Saturday, October 29, 2005

I Found It !


"The paranoid spokesman sees the fate of conspiracy in apocalyptic terms -- he traffics in the birth and death of whole worlds, whole political orders, whole systems of human values. He is always manning the barricades of civilization."
- Hofstadter


When I read Vox or other libertarian blogs, I always think, "Chicken Little - The sky is falling! The sky is Falling!", not because Vox an Co. are paranoid or nuts or way out in left field on issues concerning liberty and the results of the lack thereof, but because they are often jumping the gun on them. It's seems true to me that most of what the government does is leading us to destruction and misery, but these fellas seem to think it's "just around the corner" or "any minute", often making predictions of immediacy. Whether it's economic disaster, martial law, or the instant extinction of mankind they see it pending post-haste.

I have always attributed this to a sort of short circuit of intuition. As I understand it intuition is the brain subconsciously assimilating seemingly random and unrelated data into a sudden conclusion or solution, and I think being around others of libertarian mindset increases the relative frequency of occurrence of ideas related to eventual catastrophic failure of social/economic systems. This frequency adds urgency to the equation and the result is eminent dire predictions.

And you thought they were just paranoid.....

Drat and Double Drat

Track day canceled. Here I sit in TN with bike fully prepped and the track day was cancelled due to ????. Nobody knows, but the brothers "C" are pissed, except for Nate who wasn't allowed to go anyway.

I saw y'all got into an "oil prices" discussion. Thread stealers. Just kiddin', the whole thing blows my mind, but I have to disagree with the assertion that folks charging more for fuel that they already had in their tanks than they originally paid for it is gouging. Small operators have to anticipate big hikes in their costs so they don't get pinched in a shortage. We have to pay them to buy fuel, store it, dispense it, and to provide the service of maintaining that convenient (to us) supply.

It will be interesting to see what oil company executives have to say in the upcoming congressional hearings. They did a piss poor job of dealing with the fallout from reporting record profits in times of shortage. Regardless of the economic reality most folks have a low level of understanding of economic principles and the way our markets function which leads them to pressure their representatives for action against oil companies. The executives of oil companies are well paid and should be sacked summarily after the things that got into the press concerning reactions to the latest quarterly reports.

This and the fact that there is no way to over-estimate the impact energy prices have on the economy have folks in an uproar. I couldn't help but notice that shortly after Bill Frist announced hearings into the matter fuel prices slid dramatically. CYA anyone?

Bill, I use the ballpein method of staking master links. Sometimes well developed hammer control comes in handy.

Thursday, October 27, 2005

Zen and the Art

Damn! Is anything simple with these things? And just who the hell decided motorcycle chains had to be riveted at the masterlink? Oh, sure, it's reassuring to know there isn't a clip to fly off at 140 MPH, but that doesn't help SQUAT when the shop manual says, "Remove Chain".

I got the transmission cover off anyway and replaced the countershaft seal and the shifter shaft seal. I'm reassembling it tomorrow and putting it on the trailer. I am very excited about Sunday, though I do feel a bit twilight-zone realizing I am 40, riding around on a red motorcycle, and going to a race track for the first time.

I would concede a midlife crisis were it not that I have pretty much been a child for the entire previous 39 years and I assume one must have an adult year or two in there somewhere to qualify for regression.

On a lighter note: Nothing like a few pending indictments to send GW and Co. scurrying back to suck up to us neandrathal conservatives for support is there?!