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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

Imagine you’re a young mom, shopping for groceries with your two little kids, and you see a man with an AR-15 strapped across his back. You recognize that this is the weapon of choice for the mass murders of schoolchildren, and so perhaps you’re a bit more afraid than you would have been if it were just a holstered pistol. Are you going to be on national news for the next day or two?

The man looks like the stereotypical MAGA guy, and you remember hundreds of photos of people like him.  Is he dangerous?  It’s hard to tell.

What would you do?

Here’s what I would do: Leave. Noisily.  “Do you think I’m shopping in a place with a guy toting a weapon designed to kill hundreds of people a minute?  This is insanity.  Goodbye forever. Anyone stupid enough to shop here deserves what he gets.”

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

I was disappointed to learn that every public high school in Oklahoma will soon have a Turning Point USA chapter in it, to “counter the woke indoctrination.”

Here’s a data point that may explain Oklahoma’s extreme approach to education: The state ranks 50th out of 51 locations (including Washington, D.C.) for overall public education quality and safety. The study considered factors like reading and math test scores, median ACT and SAT scores, dropout rates, and school safety, placing Oklahoma in the bottom 10 for many of these categories.

Maybe they attribute their humiliating position to wokeness in the American education system:

Teaching: alternative political and economic systems, facts about slavery, the butchering of native Americans, and other atrocities

Not Teaching: creationism as science, forced school prayer, white supremacy and female inferiority, etc.

In any case, it’s senseless to get upset about stories like these. The fact that these people are uneducated doesn’t seem to bother them.  Why should it annoy the rest of us?

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

It’s not hard to spot the differences between Republicans and Democrats on any issues, but particularly re: their positions on Israel.

Here’s U.S Rep Mark Alford, (R-MO): “Israel has every right to live in peace and harmony with its neighbors.”

What? Does this make any sense at all?

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

We normally accredit Confucius with the saying, “Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves,” meaning that revenge is often lethal to the person who attempts to punish an enemy.

There is absolutely no chance that this thought would have any meaning to Donald Trump, as we can see now that we’re well into the president’s second term. In fact, we’ve seen no attempt on Trump’s part to be at all cagy about what he’s doing, whether that means bringing criminal prosecution against his political opponents, or economical attacks on entire organizations.

We can gain great insight into the character of the most powerful person on Earth from this statement in today’s news: “We’re cancelling all the programs written by democrats.  I hate Democrats.”

What a hateful, childish brat.  If you had a kid like that you’d be Googling “exorcists.”

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

Before I decided to write a post of the map below, I read a few brief analyses by sociologists who talked about the different cultures and financial statuses, and political leanings of the various countries.

I’m sure all this is true.

What I notice is that children in families of Scandinavian countries tend to hit the road earlier than any other region in Europe.  The question, of course, is why.

One answer must be education and general affluence.  Young people in these countries enjoy free education and are actually paid stipends to go to college.   Thus we have huge numbers of folks in their early twenties who are fully ready to leave home and pursue a career of their choice.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

Trump is a disgusting human being, and the cruelty of his actions on a day-to-day basis knows no bounds.

He needs to be removed.  Now.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Nuclear

From a reader: Look at the footprint of solar panels it takes to produce the same amount as a nuclear plant, then tell me what’s better for the Earth!

Needless to say, I’ve heard this a great many times over the years.  The subject is a bit complex.

While it’s true that nuclear offers far better energy density than solar (and wind), this is one of many criteria we use to determine the best resource(s).  We might rank our presidents on the basis of how few wars the Unites States was fighting during their tenure in office, yet there are dozens of other important criteria: economic strength, lessening the gaps between rich and poor, etc.

Another way to look at this subject is to look at competing resources in a certain region.  The central part of the U.S. has incredible wind resources; a normal day in the Nebraska grid-mix offers 70% wind.

If human civilization is to avoid environmental collapse driven by climate change, nuclear is going to be absolutely necessary, but only partially due to energy density; nuclear boasts high reliability and capacity factor, as well as low operating expenses.

In all, the world needs to hope that nuclear advances quickly; we won’t do well without it.

Thanks for the comment.

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

If you believe Donald Trump, voter fraud in the U.S. is widespread. This, of course, was the (supposed) basis on which he refused to accept the results of the 2020 election, and brought the country to the edge of an armed revolution, e.g., leading thousands of Americans in an insurrection against the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.

Here’s a piece from the Brennan School of Justice at New York University Law School:

Debunking the Voter Fraud Myth
Sensationalist claims have circulated this election season about the extent of voter fraud, with some politicians going so far as to tell voters to fear that this November’s election will be “rigged.”

Because electoral integrity is one of the elements necessary to making America the greatest democracy in the world, claims like this garner media attention, and frighten and concern voters. But putting rhetoric aside to look at the facts makes clear that fraud by voters at the polls is vanishingly rare, and does not happen on a scale even close to that necessary to “rig” an election.

Studies Agree: Impersonation Fraud by Voters Very Rarely Happens

 The Brennan Center’s seminal report on this issue, The Truth About Voter Fraud, found that most
reported incidents of voter fraud are actually traceable to other sources, such as clerical errors or
bad data matching practices. The report reviewed elections that had been meticulously studied for
voter fraud, and found incident rates between 0.0003 percent and 0.0025 percent. Given this tiny
incident rate for voter impersonation fraud, it is more likely, the report noted, that an American
“will be struck by lightning than that he will impersonate another voter at the polls.”
 A study published by a Columbia University political scientist tracked incidence rates for voter
fraud for two years, and found that the rare fraud that was reported generally could be traced to
“false claims by the loser of a close race, mischief and administrative or voter error.”

When I moved from Washington D.C. to California in 1982, I got a new drivers license, then used it to register to vote. I’ve voted every two years since, and no one has asked me to show my ID.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

Looks like the committee was unimpressed with some of Trump’s key credentials:

Convicted felon (x34)

Adjudicated rapist

Insurrection instigator

Traitor – Insurgent against U.S. federal government

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

OK, our president doesn’t know what habeas corpus is.

But what’s that compared to his strengths in terms of fanning the flames of racial hate, and all his other fine abilities?

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