Vanity, In Plate Form

I do not get why people find it worthwhile to put personalized plates on their car.  Even so, I do enjoy checking them out when I'm on the road.  It's fun to try to decode them, usually.  Occasionally you come across one that doesn't make any sense - I wonder about the people who pick plates that aren't understood by their apparent audience, namely me.  I mean, not just me, but if you're picking something to show to the general public, of which I am definitely a member, shouldn't they be able to understand it?

This wouldn't be such a big deal to me if it weren't for the fact that people are paying money for these things.  It's a relatively trivial amount, I suppose, but even so it seems like money wasted.  I mention all this because today I found another type of personalized plate that I find as bad as those that are incomprehensible.  In this case, however, the plate was the exact opposite of being hard to understand.

During my morning commute I found myself behind a car that looked something like this:

The Volkswagen GLI

As the caption indicates, this is a Volkswagen GLI.  And in the case of the car I saw this morning, it was sporting this personalized license plate:

VWGLI

What?!?  I'm already driving right behind you, where the manufacturer has clearly marked the car's make and model with chrome logos and lettering.  As seen in the photo, this is also true for anyone with a front-side view.  So why would you possibly want to spend any amount of money to duplicate that information for anyone in the vicinity of your vehicle?

Maybe this driver took some misguided advice from the Utah Department of Motor Vehicles:

Hello?  This does not tell me "why" to choose a personalized plate, just what to put on it!  Somebody should have explained to this driver that the DMV is only out to get more of your money.  You do not, in fact, have to take their advice.

I do not get it.

Executive Orders

I find the Executive Order to be a very curious power of the U.S. presidency.  Maybe that's just because I don't understand it thoroughly, but from what I gather the president can make any decree he wants.  I suppose if a president did something the other branches of government objected to they must have some sort of recourse, but I don't know if that sort of response ever gets exercised.  I'm pretty sure it hasn't in my lifetime.  It seems like a governmental power that hearkens back to the time of emperors and kings.

The other day I had occasion to look up an Executive Order, and in the process I found that Google actually had some suggestions for me.  I took that to mean that other people are also looking up these things, and I was curious what the "Top 10" Orders would be.

For your enlightenment, here are the top 9 (Google's suggestion list stopped at 9) in order of increasing popularity:

• (Number 9) Executive Order 12015: Permitting students completing approved career-related work-study programs to be appointed to career or career conditional positions in the competitive service. [J.E. Carter, 10/26/1977]
  
• (Number 8) Executive Order 13575: Establishment of the White House Rural Council [B.H. Obama, 6/9/2011]
• (Number 7) Executive Order 9981: Establishing the President's Committee on Equality of Treatment and Opportunity In the Armed Forces [H.S. Truman, 7/26/1948]
• (Number 6) Executive Order 10998: Assigning emergency preparedness functions to the Secretary of Agriculture [J.F. Kennedy, 2/16/1962]
• (Number 5) Executive Order 9022: Partial Revocation of Executive Order No. 6957 of February 4, 1935, Withdrawing Certain Public Lands; Alaska [F.D. Roosevelt, 1/13/1942]
• (Number 4) Executive Order 11246: Equal Employment Opportunity [L.B. Johnson, 9/24/1965]
• (Number 3) Executive Order 11110: Amendment of Executive Order No. 10289 (which was "Providing for the performance of certain functions of the President by the Secretary of the Treasury") [J.F. Kennedy, 6/4/1963]
• (Number 2) Executive Order 8809: Good Conduct Medal [F.D. Roosevelt, 6/28/1941]
• (Number 1) Executive Order 9066: Authorizing the Secretary of War to Prescribe Military Areas [F.D. Roosevelt, 2/19/1942]

E.O. 9066 paved the way for the holding of Japanese Americans in interment camps during the war.  Some of the others look notable, but a few are definitely mysteries why they would be popular searches.

So what's your favorite Executive Order?