Our Tax Freedom Day, 2019

This was the pile from 2016. The 2018 heap is lower by 10%.

Despite earlier resolve, I couldn't scrounge up any meaningful reductions to the draft worked up in April. Today was the final date extensions were due for filing one's 2018 Federal and State income tax returns. We actually mailed them last week.

The paperwork has gone down over the years. We've been simplifying our financial lives by getting rid of small accounts, which reduces fees and saves time opening the mail and filing documents away.

Tax Freedom Day is popularly known as the date average Americans start working for themselves, assuming government gets first claim when the New Year starts. For us Tax Freedom Day is when we file our returns.

We'll enjoy the next few weeks, then start looking at the 2019 picture for ourselves and a few others.

Happy Columbus Day

To commemorate Columbus Day the Christopher Columbus statue on Telegraph Hill was vandalized:

2008 file photo of Telegraph Hill (Chronicle)

A statue of Christopher Columbus at San Francisco’s Coit Tower was vandalized with red paint over the weekend.

The words “Kill all colonizers” were painted on the concrete that encircles the statue, said Supervisor Aaron Peskin, whose district encompasses the park.

By Sunday afternoon, crews had cleaned up the paint on the statue, located on Telegraph Hill in North Beach...

The federal holiday of Columbus Day is celebrated Monday. San Francisco supervisors voted in January 2018 to instead celebrate Indigenous Peoples Day.

Following the modern tendency of viewing the deeds of historical figures and cultures through the prism of today's morality, we eagerly await critical academic analysis of Indigenous People's practices, such as human sacrifice, cannibalism, and polygyny (one man, two or more wives).

While they're working on it we lift a glass to Christopher Columbus and Queen Isabella. Salud!

Jeremiah: Relevant Advice

As an infrequent Old Testament reader, your humble blogger was surprised by today's lesson from Jeremiah 29: [bold added]

Jeremiah, Sistine Chapel ceiling

This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: “Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.”

Before the Babylonian Exile the prophet Jeremiah was a haranguer; he constantly admonished the Jews to change their evil ways, to no avail. Babylon destroyed the Jewish kingdom and deported its leaders.

Once the Exile became fact Jeremiah softened his tone and told the Jews to accept their new lives and "settle down". Moreover, they were to "seek the peace and prosperity" of their new country because it would benefit the Jews as well.

If today's migrants followed that advice--and if host nations trusted that they were trying to do so---the world would be a much happier place.

Doin' It Different Because We're Better

Gas price map from https://gasprices.aaa.com/

I pulled into the South City Costco gas station. The price was $3.939 per gallon, 30 cents higher than last week.

Quick thought--it must be another Mideast crisis; it can't be the economy, which appears to be slowing.

Nope, the AAA website didn't show a national spike. What was puzzling and galling was the map's average nation-wide price of $2.636.

The Wall Street Journal explains why our prices are 50% higher on a commodity: [bold added]

Gas prices in the Golden State have shot up 30 cents a gallon in the last week amid problems at in-state refineries to a statewide average of $4.03 a gallon and may be headed higher. Prices rose a mere 10 cents nationwide in the week after the attacks on Saudi facilities and have since ticked down a few cents.

A big reason gas prices didn’t spike after the Saudi attack is growing U.S. shale oil production, which has doubled since 2012 to about 12.5 million barrels a day and added about six million barrels to global supply. This has more than offset the 5.7 million barrels that were temporarily knocked out of Saudi production.

Yet oil production in California has declined about 18% since 2012 as older wells are exhausted and regulatory costs make it less profitable to drill new ones. California has made up for its declining domestic production by importing more foreign oil by tanker, especially from, you guessed it, Saudi Arabia—which emits more CO2.

Regulatory costs have also forced many refiners in the state to close. The California Energy Commission notes that “the cost of complying with environmental regulations and low product prices will continue to make it difficult to continue operating older, less efficient refineries.” Few refineries outside of the state produce the unique fuel blends required by California.

Thus when California refineries experience problems, retailers must import foreign gasoline at steep prices, a challenge partly exacerbated by the outages in Saudi Arabia. Add California’s 61-cent-a-gallon gas tax—the highest in the country—and this is why its gas prices are now nearly $1.40 higher than the U.S. average and $1.70 more than in Texas.

Gov. Gavin Newsom recently remarked that “Saudi Arabia is showing us how dependent we are on foreign oil.” By “we,” he means the royal California.

I blame the rich, greedy oil companies that like to rip off Californians but go easy on the rest of the country (sarc!).

Related -- CNN May, 2019 headline on Venezuela: Why the country with the world's largest oil reserves faces gas shortages. California isn't as bad as Venezuela, but just give us time.

Turn Off, Tune Out, Drop The Subject

(WSJ graphic)

The state of politics stresses out many Americans: [bold added]

A study published in September in the journal PLOS One found that politics is a source of stress for 38% of Americans.

“The major takeaway from this is that if our numbers are really anywhere in the ballpark, there are tens of millions of Americans who see politics as exacting a toll on their social, psychological, emotional and even physical health,” says Kevin Smith, lead author of the study and chair of the political science department at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

The study included 800 people in a nationally representative poll and asked them 32 questions. Among the findings:
* 11.5% say politics has adversely affected their physical health.
* 18.3% say they’ve lost sleep because of politics.
* 26.4% say they have become depressed when a preferred candidate lost.
* 26.5% say politics has led them to hate some people.
* 20% say differences in views have damaged a valued friendship.

...Common problems include sleep disturbances and falling out with family members and friends with divergent views. Social media battles are another source of tension. [Dr. Amanda Johnson, Iowa psychologist,] advises patients to take breaks from social media and watching the news. “If they want to be engaged, we work on finding ways they could have some effect on change, like becoming more involved with a campaign,” she says.

She also encourages patients to set boundaries with family and friends to avoid inflammatory conversations.

Too bad the survey didn't provide details about the political views of those who are losing sleep, initiating the breakup of friendships, or feeling angry. I daresay the vast majority of the troubled oppose President Trump. Living in the great Blue State of California, I often experience people bringing politics into discussions--usually out of nowhere and usually not just critical but scornful of the President.

I remarked on this anger and polarization in 2008, breathing a sigh of relief when President Obama was elected though I didn't vote for him:.

Put in the pictures of Hillary Clinton and Donald
Trump, and the matrix is still valid

For nearly eight years we’ve had to put up with not just whining but vituperative outbursts at home, in classes, at work, on TV, in coffee shops, and in bookstores. Exposure to the enraged is very wearying, if not hazardous to one’s health. Most conservatives avoided political arguments because they often culminated in personal insults and screaming fits.

Frankly, I feared a McCain come-from-behind win because of the anger his victory would have unleashed. (Take the Proposition 8 protests in California and multiply by a thousand.) The Obama triumph, on the other hand, has triggered overwhelming exultation in those who voted for him and only anxiety and disappointment---but very few instances of anger---in McCain supporters.

I thought that not only the Obama victory but the Democratic sweep in 2009-2010 would have ratcheted down the temperature in American politics. Everyone can see that the pendulum swings, power isn't permanent, and each side gets a chance. Boy, was I wrong; in 2019 the anger seems more pronounced than ever.

My advice, which I've followed (most of the time) during the Obama and Trump years: Turn Off the television, Tune Out the news, and drop politics from your discussions.

Glimmer of Green

Inoperative Tesla charging station in Napa (Chron photo)

During yesterday's electricity shutdown, conservative websites chuckled about expensive, idle Teslas that weren't able to recharge.

As we've noted before, if you're going with alternative energy, go all in. Vertically integrate an electric car with solar panels and a storage system.

What many neglect to include is the latter. Rather than purchase electricity high from fickle PG&E during the night and sell it low to them during the day, for us it's essential to find a storage solution, typically a battery.

2017: independence means buying two.

With car, battery, and panels, one can be completely independent of PG&E. The economics of this solar triad weren't appealing when we first looked at Tesla's PowerWall in 2017. The costs may still be higher than we want to pay, but does the concept work?

Headline: Tesla owners weather PG&E’s power outage as gas stations across CA shut down. The headline doesn't tell the complete story: [bold added]

Amidst the chaos surrounding the state, Tesla owners who purchased a Powerwall 2 battery with rooftop solar systems have reported that they are barely feeling the effects of the ongoing outage. Mark Flocco, a homeowner who acquired two Powerwalls for his home, noted in a Twitter post that his battery units have been powering his house with no issues since the outages started.

Considering that there seems to be enough sun in CA these days, Flocco noted in a follow-up post that his two Powerwalls haven’t dipped below 68% before the next day begins and they can start getting power from the sun again. Thus, for now, the Powerwall 2 owner’s home could remain powered indefinitely, or at least until the days start getting shorter...

Tesla’s electric car and energy storage business is designed to promote an ecosystem that allows customers to achieve energy independence from the grid. By using the company’s electric cars together with its solar panels and home batteries, owners could essentially power their vehicles and houses with the sun. This, ultimately, is Tesla’s endgame, and if the performance of Powerwall 2 batteries and solar panels in PG&E’s current outage is any indication, a good number of homeowners might very well end up purchasing batteries and solar systems for their houses after this incident.

At the time we roughed out the cost, installation of two PowerWall batteries and Tesla's panels (really energy-collecting shingles) would have totaled around $40,000. When one adds the car, we're talking six figures.

With technology improving and costs coming down each year, the question for us is when, not if.

We may not be "green" in the ideological sense, but we are finally seeing a glimmer of green in a switch to alternative energy.

Fiddling Around, But At Least We're Not Burning

Pacific Gas & Electric shut off the power to an estimated 800,000 Californians today. [bold added]

Scores of Northern California residents are preparing to lose power for an extended period because the company that provides their electricity chose to shut down its infrastructure so it doesn’t start yet another catastrophic wildfire during high winds and low humidity.

(Chronicle graphic)

PG&E helpfully provided county-by-county outage maps.

In general, areas like Foster City were in no danger of wildfires and avoided the shutdown.

Foster City, built on landfill, is miles away from the green tree-covered hills that are covered with brown tinder during drought years.

Already anger is building toward PG&E, not so much for the decision itself--economic estimates for the shutdown are about $1 billion to avoid the $8 billion in damage from wildfires like those in the recent past--but for the mismanagement that put us in this situation.

I think the critics are being too harsh. The utility has been focusing on California's stated priority of converting power sources to renewable energy (except for nuclear), where PG&E is ahead of schedule. They're just doing what we wanted them to do.

It's All Connected

James Peebles, 2019 Physics Nobel laureate, discusses his work in cosmology: [bold added]

Michel Mayor, Didier Queloz, and James Peebles (WSJ)

“We have very clear evidence that our universe did expand from a hot, dense state, but although the theory is thoroughly tested, we still must admit that dark matter and dark energy are mysterious,” Dr. Peebles said. “Although we have made great advances in understanding the nature and evolution of our universe, there are still many open questions.”

Lyrics from the first verse of the theme song of the hit series The Big Bang Theory:

Our whole universe was in a hot dense state
Then nearly fourteen billion years ago expansion started. Wait...
The Earth began to cool
The autotrophs began to drool
Neanderthals developed tools
We built a wall (we built the pyramids)
Math, science, history, unraveling the mystery
That all started with the big bang!

In the series finale of the Big Bang Theory Sheldon and Amy win the Nobel Prize in Physics.

In the real-life presentation of the Physics award to Dr. Peebles, Swiss astronomer Michel Mayor, and Swiss astrophysicist Didier Queloz, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences member Ulf Danielsson quoted,

"Our whole universe was in a hot, dense state, then nearly 14 billion years ago expansion started.'

Historians of the distant future may well be perplexed by this melding together of music, television entertainment, and theoretical physics in a hot dense state. And note the coincidence of the fictional culmination of the 12-year TV show in Stockholm with the actual Physics award going to someone who studied the Big Bang as his life's work.

The (inter) action is spooky.

Willie Brown: Rooting for a Rematch

Party elder Willie Brown thinks the strongest Democratic Presidential candidate in 2020 would be Hillary Clinton:

Clinton is the only candidate short of Barack Obama who has the brains, the battle-tested brawn and the national presence to take out Trump. And Obama can’t run.

Bernie Sanders was fading even before his heart started acting up. Joe Biden has become Trump’s main talking point in the whole Ukraine-China impeachment mess, which hardly helps him. And he wasn’t exactly running away with it before that.

Elizabeth Warren has a following, but it’s not that much broader than Sanders’. If he drops out, she might pick up some of his votes. But there’s the big question of whether she appeals to anyone besides the furthest left element of the Democratic Party.

Depression over the current field was swirling through my head the other day when I popped into the office of my friend Steven Kay and saw that famous picture of Muhammad Ali standing victorious over Sonny Liston hanging on the wall.

That’s when the light went on: “Rematch!”

Think about it. Hillary is still the smartest of the bunch. She’s also better known than any of the candidates, so she doesn’t need a lot of money.

Most of all, she can take a punch. Heck, she can take a 2-by-4 over the head and stay standing.

Willie Brown's assessment of the field makes sense. But will Mrs. Clinton still excite enough Democrats in the swing states to tip the election? (Blowout victories in California and New York don't count more than close ones.) It seems to this observer that other candidates would do a better job with younger voters. But what do I know--I'm neither young nor a Democrat.

Blessing of the Animals, 2019

Since 2006 local Episcopal priests have set up shop next to the Foster City Dog Park on the first Sunday in October.

The Feast of St. Francis of Assisi, in the Catholic and Anglican traditions, celebrates the life of one of the greatest saints in Christendom with the Blessing of the Animals.

A line of pets and their owners had assembled at 12:30 when we arrived.

Some were regulars at this annual event; one even brought us cupcakes.

Newcomers said they had seen the notice on the Marquee, Foster City's large electronic billboard at Hillsdale & Shell.

Some animals were young and frisky, just getting their start in life. Others were old and sickly and had seen better days. From the way their human companions handled them, all were loved.

800 years after he died, St. Francis' spirit is alive and well.

Invented in America

Vivian Chan and Jennifer Qiao
in Redwood City (SMDJ photo)

Over 40 years ago my wife changed out of the traditional wedding gown used for the Christian ceremony into a cheongsam for the reception.

There haven't been many changes to the latter in the intervening years, and two recent Yale graduates were unhappy with the selection:

Best friends Vivian Chan and Jennifer Qiao, both 28, founded East Meets Dress about a year ago after Qiao had a hard time finding the right cheongsam for her own wedding...

"Vera bespoke dress"

"We've taken the key elements of a traditional cheongsam, for example the Mandarin color and Pankou knots, and we've added them to more modern silhouettes that are flattering for many different types of body types," Qiao said...

The dresses are made in China in towns such as Chaozhou, where the two founders built relationships with dressmakers who have been making cheongsams for decades.

Like many entrepreneurs, the founders were in the market for a product, didn't like what was available, and built it themselves.

California: Marshes and Wildfowl Over the People

For decades environmentalists have regarded the Environmental Protection Agency as their bailiwick. Where the law was ambiguous, sympathetic EPA staffers, especially under Democrats, often gave environmentalists what they wanted through regulations, rulings, and interpretations.

President Trump has reversed some of these regulations and Executive Orders that he believes were not in keeping with the original laws passed by Congress. The latest skirmish is over the Clean Water Act: [bold added]

Andrew Wheeler (NPR photo)

At issue is the reach of the Clean Water Act and, more precisely, what waterways should be regulated. While for years it was unclear whether the nation’s small tributaries warranted protection by the federal government, President Barack Obama sought to remove the ambiguity by ordering the EPA in 2015 to safeguard all bodies of water that feed larger rivers and lakes.

Andrew Wheeler, the current EPA administrator, claimed the law amounted to government overreach that left landowners at the mercy of “distant unelected bureaucrats.”

The new rule maintains federal jurisdiction over navigable waters and their tributaries, Wheeler said, but removes ponds and sloughs unconnected to larger bodies of water from EPA jurisdiction.

The environmental groups, co-represented by the Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy law firm of Burlingame, claim the Trump administration’s decision to repeal the rule opens up thousands of miles of streams and wetlands throughout the country to development, including pipeline construction.

In the Bay Area that specifically re-opens the question of developing the Cargill salt ponds:

Homes on the Cargill site would be only a few
miles from Oracle and Facebook.

The salt ponds have been owned since 1978 by Cargill Inc., which withdrew a proposal to build 12,000 homes on the flats in 2012 in the face of intense community opposition. Environmental groups would like to see wetlands restored there.

“We’re not going to stand by while Cargill uses the Trump administration’s eagerness to gut our environmental laws for its own economic advantage,” said Megan Fluke, executive director of the Committee for Green Foothills. “The salt ponds are part of the bay. Development here would not only destroy restorable natural resources, it would put homes and businesses in the path of sea-level rise, on an earthquake liquefaction site and next to heavy industry.”

What the environmentalists are really thinking, but not saying, is that thousands of homes, including the entire cities of Foster City and Redwood Shores, don't meet their criteria and would never be approved today. If they really prioritized alleviating the housing shortage and eliminating carbon emissions from thousands of cars, they would welcome building where the jobs are. Judging by their actions and not their fine words about "climate change" and "inequality" they really don't.

President Trump may be impulsive, a bully, uncouth, obnoxious, and any number of other bad things. But he has exposed the progressive left as elitists who choose marshes and wildfowl over people. Hey, I don't mind; restricting the supply keeps my house price up.

SF: Can We Sell It Short Yet?

Despite the litany of San Francisco problems--homelessness, crime, needles and human waste on the sidewalks, astronomical real estate prices, astronomical taxes, boulders in the streets, taxpayers leaving, empty storefronts, $billions of transportation over-runs, not to mention picking fights with the Federal Government over immigration and the environment--now activists want San Francisco to set up its own bank.

Advocates for a public bank in San Francisco are rejoicing over Gov. Gavin Newsom signing legislation that will allow them to create a local institution to finance priorities like low-income housing, public infrastructure and small businesses...

Supporters have pushed San Francisco officials for years to consider municipal banks as an alternative to traditional commercial institutions, whose interests prioritize creating value for their shareholders over benefiting the communities where they do business. But setting up a public bank will be a complicated, time-consuming and expensive process — it could take the city 10 to 30 years to break even. But supporters are undeterred by the hurdles.

San Francisco can't even adhere to basic standards of health and citizen safety that are met by towns across the U.S., and it thinks it has the expertise to set up a bank?

If only the City of San Francisco were a stock, I would sell short in a heartbeat.

More Than You Can Give

With all the "big" problems calling for our attention, the story of the sidewalk boulders has commandeered local attention. Chronicle Reporter Heather Knight walked Clinton Park Alley:

Boulders removed, bitterness remains (Chron photo)

The much-discussed boulders of Clinton Park symbolize the anger and frustration simmering over our incredibly wealthy city’s total inability to provide basic services to its swelling homeless population or to enforce laws when street behavior turns dark and violent...

Neighbors reported feeling unsafe as they tried to get past the tents. They described a drug-dealing ring preying on homeless drug addicts. The tent dwellers would sometimes display meth-induced psychosis, cook over open flames, brandish weapons, and scream and party late into the night, neighbors said. They called 911 and 311 hundreds of times, to little avail.

Once word of the boulders got out, activists swarmed the street nightly, pushing the rocks into the road. Some people posted threatening messages regarding the neighbors on social media and, according to some neighbors, even issued death threats.

The city’s Public Works returned daily, placing the boulders back on the sidewalk. This game of move-the-boulders perfectly encapsulated City Hall’s track record on the issue: working hard to get very little accomplished.

The controversy became too much for the neighbors, who asked Public Works to remove the boulders. As of noon Monday, they were gone...

The neighbors I spoke to seemed kind and thoughtful. One man, wearing a stethoscope around his neck, said he has worked with drug-addicted people in the Tenderloin and South of Market for 20 years. Another man said he volunteers regularly feeding homeless people at the nearby St. John the Evangelist Episcopal Church.

They don’t understand why not wanting a drug den outside your home makes you anti-homeless. And they don’t understand why super-rich San Francisco can’t provide more shelter beds, supportive housing units, drug treatment, mental health care and mandated treatment for those too ill to know they need it.

The vast majority of San Franciscans--and Bay Area residents--are liberal, loving, and giving people (your humble blogger is one out of three). But the takers always want more than you can give.

Sisyphean Situation

(Chronicle photo)

Residents of Clinton Park Alley in San Francisco have become so frustrated by the homeless encampments and drug dealing on their street that they brought in boulders to make it difficult to conduct those activities on the narrow sidewalk.

For several days there was a back-and-forth battle between activists who pushed the boulders on to the street and City workers who rolled them back on the sidewalk. Finally, the City removed the rocks.

Besides losing the skirmish (and the $2,000 they spent on the boulders) the poor residents may be worse off than when they began: [bold added]

One resident who did not want to be named for fear of retaliation by activists said neighbors were being harassed in person and online by people opposed to the boulders, and the pressure was more than troublesome. Neighbors were getting death threats, being viciously trolled specifically by activists who found their names and addresses, and being shouted at on the street, the resident said.

Conditions are worsening, and there are no signs that the City Government is capable of turning the situation around.