well not exactly, but equally ridiculous and SAD.
I am from St. Louis and I often read the local paper to keep up with the Cards and Blues. I read yesterday about a man who was shot and killed in a bar over a dog's weight.
This reads like a joke, but sadly its deadly serious.....a guy walks into a bar and sits down. The guy next to him says he has a 290 lb German Shepard. The new guy at the bar said something to the effect of BS. Later when the BS guy was leaving he put his arm on the other guys shoulder and said hey no hard feelings re the dog. Seems the guy had some hard feelings and pulled his concealed handgun and fired 5 rounds. The first round hit some other guy at the sports bar, the second missed and the 3rd 4th and 5th round hit the guy in the chest and killed him. link to full story below
killed over dogs weight
Now we get to the punch line.....it took the St. Louis DA 3 weeks to decide to charge the shooter. St. Louis has very strong stand your ground laws and concealed carry. Thank you NRA (lots of sarcasm). It took weeks of reviewing video and interviewing other witnesses in the bar to decide whether or not to charge the shooter. Who knows what a jury will decide but there was a point in time not that long ago where justice would have been obvious---when an unarmed man says hey no hard feelings and you shoot and kill him you go to jail. Yea maybe its second degree murder or even manslaughter and not first degree murder but this should be like when you get run into from behind in a car---it's always the person who hits you from behind fault, no discussion.
The moral of this story is vote for life, free speech, and free association. Vote anti-NRA and be able to go to a bar and not worry if the guy next to you is going to start shooting because -----well who knows maybe he is just not having a good day or maybe he really (really, really) cares about his fatso's dog's self image. Its really important that it not be legal to shoot someone because you are afraid.
Important fact of the day---while the NRA keeps its membership secret (warning sign) the best guess is about 5m members. The US population is about 325M. That is about 1.5% of the US population. Come on 98.5% of the US population lets make our voices and pocket books heard.
On the pocket book front, Dick's Sporting Goods has gone way out on a limb and decided not to sell assault style weapons (AR-15s and such) along with some other self imposed limits. Yea. When I need to buy something and they sell it they will get my purchase. And they will need the support, because you can be sure the NRA will go at them with all guns blazing.
Wednesday, February 28, 2018
Friday, February 23, 2018
and on a much lighter note
Most of the time my kids feel like the machine in the princess bride that sucks the life out of our hero.
But sometimes the kids do provide a bit of entertainment that fills me back up with joy and happiness.
My daughter came home yesterday and informed me that she learned in school that in the 18,000s (yes the eighteen thousands) when women were having contractions they would yank on their husband's testicles to mitigate (and share) the pain. I queried the source of this historical tidbit and she assured me that her teacher was quite clear about the testicle pulling during delivery.
Betcha didn't know that.
I am off to steamboat with my history loving daughter this weekend for a bit of hockey and tequila drinking with parents, while my son skis with a friend from Chicago.
Check out the double dog deke
Elsewhere our school district has announced that they are losing another excellent music teacher (two in two years). I know comp was behind one teacher leaving and it wouldn't surprise me if it was the primary driver behind both. SAD.
Of course maybe just maybe we can hire Julie Andrews. She loves the mountains can sing and play guitar and it seems she is killer with a machine pistol.
julie andrews choir audition
But sometimes the kids do provide a bit of entertainment that fills me back up with joy and happiness.
My daughter came home yesterday and informed me that she learned in school that in the 18,000s (yes the eighteen thousands) when women were having contractions they would yank on their husband's testicles to mitigate (and share) the pain. I queried the source of this historical tidbit and she assured me that her teacher was quite clear about the testicle pulling during delivery.
Betcha didn't know that.
I am off to steamboat with my history loving daughter this weekend for a bit of hockey and tequila drinking with parents, while my son skis with a friend from Chicago.
Check out the double dog deke
Elsewhere our school district has announced that they are losing another excellent music teacher (two in two years). I know comp was behind one teacher leaving and it wouldn't surprise me if it was the primary driver behind both. SAD.
Of course maybe just maybe we can hire Julie Andrews. She loves the mountains can sing and play guitar and it seems she is killer with a machine pistol.
julie andrews choir audition
Thursday, February 22, 2018
gone gun crazy
My son will be a freshman at Aspen High School next year, and to get us ready last night there was a meeting about class registration. At the end of the meeting the Principal took questions from the audience and quickly the question of how to protect our kids came up. At about the same time that President Trump was proposing arming teachers and other school employees a parent was asking the same question in Aspen. The Principal didn't seem ready to hand out guns, but did talk about ways to 'harden' the school and improve counseling. Sadly he also seemed to indicate that it was less likely to be an Aspen problem than a front range problem. We have our share of mental health issues in this valley (maybe more than our share) and a whole bunch of guns----we shouldn't think just because we are Aspen we are special---Columbine was a 'nice' area too.
But let's take a quick look at some of these proposal in total and take an honest look at what that means.
1. Arm school employees ----expensive, and do you hire a teacher for their teaching skill or shooting skill. Do more guns reduce gun violence or increase gun violence?
2. Harden schools----single point of entrance and exit. Metal detectors. Armed guards at point of entrance and exit. This is expensive. This is kinda counter to helping our kids grow and mature--we will send them on ex ed programs to experience the world but not let 17 year olds leave campus for lunch? Will we require kids to get to school 30 minutes prior to the start of day to go through metal detectors, and be frisked if necessary.
3. Improve mental health screening and if red flags appear do..............what toss them out of school? We want kids in need to feel safe asking for counseling and support, but if they do how is their privacy maintained? At what point do counselors rat out students with 'issues'. What happens to those kids?
Armed employees, hardened structure, and rats (informants)----does that sound like school or prison?
How many freedoms will we sacrifice at the altar of the second amendment?
But wait, there's more:
The Garfield County Sheriff goes on a rant about liberals and hollywood elites using the MSD shooting to push gun control measures. Some folks thought his post over the top and insensitive (I would be one of those) but he continues to defend his comments. While I don't live in his county so I can't vote for anyone but him in the next election (shit I might run against him) it is a useful reminder of how hardened views are in this country around guns--and dangerously uniformed.
I want to ask Sheriff Vallario if the MSD shooter attacked the school with a fly swatter (or a bat or a rifle that held a single round) how many more people would be alive. If the Vegas shooter had to load a round into a rifle every time after he pulled the trigger how many more people would be alive? When your officers pulled someone over or dealt with a domestic disturbance knew the odds of there being a gun nearby were next to nihl how much better could they do their jobs---how much less stress would they face, how many fewer shootings of citizens by police would there be?
Again how many freedoms will we sacrifice at the altar of the second amendment?
Here is a link to his rant:
garfield county sheriff just the facts
And then some other facts (namely we don't have more crazy in the US just more guns and a lot more gun deaths, or why Americans shoot each other--cause we can)
america and the world and guns
But let's take a quick look at some of these proposal in total and take an honest look at what that means.
1. Arm school employees ----expensive, and do you hire a teacher for their teaching skill or shooting skill. Do more guns reduce gun violence or increase gun violence?
2. Harden schools----single point of entrance and exit. Metal detectors. Armed guards at point of entrance and exit. This is expensive. This is kinda counter to helping our kids grow and mature--we will send them on ex ed programs to experience the world but not let 17 year olds leave campus for lunch? Will we require kids to get to school 30 minutes prior to the start of day to go through metal detectors, and be frisked if necessary.
3. Improve mental health screening and if red flags appear do..............what toss them out of school? We want kids in need to feel safe asking for counseling and support, but if they do how is their privacy maintained? At what point do counselors rat out students with 'issues'. What happens to those kids?
Armed employees, hardened structure, and rats (informants)----does that sound like school or prison?
How many freedoms will we sacrifice at the altar of the second amendment?
But wait, there's more:
The Garfield County Sheriff goes on a rant about liberals and hollywood elites using the MSD shooting to push gun control measures. Some folks thought his post over the top and insensitive (I would be one of those) but he continues to defend his comments. While I don't live in his county so I can't vote for anyone but him in the next election (shit I might run against him) it is a useful reminder of how hardened views are in this country around guns--and dangerously uniformed.
I want to ask Sheriff Vallario if the MSD shooter attacked the school with a fly swatter (or a bat or a rifle that held a single round) how many more people would be alive. If the Vegas shooter had to load a round into a rifle every time after he pulled the trigger how many more people would be alive? When your officers pulled someone over or dealt with a domestic disturbance knew the odds of there being a gun nearby were next to nihl how much better could they do their jobs---how much less stress would they face, how many fewer shootings of citizens by police would there be?
Again how many freedoms will we sacrifice at the altar of the second amendment?
Here is a link to his rant:
garfield county sheriff just the facts
And then some other facts (namely we don't have more crazy in the US just more guns and a lot more gun deaths, or why Americans shoot each other--cause we can)
america and the world and guns
Wednesday, February 21, 2018
reductio ad absurdum
that was my secret to As in Econ in college and some success in the financial markets.
Let's take a couple of examples and reduce to the absurd.
Teacher Pay
Did you know teachers in Aspen get paid about half of what teachers in Lake Forest IL get paid. And they get only about 2/3rds of what teachers in Boulder get paid. And of course you know which area has the higher cost of living. Would you be surprised to know that Aspen has a very high rate of teacher turnover. Reductio ad Absurdum applied to teachers' pay---if you pay Aspen teachers 1$ a year (cause Aspen is such a great place to live and teach) you will have no teachers. If you pay Aspen teachers $1m a year you can employ just about any teacher in the world (but our taxes would be a lot higher--still not as high as Chicago but a lot higher). What is the 'optimal' level of teachers pay---surely more than we are currently paying, because the turnover is high and that is costly.
Taxes
Did you know that most schools in Oklahoma are only in session 4 days a week. They can't afford to pay teachers for 5 days of work so they only open the schools Tuesday-Friday. Did low taxes create enough economic growth to generate enough revenue to provide good education environment---nope. Are new businesses choosing other states cause of the poor schools (and infrastructure ) in OK? Yup---even with the low taxes of OK. Are taxes too low in OK (and KS) --obviously. Reductio ad Absurdum----if the tax rate is zero then there are no public services---no government, no property rights, no infrastructure etc---zero is clearly too low unless you are an anarchist. 100% taxes are clearly too high---no one wants to just work for the man. What is the 'right' top tax rate--it's hard to know for sure but I would guess between 30-50% would still provide incentive to earn money. And the other side to balance in the equation is how much revenue does the government require to provide the services for its citizens to best flourish--the OECD average is 35% while the US is about 26% (and dropping).
Guns---2nd amendment
Reductio ad Absurdum----nothing shall infringe upon the right to bear arms. Arms includes all weapons---muskets to nuclear weapons. Right? That is reducing it to absurd. The gun control 'debate' is the ultimate place to reduce to the absurd because it is absurd. What is the 'right' age to buy an AR-15? Do you realize how absurd things have gotten when you start to have a serious debate about how to harden (secure) schools? Do you really want the government to have a huge database tracking all potential mental issues? Are you ready to give up that much privacy and spend that much money so that individuals can purchase semi auto weapons and handguns? More guns equals more gun deaths. There is a great article in the NYT showing this very clearly. gun deaths--international comparsion .
I propose making all guns illegal except for single shot rifles (no magazines and bolt action but rifles that chamber only a single round) and over under or side by side shotguns. This wouldn't (shouldn't) impact hunters.
Reduce to the absurd --a kid walks into school with a rife and shoots someone---and then has to work the bolt to remove the spent casing and find and load and new bullet with their adrenaline pumping. How long do you think that would take? Long enough for a student or teacher to whack the kid with a chair or disarm them somehow. You betcha. Maybe not after the first round and maybe, just maybe not after the second but I guarantee you that the number of deaths in Newtown CT or Florida would drop a lot.
Reduce to the absurd==a kid walks into school with an AR-15 and starts shooting. Every kid and teacher is armed with a handgun or AR-15. One kid starts firing their gun. Then the good guys start firing theirs. In this absurd situation many more people die.
Here are some Reductio ad absurdum questions the second amendment provokes:
1. What limits on the right to bear arms---semi auto is ok but not full auto. Guns are ok but not cannons. Artillery is ok but not bombs? Bombs ok but not WMDs? When the second amendment was written arms referred to swords, single shot pistols and muskets that had a rate of fire of 2-3 rounds per minute. An AR-15 can fire 90-140 rounds per minute (assuming a 30 round mag). Using the most conservative assumptions an AR-15 is 30x more powerful than a 1790s musket. It's arguably more powerful than a 1790s cannon. Do you think our founding fathers intent was to allow an 18 year old boy to buy 5 cannons from the local arms depot? Absurd.
2. Make schools more secure. With what money? What about the right to carry my gun everywhere. So how does this work exactly---we've got every school employee and student over the age of 18 carrying a gun, do you really honestly think schools are going to be safer.
3. Don't let crazy people buy guns. How can we tell who is crazy? Who makes that determination? How is that information shared? Where does the 4th amendment stack up against the second?
The amount of guns owned in the US is staggering (like 300 million). What is maybe more terrifying is the firepower of those guns has increased massively as well.
More guns + more firepower = more deaths
Anything else is absurd.
Ok enough serious shit--here is an absurd picture of my dogs looking to take the car for a spin.
Let's take a couple of examples and reduce to the absurd.
Teacher Pay
Did you know teachers in Aspen get paid about half of what teachers in Lake Forest IL get paid. And they get only about 2/3rds of what teachers in Boulder get paid. And of course you know which area has the higher cost of living. Would you be surprised to know that Aspen has a very high rate of teacher turnover. Reductio ad Absurdum applied to teachers' pay---if you pay Aspen teachers 1$ a year (cause Aspen is such a great place to live and teach) you will have no teachers. If you pay Aspen teachers $1m a year you can employ just about any teacher in the world (but our taxes would be a lot higher--still not as high as Chicago but a lot higher). What is the 'optimal' level of teachers pay---surely more than we are currently paying, because the turnover is high and that is costly.
Taxes
Did you know that most schools in Oklahoma are only in session 4 days a week. They can't afford to pay teachers for 5 days of work so they only open the schools Tuesday-Friday. Did low taxes create enough economic growth to generate enough revenue to provide good education environment---nope. Are new businesses choosing other states cause of the poor schools (and infrastructure ) in OK? Yup---even with the low taxes of OK. Are taxes too low in OK (and KS) --obviously. Reductio ad Absurdum----if the tax rate is zero then there are no public services---no government, no property rights, no infrastructure etc---zero is clearly too low unless you are an anarchist. 100% taxes are clearly too high---no one wants to just work for the man. What is the 'right' top tax rate--it's hard to know for sure but I would guess between 30-50% would still provide incentive to earn money. And the other side to balance in the equation is how much revenue does the government require to provide the services for its citizens to best flourish--the OECD average is 35% while the US is about 26% (and dropping).
Guns---2nd amendment
Reductio ad Absurdum----nothing shall infringe upon the right to bear arms. Arms includes all weapons---muskets to nuclear weapons. Right? That is reducing it to absurd. The gun control 'debate' is the ultimate place to reduce to the absurd because it is absurd. What is the 'right' age to buy an AR-15? Do you realize how absurd things have gotten when you start to have a serious debate about how to harden (secure) schools? Do you really want the government to have a huge database tracking all potential mental issues? Are you ready to give up that much privacy and spend that much money so that individuals can purchase semi auto weapons and handguns? More guns equals more gun deaths. There is a great article in the NYT showing this very clearly. gun deaths--international comparsion .
I propose making all guns illegal except for single shot rifles (no magazines and bolt action but rifles that chamber only a single round) and over under or side by side shotguns. This wouldn't (shouldn't) impact hunters.
Reduce to the absurd --a kid walks into school with a rife and shoots someone---and then has to work the bolt to remove the spent casing and find and load and new bullet with their adrenaline pumping. How long do you think that would take? Long enough for a student or teacher to whack the kid with a chair or disarm them somehow. You betcha. Maybe not after the first round and maybe, just maybe not after the second but I guarantee you that the number of deaths in Newtown CT or Florida would drop a lot.
Reduce to the absurd==a kid walks into school with an AR-15 and starts shooting. Every kid and teacher is armed with a handgun or AR-15. One kid starts firing their gun. Then the good guys start firing theirs. In this absurd situation many more people die.
Here are some Reductio ad absurdum questions the second amendment provokes:
1. What limits on the right to bear arms---semi auto is ok but not full auto. Guns are ok but not cannons. Artillery is ok but not bombs? Bombs ok but not WMDs? When the second amendment was written arms referred to swords, single shot pistols and muskets that had a rate of fire of 2-3 rounds per minute. An AR-15 can fire 90-140 rounds per minute (assuming a 30 round mag). Using the most conservative assumptions an AR-15 is 30x more powerful than a 1790s musket. It's arguably more powerful than a 1790s cannon. Do you think our founding fathers intent was to allow an 18 year old boy to buy 5 cannons from the local arms depot? Absurd.
2. Make schools more secure. With what money? What about the right to carry my gun everywhere. So how does this work exactly---we've got every school employee and student over the age of 18 carrying a gun, do you really honestly think schools are going to be safer.
3. Don't let crazy people buy guns. How can we tell who is crazy? Who makes that determination? How is that information shared? Where does the 4th amendment stack up against the second?
The amount of guns owned in the US is staggering (like 300 million). What is maybe more terrifying is the firepower of those guns has increased massively as well.
More guns + more firepower = more deaths
Anything else is absurd.
Ok enough serious shit--here is an absurd picture of my dogs looking to take the car for a spin.
Friday, February 9, 2018
and in local news .................
Bloated Dog
Why was there 24 flour torts sitting on our kitchen countertop? I gotta blame the wife. She volunteered (again). This time she is doing food prep for 6th grade ODE (a cross country hut to hut trip). Anyone ever notice that the women seem to volunteer for everything and guys only volunteer for really cool stuff where they get to boss people around and not work hard and maybe get a free Marmont jacket out of it. Thank God for women and someone please stop my wife before she volunteers again.
Drunks vandalize deaf camp--deaf camp wins
There is a camp for deaf kids in old snowmass. They often rent out their cabins to earn some extra money during high occupancy periods --like lets say X Games. The X Gamers came, stayed, got drunk and stoned and broke into the cafeteria and trashed the place (surprising no one). The icing on the puke covered cake was the graffiti that said 'we are not deaf'. So witty. Still stoned and drunk X gamers doing what stoned and drunk X gamers do. The deaf camp however didn't have a decent insurance policy in place nor a large deposit from renters so it looked like they were out about $4k. When this hit the local papers the camp raised about $10k in 3 days. Camp wins. Not only is the damage covered but they raised enough money to cover 3 kids fees for camp. A new form of viral marketing???????
Aspen Real Estate in Full Bubble Terrority
Yes I am a known hater of real estate, so I admit my judgment isn't neutral, but when people are trying to flip homes for 20% in 6 months you gotta wonder. And when my real estate agent says $2k a square foot is the new normal for aspen prices (not in town, not primo house, not fab location just a freaking home) you gotta wonder. And when everyone is rushing to list their home hoping someone pays a stupid price you gotta wonder. And when you can buy the land a build your own home for 1k you just gotta wonder. Or not. I don't wonder, I know its a bubble. Bubbles can go on a long time, and you can make money during them but your entry point in real estate is very important in a volatile market like Aspen's. And speaking of making money in bubbles how many of you bought bitcoin at 1k and sold it at 19k? Yea I thought so.
Snow Report
There is no snow. Well not much snow. I have skied maybe 15 hours this winter. Ski Co is closing lifts and closing restaurants (no dinner at Cloud 9). Our snow pack is like 60% of average. That may not sound bad, but it is. I could get all mathy on you but I won't. Lets just say even skiing right after a 7 in dump (????) Tuesday Am I was hitting rocks and trees and grass. At 9 am in the morning skiing a fresh 7 in I am still hitting rocks. And this is in February. My non local friends are heading to MT and they are wise to do so cause the skiing in Aspen sucks. I'd like to blame Trump and given who they got running the EPA its not a bad idea but honestly it's just too soon to blame Trump for my lack of ski days. Still...............dam orange hair fake breasts chasing tweeting twit.
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