Insular, Scared, or Both?

In my hometown of Iowa City, Iowa, there is a well-known and well-loved breakfast/lunch diner-type joint called the Hamburg Inn No. 2. It has great cheap food (scores of different omelets, including my favorite, the Iowa Omelet), and is always crowded. Two U.S. Presidents, Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan, have eaten there. You can see pictures of Clinton here (oh my, Bill, you are seriously overdressed for the Hamburg Inn); I guess the political sensibilities of the owners preclude putting Reagan's picture up, but trust me, he was there.

George W. Bush spent last Friday night in Wine Country, and he most definitely did not go anywhere near an establishment like the Hamburg Inn #2. As the Santa Rosa Press Democrat reported:

During his 17 hours in the Napa Valley, Bush had been something of a stealth president -- landing unexpectedly at the Angwin airport after dark Friday, then traveling via back roads to St. Helena's exclusive Meadowood Resort, and Saturday taking a two-hour bike ride in Las Posadas State Forest under tight security.

The Meadowood Resort, in case you were wondering, is a very exclusive resort; according to is website, rooms in the high season run from $525 per night (for us common folk) to $3,925 (for a suite). Not very Hamburg Inn No. 2-like. Well, at least the President took a bike ride with some locals. Oops, check that, he rode with the Travis Air Force Base Cycling Team. No decent mountain bikers in Napa County, presumably.

The President seemed to consider his trip to be on par with an excursion into enemy territory. As the PD reported:

Napa County Sheriff's Lt. Jean Donaldson said about 175 officers from the CHP, local police departments, and the Napa, Sonoma and Solano county sheriff's departments had been called in to help with security for the president, who never traveled with fewer than 25 cars, including numerous Secret Service vehicles, a bomb truck and an ambulance, as well as dozens of CHP units.

Even the Parrott Field airport was equipped with special antennas and communications equipment for the visit.

Three or four Blackhawk helicopters joined Marine One and a second aircraft as Bush left.

Sneak in, sneak out, accompanied by a small army, surround yourself with sycophants ... truly, what's the point of even coming in the first place? One has to wonder: Is Bush scared of a few protesters? Or has he become so insular that mixing with the great unwashed masses is an inconceivable burden? Either way, it's a sad state of affairs, not good for Bush, and not good for the country.

Like them or hate them, to the end it always seemed as if Reagan and Clinton genuinely respected, liked, and wanted to do right by the little guy, even though they had dramatically different policy means of getting to that goal. Bush no longer seems that way, if in fact he ever was. He seems imperial, in a bad way.

Next time you come for a visit our way, Mr. President, come into town, come in the daylight, find the closest thing you can to the Hamburg Inn No. 2. It'd be good for your soul, and the country's.

Sustain This: Hybrids Consume More Energy in Lifetime Than Chevrolet's Tahoe SUV

A very interesting recent study evaluated the "lifetime energy usage" of various vehicles, by looking not only at their fuel economy, but all energy costs associated with the design, manufacture, delivery, and disposal of those vehicles. The surprise? Hybrids don't fare especially well in this analysis.

For example, the Honda Accord Hybrid has an Energy Cost per Mile of $3.29 while the conventional Honda Accord is $2.18. Put simply, over the "Dust to Dust" lifetime of the Accord Hybrid, it will require about 50 percent more energy than the non-hybrid version.

[W]hile the industry average of all vehicles sold in the U.S. in 2005 was $2.28 cents per mile, the Hummer H3 (among most SUVs) was only $1.949 cents per mile. That figure is also lower than all currently offered hybrids and Honda Civic at $2.42 per mile.

The conclusion? "Basing purchase decisions solely on fuel economy or vehicle size does not get to the heart of the energy usage issue," because "some high-mileage vehicles actually cost society more than conventional or even larger models over their lifetime."

Hybrids never made much sense economically, as it was difficult to make up the additional upfront cost in fuel savings. But it allowed people to feel that they were making a contribution to a more "sustainable" world. Well, baby, it may be time for a trade. And while we're at it, can we now get single-driver hybrids out of the carpool lane?

The link to a report on the study is here.

2 Feet of Snow on Spring Break

We went to Tahoe for 5 days over Spring Break, and spent two of them hunkered down in our cabin waiting out an incredible late winter storm. It dropped 25 inches of snow between Saturday and Sunday, with horrendous winds (60 mph on Saturday at the top of Alpine Meadows, which convinced us not to ski that day). It was fun in a way to be forced to stay in all day on Sunday, not wanting to venture out in the car, drinking coffee and sodas, reading and watching TV, just passing the time with nothing to do. Monday the skiing at Alpine was incredible; the snow was so light and powdery and squeeky and cold that even though in the late afternoon the temperature had risen considerably above freezing, it never got slushy. Tuesday we came back, and had the odd experience of going from 15 degrees and ice and snow in the morning to a glorious green warm spring day through the Central Valley and back into Sonoma County.

If you like to see snow, pictures are below; larger versions are here, here, and here.

Grump: The Beginning of the End for "W"?

The Grump must confess that he has not followed the Valerie Plame/Libby Lewis leak story in detail. But one thing the Grump recalls firmly is the absolutely unequivocal statement by George Bush shortly after the row started, to the effect that leaks were wrong and that if someone in his administration leaked something, well then he was going to bring the hammer down on them.

Now we hear the President's Press Secretary say, well, the President authorized the release of the information, and that since a document isn't classified if the President says it isn't classified, no wrongful leak of classified information ever took place.

This will not, the Grump thinks, play well in Peoria. The problem is that even though the "Pres says it's not classified so it's not classified" argument may hold water logically, it's too reminiscent of Clinton's fine parsing of words like "sex" and "is" when he got in a jam. Bush was asked about the Plame leak; he said, essentially, "it's wrong and when I find out who did it they'll get theirs." If he had been honest, he would have said, at the time, "I've decided that information could be released because it's important that the truth get out," not pretend that he didn't know about the leak.

The Grump says that this is going to hurt Bush, because this is what in college we used to call (for reasons that are lost to me now, as it doesn't make any sense) a "self-inhale." Like Bill and Monica, this isn't a situation created by Bush's enemies. And like Bill and Monica, it reveals something fundamental about the man's character, which, the Grump thinks, a lot of people who voted for Bush have been hoping against hope isn't what it now seems to be. Not quite caught dead in a lie, perhaps, but close enough to make those centrist Bush voters look back on the whole Iraq war buildup and ask: Was I duped? Loss of credibility with your supporters, the Grump thinks, is the beginning of the end.

Unceasing Rain, Unceasing Gloom

This has been the longest, most gloomy winter I've experienced since moving to California ... holy crud, it's almost 19 years now! Here's pretty much what it's been like all the time:



Want a bigger view of gloom? Click here.

No wonder the Grump is grumpy. He's wondering why he ever left Seattle.

The Grump is Sharing My Blog

My friend the Grumpy Moderate has had too hard a time figuring out how to use his own blog (he's been very busy lately besides), so I have generously offered to let him share the SSSBLOG for the time being. Whether someone as incredibly upbeat and optimistic as SSS can bear sharing space wtih someone as, how do I say this, well ... as grumpy as the Grump remains to be seen. It is likely, however, that the posts will come more frequently now. Something to look forward to (or not).

The Final Four Can't Match This

Basketball season ended on Saturday, with Andrew's fifth grade school team going down to a tough defeat in a hard-fought game at St. Francis in Sonoma. Poor kid got knocked down twice, with no foul ever called, but he played great defense and scored 2 points. He has 19 kids on his team, so no one gets a lot of playing time.



Full size picture here.