09:44 – With all of the news about the catastrophic rollout of Obamacare, I’m surprised that no one has pointed out that these problems lose Obamacare the fig-leaf of Constitutionality that the contingent SCOTUS ruling provided. It ruled that Obamacare was Constitutional based on representations that are clearly false and were known to be false when they were made, and it made clear that its ruling was based on those representations being true.
07:55 – Barbara is taking the day off work today and heading out on a day trip with her friend Bonnie. She needs the break. For the last year–the last two years, really–she’s been coping pretty much constantly with serious medical issues with her dad and mom, and now her sister’s husband. She and her sister have both essentially been on-call 24×7, so having even one day off once in a while helps. I tried to convince Barbara to turn off her cell phone today and stay completely off the grid, but she said she’d better keep it on, just in case.
We got hammered pretty badly by the Federal Follies last month. Revenues for October 2013 were only about 120% those for October 2012. I realize that most people would be delighted with 20% growth, but I’m disappointed by anything short of doubling.
09:07 – The numbers for ObamaCare signups are finally becoming public. On 1 October, the first day of sign-ups, the expected flood of sign-ups took place. ObamaCare signed up not one, not two, not three, not four, not five, but SIX people. And that torrid rate has apparently continued all month. During October, HUNDREDS of people signed up for ObamaCare. The sign-ups may even have gone into FOUR FIGURES, leaving only about 99.9999% of those eligible not yet signed up. Not to worry, though. There’s still two whole months before the end of the year.
And I’m betting that nearly all of the people who’ve signed up are insurance companies’ worst nightmares, with pre-existing conditions that are hideously expensive to treat. I wonder if the health insurance companies that foolishly supported ObamaCare are finally realizing that the true purpose of ObamaCare has always been to put them out of business and force a change to a single-payer government monopoly on health insurance. If they doubt that, they need only look at the numbers: after only one month, the net effect of ObamaCare is that millions of people who used to have private health insurance now have no insurance at all.
09:45 – Our inventory of biology and chemistry kits is getting low, so I’ll take time today to build another dozen or so of each. We have all the components and subassemblies in stock, so it’s just a question of boxing them up.
I was actually surprised this morning by Charles Krauthammer’s column, Redskins and Reason. As far as I’m concerned, he nailed it.
14:12 – I’ve been doing some casual analysis of our revenues this year versus 2012, and I conclude that the actions of the federal government in 2013 have had a tremendous impact. In 2013Q1, our revenues were about six times those of 2012Q1. In 2013Q2, the sequester kicked in and our revenues were 192% those of 2012Q2. In 2013Q3, the government shutdown and debt limit crisis hit just at the end, and our revenues were only 161% those of 2012Q3. Interestingly, the second half of September was the real killer. If the second half of September had only maintained the run rate of the first half, we’d have finished Q3 at close to the 192% gain of Q2. Sales fell off a cliff around 9/15, presumably in expectation of the October budget crisis. October sales may equal those of October 2012, if we’re lucky. It seems that people are postponing or cutting back on consumer spending due both to the higher taxes that kicked in in Q1 and the uncertainty spawned by this month’s budget crisis.
Our original goal was to double revenue in 2013 versus 2012. We may still make that, but it’s not a lock by any means. But if things had continued all year as they started the year, we’d have at least quadrupled revenues and possibly hextupled them. So, I think our modified goal for 2014 will be to increase revenues by 50% year on year. Even that may be optimistic, depending on what the damned government does.
09:16 – You won’t read about it in the MSM, but a lot of people are hoping that the government gridlock will continue, ideally until the next president takes office. As far as I’m concerned, the Republicans’ job at this point is to cut off the oxygen to Obama, Reid, Pelosi, and the rest of that bunch. Don’t give an inch on the budget, the debt limit, or anything else. Force them to spend within their means. If that means the size of the federal government is cut in half, well that’d be a good start.
I’ve just been reading about the case in Florida where a 12-year-old girl killed herself by jumping from a tower in a disused concrete plant, apparently because she was depressed by other girls posting mean things about her on Facebook. As sad as death of any child is, the response of the sheriff was outrageous. He’s charged two other girls, aged 12 and 14, with felonies for engaging in speech protected by the First Amendment. From the reports, these other girls are despicable little weasels and poor excuses for human beings. But they didn’t kill the victim; she killed herself. And there’s no excuse for the sheriff violating the Constitutional rights of these other girls, or indeed anyone else.
I made up two dozen chemical bags for chemistry kits yesterday. Today, I’ll make up two dozen chemical bags for biology kit. After we get those four dozen kits assembled, it’ll be back to bottling more chemicals and making up more subassemblies. Lather, rinse, repeat.
07:53 – It seems to me that there’s an easy solution to this federal government impasse. Compromise. The Republicans agree to pass a budget and approve the debt limit increase. In return, the Democrats agree to repeal ObamaCare. Surely the Democrats must realize that a majority of Americans oppose ObamaCare, so why are they being so obstinate?
Netflix just added series four of Parenthood, which Barbara and I have been watching. One of the characters is diagnosed with breast cancer, and is likely to be put on chemotherapy. I told Barbara that my gut reaction is that chemotherapy is a dead-end technology and that the real cure for cancer is probably going to be through engineered viruses that seek out and destroy only cancerous cells. For that matter, I think in the long term that antibiotics are a dead-end technology and that the future lies in engineered bacteriophage viruses. Bacteria are disturbingly good at developing resistance to antibiotics, but it’s a lot harder for prokaryotes to develop resistance to hunter/killer viruses. But where are all the future molecular biologists and virologists who are going to discover these cures going to come from? The public schools sure aren’t producing much of a crop of future scientists and engineers.
That’s the main reason we started doing science kits. If kids don’t have access to the tools they’re not going to develop the skills they need to become our future scientists and engineers. Over the coming years, we’ll sell thousands of science kits. Obviously, not every kid who uses one of our kits will decide on a career in science. But if even 1% of those kids go on to become scientists and engineers it will have been worth the effort.
Part of our front yard is a swamp. There was an article in the paper the other day about the city water department. One of their water treatment plants had been down and is being brought back on-line. That means there will be silt in the lines during the changeover, so they’re flushing the lines. Yesterday afternoon, Colin started barking to warn me that something was going on. There’s a fire hydrant in the corner of our yard, and there was a guy from the water department out there opening it up and letting water flow at a high rate into the gutter. I walked out to talk to him and he said they were going to let it run overnight to flush the lines. As of now, it’s still gushing.
07:47 – The federal government is still “shut down” and trying desperately to make sure people notice. As far as I’m concerned, the ideal outcome would be for the federal government to shut down totally and permananently, leaving everything up to the state and local governments. For that matter, if the federal government is shut down, why should it still be collecting taxes? It seems to me that individuals and businesses should stop sending tax payments to the federal government. Each state could begin collecting those taxes and use them to fund necessary expenditures for things formerly done by the federal government. Congress should refuse to increase the debt limit, forcing the federal government into bankruptcy and liquidation. The last person out of DC could turn off the lights. We’d all be a lot better off.
07:49 – I just checked, and I’m still here. What with the government “shut down” and all, I figured I might be missing. Everyone else I’ve checked with is still here as well.
What scares the federal government, of course, is that old hippie question: “What if the government shut down and no one noticed?” So the feds are doing everything possible, as always, to make sure the impact is felt by ordinary people. I mean, shutting down the PandaCam? Way to save a few cents, guys. The feds could have RIFd a million faceless bureaucrats, but hardly anyone would have noticed for years, if ever. Instead, they close down the national parks and so on, actions calculated to have the maximum visible impact. And they make a big point about furloughing 845,000 federal employees who are not “essential”. Since no one else is apparently asking, I’ll do it: if these 845,000 employees aren’t essential, why were they employed in the first place?
14:38 – Another anniversary today, this one not a happy one. It’s been 12 years, and the US has done little to avenge an attack comparable to Pearl Harbor. Worse, in fact, because the 9/11 attack targeted our civilians. We’ve known since the day of the attack that Saudi Arabia was responsible, and yet there they still sit, undamaged and laughing at us. And, incredibly, the US president wanted to intervene militarily in Syria to protect Al Quaeda terrorists, the group that was primarily responsible for the attack on 9/11.
10:37 – I’m still busy building science kits and processing orders. We were able, barely, to keep up with demand in August. We managed to ship every order without any delay. This month will be a bit easier because demand, while still high, is lower than August, when most homeschoolers are ordering stuff for the fall semester.
I’m also putting some serious thought into designing “middle school” science kits. The normal progression is “life science” (biology light) in grade 6 or 7, followed by “earth and space science”, followed by “physical science” (chemistry lite + physics lite). I don’t have a high opinion of that sequence, because I think it wastes two years of science. I think that by the end of grade 7, students should already have a good handle on the fundamentals of science, and starting in grade 8 they should begin with real “high school level” courses. High-school level earth (geology) and space science (astronomy) in grade 8, chemistry in grade 9, biology in grade 10, physics and/or an advanced biology/chemistry course in grade 11, and one or two advanced biology/chemistry/physics courses in grade 12. If I had a bright student who was destined to major in STEM, I’d devote 40% of class time from grade 8 onward to science courses–with at least half of that lab and other hands-on activities–25% to math courses, and fit the rest into the remaining 35%. I’d also have school running eight hours a day Monday through Friday, with a couple hours of homework in the evenings, and half a day on Saturdays. And I’d run it year-round, with three or four one- or two-week breaks over the course of the year.
12:39 – Brussels fears European ‘industrial massacre’ sparked by energy costs
Quixotic, indeed. With electricity costs typically twice to three times those in the US and natural gas costs four or more times those in the US, Europe can no longer compete industrially with the US and Canada. Of course, neither can Asia, nor indeed anywhere else in the world. This is already obvious in the chemical industry, where feedstock and energy costs are a major portion of total costs. Everyone is busy building new chemical plants in the US and Canada and closing down ones elsewhere. But it’s not just chemical plants. Nearly all manufacturing is heavily energy-dependent, which gives the US and Canada a huge and sustained advantage over the rest of the world. Meanwhile, Europe insists on repeatedly shooting itself in its collective feet by wasting huge subsidies on “sustainable” energy. I mean, off-shore windmills, for Thor’s sake? What idiot decided that? Germany abandoned nuclear after Fukushima, and it and the rest of the EU are busy passing “green” taxes that further hamper the ability of European manufacturers to compete. And in the one renewable-energy technology that may actually make long-term sense, solar, Europe is nowhere.
09:55 – I don’t know why, but I’m still surprised every time I buy components. So much for government inflation figures. The sodium bicarbonate tablets cost 50% more than they did when I ordered them a year ago. The purple Sharpies were up more than 20% in less than six months. The 9V batteries were up more than 8% since I ordered them a year ago. My guess is that the real inflation figure, like the real unemployment figure, is at least three times higher than the government admits to.
Of course, inflation is actually a hidden tax on monetary assets. It penalizes the prudent and the creditors, and rewards the imprudent and the debtors. And it eventually makes the prudent and the creditors decide to transfer their assets to tangible property instead of fiat currency. Which is why I’m happy that I have, for example, almost a thousand test tube racks in stock. The real value of the money I used to buy those has been decreasing every week, while the real value of those test tube racks remains the same. So, a year from now, that $4 test tube rack will sell for $5 or whatever.
Once the autumn rush has tapered off, I’m seriously thinking about bringing up a shopping cart system. I actually installed Zen Cart a couple of years ago, but I’ve never had time to enable it. Until now, about 99% of our sales have been packaged kits, but we’re starting to get more requests from people who want to order just specific components.