New appliances from Fisher & Paykel

New Zealand-based Fisher & Paykel released some new kitchen appliances recently and they have some interesting innovations. First out of the gate is this dish drawer.

Fisher & Paykel developed the dish drawer dishwasher, but this one's pretty unique in that it's 36-inches wide and deep enough to accommodate a 12 3/4" dinner plate. Having access to a 36" single-drawer dishwasher is bound to add a lot of flexibility to kitchen designs from this point forward.

They haven't stopped with dish drawers. Fisher & Paykel has four new refrigerator models this year too. All four are counter-depth, 36" wide and less than 72" tall. Those dimensions ought to make retrofits a bit easier. All four models are Energy Star rated and feature Fisher & Paykel's Active Smart™ technology. Active Smart™ uses two separate fans to circulate air inside of the appliance. This allows for faster cooling and more constant temperatures.

The first two new refrigerators are counter-depth, bottom-mount French door models. They're available with or without water and ice, and both versions have door shelves deep enough to accommodate gallon bottles and jugs.

The third and fourth new models are are counter-depth, bottom-mount single door models. The difference between the two is the presence or absence of water and ice.

Just as is the case with their French door cousins, the single door models have door shelves deep enough to accommodate gallon jugs and bottles.

Fisher & Paykel keeps itself at the forefront of appliance innovation and the quest for ever-increasing standards of efficiency. If you're in the market for new appliances, be sure to include Fisher & Paykel in the mix of brands you investigate.

What happens when the public square isn't public anymore?

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This is the 200 block of Central Avenue in Downtown St. Pete. The sidewalks and Central Avenue itself are owned in common by the rest of the residents of St. Pete and me. In other words, it's public property. As public property, I can assemble freely there and so long as I'm obeying the laws, no one can make me leave should I want to stand on that sidewalk.

These rights are guaranteed me by the First Amendment to the Constitution with the following words:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

This means that I can also stand there with a group of like- or unlike-minded people. We can hold signs if we want to protest something. We can pass out leaflets advocating a cause. Or we can just stand there and take in the scenery.

Our right to assemble is guaranteed by Sections Four and Five of the Florida Constitution:

SECTION 4. Freedom of speech and press.—Every person may speak, write and publish sentiments on all subjects but shall be responsible for the abuse of that right. No law shall be passed to restrain or abridge the liberty of speech or of the press. In all criminal prosecutions and civil actions for defamation the truth may be given in evidence. If the matter charged as defamatory is true and was published with good motives, the party shall be acquitted or exonerated.

History.—Am. proposed by Constitution Revision Commission, Revision No. 13, 1998, filed with the Secretary of State May 5, 1998; adopted 1998.

SECTION 5. Right to assemble.—The people shall have the right peaceably to assemble, to instruct their representatives, and to petition for redress of grievances.

The rights to free assembly and to petition grievances are a fundamental part of what makes my citizenship so valuable. However those same rights are what make our representative democracy so messy. Some people take offense at protests and some people will take great pains to silence opposition.

Opposition and dissent aren't just rights though, they're obligations. Any attempt to silence public dissent or to thwart the right to free assembly is a threat to you, regardless of your politics.

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This is Main Street in Lakewood Ranch, a master planned community around 30 miles to my south in Bradenton, Fl. It looks like a main street anywhere but there are some notable and important differences.

For starters, the sidewalk, the street, the buildings and the trees aren't owned in common by the people of Bradenton. They're owned by Schroeder-Manatee Ranch, Inc. Shroeder-Manateee Ranch, Inc is the corporation that developed Lakewood Ranch. This makes Lakewood Ranch's Main Street a Potemkin Village and private property. As such, the First Amendment to the US Constitution and Articles Four and Five of the Florida Constitution do not apply.

Residents of Lakewood Ranch who want to stand on that corner can be escorted off that corner for any reason at all. If they want to protest something or hand out leaflets, they can't. There's no right to free speech nor is there a right to redress of grievances.

I'm sure most people who move to planned communities never think about that, but there's a great big and often hidden trade off to moving to a place that seems so peaceful. Residents of such places can't exercise some pretty fundamental aspects to what makes the United States unique.

I think about this often and I'll never understand why anybody would willingly move to a place that operates under some kind of corporate martial law. Is not having to rub shoulders with your social lessers worth it? That's a rhetorical question.

All of this came to a head in Florida on May 26th, 2011. Florida Governor Rick Scott held a budget signing ceremony in the center square of a master planned community called The Villages.

Rick Scott has a nearly pathological need to avoid dissent and as someone with a 29 percent approval rating six months after taking office I can almost see why. Almost.

Anyhow, Governor Scott chose to sign the new state budget in front of one of his few constituencies, rural retirees. In order to do it, he had to hold a budget signing on private property for the first time in Florida's history. That's OK, though. The Villages' central square is just like a town square anywhere, right?

Wrong.

On May 26th, the Republican Party of Florida leased The Villages' central square and before the actual ceremony started, the Republican Party of Florida instructed the Sumter County Sheriff's department to sweep the crowd and remove anybody who didn't support the Governor. Here it is, caught on video:





More than a dozen people were escorted off the property, even though those escorted were association dues-paying residents of The Villages.

When confronted about it, Governor Scott's office denied removing anybody and then when they couldn't deny away that video footage, they claimed that no one knew what actually happened that morning. Here are some news links from the end of May that describe the events in detail. Here. Here. Here.

As appalling as it is that Governor Scott decided to have his ceremony on private property, it probably didn't violate any laws. It certainly violated decency and the fundamental way American government is run, but all he and his supporters were doing was taking advantage of private property laws. They were also playing on the widely held misperception that the centers squares in planned communities are public spaces. The folks who were  removed from the budget signing know that first hand that there's nothing public about a pretend town square in a planned community.

Our rights to things like free speech, free assembly and redress of grievances are as fundamentally sacred as they are non-partisan. Political winds shift all the time and the party in power today usually isn't there for very long. What never changes, or at least shouldn't change, are the fundamentals of what make us, us.

Someone who's holding a sign you don't agree with isn't your enemy. You may find it reprehensible or you may agree with what ever's on that sign, but the holder is not your enemy. That sign holder is your fellow citizen, however mistaken you may think he is. Your real enemy is someone who seeks to remove the sign and silence what's he's trying to say.

Public spaces and the public sphere don't come back once they're gone. As more and more master planned communities spring up around the country, think about the implications of all of town squares that aren't really town squares at all. How do you keep a representative democracy alive in all those privately held "towns" and "town squares?"

Great photo for a Saturday

I had the pleasure of a visit from my sister and her family this week and it's always a joy to see the place I call home through the eyes of some people to whom all of this is different and exotic. It's funnny, the older I get the more I realize just how important it is to have a place where I come from and to maintain the connections with the people who were there way back then.

My niece Nancy took this photo on Wednesday, and it was all her composition. She had two of her sisters and I stand in the surf and salute the setting sun.

I've seen more sunsets over the Gulf than I can count, but I can't think of one that was as glorious as the one on Wednesday when I was surrounded by nieces.

Meet the Halogena and stop pretending it's 1950

Meet the Halogena.

This is an incandescent light bulb that actually meets the new energy standards for lighting that go into effect at the end of the year. Did you hear that? It's an incandescent light bulb. It meets the new energy standards.

The Halogena was developed by Philips Electronics and is available now at Amazon and Home Depot and will go into wider circulation as the year marches ever forward.

How it works is as simple as it is ingenious. Inside of each Halogena bulb is a halogen bulb and once turned on, it shines with all the glaring brilliance of a standard 100-watt light bulb even though it's just a 70-watt bulb.

A certain faction of a certain political party in the US has latched onto the new energy standards and has used them to draw a line in the sand. Politicians across the land have bent over backwards to appease this very loud faction and have made endless promises to fight what's being billed (erroneously) as a ban on incandescent light bulbs. Lost in all of this is that the actual standard in question was signed into law by a Republican president.

Just this afternoon, in a fit of grandstanding and posturing while Rome burns, the House of Representatives voted to block funds to implement these new energy standards. From The New York Times this afternoon:

The House on Friday voted to withhold funding to enforce part of a 2007 law that increases efficiency standards for light bulbs.

The new standards, which would require most light bulbs to be 25 to 30 percent more efficient by 2014 and at least 60 percent more efficient by 2020, have become a symbol of what conservatives see as an unnecessary intrusion by the federal government into the market.

Although the regulations do not specify what types of bulbs are allowed, the standards would have the effect of eliminating the traditional 100-watt incandescent bulb by Jan. 1, 2012.

You cannot pretend the 21st Century isn't here no matter how hard you try. Really, you just can't. The United States is on a collision course with reality as our energy needs outstrip our ability to meet them. 100-watt incandescent light bulbs are outrageously inefficient users of scarce resources and the technology is already here to phase them out.

Using resources wisely and issues related to sustainability aren't partisan issues, or at least the shouldn't be. Stewarding resources sensibly is part of what it is to be a good citizen. Not only are we compelled as members of a society to think beyond out immediate needs and wants, finding better solutions to problems like inefficient lighting saves money. Public resources like energy delivery and water belong to all of us, not just who ever can buy the most. Hence the term public resources.

Market forces and private industry can't solve every problem on their own. If that were true we'd still be driving four-ton death traps that got nine miles per gallon of gas. Setting standards for things like safety, water quality and energy efficiency is one of the things government is for for crying out loud.

If you're as appalled by today's vote in the House as I am, please call your Representative. If you think the vote today is a good thing, embrace the 21st Century and head on over to Amazon to buy some of these because you cannot stop time no matter how hard you try. And let's repeat it until the bullheaded realize that it's true. No. One. Is. Banning. Incandescent. Light. Bulbs.

Meet my new telephone and listen to a good customer service story

This is my new telephone, the HTC Inspire.

It's 4.8 inches tall, 2.7 inches wide and it's only .46 inches thick. It's also packed with more features than I'd hoped for. Its 8 megapixel camera has face recognition, autofocus and flash. Similarly, its 720pi video camera also has a flash should the need arise. Its screen feels really huge to me at 4.3 inches diagonally.

Because its a Droid phone it does all manner of things that an iPhone can't or won't. Simple things like seeing Flash websites. Also, it has a removable and replaceable battery. Short of another software hijacking, I expect to have this phone for a good long time.

And oh, the call clarity is fantastic.

A big difference between this phone and an iPhone is that it doesn't have visual voicemail, a feature I'm going to miss. However, my need for some guidance in setting up my new voicemail yesterday brought me face to face with AT&T technical help department and it had a happier ending than I was expecting to say the lease.

I called AT&T and was connected with an amiable guy named Larry. I explained the situation, he explained why I was having trouble and I thought that was going to be that.

Just as I was concluding the call, Larry asked me to wait a minute. He wanted to see if he could save me some money.

Larry went through my 10-year calling history with AT&T, crunched some numbers and reconfigured my calling plan so that my phone will will drop by $25 every month. A $25 monthly savings along with my grandfathered-in unlimited data plan and all of my 3,000+ rollover minutes.

Now that's customer service!