My idea of writing blogs about interesting topics is far more difficult than expected. I continue to have “blog worthy” topics aplenty, four or five a day. Sometimes I make notes of them for future reference (and then lose the notes), sometimes I actually start writing them (such as a partially completed one on the topic of what mistakes did the writers of the Constitution make that allow for the current behavior of the President). My unwritten blogs are frustrating to me, but it seems that I would need another “me” to find the time necessary to get to them all. Maybe I make them too long, thereby taking too much time to write – but in reality the topics deserve much more than I give as it is.

Today I am going to attempt a short, and kind of silly, discussion about hair.

The other day I noticed a young lady with a braid reaching down to her butt – I am sure she would sit on it if not careful. On the same day I saw a guy with a big beard reaching to about his belly button. Both of these observations got me to wondering how having such long hair could come about. How could evolution create such an odd state of affairs?

As we all known, humans have several different types of hair – most of which might be better described as “sparse (sometime not so sparse) fur” – hair that only grows to a given length and then stops. While this hair has different characteristics depending upon location on our body, it seems to be self-limiting in length. Arm pit hair, arm hair, chest hair are all different – but limited in length. I am not sure about beards. Beards get quite long, but are usually limited to somewhere between 12 to 36 inches, most commonly about 14 inches. (The longest recorded beard was 18.6 feet long!!) Head hair, however, is quite different.

If left to fend for itself, head hair grows to a length of several feet before it breaks or falls out as the follicle ages. I have seen women with hair dragging behind them on the floor! I am not sure, and couldn’t find a reliable reference, but I suspect our head hair can easily reach to our knees and beyond. I think this is a really odd situation. I am unaware of any other animal having anywhere near this long of hair/fur. Some animals get pretty shaggy looking, but not so much that the hair could become a significant – potentially life threatening – problem.

The only reason that it is manageable for humans is the presence of our highly dexterous hands and clever minds. We make tools to cut our hair, find ways to wrap and tie it out of the way, or create devices to hold our contain it. If we didn’t have our dexterous hands and smart minds we would be severely hampered by our over abundance of head hair. So how does this happen genetically? There are a few animals that are so “over endowed” with sexual displays (primarily birds) that they seriously hampered in their daily lives – it appears that people fall into that category. Perhaps being able to grow so much hair means that that individual is somehow more “fit” than those that can’t.

I don’t have any thoughts to offer about this odd state of affairs other than it seems a rather odd trait to have evolve through the slow process of genetic selection. I wonder how baldness might fit into the picture. Why are we all bald? It seems that generally the story of the development of any given trait can be described in semi-logical terms. The new trait provides an advantage with regard to passing on the gene(s) responsible for that new trait to future generations. What is it about long hair that overshadows the negative repercussions associated with it? It seems that long head hair is only viable in combination with our basic human capabilities – requiring a specific set of characteristics to be a viable option. That means our species acquired a smart enough mind to manage their hair before it could evolve. For example, chimpanzees aren’t smart enough to make the tools necessary to manage long hair, therefore they have short hair. I wonder about our cousins the Neanderthals, did they have long hair too?

Who would have thought that the “American Experiment” was designed to allow the “peaceful” takeover of the Country by an unknown, politically agnostic, megalomaniac foreign dictator?  We all thought that the “founding fathers” had magically created a system of checks and balances, of fair and open elections, of free speech that would automatically bring any dangerous political deviations quickly back to center again.  As long as enough of us believed that – it was true.  However, as soon as enough of us stopped believing in the experiment – it is no longer true.

Rather than being full of checks and balances, protections, and a legal system that made violation of the American dream impossible (and hopefully illegal), we actually built a system without ANY checks and balances.  The founding fathers created, and we perpetuated, the potential for unlimited power and control to any person that had a desire and ability to claim it. 

We are now seeing a totally horrifying, and unexpected, shift of power and control to a narcissistic rich white guy from South Africa who is changing the global balance of power on a whim.  For example, Musk (with Trump’s blessing) just canceled the $40 billion dollar a year USAID program which prevents tens of thousands (perhaps hundreds of thousands of lives) of deaths by starvation – just because he could.  In a post on X Musk said that he had “spent the weekend feeding USAID into the wood chipper. Could gone to some great parties. Did that instead.”

Shutting down USAID in such a dramatic and immediate way will undoubtedly lead directly to the starvation deaths of thousands of people while opening up grand opportunities for China and Russia as they rush into the void to stop the resulting famine – transferring the mantle of being the global leader of humanitarianism in the eyes of the world from America to China and Russia.  Who knows, perhaps North Korea will also volunteer their assistance and get in on the shining new glory that used to belong to America. 

Not only will this abrupt change in global humanitarian assistance result in many horrible deaths, but it is likely to destroy much of America’s agricultural base that has been struggling for the past decades.  The vast majority of the food as well as manufactured and medical products provided in USAID’s  humanitarian assistance programs comes from USA based farmers and industry.  A $40 billion unexpected cut will undoubtedly bring many farmers to their knees.  These cuts will likely result in many bankruptcies leading to an increase in farmer suicide as they are forced out of business, losing their family farms and their feeling of self-respect.  However, foreign farmers and manufacturers can be expected to reap the benefit of the suddenly expanded market as China, Russia and others rush to fill the void.

The pair’s “feeding USAID into the wood chipper” is just the tip of the iceberg.  Musk and Trump are busily dismantling vast swaths of the Federal Government machinery that has traditionally protected us, including protecting us from madmen gaining control of the power and wealth of the County.  The first step was to eliminate the “checks and balances” aspect of the Supreme Court – which Trump accomplished in his first term.  Then all that was needed was to castrate the Legislative Branch of government by threatening them with unleashing the forces of civil war by his throng of fanatical cult followers – the MAGA group.  Legislators in the Southern States are terrified that a full blown American Civil war will rekindle if they go against the wishes of this crowd – as indeed seems likely.  Trump is a master of using extortion by the threat of unleashing his cult to control the leaders of what were secessionist States during the Civil War.     

So here we are, looking down the barrel of a cannon aimed at destroying our County led by an idiot and his dictatorial foreign madman – apparently without our having any way to divert or stop it.  The only force that could stop this would be through the force of unified opinions of Americans – unfortunately,  the expressed “majority” opinion at this time is that it is much more fun to watch the sparks fly with the hope that something “good” might eventually arise from the ashes of their actions.   

God help us all.

Those of you who have been following my blogs know that I keep talking about the ease by which new and existing homes can be modified to achieve a vastly reduced energy “footprint” while improving comfort, at a cost that is much lower than following most existing HVAC (Heating, Ventilation and Cooling) design and installation practices.  No new or exotic technologies or design techniques are required, everything can be implemented using off-the-shelf equipment and well-known design practices.  Unfortunately, installations and retrofits rarely follow known best practices. 

The questions I keep wondering about are: Why are good practices not followed and what changes are necessary to achieve excellent results?  The potential savings to the user (home and small business owners) are far in excess of the costs of the necessary work to achieve them.  Since there is almost always a reduction in the cost following existing (wasteful) practices, there is no “payback” time – correct installations can be achieved at an immediate savings over doing it wrong.  There is no “payback” associated with savings from the cost of doing what would have been done.

My observation is that correct designs are not implemented because there is no one available to do the designs.  Most HVAC contractors are not prepared to do the necessary designs because of a number of reasons.  Foremost is that they don’t have the mind set to do that sort of work.  They do things, they seldom design them.  Sitting down to a computer to create a detailed design is just not in their wheelhouse – they are tradesmen, not engineers.  They learn some “rules of thumb” that always result in systems that have enough power to “work” – their approach results in systems that can heat and cool a house.  Not very efficiently, and probably not very comfortably – but they work.  A second major problem is that designing an efficient home is more than just installing a high SEER HVAC system – it is a “system” problem, including more than just the HVAC unit.  It includes selection of lighting fixtures, appliances, windows, air sealing, ventilation management, insulation, outdoor shading features and many more.  A house is a complex system, one that falls outside of the scope of effort of any one type of subcontractor.  The work falls under the umbrella of a general contractor, but their job isn’t to figure out what to do – it is to do what has been figured out by others.

The third big stumbling block is that there is no place to find a person or firm skilled about designing energy efficient homes and small businesses.  There are engineers, and engineering firms, which do this sort of work for large buildings – but very few doing this design work for smaller buildings (at a fee that is affordable).  It is possible to affordably do this work for small buildings, but most energy engineers prefer to work on the much larger, and more lucrative, multimillion dollar projects.

I have come to the conclusion that in order to change the culture of energy efficiency through the design of new, retrofitted or repaired systems there needs to be a way for building owners to get good designs and advice that they can take to their construction team – rather than the construction team bringing solutions to them.  Currently, if you ask an HVAC contractor to install a new HVAC system, or replace parts of a failed system, they will follow their habitual rules of thumb – that is the only option that most of them have.  They are usually quite willing to follow a design, but don’t have the skills,  available time or desire to be creative.

I have been thinking that perhaps I could create a non-profit business offering design, education and inspection services to building owners, so that they can then use this information to select the necessary contractors.  It seems that perhaps my new firm could offer these services for a reasonable fee, providing detailed design specifications that can be used by contractors during the bidding process. My firm would be totally independent from the contractors to avoid any sort of selection “bias” in the design effort.  Perhaps the government could help fund this sort of effort since it is all for the general good by reducing dependence upon energy, thereby reducing the CO2 and global warming impacts worldwide.  I think governmental assistance could be in the form of loans to the building owners to be paid back by their eventual savings.  Once the process gets underway it might be able to be self-sufficient.  However, to get started will take an investment in the business.  Offices will need to be obtained and equipped, employees will need to be hired and trained (since very few engineers know how to do this work), test equipment will need to be purchased – and the early stages of the high cost of starting a new business funded.

However, the other day a new idea crossed my mind.  Perhaps this work isn’t best performed by an independent entity such as the business that I have been contemplating, perhaps there is already an entity already in place that can do this better , and more efficiently, than I have been contemplating.  Perhaps the utility companies are in a better position to provide this service, for free, to the building owner. 

Perhaps the services necessary for providing design assistance can be funded through the Public Purpose Programs* portion of the power bill.  In California, this charge already funds a wide variety of educational programs aimed at teaching contractors, homeowners, building officials and others the details of how to achieve highly efficient buildings (both residential and large commercial buildings).  They already have the staff, facilities, curriculum, and experience for providing the educational aspects of the process.  The inspection parts are already being done through a combination of efforts by the local building departments and third party “HERS” (Home Energy Rating System) inspectors.  The combination of the building department and the HERS inspections have the capability for ensure that energy installations meet the appropriate design standards.  The California Energy Code (Title 24) already contains the basis for achieving an excellent and efficient home energy system.

The part that is missing is a cost effective means of linking the training, regulations, system designs, installations and inspections to achieve excellent results.  All of the basic parts have been accomplished, but there is nobody in place to tie it all together into a working whole.  Someone needs to engineer solutions – the contractors can’t do it, very few engineering or architectural firms have the capability to do this work, and those that do change so much that it makes the process seem unrealistic. 

A couple of days ago a friend of mine called to ask for advice on how to get a good solution for his upgrade to his old and failing HVAC system.  He is aware that I have experience designing and installing systems for some of our neighbors (I am an engineer and a general contractor), achieving near net-zero energy performance for their older “tract” homes for a cost similar to what local HVAC contractors bid to replace their failing systems with “high efficiency” units that would have resulted in almost no improvement in efficiency.   He knew that I retired a few years ago and therefore not willing to take on his project.  He was asking me for a recommendation for a firm that might do the system level designs that I used to do, thereby minimizing costs while greatly cutting his energy bill.  Having been in the business, and recently hiring an HVAC contractor to install a new HVAC system in a house I am renovating, I realized that I don’t know of any local contractors, engineers or others to do this work.  I couldn’t find anyone for my renovation (and I was just too busy to do it), and I don’t know of any within a hundred miles that might be able to do the work.  I know of a person in the far end of northern California and another in the Sierra Foothills – but that it is.  I suppose there might be few others, but I don’t know how to find them – or trust them. 

My friend knows about what is needed, is hoping for find someone to do that work properly, and is looking for assistance – but isn’t able to do so.  By the way, the contractor I hired did just what I expected – he installed a bunch of equipment that “does the job,” but is far from “optimal” from the efficiency and comfort point of view (and did some major structural damage to my house in the process because he couldn’t recognize what parts of the building structure are necessary and which aren’t.  He cut out some critically important structural elements).

What we both needed was access to an organization that could assess the energy needs of our buildings, offer energy improvement options, and provide a detailed HVAC design that would achieve good energy efficiency.  By the way, the idea of “energy efficiency” in a building is a bit different from what is normally discussed in the engineering world.  It isn’t so much efficiency in the sense of the most amount of energy out for the least amount of energy in.  Rather, it is providing comfort and utility for the least amount of energy in.  Insulation is an example of what I mean.  Good thermal insulation doesn’t exactly improve the efficiency of any equipment, but it does result in a building that maintains comfort with less energy. 

I am currently convinced that the major energy suppliers are in the best position to provide the range of services that I am suggesting.  They have the staff, the knowledge and a funding source.  Perhaps the Public Purpose Program fee will need to be increased a little bit to fund this sort of initiative, but a program such as this could provide an incalculable benefit to the “public” good – locally, nationally and globally.

*The Public Purpose Programs are listed as one of the line item fees on electrical bills.  These fees are used to fund many energy related efforts such as support for low income individuals and many training programs. 

This morning while lazing in bed half asleep thinking about getting up I wondered about the utility of back scratching. It is obviously a universal human enjoyment, as evidenced by the phrase “I’ll scratch your back if you’ll scratch mine.” We all know what that means – if we work together we can both “win.”

As I contemplated the pleasures of having my back scratched I realized that it is a lot more pleasurable than we let on. A nice back scratch is GREAT! Back scratching is much better than having other areas, such as my legs or belly, scratched by my favorite friend – there is nothing like the sublime pleasure of a good scratching of my back. When my back is being scratched newly created itches seem to travel around my back – just begging the scratcher to roam over my entire back. I find myself in complete bliss when it is done properly (and there is a wide range of what I consider “properly”).

So what is up with this? Giving a back scratch seems much more compelling than just being a nice thing to do – it seems more compelling than a nice massage/rub of the same place. It feels powerfully “bonding” in nature, but different than just sexual pleasure.

This makes me wonder if there isn’t something much more; something very primordial, more “primitive,” about this activity. When I think of a troop of baboons, or chimpanzees, the image that first comes to mind is of them sitting or squatting next to each other with one grooming the back of the other. Sure, they are picking (and eating) nits (lice), but I suspect there is there a bigger “reason” than just hygienic sharing.

A quick search of Google found this information, “It has been scientifically proven that touch can reduce stress, lower blood pressure, and improve mood. Back scratches, in particular, activate the C-tactile fibers in our skin, which are responsible for transmitting pleasant sensations to the brain. This activation leads to the release of oxytocin, a hormone associated with bonding and feelings of trust.”

Wow – these are pretty important benefits from such a simple procedure.

I am going to throw out a hypothesis that back scratching is an ancient activity maintained in our genes because it is a critical part of the “glue” that keeps us bonded to our partner, family and “troop.” I predict that if we neglect the extremely important gift of giving each other back scratches (as opposed to just back rubs), we miss out on a major part of our humanity. I suspect back scratching might be as important, or perhaps even more important than the sexual act for maintaining group cohesion.

I know of no research into the topic of the importance of back scratching to maintain strong inter-personal bonding, but I suspect that it is huge just from the level of exquisite enjoyment that I experience. The pleasure seems entirely out of proportion given the simplicity, and innocence, of the activity. Sure, it also feels good to have my head rubbed/scratched. Yep – all parts of my body love to be massaged. But back scratching rises to an entirely different level – I think that it must be very important in some unknown and hidden way. It isn’t just a “back scratch,” I think it may be an important part of the glue that allows humans to live in communities and form stable families.

This is just my wondering why should it feel so darned good? Lots of things feel good, but nothing like a great backrub/scratching session.

Sujata Gupta’s article called “Secrets of Human Navigation” in the January 2025 issue of ScienceNews describes some very interesting research on the subject. Apparently the question of how humans find their way has intrigued, and eluded, scientists for decades. Interestingly, it seems that “getting lost” is a problem usually associated with living in modern cities. City dwellers do pretty well at navigating in cities where the roads form rectangular grids and there are a lot of stationary markers (such as buildings, bridges, etc) – but these folks don’t do so well in locations without roads and clearly identifiable markers. The more a person spends “wandering in the outdoors” the better they are at navigation. Those that live in the wild country don’t even know what it means to be lost.

According to the article, “the Western fear of getting lost is incomprehensible to the Evenki (Northern Russia) hunters.” Valasco and Gleizer reported in a recent study, “When we asked an Evenki hunter what he would do if lost, he looked at us confused and said, ‘Well, I would just find my way.'” So much for getting lost for someone who navigates.

I have read that there are differences between the sexes when it comes to navigation techniques. Apparently, men tend to navigate by dead-reckoning, women tend to use known landmarks. Men travel long distances over unfamiliar territory while women tend to stay closer to home. Perhaps that is related to the “hunter” (men)/”gatherer”(women) sharing of survival skills. While this seems like a plausible distinction, I am unaware of any actual evidence of this distinction. Gupta suggested that people either navigate by following a specific route where they know which way to turn (using landmarks), or by gauging cardinal directions. City dwellers rely more on route strategies while people living in “the wild” rely more on spatial navigation.

I found this article to be fascinating because I often wondered how I navigated when I was an avid hiker/camper/explorer kind of individual. It seemed that I always just knew the way to camp, without needing to know the area or see maps. As a child I was allowed to wonder freely in the hills near my home. From the age of perhaps eight years old I wandered in the densely wooded hills without supervision or any knowledge of where I was going – I was just playing and exploring. My “territory” was quite hilly, and perhaps ten miles in diameter. While it was fairly constrained, it was certainly large enough to get lost in, but that never crossed my mind (and apparently didn’t cross my parent’s either) – although much of the terrain was new to me, I always knew “where” I was in the sense of always knowing where home was in terms of direction and distance. It felt like that was a “fixed” location that I could just naturally return to.

Another example of navigating without landmarks is when I ran a small fishing boat with my father.  He owned an open hull sixteen foot “runabout” outboard boat.  We would start out at dawn, heading out into the Pacific Ocean through thick fog until we were perhaps a few miles off of shore where we hoped the fish were. This part of the California is known for the dense morning fog, so we would often use the compass to find our way for the first mile or two until we were safely away from the shore. I drove and navigated, while my father fished from our very small commercial fishing boat.

My job was to follow a square pattern for a fixed period of time (e.g., thirty minutes – perhaps three miles) on a side until it was time to go home, and then take us back to the harbor. However, this was more difficult than it appeared because the fog eliminated visual clues of direction, and the almost complete lack of knowledge about currents and wind directions made it effectively impossible to know my location at any time. I could use the compass the generally drive toward the four quadrants, but didn’t actually know just how “square” my squares were, or where they were located. At some point my father would decide that fishing was done for the day, and I had to “navigate” back to the narrow harbor entrance – but after several hours there was no way to know which way to go except generally to the east (toward the continent). If I missed and ended up a mile or so north of the harbor we would end up in the breakers and crash on the beach. This stretch of beach was the site of many ship wrecks caused by this miscalculation. In the fog you can’t tell that you are moving into the back side of the breakers until they get so steep and forceful that they become a trap where you can’t get out of again.

As odd as it seems, I never felt “lost” or even concerned. I knew where the entrance to the harbor was, and I knew how to get there through the swells and choppy sea.  I would just turn the boat to the correct direction until we could hear the whistle buoy welcoming our return.  It all just seemed easy and natural – but I also recognized that I had no obvious way of accomplishing this feat.  My father was so unconcerned that he acted as if “of course you know the way home.” There was never a question.

When I was about thirty-five years old I went to Maui in Hawaii for a vacation to visit my parents who were working there.  I borrowed my father’s car to site see and discovered that my “direction finder” didn’t work there.  For the first time in my life I had to depend upon a map to know which way to go. I had to go from known object to known object, like a blind man feeling his way along. It was slightly embarrassing, and almost scary to not know how to know which way to go. 

I was never able to free-form navigate after that trip. I didn’t lose the “feeling” but as likely as not I would go in the exact opposite direction. The feeling is still so strong that I have a very difficult time not believing it. One morning I was driving my client to a meeting in San Jose, California.  The morning was very foggy, dense fog far enough from the ground to be able to drive, but so dense that landmarks and street signs were invisible.  It didn’t bother me, I knew where we were going and “felt” the directions – until we drove up on a slight hill where we could see I had gone east instead of west!  Luckily GPS came into my life so I can get around in my car without being lost. Otherwise I am dependent upon known objects or maps.

About 15 years ago I took a trip to Australia to join an old college buddy on an extended driving “walkabout” bird census trip in the great deserts around Alice Springs. One day we were camping in some “wild country” mountains in the far “outback,” many miles from the nearest town or civilization. We found a small creek where there were a lot of rock carvings leading up a small waterway.  We clambered up the creek from rock to rock to see the next petroglyph. By mid-day it was turning pretty hot, we had no lunch and decided it was time to back to camp – but couldn’t. We had managed to climb up a steep slope that was too dangerous to go back down. So we had little choice but to go the rest of the way to the top where we ended on a large treeless tableland. By this point we had lost all bearings of direction, the sun was directly overhead so of no use for discerning cardinal directions.  We were well and good “lost” in the sense of not knowing where we were or which way to go to get back to camp. Every direction looked the same. So we decided to just walk, which was pretty stupid given that we were probably 100 miles from the next person and nobody knew we were there. We just walked for a couple of hours. We finally came to a bluff, which we managed to slip and slide down to a large waterway, figuring that that would eventually lead to a road where we might find help. At the bottom of the bluff we walked around a big bush and ran smack dab into our car!

The point of all of this is that I suspect human navigation is MUCH more complicated that simply knowing the cardinal directions or remembering paths or even noticing landmarks and known objects. I wonder if there might not be something in us that detects magnetic fields, or perhaps can detect polarized light like some birds and other animals. I wonder if there might not be things that we detect that we can “feel” but don’t really recognize as an obvious experience like those of sight, sound and touch. I don’t know what those things might be, but I do know that my experience of “knowing the way” was quite strong, and for 35 years it worked. Then it didn’t. That seems quite odd in itself. If it was just learned behavior to observe my surroundings, why would that all of a sudden vanish?

In any case, there are many mysteries to life such as the ability to navigate that while are probably open to scientific scrutiny, aren’t as obvious I they first appear to be. I keep my eyes open for research that hints of senses beyond those that we are so familiar to us. 

I am back on my worry about making houses and small buildings more energy efficient as relatively easy and cost effective means of improving decreasing green house gases and reducing our dependence upon non-renewable energy sources. I consider it a vital step toward “saving the world” from ourselves.

Actually, I am not wanting to make these buildings more energy efficient, I want to make them net producers of pollution free energy – and I want to do that “for free,” with no extra cost to the homeowner, the utilities or the government. Of course it can’t actually be “free” in the sense of not costing any money (new equipment costs money), it is free in the sense of costing less than the alternatives that would have been done. Thus if you were going to spend say, $10,000 to fix an equipment problem without improving energy use, and it only costs $8,000 to fix the problem in a different way that vastly reduces the energy use, then the improvement is “free” in the sense that it saved money over what was going to be spent. I know it is a bit of a convoluted way to look at it. It is very different from what you usually hear about it making an investment in order to reduce future energy costs. Usually the argument centers upon how much it will cost and how long it will take to recoup that investment. For example, if the better system cost $15,000 instead of $10,000 then you make an investment of an additional $5000 in the hopes of recouping it in the future. This is not “free” – it is an investment in the future. I am talking about making a savings in the moment – not one that has to be recouped in the distant future. Do the improvement the way I suggest and you will fix your problem for less than you were going to pay, and by the way – your future energy bills will be MUCH lower than if you had done what you planned.

I have written in previous blogs about how it is relatively easy to make improvements to a building energy system (the system including the building and all energy related equipment in it) that can achieve zero net energy use for less than the cost of installing a typical system or replacing a broken unit with an identical (improved) replacement. This can be achieved by carefully sealing the barrier between the building and the attic and/or crawlspace (if any), installing a properly designed and sized HVAC (Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning) system, adding sufficient insulation where practical, and adding a small amount of solar to offset the greatly reduced energy demand.

The approach of fixing the whole house system to achieve “efficiency” is much better, and much less expensive, than the “normal” approach of keeping the house the same but buying a very expensive “high efficiency” HVAC unit, or adding a large solar array to overpower the inefficiencies of the building. It is best to fix the building first, installing a much smaller HVAC unit and solar array to meet the needs of the much less wasteful building. The approach of fixing the system saves money and results in a much more comfortable home environment.

All of this can be achieved in States like California by meeting the existing energy codes, using easily obtained off-the-shelf equipment, using installation techniques already well known and practiced by the related trades – and by careful design and installation. The information on how to do this is easily obtainable, the equipment is sitting on store shelves and the codes and requirements have been developed and promulgated (with only a few unworkable requirements.) However, it still isn’t being done.

You might ask, “If this is such a easy and obvious thing to do, why isn’t it being done?” I think that the main reason this isn’t being done is that it is a building “system” level problem and there are no “system” related efforts being made. The problem is partly related to the nature of the building trades being subdivided into many specialties. There a people specializing in the many tasks such as rough carpentry, finish carpentry, insulation, HVAC installation, roofing, flooring, electrical, plumbing, glazing, etc. The general contractors are the ones in a position to oversee the entire system, but they usually are mostly concerned about things like scheduling, cost of materials, labor costs and building inspectors – making sure that the necessary sub-contractors are available and doing there job at the right time, for the right price. General contractors aren’t concerned with the “design” of a building, they are concerned with building to the design and local codes. Nobody in the construction team is responsible, or even concerned, with the overall system.

Sometimes architects consider the greater system as an integrated whole, but they tend to be focused on issues other than achieving an energy efficient building system. Architects and engineers are responsible for energy efficiency in very large buildings where their services are known to be necessary and affordable, but it is deemed too expensive and time consuming for most small buildings, remodels or repairing or updating existing buildings. Nobody hires an architect to design and oversee the replacement of an old furnace – they just hire an HVAC contractor to replace the failed unit with as few a number of changes as they can. If a building owner wants to upgrade the insulation they don’t go to an architect or a general contractor, they go to an insulation contractor. The idea of improving the performance of the building system and redesigning the HVAC to fit never comes up. There is no time to do it, nobody has the skills or knowledge to do it — and nobody cares. The burden of designing beyond the structural elements and minimum code compliance of a new building is usually considered extraneous and too expensive.

The amount of energy being wasted by poorly designed and constructed home energy systems is substantial. Residential uses of energy in California amounts to about 28% of the total and about 34% of the total amount of electrical energy used in the State. That means that approximately 25% of the energy currently used could be saved if buildings were designed to be net zero users. If transmission loses are considered, then more than 35% of the total electrical energy currently generated would no longer be needed.

When I heard about the massive improvements possible from just being “careful” with the design and installation I couldn’t believe it. I thought it must just be “energy company hype.” My response to that was to take about 40 free one-day courses offered by PG&E on how to reduce the energy footprint of a home. Then I re-activated my general contractors license and went into the energy improvement business in order to test the ideas in practice. I didn’t work to the extremes described in the courses, but got perhaps 95% of the way using relatively easy and inexpensive techniques. Much to my surprise, the process worked! I managed to achieve almost all of the goals described in the courses, and it was easy to do so. The houses I worked on ended up with close to zero net energy use, and the retrofits cost about the same as it would have to do the work “the old way.”

My approach required a few extra steps, but was easy and straightforward. The first part was to remove the existing ceiling insulation in preparation for sealing air leaks between the living space and the attic space. Then a new air handler and heat pump, along with new ducts and registers, was installed. Careful design and better insulation reduced the size needs for the HVAC equipment to 1/3 of what was originally installed – using high quality but simple units (as opposed to complicated and expensive high SEER units). The cost of the new equipment, and new properly sized and installed unit for a typical 2000 square foot home dropped to approximately $8000 – saving $10,000. Removing and installing new insulation cost about $2000, leaving $8000 for a new photovoltaic solar system on the roof. Because the electrical loads had been reduced so much, $8000 was sufficient to install enough solar panels to offset the total energy footprint.

The new insulation treatment reduced the energy demand so far that the HVAC system is seldom used. In the hottest days of summer these improved homes stay quite comfortable until about 4:00 pm, when the AC kicks in for an hour or so until evening. Instead of running most of the day to keep temperatures comfortable it only takes a couple of hours from a much smaller unit. Heating is similar, since the California valleys and coastal regions have relatively mild winters, heating is almost not needed for a well insulated home. Other heat sources within the building, such as people’s bodies, cooking and lighting are often adequate with supplemental heating used for brief periods or when returning to a home that hadn’t been occupied for a day or so.

The advantages of “fixing” a house (or building one correctly in the first place) are many. Probably the most appreciated improvement is in the increased comfort of the house. The house just stays comfortable everywhere at all times. There aren’t cold places and warm places, there aren’t cold drafts – it is just comfortable. Once the interior objects (walls, floor, ceiling, furniture) reach a comfortable temperature they no longer radiate/absorb heat from a person’s body – so they feel comfortable.

Given that homes and small businesses buildings use account for about a third of the energy use, they are a reasonable target for improvements, especially if that can be done in a way that costs less than doing what we are currently doing. The problem with achieving energy reductions on the order of 1/3 nationwide is not related to the availability of equipment, engineering know-how or regulations. Everything needed to achieve excellent results are readily available, why isn’t this work being done and what can we do to solve that problem?

I think the problem is that there is an element missing from the design/build process. There is a need for someone to be between the building designer and then contractor(s) – especially for projects such as repairs, upgrades or remodels where there isn’t an architect or engineer involved. I envision a non-profit company (“energy designer company” – EDC) where a homeowner can go to get a detailed energy inspection and design performed. The output would be detailed recommendations for energy reduction improvements such as changing pumps, lighting, appliances, etc. along with a detailed design for the HVAC system including details such as duct locations, air register specifications, duct routing and sizing – all of the nitty gritty details that are usually left up to the imagination of the installer but that are critical for correct system operation.

The will create the detailed specifications that is then announced for bid to interested contractors. This is an advantage to the HVAC contractor because they don’t have to take the time and effort to design the system or spec out the parts, they just have to purchase the equipment and install it. The EDC will perform an independent audit of the installation to ensure that everything was done to its specifications.

In order to make this attractive to the contractors there will need to be some sort of “incentive” beyond being supplied with potential customers. One thing that will be required will be training and mentoring for the contractors to assist them in achieving excellent installations to the new specifications. As a minimum, this training should be free. Optimally, they would get reimbursed by the EDC for the time spent in training. Free access to resources, mentoring, system testing and other services should be available to the contractors. Another key element that might be initially required is an indemnification to protect a contractor in the event that a provided design fails to function as intended. The EDC should indemnify the contractor, paying the contractor’s cost of fixing the failed system. My experience has been that an additional advantage to the contractor is that the work goes much faster for a well designed system, including greatly reducing or eliminating time required to “dial in” a new system – the systems work properly as installed. Because of the greatly reduced energy demand, the installation of a small solar array can easily offset the remaining power needs – achieving “net zero” energy use for a cost that is about the cost of replacing a failed HVAC unit.

I envision putting together a demonstration program aimed at making an interested small community “net zero” for less than would have been spent doing “business as usual.” New homes are an obvious target for great improvements integrated into the building design. Existing homes are a bit more complex because questionable design decisions have been made and are costly to fix. However even these can generally be fixed for “free” if done because an old system failed because of being worn out. The life expectancy of an HVAC or furnace is about 15 years.

To get an idea of the amount of work necessary to do this job, consider that a town with a population of 20,000 people has about 7000 households, and perhaps 6,000 buildings for their homes. A failure rate of 15 years implies that there are an average of 400 replacements a year, or eight jobs per week. It is expected to take about 4 days per job for the EDC to do the necessary inspections, testing and design activities. This equates to about 6 full time employees for the remodels. Perhaps 2 additional people would be required for the new buildings. Added to that will be a manager, an instructor and at least 2 office support people for perhaps 12 people on staff. My estimated annual costs will be something on the order of $1.2M for staff, $150,000 for building, $150,000 for equipment (vehicles, test equipment, etc) for a total cost of about $1.5M a year. This would result in an average cost of about $2,500 per job in order to reduce an average power bill from perhaps $400 a month to near zero. Therefore, the “payback time” for the extra design and inspection effort is about 6 months! It is hard to find an investment to come close to matching this figure.

What is needed now is an organization or a person who is interested in guaranteeing funding for this sort of project for a period long enough that the EDC can maintain self-funding status. This means someone willing to “experiment” with around $4M over five years to see if it can be made to work. It will take awhile to get started since the idea is new and therefore unknown. Finding contractors will take time, training contractors and the public will take time, training building inspectors and demonstrating success will take time. It will all take time, but expenses will still be there while the project grows and becomes in demand by customers, contractors and the city.

I am looking for someone that is interested in exploring an idea such as mine. There are many details to work out, and there will be a lot of what appear to be false starts – but that is just the normal pain associated with exploring new approaches to doing business. Once the host city shows that this is a viable and cost effective approach, the idea will spread – rapidly. First there needs to be a demonstration project that develops the necessary skills, training, approaches, etc. Once the services become demanded, then it will grow.

Do you know anyone that might be interested? I would rather not do it through grants or government assistance because of the paperwork and restrictions that come with those funding approaches. I also don’t want to do it through an investment company because they then want to take the project to maximize their profits, rather than minimize the costs. This needs to be a not-for-profit, community based project designed to help communities rather than a business opportunity to charge as much as the market will support. My goal is to provide a great deal to everyone involved – the building owner gets a huge savings and better building, the contractors gets great work and assistance, the EDC pays great wages with benefits, the community becomes a showcase of environmental excellence – and the world becomes a better and clearer place. Many win-wins all lined up in a row as long as massive profits are not part of the equation. Sufficient profits are necessary, taking more is not appropriate for a project such as this because it cuts out those at the lower end of the economic spectrum – this needs to be affordable for all.

My lady and I were discussing the upcoming holidays, wondering what we might do for entertainment. We realized that both of us had become a bit bored with the daily grind and are looking for something “fun” to do. I like having fun and so does she, but oddly enough we found it difficult to think of something that filled the bill. We thought of a lot of things to do, but few really sounded like “FUN” but instead were just something to do.

This got me to wonder what the concept of “fun” really means and what sorts of things trigger it. Most dictionaries associate “fun” with amusement, entertainment, laughter and such. Webster offers the definition of fun being: “What provides amusement or enjoyment specifically: playful often boisterous action or speech.” While these experiences seem appropriate, I think there is much more to the concept.

Years ago I created my company’s motto of “Do Good and Have Fun.” My company specializes in system safety engineering (related to product safety engineering). This seems like it should be a rather “serious” no-nonsense branch of engineering, what does “fun” have to do with it? It is easy to see how we are focused on “doing good things” by protecting people and the environment. The harder to understand is perhaps the “have fun” part. I don’t mean having fun as an amusement or boisterous distraction, I mean having fun by doing interesting, difficult and important things. For me, solving difficult problems is “fun” – and saving people’s lives by doing so is doubly fun. Doing excellent work while making the world a better place is what I was talking about. Perhaps I am thinking more along the lines of being fulfilled or a feeling of making a positive difference. To me, those things feel like “fun.”

That brings up the question of what makes something fun. I am not at all sure about the answers, so I am just going to throw some ideas out there to see where the topic might go. The following list includes a few of the things I believe can make something fun:

• Intellectual
  • Sharing ideas
  • Problem solving
  • Creation
  • Working with a team
  • Learning new things
  • Doing new things
  • Surprises
  • Being mentally challenged
• Esthetics
  • Seeing beautiful things
  • Hearing beautiful things (music)
  • Smelling pleasing odors
• Imagination
  • Sexual
    • Flirting
    • Fantasy
  • Daydreaming/fantasizing
    • Places
    • Activities
    • People
• Exciting
  • Scary
  • Fast action
  • Dangerous
• Accomplishment
  • Physical
  • Mental
  • Artistic
  • Communication
• Sensual
  • Touch (e.g., massage, snuggling)
  • Hearing
  • Sight
  • Taste
  • Body motion (e.g., dancing, hiking, skiing)
  • Eating
    • Taste
    • Smell
    • Texture
  • Temperature/humidity (warm south Pacific beach)
• Spiritual
  • Experiencing “other” worlds
    • Visions
    • Physical experiences
    • “Stopping the world”
    • Experiencing a feeling of “awe”
  • Experiencing nature

I am sure there are many more topics, and also sure that some of these are misplaced or mistaken. I created this list to help get away from thinking about “fun things to do” and instead consider what makes these things fun in the hopes that it will help me think of something to do. Obviously, some (perhaps most) fun activities contain multiple items on this list. For example, I like to dance. When dancing is really “fun” it includes listening to good music, moving my body in enjoyable ways, perhaps touching another person, maybe some flirting and a bit of fantasy. Put them all together and I am definitely “having fun.”

My goal with making this list was to help me identify activities that might end up being “fun” and those that are just amusing or filling time. That doesn’t mean I have to be accomplishing things all of the time, it is alright to just be entertained and amused, being playful is a good thing. However, it seems that there are levels of having “fun” and some of the most enjoyable are deeper and get closer to the heart of the idea of being a “good” person.

I wrote the first draft of this blog a week or so ago, and decided to just let it sit for a bit to see if it is worth posting. I find that the ideas included in my short list of “fun” things comes up several times a day. I find myself pausing for a moment to check in with myself, asking myself if what I am doing meets any of the items – and if not, is there something I could do to change my “moment” to be funner. It turns out there usually is something that I could do, and making whatever I am doing more fun actually makes a difference. It helps remind me that life can be made more beautiful, enjoyable and important just with a thought. Nothing has to change except for our view.

I began writing this blog several weeks before the last election thinking that perhaps I could help clarify some considerations I had been hearing from a few of my friends. I found the noise and confusion leading up to the election distracted me from finishing the blog, and afterward my politic will seemed to have drained away. I am finally getting interested in the topic again, so am going to give it another try.

I had been noticing that the MAGA crowd were bringing up the question of policy differences between the two presidential candidates. I keep running into Trump supporters who say things like, “I can’t stand Trump personally, but his policies are what are important.” I have begun to wonder just what that means, and whether the people who say that have any clue about his actual policies.

I wonder just what they mean when they use the term “policy” in this context. Wikipedia includes a statement that; “A policy is a statement of intent and is implemented as a procedure or protocol.” My copy of Webster’s dictionary includes the following definition; “A (policy is a) high-level overall plan embracing the general goals and acceptable procedures esp. of a governmental body.”

I think both of these get to the core of what is meant by a Presidential candidate talking about their proposed “policies” behind their promised actions. A policy in this context includes goals (intent) as well as something about acceptable procedures for achieving those goals. A policy isn’t just a set of actions that will be taken, rather it is a description of the goals or intent along with the procedures that will be used to implement those goals.

An interesting “policy” statement for the Presidential election might be grounded in one contained in the Constitution. Namely, ” We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.” There it is in a nutshell, the statement identifies the goals and the procedures for meeting those goals and contained in the body of the Constitution (including the Amendments).

Given this meaning for the term “policy,” I wonder what Trump’s policies might be. He discusses a lot of procedures such as expel all of the undocumented people from the Country, but he doesn’t clarify why he might want to do that. What is the goal or intent? I can think of a number of possible answers, but haven’t heard which are driving the procedures. For example, perhaps the goal is to reduce the overall population of Country by getting rid of the “extra” people. Perhaps it has to do with prejudice against a particular race, nationality or origin. Perhaps it is because they depress wages by working for less that citizens are willing to work for. Perhaps it is because they drain the economy of the country by unfairly using limited resources. These might all be supportable reasons (except for the prejudice idea), but if so it would be more useful to state the goal/intent so that it is possible to consider whether or not the proposed solution works or if there might be better solutions.

Another example that might be worth considering has to do with overturning Roe v. Wade. Why was that done? Once again, I can think of a number of reasons – but they haven’t been stated in ways that I find compelling (or even believable). It might be a moral issue of some sort, perhaps a moral issue about killing unborn “children” (even at the risk of killing the mother). That sounds really forceful and is hard to muster an effective challenge to, but it is really the reason or is it just a powerfully sounding argument? During my long drive through the southern part of the USA I heard that the moral issue isn’t really the reason. I was told that the real reason is most abortions and other types of fertility control measures are used by white people, therefore reducing the number of white births – allowing the population of non-whites to grow faster than the white population. Soon whites will be the minority, and this is not tolerable. Those who told me that said they use the moral argument because it sounds good, but they are actually worried that the Country will be overrun and ruled by non-white people. I was told that is why they don’t take into consideration the resulting deaths and bad outcomes that were common from botched amateur abortions before Roe v. Wade legalized abortion.

I am aware of many of Trump’s proposed solutions, but don’t know much about why he is proposing them (what his policies are). Examples include;

• Make abortions difficult, expensive and time consuming
• Remove all “illegal” people from the country
• Eliminate taxes on tips
• Impose huge import tariffs
• Replace experienced professionals from government posts, replacing them with unqualified “yes men”
• Reduce taxes on the rich
• Eliminate the Affordable Care Act
• Reduce or eliminate Social Security benefits
• Complete the boarder wall
• End birthright citizenship
• Ban U.S. companies from investing in Chinese companies, and ban Chinese companies from investing in U.S. companies.
• End taxation on overtime
• Reduce corporate tax rates
• Cut car insurance rates by 50%
• Withdraw from the World Health Organization
• Abolish the educational department
• Provide $10,000 a year to home schoolers
• Create a new credentialing body for teachers
• Abolish teacher tenure for k-12
• Enable prayer and other activities in public schools
• Stop funding colleges that engage in censorship (as defined by Trump)
• Pardon participants in storming the Capitol January 6th
• Create a special prosecutor to “go after” Biden
• Impose death penalty for selling drugs
• Encourage stop-and-frisk policing
• Require proof of citizenship at polls
• Require only paper ballets
• Required all votes to be counted on election night
• Cut off federal funding for NPR
• Pull out of Paris Climate Accord
• Prevent further development of off-shore wind development
• Lower energy costs by 50% within first year
• Promote research and development of vertical takeoff flying cars

There are many, many other things that Trump has promised to do, but these are things to do – they are not policies. For example, take his promise to lower energy costs by 50%. How might that happen and why? What policy is he implementing? Would this mean that it is now the policy that the Federal government to manage and force the petroleum industry to cut prices at their loss, or does this mean that it is now the policy of the government to subsidize gas prices in order to maximize the burning of petroleum? Is this a call for the Federal Government to take over (nationalize) the petroleum industry so the government can control prices? Is he trying to funnel tax money to the petroleum industry by decreasing gas prices thereby increase gas use? What policy could possible be driving this sort of action, and how might that be implemented? What problem is he trying to solve?

What he seems to be doing is agreeing to the “wish lists” from his “base” so he can get into power and have sufficient control to turn the Country into something like a dictatorship. His base wants lower prices, higher income, lower taxes, less competition with “those” other people and a chicken in every pot. He has articulated very few actual policies, just a bunch of rather odd and disjointed action plans.

Harris hasn’t done a much better job at articulating her “policies”, but she did describe numerous policies (goals/intents) along the lines of improving access to affordable health care, working toward reducing the global warming risks, protecting labor, improving public education, restore access to family planning, ban corporate price gouging on critical items such as food and groceries, roll back tax cuts on wealth, increase capital gains taxes on high income people, sign the bipartisan border security act, require Supreme Court Justices to comply with ethics laws, etc, etc.

I got tired listing all of the promised actions from both. What I am trying to point out is that Trump doesn’t seem to have much of a policy beyond gaining power and enriching the rich. Harris also didn’t specifically state her policies, but I can easily make the connection between each one of her promises and the higher policy statement contained in the opening line of the US Constitution. While she didn’t make a clear and specific link to the Constitution, it is easy to do so. Many, perhaps most, of Trump’s promises don’t seem to be aimed at implementing the highest level policies of the United States. His policies seem to be personal rather than in support of “we the people.”

Last night’s debate was a big disappointment to me. Yes- Kamala was awake, engaged and almost “Presidential,” but she failed to delivered what I need (and I believe most viewers wanted to hear). I believe she seriously flubbed an opportunity that will not return and very likely will cost her the race.

I suppose I should mention Trump’s performance. It was a mixture of pretty good points embedded in his normal circus show of lies, stupid comments and insults. The thing is, almost nobody who is “on the fence” cares at all about the lies, stupid comments and insults – in fact they find them kind of fun and entertaining. What they care about are the rather sparse statements of what he plans to do if elected. I only heard four things that he plans on doing, (1) get the abortion question out of the overview of the Federal Government and instead leave it up to the States, (2) put a 20% tariff on imports from some countries (at least China, maybe more), (3) cut taxes even more for the rich (increasing the deficit by $6 trillion dollars), and (4) end the war in Ukraine in one day by talking to the two sides. He didn’t provide any details about any of these statements including details about things like what would happen to the USA economy should he implement broad 20% tariffs, how he would manage to stop the war in Ukraine in a day, or any of the other things he “promised.” (Actually, he promised almost nothing; he mostly just ranted, insulted and said many amazingly stupid things.)

However, the facts that Trump says nothing of substance or that he just makes up outrageous lies and insults has no impact upon the election. Those that are appalled by his antics still won’t vote for him, those that find his antics to be funny and “down home” heartwarming will ignore them. What he said or did will have zero impact upon the election. However, Harris’s influence has a potential impact because there are many people who are sitting on the fence but would like a better choice. My friend who pleaded for me to give him a reason to NOT vote for Trump is a case in point. I wanted her to give me details that I could then discuss with my friend as the reasons for not voting for Trump. Unfortunately, in my view she failed to provide that.

Harris said that she would do a handful of things: (1) Get something like Row V Wade reinstalled, (2) Create an opportunity economy, (3) impose the bi-partisan immigration reform bill that was killed in Congress, (4) increase use of diverse source of energy to decrease reliance upon foreign oil, (5) work on charting a course toward a two-state solution while maintaining our support for Israel, (6) create opportunities in the countries where the immigrants are coming for in order to stem their desire to come here, and (7) not take guns away from Americans.

What I wanted to hear from Harris is a tiny bit more about these things. I wanted her to explain that Roe v Wade removes restrictions on abortions earlier than 24 months, but allows States to determine the policy after that. I wanted her to tell me how her “opportunity economy” would work without increasing inflation by handing out free money to families and small businesses – is that all she has in mind?? I wanted her to mention what she means by “diverse sources of energy.” I want to know how she will make that happen. I wanted to know how she intends to bring industry back to the USA (or even if that is her intent). I wanted to know how she intends to bolster the economies of southern countries without inflaming corruption as has been the case so many times in the past. I wanted to know how her approach to a two-state solution would work any better than what happened in the past. There are more things that I wanted to hear about – but instead much time was squandered by both sides throwing mud at each other. I don’t think Harris needed to throw much mud – everyone is aware of the negative things about her opponent. Rather than waste time throwing mud I wish she had briefly outlined how should would accomplish things, not just offering vague areas that need work on.

One of the really big problems that I noticed with Harris’s discussions came when she was asked if the economy is better or worse than when she came into office. She didn’t answer that question, and I think she should have done so in a factual and forthright way. She didn’t hide anything by avoiding the question, she just buried herself. Her answer was she is going to promote an “opportunity economy” by giving a $6000 child credit and making “substantial” tax breaks for small businesses. By saying these things she made it clear that she agrees that the economy got much worse during her term as VP, and that she has no plan about how to change that. It would have been far better to admit it, explain why it happened, and tell us a bit about the actual path forward. A $6000 child credit and tax breaks for small businesses isn’t going to cut it unless there are a lot of other things to go along with it.

My overall opinion was that she put on a better, saner and more positive show. She did a better job of pointing out a few areas that need improvements… but she didn’t give me any substantive answers to take back to my friend to help he understand why he shouldn’t vote for Trump. My friend already knows about the personality issues, he wants to know how Harris will make his life better. Inflation is killing him, how is that going to be brought under control. It is good enough for inflation to be stopped, it needs to be reversed or incomes have to be increased otherwise everyone will experience a real, permanent decrease in their quality of life. If it is not possible to provide a plan for fixing this problem, at least describe why the problem is so intractable and what tools can be brought to bear on fixing the problem. A little education might be useful to bring clarity into the real nature of the problem.

And…. a really big missed opportunity was for Harris to point out that running the County is not a one-person show. It is a very large group effort, and that specifically her office is not just her dictating but instead considers the wisdom of many of the nation’s brightest and most experienced individuals that have deep understanding and experience in their respective fields of expertise. She isn’t just a person, she is the sum total of a whole lot of people from the Cabinet and important agencies on down. She needed to point out that she is a “manager” bringing the combined efforts of the best and brightest to assist the Country in finding a better path forward. She could point out that Trump does exactly the opposite, he fires the best and brightest and fills those positions with people loyal to him rather than the Country. Harris needs to get the monkey off of her back and make sure we know her job isn’t to do all of those wonderful things, her job is to put together a coalition of smart people working together to find solutions, and that this coalition needs to include both Democrats and Republicans to achieve success for the whole.

I am glad that Kamala was not an embarrassment – but I don’t think she did what it takes to change the minds of those that don’t embarrass easily. She needed to answer the question of, “What about the policies?”

After yesterday’s adventure of attempting to listen to Trump’s Aug 8 Emergency Press Conference while wading through his 162 lies (averaging an impressive rate of one lie or falsehood every 23 seconds) I decided it was perhaps time to look into the proposed policies, as outlined in the Project 2025 book – all 887 pages of it. I did this in part because of questions that I have been getting from some of my “conservative” friends about how the policies of Trump differ from those of Harris. Their comments usually go something like, “Sure, his personal ethics and presentations are disgusting, but his proposed policies are great.” First off, I have heard almost nothing about Trump’s proposed policies from Trump, he just spits hate, insults and vitriol when he speaks, and he doesn’t seem to write more than a few rather incoherent words at a time in his tweets. In his speeches he very seldom stays on topic long enough to describe any part of his proposed policy (assuming he even has one). Given that his utterances are just looping “stream of consciousness” rants about anything, and nothing – we have to look elsewhere for what he might actually attempt to do once in office. The far right present their “Mandate for Leadership the Conservative Promise 2025” (i.e., Project 2025) as the definitive description of changes that will be implemented once he is back in office. He says he agrees with them, hence I assume that document represents his “policies.”

I wonder how many of my conservative friends have read or understand the contents of this huge policy statement? I wonder if any of them have any actual knowledge of its contents beyond “it must be great” because it is endorsed by Trump and the conservative talking heads. I should confess that I also haven’t read all of it, I could only stand looking at it for three hours before I became totally disgusted with the insanity of what I was reading – similar to my actually only listening to about half of the 64 minutes of Trumps emergency press conference before I just got disgusted and tired of wasting my time listening to a moron blathering on about nothing meaningful. In both cases, I did my best to “skim” the material to make sure I wasn’t missing something valid that I might agree with.

I found the Forward section in the Mandate to be quite interesting because it describes many of the problems facing us in the United States today, problems that we are all concerned about. They discuss issues such as poor and unaffordable medical care, problems caused by the wildly unequal distribution of wealth, problems with the wealthy getting too much control and political power, problems with vastly unequal educational opportunities based upon race and address – the thing that they didn’t mention was that almost the entire set of issues they were discussing where the direct result of Republican actions. They are correct, all of those bad things exists – and they almost all exist in large measure because the “Conservatives” created them or blocked actions to solve or mitigate them. Conservative should read this and say to themselves; “We have met the enemy and he is us.” We can all agree that there are many injustices that should be righted, there are many holes in our support for the less fortunate among us, homelessness is a serious problem, deaths from drug overdose is a huge issue, and we squander money where we could be making real improvements. We need to work hard toward fixing these glaring problems. However, it is not at all clear that the suggestions offered in the remaining 850 pages or so would do much more than exacerbate the existing problems. We agree with some of the problem identification; we disagree with how to find the best solutions.

Of course there are also many parts of the “forward” that do NOT align at all with my more liberal view of the world. This book was created and supported by the Heritage Foundation, an extremely influential think tank promoting far right conservative agendas. When they talk about “family” they really mean more government funding for Christian schools while cutting funding for public schools. When they speak of family values they actually mean eliminating all rights for LGBTQ individuals, and outlaw family planning and abortion rights. When they talk about reduction of taxes, they mean reduction of taxes to the very rich while eliminating or reducing value for the rest of us. When they speak of reforming government they mean firing existing merit based employees and replacing them with “loyal” political appointments.

Once I managed to grind my way through the Forward, I was faced with more than 800 pages of details, often very high level recommendations, interspersed with very detailed specific changes including things things like curriculum changes aimed at eliminating any references to ideas or considerations such as “black matters,” “woke”, “LGBTQ,” or considerations of the current impacts of past transgressions (e.g., slavery).

It sounds like they are proposing a total rearrangement and realignment of all government agencies. They are proposing a new set of “agencies” that rule over existing semi-independent agencies with the intent of making them all political positions based upon loyalty to the “administration” (President) and the President’s interpretation of the Constitution. They are promoting changes that give the President complete control over loyalty based hiring and firing decisions impacting individuals deep within the agencies, allowing complete control over the staffing and actions of government employees. They are hoping to create a vast new system of government totally under the control of the President, answering to no one else – and with no requirements that positions be filled with those who are qualified for the job as long as they are loyal to the President.

What could go wrong with this??? How anxious would the Heritage Foundation be in supporting this approach to governance if, accidentally, Kamala Harris wins the election?

There are so many horrors outlined and described in this tome that it is impossible for me to respond in anything like a comprehensive and meaningful way. It would take for more than 900 pages of response to discuss the likely impacts of all of the recommendations for “small” changes such as moving the placement of the FBI from its current position to one completely under the oversight and control of the President. Has anyone contemplated the impacts of these recommendations should they be implemented? Each of their “simple” recommendations open up topics that would take many pages for an adequate response of why it would be a very bad idea. The overall proposal is set up to create a whole new class of oligarchs at the beck and call of the new dictator/President. Good idea – we should all feel better knowing that Trump would be free to implement any action or rules that he wants without oversight or control – enforced by his finger being on the “Big Red Button.”

I know it sounds like I am overstating the dangers of their “Mandate for Leadership.” Perhaps I am. I can only recommend that you get it (it is freely available to download) and check it out. When doing so, think about what impacts might be generated by implementing their thousands of recommendations for changes to the government and legal system. For you conservatives, I suggest reading it from the point of view of what happens should these changes be made and a liberal gets elected. Would that be such a perfect world for you? Would you really like all of the proposed changes if leadership was to become liberal instead of conservative? Perhaps it is a good time to consider what you are asking for.