Mad Cow

My house backs up to a field by the Virgin River. We were sitting on our back porch this morning watching geese fly in, when we spotted a cow in our neighbor's backyard (also apparently enjoying the geese). We telephoned the cow's human and started the round up. My kids formed a (mostly) brave line of defense between the cow and the sleeping, unsuspecting world beyond the backyard, as I looked for a soft spot in the fencing to get him back in the field. The ("scary, slobbering") cow charged the line, and it held! Well, actually the female part of the line held, as my boy bailed out for dear life.

Crandall Canyon Mine

The hearts of all Utahns go out to the families that are suffering. Many issues must be addressed and many questions must be answered concerning the Crandall Canyon mine disaster. But, the political sideshow should stop; it helps nothing.

UPDATE (later): Ethan disagrees. Fair enough.

Editorial Boards Turn Negative for a Change

The editorial boards for the Deseret News and Tribune didn't like the outcome of the special session. Dang. I was sure they'd give the Legislature a gold star. Maybe next time.

Both editorials stated that one reason the County Council postponed a decision on the district splits issue (a.k.a., "punted") was that a provision in the law needed to be "corrected," allowing all residents of a district to vote on the split, instead of just the voters in the area wanting to split off. Um, no. That issue was debated at length in establishing the law on district splits, a decision was made, and a law was enacted. Like it or dislike it, that is the law.

If the Council thought the law was unfair, rather than punt, it could have voted "no." But taking positions tends to displease some group or other. So, if a governmental entity that represents an extremely small percentage of voters (4% in the Jordan school district) refuses to make a decision, you bet the Legislature will make the call for them. Someone has to govern.

Polar Bears, School Kids, and Priorities

The Salt Lake County Council was tasked with deciding whether a vote should go forward to allow school district splits in SL County. Instead, the Council punted, saying that it could not make that decision unless the Legislature first puts a funding equalization formula in place. No recommendations or suggestions on how that formula should look. Just a punt. “It’s your problem.”

Now, though, predictably, people are complaining that the Legislature is up to no good. This article uses the words “steal . . . draconian cuts . . . tax increase . . . hurried and slipshod politics . . . bad public policy.” Oh my.

Equalization, in general, isn’t rocket science. Money goes into a pool and some areas get more than they previously did and other areas get less. Apparently, though, it is just now occurring to folks that equalization will move money from no-growth areas to high-growth areas.

The richest part of this debate, though, is Salt Lake City residents griping that their money might help educate kids on the west side. The injustice! However, there’s apparently nothing wrong with requiring those west side families to pay for Salt Lake City concerns, like better air conditioning for the polar bears at the Hogle Zoo, under the county-wide ZAP tax, instead of the Salt Lake City property tax.

Kids – polar bears. School buildings for children – air conditioning at the zoo. Hmm. Priorities, priorities.

Oh, ya, speaking of which, we’ll be voting on Henry’s Law, to make animal abuse a felony. This item couldn’t wait until the general session, since part of the bill bans Michael Vick from appearing in any NFL games in Utah.

UPDATE (8/22/07): County-wide sales tax AND property tax for the Salt Lake City zoo. Equalization for bears, yes. Kids, no.

Objection -- Lack of Foundation

Trib Columnist Rebecca Walsh attacks Judge Ted Stewart – saying that he is a magnet for reversal. Walsh lists 3 reversals. Judge Stewart, a Clinton appointee, has been on the bench for 8 years. That’s not many reversals. Does he have more? Is his reversal rate higher than other judges?

We don’t know from reading Walsh’s ad hominem.

What we do know from reading Walsh’s column is that Judge Stewart has a background in Republican politics and that one of his decisions failed to stick it to the Mormon church. And as any reader of Walsh’s rants knows, anyone who is Republican or doesn’t hate the Mormon church is suspect.

Global Warming "Facts"

Nothing lies like facts. As I’ve written regarding education vouchers, it’s proving extremely difficult to get the debate focused on correct financial numbers. And that involves simple accounting.

Take a truly complex scientific issue, like global warming, turn it into a political football, and getting at the truth becomes almost impossible. A few weeks ago, I was taken to task for stating that more research is needed before we draw hard conclusions on human-induced global warming.

Since then, NASA has come to my defense. (I still have a few connections in Houston.). Republished data shows that even the most basic data in this debate, if you want to call it that, have been in error. Though the last decade clearly has been hot, it turns out that it has not been off-the-charts hot, relative to other periods, as previously advertised.

Contrary to previously-accepted fact, 1998 was not the hottest year in at least a millennium. Turns out, it wasn’t the hottest year in the last century. That would be 1934. The actual – revised – facts now show that 5 of the hottest 10 years of the past century preceded World War II.

Do the revised numbers prove that human-induced global warming is a fraud? Nope.

Do the numbers show we shouldn’t worry about reducing carbon dioxide emissions? Nope.

But, the revised numbers absolutely show that people should take a deep breath and give science some room to study various hypotheses regarding this important issue.

Virtual Town Hall

The amazing Ric Cantrell, Mark Allred, and our other great technologists/futurists working with the Legislature are putting together a virtual town hall. Citizens can submit questions and have a legislator respond. This could be cool. If nothing else, it will save our opponents a little time next election cycle on their opposition research.

I get this one a lot, so I'll go ahead and answer: "Why are you (Rep. U.) so good looking?"

Answer: genetics and pilates.

Financial Impact of Vouchers

Rep. Sheryl Allen and I spoke on vouchers at the annual meeting of the National Conference of State Legislatures in Boston. It was a fun exchange. However, based on some of the commentary, I sense that the financial aspects of the voucher program seem particularly difficult for some people to understand.

One attendee gave me the business on the “cost” of vouchers – repeatedly challenging whether Utah could afford vouchers. The cost he cited was over $300 million. “Can Utah afford that?” I explained that the other side of the balance sheet – the savings – was $1.4 billion. To understand the financial impact, the costs AND the savings have to be considered. Thus, if Utah does spend $300 million on vouchers, the savings would be $1.4 billion – thus, a net gain of $1.1 billion, to be spent on students remaining in the system.

Vouchers will make education dollars go further. It’s not magic. It’s basic accounting.

Legislators and union leaders understand these numbers. I wish they, at least, would not perpetuate the myth of costs with no savings. It plays well to the choir, but it misinforms the dialogue. But, people in politics seem to be as honest as constituencies require them to be – and that’s not very much, as long as their heart is in the right place.

Evolution and Public Policy

Because the Utah Legislature has struggled recently on some evolution issues, I thought a tutorial might be helpful.

Organisms have different traits. Some of those traits will be better adapted to certain conditions and situations. Organisms with preferred traits will have a better chance of surviving and reproducing. Offspring inheriting those traits, likewise, will have a better chance of surviving and passing on the genetic trait to their offspring. On and on it goes, until the differences are so pronounced that we have actual speciation – two distinct species.

The opposable thumb made primates the rock stars of the animal kingdom. Once again, the thumb promises to stir things up.

In today’s world, human “fast thumbers” have an advantage over “slow thumbers.” Organizational and productivity tools allow people to do more and do it faster. Unfortunately for “slow thumbers,” the interfaces on those tools are becoming smaller and smaller. Thus, humans with thin, nimble thumbs can operate the tools better – thereby gaining organizational and productivity superiority over humans with beefy, clunky thumbs.

The text messages of fast thumbers come back quicker, with better spelling, suggesting to potential mates superior intellect and, with that, superior chances to provide and nurture. Hence, fast thumbers mate and pass on to their offspring fast-thumbing genes. The offspring, then, are better adapted to and more successful with small interfaces. And on and on. Fair? Probably not. But evolution has no concern for fairness.

Thomas Martel, a 28-year old slow thumber, has spotted the trend. No doubt attempting to improve his chances of biological success, Martel had his thumb bones surgically shaved and his thumb nails and muscles altered to become a fast thumber. Those surgical alterations, of course, are not heritable. Thus, unless Martel confessed to the surgery, potential mates would not know that genetically he is a slow thumber. They, later, would be surprised that their children have beefy, clunky thumbs.

The issue is fraught with legal, ethical and scientific complexities. But, a situation that literally threatens to divide the human species clearly cries out for legislative consideration. A few possibilities include (1) banning iThumb surgery, (2) requiring a registry of iThumb patients, or (3) prohibiting graphic interfaces with keys smaller than some designated point on the surficial thumb index (STI). Needless to say, we’ll need our best minds to work on a solution.

Western Wildfires and Global Warming

The wide-open spaces of the West are rapidly changing from carbon filters to carbon emitters.

Western forests historically have filtered between 20- to 40% of the amount of carbon dioxide produced in the United States. In the 1980s, though, the frequency and severity of fires in the West started to climb precipitously. While fire is a natural and naturally-healthy part of the West, these fires are catastrophically more frequent and hotter than anything nature has previously produced.

Some scientists claim this hyperactive fire cycle is a product of global warming. Others note vegetative causes, like unnaturally high fuel loads (from overly-aggressive fire prevention and proliferation of highly-flammable invasive species). Regardless whether the fires are a product of global warming, a causal contributor to global warming, both (in a feedback loop that might occur during warming trends), or neither – it is a fact that increased western fires currently are pumping tremendous amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

Anyone serious about reducing carbon emissions should take a good look at the health of the West’s wide-open spaces, to see if these unnatural fires can be reduced and a more natural fire cycle reintroduced.

Some context: All gasoline-powered cars in Utah produced 9.4 million metric tons of carbon dioxide in 2005 (latest data I have). In June/July of this year, wildfires in Utah produced 3 million metric tons of carbon dioxide. That I recall, these were mostly grass fires. I make the distinction, because timber fires produce more than 10 times the amount of carbon emissions per acre than grass fires.

Republicans and the Internets

Robert Bluey points out that Republican campaign staffs are outnumbered 3-to-1 compared to Democratic staffs when it comes to new-media types. As a result, Republican campaign efforts on the Internet -- let's say -- struggle.

Robert moderated a panel I was on last spring at the Heritage Foundation's Resources Bank in Philadelphia. I'm sure I said some wonderfully inspiring things during my presentation about Republican online outreach, but it was only in conversations immediately after the presentation that I learned the real reason Republicans struggle. Republican campaign operatives don't use or understand the Internet. They're an older bunch that doesn't have time for it. Too busy cranking out mimeographs, I guess.

Meanwhile, ActBlue alone has raised $25 million for Democrats. That's some juice flowing through the InterTubes.

To lift my sinking spirits, Robert introduced me to David All. First off, David is a force of nature. Second, he gets it. With the help of folks like David, I think Republicans will close the gap. But if they don't want to cede Internet politics to the Democrats in 2008, Republicans have a lot of ground to make up.