Kitchen

Olympic low VOC satin “Gold Buff” B14-3

Nanho Blue Butterfly Bush (Buddleia davidii ‘Nanho Blue’)

Full Moon Coreopsis (Coreopsis verticillata ‘Full Moon’)

Go download Jad and install it.  Then unzip your jar file:

unzip sourcefile.jar

This command will decompile all the .class files in source_dir and put the new files in target_dir with a .java file extension on them.

jad -o -r -sjava -dtarget_dir 'source_dir/**/*.class'

Michael Moore has a plan.

In short:

1. APPOINT A SPECIAL PROSECUTOR TO CRIMINALLY INDICT ANYONE ON WALL STREET WHO KNOWINGLY CONTRIBUTED TO THIS COLLAPSE.
2. THE RICH MUST PAY FOR THEIR OWN BAILOUT.
3. BAIL OUT THE PEOPLE LOSING THEIR HOMES, NOT THE PEOPLE WHO WILL BUILD AN EIGHTH HOME.
4. IF YOUR BANK OR COMPANY GETS ANY OF OUR MONEY IN A “BAILOUT,” THEN WE OWN YOU.
5. ALL REGULATIONS MUST BE RESTORED. THE REAGAN REVOLUTION IS DEAD.
6. IF IT’S TOO BIG TO FAIL, THEN THAT MEANS IT’S TOO BIG TO EXIST.
7. NO EXECUTIVE SHOULD BE PAID MORE THAN 40 TIMES THEIR AVERAGE EMPLOYEE, AND NO EXECUTIVE SHOULD RECEIVE ANY KIND OF “PARACHUTE” OTHER THAN THE VERY GENEROUS SALARY HE OR SHE MADE WHILE WORKING FOR THE COMPANY.
8. STRENGTHEN THE FDIC AND MAKE IT A MODEL FOR PROTECTING NOT ONLY PEOPLE’S SAVINGS, BUT ALSO THEIR PENSIONS AND THEIR HOMES.
9. EVERYBODY NEEDS TO TAKE A DEEP BREATH, CALM DOWN, AND NOT LET FEAR RULE THE DAY.
10. CREATE A NATIONAL BANK, A “PEOPLE’S BANK.”

During the last week or so, I’ve been leaning toward approval of the $700 billion bailout plan.  I was, that is, until I heard Dennis Kucinich speak on Rachel Maddow’s new show.

I completely agree with his point that the current Paulson package is a top-down solution.  It’s directed at those top 400 people Michael Moore mentioned.  And I, like Representative Kucinich, am a Democrat, and don’t believe in trickle-down economics.  So let’s declare the Reagan Revolution dead.  Let’s use this opportunity to cut off the welfare queens at the top, and start legislating to improve the lot of those who actually need assistance.

Mother Earth News article with some numbers so that you can respond to people who think we can drill our way out of our current energy crisis.  I, like Al Gore, believe that the whole dependance on foreign oil position is a red herring.  The problem isn’t that it’s foreign, the problem is that it’s oil.  And coal.  And yes, natural gas.  That’s why I was even more pleased to see that the linked article included recommendations that didn’t involve fossil fuels at all.

With the increasing production and modification of plug-in cars, vehicles could eventually be powered, at least partly so, from energy obtained through wind turbines. Here’s an article about this very concept.

This one in particular is something I’ve been touting for a long time.  I feel that any of the current forms of energy are like drugs:  the supply side is small, provides limited access and can set prices however they like.  You also have no choice but go to them to get the product.  The fact that ethanol, bio-diesel, CNG and hydrogen all fit this same model is surely no mistake.  I’m sure the oil companies understand this, and will jockey to write legislation that supports this model.

No, I think that until we can break this model we are screwed.  And the best and easiest way to do it (we currently have all the technology available, too) is to create incentives for residential and commercial solar and wind and plug-in electric and hybrid transport.  The key to this model is that the energy production is home- or business-sized, and not generated at a central location and distrubuted long-distance.  No more pusher.