Category: Politics, Religion & Money

2002 Honda CR-V A/C Death

I mentioned recently that the air conditioner died in Carol’s 2002 Honda CR-V. The local Honda dealer says it’s not just dead, it’s really dead. The compressor has been “disintegrating over time” and putting metal shavings into the coolant lines. The entire system has to be replaced. Obviously, this not the result of normal wear and tear. The compressor was junk.

We have a case number open with Honda of America, and we’re waiting to hear from the dealer what they’re willing to do about this. My plan is to give Eric my ’98 Accord next year (after he gets his license, of course!), then I would take the CR-V, and Carol would get a new car. Depending on the resolution of the A/C problem, we may, or may not, continue to be a “Honda Loyal” family. I’ll let you know.

A Dismal Scientist

Harvard economist Martin Feldstein (no relation I assume to MAD Magazine editor Al Feldstein) rode to influence in the Reagan administration on the coattails of the loony Milton Friedman’s unreal views about people becoming fashionable. Friedman’s the guy who, in a bit of silly mental jerking off, said a dollar is worth as much — has as much “marginal utility” — to a rich man as to a poor man.

You can blame Martin Feldstein for George Bush’s nonsensical insistence that Social Security needed a major overhaul. The idea was nonsensical because the arithmetic didn’t support the claim the system will inevitably collapse, and because the alternative was to go private.

People have 401K plans, so they’re already invested in the market for their retirement! It doesn’t make sense for people to put ALL of their retirement money into the stock market. Social Security is supposed to be a safety net. It works. Yes, it undoubtedly will need adjustments, but changing its very charter, and the way it operates, is simply wrong, wrong, wrong.

Most people can’t be professional money managers, and why should they be? It’s like saying everybody should do their own car repairs. Duh! NO! And even if somebody is very good at managing investments, or they hire somebody who is actually honest, there are times — like right now — when the market moves down and they lose money. And people much further down the economic ladder, who don’t have retirement plans, need a sure thing. Something to keep the wolf away from the door. That’s what Social Security is all about, Charlie Brown.

Privatizing Social Security was a very stupid idea from Martin Feldstein, a man who is supposed to be intelligent, but he sure doesn’t seem to think very clearly. Tuesday he proved that on the NPR program “On Point” with Tom Ashbrook, that originates at WBUR in Boston.

Did Feldstein say the tax cuts for the ultra-rich in Bush’s first term were a bad idea? No. Did he say the occupation in Iraq is draining America dry? No. Did he say the ideas of Milton Friedman needed to be retired? No. He said we’re in a recession and blamed the problems on Alan Greenspan’s final years as Federal Reserve chairman, and he said the recent incentive checks didn’t work because everybody salted them away in the bank. Talk about being out of touch. Fortunately, a caller named Judy was incensed by Feldstein’s informed yet idiotic academic blather and she got on the air to tell him a thing or two.

[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/2008/JUL/OnPointFeldstein.mp3]

Way to go, Judy.

Mental Recession?

It’s July, and we have a mini-heatwave, yet the talk is of next winter. Take a look at these numbers for home heating oil here in Massachusetts.

Average Price For July 8

  • 2008: 4.71
  • 2007: 2.54
  • 2006: 2.58
  • 2005: 1.98
  • 2004: 1.54
  • 2003: 1.31
  • 2002: 1.16
  • 2001: 1.31

Somebody should let Phil Gramm, former senator and now economic advisor to John McCain, know that there’s nothing psychological about the cost of energy. There are many people in the northeast who simply will not be able to pay their heating bills, and they need to do their whining now, before they freeze in their own homes. And today the price of a barrel of crude oil has set yet another record.

Liturgial Lettering

Charles M. Schulz in \A couple of posts ago I shook my head in dismay because it seems Doonesbury now has computer lettering, and I expressed my admiration for Charles Schulz having lettered his comic strips by hand even when his hand was shaking. Schulz’s lettering, instantly recognizable, had a lot of style, as seen in this single panel from the book Schulz’s Youth, a must-have collection for Schulz fans of cartoons that he did for the Church of God. Take note of the “CMS” signature.

I can relate to this cartoon, having gone through a very religious period in my own youth. I remember how, as a member of Campus Crusade for Christ, we were warned against the “liberal” members of the Intervarsity group from another school. We occasionally got together for fellowship meetings and to pool our resources for retreats. It seems silly to me now, but even between groups such as ours there were denominations. This is my semi-sneaky way of introducing an upcoming post about somebody I knew in college named Paul Howley.

P.S. Hey, guess what? Take a close look at the enlarged view of that scanned cartoon. I think that’s computer lettering! I’ll check with Nat Gertler, who did the editing and layout.

P.P.S. I asked Nat if the original captions were typeset, and here is his reply.

The cartoons were indeed originally published with typeset captions, with some variation in the font. Since obviously Schulz did not typeset them himself, I didn’t feel the need to keep that aspect of the original edition (and resetting them allowed me some flexibility, like putting the text to the side in some captions rather than beneath, helping things fit the squarish book better.) And while the set type looked fine on the cartoons in their original context (in the midst of a page of typeset articles), I thought that using a font based on Schulz’s hand lettering would be more comfortable visually. (You’ll note that the lettering has the shake in it, despite the cartoons being before Schulz’s health troubles.)

Having said that, there is one cartoon there that has genuine Schulz hand-lettering: page 165. Some of the places this cartoon has been reused have reset it in type; I was glad to have the source with the hand lettering.

–Nat

Thanks, Nat! Here’s the cartoon he refers to…

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Another book Nat did that I highly recommend is It’s Only A Game, a collection of comic strips done by Schulz and the late Jim Sasseville, who also assisted on some of the Peanuts comic books.