Exactly a month prior to John McCain's selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate, I suggested her (along with Tim Pawlenty and Tom Ridge) in this blog as a strong candidate for the job:

[...] and Sarah Palin, the popular Alaska governor with green and pro-life credentials and a nice face. All three would make decent candidates and vice presidents, but whether any of them could give McCain’s campaign a much-needed shot in the arm is entirely up to them.

What I did not write was that Palin would give McCain inroads with women (especially the temptingly disaffected Hillary Clinton supporters who are still not sold on Barack Obama). She also appeals to blue collar Americans, another demographic that remains skeptical of Obama: Palin is an avid hunter, ice fisherwoman, and snowmobiler (her husband Todd is a snowmobile racer), three qualities which could turn Maine's northern congressional district red and win the Republicans an extra electoral vote.

But most importantly, she complements McCain's age and national security experience - Palin is just 44 and as governor of Alaska, is well-versed in the politics of energy. This also solves a minor problem for McCain: when he was struggling to win the Republican nomination, the issue du jour was Iraq, which McCain made the centerpiece of his campaign - a risk that paid off when the surge he was advocating for years finally paid off. Ironically, he buried an important winning issue for him, because the surge he had advocated worked so well, it took Iraq off the front pages. Now the voters care about energy, which hits voters where it hurts - their wallets. McCain's Lexington Project is turning energy into a winning issue for Republicans, and Sarah Palin can only help there. Lastly, McCain has resurrected his maverick image. Palin is just about as far outside the Beltway as it gets.

Sure, she doesn't have a whole lot of experience. The Democrats have and will continue to rail on her for this, but this may prove futile, since she is only running for vice president, whereas the similarly inexperienced Obama is running for president. She still has more executive experience than Obama, McCain, and Joe Biden combined. My only concern is if she can stand up to the sharp-tongued foreign policy specialist Biden. Hopefully someone is training her to pronounce "Medvedev" correctly (its mid-VAY-dyef).

Her selection has energized McCain's supporters and brought new energy (no pun intended) to the ticket. McCain definitely made the right choice with Palin.

The overwhelming reaction from America and Europe on the Russian riposte to Georgia's attack on Russian "peacekeeping" forces in South Ossetia has been that Russia showed too much of its claws. It should now be ostracised or penalised for "overreaction" to an attack on its soldiers. This response evades acknowledgement that the real damage President Mikhail Saakashvili of Georgia has done has been to the United States and NATO, and to Georgia itself, which for the foreseeable future will be a nation of limited sovereignty, and an awkward embarrassment to its Western allies. Georgia will have Russian troops indefinitely stationed on its territory to protect South Ossetia and Abkhazia, henceforth self-declared independent entities under Russian protection or eventually annexed to Russia, at their own petition. The Russians, at this point, prefer a self-declaration of independence because, as they like to emphasise, it would follow the precedent of Kosovo's self-proclamation of independence from Serbia in February of this year, under American sponsorship.

The crisis has been a turning point in international relations because it demonstrates that the United States will not defend Georgia, despite the impression that Washington, after having trained Georgia's troops and displayed the Saakashvili government as its protégé, was in some way implicated in the Georgian attack on South Ossetia and on the Russian soldiers legally there as "peacekeepers". Those Russian soldiers had been there for 16 years under an international agreement following a first Georgian attempt to "recover" the linguistically and historically distinct South Ossetia and Abkhazia, both of which have been autonomous  Russian protectorates or regions since 1810.

Now, Vice President Dick Cheney is going to visit Georgia next week, after visits to Azerbaijan and the Ukraine, which no doubt are in need of some bucking up after this display of Russian fury and of American "diplomatic restraint" (meaning lack of rational alternative). American naval vessels are in the Black Sea, and one of them, a destroyer, has delivered some humanitarian supplies to a southern Georgian port. The Russians have darkly declared their suspicion that American vessels have been delivering arms to Georgia. Even though the Russians destroyed all that was left of the new American military equipment and installations recently given to Georgia, Saakashvili is unlikely to want to start up the war again, at least, just now, unless Cheney is going to bring the 82nd Airborne Division and the Sixth Fleet with him. That, of course, is what Saakashvili seemed to expect the night his invasion turned into a debacle. "Where is America?" he said, "Where is the Free World?" He has since received reassurances from the presidential candidate John McCain and Barack Obama's running mate, Joe Biden, both fans of the unsuccessful Georgian liberator.

This has been an inane and stupid affair, except for the unfortunates who got killed or maimed, lost their homes, or have been ethnically cleaned by one side during the past days and are now grieving refugees. The United States left Saakashvili and the Georgians twisting in the wind, after telling them they were going to belong to NATO and help spread freedom in the Caucasus. The Ukraine and the Baltic states have been given the lesson that great powers do not go to war against other heavily armed great powers just to settle ancient sectarian quarrels or linguistic rivalries in client countries, even if those are prospective NATO members. Poland and the Czech Republic had thought it prudent to humour the obsession of Washington and its arms manufacturers with building a missile-defence system against Iran's committing suicide. Now, they find that Russia is furious about something they had taken on faith from the US, but turns out to have been, to Washington politicians, a voter-pleasing and money-making boondoggle.

Israel now finds Syria talking with Moscow arms suppliers. Russian cooperation with the US on various matters, Iran, Hamas, and Hezbollah, counterterrorism, nuclear non-proliferation, and oil and gas supplies to Europe, is now expected to cease. Why? Because a certain number of policy types in the Clinton and Bush II administrations, and in the Pentagon, decided that it could be a cost-free demonstration of American power to expand NATO right up to Russia's front door. They could even take over some of Russia's historical dependencies and protectorates, just to show who's Number One.

28 August 2008

William Pfaff

International Herald Tribune (Paris)

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/08/28/opinion/edpfaff.php (in English)

Editor’s Note:

The neocons have truly and seriously screwed up on this one. They egged on a tinhorn Caucasian dictator, and they are left holding the (very messy) bag publicly. When I read David Frum’s rant in National Review (once a respectable publication under WFB, now, on a nosedive downward), I could only think of Alice… “Things are getting curiouser and curiouser”. Ariel Cohen’s detached rambling in Commentary was even worse. Of course, all the usual cast of suspects piped up, from William Kristol to Max Boot. The hysteria underneath it all was visible to the blind, and I have never seen such “sound and fury signifying nothing” in a very long time.

Whether one likes it or no, the Ukraine, Byelorussia, the Baltic states, and the Caucasus are in the Russian sphere of influence, and have been there for centuries. They are going to be back there shortly. Much sentimental treacle has been written on the so-called Baltic states. They are recent constructs, they have had only two brief periods of independence, from 1920 to 1940, and from 1991 onward. They do not have a serious history of independence, as they were always a province in someone’s empire, be it the Teutonic Knights, the Polish Commonwealth, the Kingdom of Sweden, Imperial Russia, or the USSR. Their ineptitude at self-government is shown by their nasty treatment of the Russian minority, which, by the way, existed long before Soviet times (these statelets wish to forget that they were provinces of Russia for centuries and somebody else’s province before that).

The Ukraine is the biggest boondoggle. Firstly, the Ukraine is not a nation; it is a region of Great Russia, just as New England or the Pacific Northwest are regions of the USA. The Ukrainian “language” is actually a peasant dialect of Russian, and I might add that it is a dying tongue, as it lacks the facility and usefulness of Standard Russian in the modern world. The only sub-district where it holds any currency is in Galicia, where it is an odd mixture of Russian and Polish, with some German elements. Only 23 percent of the “Ukrainian” population speaks it as their mother tongue, with the proportion increasing the further west you go. In short, this is an unstable artifice waiting to collapse. Note well Yushchenko’s threats recently to “investigate” his entire government, up to Prime Minister Timoshenko, for “treason”. This is not a healthy entity, and one must note that there has never been a recognised “Ukrainian” state in history, except after 1991.

All of the borders that the neocons are screaming about are based on Soviet internal borders with no underpinning in formal international treaties. That is to say, there are NO internationally-recognised borders on the post-Soviet space. Therefore, all is open to revision. Washington has no power to intervene, and the EU has even less. Whatever noise is made of alternative energy sources, the EU shall be dependent on Russian oil and gas for the near and middle term. That is, Russia could collapse the economies of the EU by not pumping the oil and gas. It holds the whip hand. The USA can offer no alternative sources to them. Any alternative to the present arrangement shall require much time, and it is doubtful that the USA and EU shall devote the resources necessary, in any case. The USA would have to divert resources from the military to energy research, and that is not going to happen any time soon.

In short, Russia has returned to the stage. The Bear has not forgotten the 90s, when American carpetbaggers and their Russian oligarch scallywags raped the Russian economy and spat in Russia’s face. America shall pay for that, I fear, and the collapse of the neocon dream cannot come quickly enough. Do not forget, Russia is not Serbia, it is not Iran, and it is not Venezuela. Russia cannot be touched by the neocons because it is the only country capable of wrecking the continental USA. THAT is the true reason they hate it. It puts the lie to all of their pretences and notional vapourings.

America shall be put in its place, but, shall it leave Eastern Europe peacefully? God willing…    

LONDON, Aug. 29 — Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic declined to enter a plea Friday in a courtroom in The Hague, refusing to recognize the legitimacy of the U.N. war crimes tribunal bringing genocide and other charges against him.

“This court is representing itself falsely as a court of the international community, whereas it is in fact a court of NATO, whose aim is to liquidate me,” said Karadzic, who faces charges relating to the 1995 massacre of 8,000 Muslim men and boys in the town of Srebrenica and other crimes during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war. ...

Judge Iain Bonomy, facing Karadzic in scarlet robes, told Karadzic that Friday’s hearing was not about the court’s jurisdiction, but simply on how he planned to plead. Karadzic, 63, faces 11 charges, including genocide counts relating to the siege of Sarajevo, in which thousands of people were killed in shelling and sniper fire, and the Srebrenica massacre, the deadliest atrocity in Europe since the end of World War II.

My Opinion: This man is a hero! He foght the Jihad and should be given a medal.

(Hat tip: Chuckes@LGF)

Still fuming.

And the uninformed voters he might be able to peel off by naming a woman could be offset by the uninformed voters he'll lose by naming a woman. After all, he is dealing with Republicans. From CNN:

"Hillary left 18 million cracks in the highest, hardest glass ceiling in America. But it turns out the women of America aren't finished yet, and we can shatter that glass ceiling once and for all," Palin said in her speech.

The remark brought a mixed reaction from the Republican crowd; some women cheered, but there was also some low-pitched groaning and booing.

Besides her gender and her rather striking lack of experience, though, I really know nothing about Gov. Palin. And neither does anyone else. So while Brandy and I are off doing a crash course in Palinology, I direct you to the only Alaskan blogger I know of, DaveNoon over at LGM, for more info.

But. Her selection does entitle us -- rather, it requires us -- to further evaluate and analyze the man who named her as a major party candidate for vice-President of the United States. What do we learn about John McCain -- what new conclusions can we draw, what old ones can we jettison or reinforce -- from this quite surprising turn of events?

I'd like to hear what you think about it, about McCain, that is. Is this a brilliant stratagem, a Hail Mary Pass, or is he just flipping off the whole political network? Or did he really have a say in the matter; was Palin dumped on him because he wouldn't accept Romney and the Old Boys wouldn't let him pick Lieberman?

And a picture. This does not really answer any of the above questions, but it does reinforce one of the more intriguing images clinging to McCain. What exactly is going on in McCain's mind as he watches Palin make her acceptance speech?

But today I have surfed past two articles/posts ranting on politics which have spelling errors.

It isn't as though I don't make typos in my blog, or consider myself infallible. I just think it's bad when you clearly haven't bothered to run your spell-checker. And you misspell in the title.

I'm not talking about little things that sneak by such as typing and apple when you really mean to write an apple.

Who can seriously consider your rant when you announce the "VP coice" in the title?

i have wood for a VP candidate.

that's weird.

After months of harping on Obama's lack of experience (esp. in foreign policy), he manages to choose a woman with almost no political experience, zero foreign policy experience ((Can you spell H-Y-P-O-C-R-I-T-I-C-A-L?), and who spent most of her life as mayor of a little village in the middle of nowhere. College degree? Sports journalism hahaha (in IDAHO too). Not to mention that she is already in the middle of a state ethics investigation for causing the dismissal of a police chief in response to his refusal to fire her cop brother-in-law when the latter decided to divorce her sister and not give her all he owned.

Only Qualifications?

1. She has a vagina

2. She did not abort a Down's syndrome baby

I think McCain had a little old person's moment here. And all the more reason he would make a lousy president.

1. The legislative leadership of the Alaska Republican Party isn’t enamored with Palin’s selection, either, according to the Anchorage Daily News.

State Senate President Lyda Green said she thought it was a joke when someone called her at 6 a.m. to tell her the news.

2."She''s not prepared to be governor. How can she be prepared to be vice president or president?" said Green, a Republican from Palin''s hometown of Wasilla. "Look at what she''s done to this state. What would she do to the nation?"

Green, who has feuded with Palin, brought up the big oil tax increase Palin pushed through last year. She also pointed to the award of a $500 million state subsidy to a Canadian firm to pursue a natural gas pipeline that''s far from guaranteed.

3."The willingness of so many to accept or defend this ridiculous selection just goes to show how low the standards have been reduced. Bush set the bar so low that horribly inexperienced hockey moms are given the vp candidacy. I would have liked to have seen him select someone that was actually qualified or has actually earned and deserves the nomination - not someone that possesses the right body parts. What a sham mccain has become."

Wendy Gramm is directly responsible for Enron.

Phil Gramm is directly responsible for the Subprime meltdown. "

Please do some research. The Dems inherited the recession of the early 90s after 12 years of Republicans in the White House.

By the end of the 90s the Dems had created over 22 million new jobs and left a $5.5 trillion dollar budget surplus. And oil cost about $38 dollars per barrel.

Then the Repubs. took over and our debt is approaching $10 trillion dollars.

The Repubs have sold our country''s future to communist China (3/4 of a trillion dollars in T-bill.)

Oil cost over $100 per barrel.

The dollar has been devalued.

Home foreclosers are up more than 150%. "

It''s another Repub. electoral scam."

Give me a break ! This woman who is being investigated for "Troopergate" in Alaska by the Legislature, is seemingly fit to be PRESIDENT if McSame flakes out? Talk about lack of experience!
She also pushed for TransCanada Corp., a Calgary-based energy company,to be given the primary contract to lead the $30 billion Natural Gas Pipeline along with $500 million in matching grants from the Northern Slope.
This woman is NO SAINT. Good Job McCain now we are certain you are senile."

So now I've had a chance to really delve into her history and get a feel for who she is. I'm not overly impressed. I view this as a huge mistake. I think she was largely chosen because of her vagina. McCain is trying to get the female vote. Well, bringing this vagina in isn't going to do it for most. Most of the women that I've discussed this with view it as an insult. Like women of the country see boobs and align their choices accordingly. Like we're all very stupid and real issues don't matter to us. I'll fully admit that are women out there that will vote for her just because she's a woman. It's a hard concept for me to understand. I don't understand why a self purported feminist would be ok with being a vaginapiece. You'd think she'd have more self worth.

I'll address it on two levels. Political - which is what I would base my vote on. And personal, which I don't necessarily let effect my voting, but admittedly effects how I view the candidate on a personal level. If that makes any sense!

So first, the political level!

Some shady politics. She fired a commissioner for not firing her ex brother in law. As her campaign was run on a ethics reform platform, this stinks! In this scandal, she's also being accused of looking in personnel files she had no business in. She currently being investigated for "abuse of power".

Her pro-life stance. I'm fine with her being pro-life. But, she opposes it in cases of rape and incest. Which sickens me.

She's opposed to a long term presence in Iraq, which I agree with, but it goes directly against McCain.

You can't find anything on her foreign relations experience, or even her stance.

She's not pro gay rights (big issue for me).

She voted against making Polar Bears an endangered species, because that would interfere with her drilling (that is to be piped right through the Canadian wilderness).

She only (yes, only - I got ripped for that one) has a Bachelors degree - and that's in journalism. Not enough.

On a personal level, the fact that she was in labor (her water broke) and she stayed to give a speech in Texas (her son was a month early) makes me view her as irresponsible. Her son was born with Down Syndrome, and there could have been complications with his birth, especially being early. She went back to work after just three days, which also makes me very sad. I don't agree with your comittment to the country superceding your committment to your family. I'm not saying that women shouldn't be able to do both, but it doesn't feel like a healthy balance.

For some reason, the fact that she posed for Vogue and is a former beauty pageant contestant rubs me wrong. I'm not even sure WHY this bothers me. It's admittedly very silly. But, at least I'm being honest.

She's inexperienced. She's been in office 1.5 years. And while she has the only executive political experience, it's not enough. I hear more about her PTA experience than anything else.

I am finding it amusing how people are excusing all of this. It happens on both sides though. Now I'm hearing that her lack of experience doesn't matter, as she's the VP. I'm sorry but there is a real chance she could have to step up in the next 4 years.

So largely, I'm happy that she's McCains pick. Gives us Obama supporters a leg up (not that we needed it).

First of all, we do not need to dismiss this choice out of hand, without giving Governor Palin a very close look to see who she is and what she stands for. A lot of people have been pushing for this to happen, some as far back as February 2007. Adam over at Draft Sarah Palin for Vice President has a very good site that details why he and others believe she would be the perfect choice for Vice President. Take some time to go through his site and learn why he has believed so strongly for so long that Palin would make a good Republican Vice President.

There is another website that has sprung up since McCain announced Sarah Palin at Dayton, Ohio, spreading the "word" about the good Governor, trying to show everyone she has no business being Vice President of the United States. I will not give the address, but it gives the following items to be what they feel is her qualifications to be 2nd in command. It goes without saying, they are not being kind when they make this list.

• Education: Bachelor's Degree in Journalism
• 1984 "Miss Wasilla" Beauty Pageant Winner
• 1984 "Miss Congeniality" in Miss Wasilla Pageant
• 1984 Runner Up - Miss Alaska
• 1992-1996 City Councilor of Wasilla
• 1996-1999 Mayor of Wasilla (pop. 8,500)
• December, 2006 Governor of Alaska

They person or persons who put up the website in question have emphasized the Miss Congeniality item of her qualifications, so let's go over that for just a minute. First of all, according to Webster's Dictionary, the definition of congeniality is:

1. The state or quality of being congenial; natural affinity; adaptation; suitableness.
2. Compatibility between persons.
3. The personality trait of being friendly to a conspicuous degree.
4. The personality trait of being likable or pleasant.

I have no doubt, Governor Palin meets the definition of the word in question. The above mentioned website is trying to make the point that someone of this nature is not someone we want or need to be dealing with a leader like Vladamir Putin of Russia, if our relationship with Russia was to go south in a hand basket. I admit, this may be a fair question, so let's look at the way Governor Palin has handled herself while in public office.

In 2003, Alaskan Governor Frank Murkowski appointed Sarah Palin to be Ethics Commissioner of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, where she served until resigning in 2004, in protest over the lack of ethics by Alaska Republican Party Chairman Randy Ruedrich, who was also on the Commission. Despite her attempts to draw attention the Ruedrich and his underhanded dealings with oil and gas companies and their lobbyists, nothing was being done and after resigning, Palin had to threaten to bring it all public to protect her own reputation before anything was done. There isn't enough space in this article to go into the full details of that very complicated case, but the Anchorage Daliy News has a very in-depth article that details it very throughly. Read the article and ask yourself if that sounds like Miss Congeniality to you.

In 2006, Sarah Palin decided to run for Governor of Alaska, against the state GOP's wishes. She beat incumbent Governor Frank Murkowski in his own primary, without the support of the Republican party and went on to defeat former Democratic Governor, Tony Knowles. Again, this was done without the support of the state Republican party. Despite what they said, she didn't roll over and play dead. Again, ask yourself if this sounds like Miss Congeniality to you.

As the campaign gets fully underway in these last two months and we begin to see how McCain/Palin will shape up as President and Vice President, I am sure Barack Obama and Joe Biden will do their best to attack Sarah Palin. We know how they are going to attack John McCain because they have already started the "eight years is enough" chant during the Democratic National Convention. It will be interesting to see what they come up with for Governor Palin. They have already tried the experience trick, but that falls through the cracks, given Obama's lack of same.

Her qualifications for Vice President are real.

• She is very much pro-life, both from the child's and the woman's point of view.
• She does not want to see our rights taken away, such as the right to bear arms.
• She believes marriage should be between one man and one woman.
• She has the experience of being a Governor and of getting things done for the people.
• She understands the need to break the cycle of dependence on foreign oil and the need to drill responsibly in Alaska to help break that cycle.

It is very clear, she is not a Republican who toes the party line, just for the sake of staying in their good graces. If she were, then she would have never ran for Governor of Alaska, against an incumbent Governor of her same party. Most of all, I believe her roots and her background qualify her to be Vice President and if need be, President of the United States. She is a very regular person, with real troubles and problems that she has and continues to face. She knows what normal people are going through and if she can bring that to the office, with her record of getting things done, then she is ready to do her job.

Too many times, the hierarchy of our political parties get in the way. Some have called Sarah Palin a rising star in the Republican party, being shot down by being chosen as McCain's running mate. I say it is time for the Republican party to get itself out of the way and let someone come in that will fight for the people. A lot of us, myself included, wanted that person to be Mike Huckabee, but Governor Palin could very well be that person. Instead of dismissing her for reasons that are not valid, let's at least give her a chance to prove herself. She deserves that chance and so does our country.

That's my take!

Larry

Perhaps the hardest adjustment we as humans will have to make, provided we don't all take each other out first, is that of food supply.  When the local soils no longer support the crops to which we're accustomed, we'll be faced with two choices: move, or learn to cultivate something new.  This migratory period will be critical to the existence of all life on earth.  By creating and maintaining seed banks, we are helping to sustain the biological diversity of life on earth.  This is the aim of the latest biological depository established in Scandinavia, into which governments from around the world are locking seed samples in preservatory conditions in case of Doomsday.

But while the establishment of such seed banks are admirable, the greatest potential for preserving biological diversity lies with the individual.  After all, your grandmother's mint patch that grows in your backyard probably isn't on the seed registry's radar, and neither are your neighbor's prize heirloom sunflowers.  For any planet to sustain a wide diversity of genetic material, it is we, the people, who will have to stash away the genetic legacy of our lives thusfar as a gift to the future.  So why not get started now?

Making a seed bank is ridiculously easy.  You could well go from a single set of seeds to more than you could ever plant within the span of a single growing season.  Of course, seeds are most fertile when fresh, but stored under the right conditions, most seeds will last for years.  It is a good practice to plant from your seed bank each year, and replenish the stock with fresh seed over the growing season.  This way, most of your seed stays fresh at any time.

Now, how to get started?  First, buy an pack of little brown paper envelopes, or even just a package of writing envelopes.  Then stash a few in your pocketbook, briefcase, or car, and start hunting!  Every time you see a particularly beautiful tree in fruit, a really nice flower, or healthy looking seed grasses, take a handful of sees, pat them dry if they are wet (say from being removed from their protective fruit coverings to prevent rot), and place them in the envelope.  Be sure to label the outside of the package with what type of plant (if you don't know, just describe it as best possible), the date on which you collected it, and ideally, where you found it. Then transfer your sealed envelopes to a cool dry storage place next time you are home, to keep the seeds from germinating and then dying from lack of soil nutrition. Then you simply hit the road again and look for more!  Most people won't mind you taking a handful of anything from their lawn, but certainly some tact and discretion are in order always.

The next step in a successful seed bank is to increase the diversity through exchange with others. In most towns there are groups of seed savers who get together periodically to have exchanges, in which you give a little to get a little of something else.  This is the true gem of seed collection. You are gaining access to the best of all local areas, all of which should be relatively well suited to cultivation in your area, simply for having an eagle eye in your own neighborhood.

As with all great ventures, the best time to get started is before everyone else catches on. That way, when seeds become more scarce, you'll already be a practiced veteran of the seed trade.  This is truly a return to the simpler life our parents parents experienced, and is a selfless act of philanthropy you can complete without spending a dime.

A group of Canadian engineering students has won a $275,000 US prize from internet search giant Google Inc. for a mobile phone application that lets users calculate and adjust their travel carbon footprint.

The group of five students was among ten groups named winners of the top prize of Google's Android Developer Challenge, which asked developers to come up with useful applications using Google's software platform.

Their program, Ecorio, gives users the ability to reduce their environmental footprint with tools that provide transit options for trips, allow them to invest in carbon reduction projects and share their tips with other users.

The Ecorio team comprises recent Waterloo engineering graduates Jeff Kao, Robert Lam, Taneem Talukdar and University of Toronto masters candidates Gary Pong and Jason Wong, who describe themselves on their website as five guys from Ontario who "think that this environmental thing might be for real."

"There are many people with lots of ideas on how we can live smarter, greener and sustainable lives. Ecorio is one piece of that mosaic," they write.

Congrats guys!!!!! Really happy for you all.

Feel free to join Ecorio Facebook group here.

Dick Morris says that McCain has reached for the stars and grabbed one.  On a recent cruise to Alaska, Morris had the pleasure of spending an afternoon with Sarah Palin.  She is brilliant and articulate and, in Alaska politics, is a breath of fresh air as an alternative to their corruption epitomized by Alaska Republican Senator Ted Stevens.  Now Obama, who has spent two years preventing a woman from being president, will spend two months preventing one from becoming vice president – and hopes to do so with women votes.  The entire premise of the Democratic convention was the fungibility of Bush and McCain.  Now McCain has vividly demonstrated the difference.  Sarah Palin is no Dick Cheney!

Quote of the Day:
Too many people miss the silver lining because they’re expecting gold.
--Maurice Setter

Having been through Hurricane Andrew in 1992, I know what it's like to live through something devastating.  I know the noise the wind makes as it howls through the house, and the way the pressure moves all the closed doors in the house as if there's a ghost on the other side trying to get out.  What I don't know is about having to sit in your attic to get away from the rising flood waters.  Dead strewn about the city.  The conditions these people had to endure, nobody should.  Granted I had to deal with rising sewer waters, rats, and other such pests, but not to the extent they did.  I don't think anybody could ever know what they went through without actually going through it yourself, and for the President of our country to act as if he did not care, and acted as if he cared more because there was a direct threat to him by terrorist then an act of God shows to me that he only cares about his own interests.  This also tells me why he actually went into the middle east to invade Iraq.  It's because they hit his pride and it was never about the people who perished in the towers.

I'm concerned about Gustav and the readiness of the people in this area.  I'm concerned that they have not rebuilt to the point where they can withstand another big hurricane of the magnitude of Katrina and my thoughts are with them.

How the Democrats Helped Bush Hijack the Country

By CYNTHIA McKINNEY

Our country has been hijacked and the Democrats have proven themselves to have been in on the plan. When it came to the Constitution, the Democratic leadership showed us that aiding and abetting illegal spying on us was more important to them than protecting our civil liberties.

When it came to war and occupation, the Democratic leadership showed us that financing an illegal and immoral war, based on lies, was more important to them than the people's desire for peace.

And when the people, hurting from the financial mismanagement of this country, called for accountability for the crimes that have been committed against the people here, against the global community, against nature, itself, the Democratic leadership took impeachment off the table!

SOURCE.

The future of America is now. We need CHANGE from the next president of our nation. Will our future be bright and hopeful, or will the coming years be bleak and depressing? The choice is up to each and every one of us in electing a president who cares about, respects and represents each and every one of us as individuals.

The American people must select a president who will repair our fractured economy. We need a leader who will return the United States to a position where she is respected throughout the world. Our next leader has to return America to a symbol of peace that other nations can look toward as an example. The next president must bleed out of our veins the toxin that is oil and breathe new energy into the body of America.

I urge all of you to research Barack Obama as a person and his record and achievements. Learn about his childhood growing up without a father. Delve deeper into the past of John McCain and his record and accomplishments. Learn about his first marriage, and subsequent divorce. Tune into CNN, MSNBC, and FOX News. Surf over to Politico.com. Visit each candidate’s websites, BarackObama.com and JohnMcCain.com. Listen and watch the news for information on each nominee. Watch the upcoming debates. Learn and decide what Obama and McCain each stand for as a person and what their visions are for our country’s future in the next decade.

We must stand up and be counted. We must show America that we want our children to have the best education in the world. We must show that we care if our next door neighbors have a job; and are not like 1.2 million who lost jobs between 2005-2007 and still had not secured a new position by the beginning of this year (source). We must ensure our dignity. This is your life and that hangs in the balance. This is the life of America’s children teetering on top of purple mountain majesties. This nation must continue to be “America the Beautiful,” and not become “America the dreadful.”

Is the right person Barack Obama? Is the right person John McCain? The choice is clear. It is one that each of us must make and cast on November 4th 2008. We must be certain in our hearts and minds that we are choosing the leader of tomorrow. Whether it is John McCain or Barack Obama, each and every one of us holds the dreams and hopes of our fellow Americans in our hands as we cast our votes in 66 days. This is an epic election, one of the most important in decades. We must be more engaged with the political process than ever before. We need record breaking voter turnout. Millions more people are not enough; we need tens of millions of people more than before.

Americans can either move forward by growing, prospering, and increasing our self worth or we can fall flat on our faces, continuing to sink deeper into despair. We are in control of our destiny. If the United States of America does not progress to your liking in the next four years, don’t blame it on the politician sitting on the throne in the oval office. Blame it on ourselves for not taking a stand in what we believe and not making the right choice for president. Our time is now. Get out there and make your voices heard, make them count!

By John E. Carey
The Washington Times
Saturday, June 17, 2006

Sea of Gray: The Around-the-World Odyssey of the Confederate Raider Shenandoah (Hill and Wang, 2006, 448 pp.) by Tom Chaffin tells the harrowing story of the last Confederate sea raider’s mission around the globe—a mission that confounded the United States navy for more than a year.

On Oct. 8, 1864, the British merchant Sea King set sail from London bound for Bombay. She vanished and word quickly spread in seaports that she was lost at sea. In fact, the Confederate Navy had reinvented the Sea King as the commerce raider CSS Shenandoah.

Openly building or procuring a vessel to assist the Confederacy in the war would have violated England’s neutrality. So Chaffin introduces readers to Commander James D. Bulloch, the Confederacy’s premier agent provocateur in England. Bulloch procured 33 blockade runners and had masterminded the building of CSS Alabama, a 1050-ton screw steam sloop of war that made her Captain, Rafeal Semmes, a hero of the Confederacy.

Above: Semmes

The novel design and construction of Shenandoah herself will be of interest to seamen. The ship was a “composite, full-rigged ship, with something more than auxiliary steam-power, and all necessary arrangements for disconnecting and lifting her screw” to reduce drag while sailing. The ship weighed 1,018 tons and was propeller-driven by a 250-horsepower steam engine with a top speed of eight knots—sixteen knots under sail. Armed with modern rifled British Whitworth 32 pounders and other guns, Shenandoah was a sleek, fast, cutting-edge technological wonder.

The Shenandoah’s Captain, U.S. Naval Academy graduate James Iredell Waddell and his crew ultimately destroyed 32 ships, ransomed six, took more than 1,000 prisoners, and destroyed or captured $1.4 million in Union assets. Shenandoah never fired a shot in anger – a remarkable feat of daredevil nerve. And Waddell and his men managed to round up and send home safely every one of her captive seamen: without serious injury to any man.

Above: Commander James Iredell Waddell, CSN

The Shenandoah’s tale is easily the most quixotic and previously neglected sea story of the Civil War. Her 58,000-mile, circumnavigation of the globe made her the Confederacy's second most successful merchant raider.Her Captain, James Waddell, who became a Confederate Navy Lieutenant (later a Commander) proved himself not quite the strategist, seaman and warrior as Rafeal Semmes, who delighted Confederate newspaper readers for twenty two months of at sea bravery starting on 24 August 1862 in CSS Alabama.

Waddell’s exploits at sea were often overlooked amid the overwhelming news of Union Army advances and the Confederacy’s final days.For four months after General Lee surrendered at Appomattox, Waddell continued his wartime mission: totally unaware that he had no flag, rank or legal standing.
The already legally murky work of the commerce raider became, for the loser at war’s end, potential grounds for prosecution for war crimes. The author notes that even before the war ended, “the difference between privateer and pirate was, literally, paper-thin.” As news spread that the war was over, Waddell’s men made this realization, and feared for their lives. Waddell displayed indecision, which ultimately resulted in the near mutiny of his men; an interesting sidebar to this saga of the sea.

Chaffin’s way of telling the tale makes readers understand that this is not just a historical account of Shenandoah, Bullock and Waddell. By adding quotes from diaries and other first hand accounts, Chaffin gives readers and students of history insight into First Lieutenant William Whittle, Jr., the Executive Officer, and Midshipman John Mason who recorded that the crew “made it a rule from the start that there should be no pillaging of the captured vessels.

”The interesting characters encountered include several Shenandoah captives, some who exhibited cowardice, and some who showed great dignity and bravery. Captain John Eldridge of the Hawaiian vessel Harvest, protested the capture of his ship vehemently, as Harvest was not a U.S. flagged vessel. Much like the crewmen of HMS Bounty, who disappeared on Pitcairn Island in 1789, when put ashore in the languid paradise of the Pacific Islands by Shenandoah, Eldridge spent the rest of his days on a tropical island with a native wife, where his descendants live today.

Chaffin also recounts the Shenandoah’s encounters with the likes of the Royal native leader of Ascension Island, where males “submitted to a rite of passage that required castration of the left testicle.”

Shenandoah sailed past both the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Horn, crossed the Sea of Okhotsk, the Bering Sea, and past the west and east coasts of North America. The officers and men suffered the hardships of long periods of desolation at sea. There were also times of playful interaction, including one “winter” frolic aboard the commerce raider on June 4, 1865 near Siberia. The Confederate sailors did not yet know that the war was over and “engaged in a regular school-boy "snow-balling,’” according to observer and participant Francis Chew.

Other memorable good times for the men of Shenandoah included a sumptuous wine-fueled reception in Melbourne, Australia. This breech of Victoria's neutrality proved costly to the British government, after an international tribunal awarded damages of 800,000 pounds against Britain when Shenandoah continued to attack shipping after she departed Australia.

Sea of Gray is a detailed account of the history and voyage of the Shenandoah’s men and captives. Captain Waddell, for all his flaws, outran and out-lasted the vastly superior United States Navy. The Liverpool Mercury reported on the last days of the Shenandoah on Tuesday, November 7, 1865. The reporter commented that “one or two of the fleetest ships in the United States navy were sent in pursuit of the Shenandoah,” to no avail.

In some of the more intriguing elements of the Shenandoah story, a U.S. Navy Charles F. Adams class guided missile destroyer would bear the name of James Waddell. And another John Eldridge, USNA Class of 1971, would rise to command both USS Los Angeles and USS Rhode Island.

Tom Chaffin based most of his work on painstaking research in diaries, letters and documents of the period. He wrote a captivating history important to Civil War buffs, mariners and students of American Studies.

Commander John E. Carey, USN (Ret) works in the war against terror.

But I want to hear from you on this one.  Do you think Sarah Palin was a good move for McCain's party? I don't want to hear a debate, or your personal views on why you personally would vote for that ticket or not, I just want to know if and how you think it will help or hinder the Republican ticket.

So, let's get talkin'!

However,  I'm reminded of a poker game in which I strongly suspect my opponent has the stronger hand, and in looking at my own I tell myself,  "to hell with it,  I'm throwing away four cards for four new ones, because, well, why not go for broke, and I might get a better hand, because the one I have isn't going to win".

I've heard the argument that because Obama has little experience, and is running for president, therefore McCain can pick, as a VP, someone with a similar level of experience.

That may be true, but she is not in league with Obama, or, at least, that fact is not proven.  Obama has arrived to where he is after a long, grueling, democratic process, put their by voters, and Obama can fill an auditorium of 85,000 people with only the force of his message.  No way in hell you can make that argument for Palin.  This is not an apples to apples comparison,  hell, it's not even apples and oranges -- not even apples and dried figs, more like apples and Koolaid.

So, the point is,  on the single most important decision in his campaign,  McCain, a man who is asking us to be our President,  and man who will have the nuclear trigger by his side at all times,  is taking one of the most incredible risks of his campain,  by choosing someone with only two years as Governor in a state whose population probably is similar to that of San Bernardino's,  someone he has only met once, briefly, someone whose foreign policy is limited to the plight of the polar bear (and I don't even think they are foreign, are they?).

The choice, no matter what the reality is, since perception is everything,  seems wreckless, it seems to be purely a political choice,  and McCain seems to be doing exactly what he has accused Obama of:   putting his own political interest above the best interest of the country.

Surely there is a Republican far more qualified to serve as Vice President and who can step in as President, than Palin.

Surely.

McCain,  you have therefore succeeded in proving, incontrovertibly, you are a man of 25 years of political experience, not cummulative experience, but one year experience repeated 25 times.

Thaddeus Gadfly