The hearing is now on-line (I’m at the 55:18 mark; Maxine Waters is at the 2:10:20 mark), as is my written testimony.
Things I should’ve said: that a dictator did a good job in the past hardly means that a dictatorship is a good idea, even if you can reappoint the same dictator. But one can be dumbfounded by the stupidity of some questions.
One Comment
I was talking with a colleague some years ago about my interest in how people know what they know, and how they have certainty. The fellow said that he was absolutely certain about one thing. I asked him what is was. “Jesus loves me” he answered.
Work on the towers after 9/11 was done in the open air, which air continuously refreshed itself. The dust from the pile was almost all plain dust. There is no rational reason to suspect that anyone became ill from the air. Cigarette smoking has an effect when people inhale smoke from pack a day habits – or two or three packs – over many years. The pile was removed in just a few months. Yet the doctor at the hearing spoke of exposures in a way that left out magnitude of exposure. In effect he equated breathing of the extremely diluted dust from the towers to years of underground coal mining. His testimony was moronic. But everybody conceded that there are victims from the exposure. It is as much a religious belief as is the belief in the love of Jesus.
You will often get the question of “how can you put a price on human life or health” although people who ask this question will settle for a large enough sum. Another colleague ask this question of me. I then asked him if he ever exceeded the speed limit. One can back calculate a value of human life by equating the increased expectation of life lost to the value of time saved. He did not answer my point. I found out later that he was one of the most aggressive divers in the world.
I believe that Ted Frank did about as well as anyone could at the hearing. Good job, Ted.