IMPORTANT: Please read and consider

UPDATE: We are now hearing rumors that President Obama may not attend the Copenhagen conference at all. There will, of course, be some vague statement delivered by an administration representative - that's a given. If true one has to wonder why ( besides any official reason) the President decided against going? I can only hope that he realizes the utter absurdity of the notion that "we must fight climate change". Future historians are already laughing at us over that one...
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In December a conference is going to be held in Copenhagen in regards to so-called global climate change. There is a good chance that President Obama will sign a treaty that essentially abdicates the sovereignty of the United States to a "world government". The purpose of this "government" is to facilitate the transfer of wealth - yours and mine, and everyone in the West - to poor third world countries. Wealth that was not earned by corrupt poor third world countries, rather, wealth that was earned by you and me!

Take 4:12 to watch this video... Lord Monckton is a respected scholar and a former high ranking adviser to PM Thatcher of Great Britain.




This will be done in the name of climate change and the crimes of the West that it entails. It's a fools game that will solve nothing. The poor nations will not become wealthier because they will still be corrupt. But you and I will become poorer - no matter how hard you have worked to create a good life for you and your family. Don't let this happen.

I have sent a letter to my Senators and Congressman. As follows:
___________________________________________
October 20, 2009

Dear Representative McCollum,
Dear Senator Klobuchar,
Dear Senator Franken,

Please do not commit such a crime against the sovereignty of the United States by sponsoring, advocating or backing ill advised international "climate change" TREATIES OR LEGISLATION!

You will go down in history as the people who destroyed American greatness. And if you snidely dismiss what I've said because you don't believe in the truth of American exceptionalism then you are in the wrong job.

Stop lying about so-called human caused global warming. The utter arrogance on display by those who think we humans are more powerful than nature leaves me breathless.

I am praying for this country with all my heart.

Sincerely,

Craig Willms
Saint Paul, MN
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I have sent this letter to my Senators and Congressman. You should too!


CW

Is This "the" Battery Breakthrough?

The problems with today's meager batteries and their various undesirable byproducts are legend. Advanced battery technology is the missing link in the chain that could one day pull us out of the age of oil. The problem just might be solved....

An Israeli scientist, Yair Ein-Eli, at a firm called Technion, in collaboration with Prof. Digby Macdonald of Pennsylvania State University in the U.S. and Prof. Rika Hagiwara in Japan, has developed a unique battery that is based on silicon as a fuel. Once spent the fuel reverts to its original state - sand - making it environmentally freindly and reusable. Best of all this battery has an indefinate shelf life.

It works like this: oxygen from the air in the battery capsule passes through a membrane and interacts with oxidized silicon. The silicon in this battery has the favorable qualities of being inert, stable, lightweight and nontoxic. Just as important - it has a very high-energy content.

Other metal-air batteries exist, some using lithium that are cheaper and far lighter than conventional batteries. These technologies have the backing of corporate giants on the technology side for use in electronics. They have not been successful in creating rechargeable metal-air batteries yet. Technion has bigger goals for their battery such as powering cars and also integration into solar or wind operations to make up for the largest single flaw in those energy solutions.

Technion's Ein-Eli tells us this new battery technology - with a US patent pending - is not yet rechargeable, but it can supply power for thousands of hours. Full development may take ten years but many companies world-wide have inquired about this promising technology.

I for one am all for it!

CW

Up To The Lake

"Up to The Lake"

18X24 (acrylic)
2009
by Craig Willms
(click on the image for a larger view)

A fabulous vacation photo for the "project". For my friend Deb J. based on a S. Oakland photo. Be sure to see all Vacation Photo Project paintings - click here -

You can see other examples of my paintings at my online art gallery at http://www.static-art.blogspot.com/

I got a disease

__________
I got a disease
Deep inside me,
Makes me feel uneasy, baby.
I can't live without you.
Tell me, what I am supposed
to do about it?!
Keep your distance from it.
Don't pay no attention to me,
I got a disease!
I think that I'm sick
_________
(chorus from "Disease" by Matchbox 20)

So, I went to the Rob Thomas concert last Sunday night. Now, right up front I can tell you Rob Thomas is a hellva singer and had I known more than 1 or 2 songs I might have truly enjoyed the concert (oddly he played not one song from his Matchbox 20 days, not one). Frankly I was distracted through the entire show.

Distracted by what you might ask? Well, it was hundreds, perhaps thousands of little glowing screens. I mean to tell you Americans have a disease... I would guess that 30 to 40% of the five or six thousand in attendance never put their cells, their Blackberrys or their Iphones away. It was unbelievable. These people were so attached to being attached that they couldn't put it down for 2 hours and enjoy the show. One guy literally never looked up from Blackberry until his neglected girlfriend finally elbowed him. Why on Earth did he pay $50 to sit and stare at his little screen - and who the hell was on the other end of that thing? It certainly wasn't his girlfriend.

The 4 young girls in front of us danced, drank and texted all at the same time. Amazing actually. They did seem to be enjoying themselves.

What looks like a disease to me is reality to the younger set. Being connected in this fashion seems a poor substitute for actually connecting with people (I say this as I sit alone in my office blogging). In my day we had nothing of the sort and our reality was just different, not better, not worse, just different. WAIT WAIT WAIT - I can't really say that. I feel sorry for these kids. They know nothing of solitude, of useful self-reflection or clarifying introspection. They wake up in the morning and reach for their Blackberrys instead of the Pop-Tarts.

I wonder that in the age of Facebook, Myspace, blogging, Twitter and the rest of the non-stop deluge if there will be a backlash. In my day the hippies were advised to Turn on, Tune in and Drop out. Will today's culture ever Turn off, Tune out and Drop in? You've seen the commercials where the parents become "hooked" on Tweeting and Facebooking and disgust their own children. Funny stuff.

The enablers, the Blackberrys, Facebooks and Twitters as well as the Verizon's and The T-Mobile's are profit making corporate giants. Are they the modern day pushers? Do they have a responsibility for this potentially destructive and addictive behavior? Probably not, but don't be surprised when the do gooders get a hold of this concept. There will be blood - er I mean there will be legislation. And pray tell, somewhere in the bill there will be funding for "Crackberry Clinics". Mark my words.



CW

Weak Dollar, Strong Dollar Part II

The strength of the U.S. dollar relative to other currencies is of utmost importance to all of us. Unfortunately until the Treasury replaces George with a picture of Betsy Ross in a low cut V-neck displaying ample cleavage our shallow pop culture won't care until it's too late. How about ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, and even Fox as well as all the rest of the alphabet networks? A passing mention, maybe - as long as it doesn't directly reflect badly on the current regime.

The falling dollar didn't start with the Obama administration. The Bush Administration was no friend to a strong dollar policy. The dollar began it's decline during the recession of 2000-2001 and despite a few brief turnarounds it is heading south at a breathtaking pace.

The thing that is so frightening now is that the Obama administration is barely paying lip service to a strong dollar while pursuing policies guaranteed to push it down to a point where global investors abandon it altogether. This is bad on many, many levels.

The trajectory of economic policy coming from Washington is clear. The things important to investment and growth are clearly in the cross hairs of the Obama plan. Capital gains tax going up. Income tax on the investor class going up. Tax and entitlement pressure on the entrepreneurial class going up. New entitlements requiring trillions of dollars in new U.S. debt. More vigorous antitrust enforcement and more regulation of the shining star of American ingenuity telecom in the form of net neutrality. Then there's the Climate Change scam and a new wave of protectionism and tilted rules for union organizing. Basically the folks in Washington are guaranteeing that the United States will be relinquishing the crown of the King of the Global Economy.

What's worse is that the opposition called the Republican Party is so bereft of motivating ideas there is absolutely nowhere to go. Those of us diametrically opposed to the vision of Obama, Soros, Pelosi and Axelrod have no one to rally around. The truth about this is so evident that the Democratic machine and their friends in the media are targeting Fox News, (Hannity, O'reilly, Beck), talk radio (Limbaugh, Levin) as the face of the Republican party. It's working. Only Sarah Palin, damaged goods in her own right, scares them. Unfortunately Sarah has done herself no favors. Instead of trying to impress those in the middle where elections are won and lost she is pandering to the rabid. She's not a far right "wing nut" as she is being portrayed but she's doing absolutly nothing to dispel the notion. She's taken on corruption in her own party and challenged the status quo for the good of her state - that's exactly what we need now. Too bad she has botched her chance to impress upon the people that she's not the portrait the opposition media has painted.

The question of the fate of the American greenback hangs in the balance and so to all of our fortunes. The current path under Obama is unsustainable and unattractive ( in my eyes). When is someone going to lay out a better path?



CW

Weak Dollar, Strong Dollar: A Love Story

There is something of a global finance mystery challenging financial journalists this week. Those of you about to yawn - well, I understand, but this is important. Politico, a top-notch blog page posts the story "Whodunit? Sneak attack on the U.S. dollar".


From the article: It began with a thinly sourced but highly explosive report Monday in a British newspaper: Arab oil sheiks are conspiring with the Russians and Chinese to quit using the dollar to set the value of oil trades — a direct threat to the global supremacy of the greenback.

It sent the dollar reeling on global currency markets and shot gold to record highs. While this is only the latest salvo against the dollar each previous dive bomb was followed by silence. No one believed anything of the sort would actually happen. Surely the American government would do what it takes to prop up the dollar, right? As always - follow the money.

Who benefits from a weak dollar? American exporters for one. It supposedly makes U.S. exports more attractive to foreign buyers. When one looks at what we export it starts to make sense. Decades ago America exported finished products made with the blood, sweat and tears of American labor. Not any more.

In 2008 capital goods was the largest category of U.S. exports. What are capital goods? Raw materials used to produce finished products. Industrial supplies was the largest growth category including fuel oil, other petroleum products , non-monetary gold, chemicals-fertilizers, and steelmaking materials. Other growth areas for capital goods exports were medicinal equipment, materials handling equipment, industrial engines, telecommunications equipment, and civilian aircraft engines. These are things that make up the finished products that are shipped back here from Asia (China) to be sold to you and me.

The second huge area for exports from the U.S. to the world is agricultural. Farmers (read Agri-business) just love a weak U.S. dollar. Neither farm work nor the extraction of raw materials is very labor intensive anymore. Now who do you think your government is going to favor? The down on his luck laborer? The overworked, under payed service worker? Or possibly agri-business and commodity exporters?

Don't count on Congress or this President to stand up for the dollar by getting government debt under control. The more the U.S. Treasury prints dollars the less valuable they become. Exporters love it. Overseas manufacturers love it. Your bank account and retirement savings - not as much.


CW

Uncertainty and The Future

The government employment numbers came out for the month of September and things do not look good. The "official" unemployment figure is 9.8%. A statistically significant number yes, but realistically it's meaningless. The true number of unemployed or chronically under-employed is probably better than 15% maybe even 20%. Twenty-one months of decline and million upon millions of good jobs lost. Why is this downward spiral continuing? One word: uncertainty

There is massive uncertainty about the creeping Federal takeover of the economy. You might scoff at the notion and label me (and many others) a reactionary, but it has been a long time coming and this administration has got the accelerator mashed to the floor.

The only one doing any hiring right now is the Federal government. What business, big and small, need from government now is a steady hand at the helm with a calm and measured response to the continuing financial crisis. What we have now is calm words from an articulate speaker (teleprompted of course) but whose actual deeds are anything but reassuring.

America followed George W. Bush to war after 9/11, even invading a country that had nothing to do with it because he was steady and resolute. There were no flowery speeches, quite the opposite actually, but underneath there was calm, conviction and certainty. He was reelected. Less than a year later his Presidency was in shambles as he appeared absent in the aftermath of Katrina and uncertain as Abu Grabbe and Fallujah unfolded. Bush never recovered from this shocking appearance of uncertainty.

Barack Obama is not instilling any certainty in middle America. We have seen our world turned upside down by this financial crisis that most of us had little to do with. The crash of the housing sector was as much a function of government meddling as it was so-called capitalist greed. So here we have the same players - congress and the big lending/investment/insurance houses - gobbling up even more of the cash while the middle class plummets. Rather than a calm and steady hand Obama appears to be ready to double down on all the things that got us into this mess... What is he doing about bringing jobs back to America? What is Obama doing to instill confidence and certainty so that employers big and small can start calling the American people back to work? The answer is nothing.

As the value of the dollar shrinks due Obama's massive spending programs American business is going to take what dollars they have left to grow their businesses overseas. It's already happening - has been for years actually.

Without certainty there is no future.

CW