February 2012 – Page 2 – Chaos Manor

FTL Neutrinos Back? Medicare Payments rising? Privacy invaded?

By Jerry Pournelle | Feb 25, 2012 - 3:15 pm | Updated: February 25, 2012 - 3:35 pm | View

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View 714 Saturday, February 25, 2012

The FTL neutrinos may not be gone after all. The evidence is still murky.

This from one of our PhD physicist readers:

Subj: FTL Neutrino "Clarification"

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17139635

On the one hand, the team said there is a problem in the "oscillator" that provides a ticking clock to the experiment in the intervals between the synchronisations of GPS equipment.

This is used to provide start and stop times for the measurement as well as precise distance information.

That problem would increase the measured time of the neutrinos’ flight, in turn reducing the surprising faster-than-light effect.

But the team also said they found a problem in the optical fibre connection between the GPS signal and the experiment’s main clock – quite simply, a cable not quite fully plugged in.

In contrast, the team said that effect would increase the neutrinos’ apparent speed.

_____

In other words, the much ballyhooed "loose plug" from the earlier reports, when corrected, makes the discrepancy even worse, rather than better. It’s a separate problem, the oscillator, that reduces he discrepancy.

_____

Meanwhile, I have finally looked at a few of the numbers. Given that classic tachyons of higher energies travel at speeds closer to the speed of light, and given that the mean energy of these muon neutrinos was something over 20 GeV, the measured speed is actually MUCH TOO FAST for these measured neutrinos to be classic tachyons if we assume the normally assumed rest energy in the vicinity of a few eV. Amusingly, the speed works out about right if the mass of the muon neutrino is sqrt(-1)*mass of the muon. But there is no apparent way to reconcile that with the obvious argument that it would suggest an electron neutrino mass of i*me.

And the fact remains as I noted in my presentation in November: EVERY quoted measurement of the neutrino mass is consistent with faster than light neutrinos. Even if this measurement falls, as noted above, it does not prove that neutrinos are not classic tachyons.

I will agree that it’s a mess and not getting cleaner until they get some good data with their hardware errors corrected.

Then we have:

The per person Medicare insurance premium will increase from the present monthly fee of $96.40, rising to: $104.20 in 2012; $120.20 in 2013; And $247.00 in 2014. These are provisions incorporated in the Obamacare legislation, purposely delayed so as not to ‘confuse’ the 2012 re-election campaigns. Send this to all seniors that you know, so they will know who’s throwing them under the bus.

I have no idea whether this is correct or not. It is from a partisan source. I haven’t read the Obama Health Care Act, (nor do I know anyone including some Members of Congress who has; it very long and complex) so I can’t say. Most of those who passed Obamacare didn’t know much about it – then Speaker Pelosi famously told the Congress they had to pass the act to see what was in it – but it is well known that it had lengthy time delays for many of its provisions. I am realizably informed that it has major changes in Medicare both A and B. I don’t want to get into a discussion of facts and interpretations, but do we have any experts who actually know in the readership?

I understand there is a new Internet Bill in Congress that has got past the Judiciasy Committee. It will require ISP’s to keep records of you internet visits, and make them available to law enforcement and also to discovery fishing lawyers in civil cases. Such as child custody or divorce – hah, he went to a porn site! – and any other civil suits. So all someone has to do is bring a lawsuit and collect everything your ISP knows about you, which is a lot.

I’ll have a lot more about this next week. I just heard about this on Leo Laporte’s radio show. More details later. Feel free to tell me what you know about this.

From the Show Notes, Saturday Feb 25 2012 of Leo Laporte’s radio show:

The EFF says Congressman Lamar Smith, you know, the SOPA guy, has introduced a new bill HR1981 which hides behind protecting children from internet pornography. But others are calling it the Internet Surveillance Act. Leo says it’s a grave invasion of privacy. It requires ISPs to keep track of all your search, electronics communications, email and IP addresses, credit card data for at least 12 months, and indemnifies ISPs from being sued for it. Leo also says it’ll give the MPAA and RIAA the ability to track you down easier.

On the air he said that the act would allow civil lawsuit lawyers access to all those records as part of discovery search. If so it’s not merely an invasion of privacy, it’s the end of any pretense of electronic privacy. Everything you have bought, every web site you went to intentionally or not, every place you have travelled…

Ands yet another warning: I got this Thursday but overlooked it.

GPS vulnerability

Jerry

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/02/23/gps-emerging-threat/

It’s worth reading. Excerpt:

For example, in 2010, UK researchers aimed a low-level GPS jammer at test ships in the English channel. The results were stunning: Ships that veered off course without the crew’s knowledge. False information passed to other ships about their positions, increasing the likelihood of a collision. The communications systems stopped working, meaning the crew couldn’t contact the Coast Guard. And the emergency service system — used to guide rescuers — completely failed.

Then, there’s the incident with the U.S. drone lost over Iran. Humphreys believes that by using simple jamming technology, Iranian authorities confused the ultra-sophisticated RQ-170 spy drone to the point that it went into landing mode. The drone’s Achilles heel? It had a civilian GPS system — not a military-grade encrypted model. It didn’t take much to blind it and force it down.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/02/23/gps-emerging-threat/#ixzz1nRJKFW69

Needless to say, If I can confuse ships at sea I can confuse airliners overhead. I’m not sure it’s as simple as this makes it seem, but we know how to build directional antenna and oscillators of nearly any frequency you’d like, and…

Education; the Alamo; Afghanistan

By Jerry Pournelle | Feb 24, 2012 - 11:35 pm | Updated: February 24, 2012 - 11:35 pm | View

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View 714 Friday, February 24, 2012

Dr. Pournelle —

A reminder of this day in history:

Written 24 February 1836, Mission San Antonio de Valero (the Alamo)

“To the People of Texas & All Americans in the World:

Fellow citizens & compatriots—I am besieged, by a thousand or more of the Mexicans under Santa Anna—I have sustained a continual Bombardment & cannonade for 24 hours & have not lost a man. The enemy has demanded a surrender at discretion, otherwise, the garrison are to be put to the sword, if the fort is taken—I have answered the demand with a cannon shot, & our flag still waves proudly from the walls. I shall never surrender or retreat. Then, I call on you in the name of Liberty, of patriotism & everything dear to the American character, to come to our aid, with all dispatch—The enemy is receiving reinforcements daily & will no doubt increase to three or four thousand in four or five days. If this call is neglected, I am determined to sustain myself as long as possible & die like a soldier who never forgets what is due to his own honor & that of his country—Victory or Death.

William Barret Travis

Lt. Col. comdt

P.S. The Lord is on our side—When the enemy appeared in sight we had not three bushels of corn—We have since found in deserted houses 80 or 90 bushels & got into the walls 20 or 30 head of Beeves.

Travis”

It still gives me chills to read it.

Pieter

Thermopylae had its messenger of defeat. The Alamo had none.

Bill Gates has an education article “Shaming teachers is wrong solution for school performance” that’s worth your attention. The Gates Foundation has found that in most schools, if you eliminate the worst 10% of the teachers – don’t bother to replace them, just get them out of there – you greatly improve the efficiency and performance of the school. They don’t go into details, but speculation is easy. Good teachers who break their hearts trying cannot be much encouraged when they see they are evaluated and paid exactly the same as time-servers and incompetents and frauds none of whom can be fired. None of this is in the article, which is in reaction to publishing the “performance” statistics of individual teachers, and is a powerful critique of the evaluation methods in use today.

Gates says that good teaching is a missionary activity. He’s probably tight, too. As for the current situation:

I am a strong proponent of measuring teachers’ effectiveness, and my foundation works with many schools to help make sure that such evaluations improve the overall quality of teaching. But publicly ranking teachers by name will not help them get better at their jobs or improve student learning. On the contrary, it will make it a lot harder to implement teacher evaluation systems that work.

In most public schools today, teachers are simply rated “satisfactory” or “unsatisfactory,” and evaluations consist of having the principal observe a class for a few minutes a couple of times each year. Because we are just beginning to understand what makes a teacher effective, the vast majority of teachers are rated “satisfactory.” Few get specific feedback or training to help them improve.

The rest of the essay is worth reading.

The problem is the unions which exist to protect incompetent teachers. The unions will oppose any form of teacher performance evaluation, and insist on seniority and credentialism as the only measures for teacher evaluation. That is clearly wrong.

One should always take Gates seriously, and I agree that publishing teacher evaluation scores is probably not a good idea; but I fear that his views will be used by the unions and “professional teacher associations” as an argument for doing nothing, changing nothing, and studying the problem while our public schools fail, and expensive private schools solidify the class distinctions in America so that only the rich get a good education.

It’s happening now. In many places the primary family goal is to get the kids out of the public schools. Into Catholic schools, private schools, Lutheran schools – anywhere but in the public schools. Of course in Los Angeles that’s particularly important. It happens that I live quite close to one of the best public grade school in LAUSD. It was almost wrecked some years ago in the bussing era, but it has recovered and people now buy houses in my neighborhood in order to make their children eligible. That’s shameful.

Afghanistan is exploding because prisoners were sending notes to each other in copies of the Koran, and the guards burned the books.

The only thing that has ever united the Afghan tribes has been the presence of armed foreigners on their soil. So has it been since Alexander the Great, and so is it now.

I’m still recovering from what officially isn’t flu but certainly lays you out like flu. Actually I had pneumonia once and this has taken longer to clear up. I haven’t had much energy, and what little I have has gone into errands and household maintenance. Apologies. I’m dancing as fast as I can.

While I was clearing some stuff out I came across a copy of our 1980 technology novel OATH OF FEALTY, and began to read. I got trapped. It’s a very good story and a lot more complex than it looks at first. It was written on an S-100 system with Electric Pencil, long before the computer revolution took off, so one would expect it to be primitive, but it’s not. It doesn’t of course have the Internet, but there’s something about as good; and our projections of some of the consequences of advances in computers were pretty good. We missed some of the implications of wireless so sometimes characters have to plug into a wired network, but we even had some wireless advances. It really holds up well. If you haven’t read Oath of Fealty, the paperback edition is available, and there’s a Kindle edition. It was a best seller in its time, and it’s still very readable.

A mixed bag: everyman’s drone, political matters, and other interesting stuff

By Jerry Pournelle | Feb 23, 2012 - 11:52 pm | Updated: February 23, 2012 - 11:52 pm | Mail

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Mail 714 Thursday, February 23, 2012

This will have to be short shrift – most of the mail deserves more comment, but this is the best I can do as I fall behind…

"I do wonder about the proliferation of hypothetical constructs and intervening variables in physics."

You would almost think it was a hundred years ago …. 😉

Dan Steele

Port Ludlow, WA

FTL Neutrinos & All Things Dark In Physics

Jerry,

Don’t worry about the state of modern physics too much on the account of dark matter and dark energy. These things are at least replicably measurable entities. The moniker of "dark" is a frank admission of the physics community that they do not know what the stuff is, beyond the fact that dark matter must be matter of some kind, some where, as it has a gravitational influence and that dark energy must be energy of some sort because it causes the expansion of space-time to accelerate. There are many theories as to what each is, and they are indeed theories because they are each falsifiable through observation and experimental testing.

Where physics gets into a little trouble these days concerns theories of multiple universes, many of which are inferred from our current theories of the universe — general relativity theory and quantum field theory — but which are not falsifiable or experimentally testable. So, they cannot claim the mantel of "theory" but they are still discussed as such. The physics community needs to come clean and call them what they are, speculations. Speculations are important as they provide the seeds of future observation and experiment, but they should not be elevated to the status of evolution, relativity, or quantum field theory just because someone with a PhD dreamed them up.

Kevin L. Keegan

Ofer Lahav on dark energy

Subject: Ofer Lahav on dark energy

The head of the science programme at the Dark Energy Survey on the rapidly expanding universe and the future of dark-energy research

http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2012/02/ofer-lahav-dark-energy?fsrc=nlw%7Cnewe%7C2-22-2012%7Cnew_on_the_economist

Tracy

Dark energy, like the aether, is inferred from indirect observations. Some of those observations are recent and there hasn’t been a lot of though given to alternate views. We’ll see. Meanwhile the space telescopes tell us more…

re: UFO’s and Burkhard Heim

Dear Dr Pournelle,

I’m reading A Step Farther Out and just got through the chapter about UFO’s. Something struck me: you cite a remark by Robert wood that "these things are generally reported accompanied by a really overwhelming magnetic field".

A by-product of Burkhard Heim’s unified theory is that a strong enough (as in tens of thousands of Teslas) magnetic field cancels inertia. A common theme in UFO stories is their ability to move as if they had negligible inertia – seemingly unlimited acceleration , including "turning" at very sharp angles.

As you say, it’s all conjectures.

On a different tack, it’s often stated that special relativity is what prevents us from interstellar travel. Staying with Newton doesn’t really make things much better.

Assume only Newtonian physics apply and you want to travel from Earth to Alpha Centauri in a week.

Under constant acceleration/deceleration, you’ll have to generate and handle about 22,000 g’s.

Assuming you somehow manage to survive this, your speed at turning point will be about 220c, meaning your kinetic energy will be equivalent to about 24,000 times your mass.

Let’s be optimistic and assume you have near-perfect mass-energy conversion and know how to generate and control black holes so you can store all that mass in a small enough space.

You’d still have to accelerate all this at 22,000 g’s.

The math to compute how much reaction mass you’d need to achieve this is beyond my ability under a scenario in which you also convert mass to energy to accelerate your reaction mass, but I note that with a reactionless drive, you’d need about 5 PetaWatts to do it and get a 1,000t spaceship in orbit at Alpha Centauri. Using marine nuclear reactors, we’d need (using the only figure I could find, 54kg/kW, and that for the Savannah’s power plant) 270 billion tons of power plant to generate them.

So even if Einstein were wrong, to get the the closest star system in a week we’d still need to

1) learn how to survive 22,000 g’s

2) learn how to generate energy densities about 2 (based on rocket engines) -3 (based on nuclear plants) orders (the 1,000x kind of order) of magnitude higher than we’re currently able to.

It doesn’t sound really less far-fetched than the Alderson drive.

Best Regards,

Jean-Louis Beaufils,

Paris

Nobody ever said it would be easy.

I like the Alderson Drive – I wrote the specs for it, sort of, as the input for Dan Alderson to work with – but I fear that the only way to the stars is generation ships. Those are possible.

Medical Revisions

An interesting article on how smartphones change healthcare outcomes:

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/23/technology/personaltech/monitoring-your-health-with-mobile-devices.html?_r=4

I’m surprised it took the NY times long enough to figure this out. I’ve been using search engines to diagnose myself for over a decade; now I use WebMD. Before I go to the doctor, I do my research and my recommendations are often followed. Medicine is analysis, plain and simple. You use the same structured analytical techniques that you use in matters of statecraft. The only differences are vocabulary and the composition of the information — really.

Doctors must learn all sorts of vocabulary and rules, but the analytical framework is basically the same. What a concept? That’s what the modern education system tried to erase, but they failed with some of us. Doctors are expensive consultants who speak a different language and are authorized by law to do things I can’t, like write prescriptions. I only go to the doctor if I need antibiotics, etc. Else, you’re candy on a stick, lazy, or incompetent.

—–

Most Respectfully,

Joshua Jordan, KSC

Percussa Resurgo

Well, my professional career was in Operations Research, which is generalism par excellance. Gradually I learned less and less about more and more until…

Day of the Drone

I got a kick out of InvenSense’s disclaimer.

"InvenSense sensors should not be used or sold in the development, storing, production and utilization of any conventional or mass-destructive weapons or any other weapons or life-threatening applications as well as in any other life-critical applications including but not limited to medical equipment, transportation, aerospace and nuclear instruments, undersea equipment, power plant equipment, disaster prevention and crime prevention equipment."

While it is a precision accelerometer for -16G to +16G, it’s survivable at 10,000G shock tolerance. Doesn’t say what the temperature range for operation is (probably 50 to 100 degrees F?), nor what the tolerances were for electrical, magnetic or ionizing radiation interference or damage; although you can write to the company and ask for that information.

I wonder how durable these would be for a reusable space vehicle? At $150 a piece, you could easily have a light weight, multiple-redundancy system without worrying too much about one or two dying on a flight.

Michael D. Houst

I am told that the accuracy of these microgyro guidance systems requires correction by gps, and ICBM’s don’t do that. But drones get their position fixes from gps as well as inertial memory… It used to be that we talked about cruise missiles. Drones seem to be related…

Re: Drones or the do-it-yourself cruise missile

These pages have everything needed for an autopilot:

http://www.microcenter.com/search/search_results.phtml?Ntt=arduino

Parts are on the peg at the local MC for what amounts to pocket change.

For once, the electronics are cheaper than the airframe. Build one in your garage. One fellow in NZ pointed that out a few years ago and got in big legal trouble. See:

http://aardvark.co.nz/pjet/cruise.shtml

This guy has been messing about with pulse jets for quite awhile, so the results were somewhat predictable. On another part of the site, he shows where he built every kid’s dream machine, the jet-powered go-kart.

Just not sure why we haven’t seen any terrorist cruise missiles yet, maybe because it’s easier for the terrorists to program humans to do the job than microcontrollers.

Stan Schaefer

Inertial Guidance

Jerry:

I worked on inertial guidance systems at Wright Field from 1955 through 1958. Part of my job was to look for non-mechanical alternatives to rotating-mass gyros and moving-mass accelerometers. I came across a report on experiments by a Frenchman named Georges Sagnac. He had placed an interferometer on a ship and demonstrated that the interference fringes would shift if the ship were driven in a circle. That sounded like a lead to what I was supposed to work on. I found that the sensitivity of the interferometer depended on path length (longer path = more sensitivity) and on wavelength of the illumination used (shorter wavelength = more sensitivity). Knowing the maximum size that we could get away with in an airplane, I calculated the wavelength needed to get the sensitivity we required. It came out gamma rays. That was out. There are no mirrors for gamma rays, so you can’t make them follow a closed path. Good idea, but not feasible.

Years later, after I was long out of the inertial guidance business, I read an article in AVIATION WEEK about a laser gyro. The headline puzzled me. How do you make a gyro out of a laser? About two paragraphs into the story I realized they’d found a way to get a long path length, and make a Sagnac gyro work in either an airplane or a missile.

This is one of the tricks I learned to use in my later career as a technological forecaster. Ask "what’s missing" from a potential innovation, that makes it not feasible, then watch for something to provide that missing piece. The laser provided the missing piece for the Sagnac gyro.

Joseph P. Martino

Dandridge Cole said long ago that you can’t predict the future, but you can invent it. Of course your inventions will have effects you didn’t predict.

Presidential Campaign

Jerry,

Gingrich definitely won the debate. Santorum will win some primaries and delegates, but not the nomination. I remembered that I didn’t support Santorum but couldn’t remember why. Ron Paul refreshed my memory while confirming my opinion that Santorum was the kind of kid who was always getting robbed of his lunch money.

More and more analysts are speculating about if not predicting a brokered convention. I believe that energy policy is the salient issue. If we don’t get energy policy right for a change, nothing else will matter. In spite of that infamous flirtation with Global Warming Theology posing with Pellossi on the couch, Gingrich is rational about energy policy. Santorum is also rational on energy policy and AGW. Ron Paul is also rational but would have a far too passive approach to energy policy. My fantasy is a brokered convention that nominates Governor Palin who is absolutely maniacal about energy policy. Obviously her activist approach to energy is policy is the result of the importance of oil production to Alaska, but she also understands how energy impacts the economy, foreign policy and national security. Alternatively, she could be the VP nominee and given authority over energy. If a President Paul, Romney or Gingrich reneged on such an agreement, she could seduce them. I have no doubt that the excitement of having sex with her would kill them then she would be President.

Jim Crawford

The Problem With Gingrich

I think the problem people have with Newt Gingrich is that he doesn’t care if people don’t like him, and he won’t apologize for having made someone mad. Everyone else will immediately rush out to apologize for and try to take back any statement that made someone feel mad. "Telling people who’ve spent their whole lives here that they have to leave is heartless! Um, wait, that doesn’t play well? Oh, well I didn’t *mean* it." Gingrich won’t play that game (or make that concession, if you want to see it that way.) And that’s why people get upset; not so much that he says things, but that he doesn’t pretend to feel sorry for having said them.

—

Mike T. Powers

"We thought they would support the other parties emerging from the womb of the revolution, but they didn’t."

<http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/story/2012-02-09/egypt-revolution-activists/53183038/1#.T0MRqyS8Kno.email>

Surprise, surprise.

—

Roland Dobbins

Bacevich: ‘As Israel has discovered, once targeted assassination becomes your policy, the list of targets has a way of growing ever-longer.’

<http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175505/tomgram%3A_andrew_bacevich%2C_uncle_sam%2C_global_gangster/>

—-

Roland Dobbins

I am working on an essay about proscription lists. We seem to be legalizing them.

Spacecraft volume/mass calculator

Dr. Pournelle:

This may interest you for both practical / fiction use; an online calculator for spacecraft volume and mass calculations.

http://www.5596.org/cgi-bin/structure.php

Pete Nofel

"It ain’t fair? Hey pal, ‘fair’ is where you buy funnel cakes."

Pete Nofel

Thanks. Useful

Norman Spinrad publishes rejected Star Trek script via Kindle Store.

<http://www.amazon.com/STAR-TREK-He-Walked-Among-ebook/dp/B007AJZAZY/ref=pd_zg_rss_ms_kstore_digital-text_6>

—-

Roland Dobbins

Subj: Do we need more Solemn Excommunications?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnxJyEF4qLE

Rod Montgomery==monty@starfief.com

Mumbai Attacks

Remember when I said the terrorists in Mumbai spoke a certain Hindu dialect? That made it very hard for me to believe that Muslim terrorists undertook those attacks; later I found evidence of certain outside intelligence agencies. As always, the discouragement fraternity had their baseless insults, accusations, denials, and disagreements. But, once more the truth rises to the top like the cream of the crop:

<.>

An Indian court on Saturday approved a request by prosecutors to charge an American citizen, David Coleman Headley, in connection with the 2008 terrorist attacks here, according to an official with the National Investigation Agency. The decision, which is the first step in seeking an extradition, sets up a possible confrontation between the United States and India.

Mr. Headley has confessed in the United States to playing a major role in the Mumbai attacks, which killed at least 163 people, but he testified against another man tried in the attack to avoid both the death penalty and extradition to India.

The plea deal has angered many Indians, already frustrated by the slow progress in the investigations into the brazen attack that unfolded over three days and shook this city. So far, only one person has been convicted in the case in India: the sole surviving gunman in the attacks, Ajmal Kasab, who has been sentenced to death.

The court on Saturday also approved charges against seven Pakistanis and another man in the United States, Tahawwur Rana. It was Mr. Rana whom Mr. Headley testified against in a United States court. Mr. Rana was eventually acquitted of helping to plot the Mumbai attacks, but he was found guilty of supporting plans to attack a Danish newspaper that published cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.

</>

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/world/asia/india-allows-request-to-charge-us-citizen-in-2008-attacks.html?_r=1

Just because certain intelligence agencies were able to use Hindu operatives to pull this off does not mean the sponsor of those operations was a Hindu sponsor. It is quite possible to convince people to work against their interests, even if you are their greatest enemy. In fact, KGB operations revolve around these deceptions — consider Operation Trest. As time goes on, operations become more complex and this is not an accident. I don’t know why this is a shock to the average person.

—–

Most Respectfully,

Joshua Jordan, KSC

Percussa Resurgo

I have no comment because I have no reliable information.

Justice Ginsburg causes storm dissing the Constitution while abroad <http://dailycaller.com/2012/02/06/justice-ginsburg-causes-storm-dissing-the-constitution-while-abroad/>

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2012/02/06/justice-ginsburg-causes-storm-dissing-the-constitution-while-abroad/#ixzz1mebxY5XE <http://dailycaller.com/2012/02/06/justice-ginsburg-causes-storm-dissing-the-constitution-while-abroad/#ixzz1mebxY5XE>

I missed this completely when it happened, and it’s not what I particularly want to hear from a member of the Supreme Court whose job is ensure this country follows the Constitution. It seems she would be inclined to change to meet her standards.

Tracy

Well, it has always been the fancy that the Supreme Court decides what is the law of the land, but in fact they decided cases, and only those cases that the Congress allows them to decide. (There are some cases in which they have original jurisdiction according to the Constitution, but most cases come to them on appeal, and Congress sets that up.) Jefferson abolished a number of courts when he took office; he did not care for some of the judges Adams had appointed. The relation of the Court to the other two branches of government is more complex than is usually taught in school.

Earmarks and a teaser

By Jerry Pournelle | Feb 23, 2012 - 11:15 pm | Updated: February 23, 2012 - 11:15 pm | View

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View 714 Thursday, February 23, 2012

In Defense of Earmarks

The Constitution gives Congress control of the purse strings. Congress works through a system of committees. It’s not possible for every Member and Senator to be an expert on everything the government spends money on.

Now on the principle of subsidiarity, that should mean that many of the decisions made by Congress ought to be delegated to much lower levels. Left to the states, or even to local school boards and tax districts.

On the other hand, to pursue a strategy of technology – as an example – specific decisions have to be made. In military research and development it is quite possible to have legitimate disagreements on policy. On the other hand, if you don’t have the technology you can’t take certain directions. You can’t build weapons that you don’t know how to build.

At these levels it is quite possible that individual Congressmen have good ideas for development projects that are not favored by the Administration. Much of our military technology has been developed due to funds specifically allocated in authorization and appropriation bills. Then there is service politics: the Air Force will no relinquish any fixed wing air missions, but in fact the Air Force doesn’t like to do close support of the field army, or interdiction and isolation of the battle area. The Air Force doesn’t like Warthogs, and being assigned as a Warthog pilot is generally considered a career ending post. Most of the close support and interdiction missions turn out to be flown by Air National Guard units – and most of the appropriations for the aircraft and weapons needed for those missions has been through legislative direction – i.e. earmarks.

I could give other examples, but I think the point is made. The Constitution specifically gives the Federal Government the right to build post offices and post roads, and in the early days of the Republic there was considerable competition for funding of post offices in various small communities. Log rolling – you vote for my local project and I’ll vote for yours – has been with us since the first Congress. It’s part of the oil that keeps the system running.

Now it’s true enough that Earmark Projects will increase without number if there is no limit placed on them. Part of that is the Iron Law – once something is established there is always a lobby for it, and since everyone pays but few benefit directly you get a force for the appropriation and only a generalized ‘turn them all out!’ opposition. That too is the way the world works.

Earmarks need to be controlled by rules. They should always be open, voted on by the relevant committee, not thrust into the appropriation in the dead of night by an influential Member. They should be debated. But they should not simply be ended. Sometimes individual Congressmen have pet projects that really do benefit all of us. That particularly happens in the sciences, where there would be very little contrarian research and development if the Big Science consensus controlled the appropriations. Earmarks can be for very silly projects, and fund very silly ideas; but they are not really a very large part of the budget, and for every dozen or two pork barrel museums and preservations of the birthplace of some obscure community favorite son, there will be sound research and development that leads to useful technology. The DC/X could be classed as an earmark; and the country is better off for having funded it. It was rammed down the throat of the expendable rocket industry which has no incentive to develop technology for reusable rockets.

I’m in favor of having a brighter spotlight put on earmark appropriations, but it would be a very bad idea simply to eliminate them.

I’m still trying to recover from this upper respiratory things. I think I am recovering – I thought I would be recovered enough to go to my LASFS meeting tonight – but it’s slow. When it came time to go out, I stayed home and watched mindless TV. I’m now trying the zinc stuff: I don’t really believe in it, but I have recommendations from MD readers who say they don’t believe in it either but they’ve seen it work and use it themselves… I took a long nap after lunch and still didn’t feel up to going out. Sable is making it very clear that she is entitled to walks, and why aren’t we doing it>

I’m working on it.

But at least some things get done. I think we have the final version of the latest Niven-Pournelle-Barnes project.