@FukuyamaFrancis is wrong!

Who am I to take on Dr. Fukuyama? A bored American sailor.

I read a recent interview with Dr. Fukuyama  (whom I respect - I have read every one of his books.) He tells of his concerns for the globalization movement and the rise of the mini-Trumps (his description) in Europe. He describes popuarism and nationalism as damaging the globalization movement.

I think he has it wrong. (Whew.) The enemy of globalization is multiculturalism. Dr. Kissinger in "World Order" and Samuel Huntington in "Clash of Civilizations" suggest that it is religion and cultural identity that are the primary source of conflict in the modern world. Popularism and nationalism are not a reaction to global economic events. They are a reaction to being force fed by governments, the media, and "social justice warriors" the absurd idea that all cultures are equally valuable. Cultures that do not respect the rule of law; treat women as property; engage in female genital mutilation; "honor" killings; the pervasive surveillance state; genocide; slavery; rape; - yes we are told - these cultures are equally valuable and valued as liberal democracy. IMHO society reacts by voting out the idiots who proclaim these views. Unfortunately like for President Trump the alternative (Hillary) is frequently worse.

Dr. Fukuyama postulates that political power derives from two sources: genetic overlap and reciprocal altruism. Reciprocal altruism works when both players understand the rules. We call that law and culture. Are you going to embrace governance by people who go out on a gang rape party and then have the women murdered by their families for "dishonoring" them? I think not. Particularly if one of the women is your daughter.

Globalization will never succeed until universal human rights are the norm, not the exception. The rise of nationalism in Europe was a direct result of importing millions of "refugees" who.are seen as degenerates by much of the population, not a reaction to globalism.

The interview:

https://global.handelsblatt.com/politics/mini-trumps-are-coming-up-all-over-europe-869856

Fair winds and following seas :)

Re: Source for part

Let's try again.

Looking for a source of the metal version of this.

Roger J Jones s/v Reboot

On Dec 29, 2017 10:16 PM, "Reboot Agent" <rebootagent@gmail.com> wrote:

Looking for a source of the metal version of this.

Roger J Jones s/v Reboot

Source for part

Looking for a source of the metal version of this.

Roger J Jones s/v Reboot

Beyond Epic!

https://usaaflyover.com

Fair winds and following seas  :)

Roger J Jones s/v Reboot

Finally

My boxes arrived!

Fair winds and following seas  :)

Roger J Jones s/v Reboot

Floating

Reboot is back in the water after bottom paint and polish. She looks nice.

Fair winds and following seas  :)

Bummer Day

I have been planning to sail to a Penang over Christmas. But I have been waiting for boat parts that were scheduled to be here two days ago. Customs is holding them up for some reason. And of course closing for Christmas. 

The good news is I cleaned the threads on the maxi-prop so I can put the New anode on.

Fair winds and following seas  ;)

Winter Solstice

In the Northern hemisphere so today is the shortest day. Near the equator so it doesn't matter. 

Fair winds and following seas  :)

Have bag, have cat

Fair winds and following seas  ;)

Shiny (2)

Bottom Paint

The sides are polished. The new transducer is installed. And the first coat of bottom paint is on. My girl is getting pretty again!

Fair winds and following seas  :)

On bullshit

Wonderful book on the theory of bullshit.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Bullshit

Fair winds and following seas :)

Two factor authentication stupidity

I programmed all my adult life. It never ceases to amaze me how the average programmer is ignorant. The current example: two factor authentication. I am going to send you a text message to your phone. What if your phone can't receive text messages? You know, like Skype, land lines, etc.? Duh.

Fair winds and following seas  :)

Big Breakfast

I remember a thread about McDonald's prices. A "Big Breakfast" in Malaysia is $ 2.48 USD. Can't beat the price!

Fair winds and following seas  :)

Reboot is on the hard

Which I hate. Five days for bottom paint and back in

Fair winds and following seas :)

The two fly problem

For some reason Reboot always has two and only two flies buzzing around. Never three..kill one, another shows up. Weird

Fair winds and following seas  :)

XO and Rain

Of course it is the middle of the night. Ferral cat episodes 2 and 3. Trying to get back to sleep. XO outside on leash. Each time I locked him in with me he sat on the companionway steps and howled. I put him on his leash and let him curl up outside. Thunderstorm. He fouled his leash and is caught in the rain. I go get him getting soaked in the process. Leash is wet, I figure he will stay in cockpit. No, he goes out and sits in the rain. Now totally wet he comes back inside and wants to groom sitting on my chest. 

Fair winds and following seas  :)

Repel Borders

XO has a couple of voices. There is the I want attention meow. There is the I need food meow. There is the clean my box meow. And the always unpleasant I am about to puke noise.

I was sitting in the salon at 3:30 am this morning when I heard one I have not heard in years. Hissing, screaming, spitting. Running up into the cockpit I found XO hissing at one of the local ferral cats. I don't know if it had gotten up on Reboot but it sure beat feet in retreat. We (the marina) were then subjected to 5 minutes of "take that you ...; this is my boat noises.

Fair winds and following seas  :)

XO's Latest Trick

Since we are in a marina I rented an air conditioner. The primary reason was to keep XO cool when I left him shut up inside Reboot. He has now taken to sitting on the air conditioner. He is heavy enough that his weight resets the controls. Usually turning the unit off. Well, I tried.

Fair winds and following seas  :)

Conundrum

Human knowledge is expanding, apparently at an increasing rate. That is, not only are we getting more knowledgeable, we are getting more knowledgeable faster. Underlying this growth is the unprecedented access to information brought about by the Internet.  The English language version of Wikipedia has over 5 million articles. It appears that every major scholarly journal is also online. Yes, there is chaff in the wheat. But my perception is the wheat greatly exceeds the chaff.

Why then is ignorance celebrated on Twitter, Facebook and the like? Being ignorant and spewing your "feelings" seems to be the definition of "expertise." How did this come to pass? Why is it tolerated? No, not tolerated - applauded? How did it become an acceptable substitute for fact based analysis in the "scientific" community? How did it become socially unacceptable to point out the facts? Worse, how did it become socially acceptable to engage in ad hominem attacks in the crudest possible language against those who point out the abject failure of emotional reasoning? (I think "emotional reasoning" has eclipsed "holy war" as the greatest English language oxymoron of all time.)

A simple and very "politically incorrect" example. (It doesn't matter - Big Brother - Google and Facebook et al have already filed me in their databases as in opposition to the "narrative.") Take the statement "gender roles are culturally assigned." Five million years of the history of homo sapiens doesn't support this view. Intense studies of our closest genetic cousins - chimpanzees - doesn't support this view. And yes, chimpanzees have elaborate social organizations. The roles of male and female chimpanzees are consistent across all bands. The genetic mandate for men and women is different and in fact in opposition. None of this is new news. None of these facts take more than a couple of hours of research to validate. If I were to suggest this on Twitter I would be inviting a shitstorm from the ignorant. (I guess I just did as this blog entry will eventually end up on Twitter. Fortunately I have few followers and they rarely retweet.)

One of my mother's favorite expressions was "if wishes were horses beggars would ride." Who are these "experts" who share the drivel that gender is a "social construct?" Who are the blind that agree with them? (My apologies to those with less than perfect sight.) As a child I went to a Disney production in Madison Square Garden. Tinkerbell dies. Someone, probably Mickey tells the audience that if they clap real hard Tinkerbell will come back to life. And they clap their little hearts out. I named this the "Tinkerbell effect." If I want it badly enough it must be true. Like gender is a social construct.

(Disclaimers follow - feel free to take a pass)

Nothing that I have said supports inequality of the two genetic genders. Nothing prevents workplace equality, choise of sexual partners, modes of dress, ad nausium. Social acceptance of individual rights that do not infringe on the individual rights of others is a laudatory goal. Building the argument for such social acceptance on delusional wishful thinking is a best counterproductive.

Fair winds and following seas :)

P.S. With all this knowledge why do we still not have a clue about gravity? :)

What happened?

Twenty-five year ago I tried to encrypt my email. It didn't work. My recipients laughed and ignored my emails. Twenty-five years ago I cautioned my sons "be careful what you post on the Internet, it is forever long after the initial context is gone. They laughted. 

A couple of days ago I posted a relatively passive commentary about the tax bill. I received a response that I thought was lucid and insightful. I asked the respondent if I could post their response without attribution. The answer was no. What was shocking was the why. 

Paraphrasing "I am unwilling to expose myself to the hateful attacks of the left to include physical danger to myself and my family." What saddened me was that I could not disagree.

Paranoia? I thought about this and the results were frightening. It was already all over. Google had read the text of his email - as they do to every email to a gmail account. Somewhere without any privacy regulation his political views were available to Google's AI. And Googles' employees. We could chat on the phone. I am in a foreign country. Do i teally believe that NSA would not sweep up the call? Do I need to start every telephone call to the States with "I am a U.S. Citizen and monitoring this call is illegal?"

This is America. I need not be concerned. Only if I am an idiot. Daily I read of corruption at the FBI, DOJ, IRS, State, and the office of the special counsel. I read ludicrous statements by politicians that illuminate their ignorance and partisan bias. I feel like a spectator in the colosseum in ancient Rome. Kill, kill, kill! The unbridled hate on Twitter is overwhelming. Kill me because I am white. Kill me because I am a man. A conservative. Not confused about my gender. Because I believe in evil people in the world.

How did we get here?

Wedding View (With picture!)

Newlywed couples stand in line to have their pictures taken with this background. I joked that we should put up a velvet rope and charge admission. 

Fair winds and following seas  :)

A forest

Last night 

Fair winds and following seas  :)

Tax Bill

Some random thoughts:

1. There was an opportunity to greatly simplify the tax system. Based purely on the length of the bill that didn't happen.

2. Historically business reacts to tax cuts in three steps:

(1) Executives feather their own nests.

(2) Money goes into dividends (raising the value of your 401(k)) and stock buybacks (raising the value of your equity investments and stock index funds.)

(3) Money finally gets to the workers as the economy heats up (3.9% 3rd quarter growth.)

3. 2027 is an interesting year. By then we will have had 5 new Congresses, potentially 2 new Presidents (President Trump gets 2 more, next President gets 4, next President gets 4, Next President gets 4 or 8,) and very possibly 3+ new Supreme Court Judges. So from the government side a lot of change (even seesawing) is possible.

4. Also in 2027 half of the first year baby boomers (born in 1946) will be dead. (That is my birth year so I am hoping I am not one of them.) For the next 20 years (until 2047) each year will see half of that age cohort already dead. And of course the previous cohorts will continue to die off. Since boomers are the largest consumers of government health care and pensions the outlays should start to drop. (Actuaries could give us a chart, I am just mussing.) Since pensions and health care are consuming more than 50% of the total Federal budget this is a big deal.

5. Interest on the Federal debt will become a big problem even if this tax cut fails to pass. The economy has been growing above the 3% rate. That means interest rates are going up no matter what. And the interest on the debt (not to mention paying back the principal) is a big number.

6. The Defense Budget will go up (or other Government "entities" will be created and funded.) Cyberwarfare is real. And as we are seeing every day it costs money to secure the Internet. (The original Internet was designed by academic geeks with no concern for security. The whole thing is built on mud.) It is going to take big bucks to police it and even bigger bucks to fix it.

7. There will be a continuing clash of the four major civilizations: Russia, China, radical Islam, and Euro-American. See Henry the K "World Order" for background. How this plays out with respect to expenditures is anyone's guess.

8. There will be major advances in "simple AI" and workplace automation e.g. ordering kiosks at Micky "D's." This will result in many more "unemployables."

In summary I have no real idea what the impact of this tax bill will be. Nor does anyone else.

I just depressed myself. Time for a beer and watching the sunset.

Fair winds and following seas  :)

Sayonara

I just finished reading "Sayonara" by James Mitchner. I have read quite a few of his books but this was the first I have read in years.

The story is a romance set during the Korean War. The theme is similar to the Puchini Opera "Madam Butterfly" which is referenced several times in the text.

Plunk plunk plunk na be ba  bump  (as the sun rises.)

This link will take you to the history. 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madama_Butterfly

Beautifully written and tender. I learned about the "Takarazuka Girls", an entertainment that survives today. The word pictures of the theater performances had me closing my eyes and visualizing. A most enjoyable read. 

Fair winds and following seas  :)