FOP Extortion and the Profitable Violence of Public Intoxication

Extortion, outwresting, and/or exaction is a criminal offense which occurs when a person unlawfully obtains either {money, property or services} from {a person(s), entity, or institution} through coercion.

Refraining from doing harm is sometimes euphemistically called protection. Extortion is commonly practiced by organized crime groups. The actual obtainment of money or property is not required to commit the offense.

Making a threat which refers to a requirement of money or property to halt future problems is sufficient to commit the offense. Exaction refers to extortion but also means the infliction of something (pain, suffering, enduring something unpleasant).

Neither extortion nor blackmail require a threat of violence but merely a threat used to elicit actions, money, or property from the victim. Such threats could include the filing of reports, revelation of damaging facts, etc.

The PG headline reads, "City sergeant sues owner of Station Square over bar brawl". The writing is great but the headline may be inadequate. Here's the article:

A Pittsburgh police sergeant Friday sued a Beaver County man and the owner of Station Square over an injury the officer said he suffered there in 2009 while trying to break up a bar fight.

Sgt. Craig Campbell, head of the vice unit and a veteran of the city's elite Street Response Unit, was in uniform and working a secondary employment security detail at the Saddle Ridge bar on May 3, 2009, when a fight broke out in front of the nearby Matrix Bar at about 2 a.m.

When Sgt. Campbell responded to help other officers break up the fight, he said one of the combatants, Brian Richard Grimes, 27, of Beaver, kicked him in the knee from behind. Police arrested Mr. Grimes and hauled him to jail.

Sgt. Campbell said he suffered a torn knee ligament and dislocated kneecap that has required surgery and extensive physical therapy. In the complaint, filed in Allegheny County Common Pleas Court, Sgt. Campbell accused Mr. Grimes of assault and battery and Forest City Enterprises of negligence.

[Sgt. Campbell] said Forest City, owner of Station Square, was partially liable because the company didn't hire enough security personnel to handle brawls on busy nights, putting him at risk.

According to the complaint, Forest City failed to provide adequate security despite knowledge of "heightened frequency of fights" on weekends.

Mr. Grimes was charged after the bar incident with various offenses, including aggravated assault and resisting arrest. His trial last month ended in a mistrial and a new one is coming up in the next several months, said his lawyer, Michael O'Day. . . .

I wonder if there isn't a larger story of the City of Pittsburgh allowing its police force to be hired out as security guards, providing local businesses with bouncers who, at any sign of trouble, magically transform into police officers with arrest powers and the authority to write the official version — police officers whose errors are paid for by the taxpayers and the city's insurance provider, and whose injuries are covered as if on-the-job by the City-FOP union contract.

It's a sort of reverse contracting out; instead of the city hiring private companies to provide government services, the City/FOP rents out fully-equipped, fully insured government employees to provide private services. The payment goes to the mercenaries, the politics benefit the Administration, and the liability/risk go to the taxpayers. The city (ie us) pays for all the training, uniforms, guns, bullets, Tasers, insurance, injuries, and settlements. Sweet!

Let's attempt to describe the events of "the night in question".

• Police officer works part-time, off the clock, for private business
  
• The city and union regulate, approve, and administer the arrangement
  
• He's working as an independent contractor, wearing a Pittsburgh police uniform, carrying a Pittsburgh gun and a Pittsburgh radio
  
• at a business down the street, some other contractors get in trouble
  
• How did he know about the trouble? Pittsburgh police radio
  
• He leaves his workplace to help other contractors at another site. Amazingly, in an instant they all transmogrified from private contractors into members of the FOP Pittsburgh Thin Blue Line Club.
  
• He gets injured in the fight he ran over to join, and he sues the deep-pockets owner of Station Square who will in turn pass the cost along to the bar owners
  
• He sues the owner of Station Square for - wait for it, wait for it - not hiring enough FOP members.
  
• They arrest the kid, who is Not From Here and unlikely to have any pull. There has been no conviction (which kinda sorta means the kid is innocent).

Next time, those Station Square bars should hire more FOP members. Just saying. That's extortion. That's a shake-down, nothing more than third-world corruption. You want to run a bar? You better hire enough FOP members.

The beauty is, the FOP doesn't need to lean on the penny-ante bars directly. They just withdraw their services or file suits against the landlords, the button-down money, and then the landlords tell the bar owners to shape up and play ball. I wonder if the insurance coverage has something to do with it - if the policy says there will be off-duty cops and the FOP says No, then the business won't be making any money that night.

The PG headline might have read---

FOP Militia Leaders Extort Real Estate Company

By the way, who is responsible for the Pittsburgh Police? That would be the Mayor of Pittsburgh. Who investigates the Pittsburgh Police? That would be a panel appointed (and interrupted) by the Mayor. The Mayor (this version's name is irrelevant, it's happened before, it's the Pittsburgh machine) gains by having a tight relationship with an organized political force. The Police Department gains because this lucrative arrangement induces policemen to remain on the city's force and not leave for easier work in the 'burbs.

• Remember when the Mayor called for (and the FOP implemented) a full-court press on public intoxication and parking violations? Remember when it disappeared as fast as it arrived, in spite of generating more revenue than it cost?
  
• Is it possible that the crackdown on parking and public intoxication was actually a squeeze on the bar owners, driving their customers away in a show of force?
  
• Remember the St. Patrick's Day brouhaha when the FOP threatened the city that they would withhold their efforts from their secondary assignments over a respect issue? Think about that - they threatened the city that they would stop working for private businesses? Fortunately, enough respect was paid and they were able to continue protecting the public. Glad we got past that.
  
• Is it possible that the Brinksmanship Brouhaha was actually a squeeze on the bar owners, who would have lost a key business day without police "protection"?
  
• Blog Staff apologizes for starting two related sentences with the word "remember", but it does allow us to sneak this in: The struggle of men against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting. (Milan Kundera)
  
• Do you either of those bits of kabuki theater were anything other than a dance between the Mayor, the FOP, and the bar owners?
  
• Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

Connect the dots and you'll see that the City, the FOP, and the bar owners are all complicit in optimizing the profitable violence of public intoxication.

Pittsburgh cops are shaking down businesses.
Pittsburgh cops are beating up honor students.
There needs to be a big change.

Extra Credit Journalism Questions

There are Pulitzer-worthy stories here! Interesting extra-credit questions:

• How much (city) paid time off did the Sgt. get for the injury on his (private) job, which "required surgery and extensive physical therapy"?
• How much (city) paid time off (total, citywide) did police officers get in the last year for injuries from their private jobs?
• How much money has the City paid this year in awards, settlements, and lawyer fees over police officer's outside jobs?

Bugger the British Royals

Ah, Kate. God bless her. She's no Diana, to be sure, but she's no Fergie, either. We hope.



So the public mind, such as it is, turns from energy and economy, weather and wars, to dwell as any attention-deficient schoolboy would on a shallow, fleeting infatuation with The Royals, which I submit to you is un-American, and - viewed in the long term - treasonous, in a "giving comfort to the enemy" sort of way.

Who are these people except the intermarried feeble descendents of dwindling monarchies, who do no work and produce no product and yet draw their sustenance from those who do? The British inclination to grovel and scrape to these professional parasites is so irrational as to betray the Renaissance and the Age of Enlightenment, and to make nearby France seem a model government; and the notion of putting these reprobates in charge of their religion is beyond explanation.

Americans, when they realize who they are, reject Monarchy, Kings, hereditary positions, and privilege by birth. (The Bushes, the Clintons, the Kennedys, and the Pauls notwithstanding.)

We Americans once wrote down our grievances with the British king (george):

Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

• He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
  
• He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
  
• He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
  
• He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
  
• He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
  
• He has refused for a long time, after such disolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
  
• He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
  
• He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
  
• He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
  
• He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
  
• He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
  
• He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
  
• He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
  • For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
    For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
    
  • For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
    
  • For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
    
  • For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
    
  • For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
    
  • For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
    
  • For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
    
  • For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
  
  
• He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
  
• He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
  
• He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
  
• He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
  
• He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

The American Revolution was fought to free us of these parasites, and the notion that 235 years later we would show interest in their serial couplings and progeny is a damning puzzlement.

Ignore Donald Trump; Vote on President Obama's Graduation Speech

Here's the quick & dirty:

• Please click here to vote on which HS graduation Pres. Obama should attend.


• We'd be most grateful if you'd please score Pittsburgh CAPA School as a 5



• How should you score those other fine schools?
  Remember what the Zen Master told the Hot Dog Vendor: "Make me ONE with everything".


• Voting closes this Friday at 2359.
• In the words of Rahm Emmanuel: Vote Early, Vote Often!

Pittsburgh CAPA is a 5!

Thank you very much.

---

Pittsburgh CAPA 6-12 commits to making connections. Our academic program fuses civics with botany, mathematics with visual art and foreign language with filmmaking. Technology is a critical part of the curriculum: websites, videos, Pod Casts and computer-based projects supplement our learning.

Artistically, students are dedicated to collaboration. Whether it's the annual Literary Arts/Theater Department Ten-Minute Play Festival or the Vocal Department's joint productions with Pittsburgh Opera Theater, ideas are constantly being shared, questioned, and embraced. Our Downtown location allows for extraordinarily enriching excursions. Environmental Science students may collect water samples from the Monongahela River while a Physical Education class plays softball in Point State Park. CAPA's urban campus gives us increased awareness of need in the city.

Students regularly organize charity benefits, and our Amnesty International chapter holds demonstrations in the cafeteria. High school poets read at a local community center for the elderly, and the Musical Theater Department performs often at the Children's Hospital. From the beginning of our time at CAPA, we know that everything we learn is meant to help us create change.

Each student's unique artistic perspective broadens each individual's horizons. Pittsburgh CAPA 6-12 students represent all of Pittsburgh's neighborhoods, pulling inspiration from every corner of the city. The broad range of cultural, socioeconomic, and religious backgrounds influence a broad outlook; everything from sexual orientation to politics encourages discussion and stimulates growth. Each student goes into the future with full respect for diversity: of thought, of art, and of people




hat tip: Comet

File Naming Conventions

I am all about File Naming Conventions.



(No, a file naming convention is not a large hotel full of FileNamers wearing Hi My Name Is stickers and looking for geek schwag.)



I look forward to the day when I tell my grandchildren, I remember back when we only had the old 8.3 format, just an eight-letter name followed by a three-letter file type.

I try to be reasonable.

• IANAF (I Am Not A Fundamentalist) who insists on using the DEC Alphabet in filenames, eschewing the use of letters I, L, O, Q, S and Z because they may cause confusion with numerals 1, 0, 5, and 2.
  
• IANAA (I Am Not An Anarchist) who insists on using leet (1337) substitutions in filenames. ex: f33lings-nothing-more-than-f33lings.wav
  

Noam Chomsky Essay Explains Most of the Last Seventy Years

Noam Chomsky is a philosopher and linguist (how can you be either without the other?) with some distinct political views, mostly focused on American foreign policy. His post, Is the World Too Big to Fail? The Contours of Global Order, is a compelling read (that attempts to explain most of the past seventy years).

A few key assertions by Chomsky:

• identification of the "Grand Area" strategy of Western hegememony
  
• The U.S. and Western allies will do whatever they can to prevent authentic Arab democracy
  
• In the real world, elite dislike of democracy is the norm.
  
• Adam Smith hoped that capitalists would be guided by a home bias, tolerating lower returns in their home nation than they would abroad, so that as if by an invisible hand England would be spared the ravages of economic rationality.
  
• the Iranian threat is one of destablization of Western economic interests
  
• Elections have become a charade, run by the public relations industry.
  
• Real unemployment is at Depression levels for much of the population, while Goldman Sachs is richer than ever. Propaganda must seek to blame others, such as public sector workers, their fat salaries, exorbitant pensions, and so on: all fantasy, on the model of Reaganite imagery of black mothers being driven in their limousines to pick up welfare checks.
  
• In the long run, ecology trumps economics.
  
• Systemic risk in the financial system can be remedied by the taxpayer, but no one will come to the rescue if the environment is destroyed. Business leaders conduct propaganda campaigns to convince the population that anthropogenic global warming is a liberal hoax understand the threat, but they must maximize short-term profit and market share.
  

There is sufficient food for thought for an Easter Sunday in there.

Pedants and Poseurs

Kinetic Typography.

In the Year of XKCD 2525

XKCD is a remarkable creative work, and today's art includes futurism, mild skepticism, and good humor.

I tread fearfully on Mr. Munroe's work, but I've taken the liberty of hacking the ending slightly with a homage to Zager and Evans' 2525. As you look at the image below (which may take a moment to load) you'll see a colored blue line at year 2102 which indicates where the XKCD original ends and the revision begins.

Respectfully submitted,
Vannevar

A Tale of Two Stadia, featuring Terry Bradshaw

This is the Coliseum in Rome, paid for out of the public treasury, and the site of barbaric and inhuman entertainments which were used in the technique of bread and circuses to keep the population appeased and unlikely to revolt. It was named after the Colossus of Nero, a giant likeness of Nero located nearby.

Gladiators fought and died within the walls, and often the final decision as to the loser's fate was left to the Emperor or some other factotum; people would speculate and wager on the outcome of the contests. Various houses developed their own squads of gladiators, and people declared their allegiance to one team or another.

It was a place of death by gruesome injury, the site of vicious and inhuman entertainments. The injuries and deaths that took place within its walls are a testament to the barbaric and degraded spirit of the population. The most egregious examples of debased morality must be the wealthy families who staged these events for their personal profit, regional amusement, and political demonstrations of power.




This is Heinz Field in Pittsburgh, paid for out of the public treasury, and used to provide public spectacles of conflict between opposing teams of gladiators playing American football, both professional (Steelers) and also semi-pro (University of Pittsburgh). Some political theorists suggest that identification with the Steelers, adoption of their colors, and even wearing mock uniforms distracted the population from the economic realities of the day. The stadium was named after Heinz, a dead Senator's family and a local economic powerhouse located nearby.

Fortunately, Heinz Field exists in our enlightened modernity; the players are protected, injuries are rare, and the athletes personify the highest aspirations of sport.

The Friday LA Times carries the story of one modern gladiator, Terry Bradshaw, whose mind is diminishing and slipping away because of the injuries he sustained while playing valiantly in an earlier version of the Pittsburgh Coliseum.

A series of at least six concussions incurred by Terry Bradshaw while he was the Super Bowl-winning quarterback of the Pittsburgh Steelers are beginning to interfere with his ability to carry out his current duties as a football analyst for Fox Sports, the ex-player said this week in a blog.

Bradshaw said he is suffering from deficits in short-term memory and impairments in his hand-eye coordination. He is being treated at the Amen Clinic in Newport Beach, but experts fear that the best he can hope for is a slowing of the progression of the disorder rather than an improvement in function. ...

Bradshaw wrote that he spent a weekend at the Amen Clinic, where they determined that the problem was the residue of the many concussions he had suffered as a player.

---

When we think of the Coliseum and the wealthy Roman families who staged their gruesome events for their personal profit, regional amusement, and political demonstrations of family power, we think they must have been corrupt and jaded people of mercenary indifference.

But when we think of the Rooney's, we think "Hey Mr. Rooney is an Ambassador" and we think, "wow the kid really showed Ben that he was displeased at his poor judgement n'at".

---

In a commercial blog provided by the entertainment company that exploits employs him, Terry Bradshaw describes his injuries and explains that he will do whatever it takes to stay in the booth, just as in earlier days he would do whatever it took to stay in the game.

Bradshaw's announcement of his work injuries difficulties and his courageous continuation of broadcast duties expand the voyeur's spectacle from the stadium floor to the broadcast booth. In addition to watching drugged freaks struggle with injury on the field, passive viewers will be able to mark Terry Bradshaw's deterioration as the season progresses, wondering — is Terry tired today, or is he slipping? Hey, wasn't he always a little bit dumb, anyway?

<a href="http://msn.foxsports.com/video?vid=90c5e758-11e2-4a73-862a-4291921c466e&from=IV2_en-us_foxsports_articles" target="_new" title="Terry talks treatment">Video: Terry talks treatment</a>

You wouldn't wish this on anybody.

Boy we've come a long way.

Here we go Steelers, here we go.

Washington Post Peep Show

Each year, in the week prior to Easter, the Washington Post has a competition of dioramas constructed with Peeps. The winning entry for this year's contest was the scene of the rescue of the trapped Chilean miners, complete with the introduction of one miner to his child born while he was entombed, and also including the scene where a rescued man was greeted by both his wife and his mistress (who had become acquainted at the scene).

My favorite was this whimsical execution of the iPad2 release at the Georgetown Apple store:


We respectfully suggest that Pittsburgh's best peeps are found at the Lincoln Ave. bakery in Bellevue.

Sunday 0830 Bicycle Racing

This Sunday, April 17 2011, there's a bicycle race in downtown Pittsburgh - the Steel City Showdown. At this time there are 210 registered racers.

Bicyclists will race a rectangular course framed by the Roberto Clemente Bridge and the Andy Warhol Bridge — two of the "three sisters". The first race starts at 0830, and races of riders of various categories continue until the Kiddie Race at 1.30pm. Prime spots for spectators are the walkways along the two bridges.

Showdown Tailgate

from the website:

The Showdown Tailgate began as a friendly competition among bike shops, and local shops will definitely "bring it" as they compete for the award of Best Tailgate Tent. In addition to the shops, fans will also mingle with national cycling brands and retailers as well as AGH Sports Medicine, Cycling Fusion, and other sponsors.

We are also excited about several nonprofit and local advocacy groups that will bring their unique perspectives in cycling to the Showdown Tailgate. These groups include Team H2Ope, a RAAM team from Ohio, BikePGH and Venture Outdoors, as well as other charity organizations with a cycling focus.

Why President Obama should attend the CAPA Graduation: Jordan Miles

Various reports suggest that President Obama may participate in the graduation exercises at the Pittsburgh School for the Creative and Performing Arts (aka CAPA 6-12), which is one of six finalists in the Race to the Top High School Commencement Challenge.

The other finalists are Bridgeport High School in Bridgeport, Wash.; Wayne Early Middle College High School in Goldsboro, N.C.; Booker T. Washington High School in Memphis, Tenn.; Science Park High School in Newark, N.J.; and High Tech High International in San Diego.

There are probably great reasons for President Obama to visit any of these schools, which are all fine examples of best-in-class education programs. There's one great reason for President Obama to attend the CAPA ceremony: he can have CAPA alumni Jordan Miles and his mother, Terez Miles, sitting with him.



Jordan Miles is the CAPA student who was attacked, assaulted, and beaten without cause by three Pittsburgh police officers. The picture on the above-left is "before" the beating; the picture on the above-right is "after" they pulled the hair out of his head. Jordan Miles has passed polygraph tests confirming his report. There has been no action taken on the three police officers who beat him, other than putting them on fully paid administrative leave - in other words, a no-show, paid vacation including overtime, etc.

Imagine the moment when the President of the United States says to the audience, "You think I'm important? I think Jordan Miles is important."

That's a moment worth the President's time, and that's why President Obama should attend the CAPA graduation ceremony.

Mr. Honey, the Reindeer, and the Ethics of Fatigue

What advice might you give to help a person know how to proceed? Here's an attempt:

Therefore, go forth, companion: when you find
No highway more, no track, all being blind,
The way to go shall glimmer in the mind.

"The Wanderer" by John Masefield

---

This post tells its story in media res — the first scene is in the vivid recent moment, then the storytelling goes back in time to the beginning, and time proceeds through the opening moment and continues to the denouement. But if you'd rather watch a movie, I recommend that you watch No Highway In the Sky.

Recent and Vivid: Southwest Flight 812

From the Associated Press:

On April 1 2011, a Southwest Boeing 737 with 118 people on board rapidly lost cabin pressure after the plane's fuselage ruptured, causing a 5-foot tear. Passengers reached for oxygen masks as the pilots quickly descended before making an emergency landing at an Arizona military base.

While the incident is still being investigated, the jet had been pressurized and depressurized 39,000 times in its 15 years and metal fatigue is suspected. Cracks were subsequently found on five other Southwest jets with more than 30,000 cycles.

That came as a shock to the industry. Boeing engineers had forecast that the planes wouldn't need to be inspected for metal fatigue until at least 60,000 cycles.

From the Seattle Times, which follows Boeing closely:

...the in-flight rupture of a Southwest Airlines Boeing 737 on Friday has raised concerns about part of the fuselage they previously thought wasn't vulnerable.

"It's a much thicker skin there," said John Hart-Smith, a world-renowned expert on metal-aircraft structures and a retired high-level Boeing engineer. "Typically, that area has never been susceptible to cracking at the lap splices." The limited scope "is a blessing," Hart-Smith said. "But it's a warning."

Hans Weber said that maintenance procedures to check for fatigue were established after the Aloha Airlines event. "The whole community worked really hard after Aloha to get full control over this aging-aircraft problem," Weber said. "And until about last year, we basically had no more problems. This is not good. This is really a surprise."

I think Southwest's response has been admirable and consistent with their culture:

After last week's rupture, Southwest grounded 80 737s for immediate inspection, forcing the cancellation of hundreds of flights. Its inspectors found five more planes with signs of lap joint cracks; those remain grounded while the others returned to work.

From the Wall Street Journal:

Southwest Airlines' move to ground dozens of planes last Saturday, just hours after learning of possible structural problems, was an unusual move in the industry. Typically, airlines wait for regulatory direction and manufacturer recommendations before removing planes from service.

Faced with the question of whether to let dozens of 737 jets fly with potential structural problems unlike any faced by the industry in decades, Southwest grounded the planes, canceling more than 620 flights and delaying 2,700 others.

"I give Southwest's leadership credit for not waiting until someone was pounding on them," said Robert Francis, a former member of the NTSB.

You can see Southwest's dilemma. If we ground the 737 fleet then Southwest disappears, and yet they've been very consistent in prioritizing safety over economics.

The question is what we'll learn and then where "somebody" sets the balance point. Would somebody risk 130 passengers to keep Southwest flying, to maintain a major transportation system, and to avoid the economic effects of a travel ban on 737s? Is the loss of 150 people an acceptable cost to maintain a transportation network?

We seem to have no problem with the loss of 32,738 Americans a year in our automobile transportation system. There's no telling where people set the tipping point. The good news is: you're safer in a 737 than in your Volvo.

---

1948 - No Highway In the Sky

Southwest Flight 812 was the intro, the hook, the vivid recent story that we're all aware of. But there's really very little new under the sun (VLNUS); we've seen this several times before. Let's go way back, back to 1948 and a new book by Neville Shute.

Nevil Shute is a favorite author of mine. The first book of his that I read was On The Beach; it is tremendous. His full name is Neville Shute Norway; he writes under a pen-name to keep his engineering work separate from his writing. In a way, he was the Micheal Crichton of his decade.

One of Shute's early books was "No Highway", which was later made into a movie, "No Highway in the Sky".

It tells the (fictional) story of Mr. Theodore Honey, an aeronautical engineer who becomes convinced that the Reindeer, a new airliner his company makes, is likely to suffer from metal fatigue and have a catastrophic failure after a certain number of flights.

The establishment refuses to believe Mr. Honey, shuns him, and eventually attempts to have him declared mentally unfit. Events unfold and, in fact, the Reindeer's empennage falls off while taxiing.

Mr. Honey's reputation is restored, although that seems to mean little to him; he was just doing what he thought was right the whole time. Meanwhile, his demonstration of virtue under pressure makes him attractive to women.

Although the movie is set in 1952's new, glamorous world of aviation the story is ancient: how does a person proceed? How do they behave within their beliefs? How do we handle uncertainty? These are issues that predate Kitty Hawk, and these are questions that make flying seem rather simple.

Life Imitates Art: The de Havilland Comet Disasters of 1954

When pressurized aircraft were developed, and again when jet engines were introduced, the physics of aircraft moved into unprecedented altitudes and speeds. The implications of repeated cycles of pressurizing and depressurizing the cabin were not completely understood.

The deHavilland Comet was the world's first commercial jet airliner. It first flew in 1949 and was a landmark in aeronautical design. A few years after introduction into commercial service, in 1954 the Comet suffered from catastrophic metal fatigue, which in combination with the pressurisation, caused two well-publicized accidents where the aircraft tore apart in mid-flight.

The Comet was withdrawn from service. There were two courts of inquiry, and eventually the effects of compression cycles and the square window designs were understood. The early Comets were not returned to service. A new version, the Comet4, entered passenger service is 1958. (The cockpit photo at the top of this post is a deHavilland Comet4.)

In the meantime, the DC8 and B707 were introduced (both benefiting from the Comet's experience) and the Comet series never regained her initial status as a leading airliner. Some Comet airframes were flown until March 2011 in military service as the Nimrod ASW aircraft.

It appears that de Havilland and the airlines behaved responsibly; the risk was not understood, the aircraft were withdrawn from service after the second 1954 crash, and there was a public inquiry.

Life Repeatedly Imitates Art

A favorite shibboleth is, "The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting", and the questions described by Shute, seen in the Comet inquiries, and repeated in subsequent events demonstrate the need of memory and the value of remembering.

Boeing 737 Rudders

In the 1990's a problem developed with the 737 rudders. There was a crash in 1991 and then a crash in 1992, and there was an event in early 1994 but there was no Theodore Honey involved and the situation never moved from denial to acceptance until something really bad happened.

Back to the Reindeer: Skin Cancer in the 737

In April 1988, a Boeing 737 flying as Aloha Flight 243 suffered extensive damage after an explosive decompression in flight. The crew was able to land safely on Maui. The only fatality was flight attendant C.B. Lansing who was blown out of the airplane.

The age of the aircraft became a key issue (it was 19 years old at the time of the accident and had sustained a remarkable number of takeoff–landing cycles — 89,090, the second most cycles for a plane in the world at the time — well beyond the 75,000 trips it was designed to sustain).

According to the NTSB report, passenger Gayle Yamamoto noticed a crack in the fuselage upon boarding the aircraft prior to the ill-fated flight but did not notify anyone.

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) blamed a combination of corrosion and widespread fatigue damage, the result of repeated pressurization cycles during the plane's 89,000-plus flights.

More Skin Cancer in the Boeing 737

• July 2009: Southwest Flight 2294, a Boeing 737, experienced a football-sized hole in the fuselage and made an emergency landing.
  
• October 2010: American Flight 1640, a Boeing 757, had a 1-foot by 2-foot hole develop.
  
• Which brings us back to this post's opening scene:
  April 2010: Southwest Flight 812 had a five-foot hole open up.

This has nothing to do with airplanes

It does seem like there's a problem with the 737 sheet metal, but let me say (again) that you're safer in a 737 than you are in your Volvo.

Nevil Shute's book has nothing to do with airplanes, just like science fiction really doesn't have to do with technology; the frameworks provide a way to examine human behavior in contrived settings. It's about the philosophy of how to proceed within your beliefs.

Fatigue, Perseverance, and Virtue

Nevil Shute's story has a lot to do with modern times. With the country in three wars, the economy tanking, the failure of the political system, the attack on unions, the tax reductions for the rich, the service reductions for the weakest -- fatigue can set in and have pernicious cumulative effects just like the Reindeer experienced.

At what point do we say, "That's enough. Stop." One event? Two events?
Do we stay "stop" after Wisconsin, or Michigan, or Ohio?
In a time of multiple crises, how does one proceed in a crazy world?

Hopefully, by persevering and demonstrating virtue as in Theodore Honey's example.

NextGen Derivative Financing: You Down With PPP?

Following up on a previous post: Recent stories in the press/web have announced a financing scheme to pay for the proposed NextGen aviation system, with a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) using federal seed money as a funds multiplier (gosh thanks, Enron!) to buy NextGen gizmos for every airline — satisfaction guaranteed.

NextGen is an industry wet-dream ISO somebody willing to pay for it.

The gizmo makers can't convince the airlines to pay for it, they can't convince the military to pay for it, and they can't convince Congress to pay for it. They can't sell it as economic stimulus, they can't sell it as infrastructure investment, and they can't sell it as a pre-need bailout.

When you can't pay for something the old fashioned way, but you're highly self-motivated to sell the product and ship it, warts and bugs features and all, you look for new ways to pay for it. If it's not right - well, what brand-new, leading edge invention is ever right in version 1.0? You don't want to by the first-year Tesla; you want to buy the fifth-year Prius. But industry wants everybody to throw out all the Prii and replace them all with Tesla 1.0's.

What's the Problem? Who's Problem is it?

Usually we spend money to solve problems. A problem is a discontinuity between expectations (subjective) and perceived reality (subjective). Problems, then, are a rather squishy phenomenon, subject to interpretation and bias. When I see problem-solving that I don't understand, I wonder: what problem are they solving? Whose problem is it?

What problem is NextGen Public-Private Partnership (PPP, or P³) financing solving? Here's my answer, yours may vary:

NextGen is industry's marketing package to sell, update, and maintain an unspecified technical project to people who cannot evaluate its merits; it is cynical rent-seeking at its essence.

The NextGen hype-bubble is getting long in the tooth. They've sold the sizzle to people unable to evaluate the claims, and they can't find anybody capable of evaluating the issue who is willing to spend their own money on it.

The problem is figuring out how to get industry the money it has been expecting out of the NextGen swindle.

The problem that NextGen Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) financing solves is moving money out of the public coffers and into the military-industrial complex under the guise of delivering NextGen aviation. The problem belongs to industry. The PPP financing solution benefits industry.

NextGen Marketing

It's been very easy for marketing to hype NextGen as all things to all people. When somebody says, I don't like ________, they say "NextGen will solve that!" When somebody asks, How come I can't do this, they say "NextGen can do that!"

Marketing tells NewYorkers it's going to eliminate delays at JFK, LGA, and EWR. Marketing tells the airlines they'll save money. Marketing tells the government they'll pay for NextGen by throwing everything else away. Marketing tells pilots they'll be in charge of their own destiny. That's all hype.

If you're industry, it's okay to sell and ship a buggy product - there's often more to be made in debugging adaptation and upgrades than there is in the original product; the trick is to get the client (Uncle Sam) to lock themselves in to the product line you're selling, because once they're committed to it there's no way they can reverse themselves, and then you own the market and you might even own the client.

What's the NextGen Guarantee "OrWhat" ?

Cynics may be making clucking sounds and asking Guaranteed? Guarantees don't mean anything without an established OrWhat. The OrWhat completes the syllogism, it defines the compensation. In other words, your satisfaction is guaranteed - or what?

• Guaranteed Lowest Prices OR Double the Difference
• Guaranteed Satisfaction OR complete refund
• Guaranteed OnTime OR free upgrade

What's the OrWhat in this NextGen financing scheme? What's the deal if NextGen isn't as profitable as the gizmo-makers promise? What, what, what?

Follow the Money

Use of the Public-Private Partnership was authorized in HR 658, FAA Reauthorization and Reform Act of 2011. The PPP was not included in the original legislation, but was added by Rep. John Mica as Amendment One.

They couldn't sell NextGen with any of the several initial approaches that they tried, so they've moved into more nuanced arrangements. Remarkably, as soon as FAA Reauthorization with Mica's Amendment One passed the House, a financial boutique shop announced the establishment of the NextGenFund (logo shown).

The NextGenFund (which is a private, for-profit enterprise) will use $150 Million in federal loan guarantees to generate $1.5 Billion in NextGen purchases (this used to be called betting on the come, then it was called leverage, and now it's called a Public Private Partnership).

The federal government will guarantee the loans made by the speculators private sector. The speculators will advance money to the airlines to buy NextGen technology from industry (goal-1) at a specified interest rate (goal-2). The airlines will attempt to use the NextGen gizmos to make money (goal-3). The airlines will take that money as profits, and they'll use part of it to pay off the loans.

What if the airlines don't profit as much as the marketing hype promised? What if they don't make anything additional? What if nextGen implementation is delayed? In any of those disappointing eventualities, airline satisfaction is guaranteed, and they don't have to pay for the gizmos.

Who does pays industry for the gizmos? Who pays the profit to the speculators? That's when federal loan guarantee kicks in, and the taxpayers pay for it (goal-4).

Cui Bono?

The tone of the press coverage is notably "oh good, now we have away to pay for NextGen" and they don't seem to critically ask, "Should we spend a forture on this new technology?", "Will it deliver benefits that justify the cost?", "Who will pay for this, and who will benefit?"

What a sweet deal. Marketing overhypes a vapor-ware product that doesn't exist yet, sells it to a public that can't evaluate the promise, and if the system fails to meet airline expectations then the taxpayers have to pay for it - which was what they wanted in the first place. All of the benefits accrue to the gizmo-makers, the speculators, and the airlines. All of the costs and risks go to the taxpayers.

What are the odds this goes wrong?

NextGen promises a brand new aviation system, completely replacing the existing (tested, safe, world's best) system. There is no definition of the scope of NextGen; there is no documentation of what is (and more importantly, what isn't) included in NextGen. It's been sold as all things to all people.

Russ Chew isn't saying this is going to be easy -- but just in case, if it goes over budget, off schedule, or if it fails to deliver the marketing hype -- then the federal government will pay for it. What are the odds?

Restating the NextGenFund.com PPP Guarantee in Standard Format

Guaranteed

On Schedule On Budget Expectations Exceeded Significant Savings

OR

Uncle Sam The taxpayers will buy it for you.

The Usual Suspects

Industry has packed the Public-Private Partnership with former government officials, a menagerie of Used-To-Be's with impressive titles. What is surprising is that when you look into the aftermath of their official tenures, there isn't any evidence of their lasting postive contribution.

• What did Russ Chew leave better than he found it?
• What did Marion Blakey leave better than she found it?

(Editor's Note: Point out that Republican Mica's Legislation has only passed the House. Curious that the Used-To-Be's (Chew, Blakey) were all Republican appointees. Hmm.)

Someday when you have time to watch a 14-slide presentation, check this out. Resist the urge to make sure you still have your wallet.




My compliments to the marketing team that released this PPP financing news just before all the media focus shifted over to the government shutdown. Nicely played.

Is America Addicted to War?

If you cared about a 235-year-old loved one who kept repeating disfunctional behaviors in situations that didn't justify the behavior, you'd probably ask them about it. Why do you keep doing that? Don't you see that you're in a pattern that's bad for you? Can't you stop yourself? What, What, What are you doing?



In Foreign Policy, Steven Walt asks Is America Addicted to War? It's a legitimate question, and Walt suggests that we are, in fact, addicted to war: we're not making good decisions, we keep doing things we know are going to end poorly, we're not learning from our mistakes.

Walt offers five reasons why Why America Keeps Fighting Foolish Wars-

• Because We can link
  The most obvious reason that the United States keeps doing these things is the fact that it has a remarkably powerful military, especially when facing a minor power like Libya. When you've got a hammer, everything looks like a nail. When you've got hundreds of planes, smart bombs, and cruise missiles, the whole world looks like a target set. It's hard to resist the temptation to "do something!"
  
  
• We Have No Serious Enemies link
  The end of the Cold War left the United States in a remarkably safe position. There are no great powers in the Western hemisphere; we have no "peer competitors" anywhere (though China may become one sooner if we keep squandering our power foolishly); and there is no country anywhere that could entertain the idea of attacking America without inviting its own destruction. We do face a vexing terrorism problem, but that danger is probably exaggerated, is partly a reaction to our tendency to meddle in other countries, and is best managed in other ways. It's really quite ironic: Because the American homeland is safe from serious external dangers (which is a good thing), Americans have the luxury of going abroad "in search of monsters to destroy" (not a good thing).
  
  
• It's the Establishment, Stupid link
  The foreign-policy establishment is hard-wired in favor of "doing something." Foreign-policy thinking in Washington is dominated either by neoconservatives (who openly proclaim the need to export "liberty" and never met a war they didn't like) or by "liberal interventionists" who are just as enthusiastic about using military power to solve problems, provided they can engineer some sort of multilateral cover.
  
  
• Congress has Left the Building link
  The authority to declare war is given to Congress, not the president, but that authority has been steadily usurped ever since World War II, and Congress has not seen fit to assert their role. Modern presidents of both parties clearly feel no constraints about ordering U.S. forces to attack other countries, or even to fully inform Congress as to what we might be doing in secret. The vaunted system of "checks and balances" supposedly enshrined in our Constitution simply doesn't operate anymore, which means that the use of America's military power has been left solely to the presidents and a handful of ambitious advisors.
  
  
• The All Volunteer Force link
  A third enabling factor behind our addiction to adventurism is the all-volunteer force. By limiting military service only to those individuals who volunteer to do it, public opposition to wars of choice is more easily contained. Could Bush or Obama have kept the Iraq and Afghanistan wars going if most young Americans had to register for a draft, and if the sons and daughters of Wall Street bankers were being sent in harm's way because they got an unlucky number in the draft? (more)

And I would add these factors:

• The military-industrial complex profits from war and funds politicians
  
• Demagogues, think tanks, and lobbyists profit from war
  
• War is a useful distraction
  

America needs a 12-step program.

Guaranteed NextGen Results . . . or it's Free!

At times this blog touches on arcane aspects of transportation policy. Previous entries have dealt with the NextGen aviation system, presented by the marketing departments solution providers of various industrial vendors as the Next Best Thing that will move aviation into the future.



Posts have included Runways as Constraints and a New York NextGen metaphor. We talked about solving the ATC Delay Problem, reframing the topic as the Airline Scheduled Delay Problem and suggesting,

The airlines and the airports have been overbooking the runways just like the airlines overbook seats on their planes. They do it because it's cost-effective; the profits go to the airlines and airports, and the costs go to the traveling public and the economy. When too many show up, they bump some back to the next hour, and so on, and so on.

In this analysis of NextGen we looked at a comparison of Costs and Benefits provided by Robert May, who is a NextGen shill advocate:

I'd like to point out that the costs exceed the benefits through at least the year 2027, in this chart prepared by somebody trying to put the best face possible on NextGen.

Just because the costs exceed the benefits doesn't mean NextGen isn't profitable; the industry will find great profit when if they can sell these gizmos. The people who pay for the gizmos, and the economy overall, will be at a net loss.

Everything I know about Nextgen and Delays

Great technology. Expensive. Not a replacement. Won't fix delays. Runways are the constraint. Airlines and airports intentionally overbook runways.

Gosh, that was easy. 152 characters, less than a text message. I don't dislike NextGen; I do have a problem with industry misleading the American public. Here's a set of recommendations for actually eliminating most airline / airport delays.

Selling the Dream

There are several challenges facing any salesman who needs to sell NextGen solutions. NextGen won't be backwards-compatible with existing, proven aviation equipment. It's as if the 1990s cellphone companies were selling phones that could call other cellphones but couldn't call landline phones. The benefits are subtle and limited; the costs are very high. Given this dog of a situation, salesmen respond with rhetoric and try to sell the sizzle, not the steak.

Whenever they can, the salesmen describe the existing system as outdated 1960's technology. As a taxpayer and passenger, I don't mind that we're using a reliable, time-tested, evolved system that's been paid for. Industry's sales pitch requires describing the status quo as hopelessly outdated.

As a species we've only been flying for a little over 100 years. To describe anything in aviation as "same old same old" is ludicrous. We've been using roads for millenia and I don't see anybody saying, "Roads? That's so 1410!"

Paying for the Dream

How does industry and their hired hands convince somebody, anybody to pay for it? How does industry move from pitching gizmos to selling the dream?

Scorched Earth

The first approach was to cost-justify the NextGen expense by claiming that it would replace all ground-based navigation systems and all ground-based radars. We could throw out all the old stuff, stop maintaining the buildings, and we wouldn't need maintenance people.

That was a good marketing pitch, and the spreadsheets ended up with usable numbers, but the reality was quite different: the Defense Department insists on maintaining the ground-based radars, the existing aircraft fleet requires a ground-based navigation system, and - by the way - the Chinese are capable of disabling satellites, NextGen is vulnerable to fifty-year solar events, and in most applications the (legacy, old, outdated) ground-based systems have lower weather minimums that NextGen. The scorched-earth value proposition didn't kick.

Economic Stimulus

The second approach to getting somebody to buy NextGen was positioning this big-ticket purchase as a new wave economic stimulus and an infrastructure investment, much in the way that we're rebuilding bridges and highways. This proposition didn't sell either.

Bailout

The third approach to getting somebody to buy NextGen was positioning it as the savior of the American airline industry; our economy needs the airlines, they're Too Big To Fail, let's bail them out and keep them operating by having the government buy the gizmos for the airlines, and for the business jets, and screw those little puddlejumpers. Instead of "first come, first served" let's talk about "best equipped, best served" - now, that's a tagline for a gizmo sale!

This was an attempt to gloss over the fact that except for a few early adopters, most airlines have decided they're not going to spend their money on NextGen; they'll accept it if somebody else buys it for them, but they're not rushing to invest in it themselves. This approach didn't succeed either, and the fact that airlines won't buy NextGen with their own money is generally understood now.

Complex Derivative Financing

Industry's newest approach to selling NextGen, which is beginning to look like a white elephant with a tattoo saying "Solution in Search of A Sucker", is to use complex derivative financing to pay for the gizmos, because the inscrutability of derivatives is socially acceptable and we're running out of ways to sell this stuff - which, again, nobody will buy with their own money.

Industry is no longer developing innovative solutions; they're now searching for innovative financing techniques to get somebody to commit to buying these gizmos. From today's Wall Street Journal, "New Way to Upgrade Air Control", (also: Bloomberg)

On Monday, ITT and Nexa Capital Partners LLC are expected to announce proposals to use about $150 million in federal loan guarantees as seed money to establish a larger, self-sustaining fund to pay for installing upgraded equipment on potentially thousands of U.S. airliners.

The goal is to help carriers fund their piece of a delay-plagued effort by the Federal Aviation Administration to create a satellite-based traffic control network.

Expected to cost more than $40 billion overall, the next-generation solution has been stymied by a persistent reluctance by airlines to invest billions of dollars to upgrade airborne devices. Now, after years of delays and futile industry lobbying for direct federal aid, ITT and its partner believe they have found the key to overcoming airline resistance.

ITT Chairman Steven Loranger has championed the loan-guarantee fund despite initial disinterest—and sometimes even hostility—from various industry players. The most unusual aspect is that airlines would gradually repay the cost of equipping planes only after they start reaping fuel and schedule benefits.

Nexa Capital's managing partner, Russell Chew, a former senior FAA and JetBlue official, said in an interview that the proposed fund is unique because it is pegged to the FAA's ability to deliver on promised benefits. If the rollout of NextGen falters due to a lack of agency or congressional support, airlines essentially would be off the hook for repaying the loans.

It might work. There's a sucker born every minute. More coming.

Blocked on April Fools Day

I have blogged recently about my notion that the fake press release may be my genre of choice. All my life I have yearned for a creative outlet, and I have been too clumsy and inarticulate to express myself - but the fake press release, that may just be my métier.



Given my choice of art form, you'd think that April Fools Day would be my Day of The Year, my personal Christmas, New Years, and Fourth of July all rolled into one.

I've hit a creative wall, a mocker's block. The press releases that other people are putting out tremendously exceed my ability to make stuff up.

• Microsoft is accusing somebody else of anti-competitive behavior
  
• Our Nobel Peace Prize-winning president just started our third simultaneous war.
  
• Japan's nuclear crisis will be good for American industry.
  
• Newt Gingrich is lecturing other people on values and principles.
  

You just can't make up stuff that good. Maybe we're all April Fools.

Also, James Fallows on a similar topic.