(I am David Craig Hiser.  All the other comments are various random anarchists.  Many comments were off topic, and are not shown here.
All of the comments, as well as my original essay, are here: http://www.anarchistnews.org/?q=node/7038)

----------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------

This one was on my hypermileing forum, and began as a question about gas taxes.
That quickly degraded into an argument about taxes in general, and from there fell further to a general condemnation of government.
Since it was the off topic message board anyway, I decided to weigh in:

(original, including what I am responding to, here: http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthread.php/over-80-oppose-raising-gas-tax-8319-6.html)

----------------------------------------------------

Of course 80% oppose raising gas tax. Not because they think it won't work, but because they personally enjoy the luxury of driving an inefficient vehicle. It has nothing to do with the cost of a hybrid. Trucks vans and SUVs make up 1/2 of new car sales, and all of those buyers knew they were buying gas guzzlers. It would cost less money - not just in gas, but upfront - to buy a small (non hybrid) car.

1 You do have total choice if gas prices are raised. You can choose to buy whatever car you want. In fact, even if CAFE standards were raised you would still have choice, because they only refer to fleet average, not individual models. The only way anyone's freedom is restricted is if it became illegal to buy a car that got less than XX mpg.
2 Buying a big car DOES hurt others. In addition to the fact that they do far more damage in an accident, there is this little thing called "global warming" (to be honest, I am not 100% convinced, but it is undeniable that burning fuel does environmental and health damage to all living things, including ourselves.)

Forget about social programs and libraries.
Government pays for things which are not profitable, and which the free market could not provide, or which are essential and the free market could not provide equitably. Things like roads, harbors, airports, bridges, military, police, fire services, courts. How long do you think it would take for private security to turn into mercenaries? If you want to go back to living in teepees, maybe, but giving up government in the real world means who ever has the biggest gun and most friends gets to do whatever they want.

Last I checked, the top three uses of federal tax money was:
1 the military (we spend literally as much as the rest of the world combined)
2 payments made to private health care companies (contracted medicare and health care for government employees)
3 interest on the debt.
(Social security is basically a mandatory savings account. You get back more than you pay into it. It isn't counted as part of the federal budget; although unfortunately in order to pay for massive budget deficits the government has been illegally "borrowing" from it which is why the fund is in trouble)

Welfare makes up about 1% of the budget.
Even before Clinton's welfare to work program, the average welfare recipient received benefits for less than 2 years. Currently, after 2 years, if you don't get some job - any job - you get cut off, even if they are in college at the time. So it encourages people to get minimum wage jobs instead of actually bettering themselves and getting a job which might actually support their family.
Look up some data, and turn down the Rush morning show.

I wonder how many of the people who propose alternate taxation schemes have actually crunched the numbers (or consulted a reliable unbiased source).
I haven't, so I won't say they are all impossible, but they mostly sound like fantasy to me.

When the US military is assigned to guard pipelines (which is a lot of what they do in both Iraq and Afghanistan), that is an oil company subsidy. 100s of billions of dollars of subsidy, which never get counted for what they really are on the oil companies bank sheets.
Our over-sized military budget is what allows our gas prices to be artificially low (several times lower than what any other net importing nation pays).

If you want to cut taxes, instead of cutting social safety net programs which are a insignificant amount of the budget, start with reducing the military budget to no more than 10% more than the next highest spending country.

If we were not exploiting the 3rd world, we wouldn't have so many enemies in the first place. Scandinavia has a higher standard of living than the US but no one is invading there or blowing stuff up.

Next nationalize all health care. Believe it or not, most projections actually show the government would SAVE money by giving free health care to everyone. This is because, as it is health care is the governments 2nd highest expense, but much of that money goes to the shareholders of insurance companies, for-profit hospitals and drug companies, not to actually providing services to sick people.

Then balance the budget. This might mean *gasp* raising taxes! In the long run we have to pay for all those interest payments on our loans. It should go without saying that living on credit is unsustainable, but for decades conservatives have ignored that obvious truth by pretending that that "growth" would absorb the deficit. It didn't.

You got it right about the rich inheriting their wealth, but the idea that the wealthy contribute their fair share is a stretch too. If you own a factory, you aren't creating the jobs. If that same factory was a coop, the jobs would still be there, the same work would get done, the only difference is you wouldn't be able to skim some of the profits off the top. If a few people didn't hoard most of the resources the same capital would exist, it would just be spread out a little more. If a landlord hadn't bought a particular house, the house would still be there for people to live in. They aren't actually providing anything. If someone invests in the stock market they have not actually produced anything of value. Anyone who uses money to make more money is a leech on society, just as much as welfare recipients. Only differences are they live alot better than any of us, and we glorify them.

"Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all.''
"The pretense that corporations are necessary for better government of the trade is without any foundation. "
-Adam Smith.
His argument against government was the EXACT OPPOSITE of modern libertarians. He was opposed to the corporation as something which interfered with the free market. To Smith the market consisted of INDIVIDUALS freely trading with one another, not companies, and certainly not corporations. He was opposed to government because of its tendency to protect and support corporations.

In the past 20 years GDP has grown steadily. Over that same period (accounting for inflation) median income has decreased. This disparity is because all of the increase has gone to a very small portion of society. The reason for the historic levels of inequality is a direct result of deregulation under our last 4 presidents, Regan and Jr. in particular.
Its the ideas that the wealthy must be more valuable to society and any increase in economic activity is inherently good which lead to the state we are in now.
The top 10% holds more wealth than the entire 90% added together.
Those 10% don't have to work, because they can invest instead.
The rich have not been working harder. US multinational corporations have just been able to consolidate and outsource at unprecedented levels.
This is the modern reality of the free market and deregulation.
It hurts American workers.
It hurts the middle and working classes (ie the vast majority of the population).
It hurts the federal budget.
It hurts 3rd world economies which are forced via predatory lending and threat of military action to open their markets.
It benefits one group, and one group only. Those who have the resources to live entirely off of stock dividends. They make us believe our interests coincide with their own by pointing out our 401k is in the stock market. However if not for their manipulation of the economy for their own benefit we could have higher wages and less inflation, less taxes and more stability.

Consider the Great Depression
Consider CA electricity market after deregulation (prices soared, service became terrible)
Consider Enron
Consider the recent bank bail out

Ford likes to ***** about the costs of union benefits, but they paid their CEO $21 million in a year they did terribly, lost money, begged the government for help. Meanwhile Toyota, which is doing far better in every way, paid their CEO less that 1 million. Follow that trend for the assistant CEO, the CFO, the president of the company, the president of the board, the lead project manager, etc.
The reality speaks for itself. The trickle down theory does not work.

Why do people, even here, keep claiming gas is a necessity?
Food, water, clean air, a place to live, shelter from weather extremes, these are necessities.
People in places with no cars survive.
Before cars were invented, people lived.
Cars are no more a necessity than cable TV.
This is a free country. Nobody forces you to live in the suburbs.
Actually, I lived in the suburbs for a year, in a place where it snowed all winter and rained all summer. I didn't have a car.

As it happens, back 40-50 years ago utilities were literally giving away tank based water heaters just so that people would use more electricity and gas (solar and instant water heaters already existed back then) so they could sell more. The campaign was extremely successful.
Its only fairly recently that utilities haven't been able to keep up with demand and environmental concerns made people rethink the idea that maximizing consumption is inherently good, and began trying to persuade people to conserve.
However, even "energy star" rated appliances consistently use far more power than we have the technology for. Consider how often a fridge has its hot coils on the bottom, where the heat will just rise back into it, instead of on top. They do it cause it looks nicer.
Even so, individual appliances have been getting more efficient, but Americans have been upsizing everything for for the past 20 years. The average new home size is more than twice what it was 30 years ago. That means twice the area to heat and cool and light. TVs are bigger, sound systems louder, computers many times faster. If the technology is 2 times as efficient, but everyone uses 4 times more of it, you double your energy demand. Just like with cars. Engine technology is far better than it was back then, but car companies and consumer choose to use 100% of those gains to make cars faster and larger.


uh... the car companies have been making CA specific models due to additional air quality restrictions for decades. Either that or they just make all of their cars to CA specifications to avoid having to make 2 versions. No one is exodus-ing away. Unless they are selling at a loss, companies aren't going to overlook any market.

If you tax someone with a $10,000 income 10%, he is left with $9,000
If you tax someone with a $100,000 income 80%, he is left with $20,000

Even at that rate, the person with the high income is doing far better, and is "burdened" less.
And of course in the real world the higher tax brackets are stepped and only apply to the income above the threshold, not the entire amount, (so a 80% income tax would only be 80% of the money above some amount, say 90k - the first 10k would still be taxed at the 10% rate. In other words, he would keep much more than just 20k at that rate)

No one has to go out and buy a new car tomorrow. Eventually people buy new cars. When they do, then they can buy a smaller one. They save money upfront AND save money in gas.
This could take some time, but the idea is to look long term at the big picture. If we act only for the moment we will regret it tomorrow. Individuals and corporations often can't see beyond instant gratification, and that's (hopefully and in theory) one of the useful things that large scale organization (ie government) can do.

------------------------------------------------------

[key points of the response to the above are included in my next reply]

Budget of the United States Government: Historical Tables Fiscal Year 2009

Define "Welfare"
If you choose to count SS as "welfare", maybe, but the benefits people get from it are directly proportional to what they paid in. Same goes for unemployment. If you don't work, you don't get social security or unemployment. These things are revolving funds which legally the government doesn't get to spend (although they do anyway). Part of the category of human services also includes education. Education is an investment that pays for itself by having an educated workforce. Veteran's benefits, which should properly be classified as military expense, are also lumped here.
Most of all, medical payments is counted under the same category, which I addressed earlier, and is by far the 2nd biggest sub-component after SS.
Yes, if you count all of those things as "welfare", then it adds up to more than the military.
But if you are looking only at direct AFDC payments to poor families, it is less than 1% of the budget.
If you have a source that says otherwise, please feel free to share it.

If you remove SS (which is a trust fund, not a government handout) from the budget, "national defense" come to well over 1/3. Check the numbers at the link I provided above if you don't want to take my word for it.

Ford's bailout plea to include pledge for smaller cars

Ford CEO on bailout opposition: Past is past - CNN.com

So, in other words the wealthy should be protected, and no one else should. I didn't say it was unviable.
What I said was, in the absence of law, body guard = mercenary. Whoever has money can buy guns and take what ever they want from those who can't afford a mercenary force. I'm not saying it is impossible, I'm saying that isn't a world any of us want to live in.

Yeah. Exactly. That's my point. Besides, there IS a military and police force in Mexico. The Federales carry sub machine guns and ride around in pickups with 6 guys in the back.

Sounds like someone hates America. There is this thing called the "constitution" - they put it there for a reason. Thing is, sometimes innocent people are accused accidentally. You do realize that, right? And sometimes people accuse the innocent on purpose, out of spite, or to draw attention away from themselves. Trials are not to coddle criminals. Trials are to determine the facts as best as possible so that the wrongly accused aren't punished.

He didn't say it was "necessary". He said that's what actually happens. He was not suggesting it was a good thing.

Exactly. He further suggested that corporations only exist because governments create them, and that they are inherently anti competitve.

An individual can not have a corporation. Their is a difference between a corporation and a company.

I won't repeat all the points about how libertarians distort Smith's work, because someone has already done it for me:
The Betrayal of Adam Smith
SimpleUtahMormonPolitics.com: Adam Smith Hated Corporations


That was an example to show the numbers involved.


That's not what I am saying at all. First of all, someone who works 0 hours pays 0 taxes, no matter what the tax rate is. Someone who works 2 (or 4) jobs likely does not make that much per hour (or else why would they be working so much?) and so isn't going to be in a top tax braket no matter what.
What I am saying is NOONE earns a million dollars a year through working. It can't be done. You have to understand just how rich the rich are. There was a guy who owned a chain of casinos who made one million dollars an hour on average for a year. He didn't have to work. He added nothing of value to society. He didn't build the casinos. He didn't even pay to have most built, he bought them. So he didn't earn that money, which means he didn't "deserve" any of it. Bill Gates took open source (free) software, made a few minor changes, and patented it. He was not an innovator. He was a predatory businsess man who made exclusive deals with hardware manufacturers in order to form a monopoly. Now he pays other people to come up with (often inferior) software, and he gets to skim some of the profits. He is not creating jobs. If Microsoft weren't there, those same people would be working at smaller companies.

The market does not assign wages based on how valuable the work done is to society. Consider an ad company executive. The ad company has big clients which don't make the best or cheapest product, but have momnetum on their side. The ad companies job is to convince people to buy their products. This in no way betters society as a whole, but its valuable to the corporation that hired them. So they make big bucks. Meanwhile someone who does a job that actually creates something valuable, say the day laborer that builds a house, a auto plant assembly line guy, a public school teacher, makes a tiny fraction of what the ad guy makes.

Damn straight I think people who work hard for little pay should be taxed less than someone who makes their money on the stock market, or by being a landlord, or any other job where you make a lot of money without doing any actual work!
I think you should pay less taxes.
I think anyone who makes over 200k a year or has more than 2 million in assets should pay more taxes.

----------------------------------------------

[several less relevant posts]

----------------------------------------------


----------------------------------------------------------

[The response from the other guy]
You said why would anyone sell their goods for less(I'm not quoting because the quotes are getting long lol and I don't want to snip).

The reason is because I am greedy. I see you have a business that makes 40% on its product(you used to make 10% and now with lower taxes you make an extra whatever percent), but I have a crappy job. I take out a loan get some investors and start a business model doing exactly what you do, but I sell mine for 75% of what you do so I make only 30% profit per item. All of your customer switch suppliers because I am cheaper. You undercut me and this continues until someone like walmart shows up and sells the product for .01% profit but sells trillions of items. Thats Free market.

And it is beautiful. If there is enough money to be had the single greatest force in human innovation and production comes to play. Greed. Beyond a shadow of a doubt its the most powerful force on the planet. Its predictable and powerful.

If there is enough room to make a profit better than what I am doing now I will do it. So if that means undercutting my competitors because my business just became cheaper to do and driving all their customers into my queue well then thats what I am going to do.

It is natural selection at work. The leanest most efficient wolf will be the one to survive. The bloated fat pig will be the first one eaten, because its too slow, inefficient and has too much excess weight to rapidly restructure its survival patterns.

If you believe in evolution you have to believe in a free market. Yes there will be "robber barons"(I prefer Captains of Industry) but there will always be some clever little fellow(Aptera vs GMC) who can outmaneuver you because he's not carrying baggage and your profit margins got wide enough for him to squeeze in between you and the customers. It might not be a big profit compared to your business. . .but what matters is, is it more profit than he had working for someone else or running a competition with some other industry.

Every other country in the world has universal health care. Ask someone who lived in a Foreign country if they like it. I have family(in-laws) that lived and grew up in Italy. He moved here married into my family and loves Healthcare in the US depsite the fact it comes out of his paycheck. Thats my anecdotal evidence, and I've seen a few interviews with Canadians that much prefer US healthcare. I'm sure people will speak out about it, but all I can say is I have been to a French Hospital(friend got hit by a car while in Paris) and it wasn't impressive by any means. It was far less technical than a visit to MSHA(Mountain States Health Alliance, Johnson City's Hospital) or my own personal experiences with surgery here in the US.

Looking at the fight club example. . .there is always a cost of human life. Free Market systems just tell it like it is. They don't try and hide it behind systems to make everyone feel comfortable with it. Free Market is about market value. I know you will agree with me that each person has a value. If you don't think everyone puts a value on anyone else think about it this way. You have a sniper and terrorists plan to kill some hostages. Your sniper has to chose which terrorist to kill first, the terrorist with his gun pointed at 10 civilians or the one pointed at 1 civilian. After the first shot there are no guarantees the other can be killed before he fires on his targets. Obviously you shoot the terrorist guarding the 10 people because 10 people are more important than one. If you have one person in the hospital and it will cost 10 mil to make them completely healthy and live to die of old age and you have 10 people that only need 1 million each. . .what do you do? Free Market dictates you spend 10 mil and save 10 people. Universal healthcare by definition(provide the aide people need) you spend money on whoever gets there first. So 10 mil boy gets there and the other 10 people die while waiting for the funds to do their transplants.

Market Value is true blue transparence. We don't like to admit that we would just assign a value to someone's life because that seems shallow. . .but we do. A doctor who is capable of saving lives through medicine or a painter? You have to chose. Market value and Free economy dictates you save the doctor because directly he can save more lives than the painter(assuming he's not a superhero). In anything less than a Free market there is no justification to rescue someone who is dying already rather than a teenager or some young doctor.

In all honesty there are more valuable people than others. Bill Gates has done more for the human race than I have. Bill Gates simply put if I had to chose between which of us existed. . .I would have to chose him. I won't revolutionize the world. You can play "if" history all you like and say that Bill Gates didn't do anything but we don't know, we do know that since he did what he did we arrived here today, whether its his fault we can't say. Free Markets require comfort with perfect honesty, what is something worth to you, what are you willing to do for it?

I prefer completely deregulated Free market because it allows true honesty in market value rather than fixing a price because you feel that some moral induced idea that that product is bad(sin taxes on cigarettes and gas). The product is worth what people will pay for it no more no less, whereas in regulated systems. . .its what you say its worth and who dictates who choses values? what if I get to pick? What if I say you're favorite brand of soda is an unneccesary good because its harmful and got bad flavor(Gas is harmful and not the most efficient mode of transport).

-----------------------------------------

[me again]

----------------------------------------

[He responds again, basically acknowledging his view is amoral, but that this is the cold hard reality of the world. He expresses faith that the market can solve the tragedy of the commons - that in fact someone can get rich from the threat of environmental destruction itself, but does not offer an explanation of how that might happen. At this point, given that his comments seem to me to be mainly based on faith, I did not continue responding to the specific points, but after having a dream the next morning in which I came up with a very suitable analogy, I closed with the following]

Here is another incredibly powerful force: the nuclear attraction between protons and neutrons. That force can be harnessed to power aircraft carriers and entire cities. But if it is not very carefully managed and regulated, that same force gets out of control and produces Chernobyl and 3 Mile Island. In some cases its destruction is deliberate, and you have Nagasaki and Hiroshima. In the greed model, you and I are the citizens of Hiroshima, and the top 1% of society is the bomber plane. The Great Depression, CA electricity market after deregulation (prices soared, service became terrible), Enron, the recent bank bail out - these are all examples of what happens when you give up government control in favor of totally free markets. Everybody ends up losing.

I have learned, finally, not to get into discussions with Christians.
I haven't quite got there yet with libertarians.

There is still a part of me that thinks that by pointing out the logical flaws, the mistaken assumptions of fact, and there basically immoral implications, that otherwise intelligent kind people will reconsider.
Part of it was when I read Ayn Rand's novels I could see being swayed by the unspoken implications.  It was only when reading her ides laid out in plain straight forward English that I could easily see her for what she is: the literal embodiment of pure evil.
Part of it is how many of my own friends and associates accept one or another of these ideas, and I know them personally, I know they are intelligent, compassionate, and generally reasonable.

Most of all I write for the people on the fence though, the random anonymous people who might happen across these discussions online, so there is a counterbalance to the radical rhetoric which admittedly does sound totally rational and appealing when its presented as it is, out of context.

One was a blog essay which an anarchist friend sent me a link to attacking democracy.  (He mentioned the caveat of not supporting the market economy.  I have already written before here about how a market economy will naturally arise in the absence of government regulation.)

While the arguments here are not necessarily universal among anarchists, libertarians, and capitalists, some of them are common, or are at least similar.
(It is kind of long already, so I'll save the other two for future installments.)

I don't have the responses here, but that's mainly because there really weren't any substantial responses, just general insults and links to other people's writing.  If you are interested, you can read both the original essay and all of the comments here:
http://libertariananarchy.com/2008/12/against-democracy/

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[excerpt from a response to my comment] "Economics is a logical-deductive science and can’t be falsified by empirical data."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[the person responds that I should read the work of Ludwig von Mises, and again claims that I must not understand economic theory]

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I am so sick of dating.

I can't say it hasn't been fun.
Its been really fun.  Many first experiences.

I have been asked out.  I have gathered the courage to ask out. 
Some time later I replaced courage with confidence.

I have learned an awful lot of things (and confirmed a few I suspected all along).
I learned just how different I am compared to so many of my peers in this area.
I learned that finding what I am looking for is really hard.
I learned that all the common stereotypes about gender and dating are totally false.
I learned that people really do have sex on first dates (and not just desperate people, drunks, or players, but ordinary healthy well-adjusted people)
I learned that women are just as superficial as men (just with height instead of weight)
I learned that (at least for those whose standards start at 5'6" or less) I am much more attractive than I had thought I was.
I learned that there is very little correlation between stated views on sex and actual comfort and enthusiasm in practice; and little correlation between visual sexiness and actual quality of performance.
I learned that the single most important variable is that she is truly comfortable with her own sexuality.
I was shocked to learn how many people think that the actions of the female partner have little bearing on the overall quality of sex, or that being "good" can consist solely of how much she is willing to have done to her.  I learned that not everyone can match my stamina.
I learned that people are much more forgiving of me for my infidelity than I am of myself (I decided against ever making that story a blog, but I have nothing to hide, so if you ask me I'll tell you about it)
I learned that I can easily fall in love with someone I am totally incompatible with - in fact, I'm starting to suspect that I have a tendency to do just that.
I have learned a lot about emotional responses and how rare it is to just be told, directly, when something I do is upsetting or annoying or offensive.
I learned just how guarded and polite people are, and how it breeds a sort of inadvertent falseness which I honestly never noticed before.

I have had sex with a number of beautiful intelligent compassionate women of various shapes and sizes and colors. People involved in social justice and environmental protection and education, younger than me, older, people who want to get married someday and others who think monogamy is an artificial social construct. More women in just this past year than I expected to be with in my entire life.
(I've also had my first ever STD test, and got the equivalent of an 'A' on it.) 
I've shared both physical and emotional intimacy with women who I could have conversations with and find myself questioning beliefs I've refined over a lifetime of thought and debate and felt totally confident about. 
I've even fallen in love.  It may have been with someone totally incompatible with me, but it was still nice to know for sure I still can.

It turns out that sex with someone who isn't my best-friend-and-long-term-partner is just as unfulfilling as I always assumed it would be.  They were everyone of them someone I could consider a friend, a whole world of difference from one-night-stand or purely-physical affairs (the thought of which makes me feel a little sick inside).  That just isn't enough. 

I have not had a history of following through on this sort of thing in the past; perhaps a public pronouncement will aid my meager willpower - or at least discourage the women in my life from taking advantage of it:
No more sex on first dates, no matter how good that date is.  Or second.  Or third.  No sex unless I've known you at least a couple months and had some combination of plenty of dates, long conversations, and exchanged emails.  And not unless you are looking, and feel ready, for a serious long term partner.  That isn't to say I want to be celibate until after my next wedding, but I would like that level of intimacy be reserved for when working towards something serious is at least the intention.
My old rule was I didn't want to have sex with anyone I wouldn't want to be friends with.
The new one is not with anyone I wouldn't want to have a child with.

I found my old list which I had written on the suggestion of one of my first dates, one of the people I had been most excited about at one time.  I wrote down a list of exactly what I am hoping to find in someone.
I figured after a year of dating, meeting many new people, romance and relationships and sex and new friends that I might be able to refine the list with new found perspective about what is most important to me.
Turns out I had it the first time.  There is nothing I can remove, and only one small addition.
(Its just that I haven't been actually following it.  I keep giving people chances, even though its a list of "non-negotiables".)

Really, it doesn't seem like so much to ask for.
Just three basic things.

Someone who shares my outlook on life.
Someone who challenges me intellectually.
Someone who wants the same type of life-partnership that I do.

That's it.
Its easy enough to find all of those things.
Just not all three in the same person.

One of my new friends pointed out there is a conflict in what I want:  I want a relationship that builds over at least a year, but I also want to be in that relationship already. 
She made a good point.
So its on me to keep meeting new people, but avoiding all the romantic and intimacy which sucks me in but leaves me discouraged and unfulfilled when I return to reality a few days or weeks or months later.

Perhaps my readers can help me out.
Here is the list:   EXTRA BONUS SUPER FUN PACK

If you know anyone like that, direct her my way.

A friend of mine insists that I seem really gay (despite this friend being female, and us sleeping together).
As evidence she questioned someone I had just met, who agreed that whatever I was, she doubted it was straight.
As I found this more than a little strange, I proceeded to ask other people if they thought that when they first met me.
Responses mixed, but I was surprised to find some people agreed with their assessment.

The reasons I got included: that I seem comfortable with myself and others, comfortable in my own skin (mind you, I was in my own home at the time), and that I am not a sleazy slimeball.

I definitely consider those both to be very positive (and, I like to imagine, accurate) things to say about me, but it leaves an absolutely terrible implication for like, all straight men everywhere. 
Like, (aside from gay guys and me), they are all fake, all of the time (or at least around women), always trying to show off or prove something, I suppose, or one way or another acting (presumably for the chance to have sex with everyone they meet).
I have a lot of trouble believing that.

Having an inside pass, I do know that this is terribly common.  Disturbingly common.
But if it is perceived to be universal...
Perhaps this is why nice guys finish last.  Women perceive guys who are just regular, decent human beings as all being gay.

When I was younger I used to believe that everyone is naturally bi, and it is only social conditioning that makes us suppress it.  I was raised in an extremely liberal household by an openly bi former hippy who was totally honest and through in education on all topics. 
(A note for the anti-sex-ed folk: nothing can make sex less appealing to a young person than hearing about it in detail from one's mother.  Statistics show that repressive communities have a far higher teen birth rate.  I on the other hand waited until 21, and then only because the other person insisted).
I grew up not just watching but participating in the gay parade.  It was a while before I understood that a certain anonymous alcohol recovery support group was not in fact specifically for the LGBT community.  Many of my best childhood memories was of Camp Lavender Hill, where every kid was from a LGBT family.  So I was open-minded.
Then I got the opportunity to test the theory.
Turns out I was wrong.
It just doesn't do it for me.
Not at all.
Even years later, I tell myself I "should" be more open-minded.  Nothing can make me lose interest in sex faster than watching gay porn.

I am neutral on the gender tests I have taken, and I'm proud of that.  I may act effeminate by this society's standards - mainly because I am totally oblivious to the standards.  I probably wouldn't act the way I am "supposed to" even if I knew, but the truth is I don't.  When I think about it, I don't see what I could do that wouldn't be a blatant caricature of what it means to be Manly.  I think of flannel, a big belt buckle, beer, and slapping women I barely know on the ass.  I think of constantly challenging other guys to frivolous competitions and asking total strangers for her number on the sole basis of her being "hot".  Who does these things?  How can anyone take them seriously? 

On the Kinsey scale I am all the way over to the right.  I can recognize when a guy is cute.  I have kissed a few guys.  I have even gone much further than that once.  And it all causes exactly zero erotic response for me.  Even when there is a physical response from the physical stimuli, its just not sexy (and yes, I don't know how this isn't common knowledge, but the physical and mental responses are totally separate things, and it is entirely possible to have either without the other.  They generally tend to be associated, but they are separate things.)
I may be sensitive, caring, introspective, open with my feelings, honest and not at all manipulative; but the thing is I REALLY like having sex with women.  I mean, a lot.  If I could find a partner to match, we would spend at least a few hours each day on it.  I just can't even put it in words.  I walk around a college campus, a beach, some special event, all these incredible girls walking around, ohhhh, on a hot day, skin showing, dude - I can't even write this without driving myself crazy.  Remembering race day last week for example.  I could melt.  Melt onto her.  Melt into her.  Her too.  Screw all my convictions and preferences about partnership and commitment - look at that girl right there, her face, that curve where hip meets waist, firm little belly, that smile oh my god I want that girl...
That's what makes me straight.  That, and when I see or think about two guys that way (or one and me) my deepest reaction is I feel a little sick inside, (which, incidentally, allows me to understand homophobia.  Sure, they are bigoted jack-asses who buy into what some book written thousands of years ago tells them to believe -  but ultimately homophobia comes from a raw emotional place, just like for the pro-life people).




On race day I could understand people who didn't know me assuming I was gay, given the circumstances.

The Bay to Breakers, you probably know, is an annual running race is San Francisco which is unique in that it is simultaneously a legitimate competitive race in which people fly in from all over the world to compete for $74,000 in prize money, and a moving festival/party with giant floats, free alcohol, public nudity, and all manner of silly costumes.

This was my 3rd year competing, and as always I combine the two elements by actually running the course, but not wearing traditional running attire.  Its the one time a year I don my stripper outfit - silver swimsuit and a bowtie.
I hoped to beat last years time by 11 minutes.  To improve on last years haphazard practicing I started training earlier, made a schedule, kept a log, and made sure to begin my recovery earlier (I started last years race sore).  I trained smarter - but not harder.  I skipped on rainy days and never made up for them.  I did do one long run (11miles), but I never matched last year's 4 repeats on the 300ft-in-one-block hill near my house.
In the end I beat my old time but only by 30 seconds.
On the plus side I ended the race with very little soreness or pain, and for the first time had the strength and energy to walk around, see costumes and meet up with friends instead of just lying in the grass for an hour and then going home like last year.

As I began walking back the way I had come I noticed some of those "God Hates Sinners" people with their giant signs and bull horns who come out to every public party type event in San Fransisco.

And I got a spontaneous idea for a simple counter-protest.
No words.  No sign. 
I, dressed like a male stripper, still listening to my MP3 player music, stood near them, and began to dance. 



Fun.  Life.  Free. Joy.  Dance.  No one gets hurt.  How can anyone say dancing and enjoying a beautiful day like this is something God hates?  God invented all this. 
I just happen to not being wearing a lot of clothes.  Hell, humans invented clothes.  God puts us here naked.  I'm not even gay.  I'm not Catholic either.  (Catholic is in the largest font on the list of things God hates).  I think my implication was understood because all the people passing by began to cheer and wave and take pictures - which must have confused my Christian friends, as I had come from behind and they had no way to know I was there.
Eventually they turned around, and said something I couldn't hear over my headphones, and tried to move away from me a little.  Then I went on to put on another show near a different set of the same group a little up the road.  I was told by a couple people that I was their hero. 
I was just happy to make people's experience of passing by the hate filled religious fanatics a more positive and entertaining one.
I'm thinking, maybe a worthwhile annual tradition...

Long long ago my first full-time job was as a bike messenger.
Occassionally, when things were kind of slow, I would sing to my co-workers over the 2-way radio system.
I would sing Bobby Joe Ebola songs.
One of the couriers, 1 5 Slug, he asked me who wrote those crazy songs, and I let him borrow Bobby Joe's first album.
Fast forward almost an entire decade.
I have moved out of mom's house, had about 30 jobs, traveled the country, gotten married, gotten divorced, started my own business.
Someone writes from Craigslist about a couch I am selling from a hauling run.
When I get there to drop it off, it's 1 5 Slug.
His roommate is Corbet, (former) lead singer of Bobby Joe.
For some reason 1 5 Slug does not find any of this to be the slightest bit noteworthy.

 

http://profile.myspace.com/Modules/Applications/Pages/Canvas.aspx?appId=119211&appParams={%27rt%27:%27/Media/MySpaceMessage/768dc0e1-4505-41d0-900c-a298713802cf%27}&g=1

When:
Saturday, June 20, 2009
09:00 PM to 02:00 AM

Where:
The Uptown Nightclub
1928 Telegraph Avenue
Oakland, CA, 94612

Only the greatest band ever to grace the SPAM label.
The greatest band which also doubled as an Amtgard admin.
The headliner of nearly every GeekFest.
My own old band's - Pork and the Spork - most important supporter.
The only acoustic guitar band that could play the Gilman and not get beer bottles chucked at their heads.
Of all the offensive humor bands there are in the world, none can touch the MacNuggits.
They have been broken up for many, many, many years.
And yet here they are, playing a show as if nothing happened.
Right here in Oakland.

If you do not attend this show, bad things may happen.

I'll say one thing for Jr.

His press correspondents dinner was much much funnier than Obama's was.  He gets points for that.  I guess there was just so much more to make fun of about him, and he knew it, which, granted, is a very bad quality for the most powerful person on the planet to have.

But still.

I miss the days of making fun of the president.  It was enjoyable.  And it gave a good place for everyone to direct their anger.  Now who are we gonna be angry at?  We're going to have to go back to road rage, and as a bicyclist, motorcyclist, and hypermiler, that's extra bad news for me.  I realize now, too late, that I should have voted for McCain.  In the interest of amusement.  Sure, there is a slight chance we get universal health care within the next decade, but under Jr. we didn't need health care. 

Because laughter is the best medicine.

(starts 2 minutes in)

My garden has finally been started.
It has been a long time now since I first decided to, but at least I didn't wait until mid-summer when it would be too late to plant.

I built the planter entirely out of scrap wood I had saved from past hauling jobs.



The half barrel in the pictures is also from a hauling job, but is not in use yet.



I lined the bottom with carpet (from a dump run)



to protect the plastic which goes above it (the plastic left over from a furniture move done in the rain).  Then an old blanket on top, both to protect the plastic and to aid in water wicking.

I placed some pieces of broken concrete (which used to be a fountain base) as supports for the porous sheet of wood which elevates the soil above the water reservoir, so that while the water below is accessible (via soil wicking) it does not saturate the soil or plants.



The mesh keeps the soil from getting into the reservoir.



The plastic trim lining the top of the planter is hauling leftover too.
I found slightly used (one season) potting soil on Craigslist in Oakland for free.  Potting soil wicks water better, and so is recommended in self-watering systems.  In theory the system uses less water, requires less maintenance and regulation, and produces healthier plants. 
Being my first attempt ever to grow food, I consider this season practice, and I will be very happy if I end up eating anything at all from my little home-made box of dirt.

The first thing I planted was a potato.  It was originally meant for eating, but it went bad, so I threw it in the compost.  Later I noticed stems pushing their way around the plastic cover, and lo and behold the "bad" potato was sprouting.  So maybe now I will get a good potato out of it.
My neighbor who gardens had told me even before I built the planter that she had a tomato plant for me.  She also gave me a tomato stake; which, incidentally, I had given her about a year ago, having gotten it in a dump run and having no use for it at the time.  Apparently she took a couple more than she really needed back then.
She also shared some lettuce seeds and a bean plant.  I got some free basil seeds in exchange for signing up for some email list at the farmers market last week.  My friend said she may give me a plant too. 



So far I have spent almost no money on my new garden at all (just fuel to get the soil, and some screws - though a few of the screws were actually dump run as well).
Which is good, since I spent all my discretionary income on my truck project!

I think it is time for a subscription to Mother Earth News.
I have been waiting a long time to have an excuse for that.

To think.  Food.  Actual food.  Noodles and burritos and curry dishes and popsicles, the stuff without which we can not live, the stuff our very bodies, ourselves, are made out of.  It all starts out as a seed in some dirt.  It just grows there, on dirt and air, and with energy from the sun, these plants turn dirt into nutrition.  Sweet delicious dirt.  Although, wrist deep into that potting soil, I almost sympathize with the plants on that point.  It is some nice soil.  It smells and feels and even looks delicious.

I would much appreciate it if you voted for my instructable.

I don't so much want the prize, but I would love the exposure.

Unfortunately you have to sign up, but fortunately it's free, and doesn't take very long.

Thanks in advance.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Vehicle-efficiency-upgrades/

I know I have said this before, but in light of the presidents move to end offshore tax havens and companies outsourcing jobs for cheaper labor, http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/09/05/04/Continuing-the-Conversation-Tax-Reform-for-American-Jobs/
(and more than a few people claiming there is no difference between democrats and republicans), I feel it bears repeating.

The US economy has been growing over the past decade.
Median income has not.
In fact, adjusted for inflation, the real income of the middle class has actually fallen slightly.

The reason for this disparity is that virtually 100% of the economic gain has gone to the upper class - largely people who don't need to do any real work because they own the means of production, real estate, or stock, which means they actually contribute nothing to society.
The net worth of America’s wealthiest 1 percent now exceeds the net worth of the entire bottom 90 percent. http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/assets/fy2010_new_era/Inheriting_a_Legacy1.pdf

When someone says that raising taxes hurts "the economy", well yes, it may reduce the total GDP.  But it is only taking money away from people who have too much already, who don't need it, and frankly, don't deserve it. When taxes are raised on big business they ARE NOT forced to lay off workers.  They could just as easily reduce CEO pay, reduce dividends, or slow the companies rate of growth.

Total GDP and economic growth are not goals in and of themselves.  They are useful only to the extent that they improve quality of life for American citizens.  We have myopically focused on nothing but total rate of growth for too long.  We have the worldest largest economy, yet we don't have the highest standard of living.

When middle America is ready to head to wall street with AK47s, I'm there.  In the meantime, we have Obama.  Lets not let years of cynacism keep us from appreciating it.

Total # of deaths from "swine" flu: 8

Total annual deaths from regular old human flu: 250-500 thousand

http://tiny.cc/swine511
http://tiny.cc/flu611

Turns out this isn't the first panic over "swine flu"



Only 1 person died from swine flu in 1976.  Hundreds of Americans were killed or seriously injured by the inoculation the government gave them to stave off the virus.

http://www.capitalcentury.com/1976.html

Of course it isn't just about ratings and selling papers. Some of it is human nature.  I think we enjoy panicking.
I understand that people have a hard time taking history into account.  If it didn't happen in one's own lifetime it becomes an abstraction, and therefor not something to learn from.  But "bird" flu was only, what, 3 years ago?  The "global pandemic" of bird flu killed a little over 200 people world-wide over the course of about 5 years. 
Before that was y2k.  It was supposed to shut down every computer, crippling all of modern civilization.
The supposed financial "crises" hasn't even wore itself out, and already we are on to our next one.

I stopped watching/reading "news" a long time ago, and yet somehow I keep hearing about this stuff.
I keep imagining to myself that somehow humanity is going to collectively stop being so stupid.
I know how terribly deluded I am.
I think I should just give in.
Anyone know where I can buy one of those masks?

http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/the_gay_animal_kingdom/

At first I was going to comment directly on the article, but couldn't find a place for it.
Then I noticed the article is 3 years old.
Disappointing.
Then it occurred to me; that's exactly what my blog is for!  Remember?  Duh.

On to my comments:

This is a fascinating study and long over due research, which deserves far more attention that it's gotten for both social and scientific reasons.
However, I must partially object to the conclusions of this particular article.

It presents a false dichotomy.  None of the observed activities contradict the basic principals of Darwinian evolution, including sexual selection.  They may seem to contradict some assumed extensions of the basic mechanisms of evolution, but those assumptions are the things which must be thrown out, not the entire theory.

Sex serves a social function.  This is true not only in humans, but in a great many other species as well - generally those that are more complex, intelligent, and social.  This much is clear.
This does not mean sex is not also about reproduction.  It is not an either/or question.  To dispute that sex is primarily about reproduction, the survival of one's genes, is just plain silly.

But simply maximizing number of offspring does not necessarily lead to the greatest number of survivors a few generations down.  Increasing the quality of a few offspring, and improving the environment they grow up in can be an alternate and potentially more successful strategy for grandkids (and greatgrandkids, etc).  In a social specie where individuals are dependent on the group, any behavior which increases the cohesiveness of the group has an adaptive advantage.

Because something has a primary function doesn't mean other useful things can't be gained in addition.
By the same line which suggests non-reproductive sex is a "waste" of energy or sex cells, one could just as easily see play and all other forms of recreation, reciprocal grooming, and pretty much any activity besides acquiring food and mates as a "waste" of energy as well.
But without the assumption that non-reproductive sex is "wasteful" from a sexual selection stand-point, the entire argument breaks down.
Especially since, in the majority of cases shown, the animals being referred to as gay are actually bi.
If female macaques mate with other females 93% of the time, then they mate with males 7% of the time, which is enough to occasionally get pregnant and have offspring.  All-male sheep and giraffe orgies are in addition to mating with females, not instead (even if they are more common).  All that is required for the theories of sexual selection to hold is that when individuals do choose to mate with someone of the opposite sex, they choose the sexist partner available, and that what is considered sexy is not always directly adaptive (outside of being sexy) - such as the classic peacock-tail example.
In the last section of the article it is in fact admitted that in all the examples cited of homosexual behavior in the animal kingdom, the activity was in addition to reproductive sex, not instead.  And while that fact lead to the (otherwise baseless) claim that heterosexuality (as well as pure homosexuality) in humans is a purely social construct, what few scientific studies have been done on the subject have found quite the opposite to be indicated: in human males at least, possibly no one is bi.  Researchers have studied groups of individuals who self-report as gay, straight, and bi, and took direct measurements of physiological response to various images.  Turns out guys who claim to be bi actually show a significant (physical) preference for one gender or the other.  I wouldn't go so far as to say they are "lying" - attraction goes beyond mere sex and physiology - but as far as what is "natural" and what is "social", there isn't much evidence to support that all humans are inherently bi (interestingly enough, the same type of study finds that women - regardless of self-reporting - tend to respond to both genders).  I do know of at least one other specie which, like humans, seems to have individuals who are exclusively gay. Penguins. They share another trait with us as well, one which may be even rarer than homosexuality.  Monogamy.  And it would follow that these two go together, because if you are faithful to one partner, being bi becomes meaningless.

(A brief aside: As I was writing, Pandora played a song by Queen.  The bio caught my eye and I read a little more.  Then I took a break to watch a couple of their videos on Youtube.  I realize I wasn't around in the 70s to see what the culture and style was like, but I am baffled that it was a secret that Freddi Mercury was gay.  I mean come on!  Never mind the hair or the leotards - wasn't the name of the band a clue??  But I digress...)

The apparent selfish/altruism conflict disappears when you consider that the unit of evolution is not the specie, not the individual, not even DNA, but the individual gene.  From an evolutionary standpoint, altruism can be seen as an individuals estimation of how many genes they have in common with the recipient of their assistance.  Any member of the same specie shares 99.5% of their DNA.  So while acting selfishly is advantageous (since you share 100% of your genetic code with yourself), as long as the benefit to another slightly outweighs the cost to yourself, altruism can be advantageous from a natural selection standpoint as well.  Someone from the same group/pack/heard is likely to have even more genes in common, a close relative even more so, and willingness to sacrifice reflects this (in humans no less than any other social specie).

Overall, the main problem is just that this view of sexuality - much like the one it is hoping to displace - is reductionist and over simplistic.  You don't need to force fit the oystercatcher into a simple theory to explain its behavior:a consistent minority of humans are polygynous too, and in those families most are cooperative with both mother's getting along and helping each other.  But in some cases personalities conflict, or jealousy is an issue. In humans you wouldn't expect anything different. It would be like calling either happy or dysfunctional (monogamous) marriages an anomaly.  They both exist.  People are like that.  Apparently so are oystercatchers. Neither conflict nor cooperation is the "true" default.  Game theory shows many many different combination can be stable.  Different things work for different situations, and for different individuals.  Claiming that conflict is an anomaly, as often as it occurs, presents the exact same problem as calling homosexuality an anomaly does.  It may not be the norm, but it isn't rare either, and if a theory has to explain it away, the theory is more likely to be flawed than reality.  Reality is never flawed.  Reality just is.  It isn't debatable.

I tried that once.  I found a cactus in the middle of a deciduous forest in the mountains on a lonely road in southern Mexico. I told it that cacti should live in desert.  I told it plainly and simply, as a statement of fact.  I told it more firmly: cacti don't grow in the mountains.  I yelled at it.  I got upset, and flung rocks and sticks in its general direction (mind you, I had been bicycling, solo, in a country where I didn't speak the language, for weeks at that point, I had been climbing the same mountain for days, and was many miles from civilization).  And after all my pronouncements of science, for all my certainty, the cactus was still there.  It's probably there now, on that mountain in between Taxco and Mexico City, among the pine trees. 
Whenever the theory diverges from actual reality, reality wins.  That was one of the points of the article, but then it tries to do the same thing with human behavior and intra-species conflict.  In the end it does seem to stray from pure science to trying to push a particular socio/political agenda, which is unfortunate because the information, presented without bias, really is important for its implications for human society, the idea that sex for pleasure is perfectly natural, normal, and acceptable, in all of its various forms.

Sexual selection does not preclude homosexuality, and indeed it can even have an adaptive advantage due to its encouragement of social cohesiveness, so well demonstrated by our closest evolutionary relatives, the bonobos. This would still not explain masturbation, which is also easy to find in the animal kingdom.  It has neither a reproductive nor a social function.
But evolution doesn't work like engineering.  There is no plan set out in advance.  Its just a bunch of stuff that happens, and some of it works.
One thing that works is flexible complex decision making systems (brains) because they can deal with a greater variety of situations than instinct alone can.  With free will an individual can prioritize themselves - not their genes - but genes keep our goals in line with theirs by controlling what feels good.  Things which tend to promote more surviving copies of genes feel good, from eating food to caring for babies to generosity.  But its a pretty imperfect system.  Sugar is a good energy source, but we took advantage of sugar tasting sweet to create things like chocolate cake and Twinkies - even diet soda which has exactly zero nutritive value, but triggers the sensory system in the same way as fruit.  We can experience parenthood through adoption.  We get the thrill of the hunt via video games.  None of these increases our chances of having genes survive.  But they are all byproducts of something which does help us survive - a level of intelligence that allows us to create and use technology.  Sometimes an adaption has more than one effect, and one of them is extremely useful.  As long as the other effect isn't destructive, the overall adaptation will be selected for.  Because of that we can safely short-circuit our own pleasure responses with movies and drugs and masturbation and still be fruitful and multiply.  The cost of these pointless activities is negligible.  There doesn't have to be a "why".  It feels good.  The question in this case is actually "why not?"

It shouldn't make one bit of difference what is "natural" and what isn't.  Natural isn't always good.  Getting eaten by a mountain lion is natural.  However, as it turns out all the various "perversions" do happen to be perfectly natural.  So, whatever you are into, stop worrying about it, and enjoy.