Wouldn’t it be better if we stopped listening to the loud whiners?  Shut them off, change the station;  too busy admiring people who are discovering and inventing stuff.

The desire to classify ourselves is human nature.  Humans are influenced by each other to impose group boundaries.  For instance the 1% versus the 99%.  The 99% is vast,  not cozy;  whereas the 1% are in bed together cuddling and clinging.  Here are some pretty interesting things being done by members of both groups .

http://www.humdingerwind.com/#/wi_large/

Inventor Shawn Frayne has come up with a device that harnesses the power of wind without any rotating parts. Instead, his company’s Windbelts capture energy using fluttering fabric. Air passes over a taut membrane, it induces a vibration, somewhat akin to a violin bow.   Magnets mounted on the membrane bounce back and forth between metal coils, inducing an electric current.

What makes this so way cool is that it can be put on fences in urban areas and it can be palm sized or room sized and the materials it is made from are all available right here in the good ole USA.

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Richard Branson has started a “Carbon War Room”.  Does he qualifiy as part of the 1%?    He has an influence on them.  He concerns himself with the future of the planet and makes money doing it.  His latest venture is opening a shop  near the White House for Venture Capitalists to hang out and find investment solutions.  International corporations like Maersk, the global tanker operator, 3M,   and General Electric Co., the major U.S. maker of gas turbines, windmills and appliances;  find there is money to be made and profits enhanced by cutting noxious pollutants and carbon dioxide emissions.

http://www.ecosystemmarketplace.com/pages/dynamic/article.page.php?page_id=7874&section=home

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Pegasus Global Holdings Announces Plans to Develop World’s Largest Tech Testing and Evaluation Center

Pegasus Global Holdings bought a town in New Mexico.   They needed a place to create and test green technology innovations.  How cool is that?  Is this the enemy doing cool things with their money?   Pegasus Global Holdings is actually one of those big scary conglomerates making billions from war tools and satellites; which qualifies them as a member of the 1%.  Perhaps refocusing their moneymaking prowess on technologies that have an end result of a healthier, cleaner, and subsequently happier planet is a good thing  –  even if their motivation isn’t benevolent grace.

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and another thing…

What is with some politicians and their big oil and coal bedmates?  I met a very nice young man.  He plans to take his brand new engineering degree to Mexico and work for an oil company.  My heart sank.

If he’s excited about living in the tropics why doesn’t he take that brand new degree to Costa Rica and work for a geothermal company?  Geothermal, solar, wind, biodiesel, and other renewable sources of energy aren’t at the Universities recruiting these brilliant young minds.  They don’t have the federal funding for that.  Oil and coal receive federal funding and they use much of it for recruiting.

Meantime, we’re building tired old SUV’s in our auto plants and wonder why the rest of the world doesn’t want them.  Because the rest of the world has young brilliant minds too.  They are being recruited into the renewable energy industry and making fast and powerful cars that run on batteries and biodiesel.

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one more thing…

Why are we giving up our waterways and aquifers to industry and agriculture and the bottled water industry?  If we didn’t use tax payer money to clean up their messes, we wouldn’t have the beautiful country we have.  We’d have birdless skys and choked waterways and putrid lakes without the EPA and environmental groups bringing tragedies to their attention.   Taxpayers carry the brunt of expense to clean up after them.  We fine them, but, they don’t pay.  Instead they pay for politicians who cover for them or razzle dazzle the public with birthers to take attention away from the real issues.

The new members of our 112th congress is an interesting revolt.  I understand you wanted to get rid of the current congress and oust the old white men who have consistently sat on their laurels and performed business as usual.  In my mind shaking things up would have involved voting for young, black, women.  You chose…

Vicky Hartzler (R-MO) opposes gay rights, does not want to honor visitation rights in hospitals for gay couples, does not want gays in the military and wants women to be convicted of murder if they have an abortion and has pushed for other Christian right causes.  She is a Missouri farm wife and schoolteacher who will be appointed to the house armed services committee.

Go to — http://vickyhartzler.com/issues/10/.  She states “the extreme agenda items of the gay movement is a sad chapter that must not be repeated” A few paragraphs later she states “I’ll stand up for an America that allows each of us, regardless of the circumstances of our birth, to achieve the full measure of life.” Maybe she doesn’t know about kids killing themselves due to hateful intolerance and doesn’t realize that being gay is a circumstance of birth.

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Marco Rubio (R-FL), wants to extend the Bush tax cuts.  The Bush tax cuts were temporary because there isn’t enough money to keep them going.  He plans to repeal the health care reform bill.  Why would you want to stop all the wonderful things healthcare reform will do for Americans?  Things like…

1.  Health insurance plans will no longer be allowed to deny coverage to children younger than 19 because they have a pre-existing health problem.

2.  Free preventive care covering cancer screenings, cholesterol tests, mammograms and other preventive services without charging you a co-payment, co-insurance or deductible.

3.  An end to rescissions. This change is designed to prevent insurers from denying coverage to policyholders after they get sick.

4.  individual insurance plans can no longer impose lifetime limits on coverage

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2010-09-22-healthlaw22_ST_N.htm#chart

Why doesn’t Marco Rubio want us to have the advantages of healthcare reform?  Well, If he continues tax cuts for the rich than we can’t afford healthcare reform.

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Renee Elmers (R-NC) created the “conservative freakout” over the ground zero mosque that wasn’t a mosque and wasn’t being built on ground zero.

All of us are descendants of immigrants or actual immigrants who came here to get away from religious intolerance.  We’re here to enjoy the freedom of thought, speech, religious faith, and property ownership.   Now, Renee and the gang have turned against religious freedom out of fear.  She fans the fear of Muslims, and is rallied on by a corrupt biased cable news station.

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Rand Paul (R-KY) refused to endorse some parts of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 because big government has no right to make private lunch counters take down those “Whites Only” signs. “If private lunch counter owners want to prevent blacks from eating there, that’s their right.”

This guy is a bigot, a blatant proud bigot.  If you voted for him, I guess you’re OK with that.  What scares me is so much of the country is OK with that.

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Daniel Webster (R-FL) “has aligned himself with organizations and individuals who advocate the application of biblical law to contemporary society, including wives submitting to their husbands.   In his 2009 talk to a male audience he was telling them to focus on their own obligations rather than those of their wives. When Webster says women should pray if they want to, he’s saying they must do so in order to be obedient to God’s word. “

That is just pure scariness.  You’re afraid of Muslims?  You need to be afraid of this dude.

http://www.religiondispatches.org/dispatches/julieingersoll/3449/the_real_context_of_the_%22taliban_dan%22_ad/

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Ron Johnson (R-WI)  made his fortune through his company making plastic packaging materials.  He is another of the uber rich who poured his own personal millions into his campaign pretending to be a political insurgent who is going to shake up congress.  He stood on a platform of job creation.  Many voters don’t have time for details they are too busy looking for a job.  People like Ron Johnson don’t give two flying figs about you or your job.  He just wants power and he plans to get his millions back and then some.

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Ben Quayle (R-AZ) the son of former vice president Dan Quayle and columnist for TheDirty.com, hates Obama.  Enough said.

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Joe Manchin (D-WV)  loves coal.  West Virginia loves coal because they don’t know how to make money any other way.  Coal companies blow up mountains and dump coal sludge in valleys and build crappy dams that break and kill mine workers families.  Nice eh?

So anyway, Cap and trade’s carbon taxes would destroy the coal industry.  Coal extraction and energy production is so detrimental to this planet that it would be taxed in to bankruptcy.  The coal industry is convincing you that no other source of energy is feasible.  Your personal income taxes have subsidized coal $500 compared to $7 toward alternative energy research.   Joe Manchin has aimed his sites at destroying the cap and trade bill.  He doesn’t want alternative energy even though it will be for the good of the people of West Virginia as well as the rest of the nation.

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I’m not too excited about your choices.

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By the way, not too long ago there was an industry called “pluming”.  Plumers went down to the everglades, South America and Africa and shot every bird in site and sent the feathers to factories in New York and various other cities.  When environmentalists exposed the appalling slaughter, people yelled out “we need the jobs”  Well, the obvious idiocy made ladies realize that hats with feathers were not a necessity and the industry died and plumers learned a different trade and factories made other stuff.  We’ll survive life without coal.

 

 

I ran across a website that visually represented how much money BP lost due to the oil spill.   I was incredulous.  That much money exists?  It is a loss they plan to recoup.  How do you suppose they will make up the loss?

They have convinced us to drive bigger cars, drink our water from a bottle, use more plastic and carry on with war, any war.  Oil men love war.  War is what truly feeds Seymour.  You remember the insatiable plant from “Little Shop of Horrors”.  I liken the oil (and coal) industry to Seymour’s need to keep his plant alive.  In the beginning it was a nice fun little plant.  Harmless, at least relatively.  The plant like the oil industry has gotten so big it is devouring the planet through wars and plastic and large ships and cruise liners that carry us and our crap across oceans.

We are convinced that if we all pile on a giant boat together life will be more fun.  We are convinced that the stuff we have is not good enough.  It all needs to be replaced by better stuff.  Most of the stuff is plastic and plastic is made from oil and the plastic is brought to us on giant boats that require massive amounts of oil.  This insatiable need has been brought to you by the oil industry.

We can’t blame oil entirely.  Coal is what fuels this nations heat and air and lights.  The current grid was set up by the coal industry and subsidized by the US government.  It was harmless and useful in its beginnings.  What a blessing to have heat and air and light due to the fabulous grid work that traverses the nation.  Except, now it too is like Seymour’s plant.  Dividing and devouring and convincing us that nothing else will do.

So let me share the website that prompted this blog…

http://www.visualeconomics.com/what-bp-could-have-bought-with-all-the-money-they-lost/

I wrote to my smart friend Fred who gave me this reply…

So you see in the world of business BP’s loss isn’t so much. Don’t feel sorry for them. Don’t think how much good this money could have done because it pales in comparison to the money we waste on wars. Iraq I believe was $1,000 billion. That’s 112 times what BP wasted.

When you look at it this way — it isn’t oil and coal that feeds Seymour’s plant.  Economics feeds the plant.  How often does economic advantage take precedence over doing good?  Goodness faces doom when it gets in the way of the economy.

What truly amazed me is that 3.4 billion dollars would buy an ice cream sandwich for everyone in the world and yahoo is worth 20 billion.  Wouldn’t it be cool if yahoo bought an ice cream sandwich for everyone in the world?  There is probably a soy version for the lactose intolerant.

While drinking my hot beverage made from the beans of a tree and paying my water bill I started thinking more about water.  Coffee bean trees grow because of water and my coffee is brewed in water.

Water keeps our exquisite Earth alive.  It saves us and our earth from being lifeless mineral globs.  Of course, we nor the earth would be alive long if all the earths water was contaminated.  I wonder why we care more about oil,  than clean water?

The critter above seems to be savoring that little orb of clean water the way I am savoring my coffee right now.  I am a lifeless mineral glob without my Java.

Water plus carbon and a few other minerals makes us.  To give anything life, to keep anything alive it must have water. Someone came up with a way for cars to run on water.  Who would interfere with that technology and why, someone devilish?

Water is so life giving that I think maybe God is water and we are drilling for –> well,  you get my point?

Manufacturers may actually come back to the USA if it is more cost effective through net metering.  Jobs will be created through installation of these systems, and hopefully job opportunities returning to the USA.  Manufacturers love saving money, their profits improve so then their stock holders are happy too.  Making money is the central purpose to life on this planet.  With net metering we can save the planet and make money.  Everybody is happy.

Here is the easiest explanation I could find regarding Net Metering.

Imagine the simplest possible metering arrangement: a single, 1960s-standard electromechanical meter. Now imagine that a residential customer, Ray McSolar, added a rooftop photovoltaic (PV) system (also known as a solar-electric system) to his home, on his side of this meter. Ray wakes up early for his job; on most days, he is out of the house before sunrise. In these dark morning hours, Ray makes his coffee and breakfast while watching the morning news on TV. The electric meter spins forward as Ray is consuming electricity from the grid.

Determined not to waste a bit of electricity, Ray shuts off all of his appliances as he heads off to work. Ray’s solar panels now start churning out electricity as the sun rises—electricity Ray sends back to the overstressed grid. His meter now spins in reverse.

When Ray returns at night to cook dinner and relax in front of the TV, the meter spins forward again as he consumes more electricity than his system generates. The result? Ray’s bill will show only his net consumption of electricity from the grid. Should it be a hot sunny month (when the grid needs the most help), or a month in which Ray’s electricity use is low, any excess electricity his system generates is rolled over to his next bill, just as he might rollover excess cell phone minutes.

Utilities should not have a divine right to charge for electricity that customers can otherwise generate more efficiently and more cleanly on their own.

Congress realized the vast potential of net metering when it mandated in the 2005 Energy Bill that every state consider adopting or expanding net metering programs by the end of 2007.

Participation in New Jersey has skyrocketed by over 30,000 percent since 2002. It’s amazing. The state utility commission is literally drowning in new applications. Because they embraced the net-metering concept and new business applications soared because of the savings on their bottom line from providing their own energy. What New Jersey and other states (like Montana, and Oregon) prove is that Americans are willing to invest in their own energy independence if state regulations would only let them.

Why don’t legislators like it?