Tag: administration

Biden Releases Marijuana Offenders from Prison to Make Room for Trump Administration

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Doug Mills-Pool/Getty

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—President Biden announced that he was pardoning all people convicted under federal law of marijuana possession in order to make prison cells available for members of the Trump Administration.

Announcing the decision from the Oval Office, Biden said, “At present, thousands of Americans are in prison for the possession of marijuana. Those thousands of prison cells are badly needed to accommodate the influx of Trump aides, associates, and family members.”

Biden said that vacating the existing prison cells would save the American taxpayer billions “since the only alternative was to construct approximately forty thousand new cells that the incoming Trump prisoners would require.”

Calling the decision to pardon the marijuana users “one of the easiest [he’s] ever made,” Biden said, “What’s worse, lighting up a spliff or stealing the nuclear codes? Come on, man.”

Sock it to ’em, sock it to ’em!

The coronavirus vaccines have surpassed expectations

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The big picture: The pandemic isn’t over. There are still big threats ahead of us and big problems to solve. But for all the things that have gone wrong over the past year, the vaccines themselves have shattered even the most ambitious expectations.

The vaccines represent a “stunning scientific achievement for the world … unprecedented in the history of vaccinology,” said Dan Barouch, an expert on virology and vaccines at Harvard, who worked on the Johnson & Johnson vaccine…

Most importantly, all the leading vaccines work extremely well.

All four vaccines or vaccine candidates in the U.S. — from Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson — appear to prevent coronavirus deaths, and to offer total or near-total protection against serious illness.

RTFA. Engage with scientific facts and practice. Please, please, don’t wander off into the pop culture of profiteers, economic and ideological, who seek to line their pockets by encouraging fear and foolishness.

Uranium cubes, lost and found – How close the Nazis came!

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Uranium cube from the failed Nazi reactor — John T. Consoli/U of Maryland

❝ When University of Maryland physicist Timothy Koeth received a mysterious heavy metal cube from a friend as a birthday gift several years ago, he instantly recognized it as one of the uranium cubes used by German scientists during World War II in their unsuccessful attempt to build a working nuclear reactor. Had there been any doubt, there was an accompanying note on a piece of paper wrapped around the cube: “Taken from Germany, from the nuclear reactor Hitler tried to build. Gift of Ninninger.”

❝ Thus began Koeth’s six-year quest to track down the cube’s origins, as well as several other similar cubes that had somehow found their way across the Atlantic. Koeth and his partner in the quest, graduate student Miriam “Mimi” Hiebert, reported on their progress to date in the May issue of Physics Today. It’s quite the tale, replete with top-secret scientific intrigue, a secret Allied mission, and even black market dealers keen to hold the US hostage over uranium cubes in their possession. Small wonder Hollywood has expressed interest in adapting the story for the screen.

This truly is an interesting read. From the tale of just how close the Nazis got to a working nuclear reactor to how some of these cubes ended up in the United States. Enjoy!

The bottom line on the Energy Department’s grid study

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❝ The Energy Department published its long-delayed but much-anticipated report on whether the U.S. electric grid can handle the retirement of aging coal-fired and nuclear power plants.

The big questions the grid study sought to answer were these: What is driving the closures of those power plants? And what should be done about it?

❝ The report’s answer to that first question is notable in that it’s already widely known: The No. 1 reason coal and nuclear power plants are closing is that they are being priced out of the electricity market by an abundance of cheap natural gas pumped from hydraulic fracturing projects that have come online over the past decade.

“The biggest contributor to coal and nuclear plant retirements has been the advantaged economics of natural gas-fired generation,” the study states…

That is the result of a low commodity price for natural gas. Short-term thinking at best. Globally, the economics of scale continue to move the advantages of solar and wind-powered electricity.

❝ The study’s policy recommendations include various measures that would likely have the effect of boosting coal and nuclear power. They include requests that:

the Environmental Protection Agency ease permitting requirements for new investments at coal-fired plants

the Nuclear Regulatory Commission do the same with regard to safety requirements

and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission compensate grid participants that help keep power reliable.

What happens now? The follow-through, if any, on these policy recommendations will largely happen outside the Energy Department…

The Republican Party and the Fake President are incapable of pushing through uneconomic plans supporting failing methodology. Certainly not in a timely fashion. I’d rather see pressure put on Democrats and independents, conservative and liberal, to move this nation forward in step with modern science towards energy independence from fossil fuels. Though I’ve been an advocate for nuclear power for decades, the sum of costs for that endeavor has increased well beyond anything based on solar or wind energy. Reasonable economics moved my decision to end support for that alternative years ago.

What sensible folks need to do is fight for the range of reforms, simple and complex, needed to restore democratic, science-based progress to our energy grid. The United States is barely in a position to provide leadership on this question to anyone. The next couple of years will be critical to retaining a voice in the process of revising global power output. That will happen with or without participation by the United States.

Support for little minds in a political movement led by bigotry and ignorance will leave this nation with a mediocre economy and a second-class future.

Oklahoma considers stupid law regulating stupid policies

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Feel threatened?

An Oklahoma politician apparently felt that hype about the dangers of guns in schools had gone too far and decided to do something about it.

Under the Common Sense Zero Tolerance Act introduced by Rep. Sally Kern, schoolchildren in the state would no longer face punishment if they chew their frosted or fruit-filled breakfast pastries into the shape of guns…

According to the bill, “Brandishing a pastry or other food which is partially consumed in such a way that the remnant resembles a weapon,” would be protected…

In addition to the pastry provision, Kern’s bill would also make it safe for students to possess small toy weapons or use pencils, pens, fingers or their hands to simulate a weapon.

Students also couldn’t be punished for wearing clothes that “support or advance Second Amendment rights or organizations.”

In Oklahoma you have to include that last sentence otherwise the NRA will tell everyone the bill is part of some commie, pinko plot to send the Marines to your home and take away your guns.

Then, there’s the fun of deciding which kind of stupid you need to support, which kind you need to stop. Do you pass zero tolerance regulations that lead to silliness like suspending students who chew their pastries into dangerous weapon-shapes? Do you spend time regulating how much common sense is allowed to modify zero tolerance silliness? And on and on. An endless loop keeping politicians looking busy – if not productive.

Shipping continued after inspection system crashes at meat plants

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A troubled new computer system used by inspectors at the nation’s 6,500 meatpacking and processing plants shut down for two days this month, putting at risk millions of pounds of beef, poultry, pork and lamb that had left the plants before workers could collect samples to check for E. coli bacteria and other contaminants.

Inspectors say that they were forced to use old paper forms to complete some of their work, but that in many cases it was too late. “Management sent out a memo saying to reschedule the sampling of meat,” said Stan Painter, a federal inspector in Crossville, Ala., who leads the inspectors’ union. “But in most cases that meat is now gone. We can’t inspect product that went out the door when the system was down…”

The new inspection system was supposed to be a significant improvement over older methods that the Agriculture Department had used for decades. In the past, food safety officials at the agency determined which meat would be sampled and at what times. Inspectors collected the samples, filled out paper forms, sent them along with the meat by mail to testing labs and waited days for the results by return mail.

After the new system was set up in 2011, computers set the meat sampling schedules. Following online directions, inspectors collected specific samples of meat as they had before and mailed them for testing to labs. But instead of sending the paperwork along with the meat, inspectors sent information about the samples via the computer system to the labs. The test results were received electronically, and faster than in the past.

The overall goal was to provide real-time information about the conditions at meat processing plants and make it easy for the agency to track food safety problems before they led to outbreaks…But inspectors say the nationwide failure of the computer system early this month — along with other recent breakdowns — undermine the department’s assertions that the new technology has improved the safety of the nation’s meat.

“They’ve poured millions of dollars into this thing, and it still doesn’t work,” Mr. Painter said. “We want to do our jobs, but they need to give us tools that work, so we can…”

The report did not say whether any tainted meat had reached consumers, but inspectors say it is only a matter of time.

“I was one of the testers on the system in 2010 when it was still in the development phase,” said Jim Shanahan, an inspector from Axtell, Neb. “I sent reports in every day about issues we were having. Today the same problems are still happening.”

With all the advances trumpeted early days by the Obama administration – about advanced data processing and computerized communications – I can’t help but feel the good old boy network is still controlling design, testing and purchasing.

There is plenty of effective software used in logistics and communications throughout the US. We have some of the best designers in the world in computer science. Yet, on state and federal levels of management, crap software seems to be the rule.

Time to overhaul, rationalize the U.S. Commerce Department

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President Barack Obama said that the most “salient message” from the election was the voters’ demand that all levels of government and the private sector work together to “help the middle class move forward”. He’s right.

Real unemployment, in all categories, remains above 16 per cent; wages for 90 per cent of workers remain stagnant; there is little business confidence despite cash-rich treasuries; and the trade deficit in manufactured goods is a persistent $300bn each year.

Voters, particularly those in the industrial heartland, and only slightly less so on each coast, have demanded a more balanced economy. They want an economy that restores the vitality of the manufacturing sector. These workers supported the bailout of the auto industry because they believed there was no reasonable alternative. And they feel that the private sector, acting alone, cannot sufficiently advance the economy or protect their interests.

It is no surprise then that during the campaign Mr Obama called frequently for combining the executive branch’s nine distinct department and agency commerce-related efforts into a reconfigured “department of business”. It is not a new department but, rather, under a reconstituted and renamed commerce department, a consolidation of responsibilities and activities.

Given the complexity of the steps that need to be taken to speed up economic recovery, Mr Obama’s proposal is not just practical and expedient, it is also imperative.

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Trickle-down economics is the longest failed experiment in modern American history

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These folks ain’t waiting in line for fuel for their cars

In upper-middle-class suburbs on the East Coast, the newest must-have isn’t a $7,500 Sub-Zero refrigerator. It’s a standby generator that automatically flips on backup power to an entire house when the electrical grid goes out.

In part, that’s a legacy of Hurricane Sandy. Such a system can cost well over $10,000, but many families are fed up with losing power again and again…

More broadly, the lust for generators is a reflection of our antiquated electrical grid and failure to address climate change. The American Society of Civil Engineers gave our grid, prone to bottlenecks and blackouts, a grade of D+ in 2009…

That’s how things often work in America. Half-a-century of tax cuts focused on the wealthiest Americans leave us with third-rate public services, leading the wealthy to develop inefficient private workarounds.

It’s manifestly silly (and highly polluting) for every fine home to have a generator. It would make more sense to invest those resources in the electrical grid so that it wouldn’t fail in the first place…

The National Climatic Data Center has just reported that October was the 332nd month in a row of above-average global temperatures. As the environmental Web site Grist reported, that means that nobody younger than 27 has lived for a single month with colder-than-average global temperatures, yet climate change wasn’t even much of an issue in the 2012 campaign. Likewise, the World Economic Forum ranks American infrastructure 25th in the world, down from 8th in 2003-4, yet infrastructure is barely mentioned by politicians…

This question of public goods hovers in the backdrop as we confront the “fiscal cliff” and seek to reach a deal based on a mix of higher revenues and reduced benefits. It’s true that we have a problem with rising entitlement spending, especially in health care. But I also wonder if we’ve reached the end of a failed half-century experiment in ever-lower tax rates for the wealthy.

Since the 1950s, the top federal income tax rate has fallen from 90 percent or more to 35 percent. Capital gains tax rates have been cut by more than half since the late 1970s. Financial tycoons now often pay a lower tax rate than their secretaries.

All this has coincided with the decline of some public services and the emergence of staggering levels of inequality (granted, other factors are also at work) such that the top 1 percent of Americans now have greater collective net worth than the entire bottom 90 percent.

American building codes generally tail along a decade behind European building codes. When it comes to infrastructure, the number ranges from thirty years to fifty years. More likely the latter. You can end our progress with Eisenhower’s Interstate Highway System built officially for the Cold War – and really for the motor freight industry. Though that had improved codes that approached European standards for infrastructure, the big boys running contracting firms capable of the job were already figuring out how to cut corners – legally or otherwise.

Highway Codes have since declined. Budgets have diminished. Low-bidder rulings supersede standards. And Congress couldn’t care less.

The same is true for schools and libraries, bridges, parks, any structure designed for the common good.

Obama Administration policy on illegal immigrants Is challenged by Rahm Emanuel

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Just weeks after the Supreme Court largely reaffirmed the Obama administration’s immigration enforcement powers in its legal battle with Arizona, federal officials are facing a new, politically tricky clash with local authorities over immigration, this time in Chicago.

At a news conference on Tuesday, Mayor Rahm Emanuel said he would propose an ordinance that would bar police officers from turning over illegal immigrants to federal agents if the immigrants do not have serious criminal convictions or outstanding criminal warrants.

In contrast to the Obama administration’s long-running confrontation with officials in Arizona, who are mostly Republicans, the latest challenge to the president’s immigration policies comes from Mr. Emanuel, his former chief of staff, and from other Democratic allies in President Obama’s hometown.

“If you have no criminal record, being part of a community is not a problem for you,” Mr. Emanuel said, speaking at a high school library in Little Village, a Latino neighborhood. “We want to welcome you to the city of Chicago.”

The mayor said the proposal was part of his goal to make Chicago the “most immigrant-friendly city in the country…”

Chicago is governed separately from Cook County. The city’s ordinance would give its police department more power to decide which immigrants to turn over to federal agents, but it would not curtail most cooperation as Cook County has done…

Mr. Emanuel did not pose his initiative as a challenge to Mr. Obama. Rather he laid blame on Congress for inaction on immigration. The City Council will consider the ordinance this month.

All these chickens are coming home to roost to pay for decades of diminished responsibility by liberals – coupled with several flavors of activist bigotry from conservatives in both parties.

Over the decades of diminished access to the United States – especially aimed at barring Hispanic immigrants from Mexico and Central America – I wonder how many undocumentados would have arrived here legally? Seems to me that a significant majority of those now here would have had little problem passing through the system if standards were kept to the designs of those who originally formulated our nation’s immigration policy.

City administration in Chicago cuts up hundreds of credit cards

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Daylife/AP Photo used by permission

Local government employees who once passed around 500 credit cards will now get by on just eight, under a crackdown that exceeded Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s expectations.

Two months ago, Emanuel reduced the number of credit cards to 30 after alleged abuses that ousted the chiefs of the CHA and Chicago Park District. The plan called for five credit cards to be issued to top executives of each of six agencies: the CTA, CHA, Park District, Chicago Public Schools, City Colleges and Public Building Commission. Monthly expenditures are posted on the Internet.

Now, the number of credit cards has been further reduced to “no more than eight” with three of the six agencies joining City Hall in going cold turkey.

In a news release touting the additional cuts, Emanuel noted that lax policies he inherited had “allowed city employees to treat a city credit card as their personal expense accounts.”

He added, “Our residents work hard every day and we work for them. Abuse or misuse of taxpayer dollars absolutely will not be tolerated…”

Earlier this year, the inspector general of the Chicago Public Schools questioned more than $800,000 in spending under former school board presidents Michael Scott and Rufus Williams. The spending — not all of which was charged to CPS credit cards — ranged from $3,000 to check the board’s offices for “eavesdropping devices” to $12,624 for holiday parties at a president’s home…

The credit card crackdown followed a joint investigation by the Better Government Association and WFLD-Channel 32 news that uncovered alleged credit card abuses at the CHA and the Park District…

The investigation…found CHA credit cards were used to buy thousands of dollars worth of flowers, cakes and holiday gifts for employees, a suite at the United Center and to pay fines stemming from red-light camera tickets.

Emanuel condemned the alleged abuses, called a halt to credit card spending and ordered a sweeping audit of agency policies. Jordan subsequently resigned.

Any number of pundits are always predicting the political demise of Rahm Emanuel. They’re always predicting Chicago-style cronyism that existed for decades under traditional machine governance. In truth, no party holds a patent for cronyism – as the recent Bush administration proved. Though the results are always the same. Taxpayers, ordinary citizens are left holding the bag.

Cynic that I am, I’m pleased to see Emanuel cleaning house – at least a little bit – in Chicago. I hope he keeps it up. Maybe, someday – he’ll bring his talents back to the White House and TCB.