The Matrix

There is a growing attempt on the part of some political “leaders” to build a casino in the gorge. The gorge has incredible natural beauty as the magnificent Columbia River cuts through the Cascade mountains with views of Mt. Hood, Mt. Adams, and Mt. St. Helens. We don’t need a casino in this historic area. Political support from even our own Governor Kulongoski shows their lack of committment and pasison for protecting the natural resources and history of the state. Write your political leaders and tell them your concerns. For information and addreses to write, see:
http://www.nogorgecasino.com/public%5Fhtml/home/

Poter Goss, director of the CIA, said recently (in a TIME interview) that he has an excellent idea of where bin Laden is, but that that part of the difficulty in capturing bin Laden was “sanctuaries in sovereign nations.”

There is no sanctuary as far as terrorists are concerned. To quote Bush (and a line repeated in Star Wars III), “you are either for us or against us.” We cannot afford to let any country give him or his friends sanctuary.

Vice President Dick Cheney, speaking recently on Larry King, said, “The insurgency in Iraq is in the last throes” . He also predicted that the fighting would end before the Bush administration leaves office.

Yeh - and I’ve got a bridge I’d like to sell him. Besides, 2008 is way too long to wait to take out a guy who is trying to bankrupt America. What we need is an Administration that isn’t in a fantasy world. The terrorist threat is real, but the way the war is being waged is not. Bin Laden and team has made a joke of the administration.

Toyota responded to our letter (see comments) by letter and telephone. Very impressive letter. They assured us they will NOT raise prices to “help” the american car industry. We’ll see.

Meanwhile, Congress is phrasing out the tax deduction for the hybrids by the end of this year (token deduction remains next year). What’s the matter? You guys owned by the oil industry like the Administration?

Akbar Hashhemi Rafsanjani, now running for president of Iran, is saying the United States has been hostile toward his country for more than 30 years.

Why shouldn’t we be?

In January of 2001, Iran’s Ali Akbar Nateq-Nouri, top advisor to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, met with Imad Mugniyah in a secret bunker to plan closer cooperation between Iran and Al Qaeda. Mugniyah is a leading terrorist, works with Zawahiri, and is believed to have killed more Americans before 9/11 than any other terrorist.

In July of 2004, just before the 9/11 Commission report was to go to the printers, Philip Zelikow, the executive director, discovered a document from the U.S. intelligence agency that documented Iran’s ties to Al Qaeda in the months just before the September 11 attacks. The documents showed Iran was facilitating the travel of Al Qaeda operatives and falsifying travel documents. The Iranians were fully aware that they were helping operatives in an organization preparing attacks against the United States.

Wake up, Rafsanjani. Let’s get real. Who is hostile here? Unlike Iraq, Iran is actively engaged in war with the U.S.

It seems President Bush now has a “Viet Nam” on his hands.

The Gallup Organization now reports that 6 in 10 Americans - more than half - support troop reductions in Irag. -
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A Washington Post-ABC News Poll says that more than half of America believes the fight in Iraq has not made the United States safer.
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And here are the numbers from CBS - less than 50% Bush approval:
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President Bush has not been honest with us about Iraq:

1. We were told that Iraq had restarted its nuclear weapons program. It hadn’t.
2. We were told that Hussein was producing and stockpiling biological weapons. He wasn’t.
3. We were told that Bagdad was working with al Qaeda. Not until AFTER we went into Iraq.
4. Wilson was sent to Africa by both the CIA and State Department to find proof Africa was shipping uranium to Iraq. He found no uranium going to Iraq. His wife, a secret CIA agent, was outted and the report suppressed.

Please, Mr. President, get the solders home quickly and be honest with us. Remember the Powell Doctrine. Congress can take a lead here by taking a moving ahead where the Administration has failed us.

I use an Internet phone. Long distance calls are free, international calls are very low cost. Our business phone with Qwest was about 63 dollars a month. Our Internet phone (which is actually better quality) is only about $42 a month. If it were only a home phone, it would be about $15 a month. My cell phone is cheaper than my business phone - it’s only $30 a month.

The reason for the difference? The phone companies add a LOT of taxes and surcharges, which make up almost half the bill. The Internet phone doesn’t have these. We will cut loose from Qwest in less than a month for this reason. Now here are some tidbits:

• The phone companies want to raise the price of surcharges in an effort to bypass the control of the basic rates imposed by the state.
• Randy Leonard, a Portland city commissioner, is pulling a Dianne Linn and trying to impose a tax on Portland cell phones starting July 1, 2005. With the other commissioners, he hasn’t consulted the voters. Does he think the city voters are that dumb?
• There is also a lot of restlessness at the state level for the legislators to impose taxes on both the Internet and cell phones in an effort to help the struggling telcos that are competing with the low-cost Internet and cell phones.

Here’s another interesting fact: The utilities (Qwest, PGE, Northwest Pacific…) collect these taxes, but only a small part of what is collected is paid to the governments. In other words, what is billed to you as a tax is really a subsidy you are paying for the utility. It bypasses the rate control of the PUC. The utilities argue that their return to the investors is guaranteed, and if they didn’t raise the tax they would have to raise the rate. Come on, let’s get real. Change the rate structure to match what is happening. A utility tax should be a utility tax that goes to the government, not a subsidy that bypasses the rate control.

Warning message to these legislators:

• Don’t tax my Internet or cell phone. Let the telcos sink or swim on their own technology.
• Change laws if necessary so the existing taxes go to the government, not the utility.

We are in a Bush economy. Our phones, televisions, and cars come from Asia. America needs to be more competitive, and that won’t happen until legislators at the Federal, State, and City learn a few things about economics. More taxes is not the route.

It takes two-thirds of Congress, the President’s signature, and three-fourths of the states to change the Constitution - OR one judge.

In the past months we have seen the increasing tendancy of judical branch to become a kingdom to itself. In Colorado, a judge threw out a jury decision because a juror brought a Bible with her to help with her decision. In Florida a judge sentences Terri Schiavoi to death. It’s illegal to display the Ten Commandments in the courtroom. On May 2, Judge Ronald Alvarez in Florida allowed a 14-year old girl to kill her own baby by abortion. What next?

There is a critical need to restore the judical branch to conservative judges that can follow the Constitution. That is also President Bush’s attempt in nominating conservative judges. The Democrats apparently are trying to sabatoge this with a filibuster. This is not a partisan issue. It has to do with restoring what the writers of the Constitution intended. Write you Congressmen and women.

When you participate in your government - by letters, phone calls, emails, and blogs, you are embracing the true concept of democracy. When you don’t participate, you are following visions and goals set by others to a future set by others - one with which you may not agree.

Here is a great resource for getting those addresses at the Federal and State level for which you can sent your opinion. This takes some time to learn how to use, but with a little work you can find out what causes those you voted for represent and how they voted on various bills.

http://www.vote-smart.org

For example, most of my representatives in Congress and Legislature voted against the deficit and pork-loaded Federal Budget. The only exception was Gordon Smith. Senator Smith will get a letter.

During the first term of President Bush, federal spending increased 33% (TIME), and spending in 101 domesitic programs Congress vowed to eliminate increased 27%. Also, $89.4 million disbursed by the U.S. for Iraq reconstruction cannot be sufficiently account for.

Major inflation is already dogging the heels of American trapped in an economic depression. Gas prices have been the primary engine of the inflation, yet President Bush and company have done little and seem to know little about any solution or even the basics of economic reform. Both the President and Dick Cheney are oilmen at heart. There is little incentive for them to initiate any change that would hurt the profits of the oil companies.

Keeping the oil companies happy, however, is costing the American automotive companies a lot of money. These companies placed their bets on the SUVs, as these have the big profits. Now they find the public has a lot less interest in the SUVs with the price of gas skyrocketing. So now Wall Street gives their stock a junk rating. And that doesn’t help the rest of the stock market.

Here are a few interesting ideas:

1. Alberta, or friendly neighbor, has at least a third of the oil reserves of the Middle East. Why aren’t we using more of their oil instead of being cozy with a Crown Prince?
2. Why are we using so much oil? Most Americans drive no more than 20 miles on most days. Take a hybrid car and add a simple adapter to plug it in the wall at night and you have 500 miles a gallon for those days you don’t drive too much. This adds some to the price of the hybrid car, but the power companies would probably give you a rebate for the adapter. (See the next point for how to get that power.)
3. Open up the new oil field in Alaska - probable short term solution, but makes the oil companies happy.
4. Open up the strategic oil reserves. Only works if OPEC is not at full capacity. It would, however, be a short term solution.
5. End the war in Iraq, where they are doing a good job burning the oil reserves that’s left. That helps the oil companies, not us.

Look at the story of nuclear power in the U.S. The last nuclear plant here was ordered in 1973. Then there was the Three-Mile Island near-accident, Chernobyl, and more. These reactors were all built on a Generation I concept pioneered by Rickover that was based on a military model - the atomic submarine. Most of Europe gets almost 50% of its electricity from nuclear plants (Sweden is 45%, Belgium 58%, and France gets 75% of its electricity from nuclear energy). Modern plant design uses a passive safety control, with gravity used to shut down the reactor in the event of a problem.

China, however, is set to take a major leap in nuclear power generation. China took a nuclear plant model pioneered by Farrington Daniels (who help with the Manhattan Project). This model, known as the Pebble Reactor, was abandoned by Rickover who had military funding for the fuel rod model. The Pebble Reactor is inherently safe, can’t blow up, and is a LOT cheaper to build since it has no water coolant. It can also be built in a modular form. Buy a starter kit and add to it later. A small model is already operational in China and demonstrations show is simply can’t run away. Now here is the fun part. The waste product is nice, clean hydrogen, which could be used as fuel for hydrogen-based cars.

If I were President Bush, I’d start talking with these Chinese scientists and spend less time with the Crown Prince.

Change may be taking place, however, and it seems to be coming from Congress. A bipartisan group in Congress has been meeting the last month working on some alternative energy legislation. The group includes Jim Saxton (NJ) and Dennis Hastert. Watch what they brew up. Write your senators and congresspeople.

For more on the Pebble Reactor and China’s progress with it…See Wired, September, 2004