“You’re a legend in your own mind.”
—Clint Eastwood as Dirty Harry in Sudden Impact (1983)
Elon Musk is not just a legend in his mind but for many that uncritically accept his claims. Musk follows the axiom of selling the sizzle not the steak . The difference is that Musk is finding that he can’t deliver and a few folks that he has bewitched are waking from their stupor to find that reality is a cruel thing.
Is Tesla really the future?
Below are some quotes pulled from a New York Post story on Musk and Tesla.
Musk is walking a razor wire, another source says, between the things he’s promising and the things he can actually deliver. Until recently, Tesla investors and employees bought into Musk’s vision, even though Musk was “saying things that don’t make sense, because he’s accomplished so much.”
“He is very difficult to move off his stance,” says the source. “He’ll say, ‘The car can do X, Y or Z,’ And yes, that is possible — two decades from now,” the source said. “He bases his argument on the physically possible rather than the practical reality.”
One insider … says that when Musk tweets about a new functionality or feature, it’s often in response to a fan who has asked when such a thing might be available. Musk, says this source, will often email the tasked department, then tweet back to the fan the date it will be done, no matter how unrealistic the request.
Meanwhile, Tesla’s current great hope, the (relatively) affordably priced Model 3, is having its own issues, as is the sales force responsible for moving them.
On Tuesday, Business Insider reported that although Tesla hit its production goal of 5,000 Model 3s by the end of June, 4,300 of those vehicles required substantial fixes. That’s 14 percent making it through “first pass yield,” or an initial production line that requires no fixes at all.
This Tesla employee isn’t surprised.
“The Model 3s come in [to the showroom] scratched or damaged,” he says. “They don’t fit together properly. If you look at the panels, they’ll be mismatched. They won’t line up.”
On Thursday, Business Insider reported that Wall Street analysts tore apart a Model 3 to find multiple failures, including “inconsistent gaps & flushness throughout the car, missing bolts, loose tolerances, and uneven & misaligned spot welds … The results confirm media reports of quality issues & are disappointing for a $49k car.”
Even as doubts fester within Tesla’s factory walls, few want to believe the trajectory may be downward.
“Elon emails us directly, saying ‘We’re on top, we’re going to prove [everybody] wrong,’” this employee says. “Everyone realizes it’s f–ked up, but everyone’s afraid of losing their job before Tesla ‘hits it big.’ It’s a mess.”
Doubtless you are familiar with the phrase “Crime doesn’t pay” but actually is does; just not much unless you are in elected office.
I came across the latest wage schedule of what prisoners earn per hour when working inside the prison system. When compared to what Apple pays people to make iPhones, these guys are really doing well.
Depending on which report you believe, Apple pays somewhere between five to thirty dollars in manufacturing costs to assemble each phone. The hourly wage is estimated to be about $1.78. The guy in China making $1.78 per hour is probably having to support a wife and their government permitted one child plus all his household expenses.
Note: no recent cost estimates were found, Apple keeps this info under wraps
On the other hand, incarcerated individuals pay no housing costs and get three squares a day. Their income is tax free and used primarily for their own use. They also get free healthcare that is better than whatever you’re getting on the outside. If they had to pay Medicare, Social Security, plus State and Federal taxes, they would have to be paid much more (as a percentage) to clear a dollar an hour in wages.
2018 prison wage schedule
In many cases, taxpayers pick up this slack for guests of the California penal system and pay their families welfare, Obamacare, and other benefits.
I was inspired by the Sith Lord several years ago to consider doing Ancestry DNA and 23 and Me.
(FYI it’s called 23 because you have 46 chromosomes with 23 from each parent.)
The Sith Lord said that each website does it differently and provides different information. I’m still working on getting both done. At a retail price of $99 per test, you really have to want to do it.
In brief the Ancestry test gives you two things:
First, the obligatory breakdown of origins. Where in the world did your ancestors come from? Some of the breakdown is logical but there are some trace outliers that raised a few questions with me. Hopefully 23 and me will address these when I get around to doing their test.
Second, Ancestry provides a list of other people that are related to me in some way. The trick is they don’t say how. It claims that 998 people in their database are my 4th cousins or closer. I know one person in their list but the others, nope.
Ancestry lets you use an online version of Family Tree Maker to try to add information to build-out your family tree. If you haven’t done this before you can really get carried away. Ancestry treats all family trees on their website as containing valid data and relationships. The old saying about garbage in, garbage out applies here.
I have some information about my family history and I still had to correct instances of the same spouse or child appearing on the tree as different people. You can only go back so far before the trail gets cold, unless someone really famous crops-up in the list. I traced my mom’s father back to William the Conqueror in 1066 AD. To get such results you must rely on other people and if one relationship is incorrect then the whole tree turns to nonsense. Ronald Reagan’s “trust but verify” applies to genealogy research too.
I researched a couple of nagging issues from a few years ago and did turn-up new facts while on the website this time around. The main one being a wedding record of my great-great-grandfather. His first wife died three years before the birth of my ancestor and this has always been unexplained until this summer. Since I looked last time, Ancestry has added more records to their database and I was able to answer one of my questions about this period of the family history.
I think its worth doing if you’re curious about genealogy.
The Left is getting all charged up because they think they finally may have the leverage to take-out the President. Sorry but I don’t get it.
Paul Manafort was found guilty of stuff that happened long before he ever went to work for Trump. He was convicted of on 8 of 18 counts. That means the prosecutor threw everything including the kitchen sink at him and less than half stuck. We all know that you only prosecute what you think you can win because almost everything gets plea bargained.
What you have to remember about Trump is that he came into the political world when none of the established campaign consultants were available. His only choices were second and third tier players—bottom feeders if you will. Those with proven track records were already committed to other candidates.
Nobody took him seriously as a candidate. Hiring quality personnel has always been a problem for Trump. Those he knew in the business world were often ill suited for the political world and frankly couldn’t afford the pay-cut even if they could handle it.
Cohen, Manafort, Omarosa, and a host of others have made the Trump campaign and subsequent Administration a revolving door. I knew this would happen and said so many times before he even took the oath of office.
Trump has done nothing criminally wrong. His ethics are not in question either. Trump trusted people to do what they were hired to do but many were deeply morally flawed and gold-diggers. Anything they did illegal is on them. The liberals and many Republicans are hoping for guilt by association that somehow translates into Trump being impeached or resigning.
Drudge Report headline August 22, 2018
Richard Nixon resigned rather than face impeachment; not for committing a crime but for subsequently covering it up to protect his friends and associated. He was guilty of blind loyalty.
Bill Clinton was impeached for lying under oath and nothing happened to him. He and his surrogates attacked— vilified is more like it—his accusers and destroyed them in the public. He just laughed it off and stayed in office.
Trump has had the full power of one and a half political parties plus much of the Obama era appointees gunning for him for three years now. They have unleashed hell on him. Most of what they have done has been based on demonstrably false and phony information but as the old saying goes, why let the truth ruin a good story.
Don’t forget that the backdrop of this is that the unions and Democrats are fighting for their very existence. November is their last shot to change the direction of the government. The amount of money they have been able to spend in the past will no longer be available after this cycle. The Democrat Party is in turmoil. After this cycle, the unions will diminish and the Silicon Valley billionaires will be in a position to take the reins of power. Their Party will never be the same either way but if the existing leadership wants a hand in how the Democrat Party will be remade then they need to have a good showing in November.
So the real story is not that Trump’s existence is at stake, the Democrats are trying to nationalize their fractured party by uniting against the strawman of Trump that they themselves created. Remember that in the weeks ahead as Mueller does whatever he does. Mueller’s goal is the bleed Trump prior to November not to take him out.
Regulations come in many shapes and sizes and from every state in the Union, red states included; however, today I want to take a closer look at the devastating effects these regulations have on businesses.
Let’s take New York City’s famous, 32 oz. soda ban for example. With the stroke of a pen, if you owned a convenience store, you had to immediately remove any cups over 32 oz. from your store effective immediately. In addition to being a small business owner or franchisee, you are now an officer of the City Council. As such, it is your job (via your employees) to see to it no customer purchases a soda over 32 oz. Failure to adhere to this law will result in severe monetary penalties, potential jail time, and probably could lead to you losing your franchise. Government entities know no bounds these days. Never mind the fact you could still buy multiple quantities of 28 oz. drinks and still be in compliance. So much for banning large quantities of soda for human consumption. Also why just ban soda? Have you seen the ingredients list of a bottle of Sunny Delight? Or even some Iced Tea varieties? Those can have as much or more sugar then soda…..yet because orange juice and ice tea seem to be “healthy” they are spared the hammer from Big Government. This type of lunacy encourages folks to work for the government rather than in the private sector. Image having to run a business with all the heartache that causes, but now you must police your clientele and see to it they aren’t drinking too much soda.
The next example takes us to Soviet California where legislators (notice I didn’t just say Democrats, the GOP is complicit as well) devised a ban on single use plastic bags, like the ones you can get at a grocery store. Never minding the fact the company that produced those bags is located in California, they went ahead and banned anyway. So I guess they want to literally ban entire companies from doing business even in the state they call home. The ban passed at the ballot box with just token opposition. Now as a result we have ugly multiple use bags and paper bags that cost $.10 apiece. No one the Blog Father is aware of (I left California a while ago) actually remembers to bring these bags to the store with them which yields additional “revenue” for the stores.
Editor’s note: Grocery stores agreed to join environmentalists to support the ban as long as they got to keep the ten cents per bag and not give it to the State.
Despite efforts by the plastic bag companies, retailers will keep revenue from sales of alternative bags to cover the costs of complying with the ban, as outlined in Proposition 67.
This ban was deemed necessary due to the quantities of these bags that ended up in your “lakes, rivers, streams, and alongside roadways” I call BS on this as I believe this was done simply to make life more difficult on smaller grocery chains and due to the fact the old bags were not biodegradable. I claim it affects the smaller stores the most due to the fact that they now have to renegotiate a contract with a supplier or terminate the agreement and find a new supplier, this is not easy. While a large chain like Wal-Mart, Safeway etc. would not find this very cumbersome. They are systematically killing business in California and this is just another nail in that coffin. Don’t be misled, this is a direct attack on private workers, the goal of the dictator Gavin Newsom is to eliminate all private sector jobs and replace them with government jobs. (Or at the very least government wants to control the means of production including picking winners and losers in the economy.) Get mad at me and don’t believe me if you will but while you are mad, they are taking away your rights and retirement plans! Yes, they are coming for your 401K’s very soon. The State wants to control every aspect of your life from conception to cremation.
Now let’s take a look at all the states that continuously want to raise the minimum wage for workers. This has led to automation. It’s no small error that in Arizona many McDonald’s fast food restaurants are fully automated now, with only 1 or 2 workers in the store. This has led to a full on automation craze that is killing entry level jobs and summer temporary jobs. The hallmark of a fast food or quick service business is to offer food and beverages as cheaply and quickly as possible. Paying every worker $15 an hour (plus government required benefits) no longer plays to the “cheap” aspect of the business so innovators decided they would create a machine to automatically cook in the kitchen and a kiosk to take your order. Again if you do not believe me that’s ok, but remember the TV commercials advertising a dollar menu? The same commercials I see now feature 5 dollar boxes. This is no coincidence. Can you blame the business owner?
The future of fast food
Strangely I feel this is the end game politicians want. They want people working for the government, and they want you comfortable in poverty, as well as be able to control every facet of your life. For example why must a child ride in a car seat until the age of 8? Do we not trust a parent’s ability to simply fasten a seat belt across said child’s lap? Why can’t a child order a soda if they want? We live in the most innovative country on the planet so why is it that a single use bag could not be replaced with a compostable one? Ditto on the new crazy—not being able to ask for a straw law recently enacted.
In summary the nanny state has failed us in several ways, first by banning certain things from our lives; incandescent light bulbs, plastic bags, straws, and soda being just the latest. In some cases these laws actually contradict each other, for example why not just buy two 20 oz. sodas? They banned the Big Gulp but not the smaller gulp. Didn’t California go through a rough drought a couple years ago, I thought they banned water from restaurants unless it was specifically asked for? Now they only want to offer water and milk to a child when they can just go back home and drink all the soda they want? So it’s okay for a child to order an entrée containing 2,000 calories but a soda is not okay? Don’t really get the logic there. By the way I am a supporter of calorie counts existing on a menu as it gives you the chance to re-think your options, not take it away. Regarding those plastic bags, I have heard it from multiple people that take-out places, Home Depot as well as a few other big box retailers still use the single use bags. I guess the rule applies only to evil grocery stores, not everyone else.
Riddle me this: one California law says no water at restaurants while another says only water can be offered
Finally I want to discuss some aspects of our lives that could use regulation, but never will be. I want to give two very concrete examples; tanning beds and smoking. Let’s start with tanning beds, they offer little benefit in the health benefit category, actually zero, and can result in skin cancer issues later in life. Perhaps there is not enough public ire to make politicians act but for health reasons alone tanning beds should be banned. Cigarettes also have zero health benefit, worse yet it is well known they cause cancer and will kill you eventually. Not to mention the fact they litter our streets far more than single use plastic bags and expose people around you to harmful second hand smoke. The reason for this is obvious…tax revenue. Almost 70% of the cost to purchasing cigarettes goes towards taxes, state, local etc. These are two very easy things that could be regulated, but the power of the almighty dollar wins out. Isn’t the real reason pot is legal is to get more tax revenue?
How about this doppelganger of political schizophrenia; the same state that brought you the plastic bag ban and the outlawing of straws, was considering a bill that would keep bars open and serving alcohol until 4 am, thankfully this bill didn’t pass. It is ironic, they want to keep the streets and lakes free of bags and prohibit children from ordering sodas, because, soda causes diabetes, but simultaneously, they want to allow you to hit the bars until 4. So I guess they are okay with you drenching your sorrows and then risking killing yourself or someone else driving home under the influence; but then again, I get it, once again, it’s about government revenue.
PS If no girl’s ugly after 2 AM, what purpose does 4 AM serve?
Here is the legislative language on fines for daring to offer a children’s meal with anything but milk or water.
114379.50. A violation of this chapter is, notwithstanding Section 114395, an infraction, provided, however, that the first violation shall result in a notice of violation. A second violation within a five-year period from the notice of violation shall be punishable by a fine of not more than two hundred fifty dollars ($250). For a third or subsequent violation within a five-year period, the fine shall be not more than five hundred dollars ($500). A restaurant shall not be found to have committed a violation under this chapter more than once during an inspection visit.
Please note that there is no age limit in this bill.
Thus if a senior citizen wants the kids meal then the restaurant must still offer milk or water. Failure to do so is a violation of the law as written.
Also, a change of restaurant ownership or employees during the five year period does not reset the clock for fines.
Some of you want to homeschool your children, some of you make lunch for them instead of eating the ones prepared by union cafeteria workers at the local government school, and some of you even let your children drink with straws.
We all know that children must be kept in baby seats until age eight while traveling in cars because parents can’t be trusted to make them use a seat belt or drive safely because driver safety classes are optional now.
We all know that children are fat because parents are afraid to let their children play outside because they don’t really know their neighbors and many of them are registered on Megan’s List (or should be); plus, due to lawyers, schools have fences around them to keep children out after hours so they can’t get hurt on the playground.
Now the nanny state has put yet another bill on Governor Brown’s desk for approval; this is a bill that requires restaurants to offer only two drink choices to children.
A new state bill would give kids two options with their meals at restaurants—water or milk.
So, suddenly restaurant workers are becoming the most regulated segment of the economy and most are making minimum wage for the privilege of facing this harassment. Think about it, give a person a straw and a waitress can be fined $1,000 and face six months in jail. Now nanny state idiots are on the verge of passing another law that says she could be in trouble if she offers the wrong beverage to a child. I wonder what the fine will be for that shortcoming. If it’s not in the bill now, it certainly will be added at some point in the future.
No soda or else…
Remember, you are only parents because you engaged in a biological act that had unintended consequences and you chose not to abort the product of conception. Until government can agree on a curriculum to license parents, such patchwork responses to childrearing are necessary in an aspiring totalitarian society.
Greetings, if you don’t know me I’m actually a very good cook, as proclaimed by a former professional chef I know. Things took a rare turn this week and I felt the need to blog about it. As a Safeway club card member I received a free offer, or as the Blog Father would say…an offer I couldn’t refuse, for a PF Chang’s frozen dinner for 2 meal for a low, low cost of FREE. Free? Whoa! That’s weird! I perused the aisles and discovered about 8 choices for said free meal, there was a shrimp one (yeah no) an orange chicken one (basically panda express) nope, I finally settled on Mongolian Beef. The bag seemed small, but I returned to my dwelling, opened said bag and into the frying pan it went. Don’t know why it’s called a frying pan when it sits over a burner, but oh well, away I went. I took a gander at the ingredients; and was pleasantly surprised; beef with sweet and savory sauce, onions, string beans, and red bell peppers not a bad combination at all. I immediately recognized the beef, string beans and red bell peppers, I didn’t understand the odd brown blocks that looked like Lego’s. After a few minutes of cooking it all came into focus, the sauce was frozen into the Lego looking bricks.
After about 15 minutes in a “frying pan” again…whoa that’s weird, the meal was ready and transferred to a plate. I was not able to obtain the brown almost bamboo esque plate in the “serving suggestion” on the front of the bag, nor was I able to acquire the fancy looking chopsticks, so a generic white plate, and a small fork were used. All my large forks were in a cleaning device most call a dishwasher.
The meal was actually very good, sauce was great, the string beans and bell peppers had a nice crunch and great taste, the beef was right on point. I would go a solid 7.8 out of 10 on this meal. Again not an everyday staple but an every so often when the girlfriend or wife is gone and I need something quick and easy (other than a hooker) I would buy this one.
My big drawback was the meal is that it’s not big enough for 2, it barely fed me…….Blog Father will collaborate my story I’m an average looking (besides the face for radio) 6 foot 200lb man… and it barely fed me. Which is fine, but the branding of a meal for 2….unless you’re feeding Lindsay Lohan and yourself epic fail. The cost when not free didn’t seem too out of line, $8.99 for the meal. Every so often I see Raley’s advertisements saying $5 on certain Mondays. 310 calories per serving, which means 620 for me, because I ate the whole meal, not complaining, but yeah I would go for it again.
I told you this is coming and here it is. Canada is a few years ahead of California in its moral decline and attacks on
Christianity—although we will pass them up soon.
I have said that the moral stands of Christians will either have to be done away with or that Christian Colleges will not
be allowed money for loans and graduates will not be allowed government jobs. In Canada, they are starting with a key
part of the government education system of denying accreditation if you don’t comply. Please note this has nothing to
do with academic standards or quality of education. This is a bald faced attack on religious freedom.
A Christian university in Canada has decided to eliminate its code of behavior – which had been mandatory – for students after a court ruling that a law society could deny its law-school membership because of the “discrimination” against LGBT students.
The Supreme Court of Canada, in a pair of 7-2 rulings, recent concluded that the law societies of British Columbia and Ontario could refuse accreditation to Trinity Western University’s planned law school because of the community covenant.
As a Christian institution, Trinity Western required students and faculty to abide by biblical boundaries on sexual behavior. The covenant also requires students to abstain from, among other things, fornication, obscene language, harassment, lying, stealing, pornography and drunkenness.
But now the board of governors has reviewed the situation, and issued the following conclusion:
“In furtherance of our desire to maintain TWU as a thriving community of Christian believers that is inclusive of all students wishing to learn from a Christian viewpoint and underlying philosophy, the Community Covenant will no longer be mandatory as of the 2018-19 academic year with respect to admission of students to, or continuation of students at, the university.”
And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.
Paul of Tarsus letter to Romans ~55 AD
In the same vein of attaching Western Culture (Christianity), the state of California is considering purging all laws and regulations of gender pronouns referencing male and female because they offend folks that embrace morally deviant sexual preferences.
Liberals always paint themselves into corners from which they can never extract themselves. As a result, they are forced to embrace logical fallacies, but depending on which proposition they embrace to the exclusion of others, they can accept the same premise and be on opposite sides of other related issues.
Liberals maintain that eating chemically enhanced foods is bad. Thus, they say no GMO’s and growth hormones. Many denounce meat (meat, eggs, milk) as bad either because of chemicals or because they don’t eat food with faces. Many have chosen a vegetarian lifestyle as a result. But for those of us old enough to remember the past (1970’s and Rachel Carson), environmentalists have proven that plants have feelings too. Thus, not to harm any other living creatures, the Liberals are left only with chemicals to consume.
This ladies and gents is circular reasoning on display.
The pop-culture fad of banning plastics is in full swing now. Especially targeted are those identified as “single use.” You can’t get a plastic bag at many retail establishments any more. Now straws are being targeted by these same selfish idiots. Liberals have announced that balloons are next.
Following efforts to limit plastic bags, the push by environmentalists against straws has gained traction in recent months…And the push may bring attention to other items people may not have considered — like festive balloons.
Before I begin my next comments please be aware that I’m expecting Liberals to be logically consistent with their stated positions. This in itself is a fallacy because everything they do is based on feelings and facts; be it based on reason, science, or anything else don’t penetrate their shallow, bumper-sticker mentality. But if it did, the following argument would be even more laughable. (Oh, but they don’t have a sense of humor either.) Anyway, here it goes.
I wish to talk about how banning balloons crashes headlong into other cherished Liberal values. Balloons are made of rubber, often latex. They are being banned because they are a source of litter and hazardous to animals; be they mammals or fishes. The most common type of balloon that I encounter on my walks thru public spaces are those balloons manufactured for one-time use. These balloons are not just an eyesore but a public health hazard.
The balloons that I’m referring too are known by many names; raincoat, rubber, love sock, love glove, erasers, mood killers, etc. I have been in public places where children have found these things on the ground and tried to inflate them with their mouths (much to the horror of their parents.) I can think of few things nastier than finding these things on the ground.
Raincoat—multi-use version
Liberal have tried to make them multi-use but the government won’t let them.
Yes, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has issued an appeal to folks to not wash or otherwise reuse condoms.
“Incorrect use, such as reusing a condom or using more than one at a time, diminishes the protective effect of condoms by leading to condom breakage, slippage, or leakage,” Elizabeth Torrone, an epidemiologist at the CDC’s Division of STD Prevention, told BuzzFeed News.
“You should use the condom in the way the manufacturer has intended and tested,”…
As government certified, single use balloons, using the arguments put forth by Liberals, condoms must be included as part of the forthcoming ban.
Full, Festive, Happy, Single Use Balloons
Now imagine that you’re a young guy in college and are confronted by this issue. Do you side with your environmentalist friends to ban the balloon, thus causing your love life to suffer or do you oppose the ban? If you support the ban, you could suffer the ire of the abortion community and the rainbow people. If you are Liberal, straight, and male will you even be allowed to have an opinion on the issue? Smart money says to hell with all of ‘em and become a Libertarian.
Anyway folks, there you have it, when the rubber meets the road what will Liberals do? Who knows but it will be fun to watch.
