Perspective: The Fossil Fuel Supply is Virtually Endless.

Did you ever think that you would live to hear or read such lines as “We will never run out of oil, and fracking is safe”? Well, the title on the cover page of the May, 2013 issue of the Atlantic was “We will never run out of oil”, and in late July, 2013 the Associated Press reported that a landmark Depatment of Energy study showed no evidence that chemicals from the fracking process contaminated drinking water in aquifers in western Pennsylvania.

WOW! Do you realize how significant these two reports are? The mainstream Media is telling us that we have an enormous supply of fossil fuels, and that digging them out of the earth in the United States is safe. This means that we are no longer dependent upon oil from the Middle East, and more than anything else, this also means that a sensible Energy Policy for the United States could be implemented at last.

Oh, but you say, what about global warming which is allegedly caused by the carbon dioxide emissions from the combustion of these fossil fuels? Well, let’s assume that global warming is man caused and that carbon dioxide is the culprit. The question then is, can we control CO2 emissions? Actually, we know of a number of possible ways to manage carbon dioxide emissions. Yes, it’s true that these ways are not currently economic and will require research to bring the ideas to fruition. But so are so-called “green’ technologies currently uneconomic, but the government funds these and most have gone or are in the process of going bankrupt.

So do you squander government research funds on wind and solar projects that are uneconomic, where the available energy that could be produced from these sources could ever meet the rising demand for energy the economy of the US requires and where transporting the energy from the wind and sun sources to the end-user is impracticable, or do you want to conduct research to make fossil fuels environmentally acceptable, where the supply is virtually infinite and the transportation facilities are already in place?

If this sounds like a no-brainer to you, go to the head of the class!

Does anyone believe that our government doesn’t know that we have all of this fossil fuel supply and that research could be supported to take care of the CO2 emissions question? Of course the Department of Energy, Congress and yes, even our President, all know this! So why then are they not jumping on the fabulous opportunity? Something else is going on!

I hate to be cynical, and I definitely don’t generally believe in conspiracies, but the answer is staring us right in the face. Ever since President Obama has come onto the political stage he has mouthed one thing, namely, that we must transform the United States to obtain social justice. What better way to transform the country without our being willing than to frighten us with dooms day scenarios about Climate Change caused by CO2 emissions.

But how can the government control CO2? By taxing it! But how do you levee a tax if Congress is the only government agency that can levee taxes, and they have refused to do that? The answer, the President can have the Environmental Protection Agency label CO2 a toxic gas.

But every school child knows that CO2 is not a toxic gas! And besides, what fool would believe that since without CO2, life on this earth would not exist? I hate to let you in on this, but Obama takes all of us for fools!

So, do we and our Congress want to twiddle our thumbs while Obama, single handedly, blocks our country from using our massive fossil fuel supplies and our leadership in digital technology, which together, will allow the United States to experience its greatest century ever? If we do, the current voting generations should be ashamed and the generations that follow should hate us!

Perspective: Is Congressional Gridlock Bad?

It should be clear to anyone following what is going on in our Federal Government that nothing significant will be accomplished during the second term of President Obama. The question is this: Is that bad? According to the Media and Obama himself this is terrible considering the huge problems that the Nation faces. OK, so what are the huge problems?

• Immigration? Since this problem has been festering since 1986, can this be considered a crisis?

• Guns? Inasmuch as most murders are committed with hand guns by black on black in our major cities where hand guns are banned and by an isolated few mentally ill persons who get their hands on someone else’s gun, can this be considered a crisis that Congress could solve?

• Global Warming? Carbon dioxide is considered to be a major factor in greenhouse-caused global warming, so why did Obama fail to get a law passed to reduce it’s production when his party controlled both houses? Does that sound as though the Nation considers global warming a crisis?

• Obamacare? The plan is to provide thirty million persons, who don’t purchase insurance, with medical care mandated by the government program. Since most are young and healthy and decide not to buy insurance, is the need to insure this group a crisis?

• Foreign Policy? Since we now have all the oil and gas we will ever need, is worrying about what to do about the Arab Spring in the Middle East a crisis worthy of our attention and involvement?

The Media and the President are obsessed that the Congress cannot get its act together to work on and develop plans for these so-called crises. But from the point of view of “We the People”, shouldn’t we be pleased with this gridlock? If Congress did indeed create plans to solve the above crises, would you want to bet whether the plans would be ones we would like and could afford?

We have seen this before. Consider how earlier solutions for the aforementioned crises have worked out.

• Immigration: Regan’s plan to deal with limit illegal immigration in 1986 actually resulted in the number of illegals expanding from about 3 million in 1986 to about 12 million today.

• Guns: The ban on high power guns ten years ago did not stop the use of such weapons

• Global Warming: The Government’s selection of such clean-energy “winners” as Solyndra and the other solar energy producers have all ended in financial disasters at enormous expense for the tax payers.

Now, there actually are two crises that need be addressed!

• The National Debt and the Deficit!

• The lack of jobs for the under skilled, coupled with the lack of skilled workers for the high-tech jobs that exist!

The best answer to these two crises is to get the Congress out of the way! The collateral to this is that we don’t want the President to do anything that “We the People” don’t want either.

The less tax payer money spent to solve problems that need not be solved, the more likely we will be able to balance the budget and make inroads on reducing the National Debt. Likewise, the less the Government does to regulate and tax business, the more likely the private sector will create jobs for the unskilled unemployed, and the more likely industry will be able find and train persons to meet the high skilled jobs that are currently expanding faster than there are workers who have the needed training and skills in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) to fill them.

If we understood the principles involved here, we would stop berating the Congress, and instead compliment them for blocking the work that we don’t want. Maybe then their rating in the polls would rise from about 10% to about 90%.

In a sentence, the best news is that Congress is gridlocked and thus can do no harm. And oh, by the way, did anyone ask how the members of Congress got their jobs? That is correct. “We the People” elected them. Now, if “We the People” wanted our representatives to do what the Media says Congress should do, wouldn’t you expect that “We the People” would select candidates who would do what the Media says we should want? Isn’t it just possible that Congress, as a body representing us, is doing exactly what we want done, namely NOTHING?

Oh, maybe if they do NOTHING, they should be paid NOTHING!

Perspective: What Would the Founders Say?

I wonder what the Founding Fathers would think about what is going on with our current Administration. If we still taught Civics and the Constitution in high school, perhaps more of us would be as fearful about government’s power as the Founders were. The Founders feared government so much that they added amendments to the Constitution to protect the people. Consider these:



First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech or of the press.”



Second Amendment: “The right to bear arms shall not be abridged.”



Forth Amendment: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause supported by Oath.”



Tenth Amendment: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States, respectively, or to the people.”



Let’s begin by listing a few items that we have recently learned about that would have given the Founders concern.



• The Government has obtained access to phone messages and e-mails of certain members of the press without prior notification or Court Warrant.

(1st Ammendment)



• The government wants to register all who own arms. (2nd Ammendment)



• The Government has obtained access to our phone messages, e-mails, Facebook, etc. without prior notification, probable cause or Court Warrant.

(4th Ammendment)



Now, let’s visit some recent actions of the Executive Branch of the government that should give us pause viz a vis the 10th Ammendment.

• Who authorized the IRS to extend their purview to harass certain political groups

• Why is the President expanding the use of drones to kill enemies on foreign soil without informing anyone, including the leader of the foreign country involved?

• Why is the president unilaterally, without consulting Congress, authorizing a tax on coal with the announced objective of shutting that industry down? By the way when his party controlled both houses of Congress, that body voted against this scheme

The Founders would have been appalled at these power grabs by the Executive without congressional approval.

Now it is true that during wartime Presidents such as Lincoln and Roosevelt did exercise extreme powers. In the case of Lincoln suspending the right of habeas corpus in the civil war, and Roosevelt imprisoning Japanese Americans in WWII.



In the case of Obama one does not know if we are war or not. He never labels those who do want to attack us as “Terrorists” and then just recently he announced that the war against Terrorism is over. OK, if there is no war just bad criminals that can be handled by the police, does the Administration have to violate our Constitutional Rights to manage criminal activity? This is the central question that we need to ask ourselves as We the People.



If history were still taught, students would know that this would not be the first time that a democracy was taken over by a dictator. What if Obama, a Solinski protégé, decided he had to abort the Constitution in order to transform the country in the name of “social justice”. Wait, Obama’s campaign pledge in 2008 was that he would transform the country in the name of social justice! Transforming the country is exactly what Hitler had in mind for Germany when he, as duly elected Chancellor of Germany, burned down the Reichstag, the equivalent of our Capital Building, and took over the government. And you know how that worked out!



Now, we can just complacently sit by and watch our government do these un-constitutional things and go about our business in a blasé fashion and just trust the government, or we can demand better answers and better behavior! Remember Ben Franklin’s advice: They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty. Our Founding Fathers are probably rolling over in their graves and probably at mach speed considering the complacency of the press and the main stream citizenry.

Perspective: What Graduates Need to Know

Our grandson, Alec Schadelbauer,  graduated from High School this year as did many of our friend's children. I wrote this poem for him and them. It is may be applicable to college graduates, as well.

       CONGRATULATIONS

HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATES 2013

What you have accomplished is immense

And now you are ready to commence.

You’ve taken and handled every test

And have given every one your best.

You’ve mostly followed parent’s advice

To stay away from all sin and vice.

And next year you will be able to vote

Which means you must paddle your own boat.

You now have what you’ve always wanted

To chart your own path, quite undaunted.



There are some things you’ll want for your boat

In order to simply stay afloat.

So that your life does not fall apart

You will need a path that you will chart.

And lest you pilot a “Ship of Fools”

Be certain to stow all of life’s tools

Oh, don’t forget your Moral Compass

Lest you become complacent, pompous!

And keep someone close, you might guess,

To whom you can send an SOS.



You will sail a digital and global sea

The likes of which none ever did see.

You will not want to just drift

With the world in a paradigm shift.

You will have to be your own captain

In whatever job that you are in.

Your net is not to catch a fish.

It’s a “network” for which you must wish.

And work at and continue to explore

Today, tomorrow and evermore.



Luckily, you have a tool in hand

The Smart-Phone helps know-how to expand.

But when you need more than your remote

That’s when you’ll want God in your boat.

And you can have more joy than strife,

If you face all problems in your life.

And if you love your neighbor as yourself,

And don’t place your talent on the shelf,

Then we know that you will succeed

And will have smooth sailing at God-speed.



Wayne Pearson

June, 2013

Perspective: What Middle-east Foreign Policy?

The Benghazi event, which stems from the “leading from behind” strategy to topple Libya’s dictator, Gaddafi, raises the question just what is our foreign policy for the middle-east? Actually if you look at it even casually, it is an abysmal disaster.

The fist act of the newly elected President Obama was to go to Cairo, Egypt and apologize for all the harm the United States has done to the Muslim world. Then he demanded that Mubarak, the dictator of Egypt, step down. The Egyptian Brotherhood accommodated that wish and toppled the dictator which marked the beginning of the Arab Spring. Promptly the Brotherhood made terrible comments about the US, burned our flag and threatened our embassy. Shortly after this, Gaddafi’s troupes threatened to liquidate the rebels in Benghazi, so Obama convinced some NATO allies to liberate the rebels in Benghazi with airpower. We then added our drones and Gaddafi was assassinated. As might have been expected, Jihadists,associated with Al Queda, attacked our facility in Benghazi killing Ambassador Stevens and three other Americans. Then when rebels launched attacks to unseat Assad, the dictator of Syria, Obama encouraged them, but since Russia and Iran side with Assad and Al Queda has infiltrated the rebels, what can the US realistically do to stop the death toll which is reaching 100,000?

Meanwhile, Obama pulled all of our troupes from Iraq before their own forces were ready and capable of protecting their citizens only to find that the radicals, probably infiltrated by Al Queda affiliates, were already killing hundreds of Iraqis. Then after authorizing an immense expansion of the troupe level in Afghanistan, Obama promptly announced we are going to leave and provided a timetable allowing the Taliban to plan when to jump back in.

If this were not enough, Obama significantly expanded the use of drones in Muslim related foreign lands to conduct the war against alleged Islamic Jihadists without notifying the sovereign governments of those lands or worrying about collateral damage to innocent civilians or being concerned whether the terrorist is an American citizen or not. This drone program has heightened the anger the Jihadists have for the US and will doubtless grow more terrorists.

During this four plus year period, praise has been heaped on Secretary Clinton, to quote the song, “for traveling a million miles for one of those Arab smiles” while being oblivious to and having no knowledge of the danger her ambassadors are in. And after one was assassinated along with three other Americans in Benghazi, she shouted at the Congressional investigative panel: “What difference does it make?” Does Obama and Hillary expect to get pats on their backs for a middle-east foreign policy that can best be expressed by:

“What difference at this point does it make that the Middle-east in shambles?”

Finally, after contributing to the havoc that exists throughout the middle-east and disregarding the indisputable fact that the Arab Spring is infiltrated with Al Queda wantabes, Obama has the unmitigated gall to announce a week or so ago that the war against terror is over.

For perspective, if any corporate organization’s Chief Executive did this much damage to the corporation’s well being and to its image, that person would be unceremoniously fired on the spot.

Now, since observing the enormous damage Obama’s foreign policy has wrought to the middle-east and how it jeopardizes the world’s oil supply, we have just recently discovered y that the United States has a larger supply of oil and natural gas than all of the middle-east and then some. Can you imagine this? The US is no longer dependent upon the middle-east for its energy supply! How lucky can we get? This windfall of fossil fuels presents a once in lifetime opportunity to change our foreign policy in the middle-east.

We could just walk away and let those left behind try to crawl out of the rubble, but a more prudent and civilized approach would be, as good citizens of the world, to offer to help form a partnership of those who need middle-east oil. That partnership would consist of China, India, Japan and needy European countries, where the United States should only act as a facilitator. We should have only one stipulation, namely that the partnership becomes responsible for protecting the good middle-east governments and especially including Israel. Who believes the current Administration could pull this off?

Perspective: What is the Benghazi Story?

In the old days, before our government was inundated with lawyers, we would not require unequivocal proof that something might not be true. If those earlier folk noticed an odor that smelled like horse manure, they would not jump to the conclusion that the aroma probably came from breakfast cereal. The aroma from Benghazi is not breakfast cereal and every one of us knows it.

This is what do we know about Benghazi. The day of the attack those on the ground in Benghazi reported to their superiors, and that includes the President and Secretary of State, that our embassy in Benghazi was under attack and the that attackers were affiliated with Al Qaeda with whom we have been at war for 17 years. With this news our President went to bed to rest up for the strenuous fund raising trip to Las Vegas the next day, and he was never heard from again. Meantime, the military, not having a clue as to the number or strength of the attackers, jumped to the conclusion that they could not get there in time to save anyone. Meantime, our Ambassador and three other Americans were murdered.

A few days later we Americans were informed about this disaster by Susan Rice, Ambassador to the UN, who stated that the attack was instigated by a person who created a video that was upsetting to Muslims. Thank God we captured that idiot and have him licked up, but of course we can not find or capture the culprits who killed our Ambassador.

Of all of the scandals the Whitehouse is involved in, namely, the egregious treatment of AP and Fox correspondents and the out-of control IRS, Benghazi is the worst. No correspondent or tax payer was killed in the AP and IRS scandals, and we will probably never find out who told the perpetrators of these heinous acts to do what they did. But in the case of Benghazi, the Commander in Chief and the Secretary of State were in charge and were the key deciders. Their abandoning of their posts is tantamount to dereliction of duty. In the private world they would be fired unceremoniously on the spot. But of course they will not be fired. Worse, they will be defended on the basis that since nothing could be done, why try? And according to Secretary Clinton “What difference does it make anyway?”

If you think that that the aroma surrounding this fiasco is coming from breakfast cereal, you should contact your Ear, Nose and Throat specialist!!!

Perspective: Who Should Control Obesity...You or the Government?

Perspective: Who Should Control Obesity… You or the Government?


Today, we are told poor diets lead to the increasing amount of obesity in this country. Moreover, being overweight, which affects about 50% of us and leads to obesity, is alleged to be a major cause for the rapidly increasing medical expense. Since more and more of medical expenses are being paid by the Government through Medicare and Obamacare, and that these programs will go bankrupt in a decade or so, something must be done about obesity. Consequently, it will only be a matter of time until the Government will decide that they must control what we can and cannot eat in order to prevent Medicare and Obamacare from going bankrupt.

The assumption that obesity is a major cause for the forecast financial catastrophe is somewhat dubious in my view for the simple reason that the life expectancy of obese persons is predicted to be shorter than the average healthy American. Financially this means they won’t collect as much Social Security and won’t live long enough to require knee and hip replacements and other expensive treatments for other maladies associated with old age.

But let’s set that aside to consider the question of who is to blame for this obesity problem? There are two new books that have just hit the market that virtually state that it is not our fault that we are obese. One book has the title of Salt, Sugar, Fat by Michael Moss It claims that it is the fault of those evil purveyors of processed food. The other entitled Obsessed, by Mika Brzezinski, says these awful processed foods are addicting, and we succumb to them. Since both authors are Progressives, it is not surprising that their answer to this problem is for the government to control what we eat, and Mike Bloomburg, the pseudo Republican Mayor of New York City, surely agrees.

Let’s examine the thesis of Moss’s book Salt, Sugar, Fat. He claims that the food processors aim at what is called the “bliss’ point in the taste and satisfaction of their food product. The actually conduct massive studies involving thousands of persons enrolled in controlled tests to determine just exactly where that bliss point is as measured in precise terms of the amount of salt, sugar and fat in the food. I don’t know about you, but I am astounded to learn this. I thought, naively, that Kraft and General Mills formulated foods to taste just awful!!

I will bet that no one has ever seen an American sitting at a dinner table, at home or a restaurant, reaching for the salt shaker, the butter dish or the sugar bowl to heighten the taste and satisfaction of the food served to them. Or how about this, you are at your grandmother’s house and she serves food that she prepared from scratch that is beyond belief in taste and satisfaction. How did she do this? My grandmother served this to me in the 1930’s. But guess what, she did not even have a cook book. She did it by feel with what magic ingredients? If you had checked her pantry you would have found that she stocked flour, sugar, salt and yes fat. Not butter mind you, but LARD. That’s right, LARD which came straight from the pig they slaughtered on the farm a few weeks ago. Oh, and did I mention that she lived to the ripe old age of 94?

Now, what about the addiction factor, claimed by Mika Brinszki? Well, what do you know, I was addicted to my grandmother’s cooking, and could not wait to visit her in her kitchen. If fact, I would visit her there now were she still able to cook such heavenly meals. And, oh by the way, I notice that we mostly select our favorite breakfast cereal to take home from the grocery store. I wonder why?

Typical of our polically correct society and our propensity to search for the culprit rather than look in the mirror, we have these two authors along with Mayor Bloomberg leading us astray. As Pogo the cartoon Possum would say, “We have met the enemy and he is us!”

So let’s examine us! Research conducted by psychologists at numerous universities reveals that most personal and social problems derive from the failure of self-control. Examples include: compulsive spending and borrowing, under achievement in school, procrastination, alcohol and drug abuse, unhealthy diet, chronic anxiety and explosive anger. Poor self-control correlates with just about every kind of personal trauma including: losing friends, being fired, getting divorced and winding up in prison.” There is no question that the development of self-control is critical in order to have reliable and responsible citizens. Self-control keeps one from being swayed from the right course by evil forces which can come from either outside or inside the person. These forces can include the evil food purveyors who want us to become addicted to their food.

Let’s spend a moment on what is the cause of obesity. This is a simple problem in physics. A person’s body requires a certain amount of nutrients to sustain itself. If the body’s intake of nutrients exceeds this amount, the body stores the nutrients for another day. This stored material is called FAT!!

IN A WORD, IT’S THE CALORIES, STUPID!!

Now, I have no doubt that programs designed to help persons to diet do cause weight loss. The problem is those same persons cannot seem to keep the weight from returning. That is because none of the programs deal with the root cause, namely we lack the WILL POWER to control how much we eat. Each of these programs provides crutches which lead us to believe that there is something magic about their program. But these crutches do nothing to help us develop our will power. So when we toss the crutches aside, we fall right back to where we were.

Reminds me of the preacher who admonished his parishioners to call on the Almighty to cure their aliments. A person at the back of the Church called out that he had just witnessed a miracle. It seemed that there was a cripple on two crutches, who upon hearing the inspiring message, tossed one crutch away and then tossed the other away, as well. The preacher exclaimed that he had to see this man, where is he? Another parishioner called out, he is back here flat on his ass!

We used to believe that self-control was a vital component needed to set a child on the right course, and society spent a large amount of time and money developing moral compasses and self-control in children. This began at virtually the time the child arrived and continued until the child was an adult about eighteen years of age. Beginning in the 1960’s, however, the ideas of a moral conscience and self-control were weakened as society began to celebrate self indulgence. “If it feels good, just do it”. Concurrently, social scientists began to seek the causes for lack of consciences and self-control. They concluded that the causes were poverty, depreciation, failures of the economy, the environment or political influences. In short, the idea was that the individual was not responsible. In fact the individual was a victim. Moreover, we started to believe that we must be careful not to harm a child’s self-esteem, so we rewarded them for nearly anything and everything they did regardless of the quality of the child’s performance.

There is a better book than Moss’s or Brzezinski to help with obesity. It is actually called “Willpower”. This book is chock-a-block full of research data gathered from controlled experiments conducted over the past two or three decades. It breaks willpower into its physiological and psychological components and how to use it. The book combines clearly described scientific experiments, practical advice and a path forward from the morass we find our selves in. Based on their findings, there is hope for our society. It is a must read for parents who have the job of raising the next generation as well as anyone who would like to have more self-control. And it would doubtless help the person trying to control weight.

The government wants to be in every room in our lives, let’s not let them into our dinning room!
























































.









































.