I’ve singled Germany out for criticism on enviornmental policy for a few reasons:

1. The party in power is known as the “Green” party and is supposedly founded on a policy of being environmentally friendly and touts itself as being for ecologically friendly policies.

2. The Germany government has spent billions and billions on “renewable” energy sources, making it the largest installer of solar and one of the largest in wind. This has been the most public face of the enviornmental and energy policy.

3. They have been 100% opposed to nuclear power. Not only have they decided not to consider nuclear energy as part of energy plans in the future, but they are forcing the shutdown of existing reactors on a fast-paced schedule, even against the wishes of the utility companies with run them.

4. They have been building massive coal fired plants this whole time and increasing the dependence on coal due to the lack of energy from the renewable sources (which so much money is sunk into) and the closure of nuclear reactors.

I set out to label the areas effected by coal use in Germany, but I’ve done less than 25%. Simply put, the massive amounts of mining, burning and transporting of coal are just too large to label. It took me more than an hour to do what I have done thus far and it’s not even half done! I was also planning on doing other countries, but now I don’t know. In any case, I’d suggest you check it out. You will need Google Earth, which you should have anyway because it’s an awesome program which is fun to use and informative. Also, it’s free, so go download and install it. Then download and view this KMZ file to see just a small portion of the mines and other effects of coal burning.

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Just thought I’d mention this. I heard it on the TV news and none of the website news venues seem to have picked it up yet. It’s hot and fresh off the wire, as of less than 5 minutes ago. In any case, it’s too bad. He was 69 years old. He always seemed an interesting character, even if a bit nutty and something grizzled.

But making it to nearly 70 ain’t too bad considering the life he had and how many stunts he pulled off. Evel had a liver transplant in 1999 and obviously has had his share of health problems.

On the topic of bad science. Although I don’t wish the man death or anything, I lost quite a bit of respect for Mr. Knievel due to his promotion of a device called the “Stimulator” a few years ago on a commercial. He claimed it helped with his pains from years of broken bones and motorcycle spills. The “stimulator” was pulled due to suits from the FTC and others for making baseless medical claims. As it turns out, the damn thing is just a gas grill igniter with a plastic cover/handle on it. It doesn’t have any proven effect on pain but does deliver a mild electrical shock from the small piezoelectric pulse generator in it, which normally creates the spark to ignite a gas grill flame.

Knievel may well have been a paid spokesperson who didn’t know anything about what the product was and who may very well have believed it worked based only on the placebo effect, but that doesn’t let him off the hook for promoting quackery. Oh and also he severely beat a guy with a baseball bat in the 1970’s, nearly killing him. Based on that, while I don’t rejoice in his death or anything, he’s not really a “hero” to me in any sense of the word.

More info Here
Even More (From Casewatch)
Info on the settlement to refund purchasers from the FDA

“Colloidal silver” is a term which refers to solutions containing silver or basic silver compounds suspending in a fluid, usually water. Such preparations were once considered a valid treatment by mainstream medicine (most commonly in nosedrops), and indeed they may have some antibiotic properties. However, since the development of antibiotics like penicillin and other more effective methods of controlling infectious disease, silver-based remedies have been discarded by modern science and medicine. Silver nitrate based solutions are still occasionally used for disinfection purposes, but never as an oral medication.

However, that does not stop “alternative” medicine quacks from continuing to sell colloidal silver-based supplements and remedies. Some tout these products as being a “super antibiotic rediscovery” or claim that modern societies have a “silver deficiency” which causes health issues ranging from infectious disease to cancer. It has even been touted as a cure for AIDS. This despite the fact that colloidal silver products have never been shown to have any real benefit and they do carry a very real risk.

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Now this is something which makes me chuckle: One class of useless “natural” product which is being sold on a number of websites and other outlets is “trace mineral supplements.” Basically these are tablets which contain “trace minerals” which are according to one seller are: essential to our nutritional health but not obtainable in our daily lives. They are priced over a huge range, although on some sites they’re only $15 a bottle.

There is some truth to certain minerals or other substances being necessary or beneficial to good health, but only required in tiny amounts to get the job done. These would include such things as copper, zinc and iodine. Of course, there are also other minerals, like bismuth, which are not necessary but don’t seem to cause much in the way of harm or toxicity. But many of these “trace mineral” supplements contain a lot of stuff which is downright bad for you and isn’t useful or necessary in any dose. Will it cause harm? I doubt it would do much, because the levels are quite low. However, this is not homeopathic, so it should contain actual measurable amounts of what is listed. Some of these include:

aluminum, antimony, barium, beryllium, bismuth, boron, bromine, cadmium, calcium, cerium, cesium, chlorine, chromium, cobalt, copper, dysprosium, erbium, europium, fluorine, gadolinium, gallium, germanium, gold, hafnium, holmium, indium, iodine, iridium, iron, lanthanum, lithium, lutetium, magnesium, manganese, molybdenum, neodymium, nickel, niobium, osmium, palladium, phosphorus, platinum, potassium, praseodymium, rhenium, rhodium, rubidium, ruthenium, samarium, scandium, selenium, silicon, silver, sodium, sulfur, tantalum, tellurium, terbium, thallium, thorium, thulium, tin, titanium, tungsten, uranium, vanadium, ytterbium, yttrium, zinc and zirconium.

Well damn! Beryllium is not good for you in any dose. And while calcium and copper might be somewhat useful, silver, tungsten and tin are not going to do much good.

But here are some of my favorites:

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This video was posted on Youtube by a user who had taped it in 2002 in Yosemite National Park in California. It is listed as a “UFO” and the person notes that they are close to “Area-51.” In reality, Yosemite national park is not that close to the test facility commonly known as Area-51 and they are obviously looking west, due to the setting sun and the planet Venus visible in the frame, the opposite direction from Area-51. The word “UFO” has come to mean, in common usage, more than simply “unidentified.” It now is used to imply alien spacecraft or some top secret government project based on alien technology. I find it amusing that the person who posted this jumped to the conclusion that it was some weird project from a secret facility when what they saw is pretty cool but obviously explainable – that is if they had done some basic research.

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As long as they don’t get thirsty…

In any case, Japan has enjoyed low rates of overall crime compared to most first world countries. And while violent assaults have risen slightly in the past couple of decades, they’re still very rare. Indeed, being chased down in the street and robbed/stabbed/raped is something which is not really a big problem in Japan. But that hasn’t stopped people from becoming concerned about it. The attention given to the handful of incidents get enough media attention to cause some major fears in some citizens.

So at least one Japanese designer has come up with the idea of a dress which transforms into urban camo. When being chased down by a would-be rapist, serial killer or slasher, the clever wearer only need duck down an ally or turn a corner and transform into a vending machine… Yes, a vending machine.

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So I got incredible reactions to the “Nuclear energy is the be all end all” post I made not long ago. And apparently it’s the most blunt argument for nuclear energy around, at least according to some Considering this issue is pretty damn important to me I’m going to try to make a hard-hitting blunt video for youtube on this, because videos seem to have more power sometimes and also… too many people do not like to read.

So I’m going to concentrate my free time on making a REALLY GOOD and professional video on the whole “nuclear is the be all end all and comparable to fire” thing over the next few days. So I may not get around to posting as many blog updates as I usually do. It’ll be posted here… obviously

The German Green party has run on a platform of being environmentally friendly and making clean, safe, sustainable energy and development a priority. But things are not quite what they seem, and evidence indicates that the the actual policies of the Green’s are actually the most misguided, destructive and dishonorable ideology to ever come to power in Germany. the SECOND most misguided, destructive and dishonorable ideology to ever come to power in Germany.

Germany is currently in a program to create more environmentally-friendly sources of energy, or so they say. The primary aim of the program is to eliminate nuclear energy. The secondary is to increase renewable energy, and the distant distant distant third is to maybe someday consider maybe possibly thinking about doing something about the coal use.

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I have to admit that I was a bit ignorant about exactly what the solvents used in dry cleaning are. There are actually a number of them and they range from liquid CO2 under pressure to silicone-based solvents to hydrocarbon blends to ethers and esters. Some of them can indeed be flammable, but generally these would not be used straight and they are not generally the sort of things which ignite easily.

In the past, however, gasoline was used as a drycleaning agent. The reason would be that petroleum products like gasoline would tend to be better at dissolving certain things, such as grease or oil stains than water and would have favorable characteristics with certain fabric. I would have to think it was some extra-refined or distilled gasoline, as standard gasoline leaves quite a smell on fabric, even after it mostly evaporates. (I know this from experience). Or it may just be that at one time gasoline was based on lighter hydrocarbons which tended to evaporate better.

In any case… here’s a movie I found online explaining why you should not try to replicate the wash process at home with a can of gas. Seems like good advice.

Not to make light of the tragic events of that day but I’d like to point out how the conspiracy theories just get more and more ridiculous as time goes on. While the CT’ers are certainly entitled to their opinions and can lie all they want, the evidence has been relatively lacking on their side. Hence, I see no reason to treat their “opinion” with any more respect than holocaust deniers.

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