The Sad Truth Behind Elizabeth Montgomery's Death

"The Poor Man/Poor Woman's Vaccine"

 

      Johnson and Johnson just came out with a new vaccine. I am going to give this vaccine a humorous nickname as follows:

      "The poor man's/poor woman's vaccine."

    I dismissed it at first. It has a lower efficacy than Moderna or Pfizer. I then watched a most-informative interview with the doctor who is President Biden's "Vaccine Czar." He made one critical point that I want to share as follows:

      "Anyone who gets this vaccine could still catch Covid-19. They will not go to the hospital due to Covid-19 complications. They will not die due to Covid-19."

       There are further virtues to this vaccine as follows:

1) It requires just one dose.

2) It is easy to transport and store because it does not require cold storage.

3) Johnson and Johnson has a massive production capability.

4) The vaccine will have full approval of the US Food and Drug Administration. Those getting the vaccine will know exactly what they are getting. One cannot say the same about the Russian Sputnik and Chinese vaccines.

The Success Of Obamacare

 

Obamacare endured a grueling first decade of existence. Its launch was famously clunky. It was unpopular in its early years. It narrowly escaped repeal at both the Supreme Court and in Congress.

But the law — passed in 2010 and more formally known as the Affordable Care Act — has survived. It’s more than survived, in fact. It now stands as a monument to a particular theory of progressive lawmaking: When the federal government enacts a new benefit that makes life easier for millions of people, the program tends to endure. That describes universal high school, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and now Obamacare.

President Biden yesterday signed a package of executive actions on health care, and many experts described them as steps to undo Donald Trump’s attempted sabotage of the law. Which they are. But the modest scope of the actions is also a reminder of how little progress Trump made in undermining the law.

Consider this chart:

The New York Times | Source: United States Census Bureau, via Center on Budget and Policy Priorities

The number of Americans without health insurance did rise during the Trump presidency, because of his attempts to diminish the law. His administration did little to advertise Obamacare policies and weakened some of its provisions, like protections for people with certain medical conditions. But this increase in the number of uninsured reversed only a small portion of the decline caused by Obamacare.

Even after Trump, an additional 20 million or so Americans have health insurance today largely because of Obamacare. Others have better benefits — like maternity care and addiction treatment — or face lower costs.

Raising The Minimum Wage Has Unintended Consequences

 

         There is a lot of talk now about the $15.00 per hour minimum wage in the US. When I was homeless and poor, I worked for $8.00 US per hour. I have great empathy for poor people. I have a different idea of how to solve the problem.

          First, please allow me to talk about my time living under socialism in Australia from early September,1981, to Valentine's Day 1986. There was some good news as follows:

1) In Sydney Maria and I rented a 4-bedroom home in a very upper middle-class neighborhood. It had a swimming pool and lemon trees all about. Such a property would rent for around $6,000 US per month in Silicon Valley. With rent control, we paid $650 Australian dollars per month rent ($650.00 US in those days)

2) Maria was hit by a car in Sydney. She had to be hospitalized with an injured leg. Physical therapy was required. With Australia Medicare, the final bill was zero.

3) I had a tragic accident with severe burns. I was six weeks in the hospital including two weeks in the ICU. Physical therapy followed. Imagine what the hospital bill would be here in the US or in Brasil. When I went to check out from the hospital, I was handed a bill for $17.00 Australian.

4) Australia then was probably the most middle-class country in the world. There were few poor people and few very-rich people.

    Now let us talk about the bad side of this life as follows:

1) The Australian Taxation Department was ruthless. 50% of your paycheck was taken with taxes. There were no deductions like in the US and I presume in Brasil.

2) The high minimum wage gave workers high wages. It also distorted life for most others. A restaurant meal was a once a month treat because of the high prices. You had to learn how to fix everything that went bad in your house or apartment. You could not afford a plumber, electrician, etc. You bought a new car and held it for three years. You could not afford repair bills. The list goes on.

3) Labor unions were militant and powerful. Disruptions from strikes were an everyday occurrence.

    My answer to bringing up the wages of poor workers rests with the IRS. It is the Earned Income Credit. This program started in the early 1970's. Richard Nixon conceived a system where, if a worker earned below a certain income, he or she would file their taxes at the end of each year. The worker would get a tax refund check to bring their income up to a minimum. Sadly, the IRS has come to view this noble program as a hotbed for theft and fraud. If you file for this benefit now, you are viewed like a criminal. You will be guaranteed an audit and hassles. I know this from friends who went through this bureaucratic ordeal. This program would keep costs to employers down. Our costs for many things in life would stay low. It would give people an incentive to work and a living wage.

An Israeli Boom With The UAE!!!

 

ISRAEL

Globalization MENA-Style

The peace accord between Israel and the United Arab Emirates has created a tourism boom in Dubai, where Israelis now visit the gold markets and other attractions in the wealthy city on the Persian Gulf.

Braving COVID-19 and overcoming decades of suspicion, more than 50,000 Israelis have taken the three-hour flight to visit the UAE since the August deal, the Washington Post reported. Another 70,000 were expected to spend Hanukkah in the Muslim country. “To me this feels like the Iron Curtain lifting,” Adina Engal, an Israeli tourist in Dubai, told the newspaper.

An American rabbi who had been serving the small preexisting Jewish community in the UAE has been overwhelmed helping to accommodate the newcomers, reported National Public Radio. One Israeli visitor asked whether the local Starbucks used camel milk in its coffee, which would not be kosher.

There’s also the potential for Iranian attacks on Israelis in the UAE. Reports of Emirati security forces nabbing an Iranian cell in the country were later denied, however.

The traveling will eventually be both ways. After Israel lifts travel restrictions due to the pandemic, tourism officials expect 100,000 Emiratis to visit the country to see sites in the Holy Land as well as meet with Israeli tech entrepreneurs, the Arab News, a Saudi Arabian news outlet, wrote.

Not everyone likes the cultural exchange. Writing in Middle East Monitor, opinion writer Adnan Abu Amer claimed that too many Israelis brought illegal drugs and patronized prostitutes.

“It has become clear that any Israeli tourist in Dubai can go up to a hotel room to attend a party, pay $1,000 and jump into the pool of iniquity,” Abu Amer argued. “All of this is happening openly, while the Emirati authorities turn a blind eye to tourists spending a week in Dubai for sexual purposes.”

Palestinians were also disappointed. Emiratis can now travel in and out of Israel freely while Palestinians can’t easily do the same, opined writer Jala Abukhater in Al Jazeera. While an Israeli can hop on a plane and fly directly to the UAE, a Palestinian living in Ramallah would first need to cross the border into Jordan and catch a flight from an airport there to Dubai. That journey easily takes a day.

The Emiratis aren’t alone, however. Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan also signed deals normalizing relations with Israel last year. Egypt and Jordan had already done so.

Rumors of the death of globalization, it appears, were premature.

WA

China Is Now The Number One Destination In The World For Foreign Direct Investment

 

CHINA

Upward and Onward

China overtook the United States as the world’s top destination for new foreign direct investment (FDI), highlighting another achievement for the world’s second-largest economy amid the coronavirus pandemic, the BBC reported Monday.

A report by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development found that direct investment in China rose by four percent last year, while in the US it fell by almost half.

China had $163 billion in inflows in 2020, compared with $134 billion attracted by the US. The new figures contrast with those of 2019, when the US received $251 billion in FDI while China received $140 billion.

The report noted that the US still remains the top destination for foreign businesses looking to expand overseas, but analysts said that investments in the world’s largest economy have been dropping since 2017.

Former President Donald Trump’s administration urged US companies to leave China and re-establish operations in the US. It also warned Chinese firms and investors that they would face new scrutiny, citing national security grounds.

The top-ranking marks another victory for China, which was the only major economy to register growth last year. Earlier this month, China reported that its gross domestic product rose 2.3 percent in 2020.

The British-based Centre for Economics and Business Research predicted that China will emerge as the world’s largest economy in 2028.

P

Some Original Thinking During The Covid-19 Crisis

 

I love original "think outside the box ideas. Dr. Venn Gupta of the University of Washington Medical Center came up with a brilliant one. There is a critical shortage of people to give Covid-19 injections. Dr. Gupta pointed out that every country has an unfortunate population of diabetics. Most of these people must inject themselves with insulin every day to stay alive. With just a little additional training, they can be employed to inject people needing Covid-19 vaccine.

 

Elena Celebrates Six Decades Of Life Today

 

      Today is a special day. Elena celebrates six decades of life. Let us look at where she started. Her father and mother bought a plot of land on a shell road. Dad built a house with some help. They were humble. They did not own a car. When other people had television, they had only a radio for many years. 

      When Elena was 15 years of age, the Argentina military staged a coup and took power. People started disappearing. One's worst nightmare was to have the dreaded green Ford Falcon pull up in front of your house around midnight. Two weeks after the coup, the Torello family faced their worst nightmare. The green Ford Falcon pulled up in front of the house. There was the dreaded knock on the door. The father answered the door. They were expecting arrest followed by torture and death. The secret police asked for another person. ID documents were produced. The thugs went through their house. They broke into the house next door. A pregnant woman was hauled off and never seen again. (Years later it was found out that the arrested woman was kept alive until she gave birth to her child. She was then murdered.)

      Despite this trauma, Elena finished high school one year early. She was accepted to the University of Buenos Aires Facultad de Medicina. She finished in 1984 with an Honors Diploma. Elena completed a residency. She became a cancer doctor.

       At age 40 Elena came to San Jose, California to start life with me. She had to start her medical career over literally "from scratch."

       Elena took three highly-competitive tests to qualify for her California medical license. She scored in the top 5% of US medical students and aspiring foreign doctors seeking a US medical license. She got accepted for her residency at the Kaiser Permanente hospital in San Francisco, At age 42, she started a rigorous residency program where the average person accepted was 27 years of age. It was three years of hell including 36-hour workdays. She finished and got hired by Kaiser. At the end of March,2021, she will retire.

      I can only say one thing. "South America produces some very tough women!"

 

The Trump Campaign Paid $2,7 Million To The Organizers of The January 6 Capitol Building Rally

 https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-paid-capitol-rally-organizers-180118672.html

What We Need Now Is Compassion-Some Lessons From The End Of World War II

 

       Today I want to share with you a story about compassion and decency that is very relevant today. In April of 1990, I moved from Pasadena, California, to Johannesburg, South Africa. I had a job offer. I went to see my employer. The job fell through. I was in a strange city halfway around the world with many people who spoke strange languages. This was before internet job searches. I did it the old-fashioned way. I got in the Yellow Pages and found "Import/Export Firms." There were 150 in Johannesburg. I called all 150 companies. I got a bunch of turn downs. I did get an interview with Bahmann International Trading in the Johannesburg suburbs.

      I borrowed my landlord's car. I drove out to the interview in the suburd of Midrand. I was brought into the office of Ulli Bahmann. He was German. He had built quite a company importing truck and auto parts for Mercedes. He was also a defense contractor for military vehicles. Uli told me that he wanted to start an export division. At the end of the interview, I was hired and given a decent job offer that included a company car (3-series BMW.) I got a work permit and a residence permit for South Africa.

        South African companies had a unique aspect to their culture. A pub (drinking establishment) was always on the company property. At the end of the workday, employees were allowed to go to the pub and have a drink or two. It was a time to relax and compare notes on what had happened at work that day.

    As I enjoyed these pub meetings a fascinating story emerged about my fellow employees. All had been young boys at the end of World War II. They were occupied by the US Army. To the last man, these people praised the US soldiers for their kindness and generosity. These invaders kept people fed, rebuilt schools, fixed roads, and got people back to work. The US Army provided health care to the German population. All these men had deep admiration for Americans.

         In 1998, I was dating a woman from Tokyo, Japan. She lived at a hotel for Japanese women on Sutter Street in San Francisco. Several of the women told me similar stories about how the US Army had treated their families when they occupied Japan. These women had deep admiration for Americans.

       Right now, we are in the middle of a disaster. We must keep in mind the lessons learned from the end of World War II. Instead of hate and division, we need kindness and compassion. This is not a political matter or socialism. We need to:

1) Get people vaccinated.

2) Get people fed.

3) Get money in people's pockets by getting them back to work. There are roads, bridges, airports, and electronic infrastructure that need to be rebuilt.

       The list could go on. Give people hope and dignity. Then hate and violence will decline.

Monkey Thieves Are Getting Smarter

 

Monkey Business

Staff at the Uluwatu temple in Bali, Indonesia, have always warned tourists to beware of pickpocketing monkeys roaming the area.

The long-tailed macaques are notorious for stealing things from unsuspecting visitors and holding onto them until they are given some food as a ransom payment.

Now, scientists have discovered that the monkeys have become smarter in their thievery and are targeting items that their victims would value the most, according to the Guardian.

In their study, lead author Jean-Baptiste Leca and his team recorded the animals’ behavior for more than 270 days.

They reported that the macaques would go after important valuables, such as electronics or prescription glasses to coax the tourists into giving them food. The team also noted that the mischievous monkeys were tough negotiators when it came to returning the goods.

In one instance, it took 25 minutes – including 17 minutes of bargaining – for staff and tourists to persuade the macaque to return one item.

Leca pointed out that this peculiar behavior is learned at a young age and marks an expression of cultural intelligence on the part of the monkeys.

“These behaviors are socially learned and have been maintained across generations of monkeys for at least 30 years in this population,” he said.

The Tragic Death of Robert Urich & His Wife

I Moved My Family From California to Austin, Texas And Regretted It!

 

I moved my family from California to Austin, Texas and regretted it. Here are 10 key points every person should consider before relocating.

BRETT ALDER JANUARY 20, 2021

Brett Alder.

Brett Alder

This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers. Become an Insider and start reading now.

• Brett Alder moved to Austin, Texas for work and regrets the decision, calling the move an expensive mistake.
• He calls out 10 things he learned in this honest account, like expensive utilities, the oppressive heat, the lack of public space, and why he pulled his three children out of the local elementary school.
• This is an opinion column. The thoughts expressed are those of the author.
• Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.

A lot of people, including myself, move from California to Austin because of the hype and the perception that California and Austin are reasonably comparable in lifestyle. We found that to be far from the case.

Here's what we learned, or 10 reasons why Austin is not the "California of Texas." But first, what does Austin have in common with California?

Austin, like California, is not affordable.

The thing that California and Austin definitely have in common is that they're both very expensive. Austin is not cheap. Let the words sink in. Austin is not cheap, it's actually quite expensive.

We moved from San Diego in 2015 (owning a 2,000-square-foot house on a 1/3rd acre) looking for a boost in lifestyle. If you're looking for great schools, the southwest and northwest sectors of Austin are the main options. The only caveat is that NW Austin (Travis County) is some of the most expensive real estate in Texas.

So we bought a 4,000-square-foot house in Bee Cave (an affluent suburb of Austin) with "great schools." We heard Austin was extremely hot so we got a place with a pool. When you look at a 3D affordability map, these are the factors we discovered people are not taking into account:

• Taxes: We all know property taxes are high in Texas. They actually weren't that bad for us and ranged from 2% to 3% depending on the neighborhood. We bought a home at 2.1% and, with the homestead exception, were paying at 1.79% (vs. 1.25% in California). Don't buy at 3%, you won't be able to sell and your house won't appreciate.
• Power: Energy is incredibly expensive. You want a big house, and they're so cheap, but then it costs a fortune to heat and cool. We were paying $400 per month during the summer and winter and we were uncomfortable (our thermostat was set to 79 degrees F in the summer, and 65 degrees F in the winter). To be comfortable would have cost us $700 to $1,000 per month.
• Water: Water is also shockingly expensive. In NW Austin they pump water from Lake Travis, which is only a few miles away, but that doesn't stop greedy water collectives from shaking you down. We paid $89 per month just for the privilege of being connected to city water (using 0 gallons). And they just jacked that base rate to $97. We had a well for landscape watering, but otherwise our water bill for a young family, watering about 10,000 square feet of grass would have easily been $300 to $400 per month. New sod? Try $1,200 per month, for water. Our water in San Diego (and now San Jose) was cheaper, during a drought, and we got it from like two states away.
• Services: We thought living in Texas, stuff would be cheap, but with so many people moving to Austin, the service industry is in red hot demand. Expensive pool maintenance, expensive landscaping services, expensive home repairs, expensive dining and movies.
• Travel: For reasons described below, most anyone who can leaves Austin for a month or two during the summer to escape the heat. That's expensive since to get anywhere interesting involves flying and hotel stays. Budget another several thousand dollars per year.
• Weather: Texas weather is hard on houses. Hail storms will ruin your roof, torrential rain and scorpions will get inside. We spent tens of thousands on unexpected home repairs and remediation, and talking to other people, it wasn't uncommon.
• Finally — key point — lifestyle: Although we doubled the size of our house (and kitchen and yard), we felt more cramped and cooped up in Austin than San Diego or San Jose due to the bad weather and lack of public spaces. A 2,000-square-foot house with a yard in Austin is cheap compared to the same house in San Diego, but offers no where close to the same lifestyle because your yard in San Diego is living space and in Austin it's not.

1. The weather

Sure, you've heard it's hot and humid, but how bad could it be? It's just weather, right?

Wrong. First of all, Austin is wet, getting almost 90% as much rain as Portland, Oregon. That sounds great, and the greenery looks great, but it comes at a cost. Expect all of the problems that come with a wet climate: mold, allergies, mosquitoes, and water penetration. And the rain comes in a handful of days, often pouring inches in a single night. More on that later.

Humidity is great for your skin, but causes food to spoil fast, towels to get mildewy and drastically limits the temperature range where you feel comfortable. For me, 32 degrees in high deserts like Nevada or Utah is not that bad, just chipper. 50 degrees in Austin is butt cold, not cozy, snuggle up cold, but annoyingly cold.

And Austin is hot. It's not California hot, it's Texas hot. California heat is weak by comparison. In much of California the temperature cools down at night. You can open windows, breathe fresh air, and drastically limit your utility bill. In Austin, it would only get down to a smothering 80 degrees at night during the summer. This means your AC will be running all day and all night. Evening walks are less than refreshing when it's 11 p.m. and you're sweating. It's hard to describe how oppressive it is.

Although we had a huge yard and our own half basketball court, we really only felt like going outside about 3 to 4 months of the year. The rest of the time it was too windy, too hot/cold, too mosquito/horse fly/fire ant ridden or pouring. Often the kids would go outside anyway and come back with heat rashes and bug bites.

Compare this to San Jose or San Diego where you can enjoy being outside pretty much every day (at least during some part of the day).

2. No public land

Think about public land much? Yeah, me neither. On the west coast, we take public land for granted. Soaring Sierra Nevadas, sandy beaches, public space canyons, and even trails along creeks are standard fare in the West — not to mention Yosemite. Not so in Texas.

Because of Texas' history and lack of natural barriers (mountains, oceans) to settlement, most all of the land around is private and flat or rolling hills. Yes, there is a lot of land in Texas, but it all has barbed wire fences and no trespassing signs on it. Even creeks are parceled up as private property.

So even though Austin is supposed to be outdoorsy, there are very few places to go, and because there is a very limited number of public spaces serving such a large population, good luck getting in.

One example, we drove 90 minutes to visit Enchanted Rock, a granite rock outcropping that would largely go unnoticed on the west coast. We visited on a Saturday and met a 3-mile-long line of cars waiting to get in. Running out of gas, we grabbed lunch at a nearby town and tried again later. No dice, the parking lot was full and closed.

We've now christened the site Disenchanted Rock: 3 hours of driving and no hiking. What's even more annoying is when you consider how much land is in Texas and the state didn't build a big enough parking lot. We confirmed it was very common not to be able to get into other public attractions on weekends and holidays.

Even our neighborhood creek was divvied up as private property. So much for the kids exploring and catching crayfish.

3. Nowhere to go

Aside from the fact that everything is private, where are you going to go, anyway? There are no snowy mountains, no raging rivers, and no soaring arches. If you live in Austin things don't change much in a huge 7-hour-drive radius. Since we love the outdoors — exploring, climbing, rafting — Austin was not our cup of tea.

4. Dishonesty

Think about integrity much? I didn't. I've worked with hundreds of companies and thousands of people in California. Sure, there are bad apples, but by-and-large integrity is a default way to treat people here. It's not even something we talk about. Not so in Austin.

First it was the people we bought the home from. They lied about the cause of a leak, failed to disclose well water quality issues that made us sick, lied about how much stuff cost to repair, etc. But it didn't stop there.

We hired a guy with a 5-star rating on Yelp to pull up flooded carpet who completely and very obviously busted our closet doors while removing them and never said a word about the damage. Or whose carpet cleaner made a foot long burn mark upstairs and left without a word. Or the mover (also 5 stars on Yelp) we hired who offered to help sell our leather sectional and $600 ping pong table and split the proceeds with us.

We never heard back from him. We're not holding our breath.

Talking around we realized that our experience wasn't exceptional. People are used to it there and know to do extra due diligence — more inspections, more testing, more distrust. But for us coming from California, it was a big shock and disappointment, not to mention financial set back.

5. Yelp

Yes, there is good food in Austin, but you can't trust Yelp to find it because it doesn't work in Austin.

We drove 40 minutes for good Southern Indian food at a 4.5-star rated establishment. It was one of the worst service experiences of my life. Notice the tear drop stains on this post? In general you couldn't trust Yelp as much, which was so disconcerting, especially for a new person.

6. Rudeness

I'll probably take the most heat for this one, but Austinites are rude. We met some amazing people in Austin (like my work colleagues and church congregation) and even bumped into Matthew McConaughey at our kid's flag football game. There are some very wonderful, friendly people, but we also met more than our share of the others.

Exhibit A was the dad (also at a kids flag football league) wearing the "Don't move to Austin" t-shirt, a play on "Don't mess with Texas." Let me get this straight, I uprooted my family, moved across four states, and that's the welcome I get? And the worst part of it all is that it's not even funny. There's a bumper sticker in the West: "Montana sucks. Tell your friends!" Same message, but with some humor.

And then there are the native Texans, usually older, who stick pretty closely to the stereotypes. I've never been told so often what to do and what not to do, and the delivery is in a "this is just the way it's done" tone that is completely oblivious to any other viewpoints on the matter.

Our friends from Tennessee also confirmed that Austin does not conform to the notion of Southern hospitality, but I will say that most younger Texans were really cool.

Austin drivers are also terrible, I mean, reptilian brain terrible. They don't yield to pedestrians on crosswalks unless forced, will inexplicably tail gate and illegally pass you on a double yellow just to drive 30 feet in front of you for the next 10 minutes on open roads, and they may be conservative, but not with their horns. I drive all over the country and hands down Austin has the worst and most inexplicable driving I've experienced.

The service is also generally awful. Doesn't matter if it's a rental car company, a restaurant, you name it. We found a few exceptional waiters and hosts, but Austin is generally the worst service I've experienced nationwide. I mean, you're at the Austin airport with two pieces of luggage and you just ordered 6 items. They don't even ask if you want a bag, you have to initiate the request, and even then they just hand you the bag.

7. A conservative dystopia

If you ask people from other parts of Texas, they'll say that Austin is not representative (despite that most people moving to Austin are from Texas) of all of Texas. That is probably true, but here are a number of messed up things about Travis County/NW Austin:

• A lot of the newer developments are built on converted ranch land, which may be distant from other developments. Despite the fact that Texas leads the nation in natural gas production, they don't mandate that modern utilities be run to these new developments. In one affluent neighborhood, Belterra, the residents are suing the developer for signing a 30 year, auto-renewing contract for captured propane that leaves residents with $600 per month heating bills in the winter. Is this a sick joke? Greed run amok.
• There's also little public school choice. In California there are charter schools, two day schools, public schools, cash/combo charter school/homeschooling, you name it. In west Austin, just public schools. Don't know why, but I heard that the high school football industrial complex opposed charter schools.
• And then there's water, again. Austin will literally have water restrictions in place while it's flooding. "Can't you just take some of the water from here and…never mind." And your Texan neighbors will call you out for having a green lawn, even if you water from a well, which is a possibility they can't quite seem to imagine.

8. Monoculture

I love getting to know people from other cultures. In California we've had Vietnamese neighbors, Iranian neighbors, Filipinos, Palestinians, you name it. We love it.

In parts of Texas it's not just a monoculture, but a monoculture that doesn't seem to be aware of it's own blandness. Think about it, are you ready to have your son judged based on his suitability for a future career in football? Are you ready to network by attending the local high school football game with the guys? Because that's a thing in Texas.

And it's not just that. The lack of openness to diverse ideas leaves you with the feeling that you traveled 15 years back in time technologically moving there. They voted out Uber and Lyft and think that's not a big deal because — wait for it — they have a ride sharing Facebook group. Yeah, that should be great for out of town visitors.

They also don't have a lot of the options we enjoyed in San Diego like "game-only soccer leagues" for kids. The car washes were lame. You just couldn't trust things to be as well thought out and executed as in California.

9. Punitive, militaristic schools and sports

We had three kids in the local elementary school, rated 9 out of 10. For sure some of the teachers were excellent and very caring, but the school was run like a micro-managed military academy.

Our kids complained most about the PE and music teachers (aren't they supposed to be the fun ones?). We heard stories about kids running laps or missing recess just because they didn't sit "criss-cross applesauce." Who thought of taking away recess? And it seemed the more ignorant the coach or teacher, the more he insisted on being addressed as "Y'Sir" — which is still the norm, even in Austin.

There was a massive emphasis on conformity that was good for teachers, bad for kids. I went to read to my kindergartner's class and felt like I'd landed in a dictatorship. They had aides making sure all of the kindergartners faced forward while marching in line to the cafeteria. Kindergartners.

We withdrew our children. Our school may have been particularly bad, but it's something to look out for.

10. Cedar allergies

There's a good chance you'll be sick the whole first year in Austin being exposed to a new set of pathogens. We were, and it's not uncommon.

Then we heard that after a few years it is also common to develop cedar allergies, if you don't already have them.

They're so bad that we knew at least two professionals going through subcutaneous immunotherapy (shots over a period of years) because their allergies were ruining their lives. Allergy treatment centers are very common. There are really only two types of trees in Austin, cedar (really juniper) and oak, so no getting away from the cedar.

11. (I couldn't stop at 10) Big, luxury home obsession

I'm guessing because of the lack of public land, terrible weather, etc. that Austinites get really into their houses. We saw some unbelievably ornate homes — castle-esque.

And there's pressure to keep your house immaculate. You can buy a home that is really nice by California standards (updated kitchen, crown moldings) only to find that everyone else's house is much nicer than yours, which we didn't care about until we found that no one wanted to buy our less-than-luxurious home.

Moral of the story

It would take a lot of money to buy a "California-like" lifestyle in Austin. If you're moving to Austin, make sure it's because of the things that it offers (downtown lifestyle, BBQ, football, live music, nice houses, professional opportunity) and that you won't miss the things you're leaving behind (good weather, public spaces, etc.).

It was an expensive mistake, but my family and I now see California in a completely new light. We feel very fortunate to be living in the Bay Area.

You're welcome.

Brett Alder is a sales executive working in the semiconductor industry based out of San Jose, CA.

This answer was originally published on Quora by Brett Alder.

 

https://outline.com/g3XcED

Bearded Wisdom

 

CANADA

Bearded Wisdom

Where the US and Canada meet has long been celebrated as the longest unguarded border in the world. Lately, it is the longest closed unguarded border in the world.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recently announced that Canada would keep the border closed through late February due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Buffalo News reported.

Closing the border is a bold, controversial move. The US is Canada’s biggest trading partner and movement between the two countries in ordinary times is enormous. But Trudeau was inured to pressure during 2020, when he faced a series of tests. Iran shot down a Ukrainian commercial airliner carrying at least 63 Canadian citizens and scores of others who were traveling to Canada early in the year, for instance. And Trudeau weathered scandals, like news that he awarded a massive government contract for student grants to a charity that employed his family members.

Trudeau, 49, grew a beard in 2020. It became a symbol of his transformation from the bright-eyed young Liberal leader who pledged to inject new energy into Canada when he won office in 2015 to the scrappier, more battle-scarred politician he is a today, Politico wrote.

He has also found the temerity to remain steadfast in a diplomatic standoff against China, where two Canadians were arrested on espionage charges in what appeared to be retaliation for the Canadian arrest of a Chinese citizen, Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou, on American fraud charges. Wanzhou is now under house arrest in her Vancouver mansion and fighting extradition to the US, while the two Canadians, an ex-diplomat and a businessman, were allowed to call home for Christmas, the Guardian wrote.

Trudeau runs a minority government, so he could lose his job if the opposition chose to bring him down. But he told Reuters in an interview that he intends to stay in office for years to come. To that end, he recently reshuffled his cabinet, a move Bloomberg said likely presaged him calling a new election. His approval rating stands at 50 percent, not a bad starting point before a campaign.

If Trudeau is around for the next few years, he has some big social-political issues to face. Canada has a long-running white supremacist movement that has roots in the country’s founding, as CTV News wrote. Canadian experts recently issued warnings about rightwing populist instability in the country. The Canadian government is already considering labeling the Proud Boys as a terrorist group. Public Radio International’s The World described the Proud Boys as a “far-right extremist group involved in the US Capital riots.”

History will judge how he rises to the challenge.

I Cried When I Watched Joe Biden Being Sworn In

 

         I cried as I watched Joe Biden being sworn in as president by Chief Justice John Roberts. (By the way, it is the same oath that one takes when they enlist in the armed forces.)

          My reaction was not political. I felt empathy for a man who started life stuttering and being bullied. His family was very lower middle class. They lived paycheck to paycheck. He struggled to get through law school. Then his career took off when he took a giant risk and ran for US senate. At age 29 he was a US senator. Then his wife and infant daughter were killed when a drunk driver in a truck hit their car. His most-beloved son died of brain cancer at age 46. I could go on.

         50 years ago, if you came into my father's bedroom, you would notice his dresser. It was empty except for a set of three paperback books. It was Carl Sandburg's Lincoln. Dad loved this country. He thought that the best part of this country was that a person could start in most humble circumstances and do great things. Joe Biden proved this again.

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A Tale Of Two Joe Bidens

 

A Tale of Two Bidens

US President Joe Biden has an important week ahead of him, but somewhere in Japan’s Kumamoto prefecture, a local leader feels as though he is the star of the show.

Yutaka Umeda, the mayor of the town of Yamato, has become an internet sensation after people discovered that the characters in his name can also be pronounced as “Jo Baiden,” the Washington Post reported.

Under the Japanese Kanji writing system – which originates from China – characters have a myriad of phonetic readings.

In the mayor’s case, his first name “Yutaka” can be read as “jo,” while his last name – pronounced “ume” and “da” – can also be read as “bai” and “den.”

After Biden’s November election victory, Umeda told local media then that he wasn’t aware of their connection until his family told him that his name was causing a stir on social media.

“It feels as though I’ve also won the election,” Umeda said in November.

The mayor added that despite their different roles, he believes that he and Biden share a passion for wanting to do the best for their countries.

But Biden is not the only US politician with links to Japan based on his name.

Former President Barack Obama shares a name with two towns named “Obama,” each in separate prefectures.