Welcome, Low IQ People!

I just received a phone call from a corporation - they had a problem with a calculation. I solved it with excel in no time. They gave me five hundred. Since childhood I receive these presents for nothing, for helping a fellow student for an exam, for translating a page from an unusual language, for solving some banal calculation, for helping the President of the University with a speech, for writing a learned rebuttal to an ignorant regulator. More dumb people make my life easier. More dumb blondies ... ("deep sigh")  … would make my life … (complete the sentence). 

Newark's Water Poisoned with Lead

Mayor Ras J. Baraka wrote a letter to Donald Trump, urging the president to ditch his potential plan to fund his long-sought border wall with emergency funds and instead send some of that money to Newark to replace faulty lead lines that are leaking ‘dangerously high levels of lead’ into the city’s tap water,” The Root reported.

Newark is still in the process of fixing the corrosion control treatment process at the Pequannock plant, which is contributing to the elevated lead levels, said city spokesman Frank Baraff, adding that the city was expecting the levels would still be high during the latest monitoring period”.

It looks that the Flint Water Treatment Plant's failure in treating the water and the subsequent success in drawing Federal Emergency monies is being repeated. 


Newark is one of the oldest American settlements. Originally it was organized as a theocracy of Connecticut Puritans, but that was a long time ago. About 10% of the population is European, the rest is African. Talk about Jews replacing the natives. 

We are in War

We seem to be in an air war in Syria. They fired one missile forcing the closure the only ski facility in Israel. We reacted out of proportion and killed 12 soldiers of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard  stationed at Damascus Airport, and a bunch of Syrian soldiers. It is interesting that the recently received S-300 Russian antiair batteries were silent, only Soviet made AA fired. Probably the Russians do not allow the brutish fingers of the Syrians to touch these powerful equipment, to avoid accidents like the last month's felling of a passing Russian carrier.  The confrontation now is between Russian technology versus Israeli/Western technology .

In the Tel Aviv Palace of Justice

Two years ago I gave a written expert opinion on the flooding of a low laying shop. Wrote a short paper, took the money, paid 50% taxes, and forgot the whole business. Yet the Justice never forgets a thing and it grew till the judgment day arrived. Today. Who is responsible for the frequent flooding and sewage overflow? The Judge's own expert wrote that of course it was the occupant's duty to build a pumping station. I said that it was the Authority's legal responsibility to evacuate the sewage. The Judge went out to lunch and left us for half an hour. In this time the insurance woman and the lawyer of the flooded party achieved agreement, 80,000 shekels. When the Judge came back he dictated the conclusion and the problem was who shall pay the experts? Lots of technical discussion that I did not follow, but in the end the lawyer promised to send me the cheque.

The place is a an enormous Brutalist style building, massive cement blocks, some of them with impressed relief signs and mysterious signs (pic). It must have some meaning. I shall read it when I have time.

The Very Long Hand of American Justice

America is policing the world and imposing American morals on everybody. I applauded when a Brooklyn Justice forced Argentina to pay its debt - that was justice. But now America has demanded the arrest and extradition of a Huawei (Chinese) executive for … I don't know what, but certainly not for violating American laws. Probably they included a spy function in their chips. The Economist has noticed that banks and international corporations are increasingly afraid of American activism. In the past, American power was never exercised in such an open way. America promoted democracy, but now it is imposing its own idealist morals in the commercial world. America is following the model of England's international campaign against slavery of the 17th and 18th Centuries. I think it is a good thing. 

Israel Water Masterplan

How fast the time passes! Only twenty years ago I was working in the Water Authority and marginally involved in the preparation of the Israel Water Masterplan 2000 - 2020. That document has been forgotten by everybody and never updated or revised. The only good thing I can say about it that it was a Masterplan. Today we have none and no one is working on a new one. Another comment is that twenty years is nothing, a national Masterplan has to comprise at least fifty years. Singapur has mapped its future till 2060. Admirable!

Israeli Lunar Craft

The Chinese have a vehicle on the dark side of the moon. We too are sending a craft to the moon (left). Israel will be the fourth country with its flag "flapping" in the solar wind on the moon.

Nice, but I am losing lots of sheqels with the Israeli communication sector. The satellite company lost one in space and is broke. Bezeq, the phone company, is being liquidated. Tower, the chip fab, lost half of its worth in the last bear market.

If you ask me, the moon will not go away and the project could wait, but I need money now, here on Earth.