Should You Buy an Electric Car?

Random Thoughts on Electric Cars

"Tesla unveiled its new Model 3 sedans, starting at $35,000, in a ceremony on Friday night [July 28] on the grounds of its sprawling assembly plant and research facility outside San Francisco.

-- Bill Vlasic, "In Pivotal Moment, Tesla Unveils Its First Mass-Market Sedan," New York Times, July 30, 2017, p. A1

Reading the Times story about Tesla's ceremony and first "sale" (to employees) of 30 Tesla Model 3 electric cars, my thoughts accelerated back to my first experience driving an electric car a couple years ago. [Photo credit: Tesla Motors.]

It wasn't a Tesla. It was a Nissan Leaf. I wanted to experience driving an electric car more than I wanted to buy one -- although that was both a possibility and the dealer's wish.

It was a very nice driving experience. There was no reason not to have one because of that drive.

Ultimately, analysis led me to conclude that although it might make no sense for my wife and me, I could imagine people for whom an electric car could be a wise purchase.

Meanwhile, here are some other random thoughts as well.

Environmental impact. Face it, the only forms of transportation that come close to environmental purity would be: walking, bicycling, horseback riding, moving through the air in a glider, or over water with a sailboat.

The operation of an all-electric vehicle may have substantially less adverse environmental impact than operating an internal combustion engine. But if the electricity came from a coal-fired power plant, and a lot of electricity was lost while in transit to your community, the difference is less dramatic.

Then there's the batteries -- a lot of batteries -- the China-controlled rare earth elements it takes to make them, and what happens to them in landfills when they need be replaced. ("Most electric car batteries use lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxide (NMC) cathodes and graphite anodes. 'Rare earth' metals dysprosium, neodymium and terbium, chiefly mined in China . . . are used in some electronic components of the motor." The Electric Car Revolution Is Making These Investors Very Optimistic," Reuters/Fortune, October 4, 2016.)

Convenience. However wonderful the act of driving an electric car may be, there are limits to how far and where you can drive one.

Gasoline filing stations are everywhere -- except in the dead of night in sparsely populated areas of the country. Charging stations for electric cars are not (yet) as available.

At this time, few would want to set off on a cross-country trip in an electric. Even with a probable range "up to" (as the cable companies say about megabits per second) 100 to 200 miles (depending on the make/model), to avoid being stranded without a sufficient charge you would want to allow margins of error when starting out on more than short trips around town.

And instead of filling your tank with gas every week or so, building a home charging station, and going through the routine of starting the charging process every night, would approximate the ever-present obligation of a dairy farmer to milk the cows every evening.

Buy or lease? For me, cars are just transportation, not collectors' items or bragging rights. As long as a car is reliable and safe, I've never cared how old it was or what it looked like. So I've never before calculated the comparative benefits of buying or leasing new cars.

But when considering the Leaf, my initial analysis was that leasing would make the most sense.

Why? Internal combustion engines, properly maintained and worked on, can operate for 250,000 miles or more. There are ways to extend (or curtail) the life of batteries, but they will need to be replaced at some point -- life and price data are not yet definitive, but five years and $5000 might be examples. "[B]attery replacement costs is one of three key considerations why 57 percent of Americans cited in a USA Today/Gallup Poll say they wouldn’t buy an EV." Jim Motavalli, "Replacing EV Batterries: Your Costs Will Vary," PlugInCars.com, June 19, 2012.

Of course, that was five years ago. The technology, and pricing, are still evolving.

It's hard to compare the cost of buying with leasing because there are so many variables. But the financial differences are usually not wildly dramatic.

Bottom line: leasing means you'll always have the latest of the rapidly evolving technology, have some additional guarantees and servicing from the dealer, and never need to spend thousands of dollars on a fresh set of batteries.

Borrowing from the TV pharmaceutical commercials,"Ask your doctor if an electric car might be right for you." So what made me decide to forgo the fun of leasing an electric car?

(1) Little or no need for any car. My wife and I are retired and live in Iowa City, Iowa -- which I sometimes refer to as a "toy town." The law school is a three-or-four-block walk from home. One of the nation's largest research hospitals is closer still. The Big-10 football in Kinnick Stadium is one block further. The dental school maybe three blocks beyond that. Going "to town" is almost exactly one mile, a 15 or 20-minute walk (often quicker than the total time, including parking, to use a car). I mostly get around by bicycle and walking. We already have one car each that mostly sit in the driveway, both old and purchased used.

(2) Need for internal combustion car. We would still need a car capable of distances beyond the range of an electric -- not only for cross-country trips, but for much of our travel within the state, or for two-day trips to places without charging stations.

(3) In order for the lease to make any kind of economic sense for us it would need to be driven distances as close as possible to the maximum permitted under the lease agreement (before there are additional per-mile charges). I was not sure that even using it for all of our around-town driving would come anywhere close to that.

"You began by saying, 'I could imagine people for whom an electric car could be a wise purchase.' So, whom might they be?"

I'm not thinking of those who say, "If you have to ask the price you can't afford it;" the people for whom "money is no object." They can buy any electric they want, regardless of how much they use it, run around in it for six weeks or six months, or until their name comes up on Tesla's backlog list of 500,000 potential buyers who've paid $1000 each to stand in line -- at which point they can give the first electric car to one of their kids.

No, here's who I had in mind. A young couple, with or without kids, both of whom have steady jobs that require daily commutes. They are wealthy enough to buy new cars, but not wealthy enough to consider a $100,000 Tesla.

One of those commutes is, say, 60 miles a day (round trip), or other distance well within the car's range on a full charge (so as to avoid any risk of being stranded). If that was not enough to approach the maximum allowed mileage under the lease, the electric could also be the car of choice for any running around town.

The closer the leased electric could get to that maximum mileage the more economic sense it would make to have the car. (Of course, like most electrics owners, they would need to build a charging station in their garage and remember to charge the car every evening.)

Their other car, new or used, could be a fuel efficient gasoline car. It would be used for the other partner's daily commute, any cross-country (or local) trips beyond the range of the electric, and for local errands once the electric had reached its budgeted monthly mileage.

And that's what I think about electric cars.

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Thinking About War -- Before Starting One

March 20, 2013, 8:00 a.m.

Iraq: What Were We Thinking? We Weren't Thinking
This week marks the tenth anniversary of our ill-considered, ill-fated, unprovoked, unproductive, super-deadly, super-expensive, preemptive war of choice in Iraq.

Remember the lines from the Viet Nam War song, "War. What's it good for? Absolutely nothing"? (If not, click the link and read them.)

Unfortunately, the Iraq War was "good for" considerably more than "absolutely nothing." In addition to the hostility we created among Iraqis and throughout the Muslim world, thereby accelerating the recruitment efforts of al Qaeda, the destabilization of the Middle East, the tens of thousands of dead and disabled men, women and children, disrupted families and businesses, orphaned children, billions of property damage, and destruction of centuries old cultural artifacts from this "cradle of civilization," there is also the addition of some $2 trillion to our nation's mounting gift of debt to our grandchildren (after we've properly paid our wounded and surviving veterans for the rest of their lives). [Photo credit: multiple sources.]

Among all the regrets over which we should be grieving this week of remembrance, is that all of these consequences not only could have been predicted, they were predicted.

Although as Maritime Administrator I played some role with regard to sealift to Viet Nam, I claim no expertise in matters of war strategy. I have never been a member of the Staff to the Joints Chiefs of Staff, a member of the faculty of any of our war colleges, nor an author of any of "The Pentagon Papers."

My point is not that my early insights are evidence of my brilliance. Indeed, quite the opposite. My point, my question, is if these questions were so obvious to me, with no expertise in the strategy of war, or responsibility for launching an Iraq War of choice, why were they not even more obvious to those who had that expertise and responsibility? And if there were those within government who shared these concerns, as I assume there must have been, why were they rebuffed or overruled by their superiors?

Anyhow, here on this tenth anniversary, as we mourn their decision, is a republication of a column I wrote ten years ago:

Ten Questions for Bush Before War
Nicholas Johnson
The Daily Iowan, Guest Opinion
February 4, 2003, p. A6
As a university community we don’t just “support” or “oppose” the war in Iraq. We value data and reasoned analysis. We ask questions.

Put aside the nukes in North Korea. Put aside the emotionally charged arguments. Not that they’re irrelevant. But just consider these 10 questions you might want to ask your public officials, academic colleagues, any presidential candidates you happen upon – and yourself.

1. Al Qaeda is alive and well, just over the Afghanistan border and in 60 countries. Why start a new war before resolving the last? How is "homeland security" improved by diverting focus from Al Qaeda?

2. Global Muslim support is essential to a successful war on terrorism. Threatening war with Iraq increases Muslims’ hatred – and terrorists’ recruiting. What benefits from war in Iraq exceed the costs of increased terrorism here?

3. Iraq war or not, our arrogant, go-it-alone saber-rattling has squandered valuable post-9/11 global good will. Our worldwide economic, democratic, military and human rights efforts require allies. How does alienating them serve our national interest?

4. President Bush says Saddam might use weapons of mass destruction. The President may be wrong; but especially if he's right, why fail to heed the CIA's warning: Saddam's most likely to do so only if attacked?

5. The administration’s inherited budget surpluses have become deep deficits. War with Iraq adds billions to our grandchildren’s national debt. Why abandon our relatively low-cost policy of containment? Why now? And, if so, why not increase taxes to pay as we go?

6. The Administration’s policy of global military domination and preemptive wars reverses 200 years of American policy, violates international law, the UN Charter, NATO Treaty, and possibly the U.S. Constitution. China could use the theory to justify attacking Taiwan. How is national security improved by setting back 50 years of progress in international relations?

7. Once the dogs of war are unleashed, there’s no controlling where they go. If we let the dogs out, minimally we lose Middle East stability. Worst case, we start World War III. How does risking either serve our interests?

8. What’s “war” in a city? We can level Baghdad, as we did Dresden and Hiroshima. That’s lots of “collateral damage.” We can send in ground troops. But even a weakened Hitler was able to kill the 10,000 Russian soldiers who tried that strategy in Berlin. What military strategy makes a Baghdad war “winnable” – with acceptable levels of civilian and U.S. casualties?

9. Assume the improbable: a war that’s quick, cheap, decisive and contained. What then? Why will Saddam’s successor be better? How can he prevent civil war among Iraq’s factions, let alone Middle East chaos? Our man in Afghanistan is still under attack even in Kabul. Why will our man in Baghdad do better? What will it cost us to rebuild Iraq? Will we keep bases there forever? Or will we abandon Iraq for wars elsewhere – as we’ve done in Afghanistan?

10. Iraq sits atop the world’s second largest oil reserves. How much of this proposed war is about oil? How will U.S. occupation of Iraq affect the interests of U.S. oil companies -- and consumers? Which campaign contributors profit from this war?

Washington hasn’t, yet, provided satisfactory (to me) answers to these and other questions. Maybe we can find them in Iowa City.

As it happens, the lessons from this disaster go far beyond governmental decisions about war, and the consequences for Defense Department appropriations and their impact on our national debt.

"What were you thinking?" we sometimes wonder about (or ask) teenagers. Occasionally, we're even wise enough to put that question to ourselves. And the most honest response is often, as with our War in Iraq, "We weren't thinking."

Although the questions are different, decisions regarding our choice of career, college, spouse or partner, apartment or house, automobile, entrepreneurial business, exercise regime, hobbies and volunteer activity, and more, are also subject to a similar kind of rational, analytical thinking our government should have used before going to war in Iraq -- even if the consequences for getting it wrong are far greater from war than from our personal failures to think before acting.

The Small Business Administration reports that a full 50% of all new businesses fail sometime within five years. At least one of the reasons why, perhaps the most important reason, is the failure to take seriously the necessity of a "business plan" and the thinking that goes into it -- including the failure to use what the Small Business Administration makes available for free to all budding entrepreneurs as the step-by-step instructions for creating such a plan.

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For my additional pre-war thinking in columns throughout 2002, see

Nicholas Johnson, "Search for Better Response Than War; Don't Reward the Terrorists, but Understand Their Interests," Des Moines Sunday Register Opinion/Iowa View, June 30, 2002, p. OP3;

Nicholas Johnson, "Let's not get between Iraq and a hard place," Omaha World-Herald, August 13, 2002 (and as published in the Iowa City Press-Citizen and as submitted to both);

Nicholas Johnson, "On Iraq, Tell the Rest of the Story," Iowa City Gazette, October 2, 2002, p. A4;

Nicholas Johnson, "Capitalists Can Help U.S. Avert War with Iraq," Iowa City Press-Citizen, Sunday Insight, October 6, 2002, p. A11;

and the March 2002 lecture, Nicholas Johnson, "Rethinking Terrorism," National Lawyers Guild Conference, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, March 2, 2002.

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Wellmark, Mason and "The Issue"

July 21, 2007, 11:10 a.m., 1:15 p.m.

What Wellmark Buildings Cost; President Mason's Revelation; Spotting the Issues

Your Health Insurance Dollars at Work
How much is Wellmark willing to pay to have a building on which it can hang its name? The company has already bought a number of parcels of land around Des Moines at prices ranging from $124,000 to $283,000 an acre -- a total of over $11 million for 66 acres. It's now paying architects an undisclosed sum to design buildings on each of four possible locations -- because it can't yet decide which it wants to actually use. (The other parcels will be kept as an "investment." Whaaa?! This profit-maximizing "non-profit" health-coverage-denying insurance company is investing in Des Moines real estate?) It's willing to admit the cost of this building will run at least $100 million. Kind of puts its offer to name the UI College of Public Health after itself for a mere $15 million in perspective, doesn't it? (Note to self: Go watch "Sicko" again.)

S.P. Dinnen, "Wellmark acquires more land in W.D.M.; Insurer has not decided whether to stay in downtown D.M. or move," Des Moines Register, July 21, 2007

I came upon another story, more directly related to the UI college naming controversy, that takes on significance not so much for what it reports -- by now familiar to readers of this blog -- but for where it appears. "University of Iowa Considers Naming Health College After Wellmark," July 18, 2007. Where was the story? In the online version of the Insurance Journal. I wasn't formerly aware of this publication, but intuition tells me it's probably written and read by those in the insurance business. And the remarkable thing was that those (presumably insurance industry executives and employees) who commented about the story were almost as universally aghast at the prospect of naming a health college after a health insurance company as Wellmark's most severe critics on the UI campus.

It was reminiscent of the "Optiva" naming controversy, when I discovered that there is an industry of folks who are paid big bucks to come up with "branding" names for corporations -- and that their own blogs and Web sites were almost universally critical of the UICCU's choice of the "Optiva" name (for which one of their colleagues had been very well paid).

Meanwhile, while editorially endorsing health care for kids -- something I've long advocated as what one would hope would be a politically viable start on health care for Americans -- the Register notes for the program's critics that we already have a goodly number of government health care programs (all told, covering 100 million Americans). It notes, in passing, the desirability of what most would call the "universal, single-payer" coverage that Michael Moore's film "Sicko" leaves one advocating and that Congressman Dennis Kucinich has put into draft legislation (although the Register's editorial doesn't use the phrase or mention Moore or Kucinich by name). (As Kucinich says, "I don't want every American to have health insurance, I want every American to have health care.") Editorial, "Push Ahead for Expanding Health Coverage for Children," Des Moines Register, July 20, 2007.

And see Maria Houser Conzemius, "So It IS Accept Gift or Get Fired," Open Country blog, July 18, 2007

President Sally Mason's Revelation
The Gazette ran the following brief bit in its far left column on page B1 this morning -- here in its entirety:

Incoming UI president monitors Wellmark talks

Incoming University of Iowa President Sally Mason said she will continue to monitor discussion of a possible $15 million naming gift from the Wellmark Foundation to the College of Public Health.

In a statement to reporters Friday, Mason said, "The issue of naming our colleges is a vital one that deserves a full and respectful discussion so that we can determine collectively what’s best for the University of Iowa, the College of Public Health, and the donors who are so important to our continued success."

The public health faculty initially rejected the gift to name the college for Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield, leading Wellmark to withdraw the offer. But faculty met again this week and voted to consider the gift.
It would be one of the first instances nationally of a college being named for a corporation.

(Why this was not picked up by the Register and Press-Citizen I don't know.) The "revelation"? The first display of something of President Mason's administrative style, to which I referred yesterday as presenting her with a dilemma. (If she weighs in with personal decisions on pending issues she looks like an authoritarian and insensitive elephant in the china shop, showing little respect for stakeholders and past customs. If she passes every issue off to others she looks wimpish or like someone's puppet.)

As I predicted she would, she's demonstrated she's perfectly capable of dealing with the dilemma. Like the response of U.S. presidents, who are "following" and "receiving regular briefings" on some issue, she is "monitoring" the situation. And what's she proposing to do about it? Wisely: "full and respectful discussion so that we can determine collectively what’s best."

Well done. Home run first time at bat. Watch out Barry Bonds.

Spotting the Issue
Precision in the use of language is crucial in making wise decisions. A corporation has to address, and express precisely, "What business are we really in?" A research scientist knows it's often more difficult to frame the question than to find the answer. In personal life, asking impossibly vague questions such as whether one is "successful" or "popular" or "rich" is more likely to lead to demoralization than answers. Coming up with the most appropriate measures in establishing John Carver's "ends policies" or a management information reporting system is hard work. How a doctor phrases a diagnostic question to a patient may end up being literally a matter of life or death.

In law school we speak of "spotting the issue." No matter how good your legal theory may be, no matter how much of a slam dunk your winning case appears on the surface in your brief, if you fail to "spot the issue" regarding a statute of limitations that has already run you will lose not only the case but a client, your professional reputation, and in some instances your license to practice.

And so it is with what President Mason has called "the issue of naming our colleges."

How we phrase the issue will have everything to do with the answers that emerge from our "full and respectful discussion."

For example, is it the "naming" or is it the money?

Recently the Press-Citizen editorialized that while hanging a corporate name on the UI College of Public Health would be unacceptable, a $15 million genuine "gift" from Wellmark would be OK. Today it acknowledges, as I have argued earlier in this blog, that "The Wellmark gift now should not be accepted under any circumstances . . .." Editorial, "University Should Focus on Its Future," Iowa City Press-Citizen, July 21, 2007, p. A16. (This lengthy, historical, factual, helpful and well-written editorial is, not incidentally, well worth reading -- as is Jeff Charis-Carlson's beautiful and brilliant "Bringing Poems from Guantanamo to Iowa.")

As I wrote at the time, it seems to me that the matter of naming -- as offensive as it may be to some -- is but a subsidiary issue to the acceptance of the money. It is the acceptance of corporate money that creates the actual, or appearance of, conflict of interest. This is true whether it is an anonymous gift with no strings, results in the company name being incorporated in the name of the institution or building, or the gift becomes the subject of a year-long national TV advertising campaign by the donor. The naming simply advertises one's embarrassment, one's willingness to trade ethical purity for dollars. What is being advertised, the cause of that embarrassment, is the acceptance of the money.

Consider the matter of bribes to elected officials -- called "campaign contributions." Some critics have proposed requiring candidates to wear corporate logos on their suits, revealing and advertising the sources of their campaign funding, just as NASCAR drivers do with their suits and on their cars. In this context as well, the problem is not with the candidate's wearing -- or not -- the corporate logo, the problem comes from he or she having accepted the money.

Or is the most useful issue more broadly stated?

Matters of major university policy are often triggered by specific cases or events -- campus security by Virginia Tech, or the sale of college names by the Wellmark naming controversy. While that makes one kind of public relations sense (you appear to be "doing something" after an event in the media, and thus in the public consciousness), it is as they say, "one hell of a way to run a railroad."

One of the consequences of a rational governance system (which in my view the Regents and university administrators do not yet have in place) is that such obvious policy issues as campus security and corporate ties are identified and time is invested in addressing them in advance, proactively, rather than wasting time in the fruitless task of locking all the barn doors while watching the rear end of a herd of horses fading into a dust cloud in the distance.

What is the most appropriate and constructive way of phrasing the issue -- or at least, for starters, what are our options?

Most narrowly, it is what to do about the Wellmark money-for-naming-rights offer, if it is still available. Is "The Wellmark Blue Cross Blue Shield College of Public Health" unacceptable, but "The Wellmark College of Public Health" is OK?

[Speaking of which, when President Mason, Iowa's Regents and other higher education stakeholders get to figuring out what they want their "marketplace" naming policy to be I hope they'll get some data and advice from advertising agency executives.

Whether or not to sell one's soul to the Devil is a a question of one's own sense of ethics, morality and other values. Having decided to put them on eBay, however; once you have decided that, to borrow from George Bernard Shaw, "We have already ascertained what you are, madam," and with the moral issues behind you, it is time to do some hard driving "haggling over price" to get the greatest possible amount of money for the University of Iowa -- or, if that seems offensively extreme, at least a fair market price.

Advertising -- which is what college and building naming really is -- is normally sold by unit time. How many days does your classified ad run? How many commercials over what period of time are you buying? How many weeks or months do you have claim to that billboard space for your message?

A 30-second TV commercial during the Superbowl game costs as much as $1 to 2 million dollars. It lasts 30 seconds. It doesn't flash on your screen every time you turn on your TV set for the rest of your life. After 30 seconds it's gone, forever, poof.

Naming a building for -- how long? The life of he building? The life of the building plus its replacement? -- should be some multiple of what a corporation would pay to hang its ad on the building for a day, a month, or a year. It should, at a minimum, reflect going rates for billboards -- multiplied by the good will value of associating its name with a prestigious university rather than just a billboard advertising firm -- especially when it is the naming of colleges that is being sold.

Moreover, it's not just a billboard. It's a media mention every time the college, or building, is in the news -- graduations, announcements of new faculty appointments, receipt of grants, publications, the presentation of lectures, discoveries from research, conferences held, and so forth. It's on every piece of promotional literature, every letter on college stationery, every degree hanging on an alum's wall. Each of these should also be figured into the price -- because they all have a marketplace value.]

More generally, what should be our college corporate naming policies generally -- Wellmark aside? Beyond that, what about the corporate naming of other things -- buildings, rooms, "chairs" for professors -- or in an auditorium?

Naming, aside, what about the acceptance of corporate funding generally? To the extent there is a concern about a conflict of interest, or the possibility of a perception that research results might be manipulated to favor a donor, is that only a problem when there is a relationship between the donor and the recipient (as with a Wellmark genuine gift to a College of Public Health -- say, without naming rights), or would it be a problem even if there was no such direct relationship so long as there was a university unit somewhere that was related to the donor (say, a Wellmark gift to the College of Engineering -- or such a gift in exchange for naming it "The Wellmark College of Engineering") but no statistically significant relationship between the donor and the recipient university unit?

What about a gift from a corporation with which the University does business, and is therefore in a quasi-adversarial relationship in negotiating payments for goods or services -- such as Wellmark?

What about the granting of monopoly rights to a corporation to the exclusion of its competitors -- such as the UI contract with Coca Cola -- or profiting from relationships with any corporation pushing products to UI students that are not necessarily in their best interest (e.g., foods contributing to obesity, credit cards with onerous terms or student loans providing kick-backs to the University)?

What about providing a service to a given corporation which, while it has some slight societal benefit and research/academic elements, primarily benefits a single corporation's bottom line -- such as clinical trials of copycat pharmaceutical products?

More generally, should our corporate relations policies include an evaluation of the ethics and morality of the firm (and if so by whose standards)? Should the law school refuse to permit law firms to interview in the law school once they have had a given number of sexual harassment claims, or disbarment of partners? Would it be OK to name the College of Public Health the "Wellmark Foundation College of Public Health" but not OK to name the University the "Hustler Magazine Foundation University"? Would it be somehow better to contract with fruit and vegetable juice vending machine companies than sugared soft drink companies? Should the UI's endowment fund investments take into account various measures of corporations' "social responsibility"? Ditto for purchase of clothing with various UI logos? Is there a decisional distinction between accepting advertising from a gambling casino (over the protests of the NCAA) and, say, Adventureland?

Sure, we want to provide community service, we need to interact with and provide measurable benefits to the people of Iowa, but do we want to draw a distinction between that which benefits people generally and that which primarily benefits "economic growth" by increasing the profits of a given company?

Does the college make a difference? For example, are there corporate relationships that would be appropriate for the College of Business that would be inappropriate for the English Department -- or do the ethical issues actually cut the other way? Ditto for, say, the College of Law providing the mandated Continuing Legal Education programs for Iowa's lawyers -- or any UI college providing a training program in response to a given corporation's expressed need for future employees with corporation-specific knowledge and skills (as distinguished from, for example, just more "science and math").

Do we want to continue to operate a "non-commercial" radio station with funding (and program interruptions) from commercials? (After all, the call letters "WSUI" were acquired by the University in the early 1920s when they stood for what was then the "State University of Iowa," or "SUI.")

Maybe we don't want to get into all of these related issues. But we might at least want to consider, before rejecting the idea out of hand, the possible benefits of doing so.

Because the underlying, fundamental issue -- one that is going to continue to arise in hundreds of contexts over the years ahead -- is the extent to which we either want to continue to encourage or to resist, the rapid transition from an academy pursuing knowledge to one pursuing wealth, from a focus on "we" to "me," from a "Great Society" of social programs for all to a privatized and corporatized profit-maximizing marketplace primarily benefiting the wealthy few, from the values of education and culture to those of conspicuous consumption and hedonism, from a nation that mixes corporatized services with socialized schools, libraries, parks, police, fire protection and armies to one in which all is for-profit and for sale, from one in which many decisions are still made on Main Street to one in which all decisions are made on Wall Street.

That is the "full and respectful discussion" I think we first need. Out of that discussion the policies will flow with relative ease -- whatever our preferences may end up dictating they should be.

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