• • •   Green Stuff   • • •

“BURN, BABY, BURN—FISCAL INFERNO!”

In December 2007, we told Grinning Planet readers that they reeeaaally needed to start paying attention to what was going on in the financial world (among other things). In our 2008 wrap-up, we look back at all of our predictions from a year ago and see where things stand now. Next we offer a backgrounder on the causes of the financial crisis. We conclude with our thoughts about the 2009 trends that are likely to be up, down, or disastrous. Topics include the economy, the banking system, energy, and the environment.

TURN YOUR MP3 PLAYER INTO A BRAIN-EXPANDING MEGA-MACHINE

Grinning Planet has started a weekly news MP3 service. Our picks for weekly audio clips are intended to help you to learn and stay informed by simply listening to your MP3 player while you drive or putter around the house, or as you veg out in a chair listening via your computer. Find out what's really going on, not just what the mainstream-media spinmeisters think you should know. Our future depends on your brain!

THREE OF THE FOUR HORSEMEN VOTE TO TRAMPLE GAZA

MP3 NEWS FOR THE WEEK ENDING 02 JAN 2009:
Grinning Planet's most recent downloadable news clips include:
FSRN: Gaza Crisis Mounts, Israel Plans Ground Assault; plus Top Censored Stories of 2008 ~~ LOE: Lead Poisoning and Violent Crime; plus The Good Book's Green Message ~~ KunstlerCast: Resolutions for 2009 ~~ Peak Moment: The Importance of "Net Energy" more...  See all / download...

QUOTH THE MAVEN

Jim Hightower:  "The real bias of the media is not to the left or to the right, but to the thin strata of economic elites at the top of our society."   More from America's #1 populist here.

TUNE IN ... CROSBY & NASH —
“THEY WANT IT ALL”

A searing indictment of the money-grubbing Powers That Be, from a surprisingly good recent Crosby-Nash album.
Want that Mercedes, that Gulf Stream too;
They want to get, get it from you.
They want your life savings
    and your mother's ring;
They'd like to have everything.



Or... Check out CD

A LUMP OF “CLEAN COAL” IN TENNESSEE’S STOCKING

MP3 NEWS (BETA) FOR THE WEEK ENDING 26 DEC 2008:
Grinning Planet's most recent downloadable news clips include:  India and Pakistan moving closer to armed conflict;  1 billion gallons of coal sludge spilled in Tennessee;  James Howard Kunstler's predictions for 2009;  Bailout prejudice: Big 3 run the gauntlet while banks raise their goblets;  more...  See all / download...

“FEEL THE BURN!” CRIED THE OIL-INDUSTRY FITNESS INSTRUCTOR

There are many important intersections between our modern food system and our main sources of energy: oil, natural gas, and coal-generated electricity. That means any problems arising with our energy supplies will ultimately mean problems for the food supply. Learn more in Grinning Planet's feature article, Food and Energy ...

GLASS RECYCLING IS NOT NECESSARILY A SMASHING IDEA

It's best to recycle your empty bottles, right? Hmm. It depends on what you mean by "best." Check out GP's findings regarding recycling vs. reuse of glass ...

WATT'S OBAMA GONNA DO?

What should the Obama administration do regarding US energy policy? Here's a great set of suggestions from ASPO-USA, the top Peak Oil watchdog in the US. Opens as PDF.

You may also be interested in Grinning Planet's own take on which peak oil/energy solutions make sense. We also recently completed a peak oil resource sheet —the front is a summary of what we face; the reverse is a list of helpful books, movies, and web sites. It's a good single-sheet printout for handing to relatives, friends, and neighbors who want/need a quick take on the situation. Opens as PDF.

SECRETARY OF “DOH!”

Will President Barack Obama be our savior in this time of crisis, an agent of true change? Or will he just be the new, less-buffoonish hired executive for USA, Inc., employed by the wealthy elites to run the corrupt money system and save banks and big investors at the expense of us working stiffs? Get Grinning Planet's take on it in our article, Role Players in Obama's Cabinet -- Dark Wizards or White Knights? ...

TWO GREEN THUMBS UP

Not all fabulous films are full of flashing fannies, foooming fireballs, and freaks from faraway galaxies. Grinning Planet's list of multi-star green-tinged movies offers dozens of choices that are popcorn-worthy AND mind-expanding. See Grinning Planet's environmental movies page...

QUOTH THE MAVEN

Lester Brown:  "Among the environmental trends undermining our future are shrinking forests, expanding deserts, falling water tables, collapsing fisheries, disappearing species, and rising temperatures. The temperature increases bring crop-withering heat waves, more-destructive storms, more-intense droughts, more forest fires, and, of course, ice melting. We are crossing natural thresholds that we cannot see and violating deadlines that we do not recognize."   See Lester Brown articles on Grinning Planet

GOLD MAN SACKS TREASURY LOOT

As the trillions flow from our public treasury to the private needs of wealthy, whiny banks and investment houses, GP is left wondering if maybe this crisis was not just a gargantuan multifaceted goof, but rather an intentional strategy to loot the treasury (i.e. your pockets and mine). Maybe letting Lehman Brothers go belly up really wasn't a mistake—maybe it was simply one step in the plutocrats' overall plan.

In this Guns and Butter interview, Wall Street economist Michael Hudson offers a scorching appraisal of how we're being bled, not led, by Henry Paulson and the rest of the super-villains overseeing the financial mess. This is must-listening, folks, especially if you think it's just one-party problem. If you prefer reading, see Hudson's piece Rescue for the Few, Debt Slavery for the Many on Counterpunch.

GEOPOLITICAL UPSIDE-DOWN CAKE

Peak oil is upon us, we have ever-worsening environmental degradation, and we face a deepening global financial crisis. While we at GP feel a visceral hopefulness at the upcoming change of administration, we have seen this movie before, and we have every reason to think that we will find that newly offered solutions are still bound by the iron envelope of today's reigning free-market plutocracy. Thus it should be no surprise that we were pleased to read a book that explained how to reframe this troubled situation and strategize to take advantage of any coming chaos. The book's title is The Upside of Down—Catastrophe, Creativity, and the Renewal of Civilization, by Thomas Homer-Dixon.   Read full review of The Upside of Down ... or ... check out on Amazon.com

TUNE IN ...
TOMMY JAMES AND THE SHONDELLS — “CRYSTAL BLUE PERSUASION”

A classic from the '60s flower-pop library, sending out good vibes for a better tomorrow.
Look over yonder, what do you see!
The sun is a-rising, most definitely;
A new day's coming, people are changing.
Ain't it beautiful? Crystal blue persuasion . . .



Or... Check out CD

ELECTION 2008:  WASTING YOUR VOTE?

There's a concept among voters that if the candidate you really prefer has no apparent chance of winning, then it's a waste of your vote to check the box for that candidate. To address this issue, we've been forced to break out our light sabers. See our article, Wasting Your Vote — The Voters' Choice in 2008: Darth Vader, The Emperor, or Luke Skywalker.

TURNING GREEN OVER THE ELECTION

Do you think our politicians should do better at addressing air and water pollution, chemicals in household products, and the need for clean energy? Then you might want to check out our environmental voting guide and our article Why Vote Green? ...

DUMBO MUMBO-JUMBO

We don't hear that much about environmental issues on the news these days, but when we do hear it, it's sometimes hard to separate the info from the spin-fo. To help you decipher the code words, Grinning Planet presents an update of our Environmental Doublespeak article.

MEDIA-OCRITY

When it comes to politics, democracy, and the many other challenges of our lives, media play a central role. But, unfortunately, their value is usually negative, leaving us uninformed at best and propagandized at worst. What ever happened to true investigative journalism? Why has the press stopped doing it's job of counterbalancing those in power? Why is "media concentration" a death sentence for informative local TV, radio, and newspaper coverage? How does mainstream media send inappropriate social signals to our children and adolescents? There are lots of great books on these topics, and we have collected them on our recently upgraded Media Books list.

TUNE IN ... EMERSON, LAKE & PALMER —
“BLACK MOON”

An excellent and uncharacteristically activist song from ELP. As for the album of the same name, it's one of the few times a formerly great rock band put out something new that really was "sort of like their old stuff."
LYRICS SNIPPET:
We never learn—
Even deserts burn,
And all politicians lie.
They won't do nothin'
'Til we reach high noon...
Black Moon...



Or... Check out CD

“ANTS IN YOUR PANTS” AND OTHER NON-RECOMMENDED DANCE MOVES

If you've been engaged in kitchen warfare with little black ants all summer, you'll be pleased to know we've updated our article on how to solve your problem with sugar ants naturally.

PEAK “PEAK OIL” ARTICLES?

When it comes to alerting readers to the coming impacts of peak oil, has Grinning Planet finally reached "peak articles"? Nope. We've published a lot on the topic recently, but this issue is so important, we will keep the info-flow going until the petro-medulla section of everyone's brain is topped off. This time we present an update of Grinning Planet's two-article series based on the works of Richard Heinberg, who is widely respected as one of the planet's most clear-headed thinkers about energy issues and their impact on economies and societies. (Pt 1,  Pt 2)  Also available are two excellent short videos from Heinberg:  #1 (3 min),  #2 (12 min)

QUOTH THE MAVEN:  A GLOWING FOOD REVIEW

Mike Adams, Natural News:  "In promoting this food radiation policy, the FDA has accomplished what all the terrorists in the world could not: The mass irradiation of the US food supply."

GP note:  We agree with Adams that irradiated food is a really bad idea. You can read his entire rant at the Natural News site. We also note that two of his solutions are growing your own food and buying food at local farmers' markets—two things that will also help make you more resilient in the face of future fuel and food disruptions.

ONE WITH THE SUN

The National Solar Tour is coming in October! You can check out the listings from the American Solar Energy Society, though we note that not every local tour is listed. So be sure to check with your state coordinator to find out what tour is closest to you. Meanwhile, to get you off in the right direction with great ways to take advantage of sun energy, we've upgraded and expanded our Solar Energy Books page.

TUNE IN ... SIMON & GARFUNKEL — “THE SUN IS BURNING”

The song starts out with pastoral images of everyday life, culminating in the terrifying end described in the lyrics below. A great anti-nuke song from the 1960s folk-rock era.
Now the sun has come to earth,
Shrouded in a mushroom cloud of death.
Death comes in a blinding flash
Of hellish heat and leaves a smear of ash . . .
And the sun has come to earth.



Or... Check out CD

CLIMATE-CHANGE SKEPTICS’ ARGUMENTS MELTING AWAY LIKE ARCTIC ICE

Ice-melting horror shows are playing in theaters globally this summer—from the ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica to the permafrost of Siberia, from Glacier National Park to the snow cap on Kilimanjaro. The planet has become the Wicked Witch of the West—"I'm mellllting!" Find out what it means for the future of humans on the planet ... in Grinning Planet's feature article, Global Warming / Melting Ice ...

QUOTH THE MAVEN

Pope Benedict, 17 July 2008:
"Perhaps reluctantly we come to acknowledge that there are also scars which mark the surface of our Earth—erosion, deforestation, the squandering of the world's mineral and ocean resources in order to fuel an insatiable consumption." See Mongabay coverage of the speech.

WHAT’S THE REMEDY FOR YOUR ST. PETER PROBLEM?

The Pope's recent remarks on humanity's tendency to make a mess of the planet brought to mind a cartoon we did few years ago, Problems You May Encounter After You Die. It was a pure "funny toon," not a political or green cartoon. But now we would be inclined to add the following to the heavenly punch-line list:
Non-stop phone calls from your kids asking why the envelope marked "my beloved children" contained nothing but planetary bills.

More seriously, if you suddenly feel the eco-spirit stirring within you, a good place to learn more about the connection between religion and environment is at the web site of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment.

THE PEAKISTS ARE COMING!  THE PEAKISTS ARE COMING!

Like some crazed electronic horseman galloping through inboxes and browsers, shouting out the alarm, Grinning Planet is determined to alert people to the need for personal preparation regarding Peak Oil and related "disruption events." We recently published a thorough, 8-page Peak Oil FAQ, but some people wanted a shorter version they could forward to friends and family, so here's a 1-page version: Peak Oil Summary

TUNE IN ... ZAGER & EVANS — “IN THE YEAR 2525”

One of the most out-there, futuristic songs to ever make the Top 40. Great stuff about where we're going as a species.

In the year 9595,
I'm kind a wond'rin' if man is gonna be alive—
He's taken everything this old earth can give
And he ain't put back nothin' . . .



Or... Check out CD

GETTING IN TUNE

We've updated our list of eco songs—tunes with a great green message paired with equally good melodies and musicianship. We've added some new songs, and upgraded the page so you can hear MP3 clips and see lyric snippets right from the page. There are still more songs we need to add, but you can check out our progress so far: environmental songs ...

ENERGIZE YOUR WALLET

As summer heats up, electricity prices are rising. Keep A/C costs down by checking out Grinning Planet's article, Money-Saving Tips on Air Conditioning . For your woes at the filling station, check out The Gas Mileage Bible book at Amazon.com.

PIQUE OIL

Are we really running out of oil? Can't we just get more by drilling in Alaska and off the coasts? What about ethanol and liquefied coal and oil shale? Find out whether the oil crisis is real, a scam, or just a bad joke ... by reading Grinning Planet's Peak Oil FAQ ...

QUOTH THE MAVEN

Kenneth S. Deffeyes:  "Through our inattention, we have wasted the years that we might have used to prepare for lessened oil supplies. The next ten years are critical."

ROAD RAGE

The old "Road to Serfdom" was a myth sold to the American public by big-money types that said any interference in the free markets would kill capitalism and prosperity. It was a myth designed to help them convince the public of the wisdom of their program of deregulation, privatization of public assets, low taxation of the wealthy, and suppression of workers' wages. Today's ever-worsening banking crisis—which is a result of free-market excesses and under-regulation—clearly puts the lie to their propaganda. In an audio interview on KPFA, economist Michael Hudson explains the new threat: The plutocrats, rather than giving up, are using emerging and converging crises to drive us toward a new type of economic serfdom. Everyone should hear this!  When you get to the page, the item is titled (( Wednesday, June 25th, 2008 -- "The New Road to Serfdom" ))

MALODOROUS MALADY MARKETING

We modern humans suffer a range of ailments and worries, and drug companies have figured out that in most cases we're very ready to believe there's a new pill that will make it all better. In the book Our Daily Meds, Melody Petersen exposes Big Pharma's hyper-driven marketing campaigns, showing how all too often they're putting the "sham" in shaman. See Bill Moyers' interview with her, or check out her book at Amazon.com. Also worth viewing: "The Drugs I Need" -- a funny animation on the subject from Consumers Union.

THE FURRY WHITE BEAR VS. THE FUZZY WHITE PUNDIT

We're all aware that Washington's talking heads don't get out enough and that their mouths often seem unattached to anything resembling a brain. But occasionally one of these overpaid orating orangutans does something that's simply too much to ignore. Thus, Grinning Planet presents the case of George F. Will and the Stupid Global Warming Idiots.

QUOTH THE MAVEN

Gen. Gordon R. Sullivan, retired, former US Army chief of staff:  "Climate change is and will be a significant threat to our national security and in a larger sense to life on earth as we know it to be."

KING CORN, FLAKEY RULER

Many of the ways we consume corn are obvious enough: corn on the cob and canned corn ... pop corn and corn chips ... corn bread and taco shells. But there are some insidious ways we eat the stuff, most notably via meat consumption and corn sweeteners. The scale of the corn-related food economy in the US is hard for the average person to fathom, but King Corn feeds us the complex truth of corn in a manner that is entertaining and educational....  Read GP's full review of King Corn

“WHAT WOULD SATAN DRIVE?” ...
AT $4.00 A GALLON?

In a 2003 article, Grinning Planet asked the flippant question, "What would Satan drive?" and discussed why a driver in an SUV is not necessarily worse than some other driver in a non-SUV. Fresh back from trading in some gold bars at the gas station, we decided it was time to update the SUVs/Environmental Issues piece.

CHEMICALS IN FOOD FROM PLASTIC CONTAINERS

Our article about chemicals from plastic food containers getting into leftovers and lunch fare continues to generate lots of reader emails asking us where to buy non-plastic food storage containers. Apparently, such containers are not as easy to find in stores as we thought! So, now we've done some legwork for you. Online at Amazon.com, you can check out the wide variety of non-plastic food-storage options offered by Pyrex and CorningWare. If you take dishes to picnics, parties, and potlucks, there's also the Pyrex Portables collection. For large-volume food storage (gallon-size and up), check out the wares from Anchor Hocking (glass) or StainlessLUX (stainless steel).

IMPURITEASE IN THE AIR
AT THE TASSEL CLUB

Pollution is not just something that happens to "the environment." It affects the water we drink, the air we breathe, and the land we grow our food on. When it comes to us water-drinking, air-breathing, food-eating humans, see Grinning Planet's feature article to find out about the relationship between pollution and health.

QUOTH THE MAVEN

Lester Brown:  "In Mexico City, Tehran, Kolkata, Bangkok, Shanghai, and hundreds of other cities, the air is no longer safe to breathe. In some cities, the air is so polluted that breathing is equivalent to smoking two packs of cigarettes per day."

THE YELLOW PERIL

Deluged with dandelions but not liking the idea of spraying your lawn with 2,4-D pesticides in areas where kids and pets play? Check out our article on non-toxic dandelion removal methods, including the recently added reader suggestion, The Dandelion Stomp.

OIL-O-NOMICS

In her essay "The Expected Economic Impact of an Energy Downturn," Oil Drum wonk Gail the Actuary gives an excellent explanation of how the rocky path ahead of us is caused by the intersection between the global financial crisis and the emerging constriction in energy and commodity supplies. Related good green stuff:
(1) David Sirota commentary, "The Fed Packages Corruption as Sound Public Policy"  (2) Grinning Planet articles about Peak Oil

VITTLES VOID

We hope you took heed of our Jan-Feb-Mar series on the coming food crisis. The subject is now front-page news, but it's not too late for you to take action. This is not a drill!. Related GP stuff:  Books for Surviving Peak Oil

CLOUDS IN YOUR COFFEE?
TRY LESS STYRO, MORE FOAM

Do chemicals leach from foam cups and containers into your food? Check out our article about the potential health effects of foam cups and food containers. We'll also explain why there is actually no such thing as a "Styrofoam cup"!

QUOTH THE MAVEN

US EPA:  "Just as there may be a time lag between [pollution] emissions and exposure, there may also be a time lag between exposure and [human or ecological] damages."   More quotes

TRULY GREEN GRASS

Spring is springing, dandelions are roaring, and homeowners everywhere are eyeing the ever-thickening grass out in the yard. Why not forget about lawn chemicals this year and go green? Check out our three-part series on natural lawn care.

EMISSIONS MISSIONS, PT. 1

Climate change scientists are telling us we have to reduce carbon emissions by 80% by 2050, assuming we prefer a planet that isn't extra-crispy. That may sound impossible, but this Carl Pope video short points out that if we just reduce 2% per year, we will reduce carbon emissions by MORE than 80% by 2050!

EMISSIONS MISSIONS, PT. 2

If "80% by 2050!" now doesn't sound like enough of a challenge, let's try 80% by 2020—the goal set by Lester Brown in his book Plan B 3.0. In Chapter 11, which you can download for free from the EPI web site, he talks about how we can get there—without returning to the era of the Flintstones.

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