Month: March 2007

Categories
politics

Duncan Hunter

Duncan Hunter would make a very credible president for our country. He has years of experience in government and the military. He seems to be very principled in his positions and I like his perspective on how to make our federal government smaller. Representative Hunter may find that those who oppose him can more easily portray him as having extreme views than some of the other candidates, but to see his actual positions is to see that his views are not extreme so much as unwavering. Everything about him as a candidate suggests that I should endorse him, but something holds me back. For some reason I suspect that he can be more effective where he is, in the House of Representatives, than in the Oval Office. We need more men like him serving as strong representatives for their constituents across the country.

For that reason I choose not to endorse Duncan Hunter though I could not fault anyone who did endorse him.

Categories
culture technology

Mixing Fax and Email

There was a time when I thought that fax machines were obsolete. The more I think about it, the more I conclude that they could be obsolete, but for some reason they aren’t (the same is true of pagers). Rather than arguing that they should be obsolete, I would argue that there should be a way for people to send a fax to an email address.

I am not talking about efax.com or any of the other services that you can sign up with (often for free) to have faxes delivered to your email. Those still require that you have a fax number. Someone sends a fax to your fax number (which is maintained by efax) and they route the fax to your email address. They can even convert the fax into a different file format, like PDF or TIF which can be read by software that your probably already have.

I m talking about a system, perhaps a device that could be connected to the fax machine, that could be used to send a fax directly to an email address rather than a phone number. This allows those that have legitimate uses for faxes to continue using them and have access to the many people who do not have a fax machine. While we’re at it, perhaps we should create some kind of software that can send any printable file as a fax – oh wait, we already have that in the form of fax software programs.

On a side note – this is another example of how technology leaps ahead of us and we have to scramble to keep up with what is available. This scrambling is what leads to mistakes like DRM and obsolete laws like traditional copyright and DMCA.

Categories
politics

Joe Biden

Before I started learning about Joe and his presidential run he was just a name to me. As I studied him and his positions I found a candidate who has lots of experience in our national government. In his own life he has gained sad experience of losing his wife and a child to an accident and subsequently living as a single parent for some time. This experience seems to have given him an appreciation of the hardships that many people face.

On the issues, Joe has a plan for Iraq that deserves to be implemented even before the presidential elections. I think it is the kind of plan we should have had all along because it appears to recognize the realities of that region. In other areas Joe sounds like a pragmatist who recognizes the challenges which we face and that easy answers are hard to come by. Indeed his position on health care, that it is a problem in which we can use the experience of individual states that have tried to tackle the issue, sounds like exactly the kinds of government that we need more of – rather than trying to tackle everything from the federal level only to discover that we are creating one monolithic disaster of bureaucracy after another.

I endorse Joe Biden for President

Categories
life

Pearl of Great Price (and other parables)

In Sunday School today we were talking about the parables in Matthew 13. After the discussion I got to thinking about the parable of the pearl of great price in particular and about discussions concerning parables in general.

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant man, seeking goodly pearls: who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it. (Matthew 13:45-46)

Many times I have heard that parable and the discussion always revolves around the idea that we should give everything to obtain such a pearl if we find it. I could hardly argue that this is wrong, but imagine if the pearl did not cost all that the merchant had – would he have sold all to obtain it if he could obtain it for less? What if all that he had were insufficient to obtain the pearl – is he out of luck?

I believe that the savior talked of him giving all that he had because in obtaining the kingdom of heaven we should never feel that it is out of reach. However, if we could obtain heaven without being asked to give up all the comforts of our lives does that make our obtaining it any less sweet? If the pearl cost more than all his goods, would this merchant have found a way to obtain the resources necessary to secure the pearl for himself? I think the real point of the story is that we must be willing to give whatever is required to obtain such a pearl, whether it turns out to be more than we think ourselves capable of giving or less than all that we have.

For me the real lesson was a reminder to look at the parables from an unconventional viewpoint because the beauty of parables is that they have so many layers of meaning waiting to be uncovered.

Categories
culture life

Amazing Grace

If you have not already gone out to see Amazing Grace you should go as soon as you can. I had heard that it was really good, and I have been wanting to go for weeks, but every attempt has been thwarted until today. It is fantastic.

I am not one to lightly recommend movies – even to my friends, much less to the whole world – but this movie is not one to be missed. The subject matter is worthwhile, the script is very well done, and the acting really pulls it all together in to a compelling story. The beauty of the whole thing is that they manage to do all this without stooping to anything objectionable. How can you pass that up?

Categories
life

The New Zone

Just before I started this job I posted some predictions of how it the new situation would affect the members of my family. After four months I think we have settled into a new comfort zone where the real effects can be seen. I said that Laura would have a hard time with the change since she was still adjusting to having four kids. She has done very well and has discovered that it is actually nicer for her to have me working outside the home because she is not tempted to ask for my help when she doesn’t really need it. I was right that Savannah and Alyssa would just roll with this change and of course that Isaac would not notice the difference.

I had predicted that Mariah would have the hardest time with it. I may have been right, but if so it was by unnoticable degrees. The whole thing was very easy on all of us. The fun fact of the matter is that Mariah seems to have made a game of saying goodbye to me every morning. It’s almost as much fun for her to say goodbye in the morning as it is to yell “Daddyyyy” when I get home. She says goodbye to me every time I put on a jacket or a pair of gloves. She seems very secure in a world where coming and going are okay. She is still very much a daddy’s girl but she is not afraid to let me go and do things because she trusts that I will come back. I really did not know if she would be old enough to make that adjustment so smoothly.

Categories
life meta politics

Reach Upward

I have been wanting to post some thoughts on Scott Hinrichs post Gross Incompetence? As I have come back to it, I realize that I could quote much of the same material he is quoting or I could thoroughly botch an attempt to add something to what he said. Instead I have decided to share this as an example of the thoughtful posts that I have come to enjoy from Scott. He comes up with some good sources and always leaves you thinking.

I agree with him about 95% of the time. The other 5% I consider that I have not yet formed an opinion on the subject. Never can I reject his arguments outright, and never do I finish reading a post from Scott and feel I’ve wasted my time.

Categories
life

Fences and Cattle

While I was out running this morning I noticed a calf getting out of the field where it was supposed to be. It was stuck about 60% of the way through the fence. I stopped and wondered if I should help it. In my mind I thought, “it must weigh 300 pounds and if I approach it will be scared and unpredictable.” I started to leave, but I just couldn’t. I thought of waiting until someone came along, but then the calf freed itself. I started towards it and it hopped right back through a larger opening in the fence. Problem solved.

Later I realized, as I looked at other cattle on my run, that it was probably only 200 pounds. Still, it was an interesting dilemma – to help, or to abandon the calf to its fate.

Categories
life

The Value of Objective Mesurements

When I woke up this morning the last thing I wanted to do was go running – which is why I went. Multiple times during my run I noticed that my brain told me to just give up. Fortunately my body kept going each time that signal came. I was honestly surprised a couple of times to discover that I was still running as I felt that impulse to stop. On my return portion of the first 3 mile loop I was thinking about how slow I was going – I felt that I had been running 3 miles through a knee-deep swamp. I was deciding if I would be running for time – which would mean cutting a couple of miles off the run – or for distance – which would add 20 minutes or more to my run.

When I looked at my watch at the end of the three miles I almost fainted because my watch showed that I had done 3 miles within 1 minute of my normal 3-mile pace. That really changed my perspective for the rest of my run. I still felt very sluggish but I knew that my actual performance was typical so I was not as tempted to give up.

I suspect that the same truth applies to other parts of life. There is value in our subjective measurements of performance. When I feel bad about how well I am doing at something I should look for ways to improve my performance or my attitude. On the other hand, sometimes I need to let the subjective measure take a back seat to the objective measure of performance.

If I really am not doing well it is not very useful to keep saying “at least I’m satisfied with how well I’m doing.” I need to look into ways that I can improve so that I am doing well, not just feeling good about what I am doing. If I am doing well I should take that as a sign to not rely so heavily on the subjective feelings of inadequacy or frustration that might yet begin to mar my actual performance.

Categories
life

New Insurance

I felt like giving a follow-up to my post on insurance from October. Insurance through my job will be starting soon (as the waiting periods expire) and I feel that I have a much better deal than I had before. At my last job I was paying $350 per month in premiums after whatever the company was putting in and I was able to save about $50 per month for Flexible Spending. I could get a very comparable plan with my new job but thanks to some comments from a trusted friend I found a high deductible plan that costs me less than $150 per month in premiums. For the same chunk of my paycheck as the previous plan I can save $250 per month towards a health savings account. This sounds like not much difference until you realize that I have no copays – only the deductible – and at the end of the year I keep whatever is left in the health savings account where I used to lose anything of the pittance that was in Flexible Spending if I didn’t use it.

All those things I could figure out after learning about High Deductible Health Plans (HDHP) and Health Savings Accounts. What has really surprised me in these last few months where I have had temporary insurance (which operates much like an HDHP) is seeing what regular insurance really offers. With that $350 per month insurance I would have to pay $20 per visit to see a doctor which would not count toward my deductible. Having gone to the doctors a couple of times where I had to pay for it towards my deductible I learned that it costs around $80 for a routine visit.

If I had 10 visits a year (with four kids that seems like a reasonably low estimate) I would have paid $4200 in premiums and have $400 left in flexible spending for an emergency late in the year. With an HDHP I would have paid $1800 in premiums plus $800 for those 10 office visits which means I have $2200 left in my Health Savings Account and I have paid $800 towards my deductible. An emergency under these two plans shows the real difference. If I have an emergency at the end of the year on the old plan I have to pay $1000 plus 20% of the remaining cost. On the HDHP I have to pay $1300 plus 20% of the rest. A $5800 emergency would wipe out the $2200 that I had saved with the HDHP but it would cost me $1560 more that I had in Flexible Spending on the old plan. I paid $2400 more in premiums for $1500 less benefits. I’m glad I learned about these plans now rather than 10 years from now.