The Udder Runs Dry?

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There must be a rube in the House.

A recent Republican who does not understand how the game is played – much less why it is being played the way it is played. He and perhaps some of his fellows not-yet-initiated publicly wondered why the federal government is underwriting the sale of luxury-performance cars that happen to be electric.

It is a curious thing.

They suggested rescinding the $7,500 tax inducement which the government has been using to “help” electric car manufacturers like Tesla, which sell electric cars that start around $40,000 and which emphasize not economy but performance and style and technology.

Some might look upon the robbing of Peter – who probably drives an eight-year-old Camry in need of front end work – so that Paul can drive a brand-new, $40,000 electric luxury-performance car – as somewhat obnoxious.

But not everyone.

There is, for example, Genevieve Cullen – who is the head shill for the electric luxury-performance car lobby, styled the Electric Drive Transportation Association. She practically squealed the collective indignation of her clients, who are alarmed very much by the prospect of having to make an honest dollar:

She and they “ . . .continue to believe that a reformed tax code should include a robust set of incentives to support the electrification of transportation,” Cullen wrote to House Republican Rep. Kevin Brady of Texas, who is the chair of the Ways and Means Committee – which is the government gaggle which weighs how to dispose of our means.

But Cullen is not being straight with Brady – or with the means providers (who haven’t got much choice about that).

The issue on the table is not whether Uncle should “support the electrification of transportation,” as she shysterishly misdirects. It is whether wealth transfers from working people to affluent people ought to be continued.

Elon Musk, for instance, is a billionaire. The idea that anyone who files a W2 ought to be made to fund his operations is haltingly offensive.

The people who buy the electric cars he makes – when he does actually make them – are the same people who buy BMWs and other luxury-performance cars with prices that start around twice the price of an ordinary IC-engined economy car.

Which is why the electric cars Tesla sells do not emphasize economy. That would be as obviously absurd as suggesting a diet of potato chips and grape soda sweetened with fructose for the obese. The difference here, however, is that the government is not paying obese people to eat potato chips and grape soda.

Wait, sorry.

It is paying obse people to eat those “foods.” There is no longer any such thing as “government cheese” – i.e., the basic staples which used to be provided, at taxpayer expense, to people who could not or for whatever reason would not provide the means to feed themselves. EBT card in hand – food stamps being too shaming, you know – they are now free to dine not only on potato chips and grape soda sweetened with fructose but also to sup on sushi and steaks, courtesy of the same tax mules who are mulcted to finance the purchase of luxury-sport electric cars.

One set the stage for the other, arguably.

Wealth transfers no longer hide behind even the pretense of lending a temporary and necessary helping hand to the less fortunate, to people just barely making it – whether it’s potato chips and grape drink or high-end electric cars.

The not-so-poor-anymore are entitled to eat the same food as the taxpayers who – as a result of this – can no longer afford to eat as well themselves. Similarly, the guy who is saving up to pay for the front-end work his eight-year-old Camry needs hasn’t got the money for the repairs because that money was taken out of his hide to “help” put a San Francisco Snowflake into a $40,000 Tesla.

The interesting thing is the supine acceptance of these outrages by the populace. That persons such as Genevieve Cullen are able to appear in public without a cordon of armed guards.

It is one thing to provide staples to fill the bellies of people who for one reason or another would perhaps otherwise go hungry. In principle, it is still morally disagreeable to achieve this via the use of force and theft – i.e., taxation. But it’s a tepid affront compared with finding oneself in the checkout line at Whole Foods behind an EBT’er “paying” for his steaks and sushi and grape drank and potato chips with your money.

While you wait your turn to pay for your ground beef patties.

So also with electric cars – which are the equivalent of free steaks and sushi.

Does your car have heated leather seats and a huge LCD touchscreen? Does it tout how quickly it can get to 60?

The Tesla you “helped” your boss buy does.   

And as obnoxious as that is, the tragedy is that there would probably be electric cars that didn’t need “help” were it not for the firehose-diameter IV of government heroin flowing into the veins of crony capitalists such as Elon Musk.

And not just him, either. The entire car industry is being corrupted by this business – and driven to ruin, ultimately. Because it’s not economically viable. Eventually, as Margaret Thatcher once famous said, you run out of other people’s money.

Take away not just the $7,500 courtesy-of-your-neighbor discount but all the layers of subsidization and the focus would return to making an electric car that made economic sense. It would not be luxurious or sporty. It would lack heated leather seats and an opulent oversized LCD touchscreen.

It would take as long as it took to get to 60.

But it might actually cost less to own than an otherwise-comparable IC-engined economy car. People might be induced to buy such a car – just as people once-upon-atime bought VW Beetles and Chevettes and Datsun B210s – without using the government as a proxy to mug their neighbors to “help” them make the purchase.

But why eat government cheese when you can dine on steak and sushi – and never have to worry about the bill?

Marie Antoinette is supposed to have said, “let them eat cake” – and thereby triggered a revolution and the loss of her own head. Perhaps, one happy day, the same fate will befall Elon and his fellow tax parasites.

It’s a cheerful thought, at least.

. . .

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243 COMMENTS

  1. This is a similar problem that the higher-education cabal and the medical-payments systems have inflicted upon us: Give us special rights to the Treasury, and we’ll increase our prices beyond sanity. After all, they’re getting these contributions to their money pot from the people who purchase the item being given free stuff with which to purchase that item.

    And every one of these programs will lead to disaster, just as Margaret Thatcher said.

  2. You what’s really amazing? How, and to a lesser degree why, the comments here digressed into a cock-blocking pissing contest over battery technology.

    • Gtc, the how of it is explained easily: it happened by virtue of one know-it-all ringmeat mongoloid dickweed wedging his ignorance into the conversation. The why of it is that the ringmeat mongoloid dickweed seems to really think that he knows everything about everything and wrongly assumes that everyone else will bow to his superior wisdom and will also be thrilled to read his inanities.

      There.

  3. Actually it was 17,000 volts at right around 2 amps, in a 5,000 watt AM transmitter capable of +150% modulation. I know they didn’t teach you such things exist in mechanical engineering school.

    • I’ve been an Amateur Radio operator for over 30 years. Perhaps you could explain to me how a 16G wire is carrying 17,000 volts at 2 amps which equates to 37,000 watts, then only producing 5000 watts of transmit output. That’s 32,000 watts of heat that needs to be dissipated. Maybe you could provide a link to the schematic. Or is it some proprietary secret you learned from Nikola Tesla himself allowing such contradictions to the laws of physics.

        • Someone earlier mentioned 16G wire and 16,000V. Then you defended that by saying you’d been privy to a design that you describe above without stating the wire size. That is what is know as insinuation. Now back to the current question: what happens to the 31,000 watts that disappears between input and output in this transmitter. And I’ll take your non response about linking to the schematics as you “either can’t or won’t”. You are just a Paid Troll who’s job is to infiltrate social media and disrupt to conversation.

          • Paid trolls are called shills.
            I see your amatuer license for 30 years with my GROL since the mid 1980’s and raise with my First Phone Radiotelephone License issued in the mid 1970’s.
            What 31,000 watts from a 5000 watt transmitter? How many of those have you designed and built as an amatuer radio operator? Or are you just one of the majority of them who is an appliance operator and couldn’t fix what you don’t have a schematic of?
            I probably remember more about that Rockwell International Power Rock transmitter from 1979 than you do about what anyone has said on this group since you signed on the first time. You can find the schematic as easily as I can, my never have anything but the paper one in my hand or head. Transmitter schematics didn’t have links in 1979.

            • Yep Bill the Shill.
              I say the earlier description of you by another one of your adoring fans as being a “dickweed” is an insult to dickweeds IMO!

              • And I see that you have been reduced to spitting ad hominem by being outclassed by a broadcast radio engineer who has seen more schematics that you have ever read. You probably haven’t ever build a single piece of electronic equipment in your life, let alone troubleshot or repaired one.
                I bet you have never seen a transmitter with a final plate that operated at ground, as the Power Rock did.
                Don’t bother me with your poor memory until your recovery from Alzheimer’s is complete.

  4. “You should do a little research on battery before you display your ignorance again.”
    You should take a basic course on Ohm’s law before you demonstrate your ignorance.
    I spent a decade working on equipment that you would regard as impractical, based on past comments.

    • I’m sorry I’m a lowly Mechanical Engineer with 30 years experience working with electric power systems for aeronautical applications. I’ve been involved in the practical design and implementation of the very Lithium Chemistry that Musk uses since it inception 20 years ago. You’re just an argumentative troll.

      • Mechanical engineers usually know as much about electrical engineering as medical doctors do about nutrition. What is aeronautical about an EV? What aeronautical application uses any voltage over 1KV?

        • Whoever said anything about 1KV application? I think you need to be taking Lithium not discussing it. That is from a nutritional viewpoint, not medical!

        • As a mechanical engineer I’ve had to learn a fairly wide variety of electrical things. Did you know that switches, battery packs, RF shielding, and much more are considered mechanical responsibilities, not electrical?

          • Moving parts are a part of everything mechanical. It is typical for engineering management to assign responsibilities to whoever they expect to have the competence to do the job, regardless of how it is categorized. I do not have a degree but I seldom encountered a degreed engineer that could do anything nonmathematical any better than I could, and the only math I needed in my broadcasting career was performed by a planimeter, just as it was for those with degrees.

            • In product development mechanical engineering ends up doing everything because it retains final responsibility for the product.

              As a result I’ve had to deal with all sorts of things from other disciplines. About the only thing I haven’t been stuck with is writing the software. Although I could do that too if need be.

              There are two kinds of engineers. Those with knack and those who were good at school. It’s sad you only met the later but when you lump everyone with a degree together you’re insulting those who have knack but were good enough at school to get a degree.

              • Trouble is, Brent, it seems that the kind who just went to school are a lot more prevalent these days [Not just in engineering, but in many professions].

                And I’d imagine that those who do the hiring share 50% of the blame, because the recent practice of judging applicants mainly by the degrees they hold, essentially delegates the task testing the applicants oneself. -Although, it’s probably hard to tell who has “the knack” in a sea of applicants, when so many these days just put in the time and obtain the perfunctory degree. [As opposed to many years ago, when people worked their way up to postions based on their performance in less skilled positions in the same company].

                And if the person(s) doing the hiring aren’t engineers themselves (Which is probably far more likely to be the case these days)….it makes it even worse. I mean, if an MBA, accountant, and administrator of multi-culturalism are doing the hiring… [Probably how it is at GM…]

              • They lumped themselves together instead of going out an learning what to do from an experienced mentor. The problem occurs when there are only inexperienced degreed engineers on a project, none of them ever having done what they are expected to have.

                • No, we did not. Complain to your corporate masters if you have nothing but inexperienced degreed engineers on a project. See back in the 1990s something known as the GE system, or rank and yank spread through engineering employment. It was designed to purge the higher salaried experienced engineers. It worked.

                  Engineers that didn’t drink the corporate koolaid because they knew better were purged. Corporate HR departments considered engineers fungible. No difference between a 22 year old H1B with a BS from the Indian Institute of Technology and an american with 20 years of experience. Same thing to the corporation but the former was far cheaper.

                  • A fresh out of school engineer is just as ignorant about what s/he is working on as a fresh out of school medical intern.
                    I started learning about science before I could walk, and really didn’t put the learning hammer down until high school. Experience is the most important thing we learn about everything, and a degree doesn’t give enough of that to take up a semester.

                    • Again, complain to your corporate masters. The more that people complain about good at school engineers the more money I’ll be worth on the job market.

                      I started disassembling things as soon as I could hold a screwdriver.

                • It is not the inexperienced young engineers fault at all. It is the old engineer that screwed up. Way back when, he figured out that knobs don’t work as well as the lever. They tried knobs and they didn’t work. BUT he never wrote that down. So, of course, years later the young engineer walks in one day and says “hey we should try a knob instead of a lever!”

                  • You missed the reason the knowledge wasn’t passed down. It was because the companies fired the experienced engineers.

                    Writing everything down (if it would even be looked at) just makes it easier for companies to lower their salary costs and or move work overseas to low wage countries.

                    • Not just that, guys…..

                      It’s also “the system”.

                      i.e. some kid who has no idea of what he wants to do, or the way things in the real world are, is told “Hey, you get good grades in math. You could be an engineer…” [etc.]. And since many people just take the path of least resistance, or are just concerned with what may pay a decent salary; or because it’s been hammered into their head, and they may not hate the idea…they pursue it…..even if they didn’t take apart things when they were 6 (or ever) to see how they work; even if they never made a plan to construct something to solve a problem in their life; even if they never tinkered or built anything; even if it’s not their passion…but rather just a choice.

                      And so it is with many, many professions these days.

                      People aren’t encouraged to do what they are passionate about; or even acquire real requisite knowledge. Just pick a “career path” based largely on what you CAN do, and what it pays……and by the time you know any different, you’re stuck with it, and the debts which got you there.

                      I remember the day I dropped out of high-school. The little hen-pecked Jew guidance counselor was doing his darndest to talk me into staying.

                      He said “You could be a nuclear physicist if you want to!” My reply: “I don’t want to be a nukular physicist; just a clam-digger!”.

                    • When teachers and the guidance counselor learned where I was going to college and for an engineering degree they acted like I would never make it.

                      I have no idea why other than I wasn’t one of the kids from the richer part of the district that dominated the upper classes I was in.

                      Now that I know better I think their job is simply to crush children emotionally and mentally and enforce social classes.

                    • While government agencies in general seem to attract the worst; government schools seem to attract the worst of the worst!

                      In my case, the guidance counselor (Whose guidance I never sought, but for some reason, he’d always seem to appear around me…) worked with his big-mouthed over-bearing wife -and it was really hilarious for this guy to be giving anyone else advice, seeing that his own life was one of perfunctory servitude.

                      I’ve rememkbered him and his wife all of these years (Other than one elementary school principal, they’re virtually the only non-teacher school personnel whom I do specifically remember)- Her because of her obnoxiousness; and him, because of his pathos. The poor guy. He was actually a nice man, who meant well; and who even sought to elevate me to a higher socio-economic class- but his own life was just so pathetic; and you could see the remainder of his life mapped-out before him, and it’d just make you shudder, and think how lucky you are not to be him!

                      He served as an example….of what NOT to do.

  5. One of the core, defining characteristics of Fascism is the partnership between private companies and the government. Yet where are those mad-as-hell-and-not-going-to-take-it-anymore Antifa(tards) on this one? Isn’t breaking up an unholy alliance between a white Russian billionaire and our government-as-piggybank a little bit bigger bigger fish to fry than attacking christians for praying in a park? You’d think committed anti facists would at least know WTF fascism is when it’s literally stealing money from their own wallets. After all it’s my understanding that they do get taxes withheld from their Soros pay checks.
    Does anybody even know which way is up anymore? Does anyone even know anything anymore? The mere existence of Tesla tells me no. Everything else reinforces it.

    • Graphene batteries will allow electric cars over 500 mile range and a one minute charge.
      Musk’s gigafactory will be another billion dollar blunder.

      • We can agree that Musk is doomed [sooner or later] and that battery technology will evolve- but a 500 mile range on a one minute charge? Uh…keep dreaming about that one. The capacity of the charger and lines that deliver so much energy so fast would have to be HUGE.

        [Think of filling a 27,000 gallon pool with a garden hose. Takes about 3 days. The pool is the EV; the garden hose is the charger/electric service). Now think of the size hose you’d need to put that same amount of water in the pool in one hour. ]

        There are always all sorts of wild claims about new technologies- like solar highways and colonies on the Moon. How many of them ever come to fruition? A few years ago hydrogen cells were going to be the things to power cars…..there was just one little problem they had to work out: How to produce that hydrogen while using less energy than the hydrogen contains! They never worked it out.

        • I had the same thought. Ok so maybe they have a batter that can charge that fast but there’s no practical way to handle those currents. It would be something more cumbersome and probably more dangerous for the average american to be playing with than what people imagine CNG refueling to be. We’re talking voltages and currents that will make burning nitro-methane seem safe.

          Then there are robustness issues with the cells. Physically speaking. I have some ideas that could make charging faster and safe but they would be very expensive to implement and very cumbersome to use. Nobody would like it.

          As such I retain my view that for electric cars to be viable it has to be something on the order of zero point. A non-battery solution. There are simply unworkable limits of batteries that will prevent it from being as convenient as gasoline.

          • And Brent, I’m no electro-whats-ya-ma-calls-it….but in regards to charging a battery with such a charge so quickly, I’m thing “heat”. There’s going to be a LOT of heat. If the standard slow-charging lithium batteries already require some provision for heat dissipation, could you imagine a battery that would hold twice the charge and be charged in a minute?

            And I still don’t understand: All of these crazy ideas, and for what? To fix something which isn’t broken. What exactly is the problem with IC cars that EVs would solve, even if they were practical?

            Oh, yeah…the “problem” of autonomy/freedom/self-determination……

          • It would be similar to the power systems used to fire large numbers of lasers in nuclear fusion reactors, and those won’t fit in a service station.

        • I agree. Currently internal combustion engines have about 37 times the energy density of a battery/electric motor set up. The gap will quite possibly never be breached.

          • The only reason why those batteries are not currently available is because the enormous amount of capital to R&D them has gone to developing non conventional petroleum sources. A loosing proposition since we are reaching the point where it is now taking nearly one barrel of oil’s energy to extract one barrel of oil. Even an economic neophyte should see the folly in that formula. This is classic “misallocation of capital”. The oil companies getting first crack at the free money created by the fed have chosen to foster a debt based shale oil boom. That like all other booms will eventually bust. I already have some Graphene / Lithium batteries that are over 3 times the energy density of Musk’s and can be charged in 5 minutes. They still use a liquid electrolyte that is infused with lithium. The next generation already being demoed in labs will be solid state. Their primary component will be Carbon, the most abundant element on earth. The material is incredible. Not only can it hold a charge but it is structurally stronger that steel. Lighter and stronger than carbon fiber. And when economies of scale kick in it will be extraordinarily cheap. Now who do you think would do anything to see this technology disappear?

            • The shale boom was an unintended consequence of management’s money creation. High oil prices plus free money. It is only shale and sand oil sources that approach 1 to 1. But the energy to extract can’t come from a variety of sources that are less useful.

              That said oil can be manufactured. The flow of capital to that is essentially zero but the processes have been developed to turn waste streams into oil. It’s cheaper to extract it.

              As of 2012, NPR reported oil extraction was 20 to 1 energy wise. 20 times the energy required to extract.

                • Hydrogenation also makes liquid oils into solid lipids, but that doesn’t mean they are good for human nutrition.
                  It takes more energy to hydrogenate gas into coal than the energy that is available in the coal.

              • There is nothing unintended about it IMO. They needed some way to absorb the enormous sums of money being created, while keeping inflation in check. And at the same time they are keeping the private and public pension funds from failing. Don’t believe anything you hear from Industry shills, whether they work for an oil interest or the CorpGov. The EROI is nowhere near 20-1 industry wide. They make the fake news look trustworthy. The oil companies are one of the few investments that are paying 7% or better yields on investment, a number necessary to keep the typical pension’s checks cashing. They can only maintain these payments by constant infusion of cash from creditors with their hands in the Fed’s trough. A clear example is Exxon Mobil. They earned the highest annual corporate profit in history 2015. In 2016 they had no capital left for 2017 CAPEX going forward after paying dividends and have to borrow to do so. It’s a Ponzi scheme surpassed only by Social Security. And the shale boom is a scam that requires in excess of $100 a barrel to break even economically. A figure that the current moribund economy cannot stand which is why the price is incapable of breaking above the 50s without a war.

                • Best I can tell the owners (Carlin sense) did not want the shale boom. They don’t want the pensions to be paid out either. It’s something they overlooked.

                  The technocratic future requires expensive centrally distributed energy. Shale is a bunch of smallish companies at the bottom. The result has caused the price of oil to drop. I don’t see how this helps the owners.

                  As to break even it depends. Much of it is $40 something but other locations more, upwards of the $100/bbl pricing. If the owners wanted shale oil the Saudis would have had their market share game stopped. Instead it was hoped that the shale producers could be bankrupted and then things would get back on track.

              • These are RC cells that are made by a variety of manufacturers. They are prismatic lithium polymers cells. The Tesla uses proprietary 18650 round cells like tools, they’re lithium Ion. We’ve been years ahead of industry on power systems and robotics. Musk and his guy’s piggyback on open source designs. The guy’s from Grumman used to come to our club and pick our brains long before the first Predator flew. The need for high energy density low weight and great current production capabilities were paramount. Now in the last two years they have been coating the film with a substrate of Graphene that has brought the internal resistance down to unheard of levels and the batteries are demon starting incredible characteristic of charge and discharge plus LONG life cycles in harsh conditions. Much harsher than anything a Tesla might endure.

                  • Hyperion, Turnigy, Dinogy, amongst several other brands. They’re being made in small batchs for a cottage industry. use your search function before you testy again please.

                    • That’s the American way come up with a necessity and engineer so that your customer needs to return over and over to keep his batteries maintained at a small fee then after 5 or 6 years the big hit comes for a new pack or give the car away.

                  • Yssou can buy these thing as ready made packs and in some case single cells off ebay or amazon. There is a half dozen or more Chinese factories spitting them out.

                    • The Hyperion G7 2S 9200mAh Si-Graphene HvLi is “capable of 500+ Cycle-life.” How many battery users will want to replace a battery after 500 charges?

                    • Exactly, Bill. A graphene battery that could equal the performance and range of a Tesla battery, would cost 5 times of the current lithium battery, and have a life expectancy of 2 years.

                • QQ, are you saying that Tesla battries[sic] are made up of a bunch of 18650 cells, like rechargable tool batteries?

                  Uh…no. Have you ever seen a Tesla bettery? They’re made up of modular, replacable plates……..

                  (Or were you just trying to pull Bill’s chain?)

                  • Nunzio I wasn’t aware that Tesla was using prismatic lithium polymer cells. I hadn’t done my research and assumed they were using l8650 due to their robustness compared to the flat cells. Then that is why Teslas are fire prone. And after 20 years on the market nobody has been able to totally eliminate that with flat cells. Those cells you’re commenting on and that Bill displayed his ignorance about only having a 2 year lifespan is not correct. If they were used in a manner like the Tesla and putting out orders of magnitude higher current loads than Tesla they would last many more cycles than 500. Cycle life ratings are dependent on the amount of heat generated during charge and discharge. If you fast charged and deep discharged a Tesla at high speeds you would kill the pack much faster than if you slow charged at 1C and only drove slowly and never used more than 85% of your charge you would get many more cycles than advertised. Now you know why Musk released the last 15% of charge for Florida evacuees. The firmware cuts power at 15% to save the batteries cycle life.

                    • I knew something had to be wrong there, QQ. Could you imagine if Tesla batteries WERE made up of a bunch of 18650s?! There’d be thousands of ’em in every car; and thus, thousands of connections and thousands of casings. Although, not that I’d put it past Musk[rat] to try something like that!

                      You may be correct about the performance of graphenes (We wouldn’t know until they are tried in the real world)- Maybe they’d last longer with a slower charge and bigger reserve….but that would negate the very things which Fiskar is using to try and promote them- namely “Double the range of a Tesla, and able to charge in one minute”.

                      Maybe the truth is something like “A little more range than the Tesla, and able to charge slightly faster…but you’ll still pay dearly for that!”.

                      And again: All for what? A solution in search of a problem that doesn’t exist, because regualr internal-combustion-engined cars work just fine, and put out no more pollutants than the generation of all the electricity necessary to power all of these EVs would.

                  • The multiple small modules is what a carnut friend of mine insists that Telsa uses, but I don’t know or care. Musk’s technology is hardly as world class as his subsidy scams are .

                  • Last I heard TM was using cells of the 18650 format. Keep in mind there is large selection of cells in this format. I worked on a battery back using Panasonic/Sanyo cells a few years back so I got see the variety they offered. Supposedly TM’s were ‘custom’ but unless someone went through all of the offerings in detail there’s no way to know how custom if at all. My guess is by volume TM would simply get a new type first.

                    Apparently this year they changed to 2170s. Which again refers to the cell’s size and perhaps voltage. There is likely again a number of offerings.
                    Here’s a tear down:

                    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpSrHZnCi-A

                    You can sort of see the cylindrical nature of the cells in the modules.

          • It is easy to breach with a fuel cell, but they have yet to make a marketable propane fuel cell, and the hydrogen fuel cycle is as untenable as quick charging stations.

        • The lines would be huge if they were only carrying 110v or 220V. Take the power from the main line and don’t transform it down to 220v and the cable required would be no more than a typical HD extension cord. Besides the vast majority of people would just plug their car in where convenient and only use fast charging when necessary. And it takes me at least 5 minutes to fill my truck with diesel if I don’t have to wait in line.

          • If it were only voltage that mattered, you could run 50,000V through a 16 gauge wire with no problem- but when you figure in the amps needed to do something like power a car….you’d essentially need the kind of electrical infrastructure that they use to supply the 600V’s to in the NYC subway. I doubt there’s enough copper in the world to wire-up the whole country with something like that.

            • Nunzio, It’s watts that counts. 16,000V at 1A Current is 16,000 watts. Enough to easily weld heavy steel and then some. At 240V you’d need 66.6 amps to get 16,000 watts. But that would still take 3 or 4 hours to recharge a low pack. So yes you’re right about hardware. For fast charging a Tesla in 5 minutes it would take 3000A using 240V. Not a very likely scenario. It could only be done by raising the voltage significantly. But the typical utility pole carries somewhere between 1K and 69K volts before it’s transformed to 240 for residential service.

              • Watts are what count but voltage is limited by the voltage of the battery pack. Voltage is dictated by the number of cells and their arrangement. High voltage requires a greater number in series high current requires a greater number in parallel.

                Then there is the practical limit of the voltage the car can operate at. There could be a power transformer to step the voltage down but that’s energy loss, weight, and money.

                So realistically our charge variable is current. Which is hemmed in by physical limits, the residential electrical grid, and safety. Commercial charging would expand the limits but no where near today’s gas station turn over at the pumps.

                I have an idea how commercial charging could work around the current problem even further but it wouldn’t be cheap and would only slightly bump up the number of customers they could serve each day.

                Every time I look at the problem the real answer for electric cars is zero point. But we can’t have it even if it is or could be reality because then the technocratic order of society would collapse.

                • “Every time I look at the problem the real answer for electric cars is zero point. But we can’t have it even if it is or could be reality because then the technocratic order of society would collapse.”
                  Absolutely true! My first comment in the last thread was that exact point. “battery storage is so 20th century” it’s time to solve our problems with new thinking not the insanity that brought us to this point.

                  Reply

              • One amp wouldn’t do much welding, and most of the metal would be sublimated by the heat created by 16,000 volts before the supply collapsed under the extremely low resistance. What kind of welding requires more than a half dozen volts?

                • Actually you’d never sublimate anything, the arc from 16,000 would jump through the insulation and find ground. It was a convenient example to demonstrate Ohms Law. Most welding I’m aware of is done from 36 to 50VDC and AC, 25 to 300 Amps

                  • It may have been convenient, but it was grossly implausible, and so impractical. Beyond that, it didn’t demonstrate Ohm’s law, which isn’t demonstrable, but applicable.
                    Why would anybody design an electrical system that operates on 16,000 volts using insulation that can’t contain the corona and prevent the arc? I’ve worked on transmitters that ran on 17,000 volts and never arced over the correctly specified and installed insulation. I suspect that you haven’t.

  6. The great techno triumphalists such as comrade Elon Musk wouldn’t be making shit without government funding.
    Back in H.S. a buddy had a Chevette with a huge rust hole in the passenger side floorboard. You had to make sure you didn’t drop anything or it was gone forever.
    How nice it would have been to have a government funded unicorn fart powered mobile.
    As for Shanaynay LaQueefa and babay’s kids buying whatever with EBT that is wayciss to deny them because of da turrible slabery.
    The too big to fail banks get a cut of every EBT “transaction” so it isn’t going anywhere.

    • Under the Federal Reserve System, all the non-human players get a cut of every transaction. When they run out of “money” they load themselves or someone else more from nowhere so the system never bankrupts. It is quickly getting to the point where they can’t create more fast enough to pay the interest on the national debt, and that will bring on a liquidity crisis that will make 1929 look like a picnic. Pay off your debts and don’t leave anything in the bank that isn’t needed to make a payment on debit cards.

  7. Little apartments in the projects and they’re all made out of ticky tack
    Little apartments in the projects and they all look the same
    And the people in the projects all went to penitentiary where they were put in boxes and they all came out the same.
    And the children in the projects all want to buy a ps4 but they cant get a job because of the high minimum wage.
    So they go out selling drugs and wind up in penitentiary where they’re all put in boxes and they come out all the same.

    • They don’t want a job to get a PS4, they are entitled to it. Provide em work and they’d still sell dope. AND want you to want you to feed em too.

  8. Well, the guy with the Camry with bad ball joints ain’t gonna complain because his kids are going to school on subsidized Pell grants & student loans; he got a multi-thousand dollar kickback for each kid still living at home; he got another kickback for putting solar panels on the house (for which he deducts mortgage interest and which he financed through Freddie Mac); and he will draw Social Security when he retires. Did I mention that his son joined the Army & will get a plethora of VA bennys when he gets out?

  9. Well, you are probably going to hate me now Eric, but I just bought a Model S P100D, picking it up tomorrow.

    I am under no delusion that it makes sense economically or environmentally, but it sure is fun to drive.

    I wouldn’t vote for the subsidy myself, but if it is there I am sure going to take advantage of it. All added together I pay 50% of my income in taxes (about $60,000 a year in taxes), so I feel no guilt getting $7,500 of that back.

    I am against any subsidy in any context, because it raises overall tax rates to compensate. This is where we disagree with LewRockwell, who is against the Republican plan to remove write-offs like mortgage interest, etc.

    • “I am against any subsidy in any context” “but if it is there I am sure going to take advantage of it.”
      Thanks for making the post so easy, Interferon.

      • I am against the subsidy because it makes my tax rate go up as a consequence. I would rather have no subsidy and a lower tax rate. Either way, I would pay less.

          • So you don’t take mortgage interest, state taxes, or the personal deduction on your taxes?

            The government is stealing from me. I am merely reducing how much they take.

            The $7,500 is a reduction in taxes owed, not a check they write. Although at some point the differences just become semantic, granted.

            • No mortgage. 5k in taxes still doesn’t add up to more than the standard deduction. Property taxes should be above the line deduction the way state income taxes are in big spending liberal states.
              Since they can and do simply walk up to the computer at the Fed and change their balance any time they want – I am convinced that the only reason taxes exist at all is to force us to come up with Federal Reserve Notes. If not for taxes I would never use dollars for anything.
              When DeBeers went into Africa they tried to get the locals to pick up diamonds off the ground for $10. The locals didn’t want or need ten dollars. So DeBeers went to the government and instituted a $10 head tax. Then the locals HAD to work for them.

  10. Hey, Eric, I moused over the pic of Cullen, expecting to see a text box that says “Stupid cunt”, but it didn’t happen! You’re getting slipping 😉

    !I heard that in WI. they’re likely going to pass a bill which would have WI continue the subsidies for electric-car buyers in it’s state when/if the Fed stops theirs.

    Let’s face it: America is a communist nation. No longer just the politicians…but the people. They cheer for ths crap. : (

  11. Elon the Merciful will be gone to rule Mars by the time all those Tesla’s batteries start to belch hydrogen and cook off. I’ll go out on a limb here and claim that if we had real money and true price discovery IC vehicles would be rare. Eric is correct to point out the immorality of Tesla’s subsidies. And the ones he mentions are only the visible ones. But The cost of running on petroleum fuel has to factor in the 1000 Billion or so we’re “Voluntarily” relieved of every April 15th to support the massive military effort to spread democracy (SIC steal resources). Were it not for the ability of Oligarchs like Musk to purchase and manipulate the political process, his overhyped inelegantly engineered bumper car would cost an order of magnitude more, and gas would be in the double digits a gallon like it is in some of Europe’s formerly sovereign nations. Pure Electric vehicles are so much simpler to engineer. Without the Regulators and Revenuers and their Puppeteers making innovation and change nearly impossible, we’d have power systems that would be appropriate for every need, both electric and IC. Following Libertarian Ideals and adhering to True Principles of Freedom we’d have our own choice to make. And The Market would decide as opposed to some corrupt parasitic politician fronting for an Overlord Class.

    • I bet the opposite would be true. If we had a free market in vehicles electrics would be FAR cheaper than IC. Toshiba has 10hp electric motors for $120. Put one on each wheel and add $500 worth of batteries. Find me an IC drive train for under $1000. Also, you could make much lighter vehicles without Uncles crash test requirements.

    • The wars have not made gasoline or oil cheaper. That has never been the aim of the wars. The wars are about controlling and limiting supply to keep prices up. If the desire was cheap(er) hydrocarbon fuels all that’s needed is free and open trade. Wouldn’t cost a dime and prices would fall. But there’s no profit in that for the insiders.

      There’s a rent extracted on hydrocarbon fuels because of the wars. No wars, lower prices.

      Furthermore european gasoline costs about the same as it does in the USA. The european taxes on gasoline are much higher. Don’t think for a second that widespread electric car use wouldn’t have them finding a way to apply those taxes somewhere else.

      • It’s good that the Europeans see a truer representation of the cost at the pump. While it’s cheaper per gallon at the pump here, the true price it extracted elsewhere. Like the better than 50% of the value of our labor / capitol they skim through the IRS to give to the private owners of the Fed tax free.

        • The Europeons get reamed from both sides- they pay higher gas prices, AND higher taxes (If that’s even fathomable). When you’re a captive and disarmed population, “they” can do anything they want to ya. The Europeons are just a little ahead of us….but we’re right behind ’em, as we’re slowly being disarmed- and already to the point where our arms are not much more than a show as opposed to a threat, in the sight of those who use our money to arm themselves with the best and most powerful.

          • Nunzio, you got it. In the infamous words of the Red Raider…….Guns Up.

            If you aren’t armed, you’re ready to be anything they desire.

          • They were sold as infrastructure specific in the US, originally, but just as the Constitution and Frankenstein’s monster, they are alive.

          • Hi Brent, et al,
            The tax situation in most EU countries is absurd. The last time I was in Italy (2011) gasoline was 1.32 Euros a liter. Gas in the U.S. was like $2 a gallon. European countries also have a high VAT, sort of like a sales tax but not added at point of purchase but rather built into the price of goods. In Italy at that time the VAT was 20% IIRC. There are also high income taxes. The Continentals have been pawns of socialism for generations. The U.S. follows the same path but started from a different set of assumptions related to respect for individuals (in theory). It’s not that productive to compare Europe with most of the, especially flyover, U.S. due to differences in population density, longevity of cultures and cultural infighting etc. But, I ramble. As others said, we are all fucked in the end…just keep your powder dry and realize that western culture is collapsing, willingly destroyed from within by a bunch of brainwashed, willingly ignorant bunch of cultural marxists. But on the good side of things, people like me and 8SM have lived in the best times and in the best place that has, or in my opinion will ever have, existed for humans who actually value individual freedom of choice and thought. It’s been a grand ride.

            • Well-said, Giuseppe!

              You’d think that more people would have figured out what the US was up to after WW2 when we turned half of Europe over to the communists. But NOoooo! People just ignore that (The very people who took up arms to make it happen) and were content just so long as we preached anti-communist rhetoric.

              Put me on that list of having experienced some of best, before this country went crazy, too! Although I grew up 60 miles east of NYC; and it may be hard to believe now, but even back there, back when we still had some of our basic freedoms; when traditional culture was still intact; before everything was politicized and policed; and before the local taxes became oppressive; it was actually a quite amazing and unique place.

              I witnessed the Sovietization of that place before my eyes- and in c. a decade, that place became unrecognizable. Now there are only rare scattered places which haven’t been completely Sovietized yet- like the very rural area of KY where I now reside- but you can see the exact same processes at work here….they were just a little slower to adopt them here; but it’s the exact same M.O. -It’s NY of the 1980’s being played-out all over again. Same game plan…different place. And government just keeps on growing….. If nothing else, just that one metric says it all.

              • Hi Nunzio,

                I’m currently visiting Austin, TX from whence I escaped about five years ago for rural TN. I now refer to Austin as Moscow on the Colorado. It’s just depressing how all these young folks swarm here and expect all sorts of freebies. The real estate and taxes have skyrocketed and honest working people get fleeced as an ongoing thing. These people congregate in “smart living” housing like ants in a hill…..ant people. So, yeah, Austin was a lovely place back in the last millennia, not so much since being Californicated by an influx of Silicon Valley refugees. The interesting thing about the millennial generation is how little useful knowledge they generally possess, and of course there are exceptions. If they have car problems, they get fleeced due to sheer ignorance. They cannot, generally, do even basic arithmetic, much less think critically. No situational awareness because their heads are constantly stuck in cell phones….damn, I sound like a cranky old man…..hey you kids, get off of my lawn….but seriously, these poor suckers have been sold a bill of goods and will suffer mightily for it.

                • Guiseppe, last winter (I think it was), I was in the Carytown section of Richmond, Va where the college students flock. In one of the parking lots bordered by apartment houses on one side and retail stores’ rear entrances on the other, a young lady of about 19 or 20 had her car jacked up and was working.

                  I expected to see her changing a tire, which would have been surprising enough for someone her age in that place, but it turned out she was changing her brake pads.

                  She knew what she was doing, too and was having no trouble with it. I went inside and came back out and she was gone, leaving no mess at all.

                  That gave me a good feeling to see someone her age with the will and ability for a DIY brake pad job. Maybe all is not lost.

                  • Figures though, Ed, that it was a girl! She probably can’t boil spaghetti…but she can change brake pads. (The boys can’t do anything…other than use a smart phone).

  12. “Elon Musk, for instance, is a billionaire. ” How does one become a billionaire? “The lady of the lake, her arm clad in shimmering samite, thrust forth taxpayer dollars to me…”

    • Oh, Johnny DOH,

      ” Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.” Now you’ve done it…the obligatory MP and the Holy Grail quote

    • “The lady of the lake, her arm clad in shimmering samite, thrust forth taxpayer dollars to me…”

      Here, now, You can’t become a billionaire just because some watery tart flung a grant at you….Help! I’m being repressed!

  13. I’m with Laurence Vance on these types of credits. It just lowers the tax bill, and the rich do pay most of the taxes. Plus, by keeping it, it can make socialists hate the state as well. Maybe they will come around to the state in general being criminal, not just the current United States government.

    • The down side though to this tax credit is that it distorts the free market, the whole “Bastiat” thing- it could be that such a tax credit suppresses other more viable/better technology from coming out that doesn’t benefit from said tax credit.

      If Tesla didn’t benefit from carbon credits and the tax credit, do you think it’d still be in business?

      So while in concept I agree that people keeping more of their money is principally sound in a proverbial vacuum, when taken in the context of other competing business models(ICE) not having access to the same tax breaks in a non free market we should at least consider the possible “unseen” effects(negative).

      Ideally, there would be no taxes at all and everyone would be competing without government meddling, but since we can’t have that for now they next question should be “what does more harm/good within the current system?”

      I’m not offering an answer either way, I’m just suggesting that the core principle of letting people keep more of their money has extenuating implications when others don’t have access to the same credit.

      It’s why the Left has a valid point in talking about “crony capitalism” because they implicitly know that the playing field is not level. Some libertarians acknowledge this point, but in their focus on the fundamental principles don’t take the time to acknowledge the crony point and so as a result a Lefty will disregard the principle of letting people keep more of their own money because they know inherently that there’s an unlevel playing field. (not withstanding that most of the Left are Musk ass kissers that love the fairy tale notion of “green” cars)

      Obviously the solution is no taxes on anyone….but again, that’s not the environment we’re living in. So you have to guess which policy does the least harm. (and I’m not sure for the record)

      • I’m with you.

        1. Best thing: no taxes

        2. Second best: same credit for all cars

        3. Third: who knows, but at least we can point out hypocrisy of those who generally don’t like crony socialism

  14. “who probably drives an eight-year-old Camry in need of front end work” — that’s me exactly! How did you know? Oh, yeah, I exist (“lives” is not the right word) in California, which also has state-level Tesla subsidies, and Gov. Jerry Brown whose obsession is humans are evil destroyers of Gaia.

  15. Last week I took part in a marketing survey. It was to help some entity come up with a way to sell voters on the idea of a county run preschool or pre-head start program. For babies. See it seems that there’s a lack of daycare in the county for “working families” with kids between the ages of .5 to 3 years old. According to the marketing “facts” presented these are critical years for brain development and “working families” with mom at work means the poor kids don’t do as well later on in Uncle’s schools. So in 2018 there will probably be a voter initiative to fund this $5 million program.

    So many things wrong! First thing out of my mouth is “If this time in baby’s developement is so important why trust the state with it?” Then “Where are the churches and fraternal organizations? If your income isn’t enough to support a family why keep the job?” and “If this is so important why wouldn’t a parent make the sacrifices necessary to insure mom can stay at home?” I also pointed out that my sister took a job that she’s overqualified for so that she can work at home several days a week and lives in an area with good schools even though I think she wanted to live somewhere else. And besides, $5 million isn’t nearly enough to fund what will end up being several day care centers across a very large county, at least if you’re trying to do a good job of it. Hell, the small advertising office I managed back in the 1990s had a million dollar a year revenue budget and we weren’t even trying. Once you start any sort of facility designed around children the costs skyrocket due to massive federal regulation.

    Of course this all fell on deaf ears and detracted from the point of the marketing study. Instead of anyone questioning the whole plan, it was all about “Would you rather get your pocket picked by the real estate tax collector or the sales tax collector?” (the general consensus of the group was that sales taxes were preferred because it impacted more tourists than locals), and which slogan was more convincing to you.

    At least I got beer money out of it.

    But this is what we’re up against. Any argument against new spending at all levels of government is off the table. It’s now just accepted that Walmart employees are encouraged to get on EBT. Somewhere along the way it was decided that the working man was not only a beast to be milked dry but also that big employers had no responsibility to anyone aside from the shareholders. Oh they talk a good game about how “we” respect employees, but the reality is if you can’t survive on your income and you’re over 25 or so (and having children) then your employer is screwing you over. Instead of confronting your manager and justifying a wage increase, they just bend over and take it. Then along comes someone with a political agenda, who does a study of the working poor and their children, and instead of shaming their employers (or appealing to man’s natural tendency toward charity), instead decides that government needs to stick their nose in where it doesn’t belong. And politicians love these sorts of programs because who doesn’t support babies! And government gets a little bigger, a little more intrusive (if you’re a taxpayer. God help you if your kid end up in one of these programs), and it gets a little harder to be free.

    • Hi ReadyK: (the general consensus of the group was that sales taxes were preferred because it impacted more tourists than locals) Had I been at the meeting, I would have asked them: But is this not “taxation without representation?” Is it not immoral to force other people to fund programs which benefit only the locals? Is this not a shameful thing to do?
      Hopefully, the crowd will carefully consider your objections.

      • If it’s tourists who are being taxed, they have a choice – they don’t have to visit the taxed location. And if they don’t live there, naturally, they aren’t “represented”.

        • Liberyx, this negates nothing I have said. It remains taxation without representation, etc., etc! Also, those slimey locations do not inform tourists of this tax. They usually slip it into hotel charges. The practice remains immoral, but that isn’t a real problem to republicans and democrats.

  16. It may be the case that that person using the food stamp card in front of you bought it at a discount from someone who’d rather have cigarettes or alcohol. I can’t blame people for taking advantage of something that’s there. It may be how they stay afloat. Don’t judge.

    • Hi HHh,

      Should one also “not judge” the guy who sees your open garage and decides to help himself to some of your stuff?

      What’s the difference? After all, he’s just “taking advantage of something that’s there….”

      Right?

      I’m curious…

      • The guy that’s helped himself to your stuff and made it available to carrion birds is Uncle.

        You are now vulnerable and helpless. Lashing out at any individual buzzard seems like a poor strategy.

        Rather like virtue signaling that feels good, but accomplishes little.

        You should always blame yourself for anything that happened, since you are the only one you can control. Surely there is a way out of this cycle.

        Raging against the dying of the honest man, feels good, but isn’t a life philosophy.

        Mr. Trump Goes To Washington – Bird Version
        https://i.imgur.com/4ZiGxh3.gifv

        • Hi Tor,

          In principle, I oppose any robbing of Peter to “help” Paul. But on a realpolitik level, I can somewhat abide basic assistance for people in genuine need. But this assistance should be basic. As it once was. Staples, with regard to food. It is obscene that a welfare mooch – especially a young, able-bodied male – can dine on steak and lobster – or buy potato chips, even. The dole should be strictly limited to things like bread and milk and cheese.

          Also: The dole for single moms should be conditional on their use of birth control. And revoked for failure to use birth control.

          • If that’s what you like thinking about, that’s cool.

            What I’m interested in, is diagnosing the problem and pinpointing the causes and effects. Sort of like what you do when working on an old bike.

            While working on my room full of computer parts and other junk, the movie No Highway In The Sky.

            No Highway In The Sky
            http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043859/

            It was quite nice for a change to see a movie that deals with a Life Philosophy. I would recommend this one over any film Ayn Rand made even.

            It really had a lot going for it.

            No Highway In the Sky 1951 – James Stewart, Marlene Dietrich
            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiuuCnYlc1M

          • Also: The dole for single moms should be conditional on their use of birth control. And revoked for failure to use birth control.

            Holding women responsible for the choices they’ve made?!

            Oh, Eric, you misogynist beast, you!!!! /sarc

                • Ditto that, Bobster!

                  But the best birfs control would just be to stop all welfare. See how fast all the she-boons and coal-burners would learn to practice it if they weren’t going to be getting a penny for springing the li’l bastards!

                  Really, just stopping all forms of welfare would do more this society, economically and culturally, than any other thing that could ever be done.

                  Imagine if there had been no “Great Society”, and thus no universal welfare for the last 50 years?! Crime would be a fraction of what it now is, ’cause 90% of the criminals would never have been born; and single-mother households would not predominate.

                  All of the once great cities like Detroit and Cleveland and Baltimore would still be decent places.

                  We wouldn’t have nearly 50% of the population on food stamps. The Democratic party would have died through attrition- too few leeches to perpetuate it; and too few pathetic slobs for the libtards to use as an excuse to demand “social programs”…..etc.

                  • Not just welfare, all the liberal policies are sold to stupid people as meant to “help” them when the actual effect is to keep them poor and voting Democrat. The high minimum wage has lines of 35 year old applicants in front of the poor teenager who wants a ps4. So he either sells drugs or does without his ps4. And then he gets a felony and can’t ever get a job. Voila – another welfare Democrat voter.

          • eric, feel those crosshairs on you? That’s one of the Pope’s boys.

            Go forth and multiply…….and me and my 80 year old and 84 year old coworkers will get up early and bust ass till late so Shatanya can fuck all day, eat the stuff we can’t afford and have double digit baby daddies she can hit up for crack and cash.

            At least Shatanya could wash our windows and mirrors if we have to support her.

            There should be an able bodied EBT recipient attached to the top of our cab to keep all the glass clean. 12, 14 hours go by pretty fast when you’re busy.

          • Why should there be a dole at all?

            The ability of women to obtain the resources of productive men through the state has created one largest social distortions of all time. It will in time bring down the entire society.

            • That’s the plan.exe

              It also makes all men cockolds of the state.

              Should I publish an article proving youre a tax cheat.

              Or send a notice of attachment.

              Watch how fast your wife kids mother etc distance themselves from you.

              Relationships and affections are all built on the shifting sands of a goverment stamp of approval being upom yojr head.

          • My thinking has changed on welfare as I’ve gotten older and moved along on my spiritual journey. Given – that the United States is full of generous loving Christian people, it is a fact that anyone standing outside a grocery store begging for food for their children WILL get all the food they need.
            Thing is, begging destroys your dignity. The purpose of the welfare “card” is to get charity help to people without destroying their dignity. As Christians we should respect the dignity of all human beings. I don’t see how we could limit the poor to staples without also destroying their dignity.

            • The fact that acceptance of charity offends the dignity of those on the receiving end makes taking charity a temporary thing. Without the loss of dignity, living on the dole becomes an entitlement, which doesn’t help the person on the dole at all unless the point is to make a person dependent on the system.

              Who benefits from that dependency? The ones who run the system? Certainly not the dependents.

            • I don’t see how limiting food to staples destroys dignity. It allows them to get what they need. On the other hand, I don’t view limiting food to staples as necessary at all. Even with 50 million on it, food stamps doesn’t make up an outsized part of the federal budget. I would rather concentrate on cutting back on regulations at all levels and imposing wage adjusted tariffs to get the economy going again. That’s the real issue. All this other stuff is window dressing.

              • Here’s something to try. Because these sort of programs are so tiny relatively speaking offer any kind-hearted-with-other-peoples-money statist twice what they are asking for if they end the wars.

                This will then show the kind of people they really are.

                • Brent, therein lies the “right vs left” paradigm. The Commies want your money to be taken and given to “the poor”. The Nazis want your money taken and used for the wars. But no matter which is in power, the welfare and the wars continue endlessly, as does the robbing of us.

                  Only now, more lefties seem to be warming up to the wars; and more righties seem to be warming up to the welfare….so more so than ever, there is really no difference between the two- and they can both agree that to taking of other people’s money.

            • Hi Johny,

              While I sympathize with people who are poor, their dignity does not entitle them to force other people to subsidize them, nor does it entitle them to hide the fact that they are forcing other people to subsidize them. To – let’s be blunt – hide their shame.

              That is the issue here.

              When you take things from others, it is shameful.

              Remember: They are not asking. The “help” isn’t voluntarily given.

              Poverty is awful.

              But using force against other people is far, far worse.

            • Dignity? Some people have been begging for generations. They even think they’re providing a service by bringing more worthless parasites into the world.

            • I gave a recycler kid a few bucks and talked to him 30 mins.

              Theyre everywhere on I 45 north of downtown houston.

              I purposely beg for help at least once a month.

              Its a skill needed whether you bug out or bug in IMO

              I think a public ledger should be kept.

              All dole trx recorded.

              All these payments are LOANS from now on.

              No longer are grants to be givenevery one gets loan docs and a collection team

              • Some welfare already is (at least here in Indiana). Most medical welfare is repayable when your income improves, they will claw it back when they think you can afford it.

                • Trouble is” Almost no one ever “improves their income”. Why bother, when ya get everything for free, and it would take an income of about $50K a year to duplicate what they get in benefits?

                  If these cockroaches were functional enough to earn a basic income, they wouldn’t be on the dole in the first place. Then they have kids.

                  Then there are all these programs where they can go to school, so they can qualify to stay on the dole longer- and get free child care while they go; and while they look for a job…and even if they should get a job- which is unlikely- because “making babies” and “five-finger discount specialist” don’t look too good on a resume; and if they should get a job, it’ll just be some gov’t-funded make-work BS, or minimum-wage job, in which they’ll they’ll still get their subsidized rent; food stamps; medicaid; child care, and the earned income tax credit, which let’s ’em get back more in a tax refund than what they actually paid- so they’re essentially still getting welfare- just in another form…..basically, no one gets off.

                  I even saw this thing once where this dude won a few million in the stupid-tax (lottery) and ended up back on the dole a few years later.

                  These people are “poor” for a reason- they just can’t handle life, or make adult decisions.

                  • I’m functional enough to make low 6 figures, but I’m too lazy to care about anything beyond my $942 a month Social Security. Why bother?

              • Have to agree with you on this one…. same thing with the reparations the colored leeches keep bitchin about… give it to em and also give them a bill for everything they have gotten since emancipation. As for the white leeches, they’ll just get a bill.

              • That ceased to be the case here as late as FDR’s time. Myself, if the dole can be eliminated, I’d limit it in the same way as unemployment insurance is. It would be based on previous income and end within 6 months. It would be a good beginning to make it taper by 10% after three months with the only outs being gainfully employed or successfully schooled.

        • I see EP as using the example to point to the failure of the system. He made it clear that it was changes in the system that caused the local issue.

            • Heck, ya don’t even need to see the card- you can tell before they even pull it out, by such things as their girth (America: Where the “poor” are obese); how many kids they have in tow (How many working people can support 5 or 6 kids these days? -and there’s always a young-teens daughter with one in the oven already, and maybe one already popped, in her arms, learning how to be de next welfare mommy); and by the type of “food” in they cart (Stacks of frozen pizzas; cupcakes; potato chips; and other junk food. No fresh produce in sight. Cases of soda…)- and then with the cash they saved, not having to use it on trivial things like food, they buy $70 cartons of cigarettes- name-brand, no less!

              • How about tying the dole to the acceptance and completion of a tubal ligation with reversal only with a completed marriage license with two employed signers?

              • Did you finally take your hex off the dow jones?

                Finally its a little up today.

                I had to sell a bunch of morgan silver doll hairs in exchange for modern doll hairs just to tread water.

                Funny how your nest egg shits the bed and then you have to lie in it.

                All i have now are susan b anthonies and Sucka Jew Wee Wee silver doll hairs as a reserve.

                Tearing things apart to make a pawn store run in case the hemorrhaging resumes.

                Sell selll selll, Tor.

              • By me they are mostly older immigrants and they buy proper food. Some younger immigrants but they still usually buy proper food. Then again I go to independent grocers.

                • There is more than enough government regulation to make independent grocers a long-gone fantasy. The closest we can get is farmer’s markets. Wyoming passed a law a couple of sessions ago making direct sale of food from the producer to the consumer legal without external regulation. The raw milk people have been experiencing record growth since.

          • Did you finally take your hex off the dow jones?

            Finally its a little up today.

            I had to sell a bunch of morgan silver doll hairs in exchange for modern doll hairs just to tread water.

            Funny how your nest egg shits the bed and then you have to lie in it.

            All i have now are susan b anthonies and Sucka Jew Wee Wee silver doll hairs as a reserve.

            Tearing things apart to make a pawn store run in case the hemorrhaging resumes.

            Sell selll selll, Tor.

  17. “It is impossible to introduce into society a greater change and a greater evil than this: the conversion of the law into an instrument of plunder.”

    “Try to imagine a regulation of labor imposed by force that is not a violation of liberty; a transfer of wealth imposed by force that is not a violation of property. If you cannot reconcile these contradictions, then you must conclude that the law cannot organize labor and industry without organizing injustice”

    “Sometimes the law defends plunder and participates in it. Sometimes the law places the whole apparatus of judges, police, prisons and gendarmes at the service of the plunderers, and treats the victim – when he defends himself – as a criminal.”

    “When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men living together in society, they create for themselves in the course of time a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.”

    “The state is the great fiction by which everybody seeks to live at the expense of everybody else.”

    – Frederic Bastiat

  18. As every spare cent Washington can find seems to be destined for wars the EV subsidy at least keeps the money away from Afghanistan.

      • Even when it wasn’t ignored, it wasn’t so great. George Wurshington was arrested or fined (I forget which) for riding his horse on a Sunday. If that’s the way it was when those who penned it were still alive….

        Mere words on paper have never supplanted the evil which dwells in the hearts of men.

        • The constitution was a restraint on the federal government, not the state governments. it was the 14th amendment that forbade states from passing laws that negated the constitution. Up until then, states were permitted to outlaw guns, speech, the press, and/or any religion they so chose.
          I believe we should repeal the 14th amendment and give these powers back to the states.

            • That’s what I said. The 14th amendment – under the ‘equal protection’ clause – has been interpreted by the courts as limiting the rights of state governments to counteract federal law.

    • Blake;
      How about this from the article,

      “Musk and his companies’ investors enjoy most of the financial upside of the government support, while taxpayers shoulder the cost.”

    • How do you keep the state away from capitalism when its participants so often invite it in?

      The state is the problem, but as often as it sticks its nose in, it’s invited in.

      • Unfortunately, the only way I can see is to start a new country, issue its government a rather minimalist set of laws to enforce and deny it the power to make any new ones.

        • Why don’t we just abolish all institutions based on inappropriate and unconsented to authority and make sure that every person capable of using a firearm responsibility is allowed such, based on peer review.

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