The Smell of Integrity is About All That is Left in America

Remember the history books that told those wonderous tales of how hard our grandparents worked to build railroads, highways, dams, national parks, monuments, and all that cool stuff that's now beginning to crumble?  Yeah.  That was a generation that put the place they lived in above their own personal whiny-assed complaints.  Those days are just about dead and gone.

During a recent discussion, the same thing came up, which elicits the same response from me each time.  It's almost Pavlovian in how it runs the same course like tossing fries out your car window and watching the birds lose their minds attacking the scraps.

It goes something like this:

Person A says, "There's a drought in the West and flooding in the East!"

Me: "We could solve that."

Person A: "How?"

Me:  "The same way your great grandparents would have done:  build a pipeline, putting people to work, fueling the upstream industrial systems like manufacturing, engineering, logistics, banking, food, housing, you name it."

Person A: "That's impossible."

Me:  "If it was oil it would have been done already."

We will send battalions of young men and women into hot, dry shitholes, to spill blood for the sake of oil, yet we dare not consider spilling a drop of sweat to save our own land from drought, crop destruction, fires, flooding, and all that it cascades into beyond that.  Americans are too preoccupied with what the Kardashians are wearing or screwing, and what team traded what contract slave to another team, and what band is putting out a new recording.  And we wonder why people in poor, war-torn places don't like us very much.

Everything now is done for the good of the banks, the corporations, the shareholders.  Fuck the people.  They're disposable commodities that feed the machinery that keeps the cash flowing between places like China, India, Guatemala and the great vacuum bag of consumption called the US of A.

It's like this:  I always try to think of how I would stand in front of my grandfather and explain some issue I'm having a lot of stress over.  Things like petty office politics, irritating people in traffic, annoying TV shows and the latest social network craze.  He would look at like Samuel L. Jackson looked at Brad in Pulp Fiction.  Without saying a word, I'd know he would want to smack the living sissy-ass pettiness off my face.  (He never raised a hand at anyone as far as I know.  But he had a way of making you feel like you deserved to smack yourself for being stupid).

Even our knee-jerk behavior is becoming predictable.  When the ACRA bill was release, and the "news" pundits started their chainsaw jaw-jacking spewage of bullshit editorialized reviews, nobody, and I mean NOBODY, bothered to read the bill itself.  It was (and still is) posted online.  After a week or two of suffering through rednecks arguing with vegans about how it would fix or destroy the American economy, I decided to go download the PDF from the source, and READ IT.  Yes, actually READ IT.  O-M-F-G.  How shocking that someone would bother to read something anymore unless it blabbers on about vampires, zombies or some other stupid worn-out crap.

Someone moaned about that saying "but, it's like 1900 pages or something!"

If that was the latest installment of a Harry Potter or Hunger Games series, people would have snapped it up like raw turkeys at the Florida Alligator Farm (a pretty neat demonstration, by the way).

Instead, most (99.9999%) of "Merkans" tuned into their favorite spoon-feeding, bullshit-manufacturing TV, web or radio outlet to have the ugly details chewed and spit into their brains like momma birds feeding their young.  Never mind that momma removed 90% of the facts and twisted the rest to suit their sponsor's agenda.  They got a Cliff Notes version of it and ran like leaving a gas station without paying.  Turn the key, and start blabbering the same misinformed BS that they just had connected to their brains on the way to work.  RTFM is dead.

Sorry for the sideline diatribe.  Back to the roll-up-yer-sleeves-and-do-some-work-beyoches discussion...

We could be putting our efforts into building the next generation of cross-country (heck, cross-continent) transportation, energy generation, resource allocation management, high-speed Internet connectivity, bridge and tunnel repair/upgrades, and whatever.  You know: Like our ancestors did FOR US.  We could be doing for our kids.  Yet we spend all our time putting some sports team flag or sticker on our shitty trucks and SUV's which are made from 90% foreign parts and consume foreign-supplied oil products, on our way to WalMart and CostCo to buy foreign-made crap, and some fattening food to keep our guts ever-expanding like a Hardees commercial.  I know I sound like an old man (confession, I am), but it's true.  We're now the lazy shitheads our parents hoped we'd never become.

Now it looks like China and the rest of the emerging economic powers will gradually buy us out from under our own noses.  Farms first, then transportation, then shipping terminals, and then all of it.  Sold to the highest bidder, because the shareholders can live anywhere and don't care which team has which players because they can simply buy and trade them around from their yacht.  Meanwhile, nobody notices because we're busy teaching our kids to claim "We're Number One!!!" in between TV shows.

Good luck China!  I hope you get your money's worth out us.

Daily pessimism delivery completed.  Enjoy!

Government = Bad. Right?

I was thinking about Dave Chappelle's discussion about "dressing the part", and how it relates to other parts of American society.  Maybe you recall his skit about "just because you're dressed like a ___, doesn't make you a ___."?  Yeah.  That one.  This may seem very loosely interpreted, but if you think deep enough (or do enough drugs) it might materialize for you.

When people (okay, Americans mostly) draw up "rules" based on limited experiences, they're tossing out babies and bathwater into the wood-chipper at the same time.  After all, when you share a comic that implies "government = evil" you're lumping all of it in one bucket of badness.

Here's a thought: Next time your nearby elementary school is attacked by some nut-job who decides to suit-up and shoot at bystanders, how about you not call the police.  Call some private firm and negotiate the rate over the phone and have them come out and take care of it instead.  Better yet, forget public schools.  Make everyone pay for a private school.  Same for libraries, recreation centers, parks, water services, trash pick-up, traffic management, emergency medical services, fire department, whatever.  Why stop there?  Privatize the entire military, FAA, DOD, FEMA, CDC, FDA and whomever takes it over is free to charge whatever the "market will bear".

• Need to stop some terrorists?  Get the neighborhood together and do a car wash.
• Need to get a house fire extinguished?  Call Joe's Fire Shop.
• Need to negotiate IP rights against China or Korea because they're copying your patents and underselling you? Someone copied your clever trademark?  Call Joe's Law firm.  (after all, he's much more powerful to bargain with tiny little China).
• Monitor air traffic?  Sea ports?  Medical research?
• Gun control?  Pffft. Give EVERYONE a gun.  Wait, did I say "give"? I meant "issue" a gun to everyone, and they can buy their own ammo.  And why place age limits on anything?  That's another "big government" burden.  Driving, drinking, shooting, flying, working.... if you can do it, you're legal.  Hard liquor at 6 years old?  What could be more American!

Give it all to Joe's Do-It-All Services, and they can send you a bill for whatever they feel is fair.  Who's going to argue about their rate?  You?  Ha ha ha.

After all, we really aren't a "United" States at all.  Look at how different the laws are in each state.  Marriage restrictions. Drinking restrictions.  Taxation.  Whatever.  It's really more of a loose federation of territories.  Many states even have their own "militia" as well.  Why bother with a "national" government at all?  Maybe if the folks in Florida and Texas want to send someone to the Moon, they can take up a collection and do it themselves.  I'm sure they collect enough $ to compete with the EU, and all of Asia, after all.

You're probably pissed off at me right now, thinking something like "That Dave guy is sure pro-government."  Am I?  Or maybe you're thinking I'm bashing YOU because I'm assuming you're entirely "anti-government"?  Not really.  What I am saying is that we should all be careful to draw our lines around the things that we are trying to identify.  

As soon as you start bashing an entire thing because one or two parts of it are defective, it immediately makes you a douche-drinking suckhole.  It's the kind of thinking that creates and maintains wonderful American qualities like racism, sexism, ageism, and ism-ism.  Okay, I need to stop that and get back on the wagon here.If one person in one fast food place treats you badly, does that make the entire chain bad?  How about when one of your coworkers (assuming you have a job) acts like an assclown: does that make all of them bad too?

If you stand up during the Pledge of Allegiance, the singing of America The Beautiful, or the National Anthem, then stop and think about what those things really mean. If you "stand up" for something and spend as much time bashing it, your hooking the IV tube up to the douchebag machine and drinking from it.  Actually, no, that makes you a turbe-douche drinker.

If you're not already hearing an ever-increasing background sound track to My Country Tis of Thee by now, you need some coffee.  After all, nothing is more American than coffee.  Especially the $5/cup kind that you stand in line for.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icmRCixQrx8

A Better Way to Choose a Leader

I'm sure I'm not alone in my extreme dislike for the entire political campaign process.  It's devolved into a soup of meaningless marketing noise and useless rhetoric.  The noise level keeps rising, the solutions fade off into the far distance, with little hope in sight of any real answers.

Add to this the pollution of our environment by campaign signs, which serve NO PURPOSE other than distracting our tired eyeballs from more important things (like the vehicle in front of you).  There's also the audio noise on the radio, and audio-visual noise on every TV station and many web sites, and well, I'm ready to puke.

Now comes the "big debate".  Oh boy.  As if having your skin pealed off slowly isn't bad enough, now they want to yank out your fingernails.  Is there no relief?  Is there no end in sight?

I have some ideas to make this a more enjoyable process.  Instead of future debates, maybe we could suggest some alternatives:

The Island of Death

Drop both candidates off on a deserted tropical island.  No supplies, no food, nothing.  The one who survives is the obvious choice.  After all, if they can't save their own life, how can we expect them to save our country's economy?

Foreign Relations Obstacle Course

Each candidate is outfitted with red, white and blue clothing, adorned with U.S. flags and stars, etc.  Then they are dropped into the streets of downtown Jalalabad in the early morning.  Their goal is to make it to the Indian or Afghan border alive, and uninjured by midnight.  If they can negotiate their way out with deft reasoning and shrewd political skill, maybe they have what it takes to negotiate on the world stage after all.

Countdown to Oblivion

Each candidate is outfitted with a locked vest which contains a bomb.  They must convince at least one detainee in Guantanamo Bay to give them the key to unlock it before the time runs out and it detonates.  Again, this will prove their negotiation and arbitration skills to their fullest potential.

Submit a Resume and Interview for the Job

Each candidate must submit a blind resume (no name or identifying information) to a board of reviewers that consists of college professors, police officers, military personnel, school teachers, construction workers, fast food workers, medical technicians, firefighters, garbage collectors, and six random shoppers gathered from the Walmart in downtown Miami at 2:00 AM on a Saturday.  If each reviewer gives their resume a 75%, it then moves on to the Island of Death for final competition.

Crack House

Each candidate must survive for one week, unassisted, in a randomly chosen crack house in an urban American city.  Every minute would be recorded and televised for our entertainment of course.

Wife Swap

Each candidate swaps households, spouses, and families with the other for one week.  Whichever candidate is preferred by their opponent's spouse wins.  In the event of a tie, they're both sent to Countdown to Oblivion.

Qualifying by Experience

All candidates should be required to have worked one full month in at least four of the following jobs, without ANY special assistance or support:

• Eighth Grade Public School Teacher
• Nurse Assistant in a large U.S. inner city public hospital
• Police Officer in Newark, NJ or Los Angeles, CA, night shift only
• Garbage Collector in Camden, NJ
• Fast Food cook at a rural southern town Hardees
• Point man on foot patrol in the Korengal Valley of Afghanistan
• Dock worker in a New Jersey shipping terminal
• An apprentice chef under Gordon Ramsay

Prez-o-dent / schmez-o-dent

I've been working since before I graduated high school. That would be somewhere in the mid/late 1970's. My first paying job was back when Jimmy Carter was president and I'm still a long way from retirement. I've seen a lot of so-called "change" over that time, but I'm still confused by all the talk about how much impact a "new" president has on the American public. I hear a lot of fuss about it. TV ads, radio ads. Coffee room chatter.

Really?

Explain this please?

What impact does a US president really have?  Really.  I mean: seriously. Ok. So he can nominate a Supreme Court justice on occasion, but that's still not an appointment. The nomination has to be vetted and approved by others.

Then there's the talk about Executive Orders. But when you look over the EO history, it's really not that impressive or impactful. There's really nothing sexy there at all, and Executive Orders can be reversed.

So, I am still confused by the focus on how much impact a "new" president really has.

Can they control the economy?  No.
Can they control medical breakthroughs?  Not directly.
Can they control gasoline prices?  No.
Can they control who wins American Idol?  No.

I have to say, in all my years of working, I have never seen, or experienced any meaningful or significant "change" in my job, income, career opportunities, family life or social activities as a direct result of voting in a new president. Never. I didn't see any real change in my life under Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush Jr., or Obama. None. Zero. Zip. Nada. Nil. If you blindfolded me, put me in a time machine back to anywhere from 1976 until now, hid all the calendars, and asked me who the president is, I doubt I would know. Maybe by style and fashion, or tv shows I could guess, but certainly not by any meaningful criteria.

I have seen "change" as a result of overturn in Congress and Senate however. Oh yes. That I have seen. In fact, I have seen more "change" from local city elections than I ever have from a federal election.

Basically, in my humble view, the role of the US president is nothing more than a mouthpiece and figurehead. The news media has done a great job of programming the public into believing that the president can really invoke "change" without others involved.  It's like they have some magic wand, or magic crystal ring.  Sha-zam!  Instant Recession cure.  Instant job creation.  Instant insurance fix.  Instant Gitmo closure.  Instant terrorism fix.  Ho ho ho.  Keep wishing.

It's amazing. It's like we've forgotten everything we learned in elementary school. I shouldn't be surprised.

So. I ask you to do one thing: stop and think about each time you've experienced a change of presidential leadership in America, what exactly did you see "change" in your immediate life as a result? Not in the general public. Not on TV.  Not what your friends, neighbors, coworkers, and relatives blabbered about.  I  mean: in YOUR immediate life. And then, if you can even think of one thing, can you absolutely pin that on the president? Or was it really something that actually came from Congress or the Senate?

Each time I hear an ad that says "what will the first 100 days of a president (dipshit-asswipe) administration be like?" and they start off on listing all the "change" that will happen, I call BULLSHIT. I don't care who that president is. They simply seek to take credit for whatever their cronies in Congress and Senate can push into law. The role has become nothing more than a PR platform.

And in case you're wondering: yes, I have consumed a few beers in the past hour or two. None of which were less than 10% ABV, but it was all for a good cause: Me. ;)

Just another random thought.

Gazoline or Vazoline

Gasoline sounds so American.  Gazoline sounds like a diabolical German scientist in a black-and-white suspense movie.  I'm not an expert on the subject of Petroleum, nor any of its refined downstream products (except for plastic, of which I use daily, har har), but I do play a petroleum expert on TV.  TV in my mind, that is.  This article is going to blow the minds of a few of my colleagues, who know me as anti-oil, but this should prove that I'm objective by nature and always have been.

And if I were a real bonafide expert on post-production petroleum permutations, I would offer the following insights into the aspects of Gasoline and our cultural perspectives upon it.  Myths be damned...

Myth: The indicators of gasoline price change are easy to predict

Wrong.  They don't exist.  What does exist is picking a reason du jour for blaming anything besides profit drive.  The truth is that of all the various excuses used by big oil, none have held up consistently.  Not oil prices, war, regional conflict, weather and natural disasters, political strife, exploration costs, refinement costs, transportation challenges, not even solar flares.

The biggest "oops!" moment came in 2008, when, at the lowest point in our economic collapse, Exxon-Mobil reported their biggest profits in history.  Not biggest revenues mind you, but biggest profits.

This was during the same week that one of the biggest page 2 stories around the nation was the report from NHTSA that highway traffic was at the lowest volume recorded in the previous twenty years.  Higher unemployment and higher gas prices meant fewer people driving around, it was said.  When asked how they could rake in such insanely-high profits, each of the big oil reps gave a completely different answer.  It seemed that they skipped their weekly golf outing and didn't have a chance to synchronize their stories.  In the end, big oil faded into the background without giving a cohesive explanation, the government panel gave up, and ultimately: nobody cared.  The best example of American determination is our short public attention span.

Conclusion: If you want to know why gas prices go up suddenly, just pick any reason, I'm sure it will stick.

Myth: It's unfair that oil companies can raise prices at will

Wrong.  Companies like Exxon/Mobil, Texaco, Chevron, BP, and so on are NOT social agencies.  They do not exist to support the betterment of society nor the noble efforts of the common worker struggling to make it to their office, their kids events, the bowling alley, the bar, and back home again.  They are what's known as A BUSINESS.  A "business" is defined as an entity that exists for the purpose of making profit.  Period.  Don't like it?  Ride a bicycle or buy an electric car.  Oh wait, there's none to choose from locally.  That's because all those years when the tree-huggers you laughed at were warning you that you'd be tied to Gas like Keith Richards to a heroin couch.  You ignored it and kept dumping your cash into big American-sized shit.  Pat yourself on the back.  Good job.

Myth: Oil companies are to blame for SUV's and 4x4 trucks with crappy mileage

This is the same bullshit argument used against Microsoft's supposed monopoly on operating systems.  No one forced you to buy a stupid, over-sized, difficult-to-park SUV.  Your ego forced it.  You had to keep up with your social circles and not be the only soccer mom without a white Escalade, Lexus or Tahoe.  You had complete control over what you purchased.  You chose poorly and now you want to blame the oil companies.  If you drive a Prius and despise the oafish driving habits of half-blind SUV owners, you still can't blame big oil. Blame the peroxide-blonde with the sunglasses on, carrying a toy poodle in to get groomed.

Myth: Government should step in to regulate gasoline prices

As much as my emotional side wants to agree with that, my rational side sees the downside of that.  Where do you draw the line?  What comes after that?  Hamburger prices?  Cable TV?  Condoms?  Chewing gum? Some people would call that a "slippery slope", but I call it a "lubricated slope".

The best solution?  Pursue alternatives.  I'm not saying to talk about alternatives, that does nothing.  Americans are all about talk, rarely taking action.  "Someday I'm going to lose weight"  Yeah.  And Elvis is coming back.  You want to break your weekly dependence on oil?  Buy an electric car, bicycle or just walk, or just STFU.

Myth:  Cutting back on gasoline use will break our dependence on OPEC and foreign oil

Wrong.  Not only does America import more oil from Canada than anyone else, keep in mind that each automobile tire consumes seven (7) gallons of oil to manufacture.  That's just the start. Now consider everything else that requires oil as an ingredient:  paint and coatings, lubricants (oil and grease), and all the massive amounts of plastics used in your car, your home, your phone, your computer, your TV, your glasses, your clothes, your shampoo and toothpaste, your combs and brushes, your appliances, your food packaging, your makeup, and more.

A pure-electric car would still consume a lot of oil to manufacture and still require more oil to keep it running.  We can't stop using oil.  It's as much a part of our lives as water and air.

Also, while a lot of people assume oil generates most of our electric power in the U.S., it doesn't even come close to coal.  Not even in the same ball park.  Coal is king.  Coal producers are not in the big oil game, they have their own game.

Cheers!

Another Rant

It's been a while.  Ok, a few days, whatever. I felt an urge to vent about two things that really bother me.  I was going to say that they piss me the **** off, but then I thought that might be too crass and anti-intellectual.  Whatever.  So anyhow, here they are:

"It's all in God's hands"
"Never give up on your dreams"
"Everyone's good at something"

I'm sorry, but all of these are over-simplified turds of wisdom.  Here's why...

I'm not going to poo-poo anyone's religion.  That's not my place.  I have no right or authority to do that.  But, at what point does something STOP being in God's hands?  If "everything" is in God's hands, then that explicitly means NOTHING is "out" of God's hands.  After all, you can't have something be "Always" and "Never", or "Always" and "Sometimes" at the same time.  That's as impossible as keeping lawyers out of Washington DC.  So, I've made it a small project to ask people who range from non-religious all the way up to uber-religious about this phrase.  My questioning kind of follows Penn's logic, sort of, which is: If you release all your worries by saying everything is in God's hands, then why look before crossing a street?  Why put a seat belt on?  Why take a shower?  Why do anything?  After all, if it's in God's hands, then that means God will take care of EVERYTHING; leaving NOTHING for us to take care of.  So, why even get out of bed?  We should simply sleep all day and wait for God to take care of everything and bring it all to us.  Right?  God will take care of the rent, the food, the electricity, the water, we don't need to take care of anything.  There is a name for people that follow that belief: dead.

But, no one accepts that view.  At least, no one I've met.  So that really means that not "everything" is in God's hands. Some things are left for us to take care of.  But what?  Where is that line?  How do we, as mortals, decide for ourselves what God says is the line?  Is it for us as individuals to decide?  Is it per church?  Per city?  Per state government?  Per nation?  For some it means Cancer is a trip to the hospital, but for others it means staying home and praying, with no medical intervention at all.  For some it means courts of law to settle disputes and infractions, but for others it means prayer, while for others it means stoning to death.  If everything was truly in God's hands, we wouldn't need pastors, ministers, preachers, priests, rabbis, or whatever they call the authorities in other religions.

This nebulous, and mystical "line" divides us from the things that we are to let God handle, but "we" don't have a clear definition or belief of where that line is.  We can't even agree if the line is straight or drawn like a crayon between the toes of a Tourette's patient on Red Bull.  This is the essence of centuries of war (and millions of dollars in profit for lots of big corporations, I might add).  Too many times it's used as a scapegoat or cop-out.  Can't find a job? "It's in Gods hands".  No, it's not.  Go out and look for a job.  Child gets a nasty cut and is losing a lot of blood?  "It's in Gods hands".  No. Take the child to a doctor immediately.  I'm sure there are appropriate uses of the phrase, but it's becoming as overused as politicians saying "I have a plan".

"Never give up on your dream"

Adam Carolla has dissected this little turd on several occasions.  There is a point where dreams are not only to be left at the altar, but ground into dust like a cigarette butt under a steel toe construction boot.  Don't believe me?  Just watch American Idol.  Ask yourself what most of the first round cuts end up doing with their singing career.  That's right: they go back to busing tables, serving burgers and changing oil.  Let's face, if you're 85 and you had a lifelong dream to be a heavyweight boxer, and you hadn't made it yet: It's time to let that go.  Then again, maybe that's your idea of suicide by right-hook, which at 85 might not be so painful and drawn out.

"Everyone's good at something"

No. They. Are. Not.  For most of the human race, this is probably true.  By "most" I'm thinking 80 percent.  But if you've ever been around crack heads, ex-convict drug addicts or watched "To Catch a Predator", you should have confirmed that there are some folks who's only skill is being fertilizer.  No one is good at everything, this is true.  Most of us are good at something and not-so-good at many other things.  But *not* everyone is good at something.  They also have a TV show for people that haven't yet found their true calling, it's called Tosh.O.

Campaign Advertising Template

OPEN: Still-shot of opponent with a grim or clueless expression, panning slowly across view at awkward angle.  Overlay faded images of construction workers, people frustrated with bills, and traffic jams

NARRATOR: "[Opponent] says [he/she] is going to create jobs, but [his/her] plan will actually DESTROY jobs and crash our fragile economy.  [He/She] wants to raise taxes, and send American jobs overseas.  Don't let [him/her] get away with this!  Help us save American jobs and save America.  On [Date], vote for [You]."

DISPLAY:  smash-cut to still shot of candidate smiling and shaking hands with ordinary-looking white folks then ordinary-looking black folks.  smash-cut to video clip of small group discussion with candidate listening intently and nodding in agreement with confident grimace.

NARRATOR2: "This ad was sponsored by [insert PAC tax-avoiding-group-name] and the [Party Name] party."

Now:  Run out and vote.  Remember that since "every vote counts", YOUR vote will count too, and your candidate will win.  If they don't, then your vote didn't count, but that's impossible, so your candidate has to win.

The Candidates

Ladies and gentlemen of the United States of America: Here is your top-shelf list of candidates to lead your country.  This represents the BEST OF THE BEST.  These are the absolute BEST of what we, as a nation, can offer.  There are NO better choices to be had.  If there were, they'd be running (and on the list).  Enjoy!

Candidate	Party	Values
Obama	D	Lead by Committee
Perry	R	Lead by Corporate Dictation
Romney	R	Lead by Hair Gel
Bachman	R	Lead by Xanax
Palin	R	Lead by reality show TV ratings
Santorum	R	Lead by head in toilet
Huntsman	R	Lead by following (way in the back)
Alexander	R	Who?
Paul	R	Lead by avoiding the GOP and Fox
Person	L	Seriously?
Miller	R	Wha?
McMillan	R	Oh come on... Muttonchops??!
Martin	R	Ok, this isn't funny
McCotter	R	I'm not laughing, stop it...
Karger	R	(blank stare)
Johnson	R	(deep sigh, blank stare)
Gingrich	R	(wide-eyed blank stare w/furrough brow)
Cain	R	(cough)
Gary	L	(deep sigh)
Terry	R	(nothing, absolutely nothing at all)
Wrights	L	As if?
Wuensche	R	Are you fucking crazy?!

There it is: your candidates to lead your country into the next four year term.  My prediction is that this is all a sick joke perpetrated by the Taliban.  Ok, I get it. I get it now.  Real funny.  So funny I forgot to laugh.  Each election year I think it can't possibly get worse, and every time I'm proven wrong.

Seriously: We are fucking doomed.

Source: http://2012.presidential-candidates.org/

Nanny State?

Not to toss out any political or philosophical mumbo-jumbo, just PURE FACT for the hell of it.  These are just a few consumer-oriented things that would not exist had it not been for government regulation, introduced by both Democrat and Republican administrations over the past few decades:

• Ingredients listed on food and medical products
• Nutrition labels on food products
• Seat belts in passenger vehicles
• Collapsible steering wheels
• Air bags
• Speed-rated Bumpers on passenger vehicles
• Laminated safety glass windshields
• Licensing of Physicians
• Licensing of aircraft pilots
• Age restriction on buying cigarettes
• Age restriction on buying alcohol
• Age restriction on buying firearms
• Age restriction on buying motorized vehicles
• Age restriction on employment (children labor)
• Food safety inspections at factories and meat packing facilities
• Water safety regulation and inspection
• Inspection of imports at loading docks
• Aircraft flight path registration and tracking
• Removal of Lead from household paint coatings
• Removal of Lead from commercial grade gasoline
• Standardized road sign templates
• The Internet
• Velcro, Freeze-dried foods, LED displays, Zip-Lock technology, scratch-resistant coatings, memory foam, ear thermometers,  (via NASA)
• The Interstate Highway system
• A national currency system (rather than a state-by-state currency system)
• Regulation of radio and wireless transmission frequencies
• Regulation of hunting and fishing
• lot's more

Again - I am NOT saying these are by any means "perfect".  I am only saying most of these "exist" primarily because of government intervention.  In most cases (above), industry resisted these changes, sometimes fiercely.  Whether you agree with their necessity or not, they exist.

Light Rail in Hampton Roads

I took my son to ride the Tide today.  It's only the second day of it's operational debut.  There were some minor hiccups, congested crowds, idiots getting in the way, and so on, but it was worth it.  It was worth every second of waiting in line, boarding and riding it from end to end.

Afterwards, I thought about some of the discussions overhead at the stations and on board.  Many were complaining about what it doesn't do, where it doesn't go, who it doesn't help, and blah blah blah.  It's a start.

But I thought I'd try to respond to some of the views I heard spoke out.

How will it help Virginia Beach residents?

It won't.  They voted to skip out on the offer to join in.  So they don't count.  They have no voice.  They can STFU - or VOTE to change things.  It would help if they showed up at any of the three or four public forums, but only the blue-haired whiners showed up, and ran their mouths against any suggestions to improve traffic congestion.  Why? Because they don't deal with traffic congestion. They stay home, watch TV all day, and get a ride to show up at public forums to bitch about keeping things the way they've been for 50 years.  Progress is evil.

So, none of the other cities wanted to pitch in.  Norfolk decided to go it alone.  They did.  Norfolk has balls.  The other cities do not.  So other city residents have NO rights to complain or even debate what Norfolk decided to do.

Don't like the route?  Tough

Don't like the design? Tough

Don't like the fare system and schedules?  Tough

Why didn't they run it down the center of I-264?

I can't believe I actually heard people argue this in public.  They might as well have yelled out "I'm a complete fucking idiot! Listen to me make a fool of myself!"  Ok, for those folks, here goes:

A. 264 is owned by the State of Virginia, not the City of Norfolk

B. How would stations get access to the rail line and to the adjacent parking areas?  How would that huge "gap" be bridged?  For how much money?  paid for by whom?

C. Who cares.  It's done.  If you can't figure this out on your own, you're just too stupid.

Why didn't they run it on an elevated monorail?

A. Money

B. Lack of Money

C. Norfolk had to go it alone on this

Whatever.  It's a start and I'm excited to see SOMEONE have the balls to try it out after so many decades of being gone from our environment.  Yes, there used to be a public transit rail system in this area back in the day of our grandparents.  But our generation prefers sitting in traffic jams for hours and hours and then coming home late to complain to our family, neighbors, and friends about how bad the traffic is getting.  Yet, when the votes come around they give any alternative a thumbs down.  For you folks: Suck it.

Bullshit Monopolies

Thinking back from the 1990's to now...

Who FORCED anyone to buy Windows over other operating systems?  Did we not have access to buying OS/2, Mac, UNIX (one of a hundred flavors) or Linux?

Who FORCED anyone to buy Office?  Did we not have WordPerfect and later: OpenOffice?  Star Office?

Who FORCED anyone to use IE?  Did we not have Netscape, AOL, Firefox, Opera, Chrome and Safari?

Who FORCED anyone to use Google?  Did we not have Alta Vista, Excite, Lycos, Ask Jeeves, BigFoot, Web Crawler, Yahoo!, AOL and Bing?

Where the hell do these lawyers fish up people to file major law suits claiming they had no choices?  I don't get it.  I see Microsoft is building a consortium to file suit against Google search as being an unfair monopoly.  Wow.  So, apparently they've thrown in the towel on Bing having what it takes to draw customers away from Google.  I especially love it when my "free market" colleagues argue in favor of this practice, effectively admitting that a "free market" can't decide on its own and therefore requires government/legal intervention to correct bad behavior.  My how times have changed.

Made in 'merica

I've lived in the South most of my life.  We can't pronounce shit correctly here.  In fact, we can't pronounce the word "shit" properly.  We say "sheeeit" and usually follow it up with something cerebral like "f-ing A" or "dang rat" (that's "dang right" with a special twang on it).

The news here, and probably in many localities (since they're owned by larger corporate interests, and often cross-load their content to save wasted effort and extra thinking), has been gradually ramping up a series of "news reports" on "Made in America".  The basic aim is to go into a typical house (or trailer, "if yuze from round heeah buoy!") and identify what items are made in America.  I love how the word "news" has become synonymous with running your mouth on TV while wearing a suit in front of a green screen.

This effort is both falsely constructed and stupid as shit in its aim.  Let me explain why.

First off, what is "made"?  Does that mean the rare Earth minerals, timber, gasses and fossil fuels are mined or extracted here?  In a bonafide "state" or a protectorate?  Or does it mean the raw materials are imported (most likely, since U.S. mining is in a state of near comatose stupor now) and are then processed into wholesale commodities for downstream manufacturing?  Or does it mean the wholesale materials are imported and the final products are assembled here?  Is it the diamond coat paint, or the pigment and vehicle in the can or the can itself?  Does that include the paper label?  What about the brushes, handles and fibers?  How about the air brush kit, the compressor, the electric motor, the conductors, brushes, bearings and windings?

Yes.  It's "D" or "All the above".

Retarded, I know.  But that's what they call "fine print" reading.  That covers the falsely constructed aspect I mentioned above.  If you do some research, you will find that the current state of raw mineral mining in the continental United States is dramatically lower than it was in the 1970's.  As of 2010 and into 2011, the vast majority of many raw materials like Copper, Iron, Zinc, Paladium, Tin and Nickel are imported from countries with abundant supplies and vastly cheaper labor.  When I say "vastly" I mean "VASTLY" cheaper. 

A representative from Rio Tinto, one of the largest, if not THE largest of, mining companies on Earth said recently that it would take the United States roughly five years to restore mining output to what it was in the 1970's and the net result would be materials that cost five or ten times as much as they do now.  Have you priced Copper lately?  Are you familiar with what a spool of 200 feet of Copper wire cost in 2000 and what it costs today?  Imagine that increasing again by 5x or 10x.  Not a very practical goal.  Sound familiar?  Ever heard oil company executives talk about domestic drilling costs? (no, I don't count politicians talking shit about it. I only count the official sources).

I haven't lost you yet, have I?  Good.  Stay with me…

So, this "Made in America" crap is dangerously misleading.  It's a twisted, fine-print riddled mess designed to spin up the emotions (and viewer ratings) of people who think NASCAR and competitive eating should be awarded Nobel prizes.  But that's not all.  Now on to the stupid as shit in its aim aspect…

If you can add numbers, just basic numbers, you should be able to pull up some official numbers from government and industry web sites and add them up and realize, eventually, that if we only bought domestically produced products, it would make things worse.  Why?  Because we, as Americans, cannot consume enough goods to keep all our current factories running.  We have to sell some of our goods to other customers: Translation = foreign consumers.  That's right: we do in fact, regardless of what you've been told, still export things for sale in other countries.  Amazing.  I know.

Without the ability to spread our sales across America, Canada, Mexico, South America, Europe, Asia, Australia and the Middle East, a lot of our manufacturing would simply die out.  Any Economics 101 student knows this, but if you don't believe school is any good I suppose that's a meaningless claim.

The story from here on gets more and more complicated obviously.  In order to convince another country to sell your products, they also want an agreement that you sell theirs in your country.  Then it progresses from this to the trend of establishing manufacturing and distribution channels around the world to improve distribution and delivery to all customers, so you build factories and warehouses in other countries, and they build in yours.  That's why there are Toyota and Honda plants in America and we have Nike, Ford and GM plants in Germany and China.

So, when you decide to only buy American products, you may feel good.  But if everyone does that, sales of foreign goods drop in America and foreign trade partners cancel agreements and then American products don't sell outside of America.  Guess who bought most Harley-Davidson motorcycles last year?  Guess who buys most Levi denims and Apple iPad devices?  Here's a hint: "taint 'merica!"

Conclusion

Instead of buying something because it has a label, buy it because of its quality.  Buy the best made products and force the competition to step up.  Pandering to sub-standard shit only keeps them making, and you paying for, shit.  Don't reward shit.

What do these things have in common?

• Curing Cancer
• Building a Bridge
• Building a Company
• Invading a Country
• Sending Humans to the Moon (or other Planets)
• Diving to the Deepest Places under the Ocean
• Climbing the Highest Mountains
• Breaking Speed records
• Graduating College
• Operating to Fix a child's Cleft Pallet
• Feeding a Thousand Homeless people
• Capturing a Terrorist in a remote mountainous region

Give up?  Scroll down...

They cannot happen without a BUDGET

When 1 + 1 = 0

Once upon a time (uh oh, here goes another fairy-ish tale beginning?), there was a state government who, in their quest to cut expenses, decided it was time to outsource their IT operations to a commerical contractor.  Everything about it made sense to the financial folks, who, after all are the brains behind most corporate/government braintrusts.  The reduced benefits structuring costs, the eliminated pensions, the laisse faire employment tenants, all combined with an existing "work-at-will" legal framework, made it a no-brainer.  So the wheels were set in motion.

But there were two major problems this created, which led to yet more problems.

First, the financial golf-player suit guys didn't think it was necessary to involve the IT management folks in their decision-making process.  Technical folks obviously do not possess any useful wisdom for making decisions that impact technical operations.  That domain belongs to the MBA/CPA folks.  So they marched onward and when the plan was catalyzed into full momentum, they generously informed their propellor-capped brethren of their wonderous idea.  The net result of this was a mass exodus of those that were either ready to retired, or possessed the skills and experience to land another job quickly.  The life rafts were left with the lesser skilled and unlucky.  Floating adrift in a void economy as they watched their ship of achievements slowly sink below the rough seas.

Second, with the turmoil of the markets of the time (2007-2008), the chosen contractor was dealing with their own contractions in the Washington D.C. metro area.  Contracts were drying up faster than Joan Rivers' vagina in the desert, and jobs were being cut at a dizzying pace.  Ok, maybe that wasn't nice to say about Joan, but she's not known for being nice to anyone, is she?  And besides: they have medication for that now I'm told.  Ok, moving along…   So, when the last bastion of workforce in the DC area was staring into the abyss, they were calmly told to consider jumping onto the impending state IT contract, or close their eyes and jump, hoping for the best.  Again, those that had the skills and experience to market themselves were off to greener pastures.  The rest were left to consider relocation or sucking on the end of a double-barrel vacation.

The vortex this spun created a combination of the left-behind and the left-behind.  Those motivated by fear with those motivated by fear.  You get the picture.  What sort of "quality" meal might anyone with even an eighth of a functional brain expect to see from such ingredients?  Well, you get this.

To be fair, it's incorrect, inaccurate and illogical to extend the blame of this on other parts of either of these institutions.  The storm is relatively focused and distinct.  It resides in Richmond.  Unfortunately, the ship captains have not yet realized the detrimental impacts this boondoggle has had on their respective marketing efforts.  Their credibility is being picked apart by their competitors, the media, and to some extent the public.  For example, even today (January 2, 1011) the Virginia Dept of Motor Vehicles (DMV) web site is out of commission, as it has been for quite some time.  The reduction in DMV brick-and-mortar locations was pushed by the demand for cost reductions and increased leverage of online services.  Now that these online services are offline, and there are fewer physical locations across the state, the net result is an ugly day at work for many DMV workers.

So, I ask that - whether you are yourself a financial MBA/CPA golfer suit wearing person, or if you know one, that you print out several copies of this article, roll them up into a tight bundled tube, encase it with several turns of duct tape, grip it tightly and beat the living shit out of anyone who says the word "outsource" in a positive tone.  Be sure to follow that up with "and a Happy New Year to you!"

Happy TSA Friday!

Note:  If you look back in not-too-distant history, you'll find plenty of examples where someone ended a safety study into a particular food additive, or a particular experimental drug, giving it a surprisingly unsubstantiated approval, and then suddenly takes a high-profile job within the company making those products.  It's happened at the FDA many times.  It's happened with the FAA, the NIH, the DOE, and it's practically a daily occurrence within the DoD.  And in every case: the news ignores it.  Nobody hears about it. Nobody cares.

And now it happens again with Michael Chertoff, and again: nobody (aside from Ron Paul) seems to care?  We are the dumbest fucking idiots on this planet.  We feed our kids shit that hasn't been thoroughly tested by people only looking to get a new job and bigger salary.  We hand our elderly and our babies medicines which have not been thoroughly tested, or worse: have been proven to cause known problems but are suppressed from public awareness, simply to allow some inspector or director to take a job at the pharmaceutical firm for a big raise.  Wake up!  Stop taking this shit at face value!  You have a brain.  Use it.

It's a Small Small Government World

I've been curious about this whole "smaller government" political rallying that I had to ask just what it means.  It seems to come from Tea Partiers and Republicans mostly.  The Democrats seem to want to spend spend spend, even though the check book is empty. 

The problem I'm seeing is that I can't find two people that agree on what that means.  Some say it means cut back entitlement programs.  But when I ask what those are, all I seem to hear is "you know… entitlement programs".  So, when I toss out some ideas of potential entitlements to chop, I get some that say yes, and some say no.  So to make them all happy (after all, we can make everyone happy at once, right?) I thought I'd compile all of the things to reduce or just eliminate that would (or should) make all of them happy:

• Food Safety programs: FDA, CDC, NIH - just eliminate them entirely
• Social Security: Eliminate it entirely. Old folks should go back to work like the rest of us.
• Public Safety: OSHA, FAA, FBI, FDA, NSF, DOJ, NHTSA, State Dept - eliminate all of them
• Research and Exploration: NOAA, NGS, NASA, CDC, NIH, DARPA - nothing else to explore
• Parks and Recreation: NWS, NPS, NWF - just put everything up for sale and build more factories
• Education: "No mo spendin on dem spoiled rich college kids!"
• Defense: (DoD) / Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines; Coast Guard, CIA, NSA, DIA, FBI
• Energy: NRC, DOE, NSF
• Transportation: NHTSA, NTSB, FAA, DOC
• Regulation: FCC, FAA, DOJ, DOE, NSF, NIH, DOC, SEC

You might ask: "Well, why even have government?"  That's a great question.  I propose we follow the Amish and just tend to the land and goats.  It worked fine for centuries.  We can do just fine again.  Government is just too big and needs to be reduced to nothing.  Think of the money that will save, and no more campaign advertisements.  Awesome!

Want to know if your food is safe?  Have your kids taste it first.

Want to know how far it is to Mars?  Far.  That's how far.

Want to know how to avoid getting some new disease?  Each your vitamins and drink Red Bull (or Mountain Dew if you live Appalachia)

Want to know how to avoid terrorists?  Stay out of desert shitholes.

Want to reduce oil usage?  Stop using all plastic stuff and start walking or riding a horse.

Want to improve travel? Stay home.  Ride a horse to work

Go ahead and laugh, but (seriously now) I've had various people say they'd like to cut or eliminate every single one of these items above.  Given that you have to strive to "serve the public" in order to "serve the public", well, you have to draw an aggregate focus to base your goals on.  So cut it all and we should be just fine.  Right?  Stupid as hell.

Contrasts and Dichotomies

Everyone knows we're still in the depths of a Recession.  Some indicators show improvement, some show worsening, some show no change at all.  The aggregate indicators seem to converge on nothing really changing for anyone but a few small segments of our population (mostly the wealthiest and the poorest).  Here's some interesting juxtaposed figures to make you scratch your head:

Video Game Sales	Way Up	source: Reuters
Movie Box Office Revenue	Way Up	source: IMdB
Housing Prices	Continue to Fall	source: IRS
Commercial Real Estate Leases	Continue to Fall	source: Reuters
Mortgage Rates	Continue to Fall	source: Reuters
Employment	Steady at 10 percent	source: US BLS www.bls.gov
Number of Uninsured Americans	Continues to Rise	source: US CDC
U.S. Military Casualties Rate resulting from major limb damage	Relatively unchanged (since Vietnam conflict)	source: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18176164
U.S. Highway Vehicle Fatalities	Down	source: NHTSA/FARS
Tourism Inbound to U.S	UP	source: US DOC

Doing the numbers so you don't have to.

What's Wrong with Public Education?

This was an e-mail response to one of my brothers recently regarding what is generally thought to be the "problem" with public education and why America is continuing to fall behind the rest of the "developed" world with regards to test scores and aptitude testing.  I would appreciate any thoughts or comments on this.

Well... Having put four kids through public schools in two cities, and working for a city government as well, I have some experience in the challenges of this issue. Parents blame schools. Teachers blame parents. Both of these groups are frustrated by constraints put in place to mitigate legal risk. The rules today are not like those we encountered growing up. Not at all. If you think I'm kidding, just wait until your kid gets bullied in middle school and go meet with the "officials".

The public doesn't want more taxes, let alone alone status quo taxation, yet operating costs continue to rise, so schools cut programs and teach the bare minimum to avoid audit problems from the state and federal agencies. Do less with less. The budget forecast briefing I sat through today was sobering. I may delve into that later.

Government folks distrust school boards, mainly over political differences. Govt folks often have their kids in private schools. No dog in the fight so no concern to affect its outcome. Big business sees no value in public education because of the political, legal, demographic, racial sensitivity issues, and why would they? They're busy leveraging cheaper labor in foreign lands. A higher educated workforce requires higher pay and that's bad. Add to that an exponential increase in process automation and you have inverse diminishing returns with nobody in power giving a shit about tossing any life rings at their expense.

Kids are giving up. Parents are giving up. Schools are struggling. Politicians provide lip service. The media plays all sides to pump up outrage and revenue.

As always, I'm probably going to have this diatribe picked apart under the auspices of inferior educational absorption and substandard intellect. In any case, in my humble simpleton view: the situation as it is, and as it is evolving, is unfixable. Not because we don't possess the means or the desire to "fix" it. But rather, because no two groups (political, racial, demographic, etc.) can agree on what "fix" means. So we just let it slowly unravel. In our rush to appease every single identifiable group we have positioned the system into a standstill. To fix that you would have to reverse a lot of cultural expectations and perceptions built over the past 50 years.

The Virginia Beach Election Erection Eradication

Yes, I said it.  That’s what it means, and I mean what I said.  Our choices on the ballot this year are a “boner killer”.  A cargo ship laden with Viagra pulling a barge filled with bottles of the best wine, poured by a naked and oiled-up Jenna Jameson can’t overcome this level of crap.  Ok, maybe Jenna alone can, but only if she ran on our ballot.

If you don’t live here, that’s fine.  But if you do live here, and you may chuckle (or just shake your head in disbelief) at the sexual innuendo, but the choices this year are desperately lame.  LAME.  L-A-M-E.

Let’s break down the choices:

Platform…	Glenn Nye (D)	Scott Rigell (R)	Kenny Golden (I)
Jobs Stimulation	Beg the Navy to keep JFCOM alive and keep carriers in Norfolk	Same	Same
Address Transportation Congestion	N/A	N/A	N/A
Basic Platform Message	“Keep jobs by keeping the Navy happy”	“Keep jobs by keeping the Navy happy”	“uhh… what those two guys just said.”
Education Spending	Blah blah	Blah blah	Blah blah
Alternative Energy Investment	Blah blah	Blah blah	Blah blah
Qualifying Experience	Ran around with the Marines	Owned a car dealership	Once had hair
Most Significant Accomplishment in the Past Year	A spiffy new web site	A spiffy new web site	A complete piece of fucking shit web site (but a nice new suit)
Personal Distinctions	Young and Nerdy	Old and Nerdy	Wears Hats
Would I trust to Babysit one of my daughters	No	No	“uh, whatever those guys said.”

As a consequence: I have made a FIRM DECISION (unlike any of these pukes) to skip their vote and vote only on the remainder of choices: Virginia State Constitutional Ammendments, City Council Representatives, and School Board.

As for how I’m voting on the other folks: none of your business.  That’s why they have curtains on voting booths.  Right?  Am I right?

Ok, I’ll clue you in: Our region has some of the worst transportation problems I’ve ever seen in the U.S.  Whoever convinces me they are interested in fixing that (and by they, investing in fixing it, thereby investing in jobs, materials, and helping us in the long term by leaving our children in a better situation…) will get my vote.

Peace.

Why “Change” is Almost Impossible

This may be a long-winded post and you may fall asleep before getting half-way.  However, I am fired up and need to vent my puny brain in order to get to sleep.

Let’s just say you were attending a large high school and you were pretty tight with your buds and suddenly you started hearing word about a new student arriving from another school.  This other “new” student spends months posting videos on the Internet, buying TV commercials, and radio spots, all to emphasize that *your* school was full of inept, corrupt, good-ole boys who don’t like change and that this new student was going to single-handedly straighten things out.  Make change.  Get things done.  After months of hearing this, the new student arrives at your school and announces they are running for SCA president.

How would that go over?

Now think about this:  Substitute “school” for “Congress” or “Senate”, and “new student” for “candidate” and what do you have?

This is why things in politics will NEVER change.  Change you can believe in? Sure.  And you can believe in the Tooth Fairy too.  But in reality, politics involves, no scratch that… it CONSISTS ENTIRELY of networking and relationships.  When you see campaign ads where the candidate says things like:

• “It’s time for new thinking in Washington”
• “I will lead the way for change in Washington”
• “Because we need someone to make them listen”
• “I’m going to make them change”
• “I will work to make them change”

What it inevitably turns into is the following chronological progression:

• “I’m going to march into Washington and kick ass”
• “I got to Washington and I’m trying my best to kick ass”
• “I’m on my second week in Congress/Senate and I’m swimming upstream, looking for the right ass to kick, but there’s just sooooo many!”
• “I’m submitting bills but most are getting ignored or shot down by my own party cabinet and committee members.  I’m getting my ass kicked.”
• “I was told if I support my colleague’s bill for a new squirrel zoo in Idaho, he will back my bill for a cat crosswalk downtown. But then I need two more names to get past the first review session and that means I have to agree to add some terms to my bill to get their signatures, which are for a new airport in the middle of nowhere (near the senator’s house), and a school for blind and deaf Lesbian immigrants.”
• “I’m on day 30 and I’m not making much progress, but this really well-dressed lobby guy offered me some tickets to a NFL game this weekend for my whole family.  Good news is that the blind and deaf Lesbian immigrant school will have a crosswalk for their cats!”
• “Well, it’s day 90 and I’ve submitted 24 bills, of which 23 were rejected or buried, and 1 is pending with a review committee when they return from vacation in two months.  But I go on my six-month vacation that same week, so it won’t get voted on until early next year.  But since that’s a mid-term election cycle, half of them may not return so I’ll probably have to start from scratch.”
• “I will not seek re-election.” followed by a quiet exit and a stealth hiring by a major lobbying firm or defense contractor.

Same game, different names.  Always the same.  I saw it with Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush Jr. and now with Obama.  They say the same thing every time they’re asked why they haven’t been able to close the deal on one of their biggest campaign promises: “It’s hard” or “It’s complicated”

Well, no shit.  Golly gosh!

There’s a profound epiphany: politics ain’t easy.  I sure am glad they confirmed that for all us simple folk.

Going back to the high school scenario: Put yourself back in high school just for a minute.  Without the bong and beer cans, ok?  How successful would you have been if you walked in one Monday morning and said something like “ok, everyone, I want you to change the school’s mascot and colors right now!”  (If you could do that, you really should run for a public office).  So what makes everyone put down their cup of brain juice and just accept that a candidate is going to waltz into Washington with spurs, guns and a cowboy hat on and whip things into shape?

They have a term for new elected folks with big egos and big dreams: 

Fresh Meat