Leo Kottke - Vaseline Machine Gun

A response to this week's Supreme Court ruling: The only gun I need.

20 Percent Wind

Wind power can play a major role in meeting America's increasing demand for electricity, according to a groundbreaking technical report (click here).

The report recommends that the nation sets a goal to implement a 20% Wind Scenario by the year 2030.

New wind power installations would increase to more than 16,000 MW per year by 2018, and continue at that rate through 2030. No technological breakthroughs are needed. In the 20% Wind Scenario, 46 states would experience significant wind power development.

The report finds that by 2030, the U.S. wind industry could:

• support roughly 500,000 jobs in the U.S., with an annual average of more than 150,000 workers directly employed by the wind industry;
• support more than 100,000 jobs in associated industries (e.g., accountants, lawyers, steel workers, and electrical manufacturing);
• support more than 200,000 jobs through economic expansion based on local spending;
• increase annual property tax revenues to more than $1.5 billion by 2030; and
• increase annual payments to rural landowners to more than $600 million in 2030.
  

Using more domestic wind power will diversify the nation's energy portfolio — adding wind-generated electricity at stable prices — and strengthen national energy security.

Lock and Load

Is it acceptable that 30,000 Americans are killed by guns every year — in the home, on the job, walking to school, at the shopping mall? The Supreme Court on Thursday all but ensured that more Americans will die. Furthermore, annually over 700,000 violent crimes involve handguns.

The Court declared that the Second Amendment guarantees individuals the right to bear arms for nonmilitary uses, even though the amendment clearly links the right to service in a "militia."

This is a decision that will cost innocent lives, cause daily pain and suffering and increase the costs of law enforcement. For example, as the court was getting ready to release its decision, a worker in a Kentucky plastics plant shot his supervisor, four co-workers and himself to death.

Constitutional rights are not absolute. The First Amendment guarantees free speech, but that does not mean that laws cannot prohibit some spoken words, like threats to commit imminent violent acts. The rights gun owners have to own guns should be balanced against public-safety interests.

This harmful decision, which hands the far right a victory, is a reminder of why voters need to have the Supreme Court firmly in mind when they vote for the president this fall.

Naked As We Came - Iron and Wine

For Pete and the impermanence of life.

The Impermanence in Everything

A grandmother visited the Buddha in the middle of the day, her hair, face and clothes wet. Her beloved grandson had just died.
The Buddha asked, "Visakha, would you like to have as many children and grandchildren as there are people in Savatthi (the nearby city)?"
"Yes, Lord," Visakha replied.
"But how many people in Savatthi die in the course of a day?"
Visakha answered, "Sometimes ten people die in Savatthi, sometimes nine...eight...seven...Sometimes one person in Savatthi dies in the course of a day. Savatthi is never free from people dying."
"So what do you think, Visakha: Would you ever be free from wet clothes and wet hair?"
"No, Lord."
The Buddha replied, "Visakha, those who have a hundred dear ones have a hundred sufferings. Those who have ninety dear ones have ninety sufferings. Those who have eighty...seventy...Those who have one dear have one suffering. For those with no dear ones, there is no suffering. They are free from sorrow, free from stain, free from lamentation, I tell you."
The sorrows, and lamentations, the many kinds of suffering in the world, exist dependent on something dear. We can love a wonderful person, or a enjoy a beautiful view or a field of colorful flowers, knowing that all of these things are impermanent. Our pain in life comes to us when we expect a permanence that doesn't exist.

Because the world needs to know : 350

The science is clear, and politicians argue over policy. Carbon dioxide is causing global warming and human activity is the cause of the rapid release of CO2.

Watch this 90 second animation to learn a little more. It's goal is to build an echo chamber so that the number 350 is heard everywhere, with increasing volume.

Nick Drake - Pink Moon

Nick Drake, who died in 1974 under unresolved circumstances, was an amazing singer/songwriter. Although he is of "my generation", I've only heard of him in the past two years. His songs are timeless, and could have been written last month. In addition to the great VW commercial, here is a nice link for the full song, with some pictures of Nick Drake.

(I have actually seen a pink moon, but won't spoil the moment.)