Toadie, ain't easy being green

thetoadcroaks.blogspot.com

Your dog won't burn

University of Indiana tested dogs, house pets.  They found fire retardant in them, at 10 times the level of humans.  Fire retardant chemicals in carpets and furniture is absorbed on contact.   Ever wonder why so many dogs die of cancer and lumpy sores on their skin?  The test did not check for the chemicals that make it stain proof, like Koch's StainMaster, and it did not check for yard chemicals or deck wood treatments, these would have added to the cocktail of posions.

The test also did not check children and babies, who's sweaty little feet and hands wick up these chemicals just as the dogs do.  Wood and tile my offer a safer floor, and if you shop hard, you can find a few chemical free carpets and furniture coverings.  Fire retardant furniture treatments you can thank on the cigarette smokers for starting so many fires.

Fixing One Angry Zebra

Sarge has been unable to get the icon he leaves in your follower lists to take you to his white page and show the next link to get you into One Angry Zebra.  Instead at his white page (do they call it the home page??) you have to jog through his follow list until you find his icon there and click it to get in.
Either Skinny or Scratch, Skinny I think, made a nice set of instructions to cure this, it worked for me, but not Sarge.  I kept ragging on him but he said it didn't work, so he gave me his passwords and sha-zam, it doesn't work is correct.
Anyone have a cure?  Blogger's help system is worthless.  Below is the how to, item 10 is where it breaks down for Sarge.  There is no "add link" choice for Sarge. (the window IS in the "more choice" setting). He uses aol as his email, I chose google as his operating system, any chance that's the issue?
Any blogger whiz kids?  Anyone?

Basically here is what I did.

1) I signed in to blogger like normal.

2) I went to Whit's blog.  It appears that the same stuff won't show up if you do this on your own blog, so you have to go to someone else's blog.

3) Go to where they have pictures of all their followers.  Just underneath this are the words "Already a member?  Sign in".

4) Click on the "sign in" part.

5) Then the screen gives  you options of how to sign in.  I picked Google button.

6) Then sign in on the screen that pops up.

7) Then you'll find yourself back at that person's blog you started at.  The difference is now that your icon is duplicated above all the icon pictures, and next to your icon is "Options".

8) Click on "options".

9) On the choices that pop up, click on "site settings".

10) Then the "basic" area should be shaded, and on the right of my icon was "Add links" in blue letters.

11) I clicked on "add links", and entered my blogspot URL and my site name, then clicked on "add".

Why you will never have "Clean Coal"

For months nationwide we see TV adds by a skinny nice looking women in a suit telling us about clean gas, oil and in some adds, clean coal.  Here's why clean coal is a bunch of crap, a steaming pile.

Coal burning releases carbon.
Carbon capture has only been done in labs and now in one coal fired plant, a gizzilion dollar system that catches only 5% of the carbon from one power plant.
To catch all the CO2 at a coal burner, the plant must be twice the size, it takes that big a device to catch it.
Most coal burner plants don't have enough space to add this so retrofits will never occur.
The cost jumps to the cost of a nuke plant.
The carbon catcher consumes around 30% of the plants energy production to work it's magic.
Additional water is required, not good news in western states.
To pump the C02 underground takes pipelines to appropriate geological locations and lots of wells and pumps to force it into the earth.
This infrastructure of pipelines will require the usual imminent domain and property rights fights.

Clean coal will never be a reality in the market.  Utilities do not want it, only to sell the fantasy of it to delay other actions, and to pretend.

Trumped

Obama releases birth records without prior notice.  Excellent.  Fox says it's "a so called birth certificate", yes please keep it alive, excellent.  Trump calls himself a hero for forcing the president to release it and laying the issue to rest, remember he had evidence to the contrary a few days ago, excellent.  Trump says the whole thing is the press's fault for making such a deal of it, excellent.  I turn to Fox, for the only minute of viewing it in a couple weeks and the beautiful sarcastic soap opera news reader is saying it's Trump's fault, he brought it up, he sure did she repeats, excellent.  Obama says we have more problems to solve than this silly shit, which pins the 2012 candidates to the mat, the first one that stands up and agrees with this will face the rath of the birthers, excellent.

Divide and Conquer

Paul Ryan's GOP plan is to convince Mr and Mrs Gray hair they can invest for retirement and buy their own insurance and get a better deal.  But the people the GOP tells this too will not need to do it.   If you are already retired or will be soon, you can stay on the hated communist system, your kids and grandkids cannot, they will have to give their money to wall street.  Let me be clear, if you remember just one thing here.  Most people lose money on stocks, or loaded funds and investment managers bleed off their gains, no shit, most lose their ass on stocks.  If you think everyone can win in a casino, or in the stock market, your mis-informed about the purpose of both businesses.
Yes I know the system has problems, but 60% of our budget is for military, move a little of that to these systems, and get corporations and rich to pay taxes and the problem is suddenly very small.  But here's the GOP plan, lets cut off it's income, and lock your kids out of it, let bankers and stock brokers handle the money, lets see how that works.

Germans caught weighing Greenland every few hours, obsessed with heft

183 gigatons.  Greenland, part of the North America continent is the worlds largest island, and the Germans lust after every ounce of her enormous icy bulk.  It must be the primal Viking Hun Visogoth Saxon attribute that drives this interest in rotund forms.

183 gigatons.  By the grace of Germany the GRACE satellites were launched.  Fast moving low orbiting (450 kilometers) the two probes hurtle along one trailing the other by 137 miles.   Several times a day they dash over Greenland, measuring gravitational pull which as you should know, the more the mass the greater the gravity.  Their flight path becomes a slight mirror image of the mass they pass over, the larger the mass the greater the pull down first on one then the other.   Instruments on these satellites measure these variations between the two as small as one micron, 1/100th the width of a hair, this translates into detecting ice layers as thin as a centimeter over a land mass.

183 gigatons.  With a few exceptions during winter coldest snaps, every trip over Greenland it weighs less.  Greenland is getting lighter by the hour.  It's 6 years since the bathroom scales were shoved under our frosty island lady.  Last month the Germans gave the results.

183 gigatons = weight loss of Greenland in 6 years of monitoring.   According to this alarm set off by the Germans, Global Warming is stripping the ice off Greenland faster than the climate change model's predicted.   Here is Scott Luthcke, he compiles the weight of Greenland every week from the GRACE system, the most precise and the largest capacity bathroom scales ever built.   gigaton=1 billion ton

West of Eden

See anyone your curious about? Even a little?

5.5 point drop in kids IQ from agricultural chemicals

Organic looks a lot cheaper today.  Thats right, feed your kids conventional food sprayed with pesticides, and they cannot be as smart as children eating organic. Columbia University and Mount Sinai Medical Center study results indicate we are dumbing our kids.  Expect a tobacco industry denial, and loud.
When I was a kid I read one of those futuristic predictions that one day we could eat things that would change the capacity of our brains, wow, they got it right.  ......   Safe clean food to expensive, try stupid.

Money for water and the watts aren't free

Add conventional utilities to the list of those wasting water.  Western states drag themselves through the dust of an extend drought, burning from forests of the northwest to farmland of Texas, yet the coal plant wants more water.  Water rights fights rage from North Dakota to Mexico.  Kansas is suing Colorado again, a suit 40 years old, and now add Nebraska, as those states suck the rivers dry before they cross the border.

Generating electricity requires rivers of water.  Either from a river or river fed lake, or from massive wells into finite deposits.   Nuclear plants lead the list of water use per kilowatt delivered.  Next coal fired plants in all forms, burned as rock, or dust, mixed with natural gas, under high pressure or conventional.  Natural Gas fired generators are essentially equal in water consumption to most coal operations.   I lost the data, but the amount used is amazing at all these generating stations, a small river is needed every day all day.

These generators work when water is turned into steam.  Then it's cooled and either returned to the loop or let go, either way it has to be first cooled, evaporation towers like above or the cone shaped ones at nuke plants. But prior to water being added to the boiler it may need filtered and treated, this process also uses or eliminates lakes of water.  

But wait, there are some forms of generating which do not require any water.  Wind and solar PV.  None.   That seems like a hugh plus for western states and drought conditions.  Now those solar mirror systems that heat molten salt need water once, but it is a closed loop so none is consumed, those solar mirror systems that boil water to run a turbine will need water, so far as I know none of those are in the US or planned.

Hydroelectric dams.  Well they use lots of water, but in theory the water would have passed by just the same so it is a wash, that's a joke, get it, a wash, ha!

Canada your next, hell fire and lies.

   The fossil fuel industry and the status quo energy marketers are headed to Canada.  The percent of Canadians who understand the current climate changes under way is very high compared to the US.  The US consumes and believes much of the climate deniers propaganda and lies, Koch and BP and many others spend millions flooding (giving) the media with pre-written pseudo science stories and McLying  happy talk, and it works.  The public in the US shifts constantly towards the position being sold.
   Last week it was reported Koch is hiring advertisers in Canada, writers, speakers, and lobbyist at local and national levels to deliver to Canada the same ignorant shit as they sell here.  Money will flow, lies will be told.  Will Canada buy it, will they begin to block alternative fuels, and loosen up laws on pollution?
   Europe is already under attack, how did they miss Canada, well the correction is made.
Happy Earth Day Maple Leafs, lets see if you have better critical thinking skills than your southern neighbors.

Come on Donnie, don't let the GOP show you the door

I am hoping Donald Trump will not exit to soon.  I count on him to cause Mitty and Palenty and others to spend some of their supporters cash early to dump him.  Hang in there Donnie you and I both know  Huckabee is a wannabee, love your comb over.

Bill Moyers asks about the futility of the drug war in Baltimore

David Simon: I don't think we have the stomach to actually evaluate it.

Bill Moyers: What do you mean?

David Simon: Again, we would have to ask ourselves a lot of hard questions. The people most affected by this are black and brown and poor. It's the abandoned inner cores of our urban areas. As we said before, economically, we don't need those people; the American economy doesn't need them. So as long as they stay in their ghettos and they only kill each other, we're willing to pay for a police presence to keep them out of our America. And to let them fight over scraps, which is what the drug war, effectively, is. Since we basically have become a market-based culture, that's what we know, and it's what's led us to this sad denouement. I think we're going to follow market-based logic right to the bitter end.

Bill Moyers: Which says?

David Simon: If you don't need 'em, why extend yourself? Why seriously assess what you're doing to your poorest and most vulnerable citizens? There's no profit to be had in doing anything other than marginalizing them and discarding them.

from Grist

Oil man conversion, says Global Warming is real

Sarge over at One Angry Zebra has for the last two years embraced T Boon Pickens's plan to convert America's trucks from Diesel to Natural Gas.  I have had some trouble accepting this, didn't trust TBP, but, I saw him with Ted Turner on PBS last night and he convinced me.

Now I must clarify, I don't think TBP is totally on the level, or suddenly and totally a "green".  But, he is most the way there, and I can accept his residual oil man's "sins" and welcome him into the flock, he will make a difference, to some extent, in moving this nation to a slower rate of killing the planet.

Two years ago he launched a project to build the largest wind farm in the world in the panhandle of Texas. He ordered 500 wind mills from GE, but his enemies, the Kochs (he said are no friends of his) and others fighting any and all alternative sources were able to block the transmission lines.  He still had  those wind mills on order, quickly he found a place in Canada to put most of them and Minnesota takes the rest.  His second project was convert trucks to Natural Gas.  I didn't buy this because first he wants government to help start the project for him, and I oppose drilling more wells.  Also I have a burr in my britches that he is buying water rights in the panhandle of Texas, Oklahoma and the far southwest corner of Kansas, once he has enough capacity bought he will pipe it to Dallas, reducing some of our food production capacity in so doing.

Well he convinced me with his pitch, first we are paying for both sides of our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, our side, and by our using 25% of the worlds energy, we drive up prices which benefits some who help fund our enemies, this can be reduced if we use less oil.  Yes, Natural Gas is a fossil fuel and it's burning as transportation fuel adds CO2, but a small percent compared to Diesel, and with virtually no particulates, sulfur and so on.  The impact is very small.  I do have a problem with fracking wells in the east, in the west it appears to be less an issue, due to the geology and locations of gas and its relation to water.  Anyhow, I wish they can stop or limit the fracking, but, we have lots of natural gas, the prices are down over the last few years in half or so which would lower freight costs that impact everything we do.   TBP's model is California, many cities have bus systems on natural gas and garbage trucks, and some freight terminals, the improvement in air quality is significant, replace a diesel garbage truck with natural gas and it's like taking a couple hundred cars off the road in pollution levels.  TBP says, I it's probably a stretch, but says we could cut oil imports by almost 1/2 if all trucks were NG.

TBP said he accepted global warming as a true and real event after a number of recent trips to far north Alaska.  He saw in only a few years the ice totally melt off some mountains for the first time ever, and the loss of ice in the Arctic Ocean, and he was convinced, he said he truly worries the polar bear is in danger now.  He decided we have to do something now, if one day it proves we were wrong it won't cost much to have taken these actions, but if we do nothing we will soon be past the point of no return.   He also is excellent at playing the patriot and security card, why wouldn't the Kochs and other oil and coal companies want to save the US money and help the environment.......easy, they are multi-national corporations dedicated to profit, not to a country, if hosing us and making our long term prospects worse profits them in the near term, there sure as hell going to do it.  He went after Bush for using multi-national energy company execs so heavily in his administration, dumb he said, that was dumb to use people who have no real interest in America's future.  By the way, he ended saying, get those boys on a plane, get us out of Afghanistan and Iraq, now, we could have rebuilt America for what we have wasted there.  And he pointed out that Germany spends a lot of money on solar and wind rather than rely so much on Russian natural gas, they are concerned as we should be on supplies from unreliable vendors.

Illegal to know, illegal to see, US corporatism in action.

Why?  In the USA, why?
Government will not allow further testing of baby whales, or dolphin found dead or ill along the Gulf coast, could it be that the first tested show oil and chemicals killed them??
During the oil spill clean up last year on the gulf coast, BP workers were allowed to harass and detain people who took photo's of oil clean up, the Coast Guard made it a crime to photo some areas of the oil spill??
It is a crime for a slaughterhouse to test more than a set number of animals for mad cow disease??
A number of states have laws making it illegal to photograph hog farms, chicken farms??
..... illegal to photograph slaughterhouse activities??
..... illegal to photograph puppy farms (pet industry)??
What crimes can you commit by being informed?

Falstaff's Revenge

I wrote this true event a few years ago.  It's true, it took place in 1968 or 69 in Germany, Falstaff here, is none other than Sarge, the One Angry Zebra.

--------And so it began------

Another car rolls in to a slot in front of the barracks. Blue VW doors ajar the occupants spill out laughing and bragging. Out of the dark comes a small group on foot, walking back from town. It will soon be 12:30, the night is cool and damp as the drunks from the off base bars converge and mix with the guys coming off swing shift at our white stucco home, a NATO barracks. Cigarettes and lies and friendly insults are exchanged as they filter into the building. Off to the side, through the humid halos of distant lights lie a dozen or more low earth covered hangers sheltering nuclear armed F-4’s through the razor wire.

Inside I live on the first floor, first room to the left off the entrance. The Squadron Headquarters is the first door to the right. It’s closed at night, but there is always someone on duty, to find people, report fires or trouble, answer the phone. This duty rotates amongst the 80 men living in the 3-story building. It’s a job all of us hate, for reason of oversight I have never been called on to do it, I keep that fact to myself.

This poor schmuck stuck with tonight’s duty is in a room on the other side of my room, for some reason it’s referred to as the “day room”. It has some easy chairs in it, along with some card tables, pool tables and fuss-ball tables. I look in the day room, a few pause at the pool table where a couple of tipsy airmen are heating up, pushing one another around and slobbering red faced insults. The schmuck and some others are trying to keep a lid on it. It’s pretty funny but I decide to stay out of it this time and go to bed. I head for the latrine and on to the room.

Five of us share a room. It’s a big room made for eight, with big swing out windows that open on the parking lot. I throw my clothes in the locker and fall in bed under a green wool military blanket.

I’m almost asleep and fear washes over me, I hear something. I could hear Falstaff’s breath rattling through flem in his chest. I froze in my bunk assessing the danger. What treachery is this? The beast has just returned from a trip to Ireland, arriving back waving a crude crooked wooden mallet. It's a shillelagh to bring down his foes he brags, a weapon of wild tribes, heathens, and sheepherding murdering raping wild men. And now I know he creeps forward amongst the bunks and lockers, an assassin in the dark, I smell him, I hear him shuffle slowly. I make the decision to try to escape with my life; I know he means me harm. He has for weeks nurtured and grown his hatred for me.

The root of the malcontents discontent lies in incidents too dim in the sotted past of gin and beer and poisons, in scuffles and insults to many to endure. But, if I can put a handle on the pranks which set him off the track of sanity and onto this path of sending me to hell, it may be two incidents, incidents and faults of mine, pranks.

The first event: From 6 stories up, in a glass bird cage packed with radios and phones I work as one of the air traffic controllers. We look out into the night, every night, and when dawn arrives, before us on a near hillock sets a hideous checkered box in the grass, the radar operators of the air traffic controllers work there, and this is Falstaffs domain. The winter is long here, not severe, but long. Snow comes many times. This morning a foot of snow covers the earth. Between the base of the control tower and the checkered radar unit stretches a 40’ wide 1.6 mile long concrete taxiway, parallel to the runway. A deep ditch is on one side of the taxiway.

Like moles from the earth the radar operators emerge from their checkered burrow into snow reflected glare and trek to the base of the control tower to enter. They seek sanitary relief, there’s no bathroom in their lair. A guy with a good arm and a supply of massive slushy snowballs on the catwalk 70’ up can rain frozen pain on these poor soles as they struggle through the snow in and out of the steep ditch. 2 or 3 people with good arms can hold them back until they can’t take it. Cursing and dodging Falstaff and others can often be brought to falling in the ditch, offering an even easier and bigger target. It was great fun from the tower, but rightfully garnered hatred from those floundering in the ditch absorbing the icy hail.

The second event: A scuffle after a night of drinking. Falstaff and I, having consumed copious amounts of alcohol during an evening which started a hundred kilometers away in Luxembourg City at the Green Lantern where we laughed till we cry at a male voice waling either in pain or thrill drifting down from a harlots torture chamber above. Back at the barracks at the end of hours of debauchery, for reasons I am sure unknown to us then as now we scuffled a bit in the room and Falstaff passed out, I could say went to sleep, but in those days he didn’t go to sleep, he passed out. I, reverting to the most base animal instinct of a prank, after all we spent the day and night being base animals, grabbed a bucket of red paint and wiped the soles of his boots, when suddenly as if an alarm sounded he arose cursing the world and walked to the latrine and back.

07:30, it’s a workday and the First Sergeant is in the room screaming. Falstaff’s tracks told a story, which urinal he stood at, the wobbly path he treads to and fro. For the next few hours the hall was full of sounds of his labor as he mopped and scoured and waxed, finally unable to completely remove all the evidence. As he worked, he mumbled threats and plans of revenge. It was going to be a significant event. I was doomed and slept light from that day forward.

But now, I breathe slow and silently in the darkness of the humid German night listening as my murderer draws near with his primitive weapon. I have to escape or get to the light switch. The room is dark, a rat maze of lockers and furniture and beds. I move towards the doors, bringing me closer to him. I fix his probable approach and skirt the opposite way. I will outflank him and get to safety. Suddenly the heathen is upon me, my path choice an error. He can see me against the back light of the window. Wham, I can scarcely comprehend what happened. A horrible cracking sound and impact pitching my head to one side and I almost fall, I lunge or stumble to the side and now I can see him. He whirls the war club overhead like a cowboy working a rope on a helpless calf. He means no less than to spill my brains on the concrete floor. Stepping closer he levels insults and smiles cruelly. Surely killing or crippling me with this knobby wooden mallet is his aim. Bam it thunders again but he misses my head and lands a dent in the steel locker door. The lights come on, others are startled out of bed and want to witness my death, such is the atmosphere. I pull my hand away from my throbbing head, no blood. My punisher roars with laughter and accusations devaluing my lineage. He faints another swing but I see the attack is over, I have survived. I amble to the latrine to brush my teeth and run cold water over the growing hot lump on my head.

The latest wave of drunks staggered in from town, hearing of the attack some gawk at me in the latrine holding my head while others fill the room to hear my malevolent aggressor issue an exciting account of the battle and the guile required to win it. While he glows in victory the drunks examine the dent in the locker and pass around the cudgel, marveling at what a magnificent implement it is while swinging it dangerously over one another trying out the feel of it.

Ah, to take a beating from a friend in front of my prize pinup, DeDe Lind, the hottest Playboy foldout of all times, that was a letdown. I took DeDe down the next day, folding it carefully for storage.

If ever you find a shillelagh, burn it.

Indiana Gov. tries his hand at slamming educated people, but that's not who is waiting to kick him in the balls.

     Governor Mitch Daniels, (Koch - Indiana), scoundrels he calls them, those 97ish % of scientist in climate related fields who agree on global warming.  "Consensus is the refuge of scoundrels", says the guy who shares the same views on this issue with most fossil fuel businessmen and the GOP.   No, that's not a consensus when the GOP and business agree, that's unanimity, see that's not a scoundrel thing.
     Mitch said the debate is "dominated by experts from the "University of Hollywood", says the man who a moment ago indicated it was a plot by scoundrel scientist but now it's these other dudes or???
     The name calling continued the gov. saying that it was the "P.C. Institute of Technology" of silicone valley that was doing this.  Damn I can hardly keep up with these shape changing transformer  evil educated guys hogging all the good discoveries up from the business majors and high school dropouts.
    Mitch has a tough road ahead of him, it's choked with name callers and fear mongers, first debate with Bachman before he lowers his zipper to get the light on his globes she'll have him fighting the RHINO label.

Another catastrophic event for the energy industry

North Dakota, USA a number of environmental watch dog web sites are reporting the blades of a wind turbine fell from the tower putting that unit off line pending repair.  The results of this disaster are:

No gazillion ton concrete containment dome will have to be built over the site.

No 20 mile evacuation radius has been established for the safety of the residents, yet.

No civil or military efforts have been required for rescue and recovery.

Loss of life so far is restricted to a few dozen prairie grass plants the blades drove into the earth.

No radiation has been reported in other nations, local milk shows no increase in radiation.

Up to now the nearest ocean has not been used as a dump for leaking fluids.

The return to service of this wind mill could be as little as a few weeks. 

The surrounding grid and consumers have suffered zero power outages following the event.

What is the true and total cost of Wind energy?  What is it for nuclear energy?

unfriend coal

Amber alert for Toadie

Attention Blogstream refugees!   Toadie is still missing.  I'm calling the milk company and asking them, put Toadie on the carton.   A month ago he said he was on his way, but he never showed up, I'm getting really scared.  Any news?  Anyone?

Mitt Hole

I don't know what it means, maybe you do.   Tell me, tell us, what does it mean?

Vertical Gasoline aided by bugs and hotter weather (visit NRDC.org)

All over the American Southwest the pine trees are under attack by a pine tree bore.  This bug drills so many holes in the trunk of the pine it spills it's sap out and dies. If you go to the base of a tree in it's final days, you see sawdust on the ground and the tree weeping sap.  From the high desert mountains in southern New Mexico to north of Yellowstone you can see whole mountain sides of dead pine forests, standing death, vertical gasoline waiting for the spark.  This year and the next few could see the largest fastest fires we have ever known.  The beetle causing this can be killed by spray, but it is impossible to spray billions of pines in the West and the capacity to do so does not exist.  Once these forests are gone erosion will set in, heat in the mountain states will rise further.  New pines will grow but the beetle attacks them as soon as they are as thick as a mans wrist.  I have not heard a good projection of what these mountains will look like in a few years.  Aspen cannot take the place of all the pine, they usually grow on different facing slopes, each have their niche for sun and moisture.    

These beetles or bores, are at the Canadian border now, science says they will move north in the next few years.  Low temperatures exclude them now, but with the coming warmer temperatures they can survive there too.  

Get to the mountains of the West as soon as you can, enjoy the healthy pines where you find them, notice the dead groves, and stay alert, camp in safe places, away from the dead trees and near water and with an exit strategy.  Get to the parks, let your legislators and your state park people know you want the facilities maintained, and the animals protected.   Go to NRDC.org.  If you do not know this group, they are rated one of the top charity in the US.  Almost all their money goes to the purpose it was collected for, this my friends is something few charities can confirm.  They spend very little money raising money or paying directors, and they have the best track record among environmental groups, what they fight for they often achieve.  

NRDC alert, while we slept, Dems and Repubs decided to shoot the dogs.

.......to report that the last-minute budget deal agreed to by Congressional leaders on Friday night will strip endangered species protection from gray wolves across most of the Northern Rockies, leaving them at the mercy of states that plan to kill hundreds of them. 

This stealth attack on wolves -- which circumvents the will of the courts and good science -- was inserted by Representative Mike Simpson (R, ID) and Senator Jon Tester (D, MT). It was approved by the leadership of both the House and the Senate, and it was okayed by the White House. 

It is a shameful day for this nation when both parties unite behind the slaughter of an endangered species -- without public hearing or debate. 

And there is another victim here as well: the Endangered Species Act. 

Congress has never before removed an animal from the endangered species list. By replacing scientific judgment with political calculation, the House and Senate have struck at the very heart of wildlife protection in America. 

We have to make sure that the political door is not thrown open to new attacks on other imperiled species. 

Contact your Senator and the White House expressing your outrage at this attack on wolves and telling them to keep their hands off the Endangered Species Act. 
-------
When asked, visitors to the national parks say the number one thing they would like while there, is to hear the wolf.   Can you imagine it, a few old men have just decided it would be more fun to have them all killed. 

The secret to being rich is being rich

 It may seem too fantastic to be true, but the top 400 people with the highest income in the nation end up paying a lower tax rate than the next 1,399,600 wage earners.  This according to the magazine Businessweek.  News today, JP Morgan HMFWIC got a raise, 19 million, a nice raise.
Lets see, to grow the economy we need to make their tax breaks permanent, greater, broader, and ensure they can pass the wealth on to their kids to ensure the multigenerational money-royal aristocratic plutocracy now in power of corporate America will flourish.  OK grunts, stop dreaming, pay your taxes.

My brother-in-law,and me, estranged in a strange land.

My wife talked to her brother a few days ago.  Retired with a few acres of farmland in central Kansas.  He said how sad he was at losing so many friends.  They shun him more and more, and he them.  He tells an example, recent early morning cafe talk with the small town locals as one after another ranted Obama should be impeached for the illegal bombing of Lybia.  He pointed out Reagan did the same, and in fact attempted to take out Quadaffe duck.  Some set in silence, but some said he was nuts that Reagan never did any such thing, they said they couldn't remember that, or pretended not to, he was really stunned at how nasty they got about his bringing up facts, he said he was really depressed by the encounter, couldn't understand why his friends react this way.
A few days after Congresswoman Gifford was shot in Arizona a business friend called, he often ranted that democrats in the house and senate should be marched outside and shot in the head on the Capital steps if they failed to convert on the spot, and loved to silence meetings asking who will shoot Obama?  When he called I ask him if he was happy about the shooting, oh no he said that was bad, but I said it's what you have wanted, oh no not me, he denied it for a while, finally he said well it shouldn't have happened like that and she was the wrong target.  Since then he rarely calls and we never lunch, business conversations are a bit curt.
Do these guys persecute us for their sins?
Well, the brother-in-law said he would like to move to another state, maybe people are not so hostile, I feel the same way these days, can't wait to retire and leave, which makes me wonder, are we going to become enclaves of like minded people, political segregation?

Fireworks from a town in Germany I lived in for many years.

It changes a great deal throughout the 11 minutes.  Watch it on youtube full screen.

GOP mathiosity kills the EPA? If education costs to much, try ignorance.

From Grist.com, The riders that would forbid the EPA  regulate greenhouse gases didn’t succeed in the Senate.  That hasn’t stopped Senate Republicans from declaring victory, though. There were four riders dealing with EPA powers; no single one got 60 votes, but they went ahead and added up all the senators who voted for any of the four. And there were 64 of those, so they won!

Yeah, somebody needs to watch Schoolhouse Rock again. And not just the one about how a bill becomes a law, but also some of the math bits, because climate-hatin’,dictator-lovin’ Jim Inhofe declared this a “90 percent” majority. For those of you who also need an elementary school refresher, there are 100 senators, and 64 out of 100 is 64 percent. But 90 percent of made-up statistics are “90 percent,” we find.

I'm giving you $130.00, buy some organic food with it.

If you don't remember anything else about The Yellow Fringe, remember I told you how to make  $130.00 with no investment or risk.

If you drive to work 5 days a week, or errands, your going to save at a minimum 0.1 US gallon of fuel each day even if you suck at most the suggestions below, that's $130 a year, and I could make you lots more, up to 30% if you get serious.  In Europe the car companies, yes even Ford, gives driving classes to improve your fuel savings.
Pay attention, take notes, it's your money:

1. Air up your damn tires, and tune up your car.  (the car company suggests a pressure for comfort, on the tire is the suggested safe maximum, I use something between those)
2. Look down the road and think, if the light turned red or traffic is backing up, coast to it, you also  save brake wear.
3. Fast starts in traffic, lane hopping, saves you 2.5 minutes in 20 min of city driving, and costs 35% more fuel.
4. Loose weight, clear the trunk, don't pick up fat hitchhikers, mpg goes down 2% per 100 lbs.
5. If traffic and distance are equal, take the smoothest surface road.
6. Cruise control saves fuel on flat land, on large hills it wastes fuel.
7. In good weather and if the car is in good condition, turn off engine on long stops.
8. If you need new tires and will keep the car for their life, pay the few dollars more for "low rolling resistant" tires, they pay for themselves.
9. Going out on errands, plan your route to have more right turns than left, lowers idle time.
10. At the big box store park out near the entrance, you need the 2 minute walk, and you won't have to back out to depart.

My hybrid Camry is rated at 34 mpg city and 36 hiway, I usually get 38 mpg for the whole tank, a few tanks were at 41.  Even if you have a hybrid you have to drive smart to keep your money.  A penny saved is a penny earned.  B. Franklin

US Supreme Court and the Sharia bikini.

US Supreme Court ruled today taxpayers have no standing to object to Arizona's decision to divert  money from their public education department to religious schools.  A conservative court said to tax payers the state may give your money to religious entities as it sees fit.  Separation of church and state is on life support now, and I expect it will die soon.  The remedy for this may be a backlash or legal challenge possible stimulated by Muslims, Hindu's and Witches demanding their cut of the pie.   If our tax money will now support Mormon schools and daycare at Our Lady of Perpetual Pedophilia, then we must also give it to the Madrassa.

Note:  A few days ago Kansas passed a law stating that Kansas's laws are the law of Kansas and Islamic Shria law is not and never will be.  Wow, glad they cleared that up!  But this says something else.  This says the Republican's in overwhelming control of the legislature believe religious laws can supersede state laws.  Yet, they moved to selectively eliminate it for one minority.  This action points out the far-rights religious intentions are like the bikini conundrum, "what you see is important, what you don's see is critical".

Drilling rigs idle, leases and permits unused, I say use'm or lose'm.

Dead turtles aren't so unusual, and ducks.  This is what drill baby drill looks like.  I don't know if you get out in the country much, but in oil producing areas, it's not uncommon, leaking collection tanks and dead animals in the oil and saltwater mess.   

Obama had decided we should sell more permits, drill more wells to solve our energy problems and reduce imports.   It is true domestic oil could reduce imports.  So could shifting to transportation, buildings, neighborhoods, factories that use less fuel.  

It turns out, oil companies are sitting on the lease, or rights, to drill more wells now than they have equipment to drill in the next several years.  Not only that, much equipment is idle, unused when it could be drilling (weekly drill rig count is available in oil industry news).  They want more permits for what, to hold as assets?  The biggest players are importing Saudi oil when they could have been drilling here on permits they have held for years.  This is what corporations do for us, send our money offshore rather than make production here, and speculate.  Our situation with imports is the fault of the oil companies, our situation of consumption is our own problem, and this can be fixed by us, if we will.   In fact, you could turn the brightness down right now on your computer screen, and save a couple of watts. 

About 3 years ago a tornado hit Greensburg Kansas, town of about 1,000, it killed a few but knocked down every tree, home and almost every business.  They rebuilt as a green city.  The greenest in the nation, all the buildings built have been far above standards for conservation of energy, many are Leed certified, even homes.  The John Deere dealer's building is LEED certified and his energy bills are $30,000 less a year than before.  For homeowners and firms, the payback is 2 to 5 years, fter that, it puts money in their pocket.  The city put up windmills, and there are a few solar panels about, energy stingy lighting on the streets and in public buildings.  It's very encouraging what can be done without oil corporations.  Greensburg officials are often contacted by cities after a disaster, they want to know how to rebuild quickly, and as a green community.

What do you think, should we ask oil companies to drill or give up leases after a few years?  Should we just bypass and ignore the oil corporations and go to a less oil dependent economy?

Another Scopes Trial, this time it's Global Warming

No more surprises, or I blow my brains out

In the Reichwing congress (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Koch), the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology continued this week it's Scopes trial of Science.  Yesterday the GOP brought in their big gun.  One of the top climate deniers to testify on his research into the hundreds of thousands of temperature readings gathered since thermometers were made.  Their "ringer" Richard Muller has been looking at NOAA, NASA and a set of European data.  His part in the drama was to show up and proclaim the GOP and Koch to be right, there was a conspiracy of junk science, the info bogus.  I wrote about this a while back that he had concluded the opposite of what he had been chosen for. I guess the GOP don't read the Yellow Fringe.

In the past Muller had been a darling of the GOP, Koch and the Chamber.  But shockingly, he said something else, he said "the datasets are tightly correlated with each other, they show a distinct warming trend.  We see a global warming trend that is very similar to that previously reported by the other groups.....I believe that some of the most worrisome biases are less of a problem than I had previously thought".    Republican lawmakers fell slackjawed, stunned.  They faced a traitor, WTF.   Eventually one recovered and launched into a diatribe on shoddy science holding up a copy of a 1970 Time magazine predicting cooling.  So there, HA Ha ha.

Kerry Emanuel of MIT also testifying yesterday called out the Time mag. and the surrounding argument of cooling and warned Congress of picking unreviewed or very old studies and those who wrote them to champion their cause, saying "politicians who make mascots of mavericks are invariably engaging in advocacy".  This set a number of them on the edge of their seats, they were clearly hot.   The irony sank  in as aids whispered in committee members ears, Emanuel is a Republican. 

Koch and the fossil fuel industry will not let the beatdown at their Scopes trial on science change anything.  But the GOP global warming denial has been further isolated descredited as lies, and mascots with talking points, and no facts.