 million in profit The majority owner of OSEM Investments is the Swiss food products conglomerate Nestle SA, which earned $10 billion in profits last year on sales of $92 billion.

Looking at states

The U.S. has not performed very well with regard to OECD's PISA tests, which aim to measure the performance in math of high school students. Many have claimed that the basic problem lies with poor kids in central city schools. Three professors have analyzed the data on a state basis and have concluded that there are wide variances by state.

To wit, the results of students in Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana are similar to developing countries such as Kazakhstan and Thailand. While results for Massachusetts, Minnesota, Vermont, New Jersey and Montana would rank among the highest compared to other countries. New York and California are similar in ability to countries such as Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey, well below the averages for the US and OECD industrialised countries.

“God knows where kids get these ideas.”

That's a quote from William Bratton, Commissiner of the NYPD. That was his reaction to allegations that two Brooklyn school kids, 9 and 12 years old, put rat poison in a teacher's water bottle.

The GI Bill

Tom Ricks raises the question of the impact of the GI Bill of WWII on the country. His comments are brief but interesting. For example, the incidence of PTSD was quite minimal compared to our 21st century wars. True, the phenomenon was not named until after the war. And, yes, I was a kid at the time, but the percentage of veterans who went berserk post-war was far smaller then that of today.

The GI Bill was quite generous; you could pay for an education, get  mortgage, or draw $20 a week for a year. Some who benefited: Norman Mailer, Joseph Heller, Elmore Leonard, Rod Serling, Robert Duvall, and Robert Rauschenberg. 

Coincidentally, we did not lionize the 'warriors' as we seem to do today. Was that because we all - young and old, rich and poor, college students and high school dropouts - fought in the war? 

13,000,000 and counting

That's how many cars GM has recalled since February, that's February 2014 three months ago. Some of the vehicles recalled are of 2004 vintage. How could it have taken the company so long to rectify the problem? 

Guilty of criminal wrongdoing

For the first time in 25 years a major bank, Credit Suisse, has pled guilty to criminal wrongdoing. The bank helped thousands of Americans to hide assets in offshore accounts in order to evade paying taxes. The bank will pay $2.6 billion in penalties and hire an independent monitor for up to two years.

Next up to plead guilty to criminal charges is BNP Paribas, which is suspected of doing business with countries like Sudan and Iran that the United States has blacklisted. It will pay more than $5 billion in fines; some employees will also be penalized.

Bad words to describe GM cars

Entertainment 2014

I've been out of action for the past couple of weeks and have been forced to watch more television than I normally do. Despite claims made by many critics that the quality of tv has improved, I can't accept that conclusion for the vast majority of programs.

First of all, the number of advertisements has increased dramatically, it seems that at least half of the time one is bombarded by ads. The most common ads are for the pill that will save your life. These ads are very carefully crafted and manage to almost hide mention of side effects.

The cost of producing a program must have decreased, as there are so many reality shows. Why anyone would pay the performers in these shows in beyond me? I suppose the number of these stars is reflective of our growing population. There are still the 10% nutter population, but it's a lot larger on an absolute basis.

I used to like watching mysteries. But now the crimes are overly violent.

Oh, well, I'm getting old.

A major issue for 2016

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