This is a long video but worth watching (there are audio issues, but they go away in the first third of the video). It is more current than the last T. Boone Pickens video which we posted. I was put up on the Pickens Plan site on September 17 from Boone’s appearance the Future is Green Conference and Expo on September 15 - the direct link to the article is “We have the natural gas, why don’t we have more vehicles on natural gas?”

I think there were some great questions asked by the audience and it was good to hear Boone’s responses.  I think it is amazing that most politicians are “chasing their tails” by going after the most ineffective ways to solve this issue.

We are facing so many issues right now as a nation, it would be great to see the United States actually unite behind something that would benefit everybody and not special interests or unfair capital advantage - I think it is also very interesting that we are spending $700 Billion per year to import foreign oil at the same time the government spends $700 Billion to nationalize a bunch of irresponsible businesses to keep them afloat for some aloof benefit to the taxpayer which we will never really realize - but I digress… the point being that if we weren’t pissing our money away funding the lifestyles of the rich and infamous in the Middle East, perhaps, the $700 Billion the Fed and the Government say that we need right now for our economy would be a little easier to swallow - but you but these 2 numbers together and now we are at $1.4 Trillion dollars this year - for what???  Nothing but programs which weaken us as a nation… I love America and the people here - whether they share my views or agree with me or not - but, we have seriously got to wake up - or what will be left for our grandchildren?

With all the negative stuff floating around about the economy and AIG and everything else - I think a dose of Tony Robbins is what is called for… Enjoy!

Check out the Insurance Journal article about AIG - I commented on the article and here is a recap:

I cannot believe they are getting a bailout for being irresponsible! They screwed up and now are going to screw many of us out of more money in the form of $85,000,000,000 - that is what $85 Billion looks like… not so nice when you write it with all the zeros, eh?

They have been buying business in my State (Texas) on the P&C side with total disregard for their loss ratios and in effect making it VERY difficult for companies who are trying to improve their loss ratios to win business - but I guess they don’t have to worry because the government will just bail them out… total B.S.!

They should be allowed to go the way of the dinosaur and let companies that ARE responsible earn their book as it disintigrates… why would we “bail out” a company which has proven that it only knows how to mishandle the funds that have been entrusted to it… I totally don’t buy the, “They’re too big to fail.” balony! Nobody and NOTHING is too big to fail… they fail if they deserve to, ESPECIALLY if they have done the things that this company has chosen to do!

This whole situation SUCKS!  What do you think?

Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog

I know it is not Friday, but this is a hilarious and entertaining movie by Joss Whedon, starring Neil Patrick Harris, Nathan Fillion and Felicia Day (of YouTube’s The Guild fame - at least that is where I was first introduced to her).

Enjoy and comment!

Check out the video above… I saw this while getting my dose of Pickens news today - The story at TheDailyPickens says:

<blockquote>The ads have been “cleared” by every network… except for NBC which has refused to clear a :15 second ad about Iran…The problem? NBC wants us to PROVE that “we’re not doing a thing here.”</blockquote>

I’m not sure that NBC could be missing the point more…

T. Boone Pickens is peddling a plan called, very imaginatively, The Pickens Plan to save America from our dependence on foreign oil - is this for real, just a bunch of hot air, or worse?

According to the video on the left, the United States is in BIG trouble - we are transferring $700 Billion to foreign entities to purchase oil - that is Billion with a B folks! And it is per year… what a staggering number? Can you even imagine such a big number, try this on… $700 Billion looks like this… $700,000,000,000 - According to an ABC News Article, dated March 10, 2008, “Studies: Iraq Costs US $12B Per Month“- if we multiply that by 12, that is $144 Billion per year… not much when compared to the $700 Billion we are spending on foreign oil… Now, read this carefully… really let it soak in - Every year we are transferring just under 5 (4.86) times that amount for foreign oil outside of our country PER YEAR - or another way to put it - we could fight almost 5 wars as big as the Iraqi war for what we are spending on foreign oil EVERY YEAR! This has got to be the definition of insanity - Even another way to put this, which is maybe more scary is that we are sending out enough dollars to effectively fund 5 other countries to fight against us with the same budget in the Iraqi war…

There are some conspiracy theorists out there who suggest that this whole effort is a “cover” for Boone’s aquifer projects… and, you know what? It could be… I don’t have an answer to that - but I will say that the MUCH bigger issue is the United States transferring $7 Trillion dollars outside of our country over ten years! At the end of the day, I would suggest that if his company makes money on an aquifer project by getting us off of foreign oil, I think it could be looked at as fair commission for solving the much larger issue our country faces.

$700 Billion Dollars per year going OUT of our country and, for the most part into the hands of countries which hate America and want nothing more than to see the United States fall is insane - could we please agree on that?

What I appreciate about this approach is that Boone not only shows us how we got here, but he shows a way for us to get ourselves out of this mess. If you check out his site, and watch his messages the idea is to do ANYTHING and EVERYTHING we can to get off of foreign oil - solar power, wind power, offshore drilling, renewable energy, etc.

To me it seems that you can never make the crazy environmentalists happy (I did not say all environmentalists, I said the “crazy” ones *grins*). If you drill for oil so you don’t have to use FOOD to power the world, they complain; if you try to use renewable crops for fuel they complain that people are starving; if you say we can use the wind they try to frame some other negative picture - this group of people NEVER offer solutions which are applicable to the world we live in, just criticism and no answers…

T. Boone Pickens is putting up his own money and is not saying that wind is the only way. Boone’s Pickens Plan primarily focuses on swapping Wind for Natural Gas though, and I would say that one of the biggest pieces the Pickens Plan is missing is that we should also push for grants to companies like GM, Ford & Chrysler to create fully electric cars - screw hybrids and screw bailing them out, if all they are going to do is continue to make vehicles which continue to only run on oil - that doesn’t help! I would totally support grants to create fully electric cars which we can plug into our homes - in that way, we do not have to worry about the “infrastructure” debate which has raged for the last 20 years. This technology is also here today… in fact it was here in 1996 by GM, it was called the EV1 - and my belief is that if we can put a man on the moon in 4 years, in the span of 12 years, we sure as heck can create an electric car which has a range of 300 - 400 miles and can go 100 mph which can be plugged into a normal 120V outlet with a recharge time of less than 3 hours… In fact, if GM had spent the last 12 years perfecting their original design of the EV1, they would probably not be in front of Congress asking the American people to bail them out…

The way I see it, our dependence on foreign oil to fuel our vehicles (Cement Trucks, Rail Road Engines, as well as passenger vehicles) has become a matter of national security and I think it is a horrible thing that all we can do is continue to criticize each other instead of agreeing that ANYTHING is better than funding our enemies to the tune of $7 TRILLION over the next 10 years… Just think what our economy could do with an extra $7 Trillion dollars in 10 years… or more practically how many jobs GM, Ford, or Chrysler would be able to do create with people driving electric cars powered by electricity made here in America.

It is also exciting to think about what could happen as we started to export wind generated electricity offshore… America’s economy could become untouchable again!

Find more videos like this on PickensPlanI believe that our country, The United States of America has been the best country in the world and can be again if we only take the time and commit to doing the hard work it will take to get us there - By far, I think the hardest work we face is to be UNITED again, - We all know that there are folks who just want to watch America burn and the way they do that is by dividing us and pitting us against each other. Let’s take one small step and agree to unite and support T. Boone Picken’s Plan plan, because although it may not be perfect it sure as hell is better than where we find ourselves today!

Christian the Lion, Who Thought He Was People is a great documentary about Christian, Boy, Katania (the Lions) and Anthony (Ace) Bourke (incorrectly named in this clip and incorrectly named by all if not most of the media outlets, as Ace Berg - I wish they would get their research right…), John Rendall, Terence Adamson & George Adamson (the People). A few weeks ago a great video (embedded in this article) was put up on YouTube which has touched millions of people. It has been shown on many major network shows and is an extremely uplifting video, the comment about Christian being “completely wild” did not seem to me to be 100% truthful, although, it is close enough and the message is wonderful.

You can view the full documentary in 10 parts, also on YouTube, which was put up by somebody called Irridescent.

It is a great story which seems to have inspired so many people positively, I thought I would highlight it here.  One final note, please visit the Born Free: Keep Wildlife in the Wild Blog to see how you can help the folks and the foundation which was responsible for all of the great efforts and work it took to reintroduce Christian to Africa.  Will Travers, CEO of the Born Free Foundation posts a note on the above video in the blog here.

Note from Will Travers regarding Christian’s story:

Born Free does not advocate the keeping of any wild animal as a ‘pet’. Christian’s story was from another era and was unique. Today we must do all we can to ‘keep wildlife in the wild’.John Rendall is based in the UK and still supports wildlife conservation both with Born Free and with the George Adamson Wildlife Preservation Trust. Ace now lives in Australia.

Christian lived the life of a free, successful lion, in and around the Kora area until he was seen no more. It was assumed by George Adamson that he had crossed over the Tana River and out of the Reserve.

My family and I have been trying to get to church about twice a month recently.  Some new clients and friends go to the Shoreline Christian Center here in Austin, Texas and have invited us to go the past couple of times.

It is a massive … *ahem* MASSIVE church - tons of people so if you were inclined you could easily feel as if you would get lost in there, but for the most part it still has a tight knit feel.  For the last couple of weeks the regular pastor and his family have been on vacation, so there was a guest speaker, Keith Craft from Celebration Covenant Church in Frisco Texas.

This fellow was unique, hilarious and had a genuine spirit about him that I really enjoyed.  He had some tough words but also some really great and uplifting ideas and messages that he passed to me and that I needed to hear.

He combined audience participation with a wonderful sense of humor to allow folks to hear what he was trying to tell them - and in the end this is a great gift.   Again, because Randy Pausch is, of course, on my mind a lot recently - I remember his dissertation on Confessions of a Recovering Jerk and notice that Keith does not have to worry about whether or not he will impact people because he has mastered the ability to help people to listen by being genuine and vulnerable when he speaks.

What I took from his message on Sunday was that our relationship with God is not dependant on whether or not we will fall, but on the fact that we will fall and that one of the Secrets of Gods Kingdom is that when we choose to “push up” and get up we become stronger.  This is a simple and obvious message, but one worth repeating - when we choose to get up we become stronger…

What will you choose today?

Pastor Keith Craft ends his sermons this way with a blessing and I hope this blesses you today!

May the Lord Bless you and the Lord keep you;
May the Lord make his face to shine upon you;
May you know that if God is for you, who can be against you?
If God is on your side, whom shall you fear?
May you be like a tree that is planted by rivers of living water;
that your leaf will not wither, and
whatsoever you do, it shall prosper!

As many of you know Randy Pausch died last Friday, July 25, 2008.  I did not know him or his family, but like many of you, his spirit captured my attention after I watched his “Last Lecture” on YouTube.

I have gone back and forth over the past few days, trying to decide if I would write anything… as you can see, I did decide to write a bit.

Over the past couple of weeks a message has been coming through very clear to me - it is an exciting message, one that says, “if you wish it…”  Randy has inspired this thought and feeling even stronger in me and I want to thank him, and those who are close to him for supporting that message through him.

It may seem trite, but I like these sayings which encapsulate moments of greatness - and I think this message which I heard last week on America’s Got Talent goes hand in hand with Randy’s philosophy - “I don’t know how long I’ll last, but I’m here today!”

What a great blessing… Well, Professor Randy Pausch, Goodbye and So Long - of course, you will be missed, thank you for choosing to sew those nets for all of us.