Treason

The Whites Creek bald eagle babies have left the nest and are being coaxed from tree to tree by mom and dad. There's a lot of screeching and complaining from the babies and a lot of whistling from the parents. Some things are constant in the universe.

My walk last Thursday with a TVA botanist was fascinating. I was concerned that in rebuilding the access trail I might destroy one of the rare plants he has located but my fears were allayed. It's funny that the rare plants usually turn out to be rather abundant in the areas where they still have habitat, as is the case in Whites Creek Gorge. The goldenrod that may be so far undescribed to science grows all over the place. You can't go anywhere without stepping on some of it.

The big concerns I have are worries over water quality. When we have rain one of the larger tributaries, Piney Creek, has that old familiar smell. For now the creek can handle it but what if the problem increases in the future?

When we first moved into the gorge back in 1992, the creek was too cold to swim in comfortably until August. Now it's warm by early June. There is no one who lives in the country who doesn't have their tale of climate change. It's obvious to those who live their lives in touch with the land. I don't understand anyone who doesn't accept that things are changing seriously fast and not for the better. Paul Krugman steps out in public and says what has to be said about politicians who deny global warming because they get more campaign contributions that way. Krugman calls this an "Act of Treason."

...if you watched the debate on Friday, you didn’t see people who’ve thought hard about a crucial issue, and are trying to do the right thing. What you saw, instead, were people who show no sign of being interested in the truth. They don’t like the political and policy implications of climate change, so they’ve decided not to believe in it — and they’ll grab any argument, no matter how disreputable, that feeds their denial.

...Still, is it fair to call climate denial a form of treason? Isn’t it politics as usual?

Yes, it is — and that’s why it’s unforgivable.

The rest of Krugman's essay

Perhaps "peace" isn't the correct closing after that,

Steve

To Fathers on Father's Day

Are you a biological Father, or are you a Dad?

"Let's admit to ourselves that there are a lot of men out there that need to stop acting like boys; who need to realize that responsibility does not end at conception; who need to know that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child but the courage to raise a child."

"Any fool can have a child. That doesn't make you a father. It's the courage to raise a child that makes you a father."

"We need to step out of our own heads and tune in. We need to turn off the television and start talking with our kids, and listening to them, and understanding what's going on in their lives.

"

Barack Obama

Waddyadu When U Ain't Gotta Job

And you graduated Cum Laude in the worst job market in 35 years?

You go kayaking!




O'Be Joyful Creek in Colorado.

Quote of the Day

A journalist looks at newspapers and why they are losing journalists...

...if Google can successfully sell ads based on a mere list of headlines, shouldn’t newspapers be able to sell even more ads based on a database full of the best local reporting to be had in a given monopoly newspaper market?

Except that the nitwits running America’s big newspaper chains laid off or ran off many of their best local reporters weeks, months or years ago, you know, to cut costs.

Bob Dunn

The Prophet

Obama spaketh, and it was good: "We have to find more environmentally sound ways of mining coal than simply blowing the tops off mountains," he proclaimed.

...Even as the people rejoiced at this good news, coal barons trembled in their temples of black gold. For a decade, these mighty extractors of wealth had been allowed to accumulate unto themselves enormous profits by exploding the tops off the peaks in Appalachia, the oldest mountain range in all the land. With the top third of these awesome, forested mountains reduced to rubble, the barons used giant machines to strip out seams of coal, and then they simply shoved the rubble and toxic coal waste down the mountainsides, burying the valleys and streams below. It was a desecration — but the love of mammon made it the law of the land

Hightower

Weekend Reading Assignment

Government agencies are what we make them be. Anyone who watched the Tennessee State combined hearing on the TVA ash-valanche would have been astounded to see the main line of questioning from our elected officials: "Why didn't TDEC regulations prevent this?"

TDEC is a state agency charged with enforcing the regulations passed by the State Legislature using the budget that the state Legislature gives it. You want Tennessee's environment to be healthy? Tell Dennis Ferguson and Ken Yager...Well, Ferguson anyway. Ken is bought and paid for.

This same situation holds true at the Federal level. We get the EPA that we demand...

Reading assignment

Devil's Beating his Wife

That's what we used to hear when it was sunny and raining at the same time. For the next two months the sun will set directly up Whites Creek gorge in order to make up for dipping behind the far ridge at 4 in the afternoon in the winter. This gives us a nice side light for late afternoon showers.

Honor those who Serve

I am touched by the respect and honor shown by these photos. They were banned by the Bush administration. We weren't supposed to see them. 

As it is, you and I must come to terms with the realization that we failed these fallen warriors by allowing ourselves to be mislead into an unjust war. That we failed them, however, does not diminish their valor. May we accept their gift to their country and consecrate their sacrifice with renewed vows to heal our world and protect it from the misuse of our own power. 

TVA Ash update

TVA skyline taken from Swan Pond Road...

Not having much luck out there...

Remember Swan Pond?

Everything is going great. Fish are even returning to Swan Pond. Here is a nice carp feeding in the crystal clear waters of a drainage ditch alongside Swan Pond Road. (Taken while the nice TVA officer was telling me I couldn't do that. I'm not exactly interested in talking to a TVA officer when I'm walking along a Roane County road, when he has his cruiser parked in the middle of it and telling me I'm blocking traffic. )

Sunday Funnies

A figurine found in the Danube valley in Germany may be the oldest representational art  found to date. It proves that 35,000 years ago humans, at least one of them anyway, had a thing for....

 Boobies. What else?

Industrial Solar?

This is a good thing and a bad idea, all at the same time. 

Governor Bredesen has announced a 5 Megawatt solar farm to be operated in conjunction with TVA and UT Knoxville, and will be funded by $30 million of stimulus money. 

The good part? It's a strong move into solar power production. 

The bad part? It's a continuation of the wrong kind of thinking where energy is concerned...Centralized production and distribution over a grid controlled by energy conglomerates. 

Half of the electricity produced in big facilities is lost before it gets to its end use point. What other countries have gone to is end point generation. Call it roof top solar. An efficient house can run quite well on 4 kilowatts of electricity. That takes a 240 square foot panel array (10 feet by 24 feet) which easily fits on most roofs. The excess is fed into the power grid and the power grid feeds the house in the traditional way when the sun isn't shining. A big solar farm means more power lines, more transformers, and more wasted electricity. 

So the purpose of the stimulus money is to generate dollar flow in our economy. Ask yourself is that purpose is best served by giving the money to a big corporation to build a generating plant so they can sell you electricity? Why wouldn't using the money to subsidize residential solar installations be the best of both worlds? Jobs would be created for installers and the suppliers of residential solar. The need for more giant powerlines would be averted. And frankly, a lot more electricity will be delivered to the end user with a decentralized generating array. 

We are seeing the bubbling to the surface of the struggle of big centralized power generating companies against residential wind and solar electricity generation. Remember in all this that efficiency, conservation, and protecting the environment are the enemy from the viewpoint of power companies. 

I'm with the enemy!

Courage,

Steve

Swine Catch Human Flu

The Canadian pork industry may be devastated by pigs that caught swine flu from a human...

It had to happen.

Walk on the Last Day of April

I went for my usual morning walk and remembered to take a camera. 

These cucumber trees are just budding out around a small beech. They're wild magnolias.

This dog hobble has an amazingly profuse bloom this year. They actually make good landscape plants in a moist location.

Fire Pink...
Mandrake or mayapple grows in colonies and is all over the place but most people never see the blossom. 
Spicebush is going off, but the fragrance hasn't developed yet. 
And I need help with this one. 

Stereotype

Nate Silver...

Although there were racist voters in every state -- and although there were also voters in every state who voted for Barack Obama because of his race -- respondents in more rural, less educated states (like Arkansas or Tennessee) were more likely to say that they had voted for John McCain (that is, against Barack Obama) because of the race of the candidates.

Tennessee Democrats ran away from Barack Obama as fast and hard as they could and they lost big. Both houses of the Tennessee legislature are now controlled by Republicans. They control the committees, they control the issues, they control the future. The state Democratic party, under new leadership, seems to be squabbling with the faction that lead the charge to defeat and wants to continue the old way of fat cat donors and party bosses. In a telling statement of reality the Democratic Party had to move it's Labor Day celebration away from Labor Day, a tacit admission that not only does the working person no longer exist as a political force, but that the party is in muddled disarray. The party of the grass roots has forgotten that it is the party of the grass roots. 

Barack Obama is our President today because of Dr. Howard Dean and his 50 state strategy, which concentrated on building from the bottom instead of the top down sytem that caters to big money...That and the fact that Obama was the best candidate in the race by an exceptional margin. So much so that Obama won handily without resorting to the least bit of negative campaigning against the person of John McCain. 

(Republican strategists must have shuttered awake during the campaign knowing what a Swift Boat style attack would have done to their candidate, particularly one based on truth instead of the fabrications used against Kerry.)

Tennessee Democrats missed their chance to build a modern state party during the Obama presidential run in what seems from the outsideto be  a doomed attempt at keeping the good old boy fat cat power structure intact. It is as if they got together, looked at the election carnage in Tennessee, and said, "Well...That didn't work. Let's do the same thing all over again!"

Whie the state party was running away from Obama, something really amazing was happening. Obama raised more money in Tennessee than did John McCain. It was mostly in small donations and generated by the internet. In a demonstration of their relevance, Progressive  Tennesse bloggers mounted an improptu campain lasting a mere three days which signed up over 100 donors and raised over $4000. 

I keep waiting for that lightbulb to turn on inside the collective heads of the old guard. The Democratic Party cannot continue to exist as Republican Lite, trying to win elections with the slogan of "We suck less than those other guys!" Obama won by using Howard Dean's tools and empowering the grass roots. Most importantly, he listened to them. 

So far the state party is clinging to the party boss stereotype, reclaiming control from an attempt to begin a movement that returns power to the local party. The strength of the Democratic Party is in numbers. It is time to use our strength to move Tennessee toward an economically viable state, with a healthy environment, and an excellent public school system. 

It's time for us to make the Tennessee racist redneck stereotype a thing of the past. The newneo-conservative Republican party isn't going to do that, and neither is the old Democratic Party. 

Peace,

Steve

Ed Does Cheney

Flame Me

This is why you buy native plants from a good nursery. This is a flame azalea from Moutain Mist Nursery in North Carolina. Several others are about to bloom as well.

Easter Buckeye

This Buckeye is about to bloom. We have several varieties but I like the red/purple ones the best. This is from our Easter walk.

Tennessee Water Dog

Who needs a Portuguese Water Dog when you have a Tennessee Water Dog?

Ok, so she's a pound puppy grown old but she loves the creek anytime the water isn't hard frozen. 

Socialism, the New Gay Marriage

The Republican Party thrives as a party by making elections about one issue. Two at most, since you have to include the "gun in every pocket" distortion of the second amendment. With the realization that a rather large number of Republicans are Gay, have Gay relatives, Gay friends, or Gay children, the issue of protecting marriage (Irrationally done by keeping certain people from being able to marry) is crumbling under the weight of second thoughts and legalization by several states.

It must be really difficult to maintain enough sanity to function day to day while proclaiming one's self a Christian, villianizing Liberals, while trying to ignore the obvious fact that your self proclaimed religion was founded by the greatest Liberal to ever live on Earth, Jesus of Nazereth. 

But anyway, Republicans, needing something to drive the electorate's fears (Gay people are simply not that scary), have lurched from being scared of Gays and Liberals to being terrified by the Socialist under their beds. 

I know the sane among you are asking...

"What part of 'Government Of the people, By the people, and For the people'," 

don't you understand? 

The Constitution of the United States of America enshrines a Socialist Democratic system of government, with extra built in checks and balances to keep it from lurching into totalitarianism when this or that faction momentarily gains an overwhelming majority as happened in 2002. 

Our system of government is a little bit conservative and a lot socialist. Fully conservative government is known as Fascism, which is another word ignorants throw around, thinking it covers the pimple of racism erupting on their noses. 

So by means the Internet, the greatest socialistic invention of modern times,  I direct you to a fine bit of ironic observation...An account of a town meeting whereby a Republican Congressman rants about the very thing he needs to survive...Socialism!

Crazy Town

Peace,

Steve

Photos, Easter Sunday Walk

Danged eagles are going to force me to buy a longer lense. Their nest looks to be 10 or more feet across and sits in a dead white pine above the creek on the Rhea County side. More than that I'm not telling. I don't know if you can tell from this shot but both birds are in the nest. One of them is just to the right of the tree trunk.

Black vultures are amazing flyers and are putting on a show for their courtship ritual. There were three birds in this flight. Two of them seemed to be in aerial combat while the other stayed close by.

Phlox in several shades are everywhere right now.

I don't have a clue what these beauties are. The flower stem is about six inches high. 

I'll try to post more later.