Logic isn't Logical

WTF?
We stop the Keystone XL pipeline and the price of gas continues to go DOWN?
Were they lying to us?
California is quickly running out of water. (You, know, that stuff you need to live)
Fracking uses MILLIONS of gallons of water. Hmmm...
I wonder what we should do?

Water? And not a Drop to Drink. It's now as Clear as Mud.

I've always tried to believe the best of people and their intentions, but, by golly, it's getting more difficult all the time.

Gas prices are very low, in case you haven't noticed, and yet some people are still pushing to get this enormous Keystone XL boondoggle shoved right up our Midwest, without so much as dinner first. It's just a live sacrifice to the supreme gods of greed. No jobs, no oil, just good old fashioned graft. Make-work work that will fill the pockets of a very few, who, by the way, have far too much in their pockets already. But congress gets on their knees and starts sucking.

I used to give the benefit of the doubt to the corporations who put crap into our food, that subsequently turned out to be, let's say, less than healthy. I assumed that they had good intentions originally, but now that they know the risks and side-effects, they will surely mend their ways.
Yeah. That happened.

GMOs are necessary to provide enough food for the world? Bovine Feces! On two counts. We don't give a good rat's pi-tout about feeding the world, just selling to the world. If we farmed the natural way, rotating crops, diverse planting, companion planting, etc., we wouldn't even need pesticides or fertilizers.
GMO corn to feed cows? Are you violently expelling me? Cows eat grass. Period. They don't need hormones. They don't need antibiotics. All of these things go directly into ...wait for it...us.

Then there's the pharmaceutical companies or Big Pharma, as they like to be called, you know, like Big Tony or Big Dick. It's been said that Pharma doesn't make cures, it make customers. Have you paid for a prescription lately? Bring a co-signer.
Ask your doctor? That's what we're supposed to do these days. Even though he's probably a pimp for Pharma, ask him if you should try Bleedmedryim, a new treatment for excess money buildup. Got a boo boo? Take a pill. There was a time when we could do what prescriptions do for us, with food, but now it's even difficult to find real food.  And what do people do when they are done taking their prescriptions? They toss them in the toilet. (Another ill-conceived concept, getting rid of our waste using our drinking water) Then, these chemicals and compounds get into our water supply, so we are all taking them, whether we like it or not.

So it's an accident that everything they do hurts us? So it's an accident that everything they do enriches them? Probably not.
For how long, and at the expense of how many Trillions of dollars have our top minds been trying to find the cure for cancer? Is it easier to believe that these dedicated talented and smart people haven't made any significant progress in all that time, or that some how, the results of their research is being hindered, perhaps, even suppressed? Think about it. If there was a cure for cancer, Big Pharma would lose Trillions in revenue from their victims, I mean patients. Do you think in a billion years that they would ever willingly give that up? Right now, they are taking perfectly good (if you can call them that) compounds, that do what they were intended to do, and changing one or two molecules to create another compound that does virtually the exact same thing as the previous one did. The difference? this new one has a new life as a new compound and therefore a new patent which will allow them to charge non-generic prices to us, for pretty much the same thing they've been selling for year. That's why you should ask your doctor. Your doctor, who is so deep in Big Pharma's pocket that Lint is his neighbor.

As I get older, do I get more Cynical, or achieve more Clarity? For years huge corporations have been having "accidents" involving dumping tons of poisons into our water supply. If they face any consequences, it's a tiny slap on the wrist, you know, like the penalty for "legitimate rape" should be. Given the fact that fresh water, sorta like energy can neither be created or destroyed this practice takes on a whole new level of PURE EVIL.
Big corporations have been testing our willingness to buy water from them. Water. Let me repeat that, in case you weren't paying attention. WATER.  Guess what? We passed. With flying colors. Due to our laziness and love of convenience, they have already conditioned us to pay them ridiculously high prices for a product that we can get free or virtually free. Now what do you suppose will happen when they turn off the tap to the remaining fresh water?
Big corporations have been buying rights to fresh water throughout the world. they already have monopolies in many third world regions, where they SELL water to the poorest of the population. The MOST despicable practice of which I can conceive. And that was just a testing ground, now they're going to bring their show straight to us. Maybe those spills, leaks, and oopsies weren't intentional. Then again, maybe they were.
At least think about these things and do what you can to make our leaders answerable to us, not to their corporate masters.
Baby Steps...

Socialism. It's not just for Stalin anymore.

Whenever a progressive even hints at trying to apply some of the trappings of Socialism, the right wing goes full-tilt-defcon-four-batshit and screams about the failure of socialism in the past, usually citing Joe Stalin. The logic, I have to suppose is that socialism killed millions of people, not a seriously homicidal psychopath. They refuse to even consider the more recent, yet equally as deadly failures of Capitalism. The (First) Great Depression, the thousands of lives and treasure lost in the wars for oil, the systematic robbery of mortgage holders, the crash (and subsequent bailing-out) of Wall Street, Lehman Bros. AIG, etc. Miserable, hateful, racist bastards.

No More War.

I'm seriously considering giving up my godless heathen card. Every year I get drafted into this War on Christmas and every year we are defeated by these Fabulous and Christ-like "Christ"ians. While I swing the battleaxe of not excluding others from the holiday season, Christ-like warriors like Bill O'God-I-Love-Torture-Reilly beat back our every sallie. Unfettered Greed and Selfishness (the way Jesus intended it) continues to rule over love, and kindness. I give up in the face of such religious righteousness. Merry CHRISTmas, Mofos!

Count your Gas Blessings Carefully.

The cost of fuel (Okay, the price) has gone down a bunch recently. I have to think that it's because the big oil companies are cutting back on their profits in order to help the economies of the world.

HA! Just kidding. But, wouldn't it be nice?

I suspect that the price of gasoline going down is related to many issues, not the least of which is the success of renewable sources of energy. Don't let them fool you. Even the Biggest, Oiliest Oligarchs are divesting from oil. Every one of them uses solar and wind energy generation at their "Dacha's". Why wouldn't they? They like to save money, too. You just won't see it in their, "aren't we responsible?" advertising. According to the ad, BP have invested over 4.5 Billion Dollars in the Gulf for rebuilding. That's not so much an investment, as a court ordered fine to compensate for all the damage that their slovenly practices caused to the people and the environment of the Gulf. It's like me saying, that I invested over $20,000 in the State of Colorado, instead of me saying, I've had three DUIs!

Unfortunately, a huge contributor to this gasoline "discount", is the glut of natural gas, that these very same companies are extracting out of the ground in ways that make oil extraction look like a gentle kiss from a dying grandmother. You've heard of "Fracking", haven't you? This term is short for Hydraulic Fracturing, which is FAR more hideous than you'd ever expect. These oil barons take pipes and force them into the ground under your homes and into "seams" where free methane and propane are trapped as part of the decaying process of ancient organic life. In order to fracture the rock formations, and therefore "free" the trapped gas, they inject millions of gallons of fresh water, because everyone knows that we don't really need water for human life to exist, mixed with a concoction of carcinogenic chemicals and other chemical agents that assist in the destruction of the rock layers. The contents of this mixture are top-secret because Dick Cheney made sure we'd never know what's in it. Thank God, we know we can trust Cheney. Now, historically these oil entrepreneurs, have always looked out for the welfare and well-being of the public, and in these cases, they are just as publicly responsible as they always have been (Exxon Valdez, Deepwater Horizon, Keystone XL Pipeline, etc).

Take the dip in gas prices with a grain of salt and remember that in Battlestar Galactica if you got "Fracked" it meant something altogether different . Or maybe it didn't.

Baby Steps...

Did that Hurt?

They say that Capitalism has no morals, no ethics. It has no soul and certainly no empathy or compassion.

I say, “Let's change that.”

We're going through a strange phenomenon where really, truly, horrific behavior is being overlooked, even justified, because it effects someone's profit. What's a little whipping on the bottom of a child when it comes to the bottom line? Want to cold-cock your wife? Go ahead. But, as always, if you or any of your INF(L) crew are caught on tape, the commissioner will disavow any knowledge of your actions.

Are we willing to rewrite the laws and/or the morals of thousands of years, because there just happens to be Billions of dollars at stake? Apparently, yes.

Just watch in fascination as these coaches dance around in justification of what their star players are doing. Sounds like the lyrics to Natalie Merchant's Luca, “he's your kid, do as you see fit.”

When are we going to realize: Wrong is Wrong!

Do you honestly believe that ANYONE , in their heart of hearts believes that there isn't a clear and present danger from Global Climate Change? It's quantifiable and it's bloody obvious to anyone who has ever gone outside in the last 10 years. Of course not!

Then why are there still politicians and corporate big wigs and higher-ups who deny it up and down?

Because it might alter the way they do business, and therefore, affect their bottom line. What about the planet? What about their offspring? All of that nonsense is Trumped (get it?) by profit. Profit at all cost.

As somebody once said, “The love of money, is the root of all evil.”

I hope that their money if fire-proof, cause they're going to need it in Hell.

Baby Steps...

Let's Re-Think Family Planning.

It's weird.

I know a lot of women (my wife included) who have remained childless by choice and I'm a little sad to announce that these lovely and educated ladies are sometimes the object of ridicule by the strange “traditional” family-values cadre. Considering the rather dire straits that we find ourselves in, due to over-population and willful and negligent environmental devastation, I feel that this is not only ignorant and cruel, but just plain backward thinking.

I understand that, as mammals, there is a certain, small instinctual drive to procreate. I get that. But it's no greater than the drive to kill and eat other animals, and we've done a pretty good job curtailing that activity over the course of history. There was a time when a male individual would just mount the first female individual he saw whenever he got “the urge.” Thank goodness we've evolved beyond that.

The major reason that the vast majority of woman feel they need to continue to crank out children, is because of religious conditioning and programming. There may have been a time when it was logical to have children (mainly boys) so that you'd have some help in your chosen field of work. Farms needed lots of hands. So did blacksmithing. Same goes for ranching and sheepherding. These people had children for “practical” reasons. In many, if not most, cases this is no longer the case. But whatever religious tradition you adhere to, you are encouraged to breed indiscriminately. The more the better! The training starts at a very young age and is never questioned by anyone. Little girls play with dollies, but rarely do they play NFL owner or CEO. The subject of happily choosing not have children is never even suggested. As a woman, if you don't dream of having children, you're considered some kind of freak.

Smart, intelligent, educated women have myriad reasons for not getting involved in that lifelong commitment of child bearing and raising. Some have aspirations of travel, which is rendered difficult with small children. Some want to make a difference in the world other than populating it. Whatever their reasons, they don't deserve derision for making that choice. Hell, I commend them for even knowing that the choice exists. Your religion won't tell that to you. Or your school. Forget about hearing it from your government. Did you know, these institutions have a vested interested in making sure you have children? Preferably lots of them? People with families are much easier to control. And by control, I mean coerce. Your economic resources are spread thin, so that you have very few options.You will do whatever you are told, because you can't risk the health and safety of your family.

We don't really need any more people. When was the last time you were driving in rush-hour traffic, or walking through a mall and said to yourself, “You know, there just aren't enough people.” I'm not trying to vilify the people who have kids and families, but the #1 worst thing you can do environmentally is have a child. The source of most of our modern ills, is overpopulation and its cousin, thoughtless overconsumption. Restaurants throw away approximately 30% of all of their food. The figure is a little lower for personal households, but not much. In the name of convenience we make cleaning products out of chemicals and instead of cloth, we have to use paper products that can be thrown away. But there is no away. I bring this up because the biggest offender is disposable diapers.

I'm not saying don't have families. I'm not saying people who have families are bad. All I'm saying is let's start letting little girls know that it's okay to dream about things other than becoming a baby factory. And let's start showing them that it's alright to make other choices and maybe even wait. They have to be educated in proper family planning (birth control), and encouraged in pursuits other than gestating. Stop the tyranny of religion. It's not necessary to have a baby to take some

Baby Steps...

The American Dream was just a Dream.

Remember when hard work and perseverance were all you needed to "make it" in America?
That was before the Ultra Monster Pirana of Uncontrolled, Unregulated, Unfettered, Un F-ing Believable, Un-American Pseudo (Vampire) Capitalism took over.

Now it doesn't matter what you do to try to get ahead. The dice are loaded. The table is rigged. And you're the rube. Smile.
It used to be easy to understand, only the poor and desperate stole from others. Now it's the Corporate business plan. And it works! For them. For us, not so much.

Good for you. You get up early in the morning so you can take your time and get on the road to beat the ridiculous traffic. Guess what? Now the rich guy can pay to get in a lane that he can go fast in and make it where he's going in time. He just negated all of your planning and hard work. It's okay. He's rich. You're screwed. Welcome to the new economy!

The airport is where this is most apparent. Stand in line to go through TSA security check? Check!
It's the American way to do stupid stuff (that's stuff with an sh...) when they've told you to be paranoid. Billions of dollars go to the companies that make the scanning and screening machines that are used to humiliate us and make us feel like we're less-than-human. These machines are the modern day equivalent of a scarecrow. Or one of those owl sculpture that are supposed to scare away birds and other pests. Basically, just to make the general public feel good. They do nothing to protect us, and I can prove it.

They have a new system that can be used by the rich to circumvent these long lines and delays. Just pay the toll, and breeze right through and past the line. The good news is, terrorists would never pay to get through in this manner, so, no problem here. Just shut up and wait in line, loser!

The airport is where you can find another little piece of inequity. In the parking garage, If you call (write, e-mail, whatever. I suppose if I were rich I'd know how) ahead and pay the price you can get preferred parking in the deck where you used to have to drive up and down and down and up and hither and yon. No more. If you want to avoid that work that is part and parcel of a normal existence, you can pay to NOT be treated equally. Hooray!!

I'll bet you can think of lots of examples where the normal everyday, play by the rules consumer gets outbid by the upper echelons, and made to feel less-than.

We've got to stand-up. Let's face it, we've got more practice than they do, because we have to actually wait in those lines. Stand up for your rights! Stand up for the merit that should be afforded by the hard-work that used to be the backbone of the American Way. Stop all this pay to win. Make your voice heard! Join a union. Join a party. Join a club. Join, join, join. We are stronger TOGETHER.

We just gotta change things or we will be ground under by the 1%.
Baby Steps...

Old King Coal. Not so merry.

Coal miners have been around for a awhile. 

Mining is dirty, dangerous work, that doesn't take a lot of education, just mostly muscle and courage. And a desire to take care of your family.
Especially in rural areas where the coal is found, West Virginia, Kentucky and Missouri, to name just a few. Miners generally have a pretty tough life, filthy, back-breaking work, for long hours. As long as the employer can legally require, that's how many hours a coal miner will work.

I just drove through Ludlow, Colorado where an abomination against humanity took place a while back. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_Massacre)

Fortunately, thanks to the unions and the incredible war-like struggles that they went through to get the miners a living-wage and some protections, the miners can enjoy a somewhat normal standard of living. A liveable standard, even though these mines tend to be in horrible, back-woods locations where the boom-town economies inflate all the costs that the miners incur. Many of these miners have worked the mines for generations, so much so that it's the only existence that they've ever known, or that they can even contemplate. The job is so ingrained with the life and the culture, that the miners, not only put up with the horrible conditions that the employers thrust upon them, they defend it against all logic and against their own well-being.
The nation should be getting off coal. And petroleum. And Natural gas.

It's obvious. Coal is a dirty source of fuel and mining kills miners through bad and unsafe practices and disease. There are natural, renewable sources of power generation that we can transition into, and these miners can, with very little adaptation, be transitioned into without the loss of any income. These types of energy can, and will, be in the same rural locations where these workers now live. But there's a catch. Isn't there always? The fossil fuel energy companies have powerful and deep-pocketed lobbies that won't allow that to happen.

Workers need to be educated in these things. (another reason that the rich and the corporations are dead-set against any public education) The Politicians and the corporations aren't your friends. They fought against your rights every step of the way and killed countless miners who only wanted to make life better for their families.

Let's get out there and help these people, because by helping them, we help ourselves.
The best way to get even with the Robber Borons, is to make what they stole from us, and our planet, worthless.
Let's do it.
Baby steps...

It works if YOU work it.

This is exactly the way representative, participatory democracy should work. It's a little slow, admittedly, but the more we participate, the better and faster it will become.

After years of cajoling the White House, the solar panels are back on the White House. The lord and savior of the republican/oligarchic party Ronnie RayGunz spent time, energy and presumably money to remove the solar panels that had been installed by Carter. Had those panels been allowed to remain, who can say where research and development might have taken us by now in the renewable energy industry?
Filthy, polluted water-under-the-bridge.

Bill McKibbon and his group 350.org and their fans have turned the Obama administration around on this one aspect of the argument. Good on 'em!
The Keystone XL Pipeline has coughed it's last disgusting tarry-oily death knell, since The Truth is almost always more powerful than what the Koch's want.

Obama is playing the long-game and in order to do it, he MUST have the grass-roots (you and me) help him. All of this hard work is designed to be a sort of political ju-jitsu, in order to make these changes look natural and organic. And it's working. The bonus is that it also makes all the greedy corporations and politicians look like idiots. I LOVE that.
Keep it up!
Baby Steps...

Global Climate CHANGE. (look it up)

Why oh, why is everybody having SO much trouble with the concept of climate change?
If you've been outdoors lately, it should be obvious.

Oh, yeah. Science. The devil's workshop. The devil's "Call of Duty".
Science. The one thing that hurts God more than the scourging of Jesus.
Science. The battle rages on between science and, uh, who?

Temperatures HAVE gone up. It's a fact that has been recorded for a loooong time.
If you have ever studied meteorology or climatology, you know that all weather patterns are caused by changes in temperature. Changes in temperature are caused by how much of the Sun's radiation reaches a certain part of the planet, land OR water. The relationship between hot areas and colder areas cause high and low pressure zones, which combined with the rotation of the Earth, causes wind. Pretty simple. Amazing how powerful the Sun is! Hey, why doesn't someone figure out a way to harness all of that power? But that's another subject.

Then there are the semi-deniers. "Oh, there is a change in the weather, but there's no way it can be man-made." Really?  God gave us the Earth to do with as we see fit. Take all the resources and use what we want and throw the rest away. If I need a little bit of gas, why shouldn't I pump thousands of gallons of some toxic chemical soup, the contents of which, I won't tell you, into the ground to filter wherever it happens to go. Once we get the coal, who cares where the ash and waste from the process goes?

The way I understood it, God gave man Dominion over the Earth, to be a good caretaker. If I hired a caretaker for a facility and that guy threw trash all over the place, and refused to clean up, I for one would fire him. What if my caretaker treated all of the men women and children, as well as all of the animals, as if they were just an inconvenience, out the door. Pink-Slip.

The big fallacy is throwing things away. There is NO AWAY. The Earth is a closed system. Suppose you lived in a deep sea diving suit, with a tank of air and a years supply of food and water. Within a few days your suit would start filling up (from the bottom, you know, gravity). After a few weeks, you'd be sloshing around in a soup of human waste products. How long do you think it would take till that suit was filled? And you Drowned in Your Own Shit? But thank god, it's not man-made.

The Closed system that is Our Earth is the same way. People that DON'T believe this are either incredibly stupid, or are interested in something other than long-term survival for the planet. If your greed blinds you to these simple truths, I hope we are all gone before you drown in your own shit. Maybe you can build a life raft out of your money. I sincerely hope not.

Those of you who believe in saving the planet, keep working!
Baby Steps...

Try Love for a "Change."

It's all become clear to me now.
Rich white men are doing something that they've always done.
They are trying to control others.
All others.
They pine for the old days when you could maximize your profits by using slaves.
Wow, slavery was great! Free work, and all you had to do was try and make sure that your slaves didn't die, but if they did, eh, get another one.
Oh, bliss! Oh, profits!
And the slaves were "different," they were not men.
They were less than men. That made it easier on their consciences (those who had consciences).
They even looked different, to make it even easier. They were black.

"Hey, remember that one magic grifter book that we've convinced everyone was written by God? What if we could find something in that that explains why these guys are less than men. Look at this. Mark of Ham. Works for me. We can sell this to the rubes. Tell them it's God's will. I bet this book will come in handy later. Let's build some buildings and use brainwashing, conditioning and threats and really pound our dogma into all of the people. If they don't believe us, they'll go to this really horrible place FOREVER, and experience pain and suffering like they can't even imagine, but we'll help them imagine it."

They will ALWAYS resent that the institution of slavery was abolished and they will do anything to get back to those principles.
They hate the blacks for no longer being slaves, and expecting to be treated equally and with justice.
They hate the liberals for helping to bring down slavery and expecting to have everyone treated equally and with justice.
They hate unions, because they fight for equality and justice for the workers (who, by golly, should be slaves and not get wages).
They hate immigrants for getting here AFTER slavery.
They LOVE free-trade agreements, because they allow us to ship jobs to places where the pay for workers is just barely above slavery.
They hate women, because, just like slaves, they have had the gall to believe that they deserve equality and justice.
They hate the middle class because they want a share of the money. Not gonna happen. "It's OUR money."

The best way to keep blacks down? Poverty and taking away the right to vote by using the magic grifter book, that says whatever we want it to say.
The best way to keep immigrants down? Poverty and taking away the right to vote by using the magic grifter book, that says whatever we want it to say..
The best way to keep women down? Use their bodies against them by using the magic grifter book, that says whatever we want it to say.

How do they do it?
Buy the government.
Buy the media.
Keep us scared, keep us down.
Turn us against each other.
Give us bread and circuses.

Time to stand up and fight.
Don't believe them.
Demand the truth.
Demand equality.
And start loving each other. It disrupts their plan.
I love you.
Peace.

Baby Steps...

Who're you callin' an animal?

Over the last couple of years, I have seen a increasing number of videos posted on the web, that show the amazing capacity of dogs to show love and compassion. In one video, a dog blocks highway traffic to protect another dog whom has been injured. Dogs protect their owners. And the babies of their owners. Dogs protect each other and in the case of search and rescue dogs, people they don't even know.

The only times that these dogs get upset or frustrated, is when they don't have the resources to do more. These magnificent creatures will risk their own lives and go to whatever lengths are in their ability to protect and save their charges. They have no promise of monetary reward. There is no outside agency that motivates them. They don't crave media recognition. They won't be going on a speaking tour, or given endorsement deals. They do it for love. Isn't that incredible?

In a lot of religious traditions, these heroic creatures are considered to not have a "soul" and therefore, cannot go to "heaven." First of all, I wouldn't want to go to a "heaven" that didn't include dogs. They are better "people" than most of the people I know.

Now, when there are "people" who refuse to use the resources they have (By the way, those resources are given to them by us!) to help others who are sick or poor, they have made themselves much, much less than any dog. Any. Dog. The same dogs that, by their religious beliefs, are not allowed into "heaven". A dog will use ALL of the resources it has, and go beyond, to help. When all along, there are "people" who refuse to help others, even though they have virtually unlimited resources (that they were given by US, the taxpayer), and they refuse to use them, insisting instead to give them to the rich and comfortable.

I think this demonstrates perfectly, who does and does not have a soul.
It shows without a shadow of a doubt who will and who will not get into "heaven."
It proves to me who deserves to be called an Animal.

Baby Steps...

Sometimes thing happen just like you planned.

In a past post, I mentioned that you might be able to ask your landlord to consider making some changes that would affect our impact on the planet. Well, by golly, my landlord did just that.
Recently our complex installed hot water-on-demand in all of the buildings. Not only does the water operate on this system, so does the heat (which is hot water). I'm not going to pretend that their motives were environmental and altruistic, in fact, I'm sure they are just enjoying the HUGE energy savings, but I'll take what I can get.
In fact, that is exactly how it works. Once businesses realize that they can actually save money by doing the right thing, hey, look at that, they start doing the right thing.
Baby Steps...

Good Produce. Good Meat. Good Dog, let's eat!

Here's a story that warns of the environmentally-conscious burrito fast food retailer, Chipotle planning to raise their prices in the next year. Uh, that's what they do. That's what all businesses do. In the vast majority of cases, they do it to compensate for their prices going up and (mostly) so they don't lose their profit margin.

In the case of Chipotle, I think we should all HAPPILY pay the higher prices because of what Chipotle does for it's customers and especially what it does for the market.

Chipotle has been a leader in bringing quality food products to the fast-food market. The meats they use are sustainably produced and without hormones or other pharmaceutical Frankenstein blends that swim freely in a lot of livestock.

They are also on the forefront (or is it vanguard?) of using non-GMO produce, At this juncture in the history of corporate farming (both produce AND livestock) that isn't easy. The powers that be are very protective of their strangle hold on the market, therefore, they have lobbyists to make sure that their corporate overlords get government subsidies to keep the prices of their science-project-gone-wrong faux-foodstuffs at an artificially low price, making it the first choice for those wishing to keep costs down.

By buying products that are sustainably produced in the type of quantities that a national food distributor is able to buy in, the cost of these (better) products is driven down. (soon after the Clinton administration mandated that all government offices use at least 30% recycled paper, the price to consumers came down significantly. Just sayin'.) When the prices come down, the potential for the consumer to purchase the "better" product improves. More is sold, and the price can come down even more.

The  best way to fight against the greedy corporations (like Monsanto) that are willing to destroy the food supply for profit, is to make their product, and therefore, their profits less valuable.

Besides, I LOVE burritos. And Chipotle has some of the very best. I'll be there to shell out the extra bucks for a company who fights the good fight and makes the great food.
Baby steps...

This Is How We (should) Do It.

Okay, you've got to get someplace right Now! (This is the way we are now. Everything is me, me, me; now, now, now; fast, fast, fast; more, more, more.) So how are you going to get there? If you're like most of us, you're going to run (well, probably not run) out to your baby. You know the car that you wanted so badly that you were willing to pay $20,000 for and then carry some pretty hefty insurance in order to protect the car and you. Boy, were your friends impressed, at least for a  couple of minutes, until the next distraction came along. "Ooh, Shiny!"
Have you noticed the gas prices going up? Of course you have, especially since the car doesn't quite get the mileage that was promised in the advertising.
And if you're going downtown, you've got to pay for parking. How much? You're kidding!
There is an new alternative alternative, thanks to some forward-thinking people. Yeah, they'll make a profit, but isn't that the American-Capitalist-Way?

Since we've made the choice to travel in cars to get where we're going, I take great comfort and encouragement from a new "trend" which I hope will become a new "Normal".
There are a bunch of companies which are based on the Collaborative Consumption model. That is the "shared" use of things. This is especially effective when we're talking about big-ticket products like automobiles.
There have been a number of car share companies around for several years and I applaud their efforts and would happily use them. They have names like Occasional Car (www.occasionalcar.com),
or Zip Car (www.zipcar.com)  and Ego Car Share, which is a non-profit, (carshare.org). There's even a site that empowers people to rent out their own car when it is not in use( www.relayrides.com/).

Building on the success of these earlier  entrepreneurs is a newcomer that has taken this model to a higher level.  Located in many big cities, Car2Go (car2go.com) uses the smallest cars available, the Smart 2four, and stations them all over the city. With a membership card and a smartphone app you can find a car near you. You can reserve a trip, or just take your chances in a catch-as-catch-can style. Once you taken your trip, park (free) at any meter, or on any street and walk-away. You are only charged for the time and miles you drove. The next person finds where you parked the car from their mobile app, then they go. Like the others, fuel and insurance are covered in your fees. Unlike the others, you don't have to return the car to a drop-off location. And you don't ever have to pay to park.

Pretty freaking cool! I intend to use these vehicles often and if all goes as I anticipate, they should grow enough in the next several years, that I'll do away with my car.
I wonder who else will?

Baby steps...

Pretty easy, really.

Sustainability is a pretty simple concept.
Can something (some practice or some action) be done forever, or for a very long time, or at least for as long as it's necessary? That's pretty much it. In order for something to last, it probably has to be self-sustaining, which means it must be replenished or it must be replaced, preferably the former.
We are consumers. That is, we consume. We must eat and drink in order to survive. When we are behaving in a sustainable manner we then, in turn generate or produce something that some other organism needs to survive. Perhaps our waste is employed in the fertilization and cultivation of some produce, or perhaps we become food for some predator. At least in that scenario, we have a purpose.
The most important thing we can do is to be aware and to think about the consequences of the things we do. This is a practice that has fallen so far out of popularity that it has received it's "free-fall skydivers" certification.

We have come to become ruled by convenience. That is the most important thing anyone can seem to think of. Let's build stuff to save time. To measure time. To avoid walking. To avoid working. People just throw stuff away because it's easy. It doesn't matter if there's some use left in it, or some raw materials that can be extracted, or the fact that it just looks bad sitting there where you threw it. And using stuff up is even worse. We are trying to have a society here and why don't you think everyone should get a fair share?

I notice that no matter how thoughtless someone gets, they still manage to get up when they have to defecate at night. It's obvious why.

So, now apply that same logic to everything that you use. Should I bother to get up, or just sit here in my own filth? Same applies to every thing that we do in life. Just think. That's all.
Oh, and then do something about it.
Baby steps...

Stick that in your pipe and smoke it

I put on a lot of weight recently, because when I traveled internationally people didn't believe I was an American.
Have you noticed, lots of our fellow countrymen are looking more and more like the blob-shaped passengers on the spaceship from Wall-E?
Maybe that's why they refer to the proposed trans-continental pipeline as XL, to appeal to the excess-driven American public. By God, if we're gonna have a pipeline running through our heartland, like some sort of Borg bypass surgery, then it had better be X-tra Large!
Did it ever occur to anyone, why don't the Canadians build this pipeline to the Pacific? Or to Hudson Bay? Or to the St. Lawrence River? Perhaps it's because the Canadians aren't as greedy and stupid as we are.
This proposed pipeline will create jobs! Yeah, maybe. About 6000 transient, temporary, boom town-like oil field jobs. That ought to solve our unemployment problem.
America will benefit and profit from lower oil prices? Really?  This oil (using the term very loosely) is going to the Gulf of Mexico to be sold on the global open market. We'll have to bid on it like everyone else, we don't get to siphon some off along the way. That is, except for the inevitable leaks that will happen all over the route of this monstrosity.
 No one is noticing, but the big corporation are starting to divest of their money in fossil fuels and slowly investing in alternatives. Would these greedy a-holes do that if they didn't anticipate a huge profit? I think not!
Stop the mind-numbingly stupid XL Pipeline and try to get used to not using fossil fuels. It will serve you well in the long run.
And it will serve the planet well.
Baby steps...

Aware

Sustainability is easy. You just have to be aware.
In fact, becoming more aware would make every aspect of your life better and easier.
Most of us go through the day by rote, by habit. We don't even notice the world around us. That causes us to discount everything that goes on around us. We have a self-imposed blindness, deafness and just a "who gives a rat's..." attitude. It starts to become: me, me, me.
One of the most profound of the old sayings goes, "Stop and smell the roses." We really don't take the time to pause, and take a good look at the world outside of our little bubble. The world is FULL of beauty and wonder.

Once you've started to see the world around you, you'll be surprised at all the fascinating things out there, and the fascinating people. You'll start to appreciate what you've got and enjoying the things that you have. Eventually you may find that the things you used to think were "important" like a new car, a 72 inch TV,  a $5000 watch, don't give you as much pleasure as a beautiful sunset. Don't make you as full of life as playing with a child. Can't hold a candle to helping someone.
It's all a learning experience. You'll get better at it and then you will really find happiness and fulfillment.
Baby Steps...

I'll see you when I get there.

Nobody is Born Racist