"Joy and pleasure are as real as pain and sorrow and one must learn what they have to teach. . . ." -- Sean Russell, from Gatherer of Clouds

"If you're not having fun, you're not doing it right." -- Helyn D. Goldenberg

"I love you and I'm not afraid." -- Evanescence, "My Last Breath"

“If I hear ‘not allowed’ much oftener,” said Sam, “I’m going to get angry.” -- J.R.R. Tolkien, from Lord of the Rings

Sunday, April 30, 2017

Looking Backwards

I know, I haven't been posting, but frankly, I'm trumped out. The "president" is a dangerous buffoon -- he doesn't seem to understand that others are going to react to his hysterical tweets and off-the-cuff bombast, and it's not going to be just Fox News: it's going to be people like Kim Jong-Un and whatever ayatollah is in charge in Iran this week.

And he can't seem to get past the election:





There -- see all that red? That proves it.

And he thinks that issuing executive orders is governing. Here's one of the latest -- a give-away to the fossil fuel industry:

President Donald Trump painted a golden future of "great wealth" and "great jobs" powered by oil pumped from the ocean floor as he signed an executive order Friday to consider new offshore drilling around the country.

But his efforts could splash harmlessly against the hardened barricades that California has been fortifying for decades with regulation and legislation to prevent additional drilling along its treasured coast.

Even the faintest possibility of new oil operations prompted an immediate backlash in the state as environmentalists feared ecological disaster, surfers warned of soiled beaches and politicians promised new measures to block any development.

This is on top of trying to get waivers of Russian sanctions so the Secretary of State's old company can drill in the Russian Arctic.

We've heard so much all of our lives about America's forward-looking, entrepreneurial spirit that has made us the richest country the world has ever seen. (Pay no attention to those army veterans living on the streets.) And yet, when it comes to making ourselves energy independent, all we can come up with is drilling for oil. (Oh, and coal mining, which even the coal companies say is not going to happen.)

I've probably related this story before, but it remains timely: way back when, maybe the 1980s-90s, the Defense Department awarded a grant to Sony Corporation to develop a solar energy storage system compact enough to use on vehicles, which Sony did: they even built a factory to manufacture the prototypes, which were installed on a few cars and light trucks. Deal done, Sony packed up and went home, and, if I'm not mistaken, turned the patents over to DoD. Along comes one of those forward-thinking, entrepreneurial American "energy" companies -- Conoco, to be exact -- that bought the whole works. Conoco leveled the factory and no one has ever seen the patents again.

Let's just face it: the oligarchs running this country have a vision that sees as far as the next quarter's bottom line. And that's if they're really looking ahead.

Why in hell aren't these "energy" companies developing renewable energy -- solar, wind, tidal, whatever? I'm mean, it's not even a revolutionary idea at this point, and as it gets warmer and warmer, it's become critically important. Nope: because all they know how to do is use their muscle to open up new places to drill and new pipelines to run, for example, Canadian tar sands to Gulf Coast refineries to be refined and shipped overseas. Bottom line, remember?

Footnote: Interestingly enough, the Pentagon is going full steam ahead with converting to renewable energy sources.



1 comment:

Glenn Ingersoll said...

Trumped out in spades!

My greatest hope was for his incompetence. My greatest hope has been realized. What a sad and pathetic great hope.