Look for the Trump administration seeking a subsidy for coal burning power plants because they cannot compete with natural gas, which is available in prodigious amounts. Also, wind energy is cost competitive with coal to install and far cheaper to operate.
Trouble ahead in the White House with Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner put in charge of a number of efforts, including foreign affairs. Whoa! Does that mean that the Secretary of State reports to Jared, and not the president?
Trump's reversal of environmental control measures will create an uproar. Many jobs now depend on climate change abatement.
Common sense will eventually drive the legislature to provide medicare for all. One administrative system, modest charge, everyone covered. Rebates if don't use it and take care of health. A healthier nation. Everyone wins.
Tuesday, March 28, 2017
Friday, March 24, 2017
DECEPTION AND DEAL MAKING
Author's note. Trill is a fictional female acquaintance who makes it possible to write in a style that is comfortable for me.
My Dear Trill,
You write that you are despondent, confused by a churning world that has escaped your understanding. You are not alone.
Commercial interests, a universal drive to encourage people to consume and acquire possessions, is the engine of what is called progress. Rather than being guided, it operates by pushing boundaries as far as they can be pushed without breaking. You see this in television, which has largely become a medium for huckstering, even making a game of it, for example, and its adoption of the disgraceful role as the nation's greatest drug pusher (“see your doctor”).
Then there is the matter of utter falsehoods being foisted upon an entire population. Sad and troubling is the election of a professional huckster to lead the country; a man with the reputation as a “deal maker” with a background in casinos, steaks delivered to your door, wine, golf courses, real estate, a failed “university” ( a practiced liar, as if it isn’t commonly known that this is a necessaary attribute for deal making), and no governing experience at all: a man empty of empathy. We have elected a president who is skilled, howver, in pushing the boundaries, The worry now is that a mis-step could easily take the nation into war. It appears that he has already given up the role as leader of the free world to Angela Merkel, Prime Minister of Germany.
The marginal quality of our new President is common knowledge, and draws much critical commentary, a sample of which is illustrated by Richard Cohen’s recent opinion piece in the New York Times. Quote:
“If a budget can be a portrait of a soul, then this president’s is arid and shriveled. It is filled with contempt for the needy. Here is a man dismissive of the arts, the environment, the humanities, diplomacy, peacekeeping, science, public education and civilian national service — in short, civilization itself. If he could defund goodness he would. Charity is also ripe for the ax. Creativity needs skewering. Giving is weakness. All that counts are acquisitive instinct, walls and bans (of the kind that keep mother and son apart), displays of power, and the frisson of selective cruelty that lay behind his successful TV show. Everyone is now Donald Trump’s apprentice, at least as he sees it.”
How far this intrusion on Democracy, behaving more like a kleptocracy, will be allowed to go on is a matter of conjecture. My guess is that by mid-year the President will show signs of tiring of a job he doesn’t really understand, which is not meant to be styled to be run by deception and deal making, and the people will be really tired of him.
My Dear Trill,
Commercial interests, a universal drive to encourage people to consume and acquire possessions, is the engine of what is called progress. Rather than being guided, it operates by pushing boundaries as far as they can be pushed without breaking. You see this in television, which has largely become a medium for huckstering, even making a game of it, for example, and its adoption of the disgraceful role as the nation's greatest drug pusher (“see your doctor”).
Then there is the matter of utter falsehoods being foisted upon an entire population. Sad and troubling is the election of a professional huckster to lead the country; a man with the reputation as a “deal maker” with a background in casinos, steaks delivered to your door, wine, golf courses, real estate, a failed “university” ( a practiced liar, as if it isn’t commonly known that this is a necessaary attribute for deal making), and no governing experience at all: a man empty of empathy. We have elected a president who is skilled, howver, in pushing the boundaries, The worry now is that a mis-step could easily take the nation into war. It appears that he has already given up the role as leader of the free world to Angela Merkel, Prime Minister of Germany.
The marginal quality of our new President is common knowledge, and draws much critical commentary, a sample of which is illustrated by Richard Cohen’s recent opinion piece in the New York Times. Quote:
“If a budget can be a portrait of a soul, then this president’s is arid and shriveled. It is filled with contempt for the needy. Here is a man dismissive of the arts, the environment, the humanities, diplomacy, peacekeeping, science, public education and civilian national service — in short, civilization itself. If he could defund goodness he would. Charity is also ripe for the ax. Creativity needs skewering. Giving is weakness. All that counts are acquisitive instinct, walls and bans (of the kind that keep mother and son apart), displays of power, and the frisson of selective cruelty that lay behind his successful TV show. Everyone is now Donald Trump’s apprentice, at least as he sees it.”
How far this intrusion on Democracy, behaving more like a kleptocracy, will be allowed to go on is a matter of conjecture. My guess is that by mid-year the President will show signs of tiring of a job he doesn’t really understand, which is not meant to be styled to be run by deception and deal making, and the people will be really tired of him.
Thursday, March 16, 2017
SPACE TRAVELERS
When you think about it, human space exploration is akin to dolphins leaping out of the water. Contrast this with fact that we are already space travelers, tooling around the sun once a year at 30km per second. We even grow our own food.
Further, our spaceship moves along with the solar system in its orbit around the galaxy, at 230 km sec. which occurs once every 230 million years.
Rockets can hardly match what exists in the cosmos.
Further, our spaceship moves along with the solar system in its orbit around the galaxy, at 230 km sec. which occurs once every 230 million years.
Rockets can hardly match what exists in the cosmos.
Monday, March 6, 2017
ANXIETY
Authors note: Trill is a fictional female acquaintance who makes it possible to write in a style that is comfortable for me.
My Dear Trill,
Isn't it odd that America does not exist on maps? The Continents of North America and South America do, however. The founders had it wrong when they wrote "the United States of America' in the preamble to the constitution. Technically they should have written "the United States in the Continent of North America."
My Dear Trill,
Isn't it odd that America does not exist on maps? The Continents of North America and South America do, however. The founders had it wrong when they wrote "the United States of America' in the preamble to the constitution. Technically they should have written "the United States in the Continent of North America."
It follows then, Canadians, Mexicans, Guatemalans, Costa Ricans can claim to be Americans. Hawaiians, though part of the United States, unfortunately cannot make that claim.
For that matter, all citizens in countries in South America can claim to be Americans.
"God Bless America."
A nice song. Maybe a suitable anthem for the North and South American Continents.
The foregoing may be food for thought, Trill, but it is probably unimportant in the grand scheme of things; the immediate prospects for intelligent leadership by a lying, delusional, petulant and vindictive president, and in the broad perspective, society facing a race that is already out of the starting gates between the Transcendent Man, Dystopians, Luddites, and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)