Hi Friends, 

I just wanted to show you my latest painting "Golden terribilis".  Wikipedia says - Phyllobates terribilis, the Golden Poison Frog or the Golden Dart Frog, is a poison dart frog endemic to the Pacific coast of Colombia. In captivity, poison dart frogs are not poisonous. It is in the wild where they are in fact poisonous because of what they eat. Thisamphibian of the dendrobatidae family is currently considered the most poisonous vertebrateworldwide.^[1] The optimal habitat of P. terribilis is the rainforest with high rain rates This Frog's conservation status is on the Endangered List.

Here is a little closer look. 

Power to the Peaceful y'all - Karl Reid - Artist

With current soaring prices for marine fuels, the shipping industry is looking for alternative sources of energy to trim operating costs. Kites the size of soccer fields are being used to tow large ships in the open ocean reducing operating costs considerably.

The MV Beluga SkySails, a cargo ship rigged up with a billowing 160-meter sail from SkySails, consumed approximately 20 percent less fuel than it would have without the sail during a two-month voyage. That’s a reduction of 2.5 tons of fuel, or $1,000 a day, in operating costs. Beluga Shipping ultimately hopes to save $2,000 a day with this back to the future technology.

For the first time, the US Navy is using a new breed of sailing ship to deliver military equipment, a move that can potentially reduce fuel costs by 20 to 30 percent, or roughly $1,600 a day per ship, according to the ship's owners.

The Navy's Military Sealift Command (MSC) has chartered the "kite-assisted", fuel-saving 400 foot, MV Beluga to deliver Air Force and Army cargo to from Europe to the US.

The MV Beluga uses a paraglider-shaped, SkySails-System, which supplements its conventional, internal combustion engines. The sail is basically a huge, computer-controlled kite that soars 100 to 300 yards into the air, using the wind to tow the ship at the end of a long tear-proof, synthetic rope.

Imagine a cargo ship that is nearly 400 feet long being powered by the wind.   Obviously, it is not a new concept, as ships used to wind powered.  But they were very different then.   These modern cargo ships are way different.

The sail will be more like a kite as it allowes to drift over 600 feet above the ship.   This clearly will not totally replace the engines, as they are needed for maneuvering and power, but when the sail is deployed during the long journey, the ship can save around 20 percent of fuel consumption, which is not bad at all.

Other companies working on reducing emissions and fuel consumptions on ships include Solar Sailor, which has created sails with integrated solar panels. A ferry with sails already operates in Sydney Harbor. San Francisco may get one as early as 2009.

Yep, wind power is back! I can see a big smile on Al Gore’s face.

Source: Navy charters kite-powered cargo ship to deliver equipment - cnet news.com

By Tim Walker

From The Independent, October 12, 2008

Global warming is happening and we're to blame, right? That's certainly the view of almost every expert in the field. But a die-hard band of naysayers continues to rail against the consensus. Are they completely mad? Judge for yourself...

The caption calls him the "high priest of deceit and global destruction". The picture has him belching fire like a dragon. And who is the subject of this highly personal attack? None other than Al Gore, who last year won the Nobel Peace Prize, along with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), for their success in bringing the climate-change crisis to global public attention.

Not everybody likes Gore and his beliefs about the future of our planet – and especially not Hans Schreuder, the 62-year-old former chemist who runs the Gore-baiting website Ilovemycarbondioxide.com (see page 29). Schreuder is one of the climate-change sceptics who continue to make their case despite the mounting evidence of climate change that we, the public, are presented with every day; despite the unanimous endorsement of climate-change theory by every national academy of science in the industrialised world.

Click below link for the rest of the article

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/the-climate-change-unbelievers-958237.html

From INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY, September 26, 2008

Climate Change: Al Gore has rightly been scolded for encouraging civil disobedience to stop global warming. But his little-noticed follow-up statement might be even more foolish — and dangerous.

When it comes to sheer crackpottery on environmental issues, no national figure can measure up to the lofty standard set by the former Tennessee senator and vice president. This is a man who is leading a caravan of humming hybrid drivers to nowhere and is willing to criminalize those who disagree with him to get there.

While speaking Wednesday in New York at the Clinton Global Initiative, Gore told young people "looking at the future of this planet and looking at what is being done right now" that "it is time for civil disobedience to prevent the construction of new coal plants that do not have carbon capture and sequestration."

After fomenting crimes against property and obstruction of commerce through "rings of young people blocking bulldozers and preventing them from constructing coal-fired power plants," a strategy he advocated last year, Gore encouraged law enforcement officials to investigate a group of energy companies that he has singled out for punishment.

"I believe for a carbon company to spend money convincing the stock-buying public that the risk from the global climate crisis is not that great represents a form of stock fraud because they are misrepresenting a material fact," said Gore, who failed upward into a Nobel Prize.

"I hope these state attorneys general around the country will take some action on that."

What kind of economy would we have if attorneys general investigated every company that Gore and the environmental movement believe contributes to a "global climate crisis," the definition of which the eco-warriors are reserving for themselves? We would become sclerotic, as the flow of capital needed for energy development is choked off and energy supplies grow scarcer.

At Wednesday's conference, Gore, ever the alarmist, lamented that the battle against global warming is "losing badly" and claimed that an increase in tropical diseases and an upswing in severe hurricane activity are evidence.

Both claims are false, but there is an effort that is "losing badly," and that is his campaign to frighten the world into thinking the Earth is rolling downhill toward environmental cataclysm. The public, at least in this country, is beginning to understand the fraudulent nature of the climate-change scare and is refocusing its attention on issues that matter.

This is marginalizing Gore, and that's a shock to his ego. Expect his global warming claims and solutions to grow loopier and more extreme as he desperately — and bitterly — tries to cling to his waning, and almost wholly undeserved, relevance.

http://www.investors.com/editorial/editorialcontent.asp?secid=1501&status=article&id=307321965592638

This article concerning the Nobel Prize for Chemistry caught my attention this morning:

Twenty years ago, Douglas Prasher was one of the driving forces behind research that earned a Nobel Prize in chemistry this week. But today, he's just driving.

Prasher, 57, works as a courtesy shuttle operator at a Huntsville, Ala., Toyota dealership. While his former colleagues will fly to Stockholm in December to accept the Nobel Prize and a $1.4 million check, the former Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution scientist will be earning $10 an hour while trying to put two of his children through college.

Shuttle driver reflects on Nobel snub - Cape Cod TImes

Are we starving science research in other areas to pursue accelerated and possibly needless research into Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) and the dire consequences of AGW at the expense of other more productive and beneficial areas of study?

We have recently heard from Richard A. Muller justifying the distortions and untruths of Al Gore (I guess if the untruths were committed willingly, one could call them LIES) as necessary to stir the public to combat AGW, but at the same time are these tactics shifting funding away from more deserving science projects?

While it was perfectly within his rights not to share the cloned gene with others, Prasher said he felt an obligation to give his research a chance to turn into something significant, even if he was no longer a part of it.

"When you're using public funds, I personally believe you have an obligation to share," Prasher said.

How many researchers like Douglas Prasher are under-employed while others like Hansen and Mann receive lecture fees and yet continue to obfuscate data and research paid for by public funds simply to protect their 'empires'?

Your guess is as good as mine, but I ask if spending money on research the explore to the link between global warming and kidney stones really a good use of a limited resource?

In a final thought,  I hope some research facility sees this article and offers Doug a job that pays better than $10 an hour.  Clearly, he is a more deserving scientist than many of the AGW researchers.

There is a quote that I heard regarding global warming that I would like to share.
"Politicians who take credit for the rain WILL be blamed for the drought."

I say not a snowballs chance in . . . .

They will backpedal and say "See we told you all that it was a little too little too late. You had our hands tied so it is not our fault."

You see what people here do not realize is that there is no simple answer. It most assuredly has little to do with us. In fact, we are most likely delaying the inevitable. You see it takes reading thousands of pages to get to the truth. There are many of them. One you can bet on for sure is that the politicians will [win or loose with this global warming farce, they WILL find a way to make money from it].

1) Ten thousand years ago the last ice age was coming to its conclusion. The earth warmed and the ice went away and still is. What pollution did man have to cause this catastrophe? The answer is NONE. Wake up call number 1

2) Our "green house gasses" are mostly particulate. So much so that the suns brightness has diminished in the last 30 to 40 years by 25%. Wake up call number 2. How much warmer would the earth be today if this particulate carbon matter was not in the skies to reflect the sun back into space? No question it would be warmer than it is now.

3) Most of what out esteemed candidates want to do is to eliminate our green house gasses [these would be almost 100% of the particulate greenhouse gas matter]. This can do nothing but to accelerate the already increasing global temperature. Wake up call number 3.

4) The earth has gone through many of these cycles over its 4.5 billion-year life. These cycles had NOTHING to do with the presents of man. Wake up cal number 4.

5) As stated in number four this is natural for the earth. Wake up call number 5.

6) All this has nothing to do with "Saving Mother Earth." It has everything to do with saving man as the dominant species on the planet. Wake up call number 6.

7) Species have come and species have gone all at the whim of Mother Nature. We were not here in the beginning and we will not be here in the end. Fatalist, if you say so, but I prefer "realist." Wake up call number 7.

8 ) I cannot give you a proper synopsis of the thousands of hours of reading and research in a few sentences and the above are only a few of the many highlights that conclude that man is not remotely the biggest cause of global warming. Wake up call number 8.

9) I believe that most intelligent people do not buy into any of the political debates because we all know that they will say anything to get elected and then deliver little or nothing after winning. How many times must we endure this before it sinks in? So, I ask you why would anyone buy into this one aspect of the political debates? It is just another buzz subject to get votes. Wake up call number 9.

10) I can go on all day long but if you do not get the point by now you never will. Wake up call number 10.

b

If the offending picture is the White House - perhaps the they could tone the ad down a bit - know that you are competing with the old system - but perhaps be more subtle with it - the truth is nothing can stop the new energy - in 50 - 100 years - we are not going to be potting around with a combustion engine. The top of the range electric car is already more efficient than the gas guzzler, it goes from 0-60 mph almost as fast as you can put the pedal down, it is also faster and cheaper at 2¢/mile. Consider that like computers were 10/15 years ago.

The new buzz word is ET ~ energy technology, if we can do what we did with IT - with energy technology - then we don't know where we will end up and what will be the power of the future. It is likely - the crude oil and its cousins - will go the way of the whale oil they once had to pour in the sea (as the barrels were worth more) and the oil lamps that it powered.

An environmental action group founded by former vice president Al Gore is accusing ABC of censoring an advocacy ad the group paid to air on the network.

The Alliance for Climate Protection late Wednesday sent an e-mail blast to supporters with the ominous subject line, "ABC won't air our ad."

"Did you notice the ads after last night's presidential debate? ABC had Chevron. CBS had Exxon. CNN had the coal lobby," wrote Alliance CEO Cathy Zoi. "But you know what happened last week? ABC refused to run our Repower America ad -- the ad that takes on this same oil and coal lobby." The message sent readers to to a web page where they could send a form letter to the network.

The ad in question, which was aired by several other networks, is a 30-second spot that starts off with a call to "Repower America," with images of a little girl, windmills and solar panels.

...

Zoi sent a letter to Disney-ABC Television Group President Anne Sweeney on behalf of the Alliance, protesting the decision.

"This advertisement simply points out that the massive spending by oil companies on advertising and lobbying is a primary reason our nation hasn't switched to clean and renewable sources for our energy. The assertions that our ad makes are factual, common sense and are needed in the national debate about our energy future. Your viewers should not be denied the right to hear this point of view," wrote Zoi.

"Your rejection is even more indefensible given the overwhelming number of misleading ads that the oil and coal industry have run on your network," she continued. "This year alone, oil and coal companies and interests have spent hundreds of millions of dollars in an effort to convince the American people that they are focused on solving our energy and climate crises. On its face, these assertions by oil and coal defy all reason."

Barry said the group did not receive a response from ABC. The "Repower America" ad ran on CBS, CNN, CNN Headline News, Fox News, and MSNBC. ABC was the only one to reject the ad, according to the Alliance. The time spot purchased on ABC cost the group nearly $100,000, according to the Alliance. Instead of airing "Repower America," ABC ran the group's "Free Us" ad, which was already running on the network.

Source: Gristmill

Also a lot about the sheriff that is refusing to evict people. A lot of negative, however what we need are more local officials that are willing to do the right things, regardless of what Congress or State officials mandate. We need more sheriffs that are for the right thing to do and not more Sheriff's of Nottingham.

The government is driving us to what our forefathers rebelled against Britain for and they don't have a clue. Go back to my post 545 people.

In an article today Harold Kildow asks What Is It About Democratic Presidential Candidates and Terrorists?  The article links to a short test, and if you read the article at least up to that link you get a little background on the premise originated by former news anchor and presidential press secretary Tony Snow. 

What an interesting little quiz!  Click on this link for a series of quotes - then decide if they were written by Al Gore or the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski. 

The quotes are taken from Gore's Earth in the Balance  and Kaczynski's Manifesto.  Since I have never read either I was unfamiliar with their writing styles, but I don't think it matters.  Try it yourself. 

Good luck and let me know how you do.  I'll post my results later.

BTW, another article on AT addresses Why Obama's Terrorist Ties Don't Matter.  A terrific insight into the damage being done by our education system.

An ad produced by Al Gore's Alliance for Climate Protection has been ruled "too controversial" to air by the ABC network.
 
The TV ad, part of the WE campaign run by the alliance, was submitted for airing after this week's presidential debate between John McCain and Barack Obama.  But heads at ABC considered it violated its internal policy against "controversial" content during network-sponsored programs.
 
ABC spokesperson Julie Hoover said: "All of our advertising is reviewed on a case-by-case basis and the context of this particular ad was determined not to be acceptable per our policy on controversial issue advertising."
 
In the WE ad, an unseen narrator states that climate change can be combated through wind and solar power as well as "end our dependence on foreign oil."
 
The ad shows a child playing with blocks and the narrator goes on: "So why are we still stuck with dirty and expensive energy?  Because big oil spends hundreds of millions of dollars to block clean energy.  Lobbyists, ads, even scandals, all to increase their profits while America suffers."
 
Cathy Zoi, chief executive of the WE campaign called ABC's decision "outrageous" in light of the network's frequent airing of adverts from Chevron, Exxon Mobil and the other oil companies.

Oil companies, coal companies and industry groups have been advertising heavily during the presidential campaign events, telling what marvelous jobs they all do and how they are investing in renewable energy.
 
[Based on reports by The Guardian and thedailygreen.]

Massive voter fraud by ACORN is sweeping the nation. Much of the spike in registration of new Democrats is coming from these efforts. Even the polls are changed due to sample size adujustments made to match the surge in Democrat voter registration.

More than 1.9 million people are registered to vote in Harris County alone. A TV news team found 4,000 people dead on the voter roles. That's Houston an island of Democrats in a huge red state.

Now look at Ohio. A man who has come out and spoke about the voter-registration scandal told The New York Post yesterday he was given cash and cigarettes by aggressive ACORN activists in exchange for registering an astonishing 72 times, in a blatant violation of Ohio and federal voter laws.

"Sometimes, they come up and bribe me with a cigarette, or they'll give me a dollar to sign up," said Freddie Johnson, 19, who filled out 72 separate voter-registration cards over an 18-month period at the behest of the left-leaning Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN).

Take that into account and add it to Limbaugh's Operation Chaos that had Republicans switching over to vote for Hillary duriing the primaries and you can see that there is an artificial surge in Democrat registrations. Many states required that you declare you were a Democrat. Legal or intimidation tactic, it didn't matter, thousands of Republicans switched to defeat Hillary.

Investigative reporter Amy Davis on Houston's Local 2 reported how hundreds of voters could sway this year's election -- voters who are not even alive.

"All-in-all, a great person, a great woman, just a wonderful person" is how Alexis Guidry described her mother to Local 2 Investigates.

"As far back as I can remember, they've always voted in the election," Guidry said of her parents.

The March 2008 Primary was no exception. Voting records show Alexis' mom, Gloria Guidry, cast her ballot in person near her South Houston home.

"It was just very shocking, a little unsettling," said Alexis Guidry.

It's unsettling because Gloria Guidry died of cancer 10 months before the March Primary.

"She'd be very upset," Guidry said when asked what her mom would think.

Trent Seibert, of Texas Watchdog, says you should be too.

"This is really disquieting. It's concerning. It's worrisome," said Seibert.

He heads up the non-partisan news group on the web.

Texas Watchdog compared Harris County's voter registration roll with the Social Security death index and found more than 4,000 matches -- registered voters that, it appears, are already dead.

Harris County is overwhelming Democratic as are most big urban areas. Houston is the fourth largest city in the U.S. and has a popular Democrat as mayor, Bill White.

Some of them, like Henderson Hill's late wife Linda, voted postmortem.

"I would like to know who did it, myself," Hill told Davis.

We don't know who used Linda Hill's or Gloria Guidry's IDs to vote, but we do know if their names had been purged from voter rolls after they died, using their IDs wouldn't have worked.

"This is a red flag. No matter where you are, this should set off alarm bells," Seibert said. "Someone needs to take a look at this."

"We just kind of work with the systems that we're allowed to," explained George Hammerlein, the director of Harris County Voter Registration.

The county's system for culling deceased voters from the roll seems painfully primitive.

We watched employees clip obituaries from the newspaper and sort through probate records for names matching those on the roll. But, Hammerlein says while fraud is a concern, for his office, disenfranchising voters is a bigger one.

"We do all we can, but you know we'd rather err on the side of leaving people on the roll instead of taking them off inadvertently," he said. But could that cautious "better safe than sorry" standard sway an election some say will be a close one?

Texas Watchdog found 4,462 registered voters who appear to be deceased.

"We've never had any evidence there's a concerted attempt at fraud," Hammerlein told Local 2. But there is evidence the state agency in charge of ensuring only eligible voters can vote is not.

The State Auditor's Office conducted an audit of the voter registration system at the Secretary of State's Office last November.

Auditors identified 49,049 registered voters state-wide who may have been ineligible to vote. Approximately 23,576 may have been deceased and another 23,114 were possible felons. And they found more than 2,359 duplicate records.

The auditor did not find any instances in which potentially ineligible voters actually voted, but they wrote, "Although the Secretary of State's office has processes to identify many ineligible voters and remove them from the State's voter registration list, improvements can be made."

Almost a year after this audit, we wanted to know if the Secretary of State has made any improvements. Have they added any safeguards to the process?

No one from that office would talk to us on camera, but the Director of Elections told us, "We'd rather err in leaving someone on the roll than taking someone off."

"If there's something wrong here, if there's something amiss, this is the worst election to have that happen, "Seibert warned. And Guidry agrees. "I don't think it's a matter that she would take lightly," she said of her mom.

In what she calls an historic election, Guidry says her mother wouldn't want anyone speaking for her.

"I think she would definitely do all that she could just to make sure things were on the up and up."

We sent the information we showed you to the Director of Elections in Austin. She said her office refers any credible allegation of election fraud to the Attorney General for investigation. She said the cases we presented would be felony violations.

Visit www.texaswatchdog.org for more information about how Texas Watchdog found dead voters on the rolls.

Reports of voter fraud by liberal groups could change election results
Michelle Malkin calls this wave of fraud a "radical revolution"
that is "taking place in your backyard."

And much of these efforts are funded by your tax dollars!

The radical group ACORN - which gets 40 percent of its funding
from you and me through taxes -- has registered 1.27 million voters and now
is being exposed for fraudulent practices. The other 60 percent comes from the Democrat Party.

We are watching a constitutional crisis.

Bush supported a plan to allow employees to invest part of their social security funds into the stock market.
Unfortunately, Bush won...but if his idea had come to fruition, there would be a lot more people up at night.

George is going to speak to us this morning on the economy. When he speaks, boy do I feel reassured! He always looks like a little kid who's been pushed out on stage against his will. "Talk, George, Talk!"

And now we have the chance to elect the wandering John McCain. Actually, he has sounded more confident in the debates than at other appearances. But when he wandered around the stage at this week's debate, it reminded me of people with mental illnesses pacing around aimlessly, presumably releasing up pent up energy. Maybe he's nervous about the possibility of actually winning. Then what?

We don't need any more wandering presidents. The Republicans have had their turn...and look at the economy. We really can't afford four more years.

A website designed by a 14 year old girl known as "Eloise" who is speaking out against the likes of Al Gore.

This is one kid with her head screwed on right!

Click below link to be redirected to the Kids Against AGW website.

http://kidsagainstagw.com

Update October 11, 2008

Also visit Anthony Watt's website for a discussion on the above website

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/10/10/kids-against-anthropongenic-global-warming

De Chinese regering liet eerder deze week al weten dat Peking niet blij zal zijn met de toekenning van de Nobelprijs aan Hu. De activist werd eerder dit jaar veroordeeld tot een celstraf van drieënhalf jaar wegens staatsondermijnende activiteiten.

Aan de prijs, die ook toegekend kan worden aan een organisatie, is een geldbedrag verbonden van iets meer dan een miljoen euro. De Nobelprijs voor de Vrede ging vorig jaar - zeer voorspelbaar - naar de Amerikaan Al Gore en het VN-klimaatpanel IPCC.

bron: Reformatorisch Dagblad

d.d. 10/10/2008

So as I showed in a previous post on Ron Eglash, I found a talk by him on this site called Ted.com. That one little search led me to an amazing site. Free talks by some amazing people. They're roughly around 20 minutes each, less than a short tv show, and only 1 commercial is tagged at the end. Not bad in my opinion. I even watch the commercial because they sponsored the presentation, the least I can do is watch for 20 more seconds.

The next talk I saw was by Al Gore. It turned out to be what I would describe as a mini version of An Inconvenient Truth. I liked that movie, so watching the talk wasn't difficult. I've known about global warming and its harmful effects since every recycling initiative and arbor day they held in elementary school. The concept isn't exactly new. Growing up, and even up through watching the movie, I had a hard time understanding why our political and industrial leaders weren't jumping on board. Then I started work in retail. I observed managers and supervisors do things that even they acknowledged were stupid and non-sensical in order to appease a metric, and watched as they sacrificed employee hours in order to assuage a bleeding P&L line not figuring in the long-term alienation of customers whose needs were not met due to poor staffing. I realized that tunnel vision is an epidemic across many companies in our capitalist society. How does a far-sighted person explain what the horizon looks like to a near-sighted person? Here's an analogy that just occurred to me:

My Dad taught me to drive on the freeway, he said look out ahead about a mile or so down the road. You can see what traffic is doing ahead and the cars closest to you are still in your peripheral, so you won't miss what they're doing. It's easy just to focus on the car in front of you, but if they're brake lights flash all you can do is step on your brakes and hope you're braking at the same speed as them - you missed seeing all the cars ahead slowing down for the cop sitting on the side of the road because you weren't looking at them, you were only looking at the car in front of you.

I like that analogy. It can be used in a lot of situations. At least it makes sense to me. So now that I have a new understanding about retail, I have a new understanding about capitalism. And now that I have a new understanding about capitalism, I have a new understanding about politics. What I realize most is that when it comes down to making the changes that we as a nation need to make to remedy the causes of global warming and find a solution to what has already occurred, in order to be truly heard, we need to talk in terms of P&L. (profit and loss). From corporations to individuals, money defines how well we survive. If the cost of global warming can be monitarily quantitated, (and that estimation believable) it will speak louder than any other statistic. Al Gore talks about a carbon tax, which could expedite change. What would be great would be a personal expense calculator. How much would it cost with current trends, to continue living as one currently does? Compare that to how much it would cost if one incorporated alternative methods? How many years would that take to pay off? I think that information, freely available, is what is necessary to help people think through their wallets. Because we're going to do it anyway. (And if it already exists, for God's sake, advertise it!!!!)

This is not just bad news for polar bears and Inuit.  The warming ocean has triggered methane releases from the ocean floor.  Ships sailing north of Siberia reported methane levels one hundred times normal background, with methane bubbling up over tens of thousands of square kilometers.

What we  don't know is whether the current methane leakage is going to remain constant or whether it's the trickle before the dam breaks.  The methane on the ocean floor is held in place by a layer of permafrost, and scientists think the methane is currently bubbling to the surface through "small holes."  The coming winter may refreeze the ocean floor permafrost, but even if it does, the ice in this summer's holes will be weaker ice, just as much of the ice that reformed on the Arctic Ocean last winter after 2007's record meltoff is weaker than the cover that it replaced, which in many cases was thousands of years old.

If the "dam breaks" we will have a massive release of methane, which is likely to raise the planet's average temperature by ten degrees or more, well past the point where much of it will be habitable by humans or anything else too big to stay under a rock during the day.  You think the current drought and heat wave in the Sahara-Sahel-Darfur-Somalia area is bad?  You think there's refugees and fallout and blowback?  Wait till the Himalayas melt off and Asia goes dry! You ain't seen nothin' yet!

Meanwhile, Al Gore has called for civil disobedience to prevent new coal plants from being built, and Greenpeace protestors in England have been acquitted of all charges in closing down a coal plant in England on the grounds that

they were acting to safeguard property elsewhere around the world “in immediate need of protection” from the impacts of climate change driven in part by emissions from coal burning. (New York Times)

Meanwhile, both Obama and McCain continue to endorse the chimera called "clean coal," conveniently ignoring a number of inconvenient truths:  number one, that there is no functional technology for purifying or sequestering coal emissions; number two, that much coal is mined by an extremely destructive process called mountaintop removal, aka strip mining, number three, that China is now importing coal from the US, and, due to our bad balance of payments and how much we owe the Chinese, we are not in a good position to say "no" to them; and, finally, that the Chinese are building coal plants at a tremendous clip, one that could offset every conservation move made in the West.

In short, it's looking more and more like mankind is hitting an evolutionary dead end:  we are clever enough to screw things up really badly, but not wise enough to change our destructive behavior.  It may be time to find or dig a nice, deep cave and figure out how to build one of those stillsuits they had in Dune.  Spice, anyone?

Yes, I know the financial markets are in a mess, here at home and all around the world.

Yes, I know China is building at least one coal fired power plant a week and already 1/3 of the pollution that reaches my city comes from China.

Yes, I know a friend of mine has defaulted on his mortgage at least 5 times and may lose his home.

Yes, I know it will be harder for me to find work I love with unemployment rising.

Yes, I know I have not saved enough and don't have enough in my retirement account and I'm a boomer.

Yes, we are in debt up to our ears - collectively and individually - my own personal debt load is high and now I'm paying for mortgages even though I knew I couldn't bear one myself.

Yes, it costs me more to fill my gas tank - upwards of $50 not too long ago and expecting that to rise significantly.

Yes, more and more things are out of my reach.

Yes, there are potholes in the streets, bridges collapsing and levees breaking all across America.

Yes, farm subsidies benefit food processors more than they do the farmers.

And just recently we bailed out, again, the auto industry for $25 billion and it won't help us move into the future in a strong way - it's about shoring up the past, again.

Yes, I see government, both parties and the bureaucracies, not doing their jobs and making life both harder and stultifying.

Yes, our health care system is a nightmare.

Yes, our food system is toxic.

We are doing this to ourselves and we are all, collectively, to blame.

On the most basic levels, our system is broken, from the inside. And we are not yet dealing with the underlying issues. Our solutions assume the old paradigms. We need to find new ones suitable to the world we now actually live in.

But, there is good news. In some places we are dealing with these underlying issues. In many places we are taking many actions that, collectively, could save us.

San Francisco has turned its Ferry Building into a village square with real food (meat without hormones and antibiotics; fruits and vegetables grown organic, locally and sustainably).

Portland is ahead of the pack on sustainability regarding urban planning

Arcadia, CA and Seattle have built waste water plants that ultimately deliver no toxic waste water back into our ecosystem.

884 U.S. mayors have signed the Mayors' Climate Protection Agreement to meet the Kyoto Protocol standards by 2012

Hybrid users are converting their cars to electric plug-ins - they aren't waiting the years our auto industry leaders are telling us we have to wait.

California is suing the EPA to let it set higher auto emissions standards then those set by the Fed, and at least 15 other states are waiting to sign on when CA wins its lawsuit.

T. Boone Pickens, an oilman all his life, is spending millions promoting new ways into our energy future, not based on oil, fossil fuels, and sending billions of dollars to other countries every day.

Al Gore won the Nobel Peace Price for his work on climate change.

Lynn Twist writes about the soul of money and builds an alliance with an indigenous people in Peru.

Wal-Mart hired a past executive of the Sierra Club to help them go green... and save costs.

California pension fund managers are demanding more from their fund companies - they are asking hard questions of the oil companies.

At a business breakfast last week, the spokesperson from PG&E (large utility company) quoted Thomas Friedman's new book, Hot, Flat, and Crowded.

PG&E has gone to Congress to request more regulation on environmental issues.

The progressive media is building alliances to ensure the continuation of an independent media and a counter to the already cohered conservative media.

Ultra conservatives are beginning to ask basic questions and I find myself nodding along.

Progressives and liberals are learning to be proud of their beliefs.

A significant majority of America says they want change and it seems real. The natives are restless.

Slow Food Nation has become an international movement.

Most of the innovation, most of the creativity, most of the new business, most of the forward looking and forward thinking about this country and the world is arising from the grassroots.

It looks like many of our problems are being tackled from the ground up, not the top down.

We are beginning to see that there will be no fat cats if the small cats can't buy things. It's good business for there to be an economically strong middle class.

We have most of the tools we need to fix things:

We can refocus our health care system to prevention and away from disease - and it will save us money and make us more productive.

We can use information technology to help us save energy, guide traffic (in the air and on the ground), give consumers information that will help us be better citizens and better energy and water users.

Small towns in California (in Marin county) are building local rail systems to reduce congestion.

California is ready to pass bonds to build high-speed rail that will connect our major cities. Even in California we are looking beyond cars and trucks.

We can learn from others (here at home and abroad) how to build tidal energy systems, solar systems, restored wetlands, urban design, transportation systems, food systems, prison and legal systems.

What an exciting time! The financial chaos we are in right now has made it clear we live in a global eco system and it's time we looked at all our systems to see how they can be updated to reflect this.

Ideas and innovations and prototypes are blooming at the bottom. There is a restlessness and bubbling everywhere - everywhere except in old industries and the federal government. People are not waiting for Washington any more. We are doing it ourselves.

This is an opportunity for growth, for greater connectedness, for revamping our economy to make money, to rebuild the middle class, and to simply live in a richly textured, vibrant world.

I can't wait. I need to be part of this restless, scary, exciting, critical, essential revolution.

I have just read Al Gores and Inconvenient Truth - definately an A List book - whatever side of the spectrum you are from. Speaking with a  gentlemen of the older generation on this book, I was (frankly) astonished that this "man of the country" poo-pooed both the author (opinion) and the facts stated in the book.

I was astonished I think because this man represents many of his generation (I think); those that believe that the world is under strain - but that there is little we can do about it (individuals) and governments are incapable of action (maybe true)

BUT ISNT THAT THE POINT?! - Governments, by their very nature are unlikely to make the changes necessary (because they will always take the easy route) - so it is up to the individual - surely! And it is the individual - each one of us - that as a collective unit, will bring about the changes - and then governments will listen - because that will become the easy route.

It worries me - this gentlemen. He rubbished Carbon credits / . I simply don't understand it (carbon credits that is) and so can't comment; And I think that is part of the point - The Global changes we need to make are simple at heart but hard to explain and even harder to grasp. How can YOU make a significant change? A world changing event?? A life changing consequence - you can't? WE CAN!

You, me, your mates - we can do it! (Weak I know) The question is how? Let me step out into this beautiful day and contemplate how... (meet you on the road)

O CCSP (Centro Cultural São Paulo), região central da capital paulista, exibe até dia 16.10.2008 (domingo), na sala Lima Barreto, o ciclo Este Mundo é Meu! E as Sete Sementes.... O ciclo discute, a partir de produções audiovisuais e debate, o aquecimento global: gênese, causas, efeitos e perspectivas para o futuro.

A classificação etária é 14 anos. Os ingressos devem ser retirados uma hora antes de cada sessão. A curadoria é de Arnaldo Fernandes Júnior.

O fio condutor das exibições é uma série de programas sobre o aquecimento global produzidos pelo Globo Ecologia e veiculados pelo Canal Futura, que esmiúçam os principais elementos sobre o tema.

A programação também reúne os filmes "Uma Verdade Inconveniente", de Davis Guggenheim, em que Al Gore, ex-vice-presidente norte-americano, apresenta uma impressionante visão do fenômeno. E o documentário "Mudanças do Clima, Mudanças de Vida", produzido pelo Greenpeace Brasil e dirigido por Todd Southgate, que mostra os impactos do superaquecimento em solo brasileiro.

No domingo (16) haverá um debate sobre o assunto com o engenheiro químico, diretor técnico da Ecoinvest e doutor em energia pela Poli-USP, Ricardo Esparta, e a mestre em educação, política e legislação ambiental pela Esalq/USP, Isis Akemi Morimoto. A mediação é de Luiz Felipe Miranda.

A programação do evento pode ser consultada no site

http://www.centrocultural.sp.gov.br/este_mundo/por_dia.htm

A matéria acima foi encontrada aqui.

CCSP
R. Vergueiro, 1.000, Liberdade, São Paulo, SP
Classificação etária: 14 anos

This piece is about 3.5 inches long by 2" high. The lioness is covered in a coating of 18K gold and Black Rouge. This creates a Charcoal effect with Gold accents.  Thank you for all your support "Maestro", I'm sure you wll enjoy the piece for years to come.  This piece was inspired from the "Panel of Lions" in Chauvet Cave. 

The following is an excerpt of the http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/chauvet/index.php

"Chauvet Cave is exceptional – despite being recently discovered in 1994, it contains the world’s oldest rock art ever found. The Chauvet Cave is located near Vallon-Pont-d'Arc in the Ardèche region of southern France, its chance discovery by a trio of speleologists revealed not only the fossilized remains of many animals, including some that are now extinct, but one of the most extensive Palaeolithic rock art galleries ever recorded.

On inspecting Chauvet's rock art on behalf of the Ministry of Culture, Dr Jean Clottes realised instantly that the cave was of grave importance. "When you examine a painted line under the magnifying glass, you notice that what appears as a continuous, unbroken line is in fact full of tiny gaps caused by erosion." Not only was the art likely to prove extremely old, it was very extensive, highly varied, and very skillfully executed. But perhaps most importantly, the cave and its contents were more or less perfectly preserved – untouched for many thousands of years. For this reason, whilst the investigation of the cave took place and the age of the rock art was verified, the cave was locked down. Since 1994, more people have been to the top of Everest than into the Chauvet Cave.

Six months later, carbon 14 dating analyses showed that one buffalo and two rhinoceros were approximately 31,000 years old. The datings "have revolutionised hitherto accepted concepts on the appearance of art and its development, and prove that homo sapiens learnt to draw at a very early stage".

Hundreds of animal paintings have been recorded, depicting at least 13 different species, including those which have rarely or never been found in other "Ice age" ice age paintings. Rather than the more usual animals of the hunt that predominate in Paleolithic cave art, such as horses, cattle and reindeer, the walls of the Chauvet Cave are covered with predatory animals - lions, panthers, bears, owls, rhinos and hyenas. As one would expect, there are no human figures, except at the very end of the gallery where there appears to be a Venus figure - the legs and genitals of a woman – attracting the attention of the figure now known as the ‘Sorcerer’ - the lower body of a man with the upper body of a bison. The scene would suggest a ritual, shamanic or magical aspect to these paintings.

The gorges of the Ardèche region are home to numerous caves. Is Chauvet unique, or are there more marvels to discover?

The Bradshaw Foundation visited the Chauvet Cave in 1999 and 2001followed by a further field trip made in 2005."