Ron Amundson’s Political Blog

McCain Sees Need for More Nuclear Power - WSJ.com
The key words….. “developing domestic capability to manufacture key parts.”

I think in many ways, Nuclear energy could have played a substantial role in energy policy…. but alas, its time has come and gone. In part, due to the regulatory and litigious climate today, the publics view of nuclear disasters,  but on a very practical basis…. I seriously doubt we could manufacture them anymore for a number of reasons…. its not that we lack the technology, certainly manufacturing tech is light years ahead of where it was in 1960, but there are huge problems.

First, every engineer or designer from that era is either at the point of retirement, or long ago did so. Prints only tell a small story when it comes to manufacturing, no matter how well documented they are. It is indeed, the craftsmanship that resides in the assembler, the maintenance tech, the  engineering techs, and the engineers that make the difference, not so much as what is on paper (which of course is what we are led to believe today with all our super cool and whippy high tech tools)

Second, any and all prints from that era, are likely to be in archive status, if indeed they are still around at all. Fragile blueprints, the smell of ammonia, and massive rows of drafting tables have long since fell by the wayside. Even cad systems have a finite lift, and it is indeed likely much of the documentation is either missing, or incorrect, thus leading to a multitude of rabbit trails should a call be made to tool up and crank out parts.

Perhaps most critical is the mindset…. I’ve brought back to life more than a few legacy products over the years, in addition to maintaining some pretty archaic products as well… (yep, I’ve worked off of prints from the 40’s) The mindset of production in the 60’s up to the mid 80’s was totally different. I don’t know how many times I’d send something out for a quote, only to have it come back as we can’t build that, its impossible…. and my response was… no its not impossible, as your company built a bunch of these for us in the past, ie, in 1973, and my records show, the acceptance rate was very high, and there are even file notes saying how impressed the guys were with the quality.

Todays emphasis on lean manufacturing by the least common denominator skill wise, combined with huge reductions in overhead don’t allow for designs with low yields, or processes which require a high degree of supervision, typically by an old grey beard craftsman. Thus, its easy for vendors to no bid, rather than to take risks on huge scrap rates and failures in order to provide a limit quantity of product which meats spec. Then add in huge increases in labor costs since then, and its understandable why things are the way they are today. Yet, if one needs a specific part, understanding a vendors issues doesn’t cut it.

To rebuild the nuclear manufacturing base will require a huge change in mindset, throughout a vendors operation. I would not rule it out as being impossible, but todays climate makes it unlikely, and if possible, the costs would be out of this world.

Imho, a better solution is a focus on technological solutions aligned with what we have, and what we can project into the future, rather than trying to relive the era of 30-50 years ago. Minnesota is primed and ready for such new challenges, the issue is whether the social political climate will embrace  such, or try to revert and live in the past.

Back in my Republican days, I used to enjoy sitting down and talking with Steve Sviggum, who was speaker of the MN house at the time. Sometimes we’d agree, sometimes not, but it was always a blast just to jaw with him. One of the things I remember asking, was whats the deal with all this hate stuff. I remember him saying, they could have huge disagreements on the floor, yet, at the end of the day be willing to go have a beer across party lines etc.

Twenty years ago, when I was involved with the IA state govt (no, not as an elected guy), I found the same thing. We might have substantial disagreements in the meeting sessions, yet, when finished for the day, it was a real blast to sit back and share experiences… many of which ended up being not all that different…. apart from the difference in official pov.

Thus, it does seem to be the case, that in actual political work, hate doesn’t enter the picture all that much, folks ultimately do have to work with one another. Yet, it seems more and more, the MSM likes to focus on the disagreements, and spin such into hate in order to bump up market share, and thus ad revenue. Its somewhat similar on websites…. intense controversy teetering on hate brings up traffic counts, which again helps page rank, SEO, and ultimately ad revenue. (hate in and of itself on the web is a real problem though… just ask any webmaster… there is a fine line not to be crossed, something the MSM doesn’t have to deal with).

The problem is… hate is an insideous thing, and it can propagate from the screen or newspaper into real life fast if left unchecked. These 2 guys got into it, and one ended up in the hospital, and another in jail.

Its great to be passionate about ones candidate or issues, even so far as being vocal, but hate….whoa, thats going too far.

Defense of Democracies Offers to Debate Rep. Walz on Terrorist Surveillance « Defense of Democracies

An interesting, and well versed response and a request for dialog. I think thats a good thing. Certainly I doubt that any person reasonably skilled in this arena believes FISA in and of itself is adequate. Many things have changed over the last 30 years, threats and technology are only two of them.

Yet, the author fails to mention the sunset provisions of the Protect American Act.

(d) Authorizations in Effect- Authorizations for the acquisition of foreign intelligence information pursuant to the amendments made by this Act, and directives issued pursuant to such authorizations, shall remain in effect until their expiration. Such acquisitions shall be governed by the applicable provisions of such amendments and shall not be deemed to constitute electronic surveillance as that term is defined in section 101(f) of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (50 U.S.C. 1801(f)).

Thus, unless someone really dropped the ball, the only gap is the immunity issue… and the last news I heard, is that the phone companies are on board even without immunity as of late last week. Thus, for now, even though the Protect America Act expired, the authorizations remain in force until they expire.

What I find odd though, is that certainly Tim Walz is aware of this, citizenry who follow such arena’s in legislation are aware of this…. and yet the author left it out. Sure, its spin, but to what audience. Certainly not to those who he is likely to dialog with, nor those who have been following such legislation. It likely will serve just to aggravate them, rather than to engage…. And I think wide scale engagement and discussion of the rather complex issues is the key to resolving how best to move forward. Few will sacrifice liberty for safety. Many will be outraged to sacrifice safety for the phone company, or for a 30 year old law. Thus, all parties have very much the same goal in mind, the problem is how to get there. Spin may work forsome, but not very well for the concerned and informed citizen. Tim Walz was right, congress and the executive branch had time to work this out. There is no reason to let things slide. The end goal is too important.

Please bear in mind, I don’t want the phone companies hung out to dry. They appear to have acted in good faith, most certainly last week, and they should not be penalized for it… but more importantly, neither should the general public.

 Defense of Democracy is a new group

And talk about spin city…. but it is free speech.

I appreciated that they included details of their commercial on their website. It actually makes it pretty easy to use as a template to create a counter one. Thus…. here is some proposed audio. If anyone wants to run with it, by all means feel free to use this in any form you like. Kaltura makes for a pretty easy way to put together collaborative video projects.

• (Music ramps up)
• Midnight.
• February 16th.
• The law that lets the phone companies off the hook expires….
• Senate Democrats and Republicans vote overwhelmingly to protect the phone co.
• But the House refuses to vote on H.R.3773 (as amended by the Senate) and instead….
• want to protect the lives of American citizens AND their civil liberties.
• So the phone company looses
• Tell the House of Representatives to do its job and continue to block the Senate’s Terror Surveillance Bill. FISA must be updated based upon todays technology, AND it must also protect the civil liberties of American Citizens.

I’m not anti phone co… well ok, I’m anti alltel, but thats another story entirely. Protecting the phone company from being hung out to dry is a good thing to ensure continued cooperation in grey areas of the law, but it best not be a deciding factor as to whether FISA is updated or not. American lives may be at stake.

I also have even greater respect for Barack Obama, who chose to vote NO when the bill was before the senate. For reference, Hillary did not vote, and John McCain voted for it.

Here is a letter from Barack Obama to one of his constituents. I’ve copied a part of  it here.

On February 12, 2008, the Senate passed S. 2248, making its own reforms to FISA. I am disappointed that S. 2248, if signed into law, will grant an unprecedented level of immunity for telecommunications companies that cooperated with the President’s warrantless wiretapping program. I was proud to cosponsor several amendments, including the Dodd-Feingold amendment to strike the immunity provision, that would have enhanced privacy protections while maintaining the tools to fight terrorism. However, with the defeat of this amendment, telecom companies will not be held accountable even if it could be proven that they clearly and knowingly broke the law and nullified the privacy rights of Americans. I am frustrated by the President’s decision to play politics by threatening to veto any legislation not containing immunity. Why the President continues to try to hold this important legislation captive to that special interest provision defies explanation. The House and Senate must reconcile differences between the two versions of the bill before being signed into law.

The American people understand that new threats require flexible responses to keep them safe, and that our intelligence gathering capability needs to be improved. What they do not want is for the President or the Congress to use these imperatives as a pretext for promoting policies that not only go further than necessary to meet a real threat, but also violate some of the most basic tenets of our democracy. Like most members of Congress, I continue to believe that the essential objective of conducting effective domestic surveillance in the War on Terror can be achieved without discarding our constitutionally protected civil liberties.

And thank you as well to congressman Tim Walz for taking a stand on this.

GovTrack: S. 2433: Text of Legislation

Wow, talk about a ruckus over at FRC. Whats really scary, is I used to contribute to them….

Assuming the figure is $845 billion, and being I have yet to find a GAO analysis, its a big unknown what the real cost will be, I find the outrage more than a bit out of line. If one were to ask a grade school kid, if they would give $1.29 a day to help others in the world who were not so fortunate, the vast majority would probably be for it. Then if you told them that it will help folks who live on under $1/day, even more youngsters would no doubt chime in.

Granted, there are legitimate concerns, there also exists tie-ins to other UN programs, which can raise additional concerns. Yet, the biggest outrage seems to be cost….  It really makes me wonder.

Representative Tim Walz on the Protect America Act

I think its pretty nifty he is taking a stand. Granted, a few years back, I would have said, why argue over retroactive immunity, although I still would have agreed with his oversight objections.

Ultimately though, there was a 6 month sunset provision, and here we are, with a 21 day extension set to expire saturday. The requests of the Democrats are reasonable. Ie they won’t grant immuity on something without knowing what they are granting immunity for. Also, oversight is a must, bearing in mind recent history.

The resistance to these requests on the other hand is a challenge. From a constitutional violations pov, its probably a non-issue, albeit troubling, as it would come down to interpretation, and whether it falls under law enforcment, or wartime provisions. Either way, I expect its not so much an issue of criminal wrong doing, but more so power wrangling between branches and concerned parties.

From a national security point of view….things operate on a need to know basis, and having congress being privey, that could be an issue, and is a resonable concern. Yet… they routinely are briefed in committees, so for the most part, this too is less of an issue.

My guess is, its economics. Data mining technology and the like is very closely held, and all it takes in many cases is a seemingly trivial piece of knowledge to grant competitive advantage. When oversight is added, it can put ecomomic advantages at risk. When immunity is not granted, doors are opened, and apart from civil damages, again a contractors economic advantages can be compromised. Now, one could state that terrorists could use the same or similar issues to find vulnerabilities, and there is some truth in that. Yet… competition, and furtherance of the art in data mining by multiple contractors can be even more effective than a closed monopoly. Ie, it would be better to have terrorists guessing how to deal with 20+ different  approaches from different contractors as contrasted with just 3 or 4.

As far as time frame goes, a compromise should have been possible in within the original time frame ie 6 months,  or certainly within the extension of 21 days. I am not so sure I agree with Nancy Pelosi that another 3 weeks will result in a solution. One of two ways I could see that happening, is if something is already in the works, and the holes now created will force the issue. I hope I am way wrong on that analysis. The other, is that security agencies will scream like no tomorrow with the loss of these tools, and that will force the hand of the executive branch. Its sad it if it has to come to that, but if it does, it does. If anything, it shows change is needed in Washington in many areas.

The bottom line… because the branches could not come to some agreement, the sunset provisions will expire. Private entities are going to become very wary of cooperating without some level of immunity protection, and its likely they will choose to only operate under FISA. Oversight provisions  were not enacted, and thus even if provisions are there to operate outside of FISA for a few more months, its unlikely to happen due to the lack of immunity. The end result, the constitution remains protected, but at the cost of compromised national security.

Ultimately, its the executive branch that chose that path, and whether they chose to do so, due to economic pressures, to cover their tracks,  or for real concerns of national security, the end result, is that its a very sad day, and huge holes are now open.

I am pleased Congressman Walz is taking a stand for the constitution. Its a bold move for sure…. it shows he is a man of ideals. I am not pleased with the actions of my prior party, nor the executive branch. Selling out liberty for safety is not cool. Thank goodness for Congressman Walz and his fellow Democrats.

This should end up being pretty interesting. No doubt, many fought against this bill tooth and nail. Yet, it passed fairly easily, and had quite a number of co-sponsors on all sides. I wonder if perhaps politicians are getting a bit worried…. excluding of course Ted Steven’s and crew. I can see why there would be some level of opposition, as effectively this is dumping info competitors might be very glad to have…. yet, thats a cost of doing business. I think its a very good bill.

http://www.congress.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d109:SN02590:@@@P

The full text of the bill.

http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=109_cong_public_laws&docid=f:publ282.109

It will be interesting to see what happens when that website goes live.

I find the Kennedy-Klobuchar race interesting. Mark Kennedy has some hard hitting ads, but then again, I think they could be counter productive, in that he is showing what Amy Klobuchar is for.

The last ad, where he sits with a little old lady is interesting. He said Amy is for taxing social security, benefits for illegal immigrants, rationing healthcare etc as it they are negatives. Perhaps for some of his constituents they are, but then again, perhaps not.

Taxing social security is double taxation, yet is mandated by current legislation for those over a certain income level. While I don’t think its right on the premise of double taxation, its an easy revenue source, the overhead to do it, is pretty low, and it could probably be made more progressive without too much negativity due to the small number of people affected. I’m not sure if its a good or bad idea… but it certainly is a political one.

Rationing healthcare occurs daily, and I think it is the way of the future. People don’t like to hear it, but anyone on medicare, or any physician can definitely see that they are getting sub par care as soon as the govt is involved. Once you take the economic incentive out of the picture for excellence, entropy ensues, and quality declines. Otoh, the other situation is for people to pay for services as they are able, and this is going to mean a lot of folks would end up with sub par care even worse than under medicare, although excellence would still be available for those with deep pockets. This is not a black and white scenario, and one has to ask what is the extension of human life worth. If its a family member, its worth a lot, if its an additional 20% sales, income tax, and property tax, it seems pretty worthless.

Its a most interesting campaign either way….. I will vote for Mark, because I think he will be effective as contrated with Amy, and not because of his positions, as I tend to disagree with them.

Hmmm, looks like govt on all levels is messing up. First some people went off on the posting of security risks of Air Force One on the internet. Now, if this was a real threat, then I’d be in 100% agreement, it has to go. Otoh, what was posted, at least to anyone with even a little aviation experience was common knowledge. Please note, their was a lot more… but just in case their is some nutcase around, I’m not going to link to the rest of it.

Next was the posting of private information in FL. Talk about an invitation to identity theft. Eg, they post social security numbers, mortgage info, the whole deal. I imagine some sucker could rob people right out from under their noses with all this info. Yet, here is the response from the exec in charge.

Given that public records have been readily available, Baldwin called concerns about posting them online “a tempest in a teapot,” saying “most people’s documents don’t have [sensitive] stuff in them. There are relatively few documents that have that kind of information.”

But of course, the dudes over at digg couldn’t let her get away with that so Need_a_new_Identiy_Download_one_today was dug. And sooner or later, I knew someone would have to post her info. Yep they did, I’ve removed the links, but wow, talk about a great deal for an identity theft. Thats a lot of info.

Sue Baldwin’s (that official) Notary Certificate –

Look, she sold her condo… –

… And bought a house! –

… Don’t forget her Soc. Sec. Number! –

And she has a swimming pool, cool! –

She even paid off her mortgage –

This is not cool!

What a deal… selling out again.

And of course, they just had to add this some foolish over the counter drug sales provision within the patriot act. Gee, is someone really going to make Semtex from Nyquil. Was our congress paying attention in highschool, or were they too busy screwing around and missed chem class. Sure, I know the whole deal is about the so called meth war, but man, get a life, this is national security, and not about some stoner somewhere. Idiots!

On the other hand, I do happen to like section 309.

• `(2) directly or indirectly, corruptly demands, seeks, receives, accepts, or agrees to receive or accept anything of value personally or for any other person or entity in return for–

• • `(A) being influenced in the performance of any official act affecting any secure or restricted area or seaport; and

• • `(B) knowing that such influence will be used to commit, or plan to commit, international or domestic terrorism,

shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 15 years, or both.

On the other hand, if they would have omitted the word and highlight in red, it would have put a lot of politicians in jail over the aforementioned sales of ports. Unfortunately and makes the burden of proof pretty high.

I thought this one was another sell out. Chapter 111A, section 2293

In General- It is a bar to prosecution under this chapter if–

• `(1) the conduct in question occurred within the United States in relation to a labor dispute, and such conduct is prohibited as a felony under the law of the State in which it was committed;

In other words, terrorist are free to do as they please, as long as they join the union. I don’t think our friends at the union are going to be any too pleased with terrorists infiltrating their organization in order to avoid prosecution. Yikes, who writes this stuff anyhow.