Performance Review

Cars, like houses, are never fully known until they're inhabited. Er, driven. But you get my drift. Only after repeated and extensive interactions are the strengths and weaknesses of a car (or house) ever known.

So after six months, I feel fairly qualified to comment on my Accord Sport sedan.

The good:

The 2.4 liter, four-cylinder engine is a joy. At 189 horsepower, it's not going to challenge an Alfa-Romeo Giulia Quadrifoglio. But unlike the troublesome Alfa, it works. Which is kind of nice. What good is 503 horsepower when it's sitting in a service bay at your local A-R dealer?

And while the Accord's torque peaks at a typically Honda-ish 3,900 RPM and horsepower at 6,400, its ample horses are easily accessed. Throttle tip-in is very smooth, with no hot or cold spots in pedal travel versus acceleration.

In a mix of highway and urban driving, the Accord reliably returns 34 MPG. That's dropped off a bit with the onset of winter temps here in the Land of Lincoln, but still laudable given the Accord's robust sense of git.

Continuously variable transmissions (or CVTs), don't enjoy sparkling reviews in car magazines. They are called uninvolving, vague and mushy—none of which imparts a feeling of precision and connection. And I was skittish until I drove one.

But I have to admit the unit in the Accord is surprising. It shifts smoothly and responsively, without the hunting the transmission in my sixth-generation Accord was prone to at low speeds.

The CVT equivalent of passing gear comes quickly and decisively, moving the 3,342-pound car with authority. I have yet to encounter a situation the Accord's drivetrain couldn't handle. Which, when you think about it, is a kind of safety feature.

Ditto a good suspension. The assembly responsible for keeping each of the four tires squarely and firmly pressed against pavement plays an enormous role in your car's driveability. The Accord features MacPherson struts in the front and a multi-link set-up in the rear.

I haven't had an opportunity to push my current Accord the way I did my '99 LX coupe, which is how it goes when you move from a sparsely-populated state to the nation's third most-populous metropolitan area.

I feel the additional three-hundred pounds the newer Accord has put on and miss the four-wheel double-wishbone set-up employed by the sixth-gen iteration. That car felt light and tossable in a way the new one doesn't quite match.

At the same time, the ninth-gen edition doesn't suffer from the wind and road noise its predecessor did. Pick your poison.

Taken on its own terms, I don't see the ninth-generation's suspension provoking any complaints. The steering is responsive, if not overly communicative. The car feels planted and secure regardless of road conditions and speed.

Interior room is excellent, and is made additionally so by the multiple configurations offered by the ten-way power driver's seat and tilt and telescope steering column. The dashboard isn't quite as intuitive and uncluttered as the six-generation's, but is nevertheless ordered very nicely.

I purposely avoided higher trim levels festooned with driver-assist tech, so I can't comment on the Honda's navigation system. But the functions contained within the Sport's infotainment unit are easily understood and accessed.

And if someone as tech-weary as I can sync his phone to the Bluetooth function without exasperated sighs, think of the stress-free fun you'll have. 

Furthermore, with eight cupholders, two power outlets and a USB port, it's unlikely you'll go unentertained—or thirsty.

The bad:

With a wife suffering from reduced mobility, the wide door sills in the Accord make ingress and egress more difficult than it should be. On the glass-is-half-full side, I'd like to think the thicker doors offer more in the way of side-impact protection.

The wiper stalk is largely hidden behind the steering wheel's cross-member and a paddle shifter. But even if it weren't, choosing an appropriate setting is far from the no-brainer it should be.

Instead of rotating a piece mounted on the stalk to the desired setting, the current lay-out asks that the driver move the stalk downward through multiple wiper speeds. Beyond the fact that they are not visible, the indents that should inform the driver of each setting are vague.

In a word, using the wipers is a pain. And when conditions turn suddenly, this is not a good thing.

Speaking of indents, the one separating normal window-down function from 'express' is discernible only to surgeons and classical pianists. No matter how lightly my fingers tread upon the driver's-side window switch, I too often end up with a portal to the outdoors when all I wanted was a sliver.

Finally, the switches for the door locks and power windows are only illuminated on the driver's door. Granted, this is a trifling complaint. But the entry-level '06 Nissan Altima I drove previously paid its passengers this nicety. Why couldn't the class-leading Accord?

So there you have it: the good, the bad and the not-so-ugly.

I would enthusiastically recommend the 2015 Accord Sport Sedan to just about anyone. Its mix of performance, reliability, utility, comfort, economy and value is hard to beat.

It's ironic that just as sedans have become so incredibly useful and multi-talented they're being crowded out of the marketplace by crossovers and SUVs which don't carry people and their stuff as efficiently as a van nor drive as well as a car.

Makes perfect sense.

But they're fashionable. Sexy. And like women and high heels, the motoring public will slavishly endure their shortcomings to remain in lockstep with the prevailing style.

At the risk of dropping off Mr. Blackwell's best-dressed list, I'll take the sedan. And more-specifically, the Accord. That's my sport utility vehicle.

Trying to Understand

Okay. 

So Ivanka Trump did the same thing her father's number-one political enemy did. She used a personal, unsecured e-Mail account to conduct state business.

Naturally, this begs a question.

When the Trump-whore's zombies chant “Lock her up!” at his next validation rally, are they referring to Hillary or Ivanka?

Just asking.

Taking FLAC

I need to chill. Between the twin outrages of Donald Trump and the continued existence of the NRA, I'm going to blow a gasket. I detest the unpunished societal offenses committed by these entities.

They are horrors the combined imaginations of Edgar Allan Poe, William Peter Blatty and Stephen King never could have conceived.

I need something soothing to write about. Something lacking the bell-clanging urgency of gun control and looming fascism.

I know—I'll take sides in the FLAC – MP3 debate. Yeah. That's it.

Go ahead. Call me a glutton for punishment. No worries—I've said it many times myself.

I was late to the downloading party. I never grabbed a file off of Napster. I was a good boy. A respectful music fan. My introduction to digital downloading was e-Music, a service which offered (in retrospect) insufferably slow downloads to a set number of LPs each month.

So when I wanted the new Mogwai or Decemberists or Bettye LaVette release, I'd cue up the download before I went to bed and voila! It was ready to be ripped to a CD-R and playable in my car the next day.

(Most of the time, anyway.)

But then the Great Recession hit. And e-Music quickly became—even for a musiholic like myself—a non-essential expense.

Recession or not, my thirst for music continued. It demanded satiation. What was I to do?

In between my desperate attempts at locating even not-so-gainful employ, I discovered music sites and deciphered the intricacies of downloading and file conversion. I quickly discovered that FLAC-encoded files weren't transferable to CD-Rs and also weren't playable in my car or at home.

So they weren't very practical. And they took up a hell of a lot of room. And since I wasn't the sole user of the computer, installing a FLAC player and storing them there was not an option. So I ignored them and the raging arguments which advocated for them.

FLAC remained a speed bump I needed to cross before enjoying the ear candy the Internet was foisting upon my person.

I was entirely content with the studio recordings available for download at 320-bits. And the bootlegs whose bit-encryption was all over the map. 

I heard one twenty-eights that sounded like three-twenties and one ninety-twos that sounded absolutely pristine. I heard VBRs that sounded better than any of them. Given the enormous range of bootleg sources, it was difficult to assign one hard and fast standard to what sounded best.

Of course, sound is highly-subjective. What sounds good to me might sound like crap to you.

Muddying the waters still further is the fact that I am old. Really old. And that I've attended way too many concerts and spent way too much time in bars featuring live music and in clubs blasting dance music at unhealthy decibel levels.

So despite (or perhaps because of) my love of sound, I have not enjoyed it responsibly. I have overindulged. I have committed assault and battery upon my tympanic membranes.

But I should add that while I frequently experience difficulty discerning my mate's requests to take out the garbage or change the furnace filter, my ability to hear music remains remarkably intact.

This was confirmed when one day after an OS upgrade, I could play FLAC files on my computer.

And I was shocked. What I call 'the sound field' was deeper and wider than anything I had encountered with MP3s. Detail, space—all of it was heightened. OK. It was—and is—a richer listening experience. 

Uncle!

But naturally, there's a downside.

I still can't listen to FLAC files anywhere but on my computer. And when I want to recline on the couch with the newspaper or my current read and get lost in a favorite album, that is inconvenient.

Then there's the question of storage space. A cynic might say that after taking up three to four times the space of a conventional MP3 file, the least a FLAC-encoded file could do was sound better.

And they'd be right. After taking up that much space they ought to fold my laundry and do a little light housekeeping, too.

Yet even in my short experience, I realize they are disinclined to do so.

So I'll use FLAC where it makes the biggest difference—bootlegs. Where it enhances my favorite and most-treasured boots, it stays. With the added advantage that I can always convert it to an MP3 file when I want to listen elsewhere.

But studio releases? Well, not so much. Yeah, FLAC makes Wrecking Ball and Arkology and In a Silent Way sound even more amazing, but with a storage expense that really isn't cost-effective.

It's a twist on those old Miller Lite beer commercials. Yes, FLAC tastes great. Too bad it's not less-filling as well.

Again?

What's left to say?

A noisy, selfish minority has brought carnage and mayhem to our streets. Fear into our homes. And terror into our hearts.

We are bleeding sorrow.

If this minority had recently crossed our borders, our president would be on the verge of a cardiovascular episode. He'd be apoplectic. The keypad on his phone would have fused from heated and incessant Tweeting.

But they didn't. This minority is a home-grown terrorist group. Ironically, it is also a reliable source of Republican funding.

The same party that wants to criminalize women for seeking abortions stubbornly refuses to curtail, much less acknowledge, these terrorist's leading role in our ongoing national tragedy.

If you can make that add up, would you please let me know what kind of calculator you're using?

Think about it: can you even imagine the law enforcement response to a organization that flooded our nation with firearms in the manner of the NRA? Much less if that organization were composed of Middle-Easterners or African-Americans or Latinos?

Neither can I.

Yet the NRA does. Unfettered. Undisturbed. Untroubled. The NRA has made its position clear: it doesn't care. Not about your life. Not about that of your spouse. And not about those of your children.

What the NRA does care about is maintaining its position as God's chosen moral authority and the country's supreme arbitrator on all things pertaining to the Second Amendment.

Our government is fond of saying it doesn't negotiate with terrorists. Yet we continue to negotiate with the NRA. We bargain in good faith and with well-intentioned empathy for the white-knuckled fear of its constituency.

But the NRA steadfastly refuses any accommodation whatsoever.

It's time to get tough with the NRA.

It's time for the tail to stop wagging the dog.

It's time to realize their absolute refusal to compromise means—and can only mean—one thing. 

Fuck off.

And we have. For such a very, very long time.

We deserve to come and go as we please. To attend movies and go dancing and hear concerts and go to church without the fear of ending up on a slab.

Amendments don't require thuggish, sociopathic businessmen to keep them viable. We must crush the NRA. And we must crush it now.

Nothing less than freedom—real freedom—is at stake.

The Afterglow

Okay. It wasn't a blue wave. And as a Democrat (or more specifically, an anti-Republican), I'm confused, saddened and disappointed. I mean, if our contempt for Donald Trump doesn't unite democracy-loving Americans, what will?

We have a fact-checking report that informs us that Donald Trump lies an average of thirty times a day. About his policies, their effectiveness, his political opponents and what he had for lunch.

We have a president on the verge of killing a potentially damaging investigation into his cozy relationship with a superpower politically hostile to us.

That's an impeachable obstruction of justice, right?

I get it that Trumpers would rather have body parts forcibly removed than admit their guy isn't the swamp-draining messiah he promised he'd be. And that they'd rather he sleep with their wives or abuse their children before they'd ever think of renouncing him.

But for what? Are y'all really that concerned about the financial well-being of the one-percent? Because that's what your boy is working on. That's agenda item number-one. He's toying with gutting your social security and medicare to pay for the latest round of billionaire-centric tax cuts.

Eighty-three percent of the benefits of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act went to one-percent of the population. You know that's not you, right?

But golly—he did send the National Guard down to the border the day before the mid-terms. And that's gotta be worth something.

Exactly what has your hatred of immigrants and gays and women got you? Has it put you in different tax bracket? Are you tooling around in a brand-new BMW? Do you enjoy a heightened sense of satisfaction when you sense that those whom you hate are suffering the outrageous indignities you are?

Does it enrich your own impoverished existence? Does it nourish the parched earth of your soul?

Where is that indomitable Republican will, anyway? Where's that pick-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps self-sufficiency? Or are you just another example of American victimhood?

Oh that's right—you're a Republican. You can't be.

I've admitted that Republicans are expert marketers. And brilliant button-pushers. I laughed when I saw the Trump-whore's text alleging that Democrats had allowed cop-killer Luis Bracamontes into the country and then allowed him to stay.

I laughed even harder when I realized you'd believe it.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: you're a tool, bro. Wait until you see where the car you're riding in is headed.

A wise old man once said be careful what you wish for. You just might get it.

The Black Heart of Republicanism

I loathe Donald Trump. Despite being seventy-two years-old, he is best described as our middle-schooler in charge.

Trump's towering immaturity reveals itself in the issuing of puerile nicknames to the delight of his equally-puerile supporters. Or claiming he was misquoted by the fake news media as he walks back another incendiary statement. Or denies saying it altogether.

Emotionally and intellectually, Donald Trump is a little boy.

So it goes when you're born into wealth and know nothing but privilege. So it goes when you get a pass from the expectations and demands of adulthood. So it goes when those around you consider that wealth an adequate substitute for maturity.

Not surprisingly, the qualities that inform his White House have trickled down to the rank and file, like the fifth-grader who sees a classmate pick his nose and wipe the result on the shirt in front of him and is helpless to try it himself.

But as the estimable Eric Zorn pointed out in Friday's Chicago Tribune, there are Republican office-holders who act remarkably grown-up. Who comprehend the scope and purpose of their position and seek to fulfill it. 

Holding up Illinois' own petulant billionaire (governor Bruce Rauner) in a highly-effective compare and contrast piece, Zorn illustrates the divergent paths he and another Republican governor, Massachusetts' Charlie Baker, took after their respective elections.

To quote Zorn “Rauner chose to go down...a confrontational path. His strategy was to browbeat and insult “corrupt” Democratic legislative leaders into passing items on his highly ideological 44-point pro-business agenda, and, when that failed, to wait until they blinked during a 736-day budget stalemate.”

Baker chose consensus-building. Give and take. Choosing his battles, instead of reflexively fighting all of them. A recent endorsement in the Lowell, MA. Sun said of Baker “Differences of opinion crop up all the time. (But) there is an attitude of respect and collegiality among lawmakers that says adults are at work and we'll get this done.”

You know, just like in Washington DC.

While Rauner's re-election campaign is on the verge of becoming a blood bath (he trails Democratic challenger J.D. Prtizker by sixteen points), Baker enjoys an astounding forty-point advantage over his Democratic challenger.

So everything's great, right? Bipartisan leadership is leading the way and setting an example. Effective and necessary legislation is getting passed. Aisles are being crossed. Partisan gridlock is a memory.

What could go wrong?

In a word—Republicans.

While only ten percent of Democrats hold a negative opinion of Baker, twenty-percent of Republicans do. Right-wing nut jobs (er, organizations) are upset with Baker because he has criticized Donald Trump—and worse. Like supporting the Affordable Care Act and stronger gun control legislation.

And what kind of asshole does that?

A Republican-In-Name-Only. That's who.

So despite the fact that the Republican Baker is successfully leading a historically Democratic state and has consolidated bipartisan support behind him (shining a very positive light on Republicans in the process), party taste-makers consider him a failure. They are furious, to the point where they're urging voters to um, intercourse him on Tuesday.

Yeah.

This is the odorous black heart of Republicanism. The one that doesn't play well with others. The one that doesn't want to cooperate. The one whose core belief seems to be it's my way or the highway. Like their string-pullers at the NRA, Republicans will brook no compromise. Tolerate no free thought. The party line is all.

Or else.

Never mind that Rauner's force-fed electorate is resoundingly rejecting him, or that Baker's newly-unified one is embracing him. It's a mirage. A glitch. Kindly move on.

Three-hundred thirty-two years ago, Sir Isaac Newton formulated his Third Law of Motion, which posited that for every motion there was an equal and opposite one.

Two-thousand years before that, Greek storyteller Aesop told of a struggle between the sun and the wind. Each wanted to prove it was the greater force.

To settle their dispute, they selected a man walking along a road in a coat. Whomever could remove the man's coat would be judged the more-powerful entity.

The wind went first. It summoned its fury and tore at the man and his coat. It howled and it railed and it tried to pry the coat from the man with everything it could muster.

But the harder it tried, the tighter the man drew his coat around him.

Exhausted, the wind stopped and allowed the sun its turn.

The sun gently warmed the air, eventually coaxing the man to remove his coat.

Thus it was proven the sun was the stronger force.

Translated, this means we need grown-ups in Washington DC—not middle-school bullies who feel Lord of the Flies is a how-to manual of governance.

If you give the tiniest fuck about democracy, vote Democratic November 6.