Trump Call to CPAC Translates to . . . Insurrection

   Donald Trump's address at the Conservative Political Action Conference?   It was a veiled insurrectionist speech.  "In 2016, I declared I am your voice, Today I add: I am your warrior, I am your justice -- and for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution. I will totally obliterate the deep state."

  You can drop the word "deep." What it amounts to is that he will totally obliterate the state. By the time we get done reflecting on what he means with the word "deep," we have great reason to believe it translates into the obliteration of American democracy.

  Deep state to Trump would be anyone who opposes him, including those who occupy positions in our government. When he says he will be the "warrior" for those who have been wronged and betrayed, who could he possibly be referring to? The Capitol rioters, maybe? Who else could he be referring to? Voters who he felt were defrauded? Certainly. And, he will be their "retribution"? He will "totally obliterate" . . . who?

  That who is anyone who gets in his way. And, by the time he is done providing retribution and obliterating them, America will no longer be a democracy. It will be a nation where, if you don't like the vote, you kick out the votes you don't like and call yourself the winner, anyway. 

  That would be dictator, not a president, and it is troubling to see that this nation might be headed that way. 

The Trail of Guns Through Our Entertainment Echoes in Our Streets

   The meme comes across Facebook: "My Netflix history makes it look like I'm studying to become a murderer."

  We laugh, but there is a somber warning underlying such words. Society is affected by TV and movies. "Go ahead -- Make my day," etc.

   When there's a trail of guns through our entertainment, it echoes in our streets.

Hey, Peter, Paul and Mary, the Answer Might Be Blowing in the Wind

    It's in the wind -- or should be. Only 2.6 percent of Utah's energy comes from wind, but the state has the capability of dancing up that number by 24 percent. 

   That would easily be more than half the electricity in the state. Why don't we punch this button and go? Tilt forward and ride like the wind? 

Eighty percent of the state's population lives along the Wasatch Front. And -- wouldn't you know it -- that's conveniently adjacent to the canyon winds. The question is, would acceptable sites be available? Would the natives, so to speak, be agreeable to wind farms? 

   Across the U.S. and around the world, wind power is the fastest-growing energy source. It isn't perfect. For one thing, some birds and bats are slaughtered by the turbines. And, it does require industrial efforts to clear the land, mold the towers, manufacture the blades, and transport them to their sites. And, oh, when after 30 years or however long their lifecycle is, there's the expense of hauling them off and getting rid of them.

  But, the urgency of reducing carbon emissions in our world suggests we should to turning to the wind. It is one of our cheapest and most green-worthy sources. No energy source is perfect, and none completely lacking CO2 emissions. But do with the best you've got.

  What is the answer to our energy needs? The answer might be blowing in the wind.

(Index -- Climate change info)

Climate Change: Here's a To-Do List for the State Legislature

   The automobile is the face of greenhouse emissions. Never mind that vehicles account for only 15.9 percent of the world's CO2 emissions. It's the gas-spewing, foul-air-creating car that gets the most blame.

   And, well it should, because 15.9 percent would be a nice chunk of pollution to get rid of. So, let's go ahead and blame the automobile -- and then do something about it. 

   And, since it takes government action to achieve these things, let's have our state government step in and help us. Let's have the legislature pass a law containing 17 provisions. When we are done and finished, CO2 pollution will have been significantly reduced. 

1. Require all gas stations to have charging ports for EVs.

2. Allow EVs and other non-polluting cars in HOV lanes. 

3. Mandate up-front parking spaces be made available for EVs and other non-polluting vehicles. No, natural gas vehicles do not qualify as they do cause pollution.

4. Set a date for when gasoline and diesel cars will be taken off  the road, as California did.

5. Increase the sales tax on gas and diesel. 

6. Create a special tax on the sale of new fossil-fuel vehicles.

7. Drop the sales tax on EVs and other non-polluting vehicles.

8. Drop the registration, title, and plate fees on EVs and other non-polluting vehicles.

9. Subsidize the purchase of new EVs and other non-polluting vehicles to match the amount that is recovered from the increased taxes on fossil-fuel cars. 

10. Ban advertising on gasoline and diesel vehicles. 

11. Advertise, recognize and praise the top-selling EV (and other non-polluting) car dealerships each month. By doing so, you reward them and encourage them to sell even more. 

12. Provide free advertising for the least expensive EVs (and other non-polluting vehicles) on the road, mentioning the dealership where the cars are being sold. Since it will bring them free advertising, the companies hopefully will drop their prices to get this recognition and advertising. 

13. Undertake a public relation campaign to rally the public behind non-polluting cars and green energy. Make sure that the urgency of removing fossil-fuel cars is made clear to the public.  

14. Fund the cost of retrofitting existing cars with electric engines. Don't buy the engine for the public, but fund the work it takes to do the refitting. 

15. Provide "community cars" -- non-polluting, of course -- to the poor. Buy cars for them that are to be shared by, say, three families living in the same neighborhood. This might seem a large expense, but of the items on this list, it might be the most important. EVs are expensive, and if you get rid of gas and diesel cars, the poor will not be able to afford an EV.

16. The last two items would be funded by a carbon tax. Industrial companies would be taxed according to how much pollution they emit into the air. 

17. Accelerate the decommissioning of coal-fired power plants and their replacement with power plants that rely on solar power, wind power, and other green, non-polluting sources. When the electric vehicle is recharged, it is dependent on the power plants. So, to keep the carbon footprint at zero, those recharges need to coming from green energy sources.

(Index -- Climate change info)

Yesterday Is Not Soon Enough if We Are to Go with EVs by 2025

   It would almost be right to outlaw the sale of any new gasoline or diesel cars for as early as 2025.

   Almost, but not quite. While the urgency of getting rid of fossil-fuel cars is that great, our ability to switch over that fast to non-fossil fuel power plants would be difficult. In Utah, roughly 60 percent of our electricity comes from coal-fired power plants. We must put conversion to green power plants ahead of conversion to green cars. Here's why:

   1. Recharging batteries requires CO2 to be released into the air if the recharge is being supplied by a coal-fired power plant. Thus, it becomes important to get solar, wind, or whatever power plants in production before you switch to electric vehicles.

   2.) The switch to EVs is going to put a far greater burden on the power grid. People are not just plugging into the grid for their TVs and refrigerators and such, but now they are also plugging in for their EVs. That's a much larger draw. I do not know if studies have been done to determine how much more electricity will be needed, but it would not surprise me if the burden would increase as much as half again. Thus, it becomes important to get more power plants up, period, regardless if they are fossil fuel plants. 

   So, outlaw new gasoline cars come 2025? No, the first order of business is to get new, fossil fuel-free power plants online post haste. And, by poste haste I mean post haste. Don't dillydally; don't delay. New, not-already-in-the-works hydro power plants cannot be brought online by 2025, nor can they be brought online nearly fast enough to meet our quickly approaching needs. That leaves solar and wind, and perhaps other sources. We need to prioritize getting them online

   We should consult with the indigenous people for whatever power plants will be on their land, or land they use and land that has sacred history to them. If they say, 'no,' then we should move on to another site.

  But, we must expedite this. The approval process should be streamlined to allow the building of them to commence no later than a year from now. Then, all the fossil fuel-power plants can be decommissioned. While, in Utah, Rocky Mountain Power is phasing out carbon-creating power plants (including a notable reduction this year), the plan is to keep some of them in use as late as 2042. In my book, that's much too late. 

    The idea of outlawing gasoline and diesel vehicles by 2025 is not my own. I read it in a book in a statement by Seth Klein, team lead with the Climate Emergency Unit and author of A Good War: Mobilizing Canada for the Climate Emergency. But, if we want to convert to electric (and other green-sourced) cars by anything near to 2025, we have a lot of work to do. 

   We should do it, and do it ASAP. 

(Index -- Climate change info)

Something so Simple as That Is a Knock on Our Little Electric Car?

   One of the biggest knocks left on electric vehicles would be easy to remove. 

  You can't leave town if you own an electric? You can't travel? You can't vacation? There simply aren't enough places where you can recharge? You spend more time locating recharging stations than you do finding places to eat? 

   Now. if you will allow me, let me joke for a moment: This is all a good thing, not a bad. The plus side to this supposed "problem" is that we are going to prevent a massive amount of pollution.  Eight percent of all CO2 released into the air comes from tourism, including that from jets and boats. (I'm not joking there -- serious.) Why would we want to solve this "problem"? It is not a problem; it's a blessing. Bring it on. Once all out-of-town travel is brought to a screech, we will have gone a long ways towards putting a skid on greenhouse emissions. 

   As I said, though, I joke. Of course we need need to allow people to travel.

   But, the solution to recharge stations is simple, simple, simple. After carrying on needlessly with joking for almost all of this blog, I can state it in one sentence what it would take to make it so there were plenty enough charging places. I'll leave you to argue, but there are no good arguments against this: 

  Require every gas station to have at least one electric vehicle charging station. 

(Index -- Climate change info)

If Our Leaders Don't Believe, then That's a Problem

   As the argument goes, we don't have to live by the Paris Acccords because it takes two-thirds of the Senate to enter into a foriegn treaty -- and President Biden didn't even seek Senate approval; he figured executive order was quite enough.

  All I'll say is that if that is standing in the way of public approval of the Paris Accords, the Senate should be rushing to vote on and approve the agreement. Every senator should be saying, Oh, no, don't you lay this on me. Make no mistake. I do favor the Paris Agreement. I am in favor of it.

   They should be saying, Mr. President, don't leave us out of this. Don't you try to hog all the credit. We also want to save the planet. Anything we can do to help, we want to be part of.

   Truth be told, it is very possible that if put to a vote, the Paris Agreement would not be approved. Why? Because not everyone is onboard with the notion that climate change is a problem. Perhaps not even close. It might well be there are almost a third of our senators who disbelieve in climate change.

   And, that's a problem.

   If the top legislators of the nation that other nations turn to for leadership do not favor fighting climate change -- if so many of them disbelieve in global warming -- how do we expect we will ever dodge the bullet and survive global warming?

   If this were sports, and we rounded up some players who didn't even care about the game, that would be a problem. It's a silly game to them and they have better things to do.

   If we are going to solve the climate change crisis, we need our leaders onboard. If the people doing the leading don't even believe, don't expect them to do much leading. If they don't believe in the cause, the cause is really in trouble.

(Index -- Climate change info)