From deserts to beaches

Yesterday, I went out hiking at Joshua Tree National Park. It was my first time hiking in desert conditions, and while the weather was pretty nice, I made sure to bring lots of water and sunscreen. It was an interesting park, with conditions ranging from almost completely barren, to beautiful patches of desert plants in full bloom. The Joshua Tree is a very unusual tree, as it is a member of the Lily family as opposed to a traditional tree family. The tree is fairly rare, appearing mostly within the Mojave Desert at higher elevations.

I have posted the pictures from my trip to Joshua Tree National Park online here.



After I was finished with my conference sessions today, I went driving up the Pacific Coast Highway. I took some pictures along the beach about half an hour before sunset.

Sunny in California

Today, I flew out to California from Virginia. I connected through Minneapolis for the second time in a week, and my inbound flight was late. I was a little worried about having to stay overnight in Minnesota, given that it was cold with a little bit of snow. I had packed for California, and didn't have anything warm with me. Thankfully, I just barely made my flight, and continued out to Anaheim where the weather was a balmy eighty-seven degrees.

Tomorrow, I plan on going hiking out at the Joshua Tree National Park, which is about two hours west of here. The park is a desert environment in the mountains, so this will be a bit of a new experience. Hopefully, I will be able to get some good pictures while I am there.

Trip to Colorado

I was out visiting Colorado this past weekend, and went hiking at Rocky Mountain National Park. Despite being fairly warm in Denver, the weather was very cold and windy up in the mountains. I went hiking out from Bear Lake to Emerald Lake, and progress was a little slow due to deep snow on parts of the trail. I had not expected that I might need snowshoes at the end of April. I had a great time hiking, although I managed to get a decent sunburn. Sunscreen is always important at ten thousand feet above sea level.

The sky towards the north was a beautiful dark blue.



The wind was kicking up snow off the peaks, and blew through the valley near Emerald Lake. Emerald Lake is underneath all of the snow in the valley.



I thought that this tree looked particularly interesting.



A bird landed in a tree right next to me, and posed for a picture.



These rock formations are an interesting contrast to the rugged features of the rest of the park.

Doing a lot of nothing

After having had several weeks of non-stop activity, this weekend was a little different in that I was able to take the weekend completely off. The weather was a bit dreary, and I contemplated getting a few hours of work done. But instead, I decided to actually sit back and relax. For the most part, this meant sleeping in, watching TV, and surfing the web. I think I watched more TV yesterday than I have in total over the past two months. I can't say that the quality of the TV watching was all that great, but it was nice to just zone out.

Next weekend, I am taking a long weekend and heading out to Colorado. My nephew is having his baptism next Sunday, and so the family is gathering together for the event. I will arrive out there a little early, and go hiking in the mountains on Friday. I am hoping that I get a fair number of good pictures while I am out there, since my picture collection has been a little limited of late.

The "Blueprint" for a disaster

On March 31, the US Treasury Department announced a plan to overhaul the regulatory structure of US financial markets. A detailed description of the plan (called the "Blueprint") can be found here. One of main features of the plan is that it shifts a significant amount of regulatory authority from various government agencies and concentrates them in the Federal Reserve. In addition, the plan would give additional regulatory authority to the Federal Reserve. While the goal of streamlining the regulatory process is admirable, adding additional regulatory oversight to the government has significant risks. Unfortunately, the single most important problem with the plan is the goal of transferring regulatory authority to the Federal Reserve.

The Federal Reserve is an independent central bank that is not part of the Executive Branch.¹ While it receives some oversight from Congress, there is little that Congress can do to the Federal Reserve other than passing legislation. This approach is meant to minimize the effect of politics on monetary policy. Minimizing political effects on monetary policy is valuable, since it provides for a much more stable banking system. Unfortunately, regulation is a different activity. How regulation is applied is often an inherently political activity. If the voters want to force a change on how the Federal Reserve regulates the markets, they do not have the capability to vote for new members of the Board of Governors. Instead, voters would have to petition Congress to write new legislation - and hope that the Federal Reserve properly implements it.

Regulation of the financial markets should remain within the confines of the Executive Branch, based on clear legislation provided by Congress. Concentrating significant regulatory power in an organization that is not directly answerable to the citizens of the United States is a recipe for disaster.