Author Archives: Commentary about the Blue Marble

Unpleasant Future

22 Tuesday Nov 2022

Posted by in Population

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        My first knowledge of population projections occurred about 1970 during one of my geography courses. Amazingly those projections haven’t changed much. Did the experts see a culture change in the advanced countries, cheap and easily available birth control, and advances in keeping people alive longer?

            The United Nations’ experts stated the eight billionth person was born somewhere on November 15. Their projections are another half billion in eight years and an additional 1.2 billion by 2050. Imagine 9,500,000,000 in another 28 years. Where will they live, how will they live, where will their food come from, and how will Climate change affect them?

            Most of the growth is said to be from Africa but India is going to surpass China with the largest population. China’s economic problem is shared by many other countries. Their population is skewing towards an older population which has retired from working. This means less people are working to support a greater retired group living longer. Cultural changes dictate small families using birth control and advancing health services keeping people alive longer.

            Climate change is causing a real disruption in where people will be living. The news is full of people needing to find other places to live due to drought, starvation, war and economic disruption. The Syrian War was caused by drought which caused Syrians to flee to Europe and Turkey. Drought in Africa is the reason for the exodus to Europe. A major cause of the immigration to the United States from Latin America is cropland destruction. Many low countries and island nations are preparing for the ocean to flood their surface land. Together with low lying cities a couple of billion will need to go some somewhere higher. They will be moving to much needed farmland.

A Quandary

22 Tuesday Nov 2022

Posted by in Green Energy

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        I am in a quandary. I am finally green. I recycle, I seldom dump food, I upgraded my mileage, I compost leaves, grass, and limbs, and I get greener appliances and light bulbs. I drive half as much as the average driver in my gasoline powered vehicle. I support many green organizations.

            Here is my quandary and that of millions of others when they understand the reality of green power. We hate to see the slag piles of underground coal mining with the acids leaching out of them and into ditches, streams, and rivers. We hate to see the piles of slag and huge holes from surface mines. Even topping off “mountains” in West Virginia riles us. Now we need millions of tons of “rare earths” that few of us have ever heard of before. These minerals are so rare that a real find is an ounce for each ton of rock. I have seen quarries big enough to drop whole towns into them. If we need thousands of tons of these elements every year imagine how much waste will be produced.

            With all these holes in the deserts and plains in the Western United States will it look like the surface of the moon? Will we do large scale recycling of the batteries and do it safely? Will we come up with new technologies that don’t require mining?             Of course we can continue burning fossil fuels and be the cause of the extinction of life on earth!

18 Friday Nov 2022

Posted by in Fiction, Reality

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Alternate Reality

        When I was a little kid my Dad bought a little black and white TV so he and my Uncle could watch wrestling. I don’t know if Dad thought it was real but my Uncle did. Even today many people think it is real. Wrestling is a great example of how people lose reality on a topic or issue and allow other realities to become the one they live in instead of the one most of us live in.

            Today we have millions looking at little screens and believing the false realities they see on them. Social media and podcasts exist by getting people to believe the alternate realities they concoct and spread to gullible people. Getting them to buy the products they sell deepens that reality.          

            Of course the biggest loss of reality today is Trump’s “Big Lie” that the election was stolen. In 2016 he said if he didn’t win, the election would be stolen. He won the electoral votes but lost the popular vote by over three million. In 2020, he lost both. The electoral vote was the reverse of his 2016 electoral vote and lost the popular vote by seven million. His lawyer and advisor told state hearings their voting machines were wrong and they could prove it. One state said they could present his evidence under oath which he wouldn’t do. But millions are still in that alternate reality.

            Like fake wrestling, millions watch the scripted “reality” shows each week believing those story lines. They watched Fox News talking heads spout one lie after another when the real news had just said the opposite. Believing the talking heads is living in an alternate reality.

            Today some of those talking heads, pod-casters, and social media nitwits are siding with Putin on his invasion of Ukraine. Putin has been using his special propaganda people for years to sow divisive lies and cultivate relationships with politicians and media to weaken America. He said much could be accomplished in putting Trump in office instead of his enemy Hillary Clinton.

Kevin McCarthy’s Downfall

18 Friday Nov 2022

Posted by in Politics

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        Kevin McCarthy wants to be Speaker of the House when the new congress starts in January. He is currently the Minority Leader and the mouthpiece for the House Republicans. He had been saying his party would have the biggest “Red Wave” in history. As of nine days after election the projections are that he will have a two to four seat majority

            Why a ripple instead of a tsunami? The abortion issue had some effect with women on their decision to vote for a democrat. The increasing revolt against former President Donald Trump’s incompetence and ego turned many Republicans and right-leaning independents to vote for a Democrat.

            As strong as those reasons are Devin McCarthy’s Trump-like rants were the deciding factor for millions of voters. McCarthy put Social Security and Medicare on the block. He said when he takes control he will investigate Hunter Biden’s activities in Ukraine and impeach President Biden and Vice-President Harris. The Justice Department is already investigating Hunter Biden and McCarthy admits he has no proof of Biden or Harris doing anything wrong. His far right wing discourses turned off millions of votes.

            Many Republican Representatives have decided they don’t want someone like him to be their leader amid the increasing fallout from Donald Trump. For months he has had his staff call him Mr. Speaker and is planning how to redecorate the Speaker’s office. What will Kevin McCarthy do when he isn’t the pick of the people he thought would back him and owed him. The world will be better off if he stomps off and goes back to California. Getting to hold the gavel requires the majority of both parties. Currently the projections are that less than ten Republicans will be siding with all the Democrats to sink his hopes.

Not Independent

12 Saturday Nov 2022

Posted by in Energy, Oil Industry, Production, Oil & Gas

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        I keep hearing the politicians say the United States is producing more petroleum than we use. We are not! We use just short of 20 million barrels each day on average. We produce around 18.6 so President Joseph Biden is releasing one million a day to make it close. We also import oil from Canada and Mexico plus a little from the Mideast.

            We produce 20% of the World’s production with the Saudis at 12% and Russia was 11% before the Ukraine War. At our current proven reserves we can continue at this level for around five years according to what the oil companies have reported to the government. Unproven guesses and hopes is much more. We are producing less than before because it pushes the price up greatly In 2019 the price of options on oil in the West Texas storage facility was a negative dollar for a period so they cut back. Now they are keeping production down jacking up the price and putting millions into the pockets of their officers and billions to the share holders. Production for 2017 was 3.415 billion, 2018 was 3.993 billion, 2019 was 4.485 billion, 2020 was 4.129 billion and 2021 was 4.082 billion barrels per day.

            Biden has drawn down our strategic reserve to about 400 million barrels which is the lowest in decades. He is selling it at two to three times what it cost years ago. The draw down is dangerous because of what could happen in the future.

            Our increase in production is coming from fracking the oil bearing shale formations. These wells will produce fast for two or three years and die down quickly often before the well makes money.

           It is very obvious we need to get away from petroleum as fast as we can and go to solar, wind, and green hydrogen if we are going to keep a viable economy. The writing is on the wall. Will we follow what it says?

What a Mess

12 Saturday Nov 2022

Posted by in Politics

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        As a news junkie I can see through the screens politicians put out for their advantage to staying in office. They don’t want you to know how enormous the mess is worldwide. Just as in the 1930s Authoritarian governments are slowly eradicating the liberties their people though were inviolable. The “Big Lie” fills the news media and internet to the point people believe lies instead of their eyes and commonsense.

            In the United States one Political party did all they could to help companies move jobs offshore along with the technology? At the same time they blamed the other party which supported the unions and non-union jobs being offshored. Today we have the need for tens and even hundreds of thousands of people to do jobs from landscaping to nursing to technology that Americans are unwilling or can’t do. At the same time one party does all it can to reduce or stop the needed labor from entering the labor market. The immigrants come to work so why not let them.

            Some people in both parties refuse to do what is needed to reduce emissions in hopes of keeping climate change to a manageable amount. They voted against the bill which will put charging units out for electric vehicles to use. The bill includes lots of things we must do to survive but people who voted against it are thinking only of the people who dump millions into their campaigns or their pockets.

            For decades I have heard both parties say we need to pass a big infrastructure bill, yet one party vote against it but took credit for how they got it for their voters.

            Add in the wars in Ukraine, the future war in Taiwan, potential wars in Iran and multiple terrorist ones, and the volatility of fossil fuels, the world is in a huge mess. Perhaps a bigger mess than in the last 50 years.           

Democracy is Most Important

12 Saturday Nov 2022

Posted by in Democracy

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        I heard many people blame President Joseph Biden for a bad economy. The reason we have some inflation is because we have a hot economy, low unemployment, and high consumer demand. If the number of unemployed skyrocketed the Fed would stop raising rates so if your neighbor is out of work, it’s great for you.

            About one person in four considered democracy threatened as a high priority of who they voted for this time. Too many Republicans said they would only accept the result if they won. Do we have that many children running for office? Democrats and many moderate Republicans thought Vice President Al Gore was cheated in his run but he was gracious in his concession speech to President Bush. Those who keep pushing “The Big Lie” should remember what happened in Germany in the 1930s and Russia a decade ago. Once we start down that road to authoritarianism Liberty gets rolled over.

            The only hope we have after this election is the trials in many cities and states will put a stop to the brewing insurrection. If for some reason those efforts fail then it is up to every right-thinking voter to stop our country from going down the path of destruction of the American Dream. The Founding Fathers thought they ensured this would not happen but the Civil War and today’s insurrectionists have proven their efforts were not enough. The minority who has been deceived need to open their eyes before it is too late.

Rebuild or Not?

09 Wednesday Nov 2022

Posted by in FEMA

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            The desire and greed of land developers over the decades and even the centuries have caused people to build in areas they should not build homes and businesses. Many towns and cities were built on flood plains which flooded every spring until they were protected by levees. When the levees break they blame the governments and plead for financial help to rebuild time after time. FEMA got tired of rebuilding a small town on the Illinois side of the Mississippi River and rebuilt on the bluff where it cannot flood.

            Hurricane Ian just hit North Carolina wrecking houses and businesses on the coast. It hit at high tide so the surge went inland and into homes and stores. A sculpted levee would have absorbed the surge and kept out the flooding. Why no levee? It would end the ground floor views of the ocean. We know the Atlantic is raising and floods will be common with future tides. The rise is the result of glacial melting and the expansion of warming water but developers insisted a law be passed in North Carolina and Florida making it illegal to consider that event in any way.

            Ian just destroyed much of Florida and the Governor and President say money will be available to rebuild again. Flood maps say do not build here but owners get expensive insurance from governments and keep rebuilding. By definition building on a barrier island is stupid but Florida developers were allowed to put thousands of people in danger.

People build towns over and over in fire prone areas in California and other Western states. Governments pay out billions of tax dollars over and over. The ultimate lunacy is New Orleans which is protected by levees because it is below the Mississippi River and sea level. Some structures were abandoned after Katrina hit but rebuilding is starting again. Flood insurance should require hatches and boats on the roof for use during floods.

Ethical Conflict

09 Wednesday Nov 2022

Posted by in Uncategorized

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            During an interview a Georgian woman had a very interesting answer as to why she was voting on the first day of early voting. She thought one party’s conflicting statements was confusing. She thought Republicans were more concerned about saving a fetus’ life which hadn’t breathed than they were about people killing people with “automatic weapons” who did breathe. It was a conflict that I hadn’t thought about before. Politics creates such conflicts just to get elected.

            Some people complain about Nanny State and then work to make sure their constituents get as much out of it as they can to get re-elected. Some people in the House and Senate voted against the infrastructure bill but made sure their district and state got their fair share.

            I have heard many people complain about how the rich don’t pay their fair share of taxes. The conflict is when the government wants to raise taxes on billionaires and rich corporations; they complain or vote against the change. The IRS is going to hire thousands of new agents so the reports from those people and corporations can be audited. It may require a hundred agents to audit a return of hundreds of pages. Some people have said those agents will go after the poor and middle class voters to get re-elected by scaring people.

            Some people have been conned so much and so often they believe anything they are told. When a con artist can convince so deeply that they are willing to overthrow their government and install a dictator, then the American light is out.

Moral and Ethics Matter

06 Sunday Nov 2022

Posted by in Voting

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            I remember when a Missouri Senator wanted to run for President but was harassed out of the race because he had had a few sessions with a psychologist. I remember another Senator who was with a woman not his wife on a boat and had to quit his presidential dream when pictures came out in the newspapers. I remember another Senator who lived in a Canadian border state and called Canadians Canucks and was ridden out of the race because he supposedly disparaged the Canadians. (It is the name of a Canadian Hockey team.) I remember a President who was run out of office for something unrelated to his job.

            I remember when JFK was supposed to have gotten in because Mayor Daley pumped in 20,000 votes to put him over the top with Illinois’ electoral votes or Nixon would have won. This may not have been the first time a Republican said he was cheated. Kennedy got 303 and Nixon got 219 so Illinois wasn’t the key. Since then the popular vote has been separated by millions and no problems with the loser concerning defeat. Even Al Gore conceded after being screwed in Florida because that was what real Americans do to help rejoin the country.

            Today we have over a few hundred people running for Senator, Representative, governor and attorneys general in many states and say they won’t accept defeat. Many U.S. Senators and Representatives say the only way they lose is fraud. All of those deny Trump lost, or they don’t get his approval or the votes of his deluded followers.

            How have the voters of the United States suddenly found that voting for liars, racists and other immoral and unethical to be okay? What happened to believing the person with the most votes should win? Vote for people who want democracy and not a dictatorship.