Venezuelans Face a New Threat – a Beer Shortage Up till now Portlandia's hipsters haven't shown even the vaguest interest in Venezuela, but this should change all that in a New York minute. No Portlandian hipster worth his vintage cloths could live through a beer shortage. In Portlandia, such an event could cause a tectonic shift sufficient to trigger the long over due Richter 9 earthquake the scientists are always going on about. There is more below the break. The Earthquake That Will Devastate the Pacific Northwest
"When the next very big earthquake hits, the northwest edge of the continent, from California to Canada and the continental shelf to the Cascades, will drop by as much as six feet and rebound thirty to a hundred feet to the west—losing, within minutes, all the elevation and compression it has gained over centuries. Some of that shift will take place beneath the ocean, displacing a colossal quantity of seawater. (Watch what your fingertips do when you flatten your hand.) The water will surge upward into a huge hill, then promptly collapse. One side will rush west, toward Japan. The other side will rush east, in a seven-hundred-mile liquid wall that will reach the Northwest coast, on average, fifteen minutes after the earthquake begins. By the time the shaking has ceased and the tsunami has receded, the region will be unrecognizable. Kenneth Murphy, who directs FEMA’s Region X, the division responsible for Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Alaska, says, “Our operating assumption is that everything west of Interstate 5 will be toast.'" Stately Maddog Manor is west of I-5! I need you to revise your calculations a bit. So, what are the actual chances of this happening in the next 50 years? "In fact, the science is robust, and one of the chief scientists behind it is Chris Goldfinger. Thanks to work done by him and his colleagues, we now know that the odds of the big Cascadia earthquake happening in the next fifty years are roughly one in three. The odds of the very big one are roughly one in ten. Even those numbers do not fully reflect the danger—or, more to the point, how unprepared the Pacific Northwest is to face it. The truly worrisome figures in this story are these: Thirty years ago, no one knew that the Cascadia subduction zone had ever produced a major earthquake. Forty-five years ago, no one even knew it existed." Mon Dieu! The only redemption at this point is that scientists, as far as I can tell, are always wrong. Lies, Damned Lies, and Medical Science Thanks Doc! I needed something to calm the nerves, and you pointing out that science is nearly always wrong helps. It doesn't reduce the real chance of the "Big One," but it calms the nerves knowing the scientists don't actually have a clue. Italy knows how to deal with errant scientists. Jailed scientists who didn't predict deadly earthquake are cleared Yes, indeed, Italy uses the tried and true method whereby the beatings will continue until moral improves. Imprisoning scientists for failing to be God! That will show them. Reading accounts of the Italian judicial system always makes me feel better about the US system. And, apparently, we will get tsunami's as well! Scientists reveal plan to tackle tsunamis across the Pacific Northwest Wax up the surfboards boys, we're expecting the big kahuna any day now! Science has become a comedy routine with the scientists commonly knowing only the vague history of the thing, but tossing about very specific "expert" opinions like they had some basis in fact. Hehehehehehehehehehe. They will either get lucky or not, but this is not really science more like entails, tea leaves, or coffee grounds divination. Oh, by the by, I do carry earthquake insurance, whatever the chance is, it is real, and the lovely wife would relegate me permanently to the doghouse if I passed on this insurance. Sex is a many splendored thing, and I intend to do what I must to ensure its smooth functioning. We seem to have gone pretty far afield from beer! But then beer, and sex are inextricably entwined so maybe not. Venezuelans are now face with the fruits of supporting socialism, deprivation, hunger, and ultimately yet to come . . . death. This seems to be the most difficult lesson for humans to learn. Socialism resembles the human family, and the first human socio-economic model, the hunter/gatherer tribe, but it is an attempt to overlay a model which only works with about 100 people on societies of millions. The result is always the same, deprivation, hunger, and death. Our children, and apparently a large cohort of adults, do not understand this, and so Bernie Sanders, and Hillary Clinton, and Donald Trump all appeal to them. These are choices rife with potentially dangerous consequences. These are people who are authoritarian, and who wish to reduce liberty and expand security, all in the quest to save the now dead progressive model. In order to stave off our accretion towards Venezuela's, and Southern Europe's destructive socialism/progressivism, we need to evaluate the reformations the Northern European's are applying to their socialistic systems and realize that they are now walking back from too much socialism towards the US, towards more free markets, republican governance, reformed religions, and towards much more limited, and restrained government. The lesson we should have learned from the Great Depression is that we have sufficient wealth to create a safety net to help people avoid destitution, and to allow them to take necessary and appropriate risks in their economic lives. The lesson we should have learned from the past 35 years is that government alone cannot provide this security without destroying the individual's drive to excel, prosper, and succeed. We need to look toward the Northern Europeans to find models they are using like the Swedish privatization of the retirement system, and school vouchers, among others to see what has worked for them. We need to look to Germany to see how their labor reforms, and work rule reformation has worked. And they need to look to each other, and to the US to see what works. We clearly have the most dynamic and inclusive economy of any large nation. The Northern Europeans should determine how to emulate this aspect of the American economic system. Southern Europe, on the other hand, is essentially a basket case since its people seem to desire, and accept so much authoritarianism, and social safety net that it all but destroys the ability of their economies to provide substantial prosperity. However, it may be that this is the desired outcome, and the standard of living they wish is simply significantly less than that desired by Northern Europe, America, Japan, Korea, etc. Provided the people understand and accept the consequences of these policies, it should be their call. Americans have three great life focuses, family, friends, and work. We wish to be as prosperous as we wish to expend time in our hobbies, and with friends, and family. It may be that some people simply are willing to exchange some prosperity for additional time with friends and family. None of us wants the Venezuela outcome, and we need to make it apparent that this outcome is due to Venezuela's willingness to go all in with socialism. All we are doing, here at the End of History, is fine tuning what we know works. It seems likely that each nation, due to the makeup of its populace, will end at a slightly different point. Homogeneity of the people; total population size; social, cultural, and other similarities; all of these things will require slight variations within the model, however, the basic model is set and well understood: free markets, republican governance, reformed religions, and constitutionally limited government powers. Have a good weekend.
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