Jed I will not try to debate the issue as we stand so far away from each other. In my opinion there are very few times governmental control and management has been successful. If DoE made some good investment in technology that is fine but it does not mean anything in the discussion about how one get the most bang for the buck in research I will guarantee that eliminating the accountability will create no good results. You talk about unfunded distrust in the government. You must be joking. You take the communication system as an example. While roads are in the somewhat OK I hope you can see the railroads are a big joke. Get some information about the California bullet train. It is easy to write a book about projects that the government has screwed up. I do not think you can fill a page with things the government has done better than anyone else could have done. The government gets by with that because they mostly have monopoly on their services. My believe is, that if you make sure that there is incentives and accountability for anyone who wants to take a risk and accept the two possibilities, success or failure, then there will be good result. To have politicians supported by tenured professors provide major personal risk is not possible that you believe? Your idea that government was larger in the 40,50,60s cannot be serious. The inventions you mention are mostly done by private enterprises. Other countries has mostly replaced coal plants and reduced air pollution long before the US. The US government has rather played the role of delaying international agreement on such issues. To protect investment by large companies and the government as they are considered to big to fail. Better with small entities we can afford a few are failing.
Best Regards , Lennart Thornros www.StrategicLeadershipSac.com lenn...@thornros.com +1 916 436 1899 202 Granite Park Court, Lincoln CA 95648 “Productivity is never an accident. It is always the result of a commitment to excellence, intelligent planning, and focused effort.” PJM On Fri, Jun 19, 2015 at 5:22 PM, Jed Rothwell <jedrothw...@gmail.com> wrote: > Lennart Thornros <lenn...@thornros.com> wrote: > > >> That works in large organizations. Solindra for example is of course poor >> allocating of funds. >> > > You are missing the point. Yes, Solyndra was a poor allocation, but most > of the money invested by the DoE Loan Programs Office was in excellent > allocations. Overall, the fund made a good profit and it helped modernize > and advance U.S. energy. The results were as good as investments by any > bank or industrial corporation. > > > >> However, in the end we have no means to get any better decisions by >> analyzing why and how. >> > > That is completely wrong. We can easily analyze how and why this happened. > This is conventional technology and the results speak for themselves. We do > have a means to get better decisions. Vote for responsible members of > Congress and presidents. Obama has a far better track record than most > previous presidents in that regard. > > > Yes, somebody need something and someone else wanted something else and >> suddenly someone could collect and decided wrong. It was not a scientist or >> a person with understanding of research or anything of value to bring to >> the table. >> > > That is completely wrong. All of the DoE decisions were made by top > experts from industry and government. That is why most the decisions worked > out well. You cannot expect any group of experts to achieve 100% success > and make a profit on every investment. > > If the decisions had been made by people without understanding, or if the > decisions had been made on the basis of politics, you would end up with > deep losses in most investments. It would be like military spending, which > is highly corrupt. > > The DoE spending on conventional technology works well. DoE spending on > basic research is not as good. Dept. of Defense spending is terrible. > Different Departments do better or worse. You should blame the > Representatives in charge of the committees, and the president for these > problems. You should also give them credit for programs that work. Most > government programs work. That is why we have highways, air traffic > control, very few cases of food poisoning, reasonably safe drugs, and so on. > > > >> You say that it was better in old times. In a way you are right and it >> was less need to CYA as less of the economy was handled by the big >> government. >> > > No, in the post-WWII period, a much larger fraction of the economy was > handled by the government. This was also the most prosperous time in U.S. > history. The government's role was especially large in basic R&D. All of > the major post-war technologies such as computers, integrated circuits, the > laser, jet aircraft, space-based technology such as weather forecasting and > the GPS, nuclear power and the Internet were either paid for by the > government or invented by government researchers. *All* of them. > > We cannot turn back the clock and go back to the 1950s and 60s, nor should > we. But we should learn from history and implement some of the good > programs from that era. > > > >> Otherwise I would say there are pros and cons as time goes by. My point >> is that the decisions must be relocated to risk willing individuals or >> small homogeneous teams. >> > > That works for investments in the millions or up to a few billion dollars, > but you cannot replace all of the coal fired plants in the U.S. with > renewable energy without a major role by the government. That is on the > same scale as building a hundred major highways. Only the government can > organize such a thing. You cannot implement cold fusion without a huge role > by government, especially in performing basic physics research, and later > setting standards and ensuring safety. > > - Jed > >
