FedSpending.org: why does Virginia(8) get the most grants?

Cool site I found recently: FedSpending.org. This is set up by the OMB to provide information in two databases: contracts and grants. At the time of this writing, charts show data from fiscal year 2000 through FY2005, plus partial-year data for FY2006. Let's dive in and see what we find at random.

Federal Contracts Paid
Among Federal contracts awarded by state in FY2005, top piggy Virginia takes 12.7% of Federal contract awards paid in FY2004, 16.1% in FY2005. In those same years California takes 16.5% and 14.4% respectively. Texas ranks third, taking 9.9% and 7.0% respectively. Since the top 10 contractors appar to be industrial and defense manufacturers, the nature of the top awards appears to be for defense/military spending.

It can be further broken down by looking at districts, and it seems the lion's share in the state goes to a particular district:

• Virginia 8 (James P. Moran) takes 6.33% in FY2004, 9.59% in FY2005.
• Virginia district 10 () takes 2.92% and 2.87% in thosee same years respectively.
• California district 8 (Nancy Pelosi) takes 0.76% and 1.63 in those years.
• Texas district 12 (Kay Granger) takes 2.58% and 1.56% respectively.

Federal Grants Paid
Loads more stuff. Under Grants, you can see "grants to individuals" assistance details. Interesting to see that the "Top 5 Known Congressional Districts where Recipients are Located" lists Florida (district 14), Texas (9), New Jersay (2), Puerto Rico nonvoting, and Louisiana (3). Very bizare, seeing Puerto Rico ranked #4 ahead of, say, any district in California or hurricane-ravaged Louisiana.

However, when you look at the top payouts (to individuals), the states that ranked at the top were:

• Florida, $315 billion
• California, $146 billion
• Texas, $145 billion
• New York, $85 billion
• Louisiana $71.5 billion
• Pennsylvania, 60.7 billion
• New Jersay, $59.8 billion
• Illinois, $52.9 billion
• Ohio, $47.2 billion
• North Carolina, 47.1 billion
• Michigan, 42.2 billion

And Puerto Rico was way down on the list with $12 billion.

The top-five 2005 programs over all were:

• Flood Insurance ($608 billion),
• Social Security Retirement Insurance ($331 billion),
• Medicare hospital insurance ($184 billion),
• Medicare supplementary medical insurance ($151 billion), and
• Social Security survivors insurance ($101 billion).

In Flood Insurance for 2005, payouts by recipient were

• $51.4 billion to Florida,
• $42.2 billion to California,
• $75.5 billion to Texas,
• $15 billion to New York,
• $51.4 billion to Louisiana,
• $4.8 billion to Missisippi,
• $3.43 billion to Puerto Rico.

The order of ranking I am presenting above is in order of top payouts of total grants; for each state/protectorate the flood insurance is a varying percentage of total paid to the state.

It is surprising to see a huge number (hundreds or thousands, I stopped the search after a few minutes) of corporations getting grants paid out on the order of $2 million. This is obtained using the "low level of detail" which is the least detailed information, which produces the first 500 out of 175,602 records! Even the first 500 take minutes for the info to come back. You can get the full data set faster if you select "tab-delimited ASCII" report output and save the file.

So now slice it a different way. For 2005, Florida was the top grant recipient with $315 billion, and here are Florida's top 5 programs:

• Flood Insurance: $237 billion (note this disagrees with the number above. Hmm.)
• Social Security retirement insurance, $25 billion
• Medicare supplementary insurance, $14 billion
• Medicare hospital insurance, $14 billion
• Social Security survivor's insurance, $6.3 billion.

In FY2005 California received $146 billion grants; the top five programs were:

• Flood Insurance $42 billion
• Social Security retirement insurance $31.9 billion
• Medicare Hospital insurance $20 billion
• Medicare supplementary insurance $18.7 billion
• Social Security survivor's insurance: $9.1 billion

In 2005 third-ranked Texas received $145 billion grants; the top five programs were:

• Flood Insurance $75.5 billion (contrast with Louisiana's $51 billion flood insurance)
• Social Security retirement insurance $18.8 billion
• Medicare Hospital insurance $11.6 billion
• Medicare supplementary insurance $8.3 billion
• Mortgage insurance homes: $7.8 billion
• (Hmm, Social Security survivor didn't even make the top 5, and what's this mortgage insurance payout? Do most widows leave Texas for Florida-California ?)

Interesting Grant Category

So, just picking on a random recipient for 2005, I see that BUY-LOW DISCOUNT BEER & WINE (recipient ID 118509) of Texas was a recipient of $1.815 million in FY2005 grant money. Of this, it breaks down to two grant programs:

• 59.041: Certified Development Company Loans (504 Loans): $1,065,000
• 59.012: Small Business Loans: $750,000

I think if I was going to start a business, I'd look into how these two programs work!

Who consumes the world's oil?

I run into charts of "who uses how much of the world's oil" from time to time, and I will collect these here to see how it sorts out over time.

Matthew Simmons
First data set is from Matthew R. Simmons, who runs the consulting firm Simmons & Company International. This particular data set is pulled from his presentation Oct 2006 to Harvard Business Schoolhis , on slide #7. The only thing missing: when was this data collected?

26% United States
7.0% Japan
6.0% China
3.6% Germany
3.3% Russia
2.8% Brazil
2.8% South Korea
2.7% Canada
2.6% France
2.6% India
2.6% Mexico
2.4% Italy
2.2% United Kingdom
1.9% Spain
1.7% Saudi Arabia
1.4% Iran
1.3% Indonesia
1.1% Australia
1.1% Netherlands
1.1% Taiwan
23% The Rest of the World

General Comments on Peak Oil
If you have not read Simmons before, do check him out. I am reading his book, "Twilight in the Desert" (Wiley 2005). Or, at his web site (see above) you'll find a slew of presentations, free. In terms of outlook, Simmons is clearly an "oil bear" in the sense that he believes (1) an oil production decline is imminent (i.e. is happening now) and (2) the peak daily production rate has been achieved (or nearly so) from the worlds largest producing fields. All this, in the face of increasing demand. This means there are interesting times ahead in the form of declining production, finite supply, supply squeezes, and the inevitable follow-ons: higher prices, shortages. I can only conclude that other nasty things will inevitably follow: political and economic extortion, wars for oil, supply disruptions, maladies for those who consume a lot, and constraints on growth for rising nations. Fun stuff.

If you look at China and India as the world's rising economies, note that their combined consumption (13% of world supply) is still half of that in the U.S. (26%). It is tempting to conclude, with annual GDP growth rates in China in the range 10 to 15% for over a decade with no slowing in sight [need citation and corrections], you can conclude that some kind of "pull" will come to some kind of shoving match as we line up to eat this finite-sized pie of resource.

I would guess these two nations would make any number of back room deals to get at a larger share of the resources. Remember the Chinese Premier's visit to the U.S., I think 2005, the one where his first stop in the U.S. was to see Bill Gates and tour the Seattle Boeing plant, then to see Bush, then to see some oil-rich nations in Africa? And then he traveled to the Middle East; and was Venezuela on his itinerary? I forget. He was not putting on these miles to collect souveniers.

I try to imagine what arguments would refute Simmons work, and come up lacking. One item I take away is that the super-big oil and gas fields have basically been all discovered, and *iff* we don't have any mega-discoveries from here on out, then the hypothesis (of declining production in existing mega-fields) holds. If there is some nation or entity that is sitting on some secret reserves that are not on Simmons' radar, it weakens his thesis only because it postpones the inevitable decline in production of a finite resource. Nothing invalidates the basic fact that oil/gas is a finite resource. And many of us are use oil like there will be an ample-oil tommorrow.

If you were to just want to ask the question, "have we already reached the point of peak production," (or, "are we there yet") you miss the point. Many have pointed out that the effects of "peak oil" do not occur when the next-to-last drop is pulled from the ground.

Company "Warrantee Division" (NJ) is a scam. whocalled.us ?

Summary: the site whocalled.us is cool. Here's why.

I keep getting calls every month or two, and mailings, from something called "warranty division" at 723 (New Jersey area code) 242-6506, and 723 242-6512. The mailing says I am about to expire my factory warranty on a vehicle I bought a few years ago. The mailings have the VIN number and some model info printed on the top. So it looks legit, right?

Except that I got an offer from the manufacturer, soon after I bought the vehicle, to purchase an extended factory warranty. And I bought it. So when I see these mailings, it reminds me of the time that I thought I bought the warranty via phone and credit card only to have it screw up and not go through; it took two tries to get it right after that. Because of that snafu, I always have lingering doubts about whether my warranty is good, even though the warranty service card sits in the vehicle and the contract is in my files (somewhere).

Since the caller ID from Warranty Division pops up occasionally, I decided to call them back a few days ago. I got a phone answering machine saying I can be removed from the Warranty Division caller list if I leave my number. No operator, no electronic voice mail system, just a hoaky answering machine and a "beep." So I left the nastygram.

And today a man called back. I said "Is this the factory warranty center? Because I already bought a factory warranty." He didn't answer yes or no, but instead said, "It's possible the VIN number on your warranty contract doesn't agree with what's on record, and the dealer doesn't have a record of your warranty." So at that point, rather than explode, I said, "I have the contract here, let's give it a look right now." He said "OK." I just happened to have the file handy, because I went and checked all this stuff yesterday. And I got it. And the warranty with the factory had the VIN that matched my title. And when I got back on the phone, he was gone. He hung up.

Next I called my local car dealer, and asked them to not release my personal info for sales of other produts. They said that was already their policy. So how did these guys get the info? He figured it was probably the State Motor Vehicle records that led them to me (but how did they get my number? I'm unlisted, and as of a month ago I'm on the National do-not-call list). He also had the opinion that they are trying to scam me to buy something, that they have been operating this way for years, and that I would probably not be happy with the warranty they sell, and if I have a factory extended warranty to ignore them, and there has been no success in stopping their scam marketing efforts. Oh.

So I called back the Warranty Division, and again got the same message machine I got a few days ago. I left a message that they could stop their calls again please, and that their rep had hung up when I pressed him. And that I would certainly send this info to my State Atty. General and perhaps the Atty. General in New Jersey. Argh!

Now, here is a great way to dig up info: whocalled.us is a great site. You put in the area code and number from your caller ID, and there it is: a form tells you how many other callers logged the same call, a form to report your incident. There is a place to put in a comment about what happened, and read other folk's comments and what they found out about the caller. Great resource!!

The Creation Museum

I was just listening to Chris Hodges on the radio, delivering an address in Colorado January 2007. (This is a very smart fellow. I am getting worried about a creeping tide of fascism in the US, especially religious tyrany, whether directed at, well, anyone.) He mentioned this nugget, "The Creation Museum," and sure-as-shit, here it is, opening in Ohio in 2007, thanks to some "godly men" (their words, not mine, see the FAQ below). From their web site:

"About the Creation Museum: The 50,000 sq. ft. Creation Museum located within the greater Cincinnati area will proclaim the Bible as supreme authority in all matters of faith and practice in every area it touches on. Set to open in June 2007, this “walk through history” museum will counter evolutionary natural history museums that turn countless minds against Christ and Scripture."

OhhhKayyyy????? The hosting website is Answers in Genesis: "Upholding the Authority of the Bible from the Very First Verse." Sorry, not for me, thanks. I wonder if the public school kids will go on field trips in their big yellow (taxpayer-funded) school buses to the wonderful creation museum, hmmm?

So, Why? Let's read their words in the FAQs in Answers in Genesis. right at question #1.

"Why is this museum needed? Our increasingly anti-Christian country must return to a belief in the authority of the Bible and be presented with the life-changing gospel message. Evolutionary indoctrination has undermined the Christian foundations in America."

First off, I don't consider the foundation of the country to be Christian. I consider the foundation of this country to be freedom of, and also freedom from, religion. You can have yours, or none at all, and I for my choice can have mine, or none at all. Why is our country turning so anti-agnostic and anti-atheist?

Second, why are these religionists trying to destroy science? Didn't the enlightenment teach mankind anything... remember Galileo's little dust-up with the church over whether the Earth is fixed at the center of the universe versus the theory of heliocentrism? More from the FAQ:

"What is so different about this museum? Almost all natural history museums proclaim an evolutionary, humanistic worldview. For example, they will typically place dinosaurs on an evolutionary timeline millions of years before man. AiG’s museum will proclaim the authority and accuracy of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and will show that there is a Creator, and that this Creator is Jesus Christ (Colossians 1:15-20), who is our Savior.

So who do we thank for doing this? I mean besides... Glad you asked, the FAQ has the answer.

"Who are the leaders of Answers in Genesis? AiG’s board of directors consists of Christian leaders who are thoroughly committed to proclaiming biblical truths and reaching the world for the cause of Christ. The individual members bring to the board a wide background of professional and pastoral experiences. Each is a godly man who walks with the Lord in wisdom and maturity. AiG’s president is Ken Ham, well-known speaker, author and radio host. AiG is a non-denominational ministry, having no affiliation with any particular denomination."

Got to like the "just a Christian, no denomination" part; floating above the rest of the christians, are you? Well, enough of this bollocks. Good grief, the guy moved from Australia to the U.S.; Aussies, it's your lucky good fortune he left you. Thanks a lot.

By the way (if you've read this far, dear reader), check out the documentary film Jesus Camp. Really. Came out on DVD in 2007 already, I just watched it last month. Go right now to your Blockbuster, rent it and watch it. Blockbuster carries this, right? Still think I'm paranoid? Can you now agree that we are seeing a rise of a fascist movement here in the U.S.?

WTF.

No child left behind: Brzezinski gives Bush an "F." Let's not let Georgie fail!

"How do you expect a democracy in that setting? " An (another) F for George Bush.

Bloomberg TV interview broadcast Monday 12 March 2007 of Zbigniew Brzezinski, and discussion of his recent book, "Second Chance: Three Presidents and the Crisis of American Superpower." ZB now at the CSIS: Center for Strategic & International Studies.

Notes to follow.
--------------------------------
[] Is Congress taking the wrong approach to Iraq?

I think the Congress has no alternative, given the fact that the elections last November were fought largely over the Iraq issue, and the Democratic congress came to power because it had a very critical view of the stewardship of the president of the Iraqi war. So we are seeing the preliminary skirmishing, but I think the Congress really has to do what it is trying to do.

[]So the Bush administration, potentially, is making an error on this, as far as Iraq goes?

That depends. The president obviously is personally committed. He doesn't want to, in effect, have his policy refuted. But to the extent that he can succeed in blaming the Democrats for the "lack of victory," even though his definition of victory was really unrealistic, then to that extent he can score some political points. This is why I call it skirmishing.

[] Well you are quite critical of the Pres in a new book that you have written... You give the current president a grade of an "F". What has he failed at, in your view?

I think he has failed in global leadership, and I think that is the greatest tragedy of his administration. You know, he came to power with America still standing tall, after the leadership provided, first of all by his father, then, with some failings, by president Clinton. But he has managed to undermine American credibility, world wide, American legitimacy, worldwide, and respect for American power, worldwide. That is a real disaster. And this is why---in that table that I have ranking the three presidents in different categories---I do, very reluctantly as a citizen, give him the grade of F, failure.

[]Some of his supporters might argue that the president has kept America safe from any further terorist attack. How do you factor that into the equation?

I think the evidence for that is limited. First of all, thousands of Americans have died since then, both in Iraq and in Afghanistan. The war in Afghanistan has been neglected, thereby letting al Qeada reconstitute itself . It is true that domestically there has been no act of terror, but that's hardly related to what we have been doing in Iraq. In part it may be good work by the law enforcement agencies; in part it may be because al Qeada was disrupted initially in Afghanistan and hasn't had time yet to stage a come-back.

[]What should president Bush be doing now... to improve his grade?

I would think he should be giving serious negotiations a serious chance. He and his secretary of state have been so dismissive of diplomacy. They have been saying that diplomatic efforts are not worthwhile unless we know in advance that those we negotiate with agree with our positions. Well, that's a non-starter, in giving diplomacy a chance.

I think the conference over the weekend in Iraq with all of Iraq's neighbors suggests that the neighbors, at least, including Syria and Iran, recognize that a disrupted exploding Iraq is not in their interest. And therefore we should be able to exploit that attitude, to try to formulate some political context for the termination of the war, including American disengagement from Iraq.

[] You talk, in your book, about [how] America needs to restore its political credibility and legitimacy. If that's the case, how can the US move forward successfully on the diplomatic front, if it's lacking some of that that you mention in the book.

I think only by proving credibly that it is serious about negotiating. If our definition of negotiations is that we only talk to those who, in advance, agree to our demands, then we'll never demonstrate credibility and legitimacy in seeking alternative solutions to those imposed by force. Sometimes you have to use force. But when you choose to use force before giving the other alternative a chance, then the responsibility rests on you to be effective in the use of force. And the sad, sad fact of our engagement in Iraq is that the President has bungled badly in deciding to go to war, and then in the way he has waged that war.

[] Is Iran a major threat to the United Staes?

It is a country that is weak economically and militarily. It may, at some point, have weapons of mass destruction, but that's years away. We have time to undertake a serious effort to deter and forestall that from happening: by accomodation, by compromises, by promoting, at the same time, a dialog with the Iranians. Because we know that a large proportion of the Iranian people like America and don't like being ruled by the mullahs. And if we are smart about it, I think we can avoid the worst, and have our cake and eat it too---that is to say, have some accomodation with Iran while at the same time getting the Iranians not to cross the t's and dot the i's in the quest for nuclear weapons.

[] Do you think democracy is achievable in Iraq, if so when? And should American troups withdraw immediately?

I think American troups should withdraw within a year or so, while we go about creating a political context that absorbs some of the consequences of the withdrawl. And this is why the political effort is so needed.

Will there be a Democracy in Iraq? No! I don't think so. I think this was a totally unrealistic objective, made even less likely by the destructive impact of American war in Iraq on the Iraq society.

Just consider this one short list of figures. The Iraqi population was twenty-four million when we walked in. Two million have fled the country, probably the ablest and best educated. A million and a half have been displaced. And according to the John Hopkins University study, about a half million more were neither born, or died earlier than they would have. A total loss of close to four million people. How do you expect a democracy in that setting?

End of interview.

ZB points out how Secretary Rice has so often failed to engage diplomatically, and we need only look down a few posts in this blog to read Rice's own rationale as recently as Jan 11 2007, responding to Sen. Chris Dodd:

"I think it's extremely important to note that we have talked to the Syrians, we've generally gotten nowhere, and now we would be going in a way that I would fear looks like a supplicant." --- Rice.

Right, g*d forbid that we should "look like a supplicant," let's continue to occupy a foreign land... is it so much better that they and their neighbors hate and fear us, than we fear "what it makes us look" like? I feel so strong now... I nominate that this president's name be changed immediately to "George F. Bush" to commemorate the "accomplishment" thus far achieved. You have two years of summer school (well, now 22 months) to make up your failed course in international relations. Argh.

The AEI as author of Bush's Jan 10 2007 Iraq plan.

Another interesting nugget about George Bush's January 2007 Iraq "surge" plan. It's possible to read what's possibly the basis for the plan, in a civilian version, from its think-tank author, the AEI (American Enterprise Institute). You can hear a Senate FRC hearing where, of Jan 11, the AEI author (Kagan) and two panelists of differing view are quized by Senators.

The afternoon of Jan 11 2007, the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations conducted more of its policy hearings on the Iraq war: The Remaining Options: Troop Surge, Partition, or Withdrawl. To watch the streaming video try a link here or here.

Three witnesses sat at opposing ends of the stay/exit spectrum.

• The Honorable Peter W. Galbraith, Senior Diplomatic Fellow, Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, Washington, DC.
• Dr. Frederick W. Kagan. Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute, Washington, DC
• Dr. Ted Galen Carpenter, Vice President for Defense and Foreign Policy Studies, CATO Institute, Washington, DC.

Other goop: Wikipedia entry for Galbraith; none for Carpenter but there is one for CATO Institute. One parting grain of sand in the oyster of the conspiracy ironists: the Wikipedia entry for F. W. Kagan reports that his father, Donald Kagan, is a profesor at... wait for it... Yale! You know... skull and crossbones and all that old-boy stuff. Hey, it's not what you know, it's who you know!

Transcript Senator Barbara Boxer and Secretary Rice 2007-01-11 Sen-FRC The Administration Policy on Iraq

Fortunately, I don't have to transcribe this one. It has been published in full several places, search for it or try the copy at the New York Times Jan 11 2007.