Unconventional women

Conventional blogging — (8/22/08) A New York Times headline* (in the Fashion and Style section) reads: “The Year of the Political Blogger Has Arrived.” Many bloggers raised money for the trip to Denver on their websites. But getting credentials has been a big challenge for less well known, less well-off political blogs, such as Pam’s House Blend and Phillip Anderson’s the Albany Project. But both of them managed somehow to do so because of generous readers. Others with more clout, such as Matt Stoller of Open Left, fared better.

There are two kinds of blog credentials, says the NYT. “The first is a national credential, which offers the same access granted to members of traditional news media organizations. The second, more coveted credential is the state blogger credential. It allows one blogger per state to cover the convention alongside its state delegation, with unlimited floor access.” Or they can hang out at The Big Tent. To quote further:

This year, both parties understand the need to have greater numbers of bloggers attend. While many Americans may watch only prime-time television broadcasts of the convention speeches, party officials also recognize the ability of bloggers to deliver minute-by-minute coverage of each day’s events to a niche online audience.

. . . But some bloggers see the procurement of credentials as less of a privilege and more of a right, in recognition of their grass-roots influence.

. . . One perk that bloggers will have access to in Denver is the Big Tent, an 8,000-square-foot two-story structure adjacent to where the convention is being held. For a $100 entrance fee, 400 credentialed bloggers will be allowed to enter the air-conditioned space, hosted by a coalition of progressive blogs and organizations and sponsored by the Web sites Google and Digg, where they can eat meals and find work spaces with Wi-Fi.

. . . Among the devoted readers who believe Mr. Odum deserves their donations is Nate Freeman, one of two Democratic candidates for lieutenant governor of Vermont. Mr. Freeman, 40, gave about $100 to Mr. Odum’s laptop fund, and said he would contribute $50 for Mr. Odum’s convention trip. “Barack doesn’t need my 50 bucks, Mr. Freeman said, but John does.”

Texas Politics reported that a “San Antonio lawmaker has a prime convention spot. Sen. Leticia Van de Putte of San Antonio, a co-chair of the Democratic National Convention in Denver, said she just found out she’ll be chairing the gathering on Wednesday.” But the entire Texas delegation did not fare as well. They got snubbed in the general seating. “When it comes to seating at the Democratic convention, Texas is no Idaho,” according to Trail Blazer’s blog at the Dallas Morning News. Perhaps it will help that Governor Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas was to have been the speaker at the Texas delegation’s breakfast meeting Monday, according to DemConWatch.

My blog friend Fayrouz In Dallas wants us to know this. Her path is “The Pursuit of Happiness.” She has become a U.S. citizen. Congratulations, Fay!

My blog friend Txsharon at BlueDaze wants this — “Obama/McCain: End America’s Oil Addiction, ” partly because of this: “Big Oil. HUGE Money. ENORMOUS Influence.”

From WE/WeCanSolveIt.org., an 8/4/o8 e-mail from Cathy Zoi also decried the huge Exxon profits. She said:

Last week, Exxon Mobil announced record profits — at the same time that the rest of us were paying record high prices at the gas pump. It doesn’t need to be this way. Our energy prices don’t need to be this high. If we repower America and generate 100% of our electricity from clean sources within ten years, we can bring our energy costs down.

A lot of people are surprised when they find out how quickly we can make this transition. We’ve built a fun quiz to help show the way. How well do you know America’s energy? You might find the answers surprising.

Texas has always had a reputation for gutsy women. We will see some of them at the Democratic National Convention this week. And we will also read about it from some good progressive women bloggers who will give us more of the scoop on what is actually happening. I’ll get back to them as the week progresses.

*link from a gutsy woman from New York, betmo at life’s journey

(Cross-posted at The Reaction.)

My “creativity and dreaming” post today is at Making Good Mondays.

Technorati tags: news news and politics politics democrats convention texas women bloggers oil

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The Smell Of Snake Oil In The Wind

T. Boone Pickens, as Thomas Boone Pickens likes to be called, has been all over the media recently with his Pickens Plan.  The wealthy oil man and former corporate raider is touting himself as the country’s energy crisis savior and global warming re-mediator, or as it would seem, all around American hero.

Pickens has had a long, mostly successful run, and according to an article by Karen Breslau in the current issue of Newsweek has a personal worth of approximately $3 Billion.  Now Pickens, it seems, wants everyone to know he has seen the future, and in the future oil, particularly foreign oil will not be as readily available as it seems to be today.  No kidding.  According to Pickens his Pickens Plan will rescue us all and will work like this: he will lead the investment of $10 Billion to build the world’s largest wind farm in the Texas panhandle by erecting 1,700 to 2,000 wind turbines producing up to 4 gigawatts of electricity.  The wind fueled electricity would then replace the need to generate electricity by burning natural gas, and that would free up the natural gas to be used to fuel automobiles converted to natural gas.  Thus reducing our dependence upon foreign oil and reducing motor vehicle emissions (natural gas burns cleaner than gasoline).

While Mr. Pickens comes across in his television spots as sincere, knowledgeable and committed, he also avoids discussing all of the facts that are relevant to his proposal.  While Pickens’ wind farms might account for fueling 20% of our electrical power plants that are currently fueled by natural gas, at a very nice profit to Mr. Pickens, they will have no bearing on the 100 coal burning plants that produce 57% of the nation’s electricity. Coal fired furnaces are by far much more deadly to the atmosphere and living organisms than the gas fired furnaces that the wind turbines would replace.   While natural gas fueled vehicles might arguably be cleaner burning than gasoline powered vehicles, the fact is they will still burn fossile fuels, of which there are a finite amount under the Earth’s crust, and still result in spewing carcinogens in to the atmosphere.  The United States would still also be captive to foreign oil, and dependent upon another foreign power, Canada, which is where the bulk of the natural gas fields exist in the North American continent.

Visitors to the Pickens Plan web site probably will not find any disclosures describing Mr. Pickens’ holdings in natural gas distribution, or his motivation to increase the consumption of natural gas as an automotive fuel and thus improve his bottom line, not to mention his cornering the market on wind power.  Nor will they find any advocacy to dismantle coal fired electrical power plants as more wind farms are developed.  Pickens would have us focus only on reducing our dependency on evil foreign oil, but not on appreciably mitigating the ultimate effects of global warming on the planet.

What is really needed is a comprehensive national initiative, modeled on the United States Apollo moon program of the 1960’s and on the war effort of the 1940’s that included the Manhattan Project, bringing together the best scientists, engineers and industrial infrastructure, and human resources our country can muster, and develop a 21st century paradigm for the generation of electrical and automotive power.  Something that is not dependent upon a finite amount of carbon based Earth resources.  Something that through the process of generating energy does not negatively impact the ability for life to continue and thrive on this planet by destroying any part of the environment whether on land, sea or air.

What we need to do is figure out how to harness the renewable constants that exist not just on our planet, but in our solar system.  We need to achieve a much higher degree of leverage over solar power, the sun is a constant, the sun will remain “alive” for eons to come.  We need to leverage wind power, as long as there are weather systems circulating on this plant, there will be wind power.  We need to learn how to leverage gravity, gravity is what keeps the Earth in orbit around the sun, keeps the moon in orbit around the Earth, controls the tides.  Tidal power will generate electricity.  We need to perfect, if we can, hydrogen generation.  Motor vehicles that are powered by hydrogen power cells are just being developed, these are very fuel efficient and non polluting (the only emission from a hydrogen powered car is water vapor from the exhaust), but the current cost in fossil fuel and pollution to generate supplies of hydrogen gas for fuel negates any displacement of costs and pollutants associated with gasoline engines.

Replacing gasoline powered engines with natural gas is only a stop-gap, until the natural gas supply runs out.  The combination of wind power and natural gas bandwagon that Pickens would have us all jump aboard sounds more like a snake oil salesman’s gimmick.  It might sound like the solution to all of our energy problems, but it only postpones the inevitable, if we don’t figure out how to create power in a non-destructive manner.

Snake oil is right up T. Boone Pickens’ alley, he is the same guy who donated $3 Million to fund the Swift Boat smear attacks on John Kerry, trying to sell the country on those lies.

Cross posted from BFD Blog!

Updated 21-Aug-08:

See Scott Thill’s post at AlterNet calling out the Pickens Plan as just a shell game.

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Progressive Texans are on to the “awl bidness”

Happy Birthday, dear Barack. Senator Barack Obama turns 47 today. He took the initiative and gave a major energy speech in Lansing Michigan. With the following Memeorandum headline, Chicago Sun-Times reporter Lynn Sweet set my blog’s energy agenda for today: “Energy fueling Monday’s agenda. Obama, 47 today, acts, McCain reacts.” To quote:

The Obama campaign jumped in first to try to set the storyline of the day, producing a new spot called “Pocket,” hitting McCain by picturing him with oil man President Bush and for taking contributions from “Big Oil.”

The GOP is giving out tire gauges according to Memorandum’s headline, “GOP won’t let go of its new tire-gauge toy.” They are attempting to make a mocking point against Obama’s suggestion that drivers keep tires properly inflated to save gasoline. Meanwhile Memorandum is also reporting that House Republicans are trying to force Speaker Nancy Pelosi to call a vote on the offshore oil drilling question. Their ploy is not likely to be successful, in my opinion.

Texas progressive Alliance Weekly Round Up Aug 4, 2008, by nytexan who blogs at Bluebloggin. The roundup reports threats from Big Oil against my fellow Texas blogger, Txsharon*; efforts to defeat Blue Dogs; and a possible replacement for Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. Some Alliance exerpts:

Last week on Bluedaze , Big Oil threatened TXsharon*. In “Big Oil” Threatens Harm to My “Lovelies” and Me she calls out the abuser and includes a new PR plan that will save Chesapeake Energy millions of dollars and help clean up Big Oil’s act.

Mike Thomas of Rhetoric & Rhythm is critical of a campaign to knock off Blue Dog Democrats , even if it means electing Republicans, all in an effort to punish Democrats for failing to hew the line on certain progressive issues.

Vince at Capitol Annex notes that Railroad Commissioner Elizabeth Ames Jones is going to run for U.S. Senate if and when Kay Bailey Hutchison vacates her seat to run for Governor.

Texas’ fierce opponent against energy corporation exploitation of the oil crisis — Her point is that House Republicans grand stand play is rather easy to penetrate. “Off Shore Drilling: Fool Me Once, Fool Me Again and Again and Again…,” by Txsharon* (8/2/08)at Bluedaze. To quote:

Today, I heard people trying to make the case for off shore drilling because, suddenly oil prices dropped and all it took was Bush calling for off shore drilling.

. . . Maybe if you think real hard, you can remember another time or two when oil suddenly and mysteriously dropped. Hint: Just before the last two elections. . . This is manipulation and speculation.

Another fierce advocate, Firedoglake’s Blue Texanventures snarkily that, “McCain’s Solution To High Gas Prices Is To Obey Those Making Record Profits Off High Gas Prices” (7/23/08). Barack Obama, meanwhile, is talking about reviving the “windfall profits” tax. Quoting the post conclusion:

He’s gonna go with the appeal to authority logical fallacy … to oil executives? That’s like asking child molesters what we should do about kiddie porn. Memo to the McSame campaign: people really, really hate oil companies. Pimping their agenda is politically retarded.

Progressive Texans are all over the corporate greed coming out of the “the awl bidness.” Exxon made record profits this past quarter. At the same time Texan Boone Pickins is looking to make a profit from the wind “bidness.” And the big wind, Hurricane Edouard barrels down on the Texas Gulf Coast. Things are not so quiet in the Lone Star State these days.

*Bonus from Txsharon - fabulous and unusual pictures of a Texas cloud.

Additional References from Propublica:

1. “Expansion of Pipeline Stirs Concerns Over Safety: Natural-Gas Grid Increasingly Reaches Into Sensitive Areas.” By BEN CASSELMAN at the Wall Street Journal, August 4, 2008.
2. “Texas: Report Faults BP on Refinery,” from the AP at The New York Times, 7/29/08.
3. “Government Could Lose Billions to Oil Industry on Royalties,” by Joaquin Sapien - May 28, 2008 original in Propublica.

(Cross-posted at The Reaction.)

My “creativity and dreaming” post today is at Making Good Mondays.

Technorati tags: news news and politics politics obama energy oil prices texas blogs

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Oil is up, the Dollar is down..

Now I get it..the price of oil is tied to the value of our Dollar. So with the Buck hitting an all time low, everyone is investing in Oil? From the IHT writeup:

The immediate catalyst for the spike in energy prices is the drop in the value of the dollar. Currency traders are selling dollars and buying euros to take advantage of the difference in interest rates between the United States and Europe.

The dollar weakened, continuing its steep decline of last week, and the euro rose to a record $1.5274 in early New York trading. The dollar also fell to its lowest level in three years versus the yen.

“The question for oil is where is the dollar going,” said Roger Diwan, a managing director at PFC Energy, a consulting firm in Washington. “That’s going to the main market mover in the short term.”

The question really is..when does it all come screeching down around our heads?

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A friend to Bush and a top polluter..

“An American power company with close financial links to President George Bush has been named as one of the world’s top producers of global warming pollution.The first-ever worldwide database of such pollution also reveals the rapid growth in global-warming emissions by power plants in China, South Africa and India. Power plants already produce 40 per cent of US greenhouse gas and 25 per cent of the world’s.”

And so begins the story on CommonDreams.org. This is a disgusting tale of corruption and greed. Its always about those two things isn’t it my dear reader? Check this out…

Read more

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