President Obama: we here in Kentucky will take the money turned down by Florida and Ohio! We need to make some green technology steps to offset our role in the proliferation of coal and it's many detrimental effects on our ecology.
Read more about the debate on high speed rail here:
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/travel/2011-02-15-businesstravel15_ST_N.htm
Do we need high speed rail? Do we even ask if we need high speed Internet? Of course we need High-speed Rail! History clearly shows that during our economic downturns investments in infrastructure later paid great dividends when things picked up. Then not only will we get a moderate recovery - but we could have a boom economy once business and citizen consumers latch onto the ease, economy, ecology and joy of rail travel!
Imagine being able to catch a train from downtown Lexington to Cincinnati or Louisville and being able to read, listen to music, chat with fellow travelers or just snooze for the length of the trip?! UK has the hones to be a top twenty research institution (an unfunded economic development plain foisted on UK! Having this type of transportation infrastructure will be a great boon to this goal as many folks who are used to East Coast commuter rails are the target audience for helping us achieve those academic/economic goals!
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Monday, February 14, 2011
A note to Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear on Valentine's Day 2011
Governor Beshear,
There is no such thing as responsible surface mining. Clean drinking water is more precious than coal. The culture of Appalachia will be devastated if the people lose their Mountains!
Coal only seems cheap it's true cost is unbearable, planetary heat load changes, acid oceans, destruction of shellfish and coral, mercury in seafood: UNBEARABLY EXPENSIVE! We must change our thinking: the cost of maintaining outdated beliefs to our children and children's children will be UNIMAGINABLE.
Govenor Beshear, I believe you to be a man of good conscience. Now we we need you to be a leader of vision and wise steward of our only true wealth - the health of our home, planet earth.
Respectfully,
Jonathan Gilpin
Lexington KY
There is no such thing as responsible surface mining. Clean drinking water is more precious than coal. The culture of Appalachia will be devastated if the people lose their Mountains!
Coal only seems cheap it's true cost is unbearable, planetary heat load changes, acid oceans, destruction of shellfish and coral, mercury in seafood: UNBEARABLY EXPENSIVE! We must change our thinking: the cost of maintaining outdated beliefs to our children and children's children will be UNIMAGINABLE.
Govenor Beshear, I believe you to be a man of good conscience. Now we we need you to be a leader of vision and wise steward of our only true wealth - the health of our home, planet earth.
Respectfully,
Jonathan Gilpin
Lexington KY
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In Greek mythology, Gaia was the personification of Mother Earth. In response to the devastation brought forth by the irresponsible mining practice of mountaintop removal and valley fills, Chapman-Crane created this life-sized figurative sculpture depicting Mother Earth suffering from the abuses of strip mining.
Monday, January 17, 2011
MLK Day - Was the Man Flawless or Clawless?
According to analysis today on NPR the upshot regarding MLK falls along these racial lines:
None of this invalidates his work or message but instead affirms that all of us (as human beings) are capable of taking on the yoke he so nobly wore.
A personal observation - we are all in this together. A homily from two Christmas's ago rings in my ears: (forgive and bear with my paraphrasing:) "...as far as we know no one is actually in hell and we all will have to go to heaven together."
- Whites - wanted him Clawless - made impotent, and to ignore the complicity of white America to his assassination. FBI had labeled him a threat to America. Lost popularity after criticizing the Vietnam war.
- Blacks - wanted to raise him to sainthood, Flawless - ignoring his affairs and human foibles.
None of this invalidates his work or message but instead affirms that all of us (as human beings) are capable of taking on the yoke he so nobly wore.
A personal observation - we are all in this together. A homily from two Christmas's ago rings in my ears: (forgive and bear with my paraphrasing:) "...as far as we know no one is actually in hell and we all will have to go to heaven together."
Recent Shootings and Gun Rights
Coming from a viewpoint of being terrified of guns but also acknowledging that they exist I may seem to talk out of both sides of my mouth.
Someone once told me the first step to being a slave is that they take your weapons away. Our country was founded on the premise that populace knows what is best for themselves. If the police and military get to have 30-round clips then so should every mentally sound citizen have that same availability. I am not advocating sedition but history shows that in some extreme (and not too rare) situations the people must rise up against the powers that be (in history they are called despots, tyrants, etc.) - there is a balance of power at stake with 2nd amendment rights.
The Arizona shooting has more to do with the neglect of our society to the mentally ill. Numerous people were concerned with his state of mind - yet did not know how to proceed. The question of whether this shooter acted alone still remains to be answered. He would have been an easy target for outside manipulation.
Solutions to issues like this should restrict the freedom of the few and not the many. If gun rights legislation is our most effective response to this and other shootings by deranged assailants (and I'm not sure it is), then do it with the least possible impact on our individual rights. Due process should always be the path to restriction of rights.
Someone once told me the first step to being a slave is that they take your weapons away. Our country was founded on the premise that populace knows what is best for themselves. If the police and military get to have 30-round clips then so should every mentally sound citizen have that same availability. I am not advocating sedition but history shows that in some extreme (and not too rare) situations the people must rise up against the powers that be (in history they are called despots, tyrants, etc.) - there is a balance of power at stake with 2nd amendment rights.
The Arizona shooting has more to do with the neglect of our society to the mentally ill. Numerous people were concerned with his state of mind - yet did not know how to proceed. The question of whether this shooter acted alone still remains to be answered. He would have been an easy target for outside manipulation.
Solutions to issues like this should restrict the freedom of the few and not the many. If gun rights legislation is our most effective response to this and other shootings by deranged assailants (and I'm not sure it is), then do it with the least possible impact on our individual rights. Due process should always be the path to restriction of rights.
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