Dad's Day
The Curmudgeon ended up having an excellent Father's Day, including catching up with his dad, watching the amazing finish to the U.S. Open with his brother, hanging out with friends by their pool, chowing down on Mrs. Curmudgeon's excellent lemon pound cake and getting a nifty new watch from the kids (with a little help from their mom).
Hope all you other dads had as good a day!
GOP Effort to Gut State Laws Protecting YOU Against Identity Theft
As just about everyone knows now, identity theft is running rampant. As we reported here recently, one reason is that the financial services industry really just doesn't give a darn! How else can you explain a system under which all someone needs to steal your identity is your social security number? If the banks etc. wanted a better system, they could easily implement one--but it might cost THEM money.
So what are our good friends in Congress doing about this? As usual, they're shilling for the Big Banks that created the problem in the first place.
Here's what's up: so far, 23 states have passed "security freeze" laws that allow consumers to prevent anyone from issuing credit in their name indefinitely, regardless of whether ID theft is suspected. (Virginia ain't one of them.) Several other states allow such a freeze only to ID theft victims.
In addition, a growing number of states are passing laws forcing businesses to alert consumers about potential data losses. If a consumer knows his or her data is potentially compromised, he/she can take steps with credit agencies to prevent fraud.
And that's where our helpful GOP Congressmen (and quite a few Democratic allies, unfortunately) come in. Why surely, you say, they are also taking steps to help prevent this rampant fraud from spreading, aren't they?
Nope, far from it. The House Financial Services Committee recently approved a bill--sponsored, of course, by the major financial institutions who are large benefactors of the GOP--that would preempt the state laws referenced above. Of course, like all bad laws passed by Congress, this law has a deceptive title: the "Financial Data Protection Act" (HR 3997).
It ought to be called the "Cover the Banks' Behinds Act." The law would exempt companies from alerting consumers about data thefts or losses unless the company knows the loss places the consumer at a direct risk of identity theft. In other words, a complete cop-out!
Furthermore, the House bill would limit credit freezes to only those who are already victims of ID theft. In other words, you get no help until you've already been victimized. It's a bit like saying the police will no longer try to prevent crimes before they happen!
Stronger state laws would be "preempted"--meaning the weaker federal legislation would prevail.
Of course, you can bet that, behind the scenes, there are huge campaign contributions being made to a few key members of the House Financial Services Committee--Chaired by Ohio Republican Michael Oxley--as well as furious lobbying by well-heeled GOP connected K Street firms, all working to screw you, the consumer, so the banks don't have to do anything.
Weather Curmudgeon:
Yesterday's 10 day forecast: Hi 85, scattered T-storms, 60% rain. Rating: N
Yesterday's 5 day forecast: Hi 93, partly cloudy, 20% rain. Rating Y
Yesterday's actual weather: Hi 93, mostly sunny, no rain.
The 10 day forecast was way off, the five day forecast was right on the money.
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Today's 10 day forecast: Hi 86, mostly cloudy, 10% rain. Rating: N
Today's 5 day forecast: Hi 90, partly cloudy, 20% rain. Rating: N
Today's actual weather: Hi 89, brief, intense thundershower.
Both forecasts missed the thunderstorm, which at least brought much needed rain!
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2 comments:
XC,
How are you judging accuracy of these forecasts? The 5 day predicted 90, Partly cloudy, and 20% chance of rain. That seemed right to me. It was on and off sun, followed by a thunderstorm, which a 20% chance of rain with 90 degrees implies pretty obviously.
I'm not sure what standard you're using here, but if I saw 90 and a 20% chance, I think I would expect a chance of an afternoon thunderstorm.
The question we asked ourselves of the long range forecast is this: is it useful for planning our activities in advance. For example, could we use the long range forecast to decide what day of the week to play golf, go fishing or do some other outdoor activity between 1-6 pm.
Based on that, we decided that if the forecast calls for less than a 50% chance of rain, we would assume it's a good day for an afternoon outdoor activity; conversely, if the forecast is for 50% or greater chance of rain, we would avoid scheduling an outdoor activity. Admittedly, this is arbitrary, especially on days with a 40% chance of rain, which we generally regard as meaning there's a "decent chance" of a shower or thundershower.
But we believe the 50% line is a good test of the forecast as a planning tool.
As to your observation about a 20% chance of rain, that's hardly useful--during Spring and Summer in the Washington, D.C. area the National Weather Service forecasts at least a 20% chance of rain nearly 80% of the time, so it does not help figure out the days when a thunderstorm is most likely.
(For example, today's TWC 10-day forecast has a 20% chance of rain 2 days, 30% on 3 days, 40% on 2 days and 60% on 3 days.)
Yesterday, a weak frontal boundary passed through, which on a hot, humid day here is very likely to trigger off a sustained line of thunderstorms in the afternoon. That's just what happened yesterday--we didn't have widely scattered isolated showers. The NWS forecast yesterday morning accurately called for a 60% chance of rain. Unfortunately, just one day earlier, it was for only a 20% chance of rain.
In the end, we read "20% chance of rain" as meaning "not likely to rain," but with a hedge for the occasional isolated shower that can pop up anytime in the summer.
The good news is that short range forecasts--24-48 hours out--have gotten remarkably accurate in recent years.
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