Mince Meat, Christmas Pudding and other things British

I know this is a stretch, but just in case I have any British readers... My wife and I are considering a vacation to England next year. We will likely be using our timeshare to trade into something there so where we go will likely be limited to a few major cities. That doesn't mean we will be stuck there. We may rent a car or use public transportation to get out of whatever city we are staying in. So my question for any British readers, imagine you have friends coming to visit from another country. You have a week or two paid leave to take them around to see the sights, and they are relying upon you to selected what they will see. Where do you take them and what do they do? And now for the cooking portion of the post. Last year I made Mince meat for the first time in many years. I have long lost my grandmother's recipe, but I managed to locate something that looked very much like the one she used. Following my grandmother's (and the recipe's) practice, I combined the ingredients, including the suet, and placed the mixture in clean jars in the refrigerator for a few months before making the pies. Other recipes I have seen cook some or all of the ingredients. Can anyone enlighten me on this? Is cooking mandatory, optional, heretical?

Not politics, mince pies

We used to have these every year at Christmas growing up. At one point I had my grandmother's recipe, but I don't know for sure what has become of it. So I had to root around and find a recipe that sounded about like the ingredients that I used to have to shove through the meat grinder every fall. Every year I say I am going to make them, this year I did.

Well, that backfired

I received a flyer in the mail the other day from Uber, asking me to call my representative to complain about AB2293.  Well I went to the state's website and read the text of the bill.  I suggest you follow the link and read it for yourself, it is not very long.  But this is what I got from it. 

It you summon a ride on your Uber app, the car arrives and you get in, you will know that the driver is insured the way any other person offering transportation for hire is insured.  And if Uber has not done their job, and the driver done not in fact have appropriate insurance, then Uber's insurance will cover you.  Sounds pretty pro-consumer to me.

The business model of companies like Uber, and Postmates, whom I have written about earlier, is to classify the people who actually earn the money for them as independent contractors, putting all the risk on them.

I work as an independent contractor myself, and I choose to do that.  But what I charge is a negotiated fee, it is not set by fiat of my client.  I am required by my client to carry certain types of insurance, and have to produce certificates of insurance to demonstrate that I have them.  And my client never tells me “Say this, not that” because they are pretending to be a different business that they are.

So I called my representative and I said, “If Uber is trashing you, then you must be doing something right.”

I like to go to Reno for a weekend every now and then.  I have considered putting an add on Craigslist to see if I anyone around me would like to share gas in exchange for a ride.  That is ride sharing.  What Uber (and Lyft) are doing is running a taxi company.  They have been calling it something else to avoid the responsibility (and corresponding expense) that comes with running a taxi company.

No, they don't have meters.  But I have ridden in taxis that had no meters too.  Years ago, I had occasion to take a cab in Washington DC, and they looked up their rates on a printed sheet.  There was no meter, just a flat rate that you knew as soon as you got into the car.  Sound familiar?

The only difference I can see between them and a taxi, is that they cannot be flagged down on the street.  They are tied to the app for their income. 

The thing that ticks me off about this business model is the sense of entitlement, that they are just too fucking precious to have to assume the responsibility for anyone or anything other than themselves, or to follow laws that everyone else has to follow.
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Rep Thompson shows no courage of convictions, or perhaps just no convictions

As were many others, I was pretty pissed off when I read the leaked  documents fro the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations.  And I made sure that my representative knew about it.  Of course I knew that at best I would get a canned response.  I just hoped it would actually address at least of little of the more egregious issued revealed in the document.  Instead, this is what I got.

Thank you for contacting me regarding Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). I appreciate you taking the time to share your concerns with me on these issues.

TPA, informally known as "fast track," is the process by which Congress authorizes the President to negotiate a trade agreement on its behalf. In exchange for following specific negotiating and consultation requirements in the TPA law, the President may submit a final trade agreement to Congress for approval by an up-down vote. However, in 2007, the law authorizing TPA expired, and as a result any new trade agreement negotiated by the President will now be subject to debate and modification by Congress before any agreement could be approved.

Meanwhile, the TPP is a proposed regional trade agreement being negotiated between the United States and eleven other nations. Negotiations cover a wide range of issues, including intellectual property rights, services, government procurement, investment, rules of origin, competition, labor, and environmental standards. In many cases, the rules being negotiated are intended to be more rigorous than comparable rules established by the World Trade Organization (WTO). Some topics, such as state-owned enterprises, regulatory coherence, and supply chain competitiveness, break new ground in negotiations.

As we face an increasingly globalized world and economy, I believe balanced, two-way trade must be a tool in our toolbox of economic growth and expansion. Promoting American exports and eliminating barriers to trade in foreign countries will help us create good-paying jobs at home and grow our economy. However, in the past, many trade agreements that have been submitted for Congressional consideration have included inadequate labor and environmental provisions.

Before a final TPP agreement would be sent to Congress for approval, it is expected that Congress would need to first re-authorize TPA. To date, no TPA legislation has been introduced in either the House of Representatives or the United States Senate.  However, before Congress should even consider new TPA legislation, such a proposal must include incentives to keep well-paying jobs at home, promote innovation and job creation, strengthen our trade laws and enforcement agencies, and incorporate strong labor and environmental negotiating goals.

Please know, as a senior member of the House Committee on Ways and Means, which is charged with reviewing all matters relating to trade, I will review any proposed TPA or trade agreement with a sharp eye and concern for safety, labor, and environmental protections. TPA and any trade agreements must include incentives to help keep well-paying jobs at home, and to help spur new American innovation and job creation across all sectors of our economy.

Rest assured I will keep your thoughts in mind should any legislation or agreement regarding TPA and TPP come before the Committee or the House of Representatives for consideration.

Again, thank you for sharing your thoughts with me. Please continue to contact me on all issues of importance to you and to our district.

Note the presumption that the only way the treaty can be submitted is if the president is granted fast-track authority, tying the hands of Congress (and the people) from having any input into the document.    Note also, despite specifics being available on the content of the proposed agreement he has carefully avoided any mention of them, so he can avoid actually taking a position.  No mention of how the top executives of the corporations that will benefit from this (to the detriment of most of us) have seen copies of the text, but he as a 'senior member of the House Committee on Ways and Means' has not.

Would somebody primary this guy from the left, please?

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A different approach to ending fracking in California

Water is a big, big, issue in California.  Agriculture and residential use have been battling for years.  It takes a lot of water to make the desert bloom.

We no longer draw the water we used to from the Colorado river, and the snow pack in the Sierras has been declining.  Reservoirs are frequently not getting refilled during the winter months.  California does not have an endless supply of fresh water.  Now there is another player in the game, and that is Hydraulic Fracturing.

Much of the truth of the damage caused by Fracking is hidden behind settlement agreements that forbid the victims from revealing the injuries to their property and their bodies.  If you go here you can see quite a number of documented cases.  While I would not Fracking anywhere near water I was going to use to drink, or that would be used to water crops, that is not the issue I am addressing here.

California simply cannot afford to divert their shirking water supply away from agriculture and human consumption.  Much of California is in fact desert.  So here is my suggestion.

We need a ballot initiative that fresh water may not be diverted for the purposes of Hydraulic Fracturing in the state of California.  Any water used for that purpose must be desalinized sea water.  I specify desalinized because we do not want all of that salt injected into our groundwater (the evidence is clear that the water does end up in people's wells, and the money they have paid out to shut people up should be enough proof to convince any sane person).

So if they want to Frack, let them get their own water.  Simple.

Now, who knows how to get a measure like this on the ballot?

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The 'Independent Contractor' scam and a return to 19th Century values

For better than 20 years I have been a one-man business.  I have a corporation with one shareholder and one employee, and they are the same person.  I sell my time by the hour and I have done quite well for myself.

My client writes a check to my company for my services.  My company writes me a paycheck with all the appropriate taxes withheld.  My current client has certain stipulations in their standard contract, requiring my company to pay any employees a living wage, to offer health insurance, the sorts of things that responsible companies do for their employees.

But there is a flip side to all this, another side of the 'independent contractor' world.  That is the world where that label is used to absolve a business of any responsibility, pay a sub-minimum wage, and essentially treat the people who work for them, who are generating their income, as disposable pieces of equipment.

A number of years ago, we took in a foster child.  He is 24 years old now, and has recently returned.  He was out of work and we are letting him stay while he gets on his feet.  He took a job for Postmates, a delivery service in San Francisco (and elsewhere).  He delivers stuff all over the city on a bicycle.   Except, it isn't exactly a job, he is considered  and 'Independent Contractor'.

In order to work for them, you have to use their app.  It only runs on the iPhone, so if you don't have one they will lease you one.  They set the prices, not the riders.  In order to get any work, you have to commit to specific times.  If you have not committed to a specific time slot it is unlikely their software will offer you any deliveries.  They, on the other hand make no commitment to you on any particular amount of work.  His best days was a little over $129 working about 12 hours.  His worst was a big zero.

Should you be injured on the job, well that's your problem.  And if you should die at it (cyclists do get killed in the city), I am sure they will say all the right things as they wash their hands of the situation.  You see, they expect loyalty, but that loyalty is one-sided.

Oh, and just to add insult to injury, they pay by EFT only, and then charge their riders for the transfer.  Yes, it is a small charge, but if they were employees that would be illegal.  At least in the state of California it would be, they also operate in a couple of other locations.

As I think about the arrangement, the working conditions of 19th century coal miners comes to mind.  No they were not considered independent contractors, but the mine owners had the same level of concern for their employees, the same attitude, that this business model does.  Management controls the working conditions, while the workers take the risks. Unlike the coal miners, their workers take both the physical risk, and the financial risk

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Small victories

I have written from time to time about driving the casual carpool.  This happened yesterday.

I had a full car, and was on the carpool only on-ramp.  A few car lengths ahead I saw someone stop, and try to force themselves into the left hand (the on-ramp has two lanes, that merge at the very top) lane.  It held up traffic for a bit, until the driver managed to stick his nose between two cars, and make everyone wait until the lane change was accomplished.

There is no good reason to be changing lanes there, they are going to merge soon anyway.  Except, it was a solo driver on the carpool on-ramp, and a highway patrolman was parked near the top of the ramp.  The driver was trying to make it more difficult to be seen.

Shortly after, the highway patrolman was walking between the lanes of traffic.  This was not a dangerous maneuver, the traffic was stop and go.  He signaled to the right hand lane to stop, creating a gap.  He pointed to the solo driver, signaling for him to turn into the hole created by the stopped traffic, and pull over.

We passed the car as the patrolman was at the car window, explaining to the driver the error of his ways.  We all cheered as we drove by.

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