Tucson Examiner: Do More with Less

How can we live better in tough economic times? Try doing more with less. In my most recent Examiner article, I give suggestions for simpler lifestyles and ideas for creating useful items (like the yard light pictured here) from discarded items.

Sarah Palin: The Anti-Environmentalist

Thanks to the hundreds of you who have read my previous post, "Sarah Palin: The Anti-Feminist". Her are some links related to Palin's deplorable environmental views and more reasons why she is unfit to be a Vice President, let alone President.

All God's Children: This isn't really the name of this video by the Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund, but it should be. This is a video clip showing how Palin has promoted the brutal killing of wolves and other predators in Alaska. I guess Alaskans have learned nothing from the mistakes made by the lower 48 states when predators were mercilessly exterminated in the early 20th century. We're still trying to fix that bungle down here. Predators are part of God's plan, hello. They serve a purpose in the fabric of life. It also shows a frightening lcak of compassion for animals that she sued the federal government to take polar bears off the endangers spieces list. Below is a photo of an Alaskan who wanted to shoot this bear "because he was there", but the poor bear dropped over from heat exhaustion first. Climate change? That's just a theory. That's just science. Who believes in that?



Why not Rape Alaska? Isn't that God's Will?: An editorial about Palin's "energy policy". The delegates chanted it at the convention, "Drill baby drill." The Republicans are all for continued use of fossil fuels and raping the environment to drill to the max.

Green Candidate: Of course, I'm not referring to her. Here's an interesting editorial by Thomas Friedman on voting green.

Top photo credit: Climate Progress

Bottom photo credit: The eco-Enquirer

Denver: Ready for the Democrats

On a recent trip to Denver, all I can say is that I really blew it. I made my reservations without checking the calendar closely. I went to Denver the week before the Democratic Convention. I missed all of the action, the Democratic Party dignitaries, and Obama's great stadium speech! Oh, well. I did enjoy my trip to Denver and a visit with my four cousins who live in the area.

I had a wonderful hike in the red rocks area (above). I also enjoyed hiking around downtown Denver. On the Thursday before the convention started, the city was all dressed up for the big show. The gardens around the state capitol building were breathtaking (bottom). I enjoyed the public art-- especially the giant blue bear looking into the convention center window. I wonder what he thought of the speeches?

What really impressed me about downtown Denver was the transportation system. I was staying with my cousin who lives south of town in the suburbs. She suggested we talk the light rail train into downtown. We parked at a free lot not far from her house and took a 15-20 minute train trip into the heart of downtown. The ticket was $3.50 round trip, and the price included transfers to buses and other trains downtown. The park and ride lots in the suburbs were free, but the lots downtown were $8-10 per day. Great pricing structure to encourage ridership. The trains were clean and fast.

The light rail took us right past the convention center and dropped us off at the 16th Street Mall (below). When my cousin first talked about this, I thought it was just a mall, but no, it was a long strip of shops and businesses on an open air pedistrian mall. Only pedistrians, the light rail line, and bicycles are allowed on this strip. Very nice, well-planned, well-excuted. All I can say is: Tucson, what are we waiting for?

On the way back to the burbs at rush hour, it was standing room only. Denver has 6 or so lines now. A light rail line from Colorado Spring to Denver and a line to the new Denver airport are being planned. A line to the airport is a great idea since it is way the heck out of town. For more pictures of Colorado, check out my Flickr site.

Modern Ghost Towns

Rising gas prices and falling housing values are causing major shifts in American lifestyles. Some people are driving smaller cars and parking the SUV in the driveway, while others have purchased scooters, motocycles, bicycles, or bus passes. A signifant number of Americans have chosen not to act; in particular, many are putting off home purchases.

An interesting article on the MSNBC website discusses the woes of builders who planned to build far-flung developments (like the one pictured above). Overbuilding in a soft market has created modern day ghost towns. The development pictured above was slated to include 179 homes, but only 15 have been built. Homowners quoted in the article lament the lack of sidewalks and "safe" places for the kids to play. Oh, my gosh, their chilren are forced to play in fields and vacant lots! They also are worried because other houses are not packed in tightly around them. What's wrong with fields and elbow room? People who live in the country seem to like it.

When I was growing up, my parents' house was the first one to be built on our street. There are many family photos of our little Cape Cod surrounded by dirt and weeds. For a few years, ours was the northern most house in our small town. I can remember playing in the fields next door and picking wild strawberries-- a little bit of the country on the ourskirts of town. I also can remember being said when the last vacant lot on the block was replaced with a house and a lawn. Ok, there may have been poison ivy and bugs in those fields, but for us kids, it was FUN.

Everything We Didn't Do

As everyone knows, energy costs have been climbing steadily for several years. Gone are the days when I could fill my Toyota for $12. The last time I filled it, the tab was over $40.

As gasoline prices topped $4 per gallon, behaviors started to change. More bicycles, more scooters, and fewer SUVs and trucks are seen on the streets today than a year ago. As a result of actual behavior change on the part of Americans, prices have fluttered down a bit. After all, oil producers don't want to kill the goose who laid the golden egg by starving it; they want the goose to be fat-- if not happy.

In a previous post I lamented the switch in behaviors and policies after the energy crisis of the late 1970s. In last week's NY Times, Thomas Freidman posted an article entitled Flush with Energy. I didn't read this article when it came out, but this morning I realized it had been the most e-mailed article for several days in a row. Hmmm... if that many readers are interested enough to forward, I should read this.

Wow... Freidman's article chronicles changes in every-use behaviors in Denmark-- more bicycles, more wind energy, taxes to discourage oil dependence, and incentives to encourage develop of new green technologies. The Danes did everything we didn't do. With these changes, Denmark has gone from 99% dependence on foreign oil in 1973 to 0% today.

Pan across the ocean to the US, where we started to change our behaviors in the 1970s, and then went back to our old ways (and beyond) after Ronald Reagan's don't-worry-be-happy administration. Several Democratic presidential candidates have talked about behavior change and incentives for green energy. No one has mentioned the T word (taxes) or the S word (sacrifice), though. It will be interesting to see how this story unfolds in the future-- especially this winter.

Franklin and Jimmy: Where Are You When We Need You?

If you've been paying attention to the news these days, you know that the US is in deep economic do-do (a technical term I learned in Econ 101 at OSU).

Bush, Cheney, and their Congressional Republican minions have run the economy into the ground with their tax-break-and-spend policies. They handily eliminated the Clinton budget surplus years ago and continue to build the LARGEST budget deficit in history. Their oil man perspective on energy and environmental policy has not only led them to ignore international treatees on reducing global warming but also to work against any regulations that would encourage fuel-effiecient cars or meaningful research into alternative fuels. Being "anti-big-government" (except when it pertains to gay marriage or abortion), they also turned a blind eye to risky lending practices, which have now created a stagering mortgage crisis across the country. If all this is not bad enough, gas prices are over $4/gallon in some parts of the US and rising; automakers are closing plants and laying off thousands of people; the dollar has tanked on world markets; the stock market keeps slipping; people are losing their homes and jobs; and the Chinese are beating the pants off us at our own games (ie, capitalism and conspicuous consumption of energy-- not baseball).

Whew.... what a list. So, why don't we have a parilentary system, so we could have voted these self-serving, self-rightous oil barons out of office before they destroyed our country? I digress...

Tonight, my question is: Franklin and Jimmy, where are you when we need you most? Of course, I'm referring to Franklin D. Roosevelt and Jimmy Carter.

In the 1930s, the US was in dire financial straits; there was a banking crisis; people were losing their jobs and homes; and stock market volitlity led to huge loses. Hmmmm.... sounds familiar! Anyway, what did FDR do? Did he send everyone a $300 economic stimulus check so they could buy cheap imported goods? Noooooo.... he created social programs to give poor, sick, and elderly people a safety net and created jobs programs to put people to work. The alphabet soup of public works programs created by FDR went a long way to fix and build US infrastructure-- roads, sidewalks, parks, dams-- while giving people the work, money, and self-esteem to rebuild their lives.

We have people out of work, and we have infrastructure problems. Why not put the two together?
1) Politicians lack political will and long-term vision to take dramatic steps (even if they would benefit millions of people).
2) Sending checks is easier and very popular in an election year.
3) Sending us $300-600 dollars to spend not only helps some citizens but also helps business-- if we buy something.
4) Giveaway gimmicks are good PR amongst the poor and less educated. (Ok, sorry to sound elitist, but given some level of sophistication, you recognize the stimulus package for what it is.)

So, I've made a case of FDR, but why, you ask, do we need Jimmy Carter, too? Those of us who were around in the late 1970s, remember the last "energy crisis"-- long lines at the gas pumps, rising prices. Jimmy made a series of presidential tough-love, tighten-your-belts speeches on TV. He called on the nation to reduce energy consumption and to work together to develop an energy policy that would reduce our dependence upon foreign oil. He encouraged us to buy fuel-efficient cars, turn down our thermostats in the winter (55 at night and 65 during the day), and put on a sweater. (He wore a sweater when he gave one of these speeches.) I drove a Datsun B110 in the 1970s-- 40mph. People used to brag about the milage of their cars!!!! (Check out his speeches on YouTube.)

What is our president doing about our current energy crisis? First of all, you can't call it a crisis or people would really panic (especially since they're losing their houses and jobs, as oil and food prices rise). Are Bush and Chaney (his boss) asking people to conserve? Hell no! (Conservation is for wussies; that's what Ronald Reagan taught us.) Their solution is more oil production and exploration-- here and in the middle east.

What would the US be like today if we had re-elected Jimmy and continued to work toward energy independence? Sigh.....Of course, Americans aren't into sacrifice so we elected Ronny instead of Jimmy. Ronny said that there had been a "malaise" in the country and that now (with him as president) it was "a new day in America". Ronny (the great communicator) was selling us a "Don't Worry Be Happy" philosophy and we bought it. Magically, big cars were ok again, the energy crisis was a thing of the past, and global warming was a theory. Almost 30 years later, gas mileage for most cars is worse than it was in the late 1970s. Thanks, Ronny, George I and George II for allowing us to burry our heads in the sand, while you and your friends profitted from our ignorance.

So gasoline is fast approaching $4/gallon here in Arizona and has surpassed that mark in some states. This will put a dent in summer vacations, most likely, but what will the price of energy be in the winter when people have to heat their homes? This is a very scary thought, but, of course, except for NPR, no one in power is addressing this. (Winter is after the election, and, therefore, too far in the future.)

So, where are FDR and Jimmy when we need them? Will Barack Obama or John McCain be the type of strong, visionary president that we need now?