The critiques of American business and politics of the 1920′s applies just as much today as it did eighty years ago. Like those today struggling with real estate deflation and job losses, most people, and especially those who had the most influence and power, did not see the dangers until it was too late. One paragraph in his book neatly summarizes a lesson which 2000′s America has failed to learn:

“There was no single cause of the crash and the ensuing depression, but much of the responsibility for both falls on the foolhardy assumption that the special interests of business and the national interest were identical. The administration took the narrow interests of business groups to be the national interest, and the result was catastrophe.”

How can one read the above passage and not see the parallels between the Republican presidents of that time (Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover) and George W. Bush, and deny that their policies have brought another depression to our country? We are going to pay a heavy price for our failure to learn from history.

The book describes the bipartisan political climate of the 1960s when California was truly the Golden State, with a centrist government that was both progressive and business-friendly. The tumultous year of 1968 marked the end of Unruh’s speakership and also the beginning of California’s descent into partisan politics and gridlock that continues to this day.

It was written before 9/11 and Iraq. Though it predicted a challenge to American power, the challenge was not from nuclear-armed nations (India, Pakistan, China, North Korea) but from non-state groups like Al Qaeda and non-nuclear states like Syria and Iran. The latter theory is espoused at John Robbs’ Global Guerrillas.

Contrary to the books’ prediction, the nuclear powers in Asia (except North Korea) have interests that are not in direct conflict with those of the United States. The fear that Asian WMDs will be more likely used than Western WMDs will hopefully be proven false.

I finally read his book Hubbert’s Peak. The first six chapters are quite informative for engineers not familiar with the petroleum industry, though it may be too technical for most people. It describes the nature of oil – how it is formed, where it is found, and how it is extracted from the ground; nothing that would cause controversy. The interesting material are chapters 7 and 8, where the prediction is made using statistics and historical data. Hubbert’s 1956 paper correctly predicted US oil production for the next 40-45 years. Deffeyes’ prediction of a 2005 peak will be tested in the next 10 years. The book actually predicts a 2003-2006 peak, but that was narrowed in his next book Beyond Oil.

His rebuttal to those who say that high oil prices will increase production is simple – American oil exploration was at its highest during the 1930s, during the Great Depression when gas was less than 10 cents per gallon.

… if hypertext really becomes available, especially in the fancy versions now being talked about — where words, sounds, video, computer graphics, simulations, and more are all available at the touch of the screen — well, it is hard to imagine anyone capable of preparing the material. It will take teams of people. I predict that there will be much experimentation, and much failure, before the dimensions of this new technology are fully explored and understood.

In the next few pages, he describes the high cost of information storage and retrieval, totally missing the large investment made in Internet infrastructure that would occur during the dot-com boom of the late 90′s.

Windows is for Dummies, Linux is for the person that has loved you all your life.

I also managed to read half of Linus Torvalds’ Just For Fun. The best quote so far is in the extended entry. There is also a chapter where he takes on Steve Jobs and his RDF.

Now I may have to get his other books, especially The Visual Display of Quantiative Information. I’ve realized that the quality of my communications at work has been going downhill recently. I think a conscious effort to learn from Tufte’s comments will help me write and communicate better.

Linus Torvalds’ Just For Fun quote:

   ... he wasn't even the least bit interested in
   meeting the guy (Bill Gates). "There wouldn't
   be much of a connection point," he reasoned,
   "I'm completely uninterested in the thing that
   he's the best in the world at. I couldn't give him
   advice in business and he couldn't give me
   advice in technology."

How very true.