Four more years

Four years ago, I wrote this post after Obama was first elected.  I re-read both Obama's original speech and what I wrote, and this morning I am thinking about how the past four years have played out compared to the earnest hope I felt then.

Summary - it's been real tough.  The economy was worse than anyone thought, and that alone has dampened even the greatest accomplishments of the administration.  Still, some of the discrepancy between expectation and reality must fall upon Obama himself, who obviously over-estimated his own ability to change things in Washington.  Whether you call it cockiness, overconfidence, or even delusion...that attitude hurt the public's opinion of Obama.

Still, it takes cooperation to get things done in politics, and despite words suggesting cooperation with the Republican congressional leaders would be possible, they opposed every move of the administration:
- On health care, a bitter battle, even though the Obama administrations framework included almost every recommendation and compromise originally supported by republican health care reformers, most importantly their candidate Mitt Romney.
- On the economy, Republicans fought anti-recession government deficit spending.  This was despite supporting nearly the same thing under the Bush administration...
- On debt and the debt ceiling, willing to derail the fragile economic recovery on 100% political grounds; unwilling to accept even extremely grand compromises offered by Obama and Reid.  Compromises so generous in hindsight that both Reid and Obama would probably have deeply regretted them if they'd been accepted.
- On cooperation, there was only deliberate and overt obstructionist behavior from most of the Republican senators and representatives, including the famous quote from McConnell, "Our top political priority over the next two years should be to deny President Obama a second term in office. But the fact is, if our primary legislative goals are to repeal and replace the health spending bill; to end the bailouts; cut spending; and shrink the size and scope of government, the only way to do all these things it is to put someone in the White House who won’t veto any of these things."
- On energy, republicans insisted on pipelines, oil, gas, and coal exploitation while simultaneously making fun of the administrations failures in alternative energy.  Hey, guess what assholes, if we never try we will never succeed at fixing this...come up with some ideas; mining every last drop of finite resources just to keep energy impossibly cheap another 25 years is NOT a long term plan.  On a side note, Obama was much more flexible in domestic energy exploration than anyone, particularly Republicans, give him credit for.  Jobs in that sector have recovered, not shrunk.  Traditional domestic energy production has increased...the much touted "attack on coal" really the result of how successful natural gas exploration has been . Cheapening natural gas and it's relatively cleaner energy has made coal (and coal energy) undesirable, not the administrations direct policies.   But I digress...

So, despite all this obstruction:
- the Obama administration passed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.  This is a super important (although incomplete) brick in the wall that may contain long-term health care costs.
- The Obama administration passed economic stimulus, the economy slowly improved, and housing markets (also fragile) seem to gradually be improving.  Are things great like they were 6-10 years ago?  Nope.  But they're better than they were during the crash/recession and they are steadily getting better.
- Part of this "bail out" that was fought tooth-and-nail by republicans supported the auto industry, saving GM, Chrysler and probably Ford too in a time none of them would have been able to secure conventional loans/financing.   Jobs at these companies (and their suppliers) were preserved; and two of the three makers have already repaid their dept to the government.  Whether you believe some industry is "too big to fail" or not, this particular government intervention worked as advertised.
- The Obama administration has attempted to place the true cost of unsustainable energy (oil, coal, and even natural gas) on the industry, and thus indirectly on the consumer.  This is hard on everyone, particularly short term.  But is it the ONLY way forward.  Whether 10 years or 100 years out, we cannot keep exponentially making more humans, using more energy, and creating more waste.  And destroying our own backyard to make our current usage feasible is incredibly short-sighted and self-destructive.  We MUST change, no matter how hard it is or how much it costs us now, or there won't be a later to worry about.
- The administration has stood behind their promise of controlled withdrawal from multiple foreign wars, virtually leaving Iraq and well on the way to leaving Afghanistan.
- Yet, the administration has found/arrested/killed a substantial number of high-level terrorist leaders, not the least of which was Osama Bin Laden.  Despite some very serious attempts, no major terrorist plots have succeeded on American soil.

That's a pretty good track record, particularly given the bitter political divide that's overshadowed every initiative the past four years.  Obama is a real politician, and plays both the long game and short game well.

Many right-leaning leaders fear our military and national security will be weakened if the current administration continues their roll-back of military deployment and spending.  But this ignores the reality: we just cannot afford to be constantly at war all around the world.  Over-spending is ultimately the biggest security threat.

Eight years of Bush/Cheney unilateral cowboy bullying, self-serving, and hawkish military deployment all over the world made an exponential number of enemies, ironically justifying ever-increasing military spending.  It is (and was) an unsustainable cycle - bravely broken by the Obama administration despite Republican apathy.   Long term, rolling back our world-wide military presence and cutting military spending may be among the most important and beneficial actions of the current administration.

We, as a country, really need to learn to play nice with the other kids in the sandbox.  It takes more than four years of real diplomacy to undo the damage the previous eight years of immature chest pounding did to our international position.  But there will be significant economic payoff in the future when we limit fighting everyone we disagree with and instead practice some actual compromise.   Or at least wait to be invited into other peoples fights.  There are times, places, and people that really do need their asses kicked, I won't deny that.  But the real economic and human cost of continuous war-after-war is much higher than the actual real threats against our national security.  For instance, the money we spend at war could, every month build a new Trade Center and send rockets to Mars, it could improve education and health care, rebuild and modernize the national transportation infrastructure, and it could develop real energy and population solutions for the future.   We spend a LOT of our money on unwelcome policing of other peoples parts of the planet...it just isn't possible to keep this up.

Essentially, fighting all over the world is the equivalent of setting most of our national "paycheck" on fire in the front yard instead of taking it to the bank.  We have lost 150% more soldiers fighting than men and women we lost in the terrorist attacks on 9/11, and in addition, by the most conservative estimates, have killed 20-30 times that number of the "enemy."  Why?  Do you feel safer today, as you face new (and increasingly expensive and invasive) draconian security measures each time you travel?  Do you feel safer knowing the terrorists have been training and improving their business against the best we have to offer, full-time, for 10 years?  I don't.  And, we aren't.

The planet if full of humans - overfilled, really.  We need to get along and work on long-term, sustainable solutions to very hard problems.  Mitt Romney's ideas about digging up and pissing all over our own part of the planet is not a long term solution.  Beating up on the rest of the world isn't either.

So...this morning, we move on to another four years of the Obama administration.  They have a lot of promises to live up to - no one would deny that.  And they have super-hard problems to solve.  But I think our country, and the world in general, is better off this morning.  We, as a country under the Obama administration, get to stay on a long tortuous path to sustainability - economically, militarily, and energetically.  There is no instant fix here, so even if you disagree with his methods, read what Obama said four years ago, listen to his speech from last night, and give the current administration and your country your best cooperative effort the next four years.

Pledge your allegiance to the United States of America, and to a nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.  Together we stand,   'merica, baby!

1995 Toyota 4Runner blowing fuses and A/C Clutch Replacement

During a recent trip, the A/C fuse blew.  This fuse  is in relay box #3, behind the dashboard on the passenger side, near the door...  accessible only when the dash is taken apart - nice!  The A/C was making air before there was a nasty burning plastic smell and the fuse blew.

I put in a new fuse - it blew right away.  I tried a 20A fuse (2x the original 10A) and it held for a bit; the compressor ran very intermittently and again released some horrible smell.  I cut it off right away.

Because the compressor still turned, both then and later by hand, I assumed it wasn't shot, but that the A/C clutch had burned up.  The shop I took the truck to said it took so much labor to replace, it wasn't worth it - just replace the compressor and essentially rebuild the A/C system (new dryer, expansion, o-rings etc.).  Just under $1000 total.  Yuck-O.

A survey of the internet yielded this link:
http://www.yotatech.com/f2/c-blowing-fuses-what-could-214151/
I found just enough good ideas there to believe replacing the clutch was something I could manage.  I found a replacement clutch on ebay for just less than $70.  If this worked...pretty big savings.

So I started taking things off the car.  Loosened all the belts first, then took off the shroud and fan/fan-clutch to make space.  Also dropped the steering damper to make some space below, and removed a little cover in the front passenger wheel-well to get access to the compressor bolts.  Space is super tight, but between using wrenches and a u-joint adapter with some creative extensions, all the bolts came loose.  The compressor could be moved around quite a bit, enough for access, even still connected to the refrigerant lines.

The clutch is supposed to come apart like this:

(Note that clicking on an image should yield a bigger version.)

The bolt at the front was the first pain - the compressor wanted to turn.  I was finally able to hold the middle bit (88403 in the diagram) with some pliers and a wrap of nylon cord and get the bolt loose - it loosens the normal way (at first I was worried it might be reverse thread - it isn't).  The front piece came off easily.

The pulley is held in by a snap ring, which wasn't easy to get out in tight quarters, but I eventually pried it free.  The pulley, however, was still totally German-stuck (gutenstuk).  I needed a close-quarters pulley-puller.

I rolled my own from a 3/4" section of square aluminum channel, a T-nut, bolt with some normal nuts, and a couple c-clamps as shown:

I drilled a hole through the channel and hot-glued the T-nut in place in the hole.  The bolt was a 5/16"-18, and the two nuts tightened against each other at the end of the bolt made something flat to push up against the shaft of the compressor with.

The puller worked like a charm.  Here it is in place to start:

Soon the pulley was sliding free...note the gap forming behind the pulley:

As seen in the exploded diagram, there is another pain-in-the-ass snap ring to remove after the pulley is off; the coil then pulls easily off the shaft.  Below are the A/C clutch parts, removed; on the right is the guilty fellow - yeah, I think that coil is shot...

Next: replacement with the new parts!

The parable of the store owner

Once there was a gang of children tormenting the owner of a convenience store. The gang leader ridiculed the owner for years while his gang allegedly lifted candybars; tales of their accomplishments abounded on every street corner and playground, and children widely regarded the gang and it's leader among the "greatest of all time".  Naturally everyone assumed the leader must have also taken some candy too, and says so, but he claims he never ever did.  There was no security system to prove the leader took anything, the only proof ever offered are the boasts to one another among a gang of children.  That, and over time, many other members of the gang are actually caught red-handed lying and stealing candy at stores around the area.

So, many years later, the former gang leader has grown up - he's rich, successful, and a benevolent supporter of many laudable causes.  Members of the gang have scattered - some never amounted to anything, but many went on to become successful in their own rights, a few even own their own stores now.  No one in the gang has lifted anything for quite awhile.

But that old store owner has not forgotten the old days.  He looks at the success of the former gang leader, and the nice stores owned by a few former gang members, and thinks everyday, "That guy made fun of me, they stole from me!" and won't let it lie.  So after years of chasing windmills, he finally "convinces" some of the down-and-out former gang members to say, on record, that they KNOW the leader took some candy too back-in-the-day.  Many law enforcement agencies look at the case and decide pursuit of the old gang is not worth their time, but finally a regulatory agency in charge limiting widespread shoplifting takes up the case, and it's decided that a small (and possibly biased) jury will arbitrarily decide, based solely on hearsay and innuendo from these former gang members, if any candy was ever taken by the gang leader.  The panel has no substantial legal or enforcement power, but their ruling might at least highly embarrass the former gang leader.

The store owner spends a LOT of money convincing the public to listen to known thieves and liars to begin with, and unearths boxes of evidence; some that may be summed up simply as circumstantial, and some quite serious.  Nevertheless, in the end, the amount of money spent by the owner could have bought multiple security systems for his and others stores, and effectively prevented any further shoplifting.  Instead, the owner used the money to endlessly pursue the defamation of the gang leader.

Finally, the jury releases their decision - they found that the gang leader had indeed taken some candy bars.  He was fined the value of a handful of candybars and told he could never publicly claim to be the "greatest of all time" again.  No matter the ruling, the leader continued to claim his innocence since there was no legally binding concrete proof of any wrongdoing.  His wealth and fame declined a little, but he maintained his public good deeds as before and continued to enjoy much public support.  The ruling meant little, as many of the public privately felt all along he must have taken some candybars along the way, so at this point the public essentially let it go, and most continued to believe he was among the greatest of all time.  He obviously had not always taken candy, and he must not have taken very much, or he would have been caught like his accusers.  After all, he was the leader!  Everyone was watching him like a hawk the moment he entered any store...it just was not possible that he could have snatched much candy, no matter what those other guys were saying.  They must just be jealous.

Many new gangs have come and gone, and the store owner, on the other hand, lost candybars furiously for decades, and continues to do so.  Still, he smiles and foolishly claims victory and believes that by disparaging one alleged shoplifter from 20 years past, no one is currently shoplifting.