Change.gov

Comment

Comment by Robert Schultz on September 10, 2009 at 10:00am

The Mad as Hell Doctors passed through Spokane, WA yesterday.
Just posted this discussion earlier today...

http://pickensplan.ning.com/forum/topics/mad-as-hell-doctors-the

Mad as Hell
You CAN handle the Truth
There's no nice way to say it. The financial cost of health care is killing our citizens, hobbling our economy, crushing small business, and threatening the solvency of our government. In the meantime, the Health Care Industry is spending almost two million dollars a day lobbying Congress and manipulating public opinion to accept “reform” legislation that leaves a vicious, for-profit system intact. The "public option" is a trap. We need real reform that finds immediate savings, controls costs, and accomplishes the moral imperative of true Universal Access. A Single Payer plan is the only real path to a Health Care System that is socially, ethically and fiscally responsible. And yet, our elected officials refuse to even discuss the possibility of a Single Payer plan!
If that doesn't make you mad, we recommend checking your pulse.

Comment by www.41WorldUSA.com on July 30, 2009 at 8:41am

Dear Friends of America, Change, Obama, Pickens and 41 World USA -
Dr. Steven Chu and U.S. Department of Energy provided additional stimulus funds to the States Offices of Energy Independence. For example, our Governor of Wisconsin, The Hon. Jim Doyle, announced Monday millions in new State and Federal matching funds for Green Manufacturing Jobs. We have Wisconsin connections and information on file if you are interested. WI is #15 Green State in USA moving up.

1) Clean Energy Pickens Plan - we are active in Pickens Plan and in our local WIS-MIN bi-states and Regional 5 States WI-MN-IA-IL-MI Clean Energy Groups as proponents of a Clean Green Energy Future
in Wind/Solar/hydro alternatives, hybrids. We had a face to face with our State Senator on Friday.

2) Healthcare for All-Americans - we support U.S President Barack Obama, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius in Healthcare Change. We attended local WI Regional Healthcare meetings this week in Eau Claire, La Crosse, Madison, Milwaukee and Green Bay. We met and spoke with Tommy Thompson Friday.

Alternative Clean Energy and Healthcare Plans are both equally important in the long run in concepts, needs, and financially for Americans, our States, Country and the World we all live in and share. We hope our good friends on T Boone Pickens Plan are having a spectacular summer! Our family is visiting from New York. We will be travelling to Pike's Peak Colorado Springs, CO this Friday to Sunday.

Best in Success! - Suzanne, Paul, Michael & 41 World USA Global Company "For One World and Future..." www.41WorldUSA.com
Home: LSE American Eagle USA 2100 Wind/Solar/hydro Home: USA WeCare Healthcare Admin.

Comment by Mike Anthony Fernald Sr. on July 28, 2009 at 4:49pm

VOTE FOR ME & CHUCK :o}

Chuck can roundhouse Kick em out the door :O}

Comment by Paul on July 28, 2009 at 7:19am

The only change I'm hoping for is the ouster of *every* incumbent Congressman, Senator, and Executive, at the soonest possible election cycle!

We could have a completely fresh start in as little as 6 years! I could pick 535 random people off the street of a dozen major cities and they couldn't do any worse than the existing government has.

That's change we can believe in!

Comment by Barry M. Duggan on May 12, 2009 at 9:39pm

Howdy, my friends,
Well, interesting day-- spoke with a solar photovoltaic sales guy today, who was more skittish about explaing how to reel in a sale maybe because he is afraid to share the market. Or maybe he has swine foo. It really pissed me off how he had to explain to the former heating and air tech who used to build passive solar homes complete with cooling tubes et al, how difficult it would be for me a realtor of less than 10 years, to lay out an installation job for say, a Home Depot. REC Solar is targetting Kohl Dept stores and self storage places left and right, but try and offer a solution to this slow economy complete with state $ as well, and ... who is he really working for Exxon ??? GEEZ !!
That's it, I'm callin' REC. Ever heard Sir Francis Drake's motto-- Sic Parvis Magna-- Great things have small beginnings.

Comment by Cheryl Shuman on May 12, 2009 at 3:12pm

Thank you so much for inviting me to join your group! I'm looking forward to making a difference and getting to know all of you.

Kindest Personal Regards,
Cheryl Shuman
Beverly Hills, CA

Comment by Mike Anthony Fernald Sr. on April 2, 2009 at 3:56am

By Stephen Pizzo, News for Real
Posted on April 1, 2009, Printed on April 1, 2009
http://www.alternet.org/story/134392/I

I voted for Barack Obama, and I continue to wish him nothing but success. But I have to admit his and Tim Geithner's solution to the banking crisis is exactly the wrong solution. The administration seems to believe the best thing to do is to throw the drunken "money center" bankers into detox, hose them off and put them back in the game.

It's a bit like asking ExxonMobil to run the Environmental Protection Agency, or appointing Charles Keating to head the General Accounting Office.

The strange thing is that others in the administration, particularly those tasked with straightening out the auto industry, are taking the opposite -- and correct -- tact. They fired the head of GM and cleaned out GM's board of directors for good measure.

That's how you begin fixing stuff that's broke -- first you get rid of the folks who broke it. What you don't do is hand them billions of free bucks, a hearty slap on the back and a rousing "Now, go get 'em tiger!" (Because they will.)

But that's precisely what the administration is doing for America's failed money center banks. The nation's largest banks are often referred to as money market banks or money center banks.

In addition to the traditional markets, to be a money center bank today means to have a global presence as well as heavy involvement in wholesale banking with clients including many retail banks and large corporations. Citibank, JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America fit this description. Here's a list of America's leading money center banks.

So, it appears we will have to take matters into our own hands. By "we" I mean anyone with a checking account, savings account or certificates of deposit. That, my friends, would be you. You are up at bat, and we're counting on you.

What we need to do is force the administration to do to these tumorlike institutions -- currently hiding behind the myth they are "too big to fail" -- what they just did to GM. Tell them that, since taxpayers are now major stakeholders, they must fire their senior management and either clean up the mess they made or face immediate seizure and liquidation.

And just how are you going to force such a change? It's just this simple:


1) If you bank with any of these money center banks, withdraw your funds immediately

2) Go to this site and find an independent community bank in your area and deposit your funds there instead. (Credit unions are another excellent and safe alternative to banking a money center bank.)


That's it. That's the whole enchilada. The outflow of what bankers call "retail funds," if large enough, will become the final straw that breaks the backs of these bulls in our fiscal china shop.

But, you ask, will my money be safe in a small, community bank?

Of course it will be safe, just as safe, maybe safer, than it was at Citibank or BofA. First, community banks are covered by exactly the same deposit insurance as money center banks. But beyond that, community bankers are community bankers. They live in the communities they serve. They know their towns. And, most importantly, they know their borrowers.

Community banks are, for the most part, the last remaining healthy sector of American banking. If they are hurting at all, it's because their customers are losing their jobs, not because they lent a godzillion dollars to some fly-by-night schemer or invested in anything with an AIG logo on it.

A good community banker's definition of a toxic asset is more along the lines of Farmer Jones' wrecked pickup on which the bank holds the paper.

So, if you are customer of one of those money center banks, institutions currently hoarding hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer bailout funds, walk right in, sit right down and tell them you want the dough that still has your name on it, and you want it now.

Otherwise these tumor-banks will survive Geithner's weak-kneed chemo treatments to emerge intact to pillage another day.

I don't know if what I am suggesting is legal or not. I remember back in 1983, when I wrote my first story about how a savings and loan was using deregulation to put taxpayers at risk. The thrift's lawyers contacted me at the paper and warned me that they were going monitor withdrawals and, if there were a lot of customers withdrawing their money, they ask that I be arrested and charge with breaking a federal law -- still on the books -- that made it illegal to spark a run on a bank.

I took my chances then, and was proved right. I'll take my chances again. So, run baby. Run.

Stephen Pizzo is the author of numerous books, including Inside Job: The Looting of America's Savings and Loans, which was nominated for a Pulitzer.

© 2009 News for Real All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/134392

Comment by Michael Shawn Kendall on March 21, 2009 at 10:42am

Hello Ralph, If anyone looked at a sun belt map for the USA they would see that it extends to West Texas and a portion of West Texas is just as fine as California. California has the worst credit rating out of all 50 states. If they don't want to create jobs then lets take the solar to West Texas where they will appreciate it. It is about time for that region to get into the solar game. Texas has already surpassed California in wind and now it is time for them to do it in solar. Don't get me wrong, I think it would be outstanding if California developed it's renewable energy potential even greater than what it is but I tend to agree with you on politicians at the federal level. It basically gets down to the saying "united we stand and divided we fall". Unfortunately, I also believe that the people are not being educated enough on our real problems. Here is a link I started for California Energy Independence Savings bonds. Maybe you can be the second person to join:
California State Energy Independence Savings Bonds group on facebook
Best Regards, Mike

Comment by Ralph J Branscomb on March 21, 2009 at 9:56am

Feinstein: Don't Spoil Our Desert With Solar Panels / This is the "Change" we are going to receive?


Sen. Dianne Feinstein said development of solar and wind facilities in California's Mojave Desert would violate the spirit of what conservationists had intended when they donated much of the land to the public. Unfortunately, the average person in support of ALTERNATIVE ENERGY RESOUCES INCLUDING SOLAR POWER have not experienced or are naive to What this current congress is really about, They can meet with you in the morning to discuss helping save terminally ill individuals in the morning, receive a large donation from an Medical Insurance lobbyist at Noon, and give the orders to pull the plug on all of the individuals the told you they would support in the morning,,,, I have unfortunately had the position to deal with the majority of these congress people over the past 15 years and can tell you from experience that they will attend and say that they support your Solar Power Rally in the Morning and take your contribution checks, and that evening be at some extreme environmental groups meeting in the evening supporting them in preventing the installation of Soar Panels anywhere ! EVEN IN THE DESERT!! We have only one choice if we are to be successful in bringing Energy Independence to the USA.. REMOVE ALL INCUMBENTS / NO EXCEPTIONS from office for the next 4 years and vote in people that are from our plan team and truly in support of our Energy Plans for the GOOD of the USA not for personal gain..


WASHINGTON -- California's Mojave Desert may seem ideally suited for solar energy production, but concern over what several proposed projects might do to the aesthetics of the region and its tortoise population is setting up a potential clash between conservationists and companies seeking to develop renewable energy.
Nineteen companies have submitted applications to build solar or wind facilities on a parcel of 500,000 desert acres, but Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Friday such development would violate the spirit of what conservationists had intended when they donated much of the land to the public.
Feinstein said Friday she intends to push legislation that would turn the land into a national monument, which would allow for existing uses to continue while preventing future development.
The Wildlands Conservancy orchestrated the government's purchase of the land between 1999-2004. It negotiated a discount sale from the real estate arm of the former Santa Fe and Southern Pacific Railroad and then contributed $40 million to help pay for the purchase. David Myers, the conservancy's executive director, said the solar projects would do great harm to the region's desert tortoise population.
"It would destroy the entire Mojave Desert ecosystem," said David Myers, executive director of The Wildlands Conservancy.
Feinstein said the lands in question were donated or purchased with the intent that they would be protected forever. But the Bureau of Land Management considers the land now open to all types of development, except mining. That policy led the state to consider large swaths of the land for future renewable energy production.

"This is unacceptable," Feinstein said in a letter to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar. "I urge you to direct the BLM to suspend any further consideration of leases to develop former railroad lands for renewable energy or for any other purpose."
In a speech last year, Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger complained about environmental concerns slowing down the approval of solar plants in California.
"If we cannot put solar power plants in the Mojave desert, I don't know where the hell we can put it," Schwarzenegger said at Yale University.
But Karen Douglas, chairman of the California Energy Commission, said Feinstein's proposal could be a "win-win" for energy and conservation. The governor's office said Douglas was speaking on the administration's behalf.
"The opportunity we see in the Feinstein bill is to jump-start our own efforts to find the best sites for development and to come up with a broader conservation plan that mitigates the impact of the development," Douglas said.
Douglas said that if the national monument lines were drawn without consideration of renewable energy then a conflict was likely, but it's early enough in the planning process that she's confident the state will be able to get more solar and wind projects up and running without hurting the environment.
"We think we can do both," Douglas said. "We think this is an opportunity to accelerate both."
Greg Miller of the Bureau of Land Management said there are 14 solar energy and five wind energy projects that have submitted applications seeking to develop on what's referred to as the former Catellus lands. None of the projects are close to being approved, he said.
The land lies in the southeast corner of California, between the existing Mojave National Preserve on the north and Joshua Tree National Park on the south.
"They all have to go through a rigorous environmental analysis now," Miller said. "It will be at best close to two years out before we get some of these grants approved."
Feinstein's spokesman, Gil Duran, said the senator looks forward to working with the governor and the Interior Department on the issue.
"There's plenty of room in America's deserts for the bold expansion of renewable energy projects," Duran said.

Comment by Eric Lykins on March 19, 2009 at 4:55am

At http://www.justmeans.com/challenge/climate Green Mountain Coffee Roasters is making four separate grants-each for $200,000, payable over 5 years, to support work on reducing climate change. There will be one grant in each of four focus areas:

- Threats to Coffee-Growing Communities
- Transportation-Related Emissions
- Building Political Will
- Empowering Individual Action

The idea with the most votes so far in the Empowering Individual Action category (and overall) is Clean Energy Victory Bonds

The pitch:
President Obama is promoting green jobs and clean energy as solutions to our economic and climate change crises. The stimulus package is a good start, but funding for clean energy is still scarce in the midst of a global recession and credit crisis. At a presidential debate last fall, someone asked, "What can we do?" Green America's answer: invest in Clean Energy Victory Bonds (CEVB). Modeled on successful WWII-era Victory War Bonds that raised $185 billion ($2 trillion in today's dollars) and engaged over 85 million Americans who bought bonds that started at $25, CEVB would offer ordinary Americans federal government bonds that would fund large-scale deployment of clean energy. CEVB would pay an annual interest rate, with the payback based in part on the energy and energy savings the bonds generate. Green America and Clean Edge are teaming up to promote this idea, mobilize an advocacy coalition, and produce new research on this and other potential clean energy funding models.

All ideas and grant applications must be submitted by 12:00 AM EST on Saturday March 21, 2009. The overall results of the comments and views expressed on JustMeans will be taken into account, along with other posted criteria, in selecting final award winners.

• First
• Previous
• Next
• Last