Archive for January, 2009
January 28th, 2009
The sheer size of the proposed economic stimulus package scares me – I simply don’t think America can afford it. We’re in too much debt as it is. I’m also dubious that the stimulus package will actually stimulate anything except for some excessive back-patting on the parts of smug Democrats. The tiny glimmer of hope in the massive bill appears in the form of some money earmarked for green initiatives.
From the Wall Street Journal: the bill would add “$400 million for global-warming research and another $2.4 billion for carbon-capture demonstration projects”; renewable energy funding will receive $8 billion and mass transit $6 billion.
But for me, spending $800+ billion and using only 10% of that to fund renewable energy is exceptionally disappointing. I am not a Republican by any stretch of the imagination but I did agree with John McCain’s assessment that energy independence was critical to U.S. security. Or, to turn that around for you doves out there, energy independence is one sure fire way to keep America from meddling in the Middle East.
To me, if you are going to blow $800 billion dollars, you should just go full force and throw the entire kit and kaboodle on our energy problem. Create green jobs like Hillary Clinton said. Invest in companies developing green technology. Get us off of not only foreign oil, but oil for good.
That just might be a stimulus package I could get excited about. Otherwise, all this other pork – $650 million for digital TV conversion coupons? $6 billion to subsidize university building projects? When you compare that second number to the number spent on renewable energy ($8 billion), it shows that renewable energy is really not that big of a priority in the grand scheme of the bill.
The Democrats have an opportunity right now to show real environmental leadership, not just cheap talk, so let’s see if they actually accomplish anything of real substance with their new-found power. The last two years the Democrats spent running Congress didn’t seem to do much for the country, so I’m personally keeping my expectations wayyyy low.
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January 23rd, 2009
Wonkette has some telling photos of the inauguration aftermath. Tons and tons of trash that got left behind:
The trash amount to at least 90 tons, if not 130 tons or more, according to this report. Many of it was Obama merchandise such as hats and bags left over by vendors.
Gobs and gobs of plastic bottles, and nary a recycling bin in sight. For shame.
At least the Republicans don’t claim to own environmental issues and then act completely differently.
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January 22nd, 2009
The presidential inauguration was portrayed on the news around the world with much fanfare. Behind the scenes was a different story, sadly. As I mentioned in my post-inauguration update to my article on the inaugural environmental nightmare, almost 1,000 people ended up in medical tents at the event, mostly for hypothermia. Luckily, no-one died.
Now, controversy brews as thousands of ticket holders, many of whom campaigned tirelessly for Obama, tell harrowing tales of standing in lines for hours in the frigid air, only to miss the inauguration. Some were stuffed into the 3rd street tunnel, where it was reported on an online petition that “older people were fainting and people were urinating in the tunnel.” (more…)
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January 21st, 2009
For all you green gearheads out there interested in the CherryPal platform, here’s an interesting comment by Jack Campbell on TG Daily:
I designed this product while VP/Strategic Development for Tsinghua Tongfang. It was temporary prototype housing made in a rush to show LimePC brand products at CES 2008 — never intended for mass production. The ports are actually on the back, with the logo (for some reason) put on backwards.
For the curious, the hardware platform was engineered in cooperation with Freescale’s Austin-based R&D team in their Infotainment Division. It was never intended as a production device, but as a “superset” proof of concept system from which future devices could be derived. Also, it was never intended as a “cloud” device, instead aimed at supporting a streamlined Linux OS based load for lightweight desktop and multimedia chores.
The “CherryPal” iteration of this thing is a scraped together, low-buck abomination of what this platform could have been. I left THTF just prior to this deal coming in the door, so can only guess at the bad decisions leading to its commercialization. We had a radically unique new user interface/desktop OS version sculpted for this project, one that would have minimized the UI load on the little MPC5121e CPU, and that had a super high level of optimization work done to make the graphics/framebuffer/display subsystems use as few clock ticks as possible. None of that has emerged in the CherryPal. Instead, it carries a bog slow standard Linux build with standard desktop apps, and a browser touted as being a portal to a few server based apps. It was supposed to have a 2.5″ HDD, not NAND flash for storage… oh well.
Weird, pointless, and sad. This project had such a higher level set of goals. What you are seeing is a crippled, 30% version of what the original LimePC project was intended to deliver.
I disagree that the project was pointless – and I hope that CherryPal, LimePC, or something similar can get off the ground by some savvy company.
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January 20th, 2009
Now that the collective Obamorgasm is over and he is finally inaugurated (can we bring this man down to earth now, pleeease???), will Obama be good on his environmental promises? Or were they just “heated campaign rhetoric” that can be forgotten now (as he so deftly says when he wants to flip-flop on campaign promise)?
Obama’s true environmental commitment, in my mind, is not really that deep. The evidence I have for this is his choice of house. The “mansion” that he chose to purchase in Chicago (shown above) is obviously not green or energy efficient…do you see any solar panels on the roof? I don’t. This is a large expensive house he was only able to afford through a shady deal with the skeezy felon Tony Rezko.
So here we have a guy who bought an extremely large house beyond his means for the purposes of…what? Showing the world how to live more simply? Looks pretty opulent to me for a city dwelling. Where is the voluntary simplicity in Obama’s choice of personal residence?
Now that Obama is in the White House, will he be using any part of his $100,000 redecorating allowance to put in solar panels? Apparently not.
Funny. The well-connected, successful environmentalists I know in Los Angeles actually put their money where their mouth is and green up their homes with solar panels and energy efficient washing machines. It’s really not that difficult if you have the money. So if someone with money doesn’t do that on their own, I have to think it’s not a huge priority for them.
Let’s hope that Obama’s public commitment is greater than his private one, and that he will be pushing through an environmental energy plan that will get us off of foreign oil. I would like to see green jobs in America.
But it’d be nice if Obama could go a bit further and practice what he preaches. In the midst of all the cheesy Obama propaganda videos being passed around with celebrities pledging to flush their toilets less, I’d like to see Obama himself showing us by his own example, in his own personal life. Let’s put solar panels on the White House. Let’s find alternative fuel for Air Force One. And how about an electric presidential limosine, not just one that can handle a flamethrower or a bomb thrown at it?
Time to show us what you’re really made of, Mr. Obama. Enough with the promises and the hype – it’s time to get down to business.
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January 18th, 2009
I’m one of those people where the more something gets hyped up, the more turned off I am by it, and Barack Obama is one of those fads that I’m already damn sick and tired of. I am continually amazed at how supposedly smart progressives can’t see through this guy. Hello – he got more Wall Street money than anybody in the primaries, he lied about FISA and public campaign financing, he kept Bush’s defense secretary, and is opposed to gay marriage. He got into the White House thanks to caucus fraud, a fixed DNC nomination, rampant sexism, campaign contribution fraud, and a suspiciously complicit, fawning media (a media that is owned and run by big corporations, may I remind you).
So it’s no surprise to me, that in a time of deep recession, Obama is blowing over $150 million for an over-the-top inaugural party to coddle his big ego has he steps in to become the first biracial president. (Paid for, in part, by more Wall Street money.) What the left has been strangely quiet on is the cost of this inaugural shindig, both in dollar signs and in its environmental impact. It has sadly taken right wing, anti-environmental groups to crunch the numbers on this in an effort to showcase the hypocrisy of it all. The Institute for Liberty has put out a report on the projected CO2 emissions from the inauguration, and they may exceed 500 million pounds! Here are the obscene numbers:
* Celebrities, politicians, and bigwigs using 600 private jets will produce 25,320,000 POUNDS of CO2
* Personal vehicles could account for 262,483,200 POUNDS of CO2
* In the parade, horses alone will produce more than 400 POUNDS of CO2
* The total carbon footprint for the Inauguration will likely exceed 575 million POUNDS of CO2
* It would take the average U.S. household 57,598 years to produce a carbon footprint equal to that of the new president’s housewarming party
This report does not include the costs to DC in terms of trash, damage to city parks, and toxic human waste from legions of porta-potties. (And it takes a right wing blog, Flopping Aces, to point out the potty-hypocrisy.)
Never mind the potential for chaos in such an environment. A million people, stuck in the frigid cold, with porta-potties as their bathrooms, and no place to take shelter? I wouldn’t be surprised if some people end up dying at the event from exposure.
In the midst of this orgasmic excess, if you are in the DC area for the inauguration, you could choose to attend the Green Inaugural Ball, and assuage your guilt with a little bit of carbon-offsetting. But really, is this going to make up for turning the entire District of Columbia into some sort of muddy, filthy Obamastock celebration?
How many huge events for Obama will be enough? We had his DNC coronation at a huge stadium instead of a regular convention hall (and it took Republicans to point out the hypocrisy of the environmental litter of the thrown out American flags after the convention). We had his presidential acceptance speech in a huge outdoor event in Chicago, which was probably also another environmental clusterfuck. And am I the only progressive who looks at these huge, massive rallies and sees shades of Hitler in them? We should never worship our leaders in this manner – it’s not healthy for democracy.
Meanwhile, as the snarky right is all too eager to remind us, Obama is constantly admonishing us to tighten our belts environmentally, while he engages in the most excessive, orgiastic rituals as a means of marketing himself.
This is change we can believe in?
So my question is this: When will my friends on the left hold Obama as accountable as they have done everyone else? Hillary Clinton got blasted for her Iraq War vote. John McCain was excoriated as “McBush,” even though he was the first Republican presidential nominee who actually had environmental issues as part of his platform. And of course, Sarah Palin gets crap for simply breathing. But Obama, who as of yet has only shown he’s good at pageantry and excess, is the second coming of Christ, even though he has yet to show any true environmental commitment with his actions.
When I see a president practicing real environmental living – for example, eschewing the large mansion for a modest home heated by solar power – then I’ll believe real change is coming. Until then, to me it’s all walk and no talk.
Update: January 21, 2009. The New York Times has a story covering some of the chaos and confusion at the inauguration. Almost 1,000 people ended up getting treated in the medical tents (957 in a few tallies I found), and at least 63 people were taken to the hospital, mostly for hypothermia. This first-hand report showcases how chaotic the event was. At least, with around 2 million people there, nothing worse happened.
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January 17th, 2009
CherryPal founder Max Seybold has announced the launch of CherryPal’s first netbook, called “Bing.” The scheduled date for delivery of the first Bings is March. From his blog:
The Bing is based on the Intel Atom N270 processor, 10.2″ screen, full keyboard and web browsing capabilities, local applications as well as cloud access, brilliant multi-media experience. We are also looking into some other interesting platforms as we speak.
Unfortunately, for your PowerPC chip afficionados, it looks like this CherryPal will be running off Intel. With that, I have no idea at this time whether this CherryPal will be another low wattage computer, or if it will be expressing its “greenness” in other ways.
In other CherryPal news, some work is being done on securing better PowerVR drivers for the CherryPal C114 desktop. I believe this means we’ll eventually have an OS upgrade that utilizes the processor better. I’ve also been told that USB boot will be available at some point.
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January 3rd, 2009
I’ve actually been using a Hipster PDA (or hPDA) for my organizing needs for some time now. As much as I love computers, I have never been able to deal with electronic to-do lists. My Hipster PDA fits into my purse and I use it to write random notes, to-dos, and ideas for my business. It also has a calendar, which I make manually by printing out a template onto cards that I cut to index size. (I still don’t know why some smart person hasn’t started selling pre-printed Hipster PDA index cards…on recycled paper, of course!)
I’ve thus avoided the smartphone mania for some time. I did used to have a Palm device – actually, a Handspring Visor – and actually, I still own it. I can’t sync it anymore (serial connection) but I do have a backup module in case it needs a reset. Since it takes batteries I sometimes like to play solitaire on it, or the extremely addictive Dope Wars.
But alas, I needed a way to get email instantly and have a more robust calendar for the yoga classes I am teaching. I got a BlackBerry Curve for Christmas, and it’s fabulous. It has:
A 2.0 megapixel camera with flash
A video camera
An MP3 player (with an iPod-like interface)
Push email
Calendar/contacts
GPS system with voice navigation
Full keyboard
Games (I even found a free version of Dope Wars for BlackBerry!)
The default browser isn’t so hot, but if you download Opera Mini, you will get a fantastic mobile browsing experience, complete with easy zoom functionality.
Screw the iPhone – I love having a real, full keyboard. Touchscreen does not do it for me, never mind that it’s probably easier to break. (By the way, what was wrong with the Palm stylus system anyway? I actually got good at Graffiti and miss using it!)
The downside to the BlackBerry is that if you don’t have Microsoft Outlook, your option for syncing your calendar and contacts is Google. Google is starting to scare me – are they going to turn out to be the younger, trendier version of Microsoft? I hate having to put all my info online like that but I’m not buying Outlook. (And it does work pretty well.)
Problem is – there is no way to sync your to-do lists in Google. Once again, I am back to my Hipster PDA as the best, most convenient solution for my to-do lists and brainstorming sessions.
Is it environmentally bad to be using up paper like that? Should I just be typing it all in? If someone would come up with PDA that used a stylus with handwriting recognition, maybe I would. Well, I guess I could get a tablet PC one of these days…though buying a very resource-intensive computer just to save a few trees does not seem to be a good trade, environmentally speaking.
I guess I’ll be sporting both the Curve and the hPDA…at least we women get to carry purses around so it’s no big deal at any rate.
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