Category Archives: Detroit

Sweden v Michigan: different approaches, same outcome.

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Sweden has scientists; Michigan has scientists. Sweden’s scientists said to trust people to social distance and let the COVID-19 disease run its course. It was a highly controversial take, but Sweden didn’t close the schools, didn’t enforce masks, and let people social distance as they would. Michigan’s scientists said to wear masks and close everything, and the governor enforced just that. She closed the schools, the restaurants, the golf courses, and even the parks for a while. In Michigan you can not attend a baseball game, and you can be fined for not wearing a mask in public. The net result: Michigan and Sweden had almost the same death totals and rates, as the graphs below show. As of July 28, 2020: Sweden had 5,702 dead of COVID-19, Michigan had 6,402. That’s 13 more dead for a population that’s 20% smaller.

Sweden’s deaths pre day. There are 5,702 COVID dead since the start, out of a population of 10.63 million. There are 79,494 confirmed COVID cases, but likely a lot more infected.

Sweden and Michigan are equally industrial, with populations in a few dense cities and a rural back-country. Both banned large-scale use of hydroxy-chloroquine. Given the large difference in social distance laws, you’d expect a vastly different death rate, with Michigan’s, presumably lower, but there is hardly any difference at all, and it’s worthwhile to consider what we might learn from this.

Michigan’s deaths pre day. There are 6,426 COVID dead since the start, out of a population of 9.99 million. There are 88,025 confirmed COVID cases, but likely a lot more infected.

What I learn from this is not that social distance is unimportant, and not that hand washing and masks don’t work, but rather it seems to me that people are more likely to social distance if they themselves are in control of the rules. This is something I also notice comparing freezer economies to communist or controlled ones: people work harder when they have more of a say in what they do. Some call this self -exploitation, but it seems to be a universal lesson.

Both Sweden and the US began the epidemic with some moderate testing of a drug called hydroxychloroquine (HCQ)and both mostly stopped in April when the drug became a political football. President Trump recommended it based on studies in France and China, but the response was many publications showing the didn’t work and was even deadly. Virtually ever western country cut back use of the drug. Brazil’s scientists objected — see here where they claim that those studies were crooked. It seems that countries that continued to use the drug had fewer COVID deaths, see graph, but it’s hard to say. The Brazilians claim that the anti HCQ studies were politically motivated, but doctors in both Sweden and the US largely stopped prescribing the drug. This seems to have been a mistake.

US hospitals stopped using HCQ in early April almost as soon as Trump recommended it. Sweden did the same.

In July, Henry Ford hospitals published this large-scale study showing a strong benefit: for HCQ: out of 2,541 patients in six hospitals, the death rate for those treated with HCQ was 13%. For those not treated with HCQ, the death rate was more than double: 26.4%. It’s not clear that this is cause and effect. It’s suggestive, but there is room for unconscious bias in who got the drug. Similarly, last week, a Yale researcher this week used epidemiological evidence to say HCQ works. This might be proof, or not. Since epidemiology is not double-blind, there is more than common room for confounding variables. By and large the newspaper experts are unconvinced by epidemiology and say there is no real evidence of HCQ benefit. In Michigan and Sweden the politicians strongly recommend continuing their approaches, by and large avoiding HCQ. In Brazil, India and much of the mideast, HCQ is popular. The countries that use HCQ claim it works. The countries that don’t claim it does not. The countries with strict lock-down say that science shows this is what’s working. The countries without, claim they are right to go without. All claim SCIENCE to support their behaviors, and likely that’s faulty logic.

Hydroxychloroquine and COVID-19 fatality rates in different countries as of early June 2020. This isn’t enough to prove HCQ effectiveness, but it’s promising, and suggests that increased use is warranted, at least among those without heart problems.

Given my choice, I’d like to see more use of HCQ. I’m not sure it works, but I’m ,sure there’s enough evidence to put it into the top tier of testing. I’d also prefer the Sweden method, of nor enforced lockdown, or a very moderate lockdown, but I live I’m Michigan where the governor claims she knows science, and I’m willing to live within the governor’s lockdown.There is good, scientific evidence that, if you don’t you get fined or go to jail.

Robert Buxbaum, July 29, 2020. As I side issue, I think iodine hand wash is a good thing. I may be wrong, but here’s my case.

Package postage from China: 70¢ for 2 oz.

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The minimum US postage rate to send a 1 oz to 8 oz package across the street is $8.30. This is the price for any size package going in “zone 1”. That is, to a nearby, instate address. It costs more to send a package to nearby states or across the country, zones 2,3,4,5,6,7, 8 You don’t get shipping updates or delivery confirmation unless you pay more. By comparison the US post office charges no more than $1.50 to Chinese companies to deliver packages of up to 4.4 lbs (2 kg) and they get shipping and delivery confirmation thrown in free. The high US rates are, in part, because the post office is losing money to subsidize postage from China.

On the internet folks are amazed at how cheap things are shipped from China (I copied this post from this Forbes article)

US producers can not compete on the sale of small items, in part, because we subsidize the shipping costs. Go to Amazon or e-Bay and you can buy from China packaged items shipped by air for a total price of $1 or so. That includes the price of the item, the shipping cost, and some profit for Amazon or eBay. A US supplier could not sell this cheap even if it were a box of air. The low shipping costs result from a poorly negotiated postage deal of 2011 between us (Obama’s negotiator) and the Chinese. Until 2021, we are committed to deliver a package of 50g or less, (2 oz) for 5 Chinese Yuan, or 70¢ at the current exchange rate of 14¢/NCY. Additional ounces are billed at 35¢ up to 4.4 lbs; use the following table of prices and apply the dollar to CNY conversion. We threw in tracking services and an e-mail confirmation for free, in part because China was poor, and we were rich. Also, the deal was pushed by e-Bay and Amazon, two big supporters of Obama’s presidency.

US suppliers cannot compete.

Adding insult to injury, Obama raised the de minimis amount for billing tariffs from the normal $100 to $800 making almost all purchases from China duty free. Obama made some complaints about unfair trade, and about the counterfeits and knockoffs but no major enforcement. In 2012 and 2014, the Obama administration signed similar postage deals with Korea, Hong Kong, and the EU. The Germans applauded as it allows them to ship goods to the US for far less than the cost of us shipping to Germany. The US post office loses money on this and makes up for it by charging us more for domestic mail.

The Washington Post praised Obama on these deals claiming that they benefitted US customer and promoted democracy. Of course, the Washington Post is owned by Amazon’s main stock holder, Jeff Bezos– someone who benefits very much by the deal. He is among the relatively few people and organizations that own the media outlets. The Post loses money on newspaper sales but benefits the owners by the propaganda value of the stories, a situation also found with Al Jazeera and the emir of Qatar.

Trump has informed China that these special rates will end when the treaty runs out in January 1, 2021. A per-package ship fee will be $3.00 for a one ounce package, with 11¢ per additional once. This is less than the domestic rate, but far higher than the current 35¢ for 1 oz. I’d probably have raised their postage even more, but this is an election year, and Biden may well reverse any deal Trump signs.

Robert Buxbaum, July 14, 2020. Though I’m appalled by this postage deal, I just bought a 50 lb kayak from China, $99.99 including shipping. The prices are too low to pass up.

Who are the BLM vandals? Pampered white cowards

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There have been a dozen attempts to tear down the statue of Andrew Jackson outside the Whitehouse. Most of these appear to have been done by white people, supporters of “Black Lives Matter,” or BLM. BLM vandals were more successful destroying statues of Columbus, Lee, Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt, Lincoln, Saint Louis, and Christian Heg, an anti-slavery activist of the 1800s, — he was a white guy. Graves are spray painted BLM, stores have been vandalized and looted, people have been killed, and at least one “cop free autonomous zone” set upin Seattle. No police allowed, no fire fighters allowed. At least one murder. Policing by a BLM warlord. So who are the BLM vandals running these activities, and who are their supporters?

Graves vandalized with Black Lives Matter, and with BLM Floyd. The vandals prepared, bringing spray paint to the cemetery, but there is no sense they were helping black people.

To my observation the BLM activist-vandal is not typically black, nor illiterate, nor disadvantaged; nor do they act in a fit of anger. The tools of destruction, bricks, spray paint, chains torches, and firebombs are brought home, often many miles away. Bricks are left in buckets are key locations for ready use in the demonstration. Many of the activists are white, often women, literate, liberal, socially secure, and self-satisfied. Two lawyers, one a Princeton graduate, were among those throwing firebombs in a Jewish section of Brooklyn, last week. They were acting for social justice in Palestine, they say. Another pair of bomb-throwers were two sisters white, from upstate NY who traveled to Brooklyn to throw a gasoline bomb into a police care with four officers. Her motivation, she says, social injustice — certainly not for the innocent policemen.

There is rarely any connection between the destruction and any positive help to black people nor is there any direct relationship to George Floyd. Why behead the statue of Columbus, or burn this statue of an elk? Even the fire-bombing lawyers had trouble explaining the relationship between their bombing of a police car in Brooklyn and their claimed motivations: police brutality and ending the zionist presence in Palestine. So why burn a car, topple a statue, or loot a store, or burn an elk? As best I can tell, it’s because these things are big, available, and minimally guarded. If someone steps out to defend their property, the vandals leave, or sneak around to get a sucker-punch from behind. They leave quickly afterward, before the police get there.

The vandals do not act out of rage, but with malice and fore-thought. It takes a lot of organization to show up with working fire-bombs, bricks, or with spray paint for that matter. Neither of these items is available at stores near the demonstrations. And taking down a statute requires more. The vandals bring strong ropes, chains, and cutting torches. Check out this video of an attempt on the Andrew Jackson statue, and note the organization of labor and that virtually everyone here is white.

Samantha Shader, traveled to Brooklyn with gasoline bombs and through one into a police car with 4 officers inside. None died. She’s not black, uneducated, or oppressed, Just bored, and angry.

Whether they succeed or not, the vandals are proud of their activities. They brag to the press and often post videos. Publicity is part of the motivation, but it sometimes leads to capture. Samantha Shader, throwing a gasoline bomb, was caught because of her own bragging video.

When caught, the BLM vandal appeals for his or her rights, and is often bailed out by the politicians who claim to deplore violence. They blame the very folks they’d harmed, and claim it was justice to destroy the statue, or the Jewish or black-owned store. The black store owner is an uncle Tom, the Jewish synagog a symbol of oppression, and they see themselves as white saviors, white knights and revolutionaries, destroying offensive symbols of other folks success. It’s only other people’s stuff that’s offensive to them, by the way. I’ve yet to see any of the BLM vandals destroy their own cars or homes.

As bad as the actual vandals are, in a sense the politicians who support them are worse, spurring them, then sitting judgement on the BLM wrongs. The politicians, liberal, often white women, praise the BLM vandal leaders, and help the raise money for them. They ascend the podium with the worst of the BLM vandal leaders, proclaiming, “We’re with you.” “You are right to be angry, and your cause just.” “We are inspired by you.” They say they are against violence, but they eagerly remove the statues that the BLM vandals spray painted — The statue of Columbus in front of Columbus city hall for example, They defund the police — their salaries, retirements, etc. — and give the money to BLM-run organizations. The Biden campaign does more and provides bail money. All this helps honest black people not at all, nor is it good for the cities, but it does provide good press for the politicians, and so far the support for BLM seems to make up for Biden’s habit of touching and sniffing girls’ hair. As for where the BLM money goes, we have little information, but this is what we know. Some will go back to the Democratic party via a BLM program called #WhatMatters2020. Some will go toward Black Liberation education. None is slated to help victims of BLM vandalism, black or white. And this is what passes for political accountability.

Columbus Ohio; Vandals spray paint the statue of Columbus in front of city hall, then the Mayor cleans the statue, and removes it. Which one is the bigger vandal? Do either help black people?

I imagine that I do more for black lives than what BLM does, by my efforts to provide clean water and better sewage, for example. Another thing we might do, if we thought black lives really mattered would be to change the laws that put black people behind bars for minor crimes, e.g. pot sales. Recreational pot use is legal in much of the US, but black people are emprissoned in large numbers, because the sale is illegal unless you have special licenses. and black people never can get the license to sell legally. I don’t think defunding the police is a road to help black people, certainly not when the money goes to Black Liberation education and statue removal. It seems that black lives don’t matter at all to the BLM vandals, or to the politicians. They never did.

Robert Buxbaum, July 6 2020.

When prostitution was legal in America, 1863-65.

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Readers of this blog know that I am not a fan of very harsh punishments for crime, in particular for crimes that have no direct victim, e.g. drug possession and sales. Prostitution is another crime with no direct victim. One could argue that society as a whole is the victim, but my sense is that punishments should be minimal and targeted, e.g. to prevent involuntary human trafficking and disease. Our current laws, depicted here, are clearly not designed for this, but there was a brief period where prostitution laws did make more sense. During the civil war, civil war, prostitution was legal and regulated to prevent disease.

In 1862, Union forces captured the southern cities of Nashville and Memphis, Tenn. Major Gen. William Rosecrans set up headquarters in Nashville. Before the war, Nashville was home to 198 white prostitutes and nine  “mulatto,” operating in a two-block area known as “Smoky Row.” 

By the end of 1862,  Smokey row had grown and these numbers swelled to 1,500 “public women”. White southern women turned to prostitution out of poverty, largely. Their husbands were dead, or ill paid, and they were joined by recently freed slaves. Benton E. Dubbs, a Union private, reported a saying that “no man culd [sic] be a soldier unless he had gone through Smokey Row,” … “The street was about three-fourths of a mile long and every house or shanty on both sides was a house of ill fame. Women had no thought of dress or decency. They say Smokey Row killed more soldiers than the war.” 

By 1863, venerial disease was becoming a major problem. The Surgeon General would document 183,000 cases of venereal disease in the Union Army alone, “…the Pocks and the Clap. The cases of this complaint is numerous, especially among the officers.”  

Permit for Legal prostitution signed by Col George Spaulding.

At first General Rosecrans directed his assistant, Colonel Spaulding, to remove the women by sending them to other states, first by train, and then by boat commandeering the ship, Idaho for the purpose. The effect was horrible, not only was the ship turned back by every city, but the departure of these ladies just resulted in the appearance of a new cohort of sex-workers. By the time the Idaho had returned, Rosecrans had been relieved of command following embarrassing defeats at Chickamauga and Chattanooga . Col. Spaulding now tried a new technique to stop the plague of VD: legalized prostitution. It worked.

Women’s hospital during the war, Nashville.

For a $5/month fee a “public woman” could become a legal prostitute, or “Public Woman” so long as she submitted to monthly health inspections for a certificate of her soundness. If found infected, she was to report to a hospital dedicated to this treatment, was subject to imprisonment if she operated without the license and certificate. The effect was a major decline in sexually-transmitted disease, and an improvement (so it is claimed) in the quality of the services. The fees collected were sufficient to cover the cost of the operation and hospital, nearly.

At the end of the war, Col Spaulding and the union soldiers left Nashville, and prostitution returned to being illegal, if tolerated. One assumes that the VD rates went up as well.

George Spaulding, Congressman..

Colonel Spaulding and Maj. General Rosecrans are interesting characters beyond the above. Spaulding had entered the war as a private and rose through the ranks by merit. The rise didn’t stop at colonel. After the war, he became postmaster of Monroe Michigan, 1866 to 1870, US Treasury agent, 1871 to 1875, Mayor of Monroe, 1876 to ?, President of the board of education, a lawyer in 1878, and congressman for the MI 2nd district (Republican) 1894 -1898. He also served as board member of the Home for Girls 1885 to 1897, and postmaster of Monroe, 1899 to 1907.

William Rosecrans was a Catholic, engineer-inventor from West Point. Before the war, in 1853, he designed St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Church, one of the largest US churches at the time, site of the wedding of John Kennedy and Jacqueline Bouvier. He also designed and installed one of the first lock systems in Western Virginia. He and two partners built an early oil refinery. He patented a method of soap making and the first kerosene lamp to burn a round wick, and was one of the eleven incorporators of the Southern Pacific Railroad. After the war, he served as Ambassador to Mexico, 1868-69 and was congressman from California, 1st district (Democrat) 1880 – 1884. A true Democrat, Rosecrans could not stand either Grant or Garfield, and fought against Grant getting a retirement package.

Robert Buxbaum, June 5, 2020. There are other ways to stop the spread of sexual diseases. During the AIDS epidemic, condoms were the preferred method, and during the current COVID crisis, face masks are being touted. My preference is iodine hand wash. All methods work if they can reduce the transmission rate, Ro below 1.

Brazilian scientists speak out for hydroxychloroquine

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Brazil has decided to go its own route in response to the Corona virus pandemic. They’re using minimal social distancing with a heavy reliance on hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), a cheap drug that they claim is effective (as has our president). Brazil has been widely criticized for this, despite so far having lower death rate per million than the US, Canada, or most of Europe. In an open letter, copied in part below, 25 Brazilian scientists speak out against the politicalization of science, and in favor of their approach to COVID-19. The full letter (here). The whole letter is very worth reading, IMHO, but especially worthwhile is their section on hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), copied below.

….. Numerous countries such as the USA, Spain, France, Italy, India, Israel, Russia, Costa Rica and Senegal use the drug (HCQ) to fight covid-19, whereas other countries refrain from using HCQ as one of the strategies to contain the pandemic, betting on other controversial tactics.

Who then speaks here in the name of “science”? Which group has a monopoly on reason and its exclusive authorization to be the spokesperson of “science”? Where is such authorization found?One can choose an opinion, and base his strategy on it, this is fine, but no one should commit the sacrilege of protecting his decision risking to tarnish with it the “sacred mantle of science”.

Outraged, every day I hear mayors and governors saying at the top of their lungs that they “have followed science”. Presidents of councils and some of their advisers, and of academies and deans in their offices write letters on behalf of their entire community, as if they reflect everyone’s consensual position. Nothing could be more false.Have they followed science? Not at all! They have followed the science wing which they like, and the scientists who they chose to place around them. They ignore the other wing of science, since there are also hundreds of scientists and articles that oppose their positions and measures.

Worse, scientists are not angels. Scientists are people, and people have likes and dislikes, passions and political party preferences. Or wouldn’t they? There are many scientists, therefore, who do good without looking at whom, I know and admire many of them. But there are also pseudoscientists who use science to defend their opinion, their own pocket, or their passion. Scientists have worked and still work hard and detached to contribute to the good of humanity, many of whom are now in their laboratories, risking their lives to develop new methods of detecting coronavirus, drugs and vaccines, when they could stay “safe at home”. But, to illustrate my point, I know scientists who have published articles, some even in major journals such as “Science” or “Nature”, with data they have manufactured “during the night”; others who have removed points from their curves, or used other similar strategies. Many scientists were at Hitler’s side, weren’t they? Did they act in the name of “science”? Others have developed atom bombs. Others still develop chemical and biological weapons and illicit drugs, by design.

The Manaus’ study with chloroquine (CQ) performed here in Brazil and published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) [1], is emblematic to this discussion of “science”. Scientists there used, the manuscript reveals, lethal doses in debilitated patients, many in severe conditions and with comorbidities. The profiles of the groups do not seem to have been “randomized”, since a clear “preference” in the HIGH DOSE group for risk factors is noted. Chloroquine, which is more toxic than HCQ, was used, and it seems that they even made “childish mistakes” in simple stoichiometric calculations, doubling the dosage with the error. I’m incapable of judging intentions, but justice will do it. The former Brazilian Health Minister Luiz Henrique Mandetta quoted this study, supported it, and based on it, categorically stated: “I do not approve HCQ because I am based on ‘science, science, science’!”.

Another study published by Chinese researchers in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) and which is still persistently used against HCQ was also at least revolting [2]. In it, the authors declared: “we administer 1,200 mg for 3 days, followed by 800 mg for 12 to 21 days, in patients with moderate to severe symptoms”. In other words, they gave a huge dosage of the drug that could reach the absurdity of 20 grams in the end, and it given was too late to patients (HCQ should be administered in the first symptoms or even earlier). And even worse, overdosing on HCQ or any other drug for severe cases is poisonous. What do you think, was it good science? The recommended dosage in Brazil, since May 20th, 2020, by the new Ministry of Health, for mild symptoms is 2 times 400 mg in the first day (every 12 hours) and 400 mg for 5 days for a total of 2.8 grams.

In other published studies, also in these internationally renowned journals such as The New England Journal of Medicine, JAMA and BMJ [3-5], once again, “problems” are clearly noted, since or the patients were randomized in irregular ways, placing older, more susceptible or most severe and hypoxemic patients in the higher (lethal) dose groups, or more men (almost 3 times more deadly by covid than women), or more black people (in the USA, black people have displayed higher mortality) and more smokers, and where most of the deaths occurred in the first days of the studies (signs that were deaths of critically ill patients, who at this stage would be more “intoxicated” than “treated” with HCQ), or they administered HCQ isolated, when it is known that it is necessary to associate HCQ at least with azithromycin. One of these studies [5] administered HCQ only on the sixteenth day of symptoms (for really early treatment, HCQ administration should be started up to fifth day), in other words, at the end of the disease, when the drug can do little good or nothing to the patient.

These studies indicate that some scientists either forgot how “science” is done or that there is a huge effort to disprove, whatever it takes, that HCQ works. How can someone or even Councils and Academies of Medicine cite such studies as the “science” of their decisions? How can that be?

On the contrary, the study published – and today with more than 3 thousand patients tested – and carried out by Dr. Didier Raoult in France [6], using the correct dosage and at the right time, with a very low mortality rate (0.4%), and the Prevent Senior’s clinical experience in Brazil – also quite encouraging – are disqualified with very “futile” arguments such as: “Didier Raoult is a controversial and unworthy researcher”, “At Prevent Senior Clinic they were not sure of the diagnosis” (but none of the hospitalized patients with clear COVID symptoms died), “Placebo effect” (what a supernatural power of inducing our mind that reduces mortality from 40% to zero, I want this placebo!), “Study performed by a health plan company” (I do not doubt that this people indeed want to save lives, because the patients were their customers who pay their bills), and similar ephemeral arguments.…

The Brazilian scents who signed the letter. Read the whole letter here.

I admire the spunk of these fellows going agains the doctors, WHO. Beyond being a critique of bad research on a particular drug, it is a defense of science. Science is a discussion, a striving for truth. It is not supposed to demand blind allegiance to a few politically appointed experts. They’ve convinced me that the tests sponsored by the world health organization seem designed to show failure, and reminded me that there is rarely a one-size-fits-all for problems and all times.

I also find striking the highly critical response of my local newspapers and TV reporters. While they both like to highlight efforts by South America as they try entering the first world, with help from Bill gates and leftist politicians, they have been uniformly condemned Brazil for its non-left approach and now for use of HCQ. They want Sous Americans to think, but only if their conclusions are no different from those of their favorite, liberal thinkers.

Robert Buxbaum, May 28, 2020. Check out my notes on how to do science right. And by the way, you might want to use iodine hand wash to minimize your chance of getting or spreading COVID and other diseases.

Italian Engineering and the Kennedy assassination.

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Oswald cartridge.

The rifle Oswald used was a Modello 91/38, Carcano (1938 model of a design originally used in 1891) with an extra-long, 20.9″ barrel, bought for only $19.95 including a 4x sight. That’s $12.50 for the gun, the equivalent of $100 in 2020). The gun may have been cheep, but it was a fine Italian weapon: it was small, fast, pretty, manual, and unreliable. The small size allowed Oswald to get the gun into the book depository without arousing suspicion. He claimed his package held curtain rods, and the small, narrow shape of the gun made the claim believable.

The first question, the fast shooting, is answered in part by the fact that loading the 91/38 Carcano rifle takes practice. Three American marksmen who tried to duplicate the shots for the Warren commission didn’t succeed, but they didn’t have the practice with this type of gun that Oswald had. The Carcano rifle used a bolt and clip loading system that had gone out of style in the US before WWI. To put in a new shell, you manually unlock and pull back the bolt. The old casing then flies out, and the spring–clip loads a new shell. You then have to slam the bolt forward and lock it before you can fire again. For someone practiced, loading this way is faster than with a semi-automatic. To someone without practice it is impossibly slow, like driving a stick shift car for the first time. Even with practice, Americans avoid stick shift cars, but Italians prefer them. Some time after the Warren report came out, Howard Donahue, an American with experience on this type of rifle, was able to hit three moving targets at the distance in 4.8 seconds. That’s less than the shortest estimate of the time it took Oswald to hit twice. Penn of Penn and Teller recreates this on TV, and shows here that Kennedy’s head would indeed have moved backward.

Oswald’s magic bullet, shot two.

That Oswald was so accurate is explained, to great extent by the way the sight was mounted and by the unusual bullets. The model 38 Carcano that Oswald bought fired light, hollow, 6.5×52mm cartridges. This is a 6.5 mm diameter bullet, with a 52 mm long casing. The cartridge was adopted by the Italians in 1940, and dropped by 1941. These bullets are uncommonly bullet is unusually long and narrow (6.5 mm = .26 caliber), round-nosed and hollow from the back to nearly the front. In theory a cartridge like this gives for greater alignment with the barrel., and provides a degree of rocket power acceleration after it leaves the muzzle. Bullets like this were developed in the US, then dropped by the late 1800s. The Italians dropped this bullet for a 7.5 mm diameter version in 1941. The 6.5 mm version can go through two or three people without too much damage, and they can behave erratically. The small diameter and fast speed likely explains how Oswald’s second shot went through Kennedy and Connolly twice without dong much. An American bullet would have done a lot more damage.

Because of the light weight and the extra powder, the 6.5 mm hollow bullet travels uncommonly fast, about 700 m/s at the muzzle with some acceleration afterwards, ideally. Extra powder packs into the hollow part by the force of firing, providing, in theory, low recoil, rocket power. Unfortunately these bullets are structurally weak. They can break apart or bend and going off-direction. By comparison the main US rifle of WWII, the M1, was semi-automatic, with bullets that are shorter, heavier, and slower, going about 585 m/s. Some of our bullets had steel cores too to provide a better combination of penetration and “stopping power”. Only Oswald second shot stayed pristine. It could be that his third shot — the one that made Kennedy’s head explode — flattened or bent in flight.

Oswald fragment of third bullet. It’s hollow and seems to have come apart in a way a US bullet would not.

The extra speed of Oswald’s bullets and the alignment of his gun would have given Oswald a great advantage in accuracy. At 100 yards (91 m), test shots with the rifle landed 2 1⁄2 to 5 inches high, within a 3-to-5-inch circle. Good accuracy with a sight that was set to high for close shot accuracy. The funky sight, in my opinion , explains how Oswald managed to miss Walker, but explains how he hit Kennedy accurately especially on the last, longest shot, 81 m to Kennedy’s head

Given the unusually speed of the bullets (I will assume 750 m/s) Oswald’s third shot would have taken 0.108 s to reach the target. If the sight were aligned string and if Kennedy were not moving, the bullet would have been expected to fall 2.24″ low at this range, but given the sight alignment we’d expect him to shoot 3-6″ high on a stationary target, and dead on, on the president in his moving vehicle. Kennedy was moving at 5 m/sand Oswald had a 17° downward shot. The result was a dead on hit to the moving president assuming Oswald didn’t “lead the shot”. The peculiarities of the gun and bullets made Oswald more accurate here than he’d been in the army, while causing him to miss Walker completely at close range.

comparison of the actual, second shot, “magic bullet,” left, with four test-shot bullets. Note that one of the test bullets collapsed, two bent, and one exploded. This is not a reliable bullet design.

We now get to the missed, first shot: How did he miss the car completely firing at the closest range. The answer, might have to do with deformation of the bullets. A hollow base bullet can explode, or got dented and fly off to the side. More prosaically, it could be that he hit a tree branch or a light pole. The Warren commission blamed a tree that was in the way, and there was also a light pole that was never examined. For all we know the bullet is in a branch today, or deflected. US bullets would have a greater chance to barrel on through to at least hit the car. This is an aspect of Italian engineering — when things are light, fast, and flexible, unusual things happen that do not expect to happen with slow, ugly, US products. It’s a price of excellence, Italian style.

Another question appears: Why wasn’t Oswald stopped when the FBI knew he’d threatened Kennedy, and was suspected of shooting at Walker. The simple answer, I think, is that the FBI was slow, and plodding. Beyond this, neither the FBI nor the CIA seem to have worried much about Kennedy’s safety. Even if Kennedy had used the bubble top, Oswald would likely have killed him. Kennedy didn’t care much for the FBI and didn’t trust Texas. Kennedy had a long-running spat with the FBI involving his involvement with organized crime, and perhaps running back to the days when Kennedy’s father was a bootlegger. His relation with the CIA was similar.

The Mateba, Italian semi-automatic revolver, $3000, available only in 357 Magnum and 44 magnum.

I should mention that the engineering styles and attitudes of a country far outlast the particular engineer. We still make big, fat, slow, ugly cars — that are durable and reasonably priced. Germans still overbuild, and Italian cars and guns are as they ever were: beautiful, fast, expensive, and unreliable. The fastest production car is Italian, a Bugatti with a top speed of 245 mph; the fastest rollercoaster is at Ferrari gardens, 149 mph, and in terms of guns, let me suggest you look at the Mateba, left, a $3000 beautiful super fast semi-automatic revolver (really), produced in Italy, and available in 357 magnum and .44 magnum only . It’s a magnificent piece of Italian engineering beautiful, accurate, powerful, and my guess is it’s unreliable as all get out. Our, US pistols typically cost 1/5 to 1/10 as much. A country’s cars, planes, and guns represent the country’s aesthetics. The aesthetics of a county changes only slowly, and I think the world is better off because of it

Robert Buxbaum, February 14, 2020. One of my favorite courses in engineering school, Cooper Union, was in Engineering Aesthetics and design.

If the test of free will is that no one can tell what I will do….

Free will is generally considered a good thing — perhaps a unique gift from the creator to man-kind. Legal philosophers contend that it is free will that makes us liable to legal punishment for our crimes. while piranhas and machines are not. We would never think of jailing a gun or a piranha even it harmed a child.

It’s not totally clear that we have free will, though, nor is it totally clear what free will is. The common test is that no one can tell what I will do. If this is the only requirement, though, it seems a random number generator should be found to have free will. One might want to add some degree of artificial intelligence so that the random numbers are used to make decisions that are rational in some sense, say choosing between tea and coffee, for example, and not tea and covfefe, but this should not be difficult. With that modification, we should find that the random device would make free decisions as boldly or conservatively as any person.

The numbers should be truly random, but even if they are not quite, this should not be a barrier. We generally take statistical things to be random, the speed of the wind tomorrow at 3:00 PM for example even though there is a likely average, and 500 mph is exceedingly unlikely. And, if that isn’t quite random enough, one could use quantum mechanics. One could devise a system that measures the time between the next two radioactive decays to an accuracy many times greater than the likely time between. If the sample has a decay every 100 seconds or so, the second and third digit of this time after the decimal is random to an extent that most would accept, and that one can predict it at all — or so we understand it. (God might be an exception here, but since He is outside of time, prediction becomes an oxymoron). Using these quantum mechanic random numbers, one should be able to make decisions showing as much free will as any person shows, and likely more . Most folks are fairly predictable.

Since God is considered to be outside of time, any mention of his fore-knowledge or pre-determination is an oxymoron. There is no pre or fore if you’re outside of time, as I’d understand things

 I notice that few people would say that a radioactive atom has free will, though, and that many doubt that people have free will. Still no one seems interested in handing major issues to a computer, or holding the machine liable if things turn out poorly. And if one wants to argue that people have no free will, it seems to me that the argument for punishment would get rather weak. Without free will, shy would it be more wrong to kill a person than a piranha, or a plant.

Robert Buxbaum, January 19, 2020. Just some random thoughts on random number generators. I’ve also had thoughts about punishments, and about job choices.

The main route of lead poisoning is from the soil by way of food, dust, and smoke.

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While several towns have had problems with lead in their water, the main route for lead entering the bloodstream seems to be from the soil. The lead content in the water can be controlled by chemical means that I reviewed recently. Lead in the soil can not be controlled. The average concentration of lead in US water is less than 1 ppb, with 15 ppb as the legal limit. According to the US geological survey, of lead in the soil, 2014., the average concentration of lead in US soil is about 20 ppm. That’s more than 1000 times the legal limit for drinking water, and more than 20,000 times the typical water concentration. Lead is associated with a variety of health problems, including development problems in children, and 20 ppm is certainly a dangerous level. Here are the symtoms of lead poisoning.

Several areas have deadly concentrations of lead and other heavy metals. Central Colorado, Kansas, Washington, and Nevada is particularly indicated. These areas are associated with mining towns with names like Leadville, Telluride, Silverton, Radium, or Galena. If you live in an areas of high lead, you should probably not grow a vegetable garden, nor by produce at the local farmer’s market. Even outside of these towns, it’s a good idea to wash your vegetables to avoid eating the dirt attached. There are hardly any areas of the US where the dust contains less than 1000 times the lead level allowed for water.

Lead content of US soils, from the US geological survey of soils, 2014. Michigan doesn’t look half bad.

Breathing the dust near high-lead towns is a problem too. The soil near Telluride Colorado contains 1010 mg/kg lead, or 0.1%. On a dust-blown day in the area, you could breath several grams of the dust, each containing 1 mg of lead. That’s far more lead than you’d get from 1000 kg of water (1000 liters). Tests of blood lead levels, show they rise significantly in the summer, and drop in the winter. The likely cause is dust: There is more dust in the summer.

Recalled brand of curry powder associated with recent poisoning.

Produce is another route for lead entering the bloodstream. Michigan produce is relatively safe, as the soil contains only about 15 ppm, and levels in produce are generally far smaller than in the soil. Ohio soils contains about three times as much lead, and I’d expect the produce to similarly contain 3 times more lead. That should still be safe if you wash your food before eating. When buying from high-lead states, like Colorado and Washington, you might want to avoid produce that concentrates heavy metals. According Michigan State University’s outreach program, those are leafy and root vegetables including mustard, carrots, radishes, potatoes, lettuce, spices, and collard. Fruits do not concentrate metals, and you should be able to buy them anywhere. (I’d still avoid Leadville, Telluride, Radium, etc.). Spices tend to be particularly bad routes for heavy metal poisoning. Spices imported from India and Soviet Georgia have been observed to have as much as 1-2% lead and heavy metal content; saffron, curry and fenugreek among the worst. A recent outbreak of lead poisoning in Oakland county, MI in 2018 was associated with the brand of curry powder shown at left. It was imported from India.

Marijuana tends to be grown in metal polluted soil because it tolerates soil that is too polluted fro most other produce. The marijuana plant concentrates the lead into the leaves and buds, and smoking sends it to the lungs. While tobacco smoking is bad, tobacco leaves are washed and the tobacco products are regulated and tested for lead and other heavy metals. If you choose to smoke cigarettes, I’d suggest you chose brands that are low in lead. Here is an article comparing the lead levels of various brands. . Better yet, I’s suggest that you vape. There are several advantages of vaping relative to smoking the leaf directly. One of them is that the lead is removed in the process of making concentrate.

Some states test the lead content of marijuana; Michigans and Colorado do not, and even in products that are tested, there have been scandals that the labs under-report metal levels to help keep tainted products on the shelves. There is also a sense that the high cost encourages importers to add lead dust deliberately to increase the apparent density. I would encourage the customer to buy vape or tested products, only.

Here is a little song, “pollution” from Tom Lehrer, to lighten the mood.

Robert Buxbaum, November 24, 2019. I ran for water commissioner in 2016 and lost. I may run again in 2020. Who knows, this time I may win.

Water Towers, usually a good thing.

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Most towns have at least one water tower. Oakland county, Michigan has four. When they are sized right, they serve several valuable purposes. They provide water in case of a power failure; they provide increased pressure in the morning when people use a lot of water showering etc.; and they allow a town to use smaller pumps and to pump with cheaper electricity, e.g. at night. If a town has no tower, all these benefits are gone, but a town can still have water. It’s also possible to have a situation that’s worse than nothing. My plan is to show, at the end of this essay, one of the ways that can happen. It involves thermodynamic properties of state i a situation where there is no expansion headspace or excess drain (most towers have both).

A typical water tower — spheroidal design. A tower of the dimensions shown would contain about 1/2 million gallons of water.

The typical tower stands at the highest point in the town, with the water level about 170 feet above street level. It’s usable volume should be about as much water as the town uses in a typical day. The reason for the height has to do with the operating pressure of most city-level water pipes. It’s about 75 psi and each foot of water “head” gives you about 0.43 psi. You want pressures about 75 psi for fire fighting, and to provide for folks in apartment buildings. If you have significantly higher pressures, you pay a cost in electricity, and you start losing a lot of water to leaks. These leaks should be avoided. They can undermine the roads and swallow houses. Bob Dadow estimates that, for our water system the leakage rate is between 15 and 25%.

Oakland county has four water towers with considerably less volume than the 130 million gallons per day that the county uses. I estimate that the South-east Oakland county tower, located near my home, contains, perhaps 2 million gallons. The other three towers are similar in size. Because our county’s towers are so undersized, we pay a lot for water, and our water pressure is typically quite low in the mornings. We also have regular pressure excursions and that leads to regular water-boil emergencies. In some parts of Oakland county this happens fairly often.

There are other reasons why a system like ours should have water towers with something more like one days’ water. Having a large water reserve means you can benefit from the fact that electric prices are the lowest at night. With a days’ volume, you can avoid running the pumps during high priced, day times. Oakland county loses this advantage. The other advantage to having a large volume is that it gives you more time to correct problems, e.g. in case of an electric outage or a cyber attack. Perhaps Oakland thinks that only one pump can be attacked at one time or that the entire electric grid will not go out at one time, but these are clearly false assumptions. A big system also means you can have pumps powered by solar cells or other renewable power. Renewable power is a good thing for reliability and air pollution avoidance. Given the benefits, you’d expect Oakland county would reward towns that add water towers, but they don’t, as best I can tell.

Here’s one way that a water column can cause problems. You really need those pressure reliefs.

Now for an example of the sort of things that can go wrong in a water tower with no expansion relief. Every stand-pipe is a small water tower, and since water itself is incompressible, it’s easy to see that a small expansion in the system could produce a large pressure rise. The law requires that every apartment hose water system has to have expansion relief to limit these increases; The water tower above had two forms of reliefs, a roof vent, and an overflow pipe, both high up so that pressure could be maintained. But you can easily imagine a plumber making a mistake and installing a stand pipe without an expansion relief. I show a system like that at left, a 1000 foot tall water pipe, within a skyscraper, with a pump at the bottom, and pipes leading off at the sides to various faucets.

Lets assume that the pressure at the top is 20 psi, the pressure at the bottom will be about 450 psi. The difference in pressure (430 psi) equals the weight of the water divided by the area of the pipe. Now let’s imagine that a bubble of air at the bottom of the pipe detaches and rises to the top of the pipe when all of the faucets are closed. Since air is compressible, while water is not, the pressure at the bubble will remain the same as the bubble rises. By the time the bubble reaches the top of the pipe, the pressure there will rise to 450 psi. Since water has weight, 430 psi worth, the pressure at the bottom will rise to 880 psi = 450 + 430. This is enough to damage pump and may blow the pipes as well. A scenario like this likely destroyed the New Horizon oil platform to deadly consequences. You really want those pressure reliefs, and you want a competent plumber / designer for any water system, even a small one.

Robert Buxbaum, September 28- October 6, 2019. I ran for water commissioner is 2016.

Why does water cost what it does?

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Water costs vary greatly about Oakland county, and around the US, and I have struggled in vain to find out why. In part the problem is that each city gets to add as much maintenance and management costs as the city government thinks appropriate. High management and infrastructure fees can increase to the cost of water, but I also not that different cities about Oakland County Michigan get their water at different rates from the multi-county organization that oversees water in South East Michigan: GLWA, The Great Lakes Water Authority.

$112 water bill for zero usage. The base charge is so large that prices are essentially independent of useage.

I’ve attended meetings, both local and multi county and have tried to find out why one town gets its water at a far lower rate than another, near by. Towns get lower rates if they have a water tower, but it is not at all clear what the formula is. It also helps to separate the storm sewage from the sanitary sewage — something that I have proposed for all of Oakland county, but if there is fixed formula of how that affects rates, I’ve not seen it. And I wonder how well communities monitor the amount of storm sewage they generate.

The water itself is free. For the most part, in this county, we pump it from the Detroit river. Some of the rest of the water is pumped from wells. None of this costs anything. There is a pump cost, but it is manicure. Pumping 1 gallon of water up 75 feet, costs about 0.002¢ in pumping cost. The rest of the cost is infrastructure: the cost of the pumps, the pipes, the treatment, the billing and sewage. Among the sewage fees is a pollution penalty, and Oakland county pays plenty of pollution penalties. When it rains, we generate more sewage than the system will handle, and we dump the rest into the rivers and lakes. This results in closed beaches and poisoned fish, and fines too. The county pays the EPA when we do this, and the county passes the cost to the cities. I don’t know what the formula for fee distribution is, and don’t even know what it should be. What I do know is that we do this vastly too often. I’d really like us to stop this by moving to separate the sewers so that, as a city, we don’t spend so much on treating rainwater and we don’t pollute so often.

Another oddity is that we do a propaganda campaign to tell folks to use less water. Why? I’d much prefer if people would use more. We could then charge a lower base charge, and then collect the rest on per-gallon fees. As with much that is socialist, the current system is inefficient, but pleasant for the management. Or, for those cheapskates and environmentalists who wish to save water, here are some ideas.

August 21, 2019, Robert Buxbaum