Analyze and Optimize

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Opposite to what democracy is about, the few with billions have disproportionate influence on voting results, and the numbers are staggering. In the 2020 elections the presidential campaigns spending was more than 4 billion dollars and the senate/house campaigns were over 4 billion dollars, totaling an believable amount of 8 billion (with a B) dollars. That’s $8,000,000,000. Source: Fed.gov . Some other sources estimate that the actual numbers were about $14b or even higher. 2022 midterms were almost $4 billion according to the federal site.

In the last few years George Soros himself backed elections with hundreds of millions of dollars, in over eleven hundred installments, including in about 70 local elections of prosecutors across the country, pretty much “installing” them into position with disproportionate campaign financing. Source: Fed.gov

I think I have a better mouse trap that’s pretty simple and will solved or at least vastly improve the situation with this loophole that’s tainting democracy.

• Define a funding threshold for for each campaign type (presidential, senate, local…).
• Any amount contributed over that threshold will split 70% to whomever is was contributed for to, 30% split between all other candidates for that position.
• If any amount remains unused after a campaign is over, the money is donated to predefined charities elected by the senate (same for all candidates).
• ALL contribution sources and amounts MUST become public information AT THE TIME OF THE DONATION.

What are we getting out of the above?

• Funding will be more balanced between candidates.
• Contributors will be more thoughtful of donations.
• Voters have full real-time transparency to who is contributing and how much.
• Budgeting will become more responsible – and maybe campaigns will actually become more about what “I can do for you” than “the other one is bad”.
• Make it harder on foreign entities to influence elections.
• Reduce overall campaign spending.

I also wrote a while ago about my opinion and ideas about elections, but though I also see it as a crucially needed democracy improvement, and it’s got way worse since I wrote it (social media influence, deep fakes), that’s a different topic.

L.

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And that’s all I have to say today.

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So here’s an option that kills CO2 birds with one stone. Well maybe a few stones, but also maybe more than two birds.

1. Start with nuclear power plants. We need a lot of them.
2. Use the clean cheaper energy to produce and increase production of NH3 (ammonia).
3. Use NH3 to fuel current cars.

Yes, there are issues with everything, here are a few, and some answers to those issues.

1. “Nuclear power plants are risky.” Not really anymore. France’s energy is over 70% nuclear. They export energy. They plan to build six to fourteen additional reactors. In the US, nuclear power plants where pretty much stopped because of public opinion and Hollywood disaster movies. Wind and sun can not supply the amount of energy we need. Anything else (other than geothermic energy like in Iceland, which is not feasible, at least for now, in the US – other than maybe in Yellowstone and Hawaii). It also takes time to build nuclear power plants – so it needs an Operation Warp Speed like effort to cut time while maintaining safety. This can power everything.
2. NH3 production, used today mainly as agriculture fertilizer and as a refrigerant, is responsible for about 1% of global energy consumption which is huge, and by that is a huge CO2 emission contributor. Even just switching it to use clean nuclear produced electricity will reduce emission way more than any other effort. The process itself of producing NH3 is environmentally friendly.
3. Existing cars can use 10% of NH3 mixed with 90% gasoline with no modification to the car. With a conversion that will cost few thousand dollars (probably can be reduces to a couple of thousand) the mix can be 90% NH3. There can be incentives and tax breaks, and it’s way cheaper than any electric car – and the CO2 balance is better than electric cars, especially when you don’t have to manufacture new cars to replace existing ones. There is a minor exhaust issues of NOx, but it can be resolved relatively easily (gasoline produces it too), and then we get mostly water and nitrogen, clean and safe. New car design can use engines that are designed specifically for NH3.

There is already a network of NH3 distribution and filling stations, and these can be expended and incorporated into existing gas stations. Way easier than upgrading the electric grid and placing charging stations everywhere, and filling up the tank takes a fraction of the time compared to charging the batteries on an EV.

I know there is more to solve and discuss here, but there are a lot of studies already, NH3 engines were built over a hundred years ago, and NH3 production and distribution is proven and efficient through a hundred years of experience

Sounds to me like a much faster and cleaner solution than electric cars and legacy power plants. Until this is put into motion – we need energy to survive, and currently fusil fuels are the only option, so we better produce them here, and a lot of them, so we can afford to build green solutions. Without low cost energy, we won’t be able to switch to green energy.

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According to the CDC, the Center of Delusion Control and Proliferation, the main symptoms are severe incompetence, lack of managerial skills, hardheadedness, intolerance, childish behavior, lack of willingness to listen to others, pathological lying, ass-covering, misinformation, wokeness, cancel cloture, in some cases can be manifested as extreme low IQ, complete dopiness and even senility. Other symptoms were observed to the level of disbelief. For the full list of symptoms please listen to the news, it’s easy to figure it out if you have half a brain and look at the facts. Or just listen to people talking at the gas pump or the supermarket, it’s very revealing.

But there is hope. According to recent studies, the Pandemic has a good chance to shrink and will be semi-controlled by the end of 2022, with an optimistic prediction of a real improvement by the end of 2024 or early 2025. In good we trust.

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I’m all for the second amendment. My mother is a holocaust survivor and I won’t give up my right to defend myself from anyone including the government. Yep. People felt very safe in the 30’s in Europe, and were killed shortly after by the millions. Having the ability to defend yourself is a way to keep the peace. Switzerland not only allow purchasing of fully automatic weapons (with permit), almost every household has a gun. They also have mandatory army service and reserve. No issue with mass shooting.

Saying that and to my point here – why is it that in order to drive a car you need to train and pass both a written and driving tests, yet in order to buy/use a gun you need no training or qualification at all?

Training and qualification test (safe handling more important than marksmanship) for weapons can serve a few issues – safety, time delay between first weapon request and purchase, and the trainer can raise flags if needed if the person seems “off” in any way (this can be a procedure where if a trainer raises a flag, a second trainer gives a second opinion etc.).

That’s my thought for the day.

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Neither was ever cheap, and the user interface and ease of use, well, gently put, left a lot to be desired. There were also technical issues, and were not always trivial to solve or get a solution for (and I’m pretty damn technical).

But, they were pretty much the de facto standard, and if you want overall for connections with other banks etc. to work, they were the gold standard, even if it was fool’s gold.

It was already annoying that they forced you to upgrade, making online sync/bill pay with banks stop after the software version was 2-3 years old. Annoying, but for about $200 cost for a good version with many features, that could be used for unlimited companies, and good for about three years, reasonable.

This year they discontinued the desktop version altogether. You can’t get a desktop version, the desktop version stops working with banks which renders it useless, and the only option they sell is an subscription based online version.

OK, you might say, if it works, that’s where the world is heading, SAAS is being done for many years now. I’d agree. In principal.

Assuming the online version is the best thing since sliced bread (giving them the benefit of the doubt), I wanted to switch and looked online – information was so partial and confusing that I opened a chat. First part seemed to be automated, fine, then I got to chat with a person (not pronounces can be used safely anymore, so assuming it was someone considering themselves (that was a trap right here) to be human, I’ll refer to it (ouch) as a person). That person was all “awesome” and “great” and “gotcha” and “I’ll find the best discount for you”. So, after half an hour of interrogating me of what I needed, which was really the very minimum, their cheapest and most basic version will do more than I need, that person gave me a price, a monthly subscription, for their best discount ever for my first year! Woohoo! How much you ask? Comes out to be $600/year for that super duper discounted first year, and $1,200/year after that.

Let do a quick calculation, ever with my fabulous discount, to compare it with the desktop version I’ve been using for over two decades. For three years my cost of the online version will be $600+$1,200+$1,200 i.e. Total for three years $3,000 before tax. The last desktop version I purchased on May 13 2019 was $166.73 before tax, had way more features, unlimited companies, and lasted 3 years before they stopped my access to online banking which renders it useless.

So, $3,000 compared to $166.73 for a lesser product. That’s 18 times more expensive. You say, sure, adjust for inflation. Ha, OK, let’s, inflation for the last 3 years, cumulative, was 13% (mostly this year, LGB) so $166.73 is $188.40. Happy? That’s 16 times more. And since inflation is now over 8% annually and rising, I’m sure subscription prices will go up too, and the actual factor will will be more like 20 times more.

So, I’m dropping intuit altogether and will find alternatives. Because Intuit sucks.

SIDE NOTES: There are many other things to not like about Quickbooks and Quicken – it is very unintuitive, they intentionally limit abilities like import and export, customer service is really bad, undoing something is really difficult, etc. etc. … People still use them (accountants especially) as they gained market share at the very beginning and held on to it by locking you into using them – like a gym that is very easy to sign up to, but nearly impossible to cancel your membership. Yep, they suck.

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