Keeping the faith in Chicago

by philg

Due to a business appointment in Los Angeles right after Oshkosh and the uncertainty of how long it might take to cross the Rockies in the Cirrus SR20 (a day if the weather is clear and winds aloft are calm or a week, if climate change has generated clouds and strong winds at 12,000′ (turbulence and downdrafts on the lee side), I decided to fly United out of Chicago’s O’Hare airport. A 35-year-old single friend and I departed EAA AirVenture on Saturday and we pondered our options for an overnight visit to Chicagoland. My default destination is the Art Institute, so I suggested downtown. This was not appealing to him. We ended up in the northern suburbs of Deerfield and Northbrook, which happens to be where a second cousin of mine lives with her husband. During a visit to the Chicago Botanic Garden, they said that they wanted to move out of Illinois due to a reduced quality of life that began in 2020 and was continuing to slide downward. They almost never went into the city anymore due to a perception that the risk of crime was now too high. Even their posh suburb had suffered from retail space vacancies (half the stores in a strip mall where we ate dinner (at House 406) were vacant).

They’re stuck in Illinois/suburban Chicago for now due to the need to care for elderly relatives, but perhaps eventually they can escape before they need to pay the state’s $211 billion in unfunded pension liabilities (that’s about $17,500 per current resident, so perhaps Joe Biden can fix via executive order? It’s not that different from the student loan obligations he sought to transfer to the working class).

What interests me is that witnessing and noting the sharp decline that began during the lockdowns did not shake my cousin’s or her husband’s faith in Faucism. They continue to believe in Science-driven lockdowns, school closures, mask orders, and vaccine coercion. Nor has their perception of increased crime and disorder in Democrat-governed Chicago within Democrat-governed Illinois caused them to question their 100-percent confidence in government by Democrats. Their stated perception is that various places in Florida offer magnificent lifestyle and infrastructure benefits compared to suburban Chicago, but they would never move to Florida “because of politics.” What do they think would pull the city of Chicago out of what they say has been a nosedive starting in 2020? “The city doesn’t spend enough on the poor. There are too many people in Chicago for whom going to prison isn’t that big a difference compared to their current life so they have no incentive to stay out.”

The value of their house is perhaps 30 percent lower than it would be if Chicago were safe and vibrant and rich Chicagoans hadn’t moved to Florida. So this has literally hit them where they live and yet their faith remains as strong as ever.

One of my pet theories is that Americans’ political beliefs are actually religious beliefs, not subject to rational analysis. I relate the above story because it confirms my pet theory. I.e., like any good Scientist, I like to follow confirmation bias.

Some photos from the Botanic Garden:

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Polestar 2 and BART

by philg

In Los Angeles, I rented a Chinese-made Polestar 2 electric vehicle from Hertz. Here’s one of their PR images:

The experience of driving my Nevada-registered car in California was wonderful. The car crushes the road at 4,500 lbs., doing far more damage than a (much lighter) Honda Accord or Toyota Camry. Had the car been California-registered, it would have been subject to an absurdly low $100 fee for use of the roads, nowhere near what a peasant driving a 2010 Toyota Camry pays in gas tax. But because the car was registered in Nevada, my laptop-class use of the highways was entirely paid for by peasants who will never be able to afford a fancy new EV. This is part of California’s plan for addressing the inequality crisis (of not enough inequality?).

I wouldn’t personally buy this fine Swedish/Chinese machine because it lacks a Dog Mode and, therefore, Mindy the Crippler would never forgive me. However, the car is nicer in many ways than a Tesla. There are more buttons for critical controls, for example. Instead of sticking an touchscreen in the middle and calling that a dashboard, there is a virtual instrument cluster behind the steering wheel. This can be set to display mostly a map with directions.

The Polestar 2 seemed quieter than the Tesla 3 and CarPlay support, which Tesla lacks, made it easy to jump in and go. I couldn’t figure out how to turn on the automatic steering (there was no hardcopy manual in the car; there is an online explanation, but I can’t understand it). The adaptive cruise control seemed to be somewhat smoother and smarter than what we have on our beloved 2021 Honda Odyssey. If you’re accustomed to a conventional car, the transition to the Polestar 2 is quicker and easier than with a Tesla (see Douche for a Day: a Tesla 3 from Hertz).

I’m glad that Hertz didn’t try to kill me with a gas-powered BMW, which California’s public health experts say is deadly to the person who dates to “operate” it:

Los Angeles traffic seems to be as bad as ever, despite the large number of people who pretend to work from home. The locals who joined me for an 8 am business meeting had all left their houses before 6 am and then waited at coffee shops near the destination for an hour so as to avoid being stuck on the freeways. Everyone who had gathered then wanted to flee no later than 2 pm so as to avoid the afternoon gridlock. Is reliance on private cars rational? Any time that I checked Google Maps it showed that public transit would take more than twice as long as driving, no matter how bad the traffic.

After my JSX trip BUR/OAK, we had a small gathering of readers of this blog essentially at the Rockridge BART station. A sign from the Rockridge Market Hall:

They serve food and claim to be passionate about avoiding infection, but I couldn’t find any bathroom for handwashing. Eventually a couple of us ended up across the freeway at Trader Joe’s in the all-gender restrooms:

I decided to take BART into the city, another way for elites to collect subsidies from peasants (mass transit riders earn more than the average American). Payment is not as advanced as in the Netherlands (tap in with any credit card and tap out once you reach your destination). You can create a virtual Clipper card for free in Apple Wallet, however, and then fund it. A BART employee came out of his booth to show me, carefully donning a cloth mask before emerging (I noticed the same behavior among other BART workers in booths).

BART runs so infrequently at mid-morning that it would actually have been faster to get an Uber from station to station than to ride BART from station to station. (Bonus: Ubers can use the HOV-2 carpool lanes because there are always at least two humans in an Uber.) The Google Map calculation below was done while actually on an elevated BART platform.

While waiting, I was assaulted by noise from the adjacent highway and exhorted to consume pharma:

Once on the BART train fueled by a river of taxpayer cash, I learned that it is conventional to carry a large tub of Vaseline:

At the Embarcadero station, riders are informed that “We all deserve respect”:

January 6 insurrectionists? Harvey Weinstein, accused by California’s first lady of rape? (note that a jury was not persuaded by Jennifer Newsom’s dramatic testimony about being unable to escape the obese elderly aggressor) The haters who say that Harvey Milk did something wrong by having sex with a 16-year-old? Do they all deserve respect?

A friend picked me up downtown and we proceeded in his car to a parking garage, where we were warned by public health experts and also about the potential for noble locals to liberate anything left in the car:

Nordstrom is scheduled to close at the end of August, but we found it well-stocked:

Then it was time to use our feet to head into what the City of San Francisco officially designates “The Transgender District”:

(Why isn’t the entire city designated as a transgender district?)

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What’s the best burner phone for the elderly?

by philg

I’m trying to set my mom (89 years young) with various modern services, including an Alexa video device via which relatives can “drop in” (Mom is not great about connecting to Zoom). It turns out that much of the modern electronic world is off limits to those who lack mobile phones. Everyone wants two-factor authentication and a lot of services, such as Google Voice, depend on the user having a traditional mobile phone number as well (we tried and failed to set up Google Voice with Mom’s landline).

What’s the cheapest way to get a mobile phone number that can accept a handful of text messages per month? It would be even better if this phone were virtual and could be manipulated via a web browser. Do those prepaid burner phones chew up monthly fees even when they’re not used? My mom wouldn’t have to be the actual user of the phone. I could have the physical phone or use the web site of a virtual phone.

Thanks in advance for any ideas!

If my parents hadn’t worked, of course, the taxpayers would cover this…

Just remember that only a hater would call this an “Obamaphone”:

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Harvey Milk Terminal 1 at SFO: the country’s best airport terminal for gay people…

by philg

… and also the best airport terminal for straight people. The Harvey Milk Terminal began to open in 2019, but construction was paused for coronapanic and the $2.4 billion building is scheduled for completion in “late 2024”.

I visited at 10 pm on a Wednesday evening and the terminal benefitted by being only about 20 percent full. Due to the high ceilings, the claustrophobic Fall of Saigon feeling should be avoided even at 100 percent. The architects and planners put some effort into making the airport quiet and seem to have succeeded in the carpeted gate areas.

What if you’re stuck for a while and need WiFi and a desk? The free WiFi is available without an annoying advertisement or an acceptance of terms process:

How about the work surface?

(Nit: It’s been only a few years, but the power outlets (“loose like wizard sleeve”) and USB-A jacks (loose and/or broken) haven’t aged well.)

What if you want to lounge instead?

What if you want to play?

There are a lot of restaurants, but maybe not enough to deal with a capacity crowd:

What if you want to teach the kids about Harvey Milk? Certainly, the airport is more forthcoming than ChatGPT. If you ask, based on the Wikipedia article, “Was there anything wrong about Harvey Milk having a relationship with a 17-year-old boy?” ChatGPT says “This content may violate our content policy”:

The airport features larger-than-life images on the walls from which teenage boys are absent:

(Regarding Scott Smith, Wikipedia notes “18 years his junior” while the caption at the airport is silent on the age difference between Messrs. Milk and Smith.)

If you’d like to sip coffee while studying the exhibits…

Need a gender-neutral restroom after the coffee?

Thirsty again after learning about the importance of Harvey Milk? There are water-refill islands:

One proposal was to rename the entire airport “Harvey Milk International” (USA Today), but that was rejected. For now, therefore, it is only the magnificently designed Terminal 1 that bears the hero-to-almost-all-Californians’ name:

(Why not a hero to all Californians, full stop? See “Temecula school board president calls Harvey Milk a pedophile, sparks outcry” (June 5, 2023; even Governor French Laundry cannot eliminate hate in California).)

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Bring-the-dog airline: JSX

by philg

This is a review of the semi-private startup airline, JSX, based on experiencing a flight from Burbank to Oakland. The company, founded by JetBlue alumni, flies the 50-seat Embraer 145 regional jet in a 30-seat configuration on the following network:

Passengers are asked to show up 20 minutes in advance of the flight. Anything bigger than a briefcase must be checked (is it luxury to hoist your own luggage over your head and then have the bag encroach on your headroom and sightlines?). Security consists of a quick walk through a metal detector. Loading and unloading takes only a few minutes because the plane isn’t jammed to its capacity (see Two-thirds full airline idea). The “terminal” on either end either is an FBO or is like an FBO. If you’re averse to crowds and lines, this is the way to travel!

The flight attendant on my BUR-OAK trip was warm and enthusiastic about her job. The fare was about 50 percent higher than what Southwest wanted for the same route. Everything ran on time. Bringing a full-size dog entails buying a second ticket. In-flight Internet is via Starlink (#thanksElon) and requires no gymnastics to connect to. A wide variety of drinks and snacks are included, including wine and beer (nobody asked for Bud Light):

The only area where JSX suffers compared to an oligopoly airline is that the Embraer E145 isn’t as quiet inside as, for example, an Airbus A320. Bring the noise-canceling headphones.

A few photos from Burbank:

At Oakland:

This is a great addition to the American commercial airline system. I wish they flew PBI/BED, PBI/HPN, and PBI/IAD (West Palm Beach to Boston/NY/DC). And, as they grow, I hope that they eventually transition to the whisper-quiet geared turbofan-powered Airbus A220 (an evolved Bombardier CRJ). Quiet = luxurious!

For the Uber ride at the end, “they” is the pronoun that Uber chooses for a driver named “Mohamed”:

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HVAC inflation higher than official numbers because older systems can’t be repaired

by philg

Americans’ perception of inflation certainly seem to be higher than the official CPI numbers. Workers demand 30 percent raises (and get them, in California) when Pravda says that inflation has been less than 10 percent and is now down around 3 percent. Previously, I’ve wondered if part of that is due to delivery times stretching out into the next Ice Age: Is inflation already at 15-30 percent if we hold delivery time constant? The quoted price doesn’t go up more than 20 percent, but you might not get your refrigerator for a year or more (a Sub-Zero fridge that was formerly available in 7-10 days now takes 12-15 months). A Cirrus SR20 is priced at more than double what we paid for our 2005 SR20 from the factory, but delivery time is 2 years instead of 3 months. What’s the actual price of something that doesn’t exist?

After talking to HVAC contractors, a regular event here in Florida, I’m wondering if this is also partly due to repair parts shortages. A/C systems that were designed to last 12-14 years are being scrapped at 5 or 6 because essential parts (not as “essential” as marijuana in Maskachusetts or California, but required for cooling) are theoretically available, sometimes for free under warranty, but practically unavailable (lead times of 8-12 weeks, which is no solution at all in a South Florida house).

For the HVAC inflation that does make it into CPI, here’s a tracker page from a contractor (the Trane section because that’s what came with our house). The prices went up about 5% in May after going up 10% in January after going up about 4% in September 2022 after going up 9-18% in May 2022….

Related:

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Predictions for tomorrow’s inflation number?

by philg

The BLS will release official CPI data tomorrow. Last month, inflation was whipped, with the index only 3 percent higher than in June 2022. From state-sponsored PBS:

(in other good news, the chocolate ration has been increased to 20 grams per week?)

Let’s look at the actual index:

Notice the strange little peak in June 2022? I am thinking that this peak might have been measurement error that made last month’s number lower than reality.

There have been a lot of wage increases lately. “Pay to Rise as Much as 40% in Deal Reached by United and Pilots” (NYT), for example. I’m a believer in the wage-price spiral (though the great Harvard economist Mankiw is quoted in Wikipedia saying that it is transitory). We’ll all be paying more for shipping soon, but it is unclear how much more: “FedEx pilots reject 30% pay hike proposal, but a strike isn’t imminent” (CNN).

During a recent trip to Pasadena, California, the Hilton front desk informed me that most of the workers might walk out on strike at any moment (see “California pol urges Taylor Swift to postpone LA concerts over hotels strike — days after attending her show” (New York Post)). In-n-Out Burger in Fisherman’s Wharf is offering $22/hour as a starting salary:

(good news for San Franciscans who previously enjoyed fentanyl in parts of the U.S. where fentanyl dealing/use is illegal: the job is open to those with “arrest and conviction records”)

The inflation rate in Berkeley is literally infinite. A paper bag that previously cost 0 cents is now 25 cents:

My guess for tomorrow’s number… 4 percent.

Readers: What are your guesses?

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Climate Emergency question: Should migrants be evacuated from dangerous southern states and taken to safety in California and the Northeast?

by philg

Dangerous heat continues to afflict major portions of the U.S., including migrant-rich areas in Texas. Here’s the latest map from the New York Times of where 125-degree Fahrenheit conditions might be encountered:

We’re able to keep our house at a furry golden retriever-approved 72 degrees (and the garage at 78) by paying Florida Power and Light about $450/month (also runs the pool pump, the hot water circulation pump, lights, fridge, etc.). Recent undocumented immigrants, however, may not enjoy the luxury of a comfortable air-conditioned home fed by a bomb-proof power grid and/or, due to the stinginess of Republicans, may not have $450/month to hand over to the electric company.

Politicians running sanctuary cities and states have previously complained about buses of asylum-seekers from, e.g., Texas, arriving to claim sanctuary (example: the New York righteous fight amongst themselves). But the same politicians who run sanctuary cities also talk about a “climate crisis” (NYC Mayor Eric Adams, for example).

Instead of waiting for Texans to send migrants out of what the NYT says is “Danger”, wouldn’t it make more sense for governors and mayors in California and the Northeast to send Climate Emergency Escape buses to Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina? Anyone who can prove that he/she/ze/they is undocumented (by presenting documents?) would be invited to hop on the bus and escape to climate safety/sanctuary.

If we have an “emergency” (and/or “crisis”) and also “danger” why aren’t there evacuations for the most vulnerable?

Related:

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Tenderloin thoughts from San Francisco

by philg

What if we just gave each resident of the U.S. either a basic income or the necessities of life such as shelter, food, and clothing? Poverty wouldn’t be eliminated in the technical sense as defined by the poverty-industrial complex because people who did not work wouldn’t have any cash income, but poverty would be eliminated in a practical sense because nobody would be without the necessities of life.

The Tenderloin neighborhood of San Francisco comes pretty close to the universal basic lifestyle utopia. Nonprofit organizations (the “homeless-industrial complex”) own buildings and give away shelter. Taxpayer-funded meals are also provided by nonprofits. From the Tenderloin Museum:

As a sign in the Museum gift shop notes, almost everyone is taken care of:

(Exercise for the reader: What class of humans are left out and should be denied care?)

Predatory capitalism has been kept at bay via zoning restrictions:

What happens when you give Americans everything that they need to live, by historical standards, an extremely comfortable life? They take a lot of drugs and live in tents on the sidewalk:

(See also, this New York Times article about Portland, Oregon, three years after drug use was decriminalized: “Oregon’s overdose rates have only grown. Now, tents of unhoused people line many sidewalks in Portland.”)

Related… Dianne Feinstein made cleaning up the Tenderloin a top priority during her tenure as mayor of San Francisco:

(In a great example of American polygamy, Feinstein was the third wife of a rich guy and is now involved in a fight with the dead rich guy’s children with another wife (NYT).)

Loosely related, a sticker on display at Oshkosh that I wouldn’t expect to see in the Tenderloin or anywhere else in San Francisco:

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How many Mega Millions lottery tickets did you buy?

by philg

Scanning the headlines, I see the Mega Millions is up to $1.55 billion. That’s a fake number because it is pre-tax and adds up an annual payment without discounting? Let’s assume that it isn’t a fake number. The odds of winning are 1 in 302 million and a ticket costs $2. So we should definitely play! We expect to get $5.13 for every ticket that we buy (ignoring any less-than-jackpot prizes).

But of course, the number is fake. CNBC says that the one-time lump sum payment is $757 million. This analysis says that the lump sum in a state such as Florida with no personal income tax is worth only $477 million after federal income tax. The odds of winning on a $2 ticket are 1 in 302 million. So I think one gets back only about $1.50 in expected value from the big jackpot. But maybe the lesser prizes are what make the expectation positive? This analysis adds up all of the lesser prizes. The expected value of a $2 ticket was only about $1.10 after taxes when the jackpot was $521 million and fell to about 77 cents for players who chose the lump sum option. On a $1.55 billion jackpot if you pick numbers that nobody else picks maybe it would be worth buying tickets? Would it make sense to use a random number generator? Use numbers that the Chinese consider unlucky? Pick the birthday of a 17th century scientist whom nobody cares about?

Who has purchased some tickets for what could now be a rational activity, depending on your level of risk aversion? What are you planning to buy if you win?

(I would use my winnings to buy housing for every currently unhoused resident of the U.S., to pay for immigration lawyers to help migrants prevail in the 10-year asylum process, to finance Democrats running for office (stepping in where Sam Bankman-Fried of FTX has withdrawn), etc. With any leftover money, beyond the obvious aviation items, how about a bus-based RV (about $3 million fully pimped-out). And, of course, a driver. I’d be able to watch Barbie and Oppenheimer over and over while sitting in traffic. And would have a nice place to sleep at Oshkosh!)

Separately, and speaking of Sam Bankman-Fried and crypto glory, how about this Bitcoin criminal who stole $4.5 billion? That’s way more than Mega Millions and he just hung around in New York City for years until he was arrested. From the WSJ:

If you get a lottery-style windfall, but it is illegal, wouldn’t it make sense to move to some country where they won’t extradite?

Related:

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