Dakota Today

**Step one of any plan to get out of Iraq

Probably most of us have heard candidates running for president talking about step one of their plan for the country being getting the US out of Iraq.  That is unfortunately upside down prioritization no matter how important it really is to get out of Iraq.

The first step Obama should make in his plan to get out of Iraq should be to commit the USA to an energy conversion program to stop fossil fuel consumption similar in scope and dedication to the moon shot.

Solar and wind can produce hydrogen which can be combined with carbon dioxide to make methanol which can be converted into all kinds of chemicals and fuels. 

There is no credibility in a plan to get out of Iraq so long as there is no credible plan to get away from dependence on fossil fuels of all kinds.  Building more oil lines and more refineries destroys any credibility for plans aimed at getting out of Iraq or for preventing global catastrophe.

A previous post of mine here on the subject of wind energy for hydrogen and then to methanol as projected by Dr. George Olah led to a search of blogs for that topic.  There are some very serious blogs out there suggesting much the same for similar reasons, but also for many others more directly related to science.

I hope to get those links into another post.

***Stay tuned even if your plan for solving the energy crisis is buying a cheap SUV and using the savings to buy more gasoline--- Doug Wiken

*** Wired Magazine discovers the Obama Brain Trust, or You can go anywhere from here

Probably not too much is surprising in this story to semi-aware South Dakotans paying any attention to the Democratic primary in South Dakota and nationally.
 Wired Magazine on Obama Brain Trust

[Followup edit based on Al Tabor comment.  The story is not at Wired site, but at the Rolling Stone site.  Sorry about that screwup and thanks to AT for the correction]

 The Daschle "machine" is embedded in the Obama brain trust. I suppose Rove, et al will start attacking Sen. Obama because he doesn't have South Dakota values...whatever they are. Thune apparently thinks his family values are superior to those of all Democrats in South Dakota. Wonder how McCain and company will be able to spin family values this election.

The Daschle "machine" might have a better plan for that now than they did when Daschle lost in South Dakota.

 

**Stay tuned, there will be a South Dakota influence in the White House..and hint: It won't be John Thune--- Doug Wiken

** The Power of Prepositions

A couple of phrases or sentences indicating the power of prepositions..among other things.

We have all heard "Government of the people, by the people, and for the people."

Another that a few politicians should also remember might be:

"Freedom of religion requires both freedom for religion and freedom from religion."

And, a few posts ago, I reported on the death of a high school teacher of mine.  Today, I heard
of the death of another high school friend and classmate:  Patrick W. Collins whose obituary in the Yankton, SD P&D is under the name  "Pat Collins".  He will be buried  at 3:00 p.m. MDT, Wednesday, July 2, at Black Hills National Cemetery in Sturgis, SD.  Pat put in many years serving us in the US Military.

It was a small high school class at Wakonda, SD.  A death in the class means about a 4% drop in the original graduated population.

**Stay tuned and hang in there-- Doug Wiken

**PUMA but not a Wildcat or Mountain Lion in Sight

If you have paid a bit of attention to the Democratic Presidential primary, you have probably been hearing from the media gasbags about the terrible split in the Democratic Party.  Irate supporters of one of the losers, that being Sen. Hillary Clinton, are claimed to be hellbent on supporting Sen. John McCain.  This sure makes good press even if it makes no sense whatsoever.

There are even claims of a PUMA group which has nothing to do with wildcats or mountain lions, but with irate Hillary supporters. PUMA is apparently an acronym for "Party Unity My Ass".  There is even a PAC apparently organized on the idea that Hillary supporters are so bitter and vindictive they will vote for Sen. McCain.

Well, somebody has done some digging on one of these groups.  It appears that it was started by a McCain contributor, but there are already guesses it is a shill group for a shill group allowing GOP claims that it was actually a Democratic plot.  What a twisted web is tangled by the media now and then.  Anyway, take a look at the site below:

Pandagon on Pumas are "swiftboats There you will find more on this story:

I've been suspicious from the beginning about the existence of "PUMAs": Female Clinton supporters who are so bitter about her loss that they will throw equal pay, reproductive rights, the environment, and a chance at peace under the bus to get their revenge by voting for McCain. I'm skeptical even though they show up in comment threads all over the internet, claiming they're real. I'm skeptical even though they wrote Rebecca Traister letters claiming that they exist. I believe that the Republicans are cheerful rat-fuckers and therefore would not hesitate to set up a secretive operation of people running around claiming to be Clinton voters who are voting for McCain to keep the legend of the PUMAs alive. If you can convince people that there are PUMAs, then you accomplish two giant goals for the McCain campaign:

Some documentation at the site pulled from the required filings of PAC groups, etc. Take a look for more information. Probably not the kind of thing that will gladden the hearts of those heartsick about the odds for Sen. McCain nor support the idea that there are a lot of real PUMAs out there. ***Stay tuned and check old posts here for information on actual mountain lions-- Doug Wiken

**Some links..Non-profit Journalism and some references combined

As newspapers decline in readers and they also reduce funding for independent news gathering and something like that also hits the electronic media because it is cheaper to put on a gasbag talking head, some groups are financing non-profit news gathering...at least that is what I heard tonight on PBS News Hour.  A couple links from that program below:

Pro Publica--Journalism in the Public Interest

Center for Public Integrity-- Investigative Journalism In the Public Interest/

Pulitzer Center-- Crisis Information

Those could keep a person busy for more than a few hours and should germinate an idea or two. If you are scratching for information, you might (according to CPU Magazine) find the link below useful.
 Ref Desk ..Fact checker for the Internet

**Stay tuned even if you are turning pages in a new pixel way--- Doug Wiken

**Get the "Methanol Economy" to Sen. Obama Please

Obama and country need to do more talking about the "Methanol Economy" idea. A google search for "methanol economy" will turn up links for the book by Dr. George Olah and commentary on his idea. Methanol unlike Hydrogen is a good "portable" fuel. Hydrogen might work for huge stationary engines however. Below is a link which appears to have a good general and balanced perspective on this.

Chemical and Engineering News on the "Methanol Economy"                          

Wind energy is not a stable source of energy, but if combined with hydrogen and methanol production it can be transformed into a stable uniform level of power which even with energy losses would make for better or more usable energy.

High efficiency wind generators alone would be wonderful if the wind blew all day all night every day at the same speed. It doesn't, so conversion to stable, portable  fuel is required for stable energy production without consumption of fossil fuels..

If you have Obama connections, try to see if this kind of information can be fed into their system if it makes sense to you too.  We don't need another term of Bush petroleum wars via a McCain administration, but Obama needs to get serious on something like a moon project for a better and ecologically benign fuel or energy system.   Methanol may be a way to do it.  It is a way which deserves serious consideration and possibly serious funding.

**Stay tuned even if you are currently working on converting mosquito wing buzzing into energy-- Doug Wiken

**This and that..AP and Bloggers, Sen. Obama and good rumors

Well, it appears that AP is again on the warpath attacking bloggers who have the audacity to quote their stories and give links back to the source.  A site named Drudge RETORT (not Drudge REPORT) has gotten notice from AP in what appears to be another opening salvo.  I know some SD bloggers have also been hassled by AP in the past.  Some bloggers think all bloggers should give AP the obscurity they seem to want.

More on the story here at the Carpetbagger's blog:

Carpetbagger Blog on AP and Drudge RETORT copyright issues That is one issue. Here is another that makes a point in a rather humorous way: SLATE story on Rumors Obama should not correct And, an interesting comment found at Salon Table Talk in the White House Folder concerning the "inexperience" of Sen Obama:

Verbal Remedy - 08:40 am Pacific Time - Jun 19, 2008 - #3134 of 3149 I've just got to say this: Obama had no previous experience running for national office. He had no previous experience in widespread netroots fundraising and organizing. He had absolutely no experience running against the presumptive "inevitable" nominee with 100% national name recognition. No experience whatsoever in assembling a national security advisory board. Not one lick of experience putting together a rapid response team to fight smears. No experience addressing issues of race to a national audience, under fire from the MSM. You know what? All things considered, when you look at how all those things turned out, his lack of experience is working out a hell of a lot better than his inter- and intra-party rivals' combined hundred or so years in Washington, DC. http://tabletalk.salon.com/webx?14@@.773d380a/3130

**Stay tuned even if the weather is strange and TV network "news" becomes more and more trash and hype--- Doug Wiken

**Architecture-- University Grotesque HodgePodge Style and Graffiti

First the graffiti.  I rant and rave about vandalism, but this bit of graffiti is just plain clever and
funny.  Not  sure of the source.  It was emailed to me with no references.

And, graffiti of an architectural kind on the University of South Dakota campus at Vermillion. The appearance may be an artifact of the alumni publication or the computer generated image. Whatever..the new student center looks like a dog's vomited breakfast.
Click on image for a larger view. Source the recent USD Alumni News. This looks like something from Grotesque HodgePodge School of Architecture... Toss together the plans for a confinement hoghouse add on a nursing home design, toss in an exposed stairway and something from the plans of a highschool gymnasium and hot lunch food service....mix in a large nonsense block of decorative brick and WOW!! Your perspective might be better and/or much different than mine, but sticking this building on the same campus with Old Main seems like architectural graffiti or vandalism

. **Stay tuned even if a blog is just a house of pixels blowing in the wind--- Doug Wiken

**Nova runs the Mega Volcano show again

Sure seemed like I had seen some of the NOVA program broadcast tonight before.  I started to see hits on Dakota Today from Google searches for "Lake Toba".

Anyway, tonight I saw the whole NOVA program, but if you want to see the Dakota Today post made
months ago, check

Dakota Today on NOVA's MegaVolcano Show Sept 26, 2006

Breathing sulphuric acid and volcanic ash glass particles is not good for your health. Hope we have no immediate surprise Mega Volcano in the neighborhood such as Yellowstone.

Anyway.. interesting show, but now and then Public Broadcasting "detective-type" shows scientific, historical, whatever take an inordinate amount of time to get to the point. "Building suspense in Science Reporting" is kind of an oxymoronic phrase.
**Stay tuned as we build suspense in the wait for real SD news such as SD Democratic women whining about Tom Daschle endorsing Sen. Obama who will not be the next woman president-- Doug Wiken

**Newt Gingrich..still crazy after all these years..and wives

I did not catch all of Newt Gingrich going ballistic this morning on ABC or CBS morning blather, but below from the Huffington Post is what I mostly heard, but with a few of the HP poster's comments included.

Reacting to the recent decision of the Supreme Court of the United States of America - who recently affirmed, by 5-4 decision, our Constitutional rights of due process of law, accorded by the 14th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America - former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich came visibly unglued, and called the decision the worst since Dred Scott.
 GINGRICH: I will say, I think the recent Supreme Court decision to turn over to a local district judge decisions of national security and life and death that should be made by the president and the congress is the most extraordinarily arrogant and destructive decision the Supreme Court has made in it's history.
REID: In it's history?
GINGRICH: In it's history. Worse than Dred Scott, for the following reason: The court has now knowingly stepped in, this morning's newspaper say, smugglers had actually gotten the design of a nuclear weapon, that we now have the evidence that people out there had a nuclear weapon design. And this court is saying that any random district judge, based on whatever their personal caprice is, whatever their personal ideological bias, can intervene with a terrorist in such a way. Gingrich went on to slam Obama for supporting the decision. "The problem with Obama is that he's wrong...He applauded this court decision. This court decision is a disaster and it could cost us a city." Then Gingrich referred to district judges - all of them! - as "nutcake."

Naturally, it's Gingrich, and Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who are nutcake, and I wonder if I can sum up why that is any better then the headline of a recent post on Jezebel: "According to Scalia, People Only Get Rights When There's Nothing At Stake." Nope! Turns out I could not have possibly said it better! http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/15/gingrich-rails-at-supreme_n_107214.html http://snipurl.com/2iz4c

Are we going to have months of the same old same old crap from the Republican noise machine? After years of Gingrich in Congress and Shrub in the White House as a consequence of the gullible believing these raving loons, one might expect this kind of inflated rhetoric would not go unchallenged by press and people who are normal.
***Stay tuned even if it might not rain tomorrow and Newt's sky might not fall as the result of a court decision suggesting the constitution means something despite Bush smoke and mirrors about a unitary presidency immune to logic, facts, history, congress, and courts-- Doug Wiken