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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

The American education system continues to decay, and the horrific results are all around us. Trumpism.  Job openings going unfilled due to lack of skilled labor.  Gun nuts. White nationalism.

Those older than perhaps 50 remember a time before music was removed from public school curricula.  The tragedy here is that music is so much more than signing or playing an instrument.  Music is art, it’s math, it’s science, it’s social studies, and it’s history.

Readers who happen to be musicians will get some good chuckles out of the list of new musical terms here.  A few of my own:

LAGATO: Slowing the tempo for a difficult part of a piece
SMARZANDO: Brightly
ALLEGROTTO: Played with the sustaining pedal held down, reproducing the sound the piano would make if played in a wet cave
CON FEARZA: With the terror that accompanies approaching a run that calls for fitting 21 notes in the right hand against 6 in the left
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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability
Craig Shields: I think this is a more complicated subject, personally.
Linda Hurt Germany: Craig, insurrection is complicated? please explain……..

Carol Heesch: NO. IT. ISN’T.

Caroline Lindley: Craig,  yes, please explain the complicated part.

Bobby Scheinblum: Craig, seems rather cut & dry to this Patriot 🇺🇸

(more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

Here’s why I haven’t been in a Walmart for the last 20+ years.

It’s bad enough that the Walton family pays its employees slave wages; it’s even worse that you and I are subsidizing the Walton payroll so its people don’t starve.

 

 

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

Let’s give credit where it’s due: Fox News’ Tucker Carlson has no reservation about making the most outrageous and indefensible comments in his nightly presentation of his version of the news.

In his endless quest to paint the worst possible picture of Joe Biden, Carlson told his adoring audience that the U.S. President is trying to make the military “more feminine,” and is “making a mockery of the U.S. military,” to the wrath of the 198,432 active duty women (14.4% of the 1,417,370 total) and, especially, to the generals who operate the armed forces.

These Fox News people live in an alternative universe, one known, famously, for its “alternative facts.” As always, their existence is a function of a basic truth of human civilization: if there is a demand for something, good, bad, or indifferent, a market will arise to supply it.  It doesn’t matter if it’s a cure for a dread disease, pretzels, or heroin.

As long as there are people who couldn’t care less about the truth as long as it slams Democrats, there will be the Tucker Carlsons, Glenn Becks, Rush Limbaughs and Alex Joneses of our sad world.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

Here’s an article that describes how natural gas fracking could be Argentina’s ticket out of a years-long economic crisis, but it jeopardizes a promise to wipe out emissions by 2050.  It begins:

President Alberto Fernandez took to a makeshift stage in Argentina’s Vaca Muerta shale deposit in October to announce the nation was doubling down on fossil fuels. “Today we are relaunching the oil and gas economy,” he declared, starting with $5 billion of government subsidies. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

Is trillion-dollar public spending a good idea?  That’s arguable.

If we’re going ahead with it, should that money go to those who need it most and will spend it immediately, thus stimulating the economy?  That’s irrefutable.

See graphic below.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Sustainability

Here’s an idea for would-be school shooters: Read this article on the two kids who die in a California high school shooting, then head to the gun expo advertised at the bottom of the page to arm yourself.

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

As a marketing consultant, I sometimes like to comment on extremely poor choices when it comes to promotion.

I might do something like this in a vegan campaign, but could this possibly entice anyone to eat more meat?

 

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

The cartoon here depicts something that is sickeningly real: Trump, acknowledged by GOP leaders to be a liar and criminal, continues to be the voice of the party.

Congressional Republicans need to deal with the fact Trump enjoys cult-like adoration from their voters, who will rebel against anyone who disavows their leader.  Trump, true to form, plays this for all it’s worth, e.g., doing everything he can to ruin the careers of any dissenters. (more…)

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by craigshieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

At left is a brief excerpt from Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle.  Vonnegut doesn’t have quite the appeal to me that he held in my teens, but I still admire his sardonic wit, his observations that people are both stupid and cruel, and thus the conclusion that our lives are essentially absurd.

Now, on to the subject of pissants, especially as they apply to environmental sustainability.  I frequently find myself talking to people who use talking points they’ve picked up from Fox News to try to “make me feel like a boob,” to use the author’s words.  (more…)