Archive for the 'alethia/truth' Category

thoughts on oil addiction

Published on September 19, 2008 in alethia/truth, allagei/change, epilogei/choice, oikonomika/economics, politik/politics and zoe/life. 4 Comments

Now that gas prices are “coming down” (yes, we feel just GREAT about $3.75/gallon… what!?) I don’t sense the same urgency in the American populace to fix this problem that existed when it was $5. Of course, this placation was expected by most and predicted by many, but that doesn’t change the fact that there is still a problem out there that was never solved. And it’s not fixed now, just because we are back to ignoring it.

I fear we are addicted to foreign oil, and maybe just oil in general.

But in the words of the immutable LeVar Burton, you don’t have to take my word for it! Please check out some or all of the links below.

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T. Boone Pickens, the founder and chairman of BP Capital Management (which manages over $4 billion in energy-oriented investment funds) has created the Pickens Plan, which aims to develop clean energy solutions.

Here’s a great article from one of my favorite contemporary revolutionaries, Dr. Ron Paul: Big Government Responsible For High Gas Prices

Newt Gingrich has also thrown his thoughts into this discussion, and although I’m not convinced that more drilling will be a long-term solution, it does seem like a reasonable band-aid, considering our current economic challenges.

If you’re a reader, you know I’m a big fan of Chris Martenson; he’s a very level-headed proponent of financial literacy. Check out his very important explanation of what “peak oil” really is — apparently, I had no idea! (This video may take a moment to load.)

In my quest for the truth, I came across a documentary called A Crude Awakening: The Oil Crash. This film is so obviously targeted towards proving its premise — namely, that there will be an oil crash — that it’s earned a bit of skepticism from me (as I’m sure you’ve noticed, it is increasingly hard to decipher truth from propaganda). Nonetheless, it is very interesting and quite well-made.

(The only free version I could find online has subtitles of some language I don’t know, which isn’t saying much as I barely have a handle on English.)

There’s also an interesting intersection of the “climate crisis” with our oil addiction. Check out WE:

There’s no question this is a complex issue with many moving parts, but I think we all know that it won’t be solved by ignoring it. And it most likely won’t be solved by the fatcat baby boomers who actually have the power to help, as they have proven time and time again that they are more than happy to leave their problems to us when they leave this world. (I’ll go into more detail on that issue some other day.)

I know I’m not really offering many — if any — real solutions in this post, but I figure awareness is a good start!

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i kissed a girl, went to hell

Published on September 9, 2008 in alethia/truth, dikastis/justice, ecclesia/church, epilogei/choice, koinonia/community and zoe/life. 6 Comments

Yes, this is an actual church sign.

Church Turns Pop Lyrics Into A Bit Of Brimstone

Makes you really wonder why people don’t like christians, right?

You know, I appreciate that there are a lot of folks out there who think they’ve got it all figured out and that the bible is “black and white” on this issue, but you know what? Until you have a close friend who is gay, I wish you’d all just shut the hell up.

Amen.

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the end of the innocence

Published on July 22, 2008 in alethia/truth, allagei/change, echos/sound, oikonomika/economics, politik/politics, techni/art and zoe/life. 2 Comments

Photo by djwhelan. Essay by Bob Lefsetz: July 3, 2008

They said life would never be the same after 9/11.

But somehow it was.

Sure, the government kept telling us to be aware of terrorist attacks, but despite some anthrax being mailed around in the weeks after the Twin Towers fell, nothing ever happened. Sure, we ultimately had to take off our shoes as we went through airport security, but life was surprisingly just like it had always been. Citizens shopped as our President urged them to. Kids went to school, parents bought SUVs and life wasn’t much different than it was in the nineties.

Until a couple of months ago. When gasoline suddenly spiked. When suddenly a jaunt to buy a quart of milk, to rent a DVD, was no longer a mindless decision, but something to be debated. Was it worth the cost of the gas?

We’ve been living in ignorance for far too long. Thinking some men in white robes were looking out for us. But they just turned out to be profiteers, paying lip service to bettering society, but really only interested in lining their pockets. Now, to be an average citizen is to contemplate one’s future. One’s economic future. No one’s worrying about whether a bomb is going to hit their city, rather whether they’ll have enough money to put food on the table.

The airlines are collapsing. Even Toyota took a hit, while GM heads toward possible bankruptcy. America’s fate may no longer be intertwined with the world’s largest car manufacturer, but if your corporate institutions are struggling, the effect is felt by people who don’t even own an automobile.

We no longer produce the steel in our cars, our clothes are made overseas and it seems the only thing we make is money. And, our financial institutions are not even that good at that. Bear Stearns had to be rescued for the good of the overall economy. While we were out fighting terror, making the world safe for democracy, we lost a bunch of our freedoms and America lost a great deal of its power.

China owns not only many of our buildings, but a ton of our debt. Our fate is inextricably hooked to this eastern country. They could bring our economy to its knees instantly. And, for all our efforts in the Middle East, Iraq is still not secure and Afghanistan is in turmoil. But what hurts most is the American people. Without pensions and health care. With more bills than money.

It’s almost beyond blame. We’re in a quagmire. The only question is how to get out. Whether to stay the course or try something new. Then, the man standing for change abruptly changes his positions and we feel that the only people looking out for ourselves is us.

Drink that beer, eat that hot dog, enjoy that parade. Have a good Fourth. But know that finally, everything truly is different. Whether it be natural disasters caused by global warming or the inability to afford a cross-country trip. The American way of life has taken a hit.

We’re all in this together. That inner city gang member is not far removed from the person flying in the private jet. No one is immune. We’re all members of society. How do we change for the better?

I don’t know.

But it’s time we started speaking the truth.

I’d hope the politicians could achieve this.

But the politicians always follow the artists. The artist, unencumbered, speaking from his heart, leads the way.

In the name of lifestyle, in the name of riches, our musical artists have abdicated their responsibility. And somehow the blame has been put upon the public, for stealing their wares, denying the fat cats their profits. The movie studios abolished reality long ago, and the television outlets have manufactured a false reality to sell to a numb public, just looking for a little release.

It’s palpable. Something’s changed. And there’s no easy solution. Gas is not going back down to three dollars a gallon, never mind two. There’s a cloud over our everyday activities. And we’ve got no confidence positive change is in the wind, never mind achievable. They tell us to party like it’s 1999, but those days are long gone.

Driving home from the doctor in the fading heat of a long summer day I heard Don Henley’s “The End Of The Innocence” on the radio. I remembered 1989, when the record was ubiquitous. When MTV still played videos and everybody with an established career sold millions of albums. When my wife left our home behind. In the shock of that event, the only thing that soothed me was music. I drove around pushing the button, longing to hear “The End Of The Innocence”, longing to feel rooted, connected to something.

I don’t need a bigger house. I don’t need two dollar a gallon gas. I jus need to feel connected, to feel that I’m not crazy, that other people are freaked out too, are shocked at what’s happened to our country. I need the musicians to speak the collective truth. To put words and sounds to what we feel. To point us in the proper direction. Because I’m lost.

Subscribe to the Lefsetz Letter at Lefsetz.com.

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ben stein on the military

Published on July 21, 2008 in alethia/truth, dikastis/justice, epilogei/choice, politik/politics and zoe/life. 2 Comments

While I Swim at Home, Our Combatants Fight On
by Ben Stein (from NewsMax Magazine June 2008, Pg. 34)

THERE IS A MAGNIFICENT SCENE IN BLADE RUNNER, MY FAVORITE postwar movie, in which Rutger Hauer, who plays a replicant, a human-looking robot, prepares to die. He tells his possibly human pursuer, Harrison Ford, that he has seen amazing things in his short life far out in outer space, and then he folds himself up and says, “Time to die.”

As I get older, at a breakneck pace, I often think of the most beautiful, magnificent sights I have seen. The night sky in Santa Cruz, California, where I lay on a picnic bench and watched more stars than I had ever seen. It was a perfect moment of peace. I think of the Upper Priest Lake in Bonner County, Idaho, a lake three miles long, totally as nature made it eons ago, surrounded by forests and mountains, the Canada border a stone’s throw away, immense eagles soaring overhead, with only one other guest, a young man windsurfing along the placid waters. And people say there is no God?

Then I think of my German Shorthaired Pointers lying in each others’ paws as they sleep on the bed next to me. And I think of my saintly wife, with her perfect profile, reading in bed next to me, and I think of how lucky I was to find my soul’s perfect companions — my wife and my hounds.

But there is something I find even more amazing, even more moving: the sights of young men and women in the uniforms of the United States military, the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, the Coast Guard, the Reserves, and the Guard. It isn’t just that they look great in their uniforms and their tall, straight posture.

No, what is amazing to me, and a spectacular sight, is that these are human beings with the same wishes and dreams for a long, peaceful, fulfilled life as you and I have. But they have offered up their young lives and their bodies and their health and their peace of mind and their very sanity — and that of their families — to go out and fight for my worthless, selfish life and comfort.

I sit at home. I swim in my pool. I play with my dogs. I make fresh Alaskan salmon for my wife on the grill. Then I check my stocks and then I go to sleep with the loves of my life as the air conditioning and the electric blanket and the mattress keep me perfectly comfortable.

They — the military in combat — sleep in ditches if they can sleep at all. They get their legs blown off. They have permanent brain damage. They go to eternity before their time. They live with the fear of torture if they are captured by the terrorists. They leave their children behind. They miss years at a time of their babies growing up. Their wives — the true backbone of the nation — keep the family together while the soldiers keep the perimeter of terror far from our hearths.

And for this, they are paid modest wages, at best. They lose their families all too often. They live in extreme discomfort. They are treated like commodities to be moved on a chessboard of global struggle.

Imagine, just imagine, what it is like to be in combat! Imagine the smartest people on the planet, the Germans and the Japanese, armed with the best weapons man can devise, trying to kill our fathers and grandfathers while they struggled in mud and snow and hail and freezing rain. And then the war ends and we drive in cars with tail fins, and they who once tossed grenades at Japanese pillboxes now coach the high-school tennis team, and combat is just a nightmare. Imagine that while we complain about the stock market and how expensive gasoline is, they fight it out with terrorists who use retarded children as suicide bombers and have no such thing as conscience.

Then they come home and see that there is no mention of them in the news, that the media cares only about deranged movie stars and recording artists and how much people weigh. They, the soldiers, marines, sailors, pilots, guard, Coast Guard, reserves, are invisible and alone.

Then, the combat stars go back to fight again, and we continue to worry about interest rates.

God help us. God bless them, the thin pillars on which all of mankind’s tomorrows’ hopes rest, the most glorious sight on heaven and earth. They should be the first thoughts in our prayers every moment of every day. They are the real miracles.

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why ‘unrealistic’ goals are easier to achieve

Published on June 27, 2008 in alethia/truth, allagei/change, asteio/fun, epilogei/choice and zoe/life. 4 Comments

By Tim Ferriss (excerpt from The 4-Hour Work Week)

I had to bribe them. What other choice did I have?

My lecture at Princeton had just ended with smiles and enthusiastic questions.

At the same time, I knew that most students would go out and promptly do the opposite of what I preached. Most of them would be putting in 80-hour weeks as high-paid coffee fetchers unless I showed that the principles from class could actually be applied.

Hence the challenge.

I was offering a round-trip ticket anywhere in the world to anyone who could complete an undefined “challenge” in the most impressive fashion possible. Results plus style. I told them to meet me after class if interested, and here they were, nearly 20 out of 60 students.

The task was designed to test their comfort zones while forcing them to use some of the tactics I teach. It was simplicity itself: contact three seemingly impossible-to-reach people — J Lo, Warren Buffett, Bill Clinton, J.D. Salinger, I don’t care — and get at least one to reply to three questions…

Of 20 students, all frothing at the mouth to win a free spin across the globe, how many completed it?

Exactly… none. Not a one.

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Bigger Goals = Less Competition

There were many excuses: “It’s not that easy to get someone to…”, “I have a big paper due, and…,” “I would love to, but there’s no way I can…” There was but one real reason, however, repeated over and over again in different words: it was a difficult challenge, perhaps impossible, and the other students would out-do them. Since all of them overestimated the competition, no one even showed up.

According to the default-win rules I had set, if someone had sent me no more than an illegible one-paragraph response, I would have been obligated to give them the prize. This result both fascinated and depressed me.

The following year, the outcome was quite different.

I told this cautionary tale and six out of 17 finished the challenge in less than 48 hours. Was the second class better? No. In fact, there were more capable students in the first class, but they did nothing. Firepower up the wazoo and no trigger finger.

The second group just embraced what I told them before they started, which was…

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Doing the Unrealistic is Easier Than Doing the Realistic

From contacting billionaires [here’s how one reader did it] to rubbing elbows with celebrities—the second group of students did both—it’s as easy as believing it can be done.

It’s lonely at the top. 99% of the world is convinced they are incapable of achieving great things, so they aim for the mediocre middle-ground. The level of competition is thus fiercest for “realistic” goals, paradoxically making them the most time- and energy-consuming. It is easier to raise $10,000,000 than it is $1,000,000. It is easier to pick up the one perfect 10 in the bar than the five 8s.

If you are insecure, guess what? The rest of the world is too. Do not overestimate the competition and underestimate yourself. You are better than you think.

Unreasonable and unrealistic goals are easier to achieve for yet another reason.

Having an unusually large goal is an adrenaline infusion that provides the endurance to overcome the inevitable trials and tribulations that go along with any goal. Realistic goals, goals restricted to the average ambition level, are uninspiring and will only fuel you through the first or second problem, at which point you throw in the towel.

If the potential payoff is mediocre or average, so is your effort. I’ll run through walls to get a catamaran trip through the Greek islands, but I might not change my brand of cereal for a weekend trip through Columbus, Ohio. If I choose the latter because it is “realistic,” I won’t have the enthusiasm to jump even the smallest hurdle to accomplish it. With beautiful, crystal-clear Greek waters and delicious wine on the brain, I’m prepared to do battle for a dream that is worth dreaming. Even though their difficulty of achievement on a scale of 1-10 appears to be a 2 and a 10 respectively, Columbus is more likely to fall through.

The fishing is best where the fewest go, and the collective insecurity of the world makes it easy for people to hit homeruns while everyone else is aiming for base hits. There is just less competition for bigger goals.

(Excerpted from The 4-Hour Work Week by Tim Ferriss)

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a presidential campaign fit for a prom king

Published on June 17, 2008 in alethia/truth, allagei/change, epilogei/choice, oikonomika/economics, politik/politics and zoe/life. 14 Comments

When did the American political process become a popularity contest?

I realize that the phrase “popularity contest” is fairly cliché at this point, so, along with me, let’s try to think about what it actually means.

Remember high school? Remember the endless posturing for attention? The constant feeling of never being quite good enough? Cool enough? Popular enough? (Maybe it’s just me, but I still feel that way most of the time… I guess Bowling For Soup was right.)

Unfortunately, our presidential political process is starting to remind me of a contest for prom king. Given, it’s an infinitely more expensive, drawn-out, ridiculous contest, but still.

Shouldn’t we be concerned with trying to find the most world-wise, healthy, balanced, economically-brilliant person in the country to select as our next leader instead of relying on advertising and charisma? Shouldn’t the leader of the world’s current (and hopefully future) primary economic superpower have some advanced business degrees… or at least remotely know what the HELL they’re doing in regards to economics?

I’m not sure why this has hit me so plainly in the last few days; perhaps it’s the fact that we now have two admittedly economically ignorant presidential candidates.

Well, to be fair, only McCain has openly admitted his ignorance; but Obama’s a staunch democrat, so that automatically qualifies him for at least moderate ignorant status. (Quick explanation for such a rash comment: democratic policies all reach their logical end at varying degrees of big government and socialism, which is historically cumbersome and impossibly expensive for citizens. But if someone would like to explain to me how socialistic policies make economic sense, I’m totally open to it!) I’m no republican, either — especially in regards to this neoconservative bent that most “republicans” have nowadays. Their idea of conservatism is spending $12 billion dollars a month on an overseas war, blowing things up. (Anyone else see the irony? Conservative? REALLY? Things that are BLOWN UP don’t come back or create anything new, guys.)

I think there’s a pretty good chance that, come November, Obama will be our Guy. Call it intuition or whatever, but it seems like the cultural winds are headed that direction. I’ve mentioned Obama as a possible #2 candidate choice for me (I still believe our country made a grave error in ignoring Dr. Paul), but as I learn more about his economic outlook, I am becoming more and more skeptical.

Don’t get me wrong; I think that political savvy — in the sense of being able to connect and soothe tense and potentially volatile relationships — is a key ingredient to being a good leader, and Obama brings a sense of earnest diplomacy to the table which I like very much. But these days, I just find myself wondering if that will be enough. Will that be enough, amidst our oil prices, our overseas spending, our healthcare challenges, our real estate crashes, our retirement issues, our national debt, our declining dollar, the globalization of business… all of which are tied to very complex economic engines?

We don’t need a prom king with a credit card. We need an economic genius with some people skills.

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the roof’s not leaking

Published on June 16, 2008 in alethia/truth, asteio/fun and politik/politics. 2 Comments

Absolutely brilliant.

I think you get my point.

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adventures in hollywoodland

Published on June 10, 2008 in alethia/truth, epilogei/choice, koinonia/community and zoe/life. 9 Comments

It’s not really a big secret that I had a pretty hard time with LA when we first moved here, over two years ago.

Now that I’m older and obviously so much wiser (well, older at least… 27 on Thursday! Eek.) I know there’s good and bad in pretty much everything. The trick seems to be hanging on to as much of the good as we can.

Los Angeles has grown on me (kind of like a fungus) over the past couple years. I mean, let’s face it; there are things you can do here that you can’t do in most cities. If you play your cards right, you can get paid to do such fascinating things such as:

  • Play video games
  • Life coach aspiring Hollywood’ers
  • Spend a week chasing down a Kim Jong-Il lookalike
  • Sit in a room all day long writing jokes

    • Seriously, it’s crazy. (And if you have others I should add to the list, post me a comment!)

    But for all its magic, Hollywood continues to drag around its share of baggage. There is an addiction to vanity here that borders on dangerous. It’s repulsive to me, mostly because most of the time, it’s completely invisible. Our LA obsession with fashion and style has bought us some pretty cool-lookin’ folks, but what’s never displayed is the destruction it causes behind the scenes.

    Whether we’d ever admit it or not, us Southern Californians are constantly in comparison mode when it comes to “the look.” We are constantly renovating some kind of fashionista Potemkin village, adding on wings and digging out pools, to eternally prove that we’re “enough,” and that we’re really worthy to hang with the rest of the wannabes. It’s like impersonating some sick Ken & Barbie Beach Village, all the time, everywhere.

    Frankly, it’s exhausting.

    I know some people are more acutely tuned to this pressure than others; and sadly, my wife and I definitely fall in the “squeezed” category. For us, fashion has always been about communication; to an extent, at least, the way we dress tells a story about who we are (or who we’d like to be). Even before we moved to such a façade-conscious place, we cared about our presentation… but again, it’s because clothes aren’t just about presentation for us.

    In Hollywoodland, though, these expectations are dangerous because they have become an assumed thing… an undercurrent. It’s assumed that we’ll spend $250 on a pair of jeans, beause, seriously, who doesn’t? Ladies, you simply must have 600 pieces of jewelry accessories, and just as many shoes, because — I mean, REALLY — God-forbid you can’t match your belt. (I really do feel for you ladies; this game has almost an infinite number of rules just for playing on Team Girl.)

    No, LA’s not all bad. But it’s not all good, either.

    Honestly, I’d like to import some reality every couple months. If somebody from Colorado can come down and slap me in the face with a pair of flip-flops or something once in awhile, that’d be great.

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    the crash course

    Published on May 22, 2008 in alethia/truth, allagei/change, dikastis/justice, epilogei/choice, koinonia/community, oikonomika/economics, politik/politics and zoe/life. 0 Comments

    My good buddy Zach turned me on to this guy; his name is Chris Martenson, a Ph.D. scientist specializing in neurotoxicology who has shifted his empirical, research-based mind over to economics. He’s currently developing an online version of what he calls “The Crash Course” on topics like money, debt, growth, investing, assets, demographics, etc., and the social and political triggers and effects that intersect at all those points.

    Obviously my Connectedness just eats this kind of stuff up, but I wanted to make you aware of it, because I think there is information in here that absolutely everyone living in America right now, in 2008, simply must have.

    This goes back to a statement I made in one of my previous posts, where I said that “All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing,” quoting Sergei Bondarchuk. Well, in this case, the evil is the greed and complete lack of foresight (or complete disregard for the future) of our last few American generations, and how their inconsideration for, frankly, US (who are, of course, the future of this country) will pose myriad challenges over the next 20-30 years, specifically in regards to our economy and general way of life.

    I’ve posted his intro video below to give you a taste for his style. Please consider taking the time to watch a few or all of Chris’s video segments. Some of them may be slightly uncomfortable, but I’m guessing that more so, they will “connect the dots” for feelings you’ve had gliding under the surface for awhile now.

    P.S. I’d love to hear your thoughts on any of his videos, if you’d like to post a comment below! What really surprised or shocked you??

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    If you liked that, then try these…

    gen Y (y not?)

    unemployment

    new music tuesday wednesday

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    the millennial melee

    Published on May 13, 2008 in alethia/truth, allagei/change, koinonia/community and zoe/life. 0 Comments

    “Talkin’ ’bout my generation…”

    An increasing topic of interest to me (and, apparently, the rest of the world) is the melee that seems to surround my peoples. I’m sure you know many of us, but we go by a number of names, including Generation Y, Echo Boom, Net Generation, Generation Me, and Millennials.

    In their recent book Connecting to the Net.Generation, Reynol Junco and Jeanna Mastrodicasa found a few interesting facts about us by taking a survey of 7,705 US college students (info taken from my favorite online source, Wikipedia):

  • 97% of us own a computer
  • 94% of us own a cell phone
  • 76% of us use Instant Messaging (and 15% of us IM users are logged on 24 hours a day/7 days a week)
  • 34% of us use websites as their primary source of news
  • 28% of us author a blog and 44% read blogs
  • 49% of us download music using peer-to-peer file sharing
  • 75% of us college students have a Facebook account
  • 60% of us own some type of portable music and/or video device such as an iPod

    • I recently posted a blog entry about the apparent ignorance of Baby Boomers (and I’m really referring to the managing workforce in general when I say that) in regards to Gen Y. But today I came across this article from the Harvard Business School, and wanted to share it as it seems someone is finally paying attention to our good qualities!

    How Will Millennials Manage?
    by Jim Heskett

    Anonymous Commenter #4 pretty much sums us up, I think:

    I am ambitious but not overly committed. I prefer to work as a consultant because I am not chained to one company. I am a problem solver by nature, and I want to get immediately to the problem solving. I’m not interested in meaningless titles, mine or anyone else’s, and I’m not willing to enslave myself to attain a position with a great title and no depth of purpose. I don’t want the appearance of success. I want the integral satisfaction of succeeding. I want to make a lot of money, but only if I have time to spend it, and I’m more interested in health care and vacation than bonuses that I’d have to work too much to get and work too much to enjoy.

    My family and my pursuit of knowledge for knowledge’s sake are more important to me than any particular job, with any particular company. I have confidence in myself, my marketability, and my ability to put my nose to the grindstone when it is necessary. I’m interested in being as efficient and productive as possible, but not every second of every day, and not under someone else’s thumb.

    Are you a Millennial (born between or around 1980-2000)? Does this description fit you like it does me??

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