There is so much talk about earth lately. Is it warming up too much? Is it warming up at all? What constitutes being too warm? Who has the natural resources like oil and who wants to get it. Are we destroying the rain forest? What happens if the rain forest significantly diminishes? Elephant tusks stolen, frogs, snakes and bees are disappearing and the african fruit fly won't mate. Some believe we are on the brink of a global collapse and others believe we are just going through a "phase". First we all consult ouiji boards and turn to Al Gore as the savior of the Earth; then we find out Gore has made a fortune off a frightened worldand the scientists now reject the very same global warming hypothesis they all rushed to embrace just 10-12 years ago. What the hell is going on....really?
I don't know but I think all this talk is in many ways irrelevant. It's all centered on the state of the earth and it's future prognosis, but the bigger picture is that this world can't be saved. The population was less than 2 billion in the year 1900 and now is over 7 billion. With third-world countries producing babies faster than crops and with health care keeping people alive well into the 70's and 80's, the world's resources will not sustain the exploding population and demand for natural resources forever.
How long before there are too many mouths for the world to feed? I don't just mean in Africa, or other desperately poor regions, I mean everywhere. Before we reach that point will the haves (those that own most of the money and land) do something (God knows what) to eliminate the eventual horde at their gates. You don't really think the wealthiest are going to give up wealth so that no one goes hungry do you? No, it's clear that this planet and it's inhabitants are on borrowed time and the clock ticks every minute. I know there are earthquakes, famine, floods and pestilence but the deaths from all that is miniscule compared to the numbers being born and sticking around forever. The solution (and one we should have gotten started on years ago) is to go beyond this world. I don't mean land more men on the moon so they can drive around in land rovers, plant flags and drive gold balls into space. I don't even mean to continue to conduct endless experiments in space stations, like how long can one live in a space station before going bonkers.
I mean we need to look beyond such inconsequential space events and begin looking at the moon(s) of other planets and asteroids that might hold vast quantities of resources. Minerals, matter, and maybe even water. We have to get to resources outside Earth if we are to sustain life on this planet for a long time. Our governments response is to deemphasize NASA and hasn't (as far as I know) developed any long range plans for getting to places in space that could have resources.
So we fight on this planet over oil, watch oil platforms explode, and the wealthy build bigger fences around their estates, churches continue to beg for financial help so they can bring medicine and food to the the less fortunate. There is a lot of good intentions and energy expended to keep good old blue Earth going, BUT it won't be enough. It only stalls off the inevitable. It's like trying to keep a "D" battery in use forever. Can't be done. Instead all the counrtries of the world should be looking for a way to replenish Earth from out there instead of putting band aids on here.
Everytime I hear people argue over global warming or this war or that...I keep thinking what difference will it make in the end unless we look beyond our world to find permanent solutions. It will take a lot of time and money to accomplish this so why haven't we started already?
Of course that's just my opinion......what's yours?
Gatz
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
"I Want to be Governor"
Whew! Meg Whitman's 60+ million dollar (her own money) investment in becoming California's next Governor has paid off for now. She won the Republican primary and now will square off against former Governor Jerry Brown. So Meg, it's time to go to the ATM again because you still have 5 more months to campaign before the final showdown on November 4th.
How badly do you have to be Governor of California anyway? Apparently it's going to take 90+ million to get the job. So you'll spend 90 mil to get a job that annually pays 200K? Because you are such a civil servant? You haven't even voted yourself in the last 30 years? What is this all about? I'm guessing ego and just the challenge of trying to pull it off.
It scares me that anyone would need to be a State governor that badly. My rule of thumb is anyone that must have a certain position or job, as badly as you want to be Governor, is at the least, suspicious. Why? Because even if you were elected what would you do to keep the job? What or whom are you willing to sell out or compromise to stay Governor? No one should need or want a job that badly. Meg, if you can't win on principles, values, ideas and your past accomplishments maybe you shouldn't be Governor!?
It reminds me of a principal I once worked for at PHS that needed to be Principal so badly he sold out the discipline program, academic integrity, and essentially let the parents, students, and D.O. have their way. He told me his priority was happy kids, parents and bosses, whatever it took! So the place began to fall apart.
However, before him, the first Prinicpal I worked for at PHS was Dr. Tom Robinson. Every employee loved him and I respected him so much. He didn't sell out anyone, any department, or any program. He didn't let every parent, student and community member have what they wanted. I once asked him why he was so succesful and he told me....."I didn't need the job that much". "If I couldn't run the school the way I thought it should be run, the way they hired me to run it well they could find a new person". It didn't take long before the district office left him alone and the school functioned well. Talk to any employee that worked for him and they will tell you that he was principled, placed his family & faith first and job a distant third.
Meg Whitman it's okay to spend some of your money. In the crappy political climate we live in you have to find your own financial way to run a campaign. Hell, even Steve Poizner (who lost to Whitman) spent something like 29 million of his own money, which he shouldn't have done either. My opinion is stop trying to buy the key to the Governor's mansion. It usually doesn't work and it shouldn't work. Let your beliefs carry the day Meg, not your checkbook.
The irony in all this? Since Jerry Brown has a nostalgic appeal, and has the left leaning demos all in his corner (he comes from the young Edward Kennedy era); he might win on charisma and past accomplishments alone. You might not have enough money to buy your way in.
Meg, spend less money, tell the truth about who you are and what you believe and then as John Lennon said so well...."let it be".
How badly do you have to be Governor of California anyway? Apparently it's going to take 90+ million to get the job. So you'll spend 90 mil to get a job that annually pays 200K? Because you are such a civil servant? You haven't even voted yourself in the last 30 years? What is this all about? I'm guessing ego and just the challenge of trying to pull it off.
It scares me that anyone would need to be a State governor that badly. My rule of thumb is anyone that must have a certain position or job, as badly as you want to be Governor, is at the least, suspicious. Why? Because even if you were elected what would you do to keep the job? What or whom are you willing to sell out or compromise to stay Governor? No one should need or want a job that badly. Meg, if you can't win on principles, values, ideas and your past accomplishments maybe you shouldn't be Governor!?
It reminds me of a principal I once worked for at PHS that needed to be Principal so badly he sold out the discipline program, academic integrity, and essentially let the parents, students, and D.O. have their way. He told me his priority was happy kids, parents and bosses, whatever it took! So the place began to fall apart.
However, before him, the first Prinicpal I worked for at PHS was Dr. Tom Robinson. Every employee loved him and I respected him so much. He didn't sell out anyone, any department, or any program. He didn't let every parent, student and community member have what they wanted. I once asked him why he was so succesful and he told me....."I didn't need the job that much". "If I couldn't run the school the way I thought it should be run, the way they hired me to run it well they could find a new person". It didn't take long before the district office left him alone and the school functioned well. Talk to any employee that worked for him and they will tell you that he was principled, placed his family & faith first and job a distant third.
Meg Whitman it's okay to spend some of your money. In the crappy political climate we live in you have to find your own financial way to run a campaign. Hell, even Steve Poizner (who lost to Whitman) spent something like 29 million of his own money, which he shouldn't have done either. My opinion is stop trying to buy the key to the Governor's mansion. It usually doesn't work and it shouldn't work. Let your beliefs carry the day Meg, not your checkbook.
The irony in all this? Since Jerry Brown has a nostalgic appeal, and has the left leaning demos all in his corner (he comes from the young Edward Kennedy era); he might win on charisma and past accomplishments alone. You might not have enough money to buy your way in.
Meg, spend less money, tell the truth about who you are and what you believe and then as John Lennon said so well...."let it be".
Saturday, June 5, 2010
"People I'm Glad I'm Not"
The conventional thought is "we can only be ourselves", and we can "only be a second best somebody else" blah, blah, blah. Have any of you ever wanted to be somebody else? You know I wish I were so and so? Maybe be Larry King with his suspenders and orange color hair, or Barack Obama taking hook shots on the White House basketball court. I don't know who I would want to be but here are 10 people I am glad I'm not.
1. Jack Lalanne: Yes, I know he is alive (sort of) at age 93 and he can still get into his zip up onesie but he also had a boring life of carrot juice, celery surprise, tofu, rice cakes and no desserts. Is it worth it to be 93, have sporadic hair and look like a raisin in a Vic Tanny jumpsuit all the while missing out of the fun in life?
2. Dick Cheney: What a grinch. I bet even 75% of his family members voted him the meanest man in America. His idea of a fun is watching videos of a waterboarding all the while sneering at the waitress that forgot his stir stick.
3. Lindsay Lohan: Let's see, she's a 26 year old actress that lost her once cute "Parent Trap" perky innocent kid "thing". That was shot to hell in a purple haze of drugs, guys with a tattoos that look like a roadmap through Hell and more blood sucking vampires around her than the movie Twilight. If it's true that it's not the years it's the mileage, she's really 50 years old.
4. Glenn Beck: His ability to openly weep and scrawl with chalk at the same time is pretty amazing. Add to that his pontifications, his megalomaniacal belief that he's the savior of America and he's more like Jesus emceeing an Amway Convention.
5. James Bond: Forty years of mustachioed guys in his bathroom trying to disembowel him after he'd just slept with another bimbette with blue eyeshadow and a name that screams slut. Do you know what it's like to have to listen to that frigid Miss Moneypenny whine about not sleeping with him, and "Q" lecturing him like he's a schoolboy not cooperating with the priests? He's does get to stay in nice hotel rooms but with all his broken bones, and scar tissue, that's more of a necessity than luxury.
6. Bill Gates and Steve Jobs: Now the comedy team of Jobs and Gates. Would you want it on your conscious that you invented the technology that sucked all the imagination and concentration out of today's teens? Knowing that you and your evil twin robot partner turned several generations of able bodied intelligent teens into lazy social networking zombies? I wouldn't!
7. Santa Claus He's fat, frozen and only works one day a year. Either he is viewed as jolly or mean. I guessed it all depends on whether or not you got that Red Ryder BB Gun now doesn't it. He has stupid aka's like Kris Kringle and he had to defend his sanity on 34th Street. How would you like to spend your whole time on this earth making other people happy, doing for others first, placing spoiled little rich kids needs ahead your own? Come to think of it that about sums up my teaching career (just kidding on that one). He doesn't want to be known as Santa. From now on he wants to be called by his real name: Leo!
8. Pamela Anderson: Seriously, does any man even know what the color of her eyes are? There are only two reasons why she a star and gravity will soon take care of that. She wants to be taken seriously but who takes Prostitute Barbie seriously? The only redeeming quality she possesses is that she doesn't give a crap if anyone calls her a slut, just don't call her a bad actress.
9. Pinocchio: Yeah sure now he's alive but he had sawdust for brains, arthritis in every joint and a foot long nose that no one liked except for a few certain women. Yes, he was a jackass to fall for that Candy Island bit and his getting swallowed by a whale was a Special Ed. move for sure but fortunately for him his geezer grandpa sold his own soul to Lucifer to get him back.
10. J.K. Rowling: It's not her fault that disaffected teens hate their lives so much that they jump into her hack world of Harry Potter. She couldn't write an essay on real literature to save her life but fortunately she doesn't have to. As long as sketchy, spaced out dumbledore lovers out there suck up her goofy drivel she'll never have to write anything of merit!
That's my top ten list of people I'm glad I'm not and would never want to be. What's yours?
1. Jack Lalanne: Yes, I know he is alive (sort of) at age 93 and he can still get into his zip up onesie but he also had a boring life of carrot juice, celery surprise, tofu, rice cakes and no desserts. Is it worth it to be 93, have sporadic hair and look like a raisin in a Vic Tanny jumpsuit all the while missing out of the fun in life?
2. Dick Cheney: What a grinch. I bet even 75% of his family members voted him the meanest man in America. His idea of a fun is watching videos of a waterboarding all the while sneering at the waitress that forgot his stir stick.
3. Lindsay Lohan: Let's see, she's a 26 year old actress that lost her once cute "Parent Trap" perky innocent kid "thing". That was shot to hell in a purple haze of drugs, guys with a tattoos that look like a roadmap through Hell and more blood sucking vampires around her than the movie Twilight. If it's true that it's not the years it's the mileage, she's really 50 years old.
4. Glenn Beck: His ability to openly weep and scrawl with chalk at the same time is pretty amazing. Add to that his pontifications, his megalomaniacal belief that he's the savior of America and he's more like Jesus emceeing an Amway Convention.
5. James Bond: Forty years of mustachioed guys in his bathroom trying to disembowel him after he'd just slept with another bimbette with blue eyeshadow and a name that screams slut. Do you know what it's like to have to listen to that frigid Miss Moneypenny whine about not sleeping with him, and "Q" lecturing him like he's a schoolboy not cooperating with the priests? He's does get to stay in nice hotel rooms but with all his broken bones, and scar tissue, that's more of a necessity than luxury.
6. Bill Gates and Steve Jobs: Now the comedy team of Jobs and Gates. Would you want it on your conscious that you invented the technology that sucked all the imagination and concentration out of today's teens? Knowing that you and your evil twin robot partner turned several generations of able bodied intelligent teens into lazy social networking zombies? I wouldn't!
7. Santa Claus He's fat, frozen and only works one day a year. Either he is viewed as jolly or mean. I guessed it all depends on whether or not you got that Red Ryder BB Gun now doesn't it. He has stupid aka's like Kris Kringle and he had to defend his sanity on 34th Street. How would you like to spend your whole time on this earth making other people happy, doing for others first, placing spoiled little rich kids needs ahead your own? Come to think of it that about sums up my teaching career (just kidding on that one). He doesn't want to be known as Santa. From now on he wants to be called by his real name: Leo!
8. Pamela Anderson: Seriously, does any man even know what the color of her eyes are? There are only two reasons why she a star and gravity will soon take care of that. She wants to be taken seriously but who takes Prostitute Barbie seriously? The only redeeming quality she possesses is that she doesn't give a crap if anyone calls her a slut, just don't call her a bad actress.
9. Pinocchio: Yeah sure now he's alive but he had sawdust for brains, arthritis in every joint and a foot long nose that no one liked except for a few certain women. Yes, he was a jackass to fall for that Candy Island bit and his getting swallowed by a whale was a Special Ed. move for sure but fortunately for him his geezer grandpa sold his own soul to Lucifer to get him back.
10. J.K. Rowling: It's not her fault that disaffected teens hate their lives so much that they jump into her hack world of Harry Potter. She couldn't write an essay on real literature to save her life but fortunately she doesn't have to. As long as sketchy, spaced out dumbledore lovers out there suck up her goofy drivel she'll never have to write anything of merit!
That's my top ten list of people I'm glad I'm not and would never want to be. What's yours?
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