The governor of California is getting heat after he declared he wanted to cut millions from the state education budget.

He has recommended a $4.8 billion cut for K-14 education, on top of a $400 million reduction for education in the current year. The net effect is about $750 less per student than K-12 education would normally receive or about $18,750 per classroom.

He is laying off teachers (while other states hire them away), increasing their workloads and closing libraries. In the meantime, he has not acted to close tax loopholes that allow for exotic luxury goods. Good governance? Here’s an ad that tries to put the situation in perspective:

Just one bottle of champagne to celebrate? That seems unusually stingy to me. An accountant at a boat show explained the loopholes and why they matter:

“I would imagine that most of the people with boats over 50 or 60 feet are probably working some kind of tax dodge,” agreed Jimmy James, a semiretired certified public accountant from Kingston who has advised many boat owners. “People with enough money to buy those boats got there by having tax dodges.” […] IRS officials said they don’t keep track of how much money the government could collect if these deductions were eliminated. Conservatively, the annual total could approach $1 billion.

That is a lot of education.

This is not about the Blackberry. A conspiracy-theory laden report in the BBC tells how the US sweetener (corn?) industry manipulated the FDA to crush competition:

Legal advice and contact with the FDA had led Harvey to believe that the extract from the berry would be allowed under the classification “generally recognised as safe”. Having been eaten for centuries in Africa, without anecdotal reports of problems, it could be assumed not to be harmful.

But the FDA decided it would be considered as an additive which required several years more testing. In the poor economic climate of 1974, this could not be funded and the company folded.

“I was in shock,” says Harvey. “We were on very good terms with the FDA and enjoyed their full support. There was no sign of any problem. Without any opportunity to know what the concern was and who raised it, and to respond to it – they just banned the product.”

One might also suspect Harvey was naive, or there was a general lack of planning on his part, or his financial backers threw in the towel. However, other aspects of the story suggest industrial interference played a role.

A car was spotted driving back and forwards past Miralin’s offices, slowing down as someone took photographs of the building. Then, late one night, Harvey was followed as he drove home.

“I sped up, then he sped up. I pulled into this dirt access road and turned off my lights and the other car went past the end of the road at a very high speed. Clearly I was being monitored.”

Finally, at the end of that summer, Harvey and Emery arrived back at the office after dinner to find they were being burgled. The burglars escaped and were never found, but the main FDA file was left lying open on the floor.

A few weeks later the FDA, which had previously been very supportive, wrote to Miralin, effectively banning its product. No co-incidence, according to Don Emery.

“I honestly believe that we were done in by some industrial interest that did not want to see us survive because we were a threat. Somebody influenced somebody in the FDA to cause the regulatory action that was taken against us.”

All questions of “if you suspected foul play why didn’t you plan to defend yourself” aside, I have to wonder why it was only a product marketed for the US. Barclays was a backer, so surely they were aware of market options in Europe, let alone Asia.

The BBC highlights a study that shows humans can actually sense danger with smell, assuming prior experience/exposure:

The 12 volunteers were exposed to two “grassy” odours, and none of them could accurately tell the difference between them.

After they were shocked while smelling one of them, they developed the ability to discriminate between the two.

Do they mean marijuana? Was this really a study to get people with addictions to steer clear? Imagine the impact to the cocaine market if convicted addicts were conditioned so the smell would turn them away.

Ethical questions abound, but it also makes me think about the discussions I often have with risk managers. They do not smell danger while the technical security engineers do, and thus a discussion erupts about who is right and what is real. In the end, the primary issue I see with the study above is that it shows pre-conditioning response as opposed to the ability to actually smell danger itself.