The Daily Parker

Via The Daily Dish:

Ok, I really must do some work now.

Apparently the Duchy of Lancaster, which is essentially the property of the British Royal Family, has suffered a bit of a decline:

The Duchy of Lancaster - a portfolio of land, property and assets held in trust for the Sovereign - saw a drop of £75m to £322m in the 2008-9 financial year.

But the income the Monarchy received from the Duchy, used to fund her public and private activities, increased by 5.4% from £12.6m to £13.3m.

During the last financial year, the total cost to the taxpayer of keeping the monarchy increased by £1.5m to £41.5m.

The Beeb notes, however:

[T]he Duchy of Lancaster is a body created under Charter, it is completely self-financing and does not rely on any taxpayers' money.

Foreign Policy adds:

This is further bad news for her Highness, who has had her many, many requests for increases to the royal budget rejected by parliament in the last year. The monarchy's annual expenses currently run at £41.5 million, excluding an estimated £50 million in security costs. Nonetheless, Palace officials continue to engage in talks with the Treasury to elicit more funding for the Crown for, amongst others, planned household refurbishment and the 2012 diamond jubilee celebrations.

The Queen recently dipped into her now-dwindling private funds to pay for a few royal expenses, including Prince Harry's latest trip to New York.

The most surprising thing to me, though, is that £90 million doesn't seem like a lot of money, given the income to the country the Royals may generate merely by existing. How much money from tourists comes in because of the Royals? Has anyone studied this? And how much do most countries spend on heads of state, to what benefit?

Lots to do for the next, oh, 17 months, so I thought I'd get started. My first Duke box arrived today, containing 6 kg of books, course packets, handouts, and more books, all of which have to be read by August 15th. Fortunately I have a few extra hours each day to do all this (I use them to sleep right now, so they're kind of wasted).

Just a couple news stories of note today:

• President Obama gave an hour-long press conference yesterday in which he spent 50 minutes discussing the single most important domestic-policy issue in the U.S. right now, health care. Since health care policy is complex, full of compromises, difficult to understand, and absolutely imperative to fix, the network talking heads spent all their time today discussing a stupid Cambridge, Mass., police officer who made an ill-advised arrest Monday. This, in turn, is why network talking heads are useless. I can't wait to see Jon Stewart's take.
• Mark Buehrle, who plays for the other Chicago baseball team, threw a perfect game this afternoon, the 2nd club history and only the 16th time ever in the major leagues. (A perfect game is one in which none of the offensive players gets on base by any means.)
• Finally, Gidget the Chihuahua, aka the Taco Bell dog, died yesterday at 15.

Back to work...

Via Beth Filar-Williams, the National Resources Defence Council has ranked U.S. cities by environmental factors. The study ranks 67 large (population 250,000+), 167 medium (100-250k), and 405 small (50-100k) cities on nine factors, including standard of living, water management, transportation, and environmental participation. Seattle comes out on top for big cities; San Francisco, 2nd; Chicago, 10th.

Other leaders include Madison, Wis. (medium) and Bellingham, Wash. Bottom of the pack: Lexington, Ky., Paterson, N.J., and Pine Bluff, Ark.

Yesterday I pondered Amazon's deletion of works by Orwell, and asked for confirmation that they had deleted unauthorized (i.e., stolen) copies of the copyrighted material. Amazon last night confirmed this is, in fact, what happened:

An Amazon spokesman, Drew Herdener, said in an e-mail message that the books were added to the Kindle store by a company that did not have rights to them, using a self-service function. "When we were notified of this by the rights holder, we removed the illegal copies from our systems and from customers' devices, and refunded customers," he said.

Amazon effectively acknowledged that the deletions were a bad idea. "We are changing our systems so that in the future we will not remove books from customers' devices in these circumstances," Mr. Herdener said.

Now, I am not one who believes in perpetual copyright. I hate with a passion the Sonny Bono Mickey-Mouse Protection Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998, passed (seriously, I am not making this up) in part to protect the Disney rodent for another 20 years on the eve of its lapse into public domain. I think it's unconstitutional, making a mockery of the "limited terms" clause, and on top of that I think it's a shining example of the pernicious effects of money on politics.

However, it's a pretty clear law, and in the U.S. the coypright in Orwell's work will not expire until at least 2021, 70 years after his death. Think about that. If I live another 21 years, which I will do even if it kills me, this blog entry will be protected by copyright until the 22nd century—unless the U.S. Congress comes to its senses and returns us to a copyright law that comports with international standards. Orwell's copyrights have expired in other countries, including Canada, but that introduces a web of competing claims that Amazon doesn't want to touch.

In sum: Amazon deleting books off users' Kindles was stupid, but probably within the terms of service and copyright law. However, had the users backed up the affected devices, and if they'd downloaded copies from Canada, they'd still have the book—a loophole in the TOS that, I'm sure, Amazon's partners will want closed very soon.

A few things of note happened while I was en route to San Francisco yesterday:

• The Cubs continued winning, taking their second in a row after the All-Star break and moving up to second place, though only because they've beaten up the hapless (25-63) Nationals to do it.
• Wisconsin officials announced a deal to buy new 320 km/h train sets for the Chicago to Milwaukee route. Initially plans call for allowing the trains to run at 176 km/h (40% faster than today) while a new, dedicated high-speed line is studied.
• In San Francisco, BART, the light-rail agency, averted a strike that could cripple the area's transportation system. The agency's employees unanimously rejected management's last contract offer and walked away from negotiations, but the two sides have since resumed talks.
• Finally, Walter Cronkite died last night at 92.

And that's the way it is.

Update: One more from my dad: a big weenie drove into a house in Wisconsin yesterday, no doubt because the driver was in mourning.

The Chicago Tribune ran an exposé of suburban red-light cameras recently; today they're reporting that one suburb, Schaumburg, has removed its camera despite its success at generating revenue. So why would they remove a million-dollar-earning camera? Because it doesn't actually stop accidents, and it really annoys drivers:

When Schaumburg first signed on to the red-light camera business last year, officials could hardly wait to get started, which is why they chose Meacham and Woodfield Roads as the first of their 10 planned camera locations. That intersection wasn't chosen because it had a lot of accidents -- the spot isn't even in Schaumburg's top 10 -- but because all of the intersection's approaches are in the village's boundaries and are local roads. This let village officials deploy the cameras much faster, avoiding the state approval needed for cameras on state roads.

Almost immediately, that selection paid off, literally, as cameras there flashed as fast as a paparazzi pack, mostly nabbing drivers for making right turns on red without a complete stop. In just 2½ months, the cameras spit out about 10,000 tickets, each a $100 violation.

[But] Schaumburg officials stated Tuesday night that they terminated the RedSpeed contract because crash data, prepared by the Police Department in June, revealed that the intersection does not have a problem with running-red-light accidents nor did it have one in 2008 when the cameras were installed. That fact angers Brian Costin, president of the Schaumburg Freedom Coalition, a citizens group that campaigned against the cameras last September. "I think Mayor [Al] Larson and the board did not do their due diligence," he said.

Unfortunately, other suburbs haven't gotten the memo:

On Monday, River Forest's board voted to conditionally hire RedSpeed to install two traffic cameras along Harlem Avenue.

Sigh. Cameras may not be all bad, but when used to raise revenue rather than reduce accidents, they just piss people off.

Via Calculated Risk, apparently Wells Fargo is suing itself over a mortgage foreclosure, which Fox Business columnist Al Lewis fails to understand, and so, because it's Fox, decides to criticize:

You can't expect a bank that is dumb enough to sue itself to know why it is suing itself.

... In this particular case, Wells Fargo holds the first and second mortgages on a condominium, according to Sarasota, Fla., attorney Dan McKillop, who represents the condo owner.

As holder of the first, Wells Fargo is suing all other lien holders, including the holder of the second, which is itself.

Most of the column slams Wells Fargo for being stupid, for wasting paper, for abusing the legal process, etc., rather than trying to explain why the bank did this. Possibly, Lewis could read the third paragraph of his own column, in which he quotes a Wells Fargo spokesman explaining that "[d]ue to state foreclosure laws, lenders are obligated to name and notify subordinate lien holders." Guess how you're required to do that in most states' foreclosure laws? Through a court filing.

As one who possesses a (seldom-used and quite dusty) juris doctorate, I understand why this looks odd but is, in fact, appropriate under the law. The bank has this obligation so that other leinholders' rights are protected. Lewis, himself about as ignorant of the law as he is of journalism, asks "wouldn't it be easier for Wells Fargo to release one of the liens to itself?" I'm not sure what he means, because he doesn't seem to understand the fundamentals of real property law. As the bank's spokesman said, "The primary reason is to clear title and ownership interest in a property to prepare it for sale." (Emphasis mine.) It's not a contested suit; Wells Fargo will not be taking itself "to the Supreme Court," despite how much Lewis would enjoy that.

In the alternative I suppose Lewis could mean that Wells Fargo should simply walk away from the second lein, which would, in effect, put money in the pockets of all the other leinholders at its own expense. That would not only be stupid, it could generate a shareholder derivative suit.

The truly stupid person here is Lewis, who refuses to understand what his own sources are saying in his own column.

Since Lewis' main source seems to be the owner of the property under foreclosure, you can bet that if Wells Fargo had done something hinky with the second mortgage, Lewis would be all over that, too. That this is a complicated and somewhat nuanced legal situation doesn't seem to enter into his thinking; the Rights of the People (including—or, given this is Fox again, especially—those of millionaire property developers) Must Be Protected. The Outrage! The Outrage!

In sum: the bank really, really doesn't want to sue itself, a point several bank and legal sources make clear in the column to any person of average literacy. The bank has no choice, both as a matter of Florida law and as a matter of arithmetic. Yes, the bank probably shouldn't have agreed to an 80/20 mortgage during a real-estate boom on overly-optimistic condo project, and as pennance will now have to eat a good bit of both loans. But Lewis would rather waste column-inches getting mad rather than do what he as a journalist should do, which is to understand and explain a seemingly odd event.

Again, though, this is Fox. Understanding is not encouraged.

Wow. You know you've jumped some serious GOP shark when even Peggy Noonan stomps on you:

Mrs. Palin has now stepped down, but she continues to poll high among some members of the Republican base, some of whom have taken to telling themselves Palin myths.

To wit: ... "The elites hate her." The elites made her. It was the elites of the party, the McCain campaign and the conservative media that picked her and pushed her. The base barely knew who she was. It was the elites, from party operatives to public intellectuals, who advanced her and attacked those who said she lacked heft. She is a complete elite confection. She might as well have been a bonbon.

"She makes the Republican Party look inclusive." She makes the party look stupid, a party of the easily manipulated.

"The media did her in." Her lack of any appropriate modesty did her in. Actually, it's arguable that membership in the self-esteem generation harmed her. For 30 years the self-esteem movement told the young they're perfect in every way. It's yielding something new in history: an entire generation with no proper sense of inadequacy.

After reading the column twice, I'm not sure I understand who Noonan is addressing. I think she's talking to members of her own party; I just can't tell, despite her conclusion:

It's not a time to be frivolous, or to feel the temptation of resentment, or the temptation of thinking next year will be more or less like last year, and the assumptions of our childhoods will more or less reign in our future. It won't be that way.

We are going to need the best.

A clue, perhaps, is the column's presence on the Wall Street Journal's op-ed page. Still, as one of the media elite she blames for Palin's ascendancy, perhaps Noonan is talking to herself?

Anyway, the GOP has needed "the best" for 49 years now, but has instead chosen a string of mediocrities and ideologues as party leaders (with a couple of exceptions, including Bob Dole). Not that we haven't presented our own mediocrities and ideologues, but ours tend toward gluttony and lust rather than wroth and envy, which results in much less death and destruction for the most part. Plus ours tend not to secretly hate the people they represent.

Still, it's an odd feeling to agree with Peggy Noonan. This bears more thought.

Yesterday's post "Subsidizing rural folk" generated more commentary than usual. All of it was through my Facebook profile (I cross-post the Daily Parker there), so I thought I should copy it over here.

Debbie K. of Highland Park, Ill., wrote: "In urban areas, cities maintain roads, or the Fed maintains freeways. There are more county roads to maintain in rural areas. A fact also conveniently left out of a similar story when in ran in the SF Chronicle about a week ago."

I responded: "But that's the point: the stimulus money is going disproportionately to highways, which are disproportionately rural. Urban areas have old bridges, canals, railroads, buses, and, yes, roads, many of which need repairs, and which provide significantly higher ROI. Even highways in urban areas make better investments. Of course I want the good people of Kittitas County, Wash., to have decent infrastructure, but more people drive on Lake Shore Drive (U.S. 41) every day than will drive on U.S. 2 through Wenatchee, Wash., in a month."

Debbie K. followed up: "My issue isn't necessarily whether county roads are more valuable than city roads, but that the fact, which is relevant to the issue, was left out of a news story. Kind of like how everyone seems to be leaving out the whole 'Manuel Zelaya's removal was required by the Honduran constitution' thing. I'm so incensed that I can't trust newspapers to deliver the entire story anymore."

Samantha D., writing from the U.K.: "David, I am inclined to agree with you, but our fuel is $5.60 a gallon (equivalent) and there's no more investment in public transport. It's so bad, in fact, that people are driving more than ever and the south-east of England is virtually gridlocked at some times of the day. I wish they would invest in it more, but instead they keep hiking up the fuel duty (on which we also pay sales tax, BTW) and spend the money giving themselves pay rises and gold-plated final salary pensions, which the rest of us don't get."

Nancy R., a professional journalist in Lexington, Ky.: "I think it's a bit more complicated than traffic volume. At least my take coming from a largely rural state that is subsidized heavily by the cities, specifically the one in which I live. But I always expect a city perspective on everything from the NYT. Case in point: story on laid-off moms that interviwed only weathy moms who shared how interesting it was to actually figure out where the playgrounds were and what their kids pediatricians looked like. The nannies had always taken their kids to those place in the past. Really representative of most people's experiences, I bet. The NYT always (almost gleefully) plays the rural stereotype, at last that's my experience as a Kentuckian."

John H. said: "David, do you like to eat? I thought so. Those rural roads you are complaining about are used by trucks to get the raw materials used in most of the food you eat to where you can buy it. If those roads aren't maintained well, then the trucks need more maintenance, which costs money, which is ultimately passed on to us. Also, the porkulus money is supposed to go to 'shovel ready' projects. If these other areas are like where I live, these projects have been on the books, ready for funding, for some time. Where I live there is a project to reroute a state highway that has been on the books to be done for 55 years, and it's being bypassed (pun intended) for other projects as far as the porkulus money is concerned. As for the $5 gas; my brother used to think that too, until he had to pay it, and saw the actual impact on the economy, then he changed his mind."

Finally, Yoshio K., Debbie's husband, summed it up neatly: "Roads? Where we're going, we don't need roads!"