Thoughts in the Shadow of the Capitol

I found myself literally in the shadow of the Capitol a few days ago. Admittedly, I’m always a little awed by the building… both by its architecture and by everything it represents. The crowds always appear on the west side, so I wandered around to the east side where there were very few people. Away from the chaos of tour bus drop-offs and repeated photo ops, and literally in the shadow, I was left to ponder politics.

It’s been nine months since the inauguration, and it’s been a wild ride. The president’s popularity has fallen. He seems to revel in campaign-style speeches, but the campaigning is long over and it’s time to do the heavy lifting.

During the debates about health care reform in the town-hall meetings over the summer, far too many people were effectively told to “sit down and shut up.” Okay, not always in so many words, but disagreements with proposed reform made that message clear. People are angry… as were our Founding Fathers. And those men didn’t sit down and shut up. Even Jefferson and Adams agreed to disagree. So should we.

The ongoing tea parties epitomize what those early American heroes stood for and believed in. Now the opposition suggests they’re staged… they’re not being attended by Americans who simply want to make a public statement,,, who want to take their government back from the grasp of too many politicians… who want to stand against big government.

And if there were ever two words sewn together in a sentence that will capture the current climate, they would be, “You lie.” I don’t personally know Joe Wilson, the South Carolina Representative who yelled those words during the president’s speech to Congress when Obama stated that illegal aliens would not be eligible for health care benefits, but I suspect he’s an upstanding guy who was angered to the point of blurting exactly what he thought. He rightfully apologized afterward.

But now it seems anyone who disagrees with the president is a racist. Or at least if any Caucasian citizens disagree, they’re deemed racists. I think we’ve all lost our collective minds. The right to disagree and speak your mind about your government is the very foundation of these United States. It’s exactly what Jefferson and Adams argued about time and time again nearly two hundred and forty years ago. So no offense Mr. President, but if I disagree with your policies and politics, I’ve got every right to speak out without being accused of harboring a white hood and robe in my closet. And I’m offended that a former president would make such a suggestion.

Wilson’s comment was disrespectful to the office of the president. Regardless of what you may think of the man, you must respect the office. I certainly agree with that; however, when the president appears on late night television imitating David Letterman, isn’t he adding some degree of disrespect to the very office he holds?

Just a passing thought while in the shadow of the Capitol.

Passing Icons

Two American icons died recently. How similar their fame; how different their lives. These summer months saw the deaths of Michael Jackson and Walter Cronkite. One died “unexpectedly” at the young age of 50 while the other died at the age of 92 after a lengthy illness.

Both captivated and defined their corners of American culture. One in music, the other in news. Both achieved notoriety. One was famous, the other, infamous. I’m struck by their professional parallels and wildly disparate personal lives.

Cronkite was the first TV newsman to be honored with the title of “anchor.” Jackson, on the other hand, deemed himself “king of pop.” Cronkite reported the moon landing; Jackson “moon walked.” The most memorable image of Cronkite could be that of him removing his glasses and announcing the death of JFK. No doubt the most memorable image of Jackson is the Thriller video. While Cronkite was referred to as “the most trusted man in America,” Jackson battled charges of child molestation. While one led an exemplary life, the other… well, did not. Blame early stardom, blame a stolen childhood, blame false accusations, blame whatever you’d like. In the end, the result’s the same.

I don’t know about you, but in retrospect, I found the coverage of their respective deaths and funerals a bit disquieting. I can’t help but wonder what it says about American society in general that the coverage of Jackson’s death and funeral went on endlessly for weeks, while Cronkite garnered, by comparison, a passing mention. My hometown paper had stories of Jackson’s death on the front page every day until his memorial… and then that took over. Meanwhile, the story of Cronkite’s funeral was covered in two paragraphs in the “national re-cap section” on page A-4.

The circus that surrounded one memorial service continued to move from the sublime to the ridiculous on a daily basis. In fact, two days after Jackson’s funeral, I figured the morning news shows could not possibly lead with a story about it. Wrong. The lead story was that his casket was “missing.” It had not been publicly seen since pall bearers carried it out of Staples Center. Conversely, Cronkite’s funeral was held in his long-time church with the stately tradition you’d expect. Clearly the ceremonies and coverage of them reflected each man’s professional and personal life. I suspect each would have approved of the way in which they were memorialized and remembered.

No argument that they each changed their respective industries. No argument that they’ll each be remembered for a few generations. I simply wish that an upstanding life of integrity meant more in our society. This summer’s events lead me to believe it does not.

It’s a fly!

So President Barack Obama swatted and killed a fly this week during a televised interview… and the whole country seems to have gone absolutely bonkers about it.

The liberal media showed the interview and replayed it ad nauseum in the subsequent days. Somehow this is supposed to be an impressive quality in our commander-in-chief? I think there are more important aspects of his presidency and administration that need our attention and should be headlining our papers, broadcasts and the Internet. Not the fly swatting thing. But hey, that’s me.

I’d like to see him swatting a few terrorists, the budget deficit, and just for a few grins, Nancy Pelosi. But it seems the pedestal upon which he’s been placed was raised even higher because he swatted a fly. I appreciate that folks clamor to see the personal side of this president, but then focus on his interactions with his wife, kids or dog rather than the lowly fly.

And to make the whole situation even more ludicrous (which in my estimation was nearly impossible to begin with), the folks at PETA have gotten in on the act. I’m a long-time environmentalist and believe in treating animals ethically, but this organization is over the edge. Their defense of the fly is another ridiculous stunt in a ridiculously long line of them. I think PETA is consistently more interested in bringing attention to itself than the cause it espouses. ‘Nuff said.

So, I’m not terribly impressed that Obama swatted a fly. Maybe I should be… it’s a talent I lack. When I attempt the feat, the fly remains unscathed while whatever it was perched upon is usually broken. But I take heart in that result: at least I won’t have the PETA folks protesting me.

How To "insert anything here"

In my writings, I’ve stumbled upon and have written for www.ehow.com/ whose tag line is “How to do just about everything.” First, let me assure you that I’ve only opted to author articles that I know something about. And secondly, the articles are reviewed by an editorial staff prior to their publication online. So someone’s checking although I’m not certain to what extent they’re fact checking or simply checking to determine that the submission meets their style guidelines (i.e. every sentence starts with a verb... creative writing, it is not).

I’m still on my soapbox about participatory journalism, so, please, allow me to cite a few examples. I recently saw the following titles as available assignments for members who have signed up to write for the site.

“How to make a stapler” which leads to my next question (probably yours too): Why would anyone want to? I can write that article in one sentence, starting, of course, with a verb: Go to your office supply store or the stationery aisle of any department store and buy one.

“How to build a house on piers.” Now I can appreciate that someone with coastal property might want to build a house on piers. The interesting spin on this title was its category. It was listed under “careers and advancement” and not “home improvements.” I suppose if you were in the construction business, you might consider the ability to build a pier-supported house a career advancement. I’m certain it takes more skill than building a house on a regular foundation.

“How to build a bowling alley in your garage” listed under “business.” First of all, I haven’t seen any garages in my life that are the length of a standard bowling alley. Have you? I guess if I extended my garage to accommodate a bowling alley, I’d want to make some money to recoup the expense thereby putting this title in the business section.

“How to create a nursing certificate.” Seems fishy to me right off the bat. To make it more suspicious it was listed under “crafts.” It's crafty all right.

Here are two of my favorites:
“How to make an ankle holster for a gloc” and “How to make a taser gun out of a lighter.” With a tip of my hat to Dave Barry: “I swear I’m not making any of this up.”

Finally, I saw this title: “How long does an arrest warrant stay active?” Probably longer than you’d like. I wonder if the person requesting this title read the two before it, and that’s when the trouble started.

Who’s in Charge, Anyway?

It’s time to circle back to where I started with this blog and question the value of all this online content other than providing me and anyone else with a very public soapbox. As long as we all grasp that idea, it’s fine. Truly a global sharing of opinion.

Got that? O-p-i-n-i-o-n! Maybe there are some facts thrown in, but you can’t really count on it. And I fear there’s too much acceptance of most of what’s found on the internet.

Here’s a scary phrase that I saw the other day: “participatory journalism.” Getting news that’s relevant to you. To me, that’s just this side of being oxymoronic. For starters, relevant, schmelevant. First, I want to know: is it accurate? The fact that it’s participatory makes me question how true it may be. Accuracy first, please; then I’ll worry about relevant. I don’t know about you, but if I had to pick one or the other… please, give me accurate and let me worry about what I may or may not find relevant.

Besides, the news is news. How sheltered would I be if I only received articles that I pre-determined to be relevant by subject or location? The search engine that makes that determination is still artificial intelligence and lacks judgment. How much would I be missing? How much would any of us miss? How many participatory front pages would consist of: who’s voted off American Idol, booted off the island, found on Lost, and the local weather?

At least with traditional media, I believe there’s some foundation based in fact… that some editor somewhere is reviewing stories and information for truth and demanding that journalists have solid, reliable sources. Although that said, I’m sensing that foundation is starting to crumble or, at the very least, crack. Too often, the grammarian in me sees misspellings and other errors in assorted publications. I hope we don’t get to the point where texting abbreviations and emoticons become the norm in our news stories.

No one’s got to cite a source to publish online, and good copy can persuade some folks to believe just about anything. I suppose Wikipedia is the ultimate participatory information experience, but it’s a little frightening to me. “He’s like Wikipedia: he’s got all the answers, but they’re not always right.” Can Wikipedia change reality? It’s got the potential to change history, so why not?

Even a good journalist has to fight the urge now and then not to let the facts get in the way of a good story… so what’s to stop me or any other blogger out there from convincing the world of our expertise on anything or everything? The answer’s simple: not a thing, my friend, not a thing.

Carbon Confusion… Carbon Corruption

Oh, where to start? Let’s start with one fact: the planet is warmer than it was 200 years ago. That’s about where black and white ends and innumerable shades of gray begin.

The next question, the big, gray one is: Why? Two very mainstream and respectable content providers, National Geographic and The Associated Press, recently asserted:

”Scientists have reported recently that the world is heating up even faster than predicted only a few years ago, and that the consequences could be severe if we don't keep reducing emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that are trapping heat in our atmosphere.” National Geographic, April 2009
and
“Carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels – coal, oil and natural gas – is the chief cause of global warming.” The Associated Press as published in the Reading Eagle, May 1, 2009

But what about that big, yellow thing in the sky? Doesn’t that contribute to climate change? What about the scientific thinking that climate change is a normal planetary trend occurring every 1500 years? And what about the evidence that the warming trend we’re in right now began about 1850 and that Earth is starting to cool again? Why don’t I ever see that in the mainstream media? If we can all agree that there was an ice age, why did it end? Wouldn’t the end of the ice age have been caused by planetary warming? If it happened a million years ago, why can’t it happen again?

Those are just a few of my questions, so I’m not buying the out-and-out assertion that fossil fuels and human impact are the sole causes of global warming. Don’t get me wrong: I think we’ve done a ridiculously poor job of caring for our environment. As a society, conservationists we are not. And what we have done is downright shameful. I’m simply not convinced that what we’ve done is the sole cause of climate change.

The National Geographic quote above came from an article which included a carbon footprint calculator:
100 cubic feet of natural gas = 12 lbs. of CO2 emissions
1 kWh of electric = 1.5 lbs. of CO2 emissions
Each gallon of gas = 19.6 lbs. of CO2 emissions
Because, apparently, I have nothing else to do, I calculated my carbon footprint based on those three categories and determined that I output 10.78 metric tons of carbon annually. Sounds like a lot, but the average is 19. Granted, I’m a household of one and occasionally two… less than the average as well. And admittedly, I did not factor airplane travel into my calculation. I’m good for a couple flights a year.

Now, I could feel even better about my carbon footprint if I purchased carbon offsets. Buying carbon offsets? That’s right, I send my money to some organization who promises to invest it in reforestation, renewable energy R&D, etc. and that relieves me of my guilt about emitting too much CO2. I checked www.carbonfund.org and for $11.33, I can be guilt-free about my flights earlier this year.

I’m all for reforestation and renewal energy, but have we all lost our minds? The first time I heard about buying carbon offsets, I immediately thought about the parallel between that and the corruption in the early church surrounding the selling of indulgences. Indulgences replaced the severe penances of the early church and were granted for specific good works and prayers. So someone figured out, human nature being what it was (and still is), that you could make a buck by selling an indulgence rather than requiring good works and prayers. Cash to the easy route of forgiveness. Seeing the similarity to selling carbon offsets yet?

Now carbonfund.org might be a completely worthwhile and above-board organization. I don’t know. But I do know that “there’s a sucker born every minute”… and snake oil salesmen abound. As for me, I’ll keeping turning off the lights, turning down the heat and doing everything possible to reduce my consumption on every level. As for my monetary contributions, they’ll continue to go to the Dolphin Research Center and the Nature Conservancy – two organizations I know are doing good things for the planet. And I have to get my sweatshirt. It feels chilly to me.

Talkin’ Trash

According to the EPA, from 1960 to 2007, the amount of ‘stuff’’ Americans threw in the trash nearly doubled from 2.7 pounds per person per day to 4.6 pounds per person per day. How much do you put in the trash on a daily basis? Have you ever even thought about it?

To make that statistic a tad more frightening, nearly a third of what we put in the trash is paper and paperboard… generally lightweight stuff. So now imagine converting that 4.6 pounds per day to volume when over a pound and a half of the total is paper. No wonder our landfills are filling up. There are now 1,794 landfills in the United States, down from 20,000 in the early 70’s. You can work out the math if you’d like, but a simple overview says it all: We’ve nearly doubled output and cut the place to put it to less than ten percent of what it was. Think that’s a problem?

Granted, we’ve learned a lot and have made great progress during that same timeframe in recycling. Aluminum recycling has become streamlined to the point that we shouldn’t need to mine any more bauxite. Ditto on newspapers and paper products. (Of course the internet is slowly tolling the death knell for newspapers, so maybe we won’t have to worry about them clogging our landfills in the future, but that turn of events is fodder for a blog on another day.) Unlike aluminum which can be recycled indefinitely, paper can only go through the process until the fibers are unusable, and each generation of recycled fiber creates a lesser product. Simply put, you start with clean, white office grade paper and end up with toilet paper or pressboard. You can’t recycle paper ‘up’ the quality chain, but the process is certainly worthwhile. Glass is another trash component that can be recycled indefinitely.

Besides saving space in our increasingly scarce landfills, recycled materials use less energy to manufacture new products. Recycled aluminum uses 95% less energy to make new cans than its virgin ore counterpart. Recycled glass melts at a lower temperature and uses 50% less energy in the process. Recycling one ton of paper saves 7000 gallons of water. Energy savings and landfill savings make it seem like a no-brainer to me. To you?

In much the same way that the economic downturn has forced folks to buy less, it will also be a boon to reducing trash and improving recycling. As much as I’d like to see a return to economic stability, the conservationist in me is smiling at the inversely proportionate nature of cash and trash. I’ve long been a proponent of usage-based trash collection. Today, I put out recycling, but not trash… just didn’t have enough of it. My neighbor put the maximum amount of trash allowed at his curb. We pay the same. We’re only going to really cut trash when the price goes up. And at the rate at which the landfills are filling up, I suspect that painful increase is right around the corner.

We need to take responsibility for our trash and reduce it. “Throw it away.” Where’s “away” anyway? Away from our homes, our streets, our neighborhoods, but it’s never away from our planet. Less in, less out… it’s that simple.