4th of July - Independence Day

What is our Independence Day good for
if we are dependent from Oil ?

It is such a shame that in this year on
Independence Day we are reminded every minute of the poisonous oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico, destroying the habitat of all these creatures living in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico and depriving the people living at the shores of the Gulf of Mexico of their livelihood.

Let's do a dramatic switch over to renewable energy !

- a switch less dramatic than the Gulf 'oil spill' -
but with huge rewards, rewards we will never get by burning up fossil oil reserves.

When the United States Declaration of Independence was signed, the British still ruled this country.

Let us celebrate this 4th of July to become independent from the British again,
independent from the British Petroleum,
and pledge to get rid of the petroleum oil spill at the Gulf of Mexico!

Looking at this tremendous oil spill,
I have the feeling to be totally helpless.

Will our Government solve this situation?
What shall we do?

"Ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man" - words of my hero, words of President Kennedy.

Today he would say: "Ask not what the Government will do for you, but what together we can do to be freed from the curse of oil".

I am sure you have heard the phrase "
Power to the people".

Dependency on oil makes helpless - Solar Panels give Power to the People, a power which can not be usurped to get power over people, on the contrary, Solar Power will set us free.

How often do we hear that we are living
in the land of the free?! Did you ever think about this?

Are we really living in the land of the free?

As long as we are depending on foreign oil or life threatening oil exploration, we are not living in the land of the free.

Only renewable energy will give us the freedom we deserve. Think about it!

People of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida, and people all over the country, use your idle time and put Solar Panels on your roofs! Only Solar Panels will give Power to the People!

I know, everybody has to work hard and there is rarely any idle time.

But think about it! Decide for yourself, if you like to live as a free in this country or if you like to be depending on oil forever destroying more and more of our beautiful nature and country.

By the way, we have to admit, once and for all, in the Gulf of Mexico, most of the hydrocarbon reserves in the relatively shallow shelf waters have been drained!

The easy oil is gone!

Only in deep waters there’s plenty left: at least 56 billion barrels of oil equivalent — a measure that includes oil and natural gas — the catch is that finding oil at such depths is extremely challenging and hugely expensive.

But what a price has to be paid for this! We can see it every day.

A decision has to be made: living with oil forever destroying more and more of our beautiful nature and country up to the day where the last drop of oil has gone, or making a dramatic - but safe - switch to renewable energy from sun, like solar, wind, and geothermal now!

Geothermal energy needs deep drilling, but this should be no problem - to tap geothermal energy the oil rigs are coming in just right!

Congratulations, Mr. President !

With awe and excitement I heard the news today that our President, President Obama, has been chosen to receive the Peace Nobel Prize this year 2009!

With this backing a new era will begin, I am sure of it.
An era of peace and ending wars.

There are so many other possibilities to end international conflicts.
So many people are researching and working on ways to peaceful solving conflicts, normally not seen by the public.

First of all there is the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), an organization that conducts scientific research into questions of conflict and cooperation of importance for international peace and security, in order to contribute to an understanding of the conditions for peaceful solutions to international conflicts and for a stable peace, founded in 1966 to commemorate 150 years of unbroken peace in Sweden.

And there is The Carter Center, a nongovernmental organization founded in 1982 by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter and his wife Rosalynn Carter. In partnership with Emory University, The Carter Center works to advance human rights and alleviate human suffering.

There is the Heidelberg Institute for International Conflict Research (HIIK) at the University of Heidelberg, a private organization dedicated to research, documentation and analysis of national and international political conflicts, founded 1991.

There is the Center for Conflict Resolution (CICR), founded 1997 by Prof. Andrea Bartoli as the International Conflict Resolution Program at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs.

There is the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict that promotes the study and utilization of nonmilitary strategies by civilian-based movements to establish and defend human rights, social justice and democracy, based in Washington DC, since its founding in 2001.

There is the non-governmental Conflict Solutions International (CSI) organization incorporated in February 2003 in the District of Columbia.

And there is the United States Institute of Peace (USIP), established in 1984, an independent, nonpartisan, government-funded institution established and funded by the United States Congress with a long list of achievements.

To see all this effort is a promising development, and this experience should be used.

How come that there are still wars in this world?
How come that since medieval ages the methods of war have been developed, but methods of peace and conflict resolution seems to be have not been used?

There is the International Center for Transitional Justice ICTJ, founded in 2001 dedicated to pursuing accountability for mass atrocity and human rights abuse through transitional justice mechanisms. Their specialty are Judicial investigations of those responsible for human rights violations. Prosecutors frequently emphasize investigations of the "big fish": suspects considered most responsible for massive or systematic crimes.

Why wasn't there a prosecution of Osama bin Laden instead of a great war with a lot of atrocities?

It could have been done!

Why wasn't there a prosecution of Saddam Hussein instead of a great war with a lot of atrocities?
It could have been done!

Peace is possible.
Nonviolence is the method.

End wars!
End Poverty!
Give Peace a Chance!

Don't move!

Every time I write a blog I like to be prepared, I like to get support of evidence for my observations, so I scan all information I can get to do it right, to be sure to tell the truth.

Two days ago when I started writing I thought I have to do a little research about malpractice litigation and I was overwhelmed. To me it appears now that discussing Health Care is like opening Pandora's box - but there is light at the end of the tunnel:

There is hope to get a healthcare reform to close this unpleasant box.

If you are curious and click at the above link about the light at the end of the tunnel you will find this:

"The new health care reform is supposed to end all these dire quagmires. It will plug the current gaps between urban and rural residents in the medical system. People will be viewed as individuals rather than members of a household. It will greatly ease the trouble of highly-mobilized people. Change of work？ Change of residence? Or even change of city? No problem. You will still be covered in the medical system. "

Wouldn't it be great if this would be part of our Health Care Reform?

Having Health Insurance in this country here is like living in mediaeval times - every citizen is subject of the state where he lives - not allowed to move. Because if you move you loose your Health Insurance.

I just had this experience these days.

I was offered to move to another location only two miles south from here.
Just before I signed the new lease I checked my Health Insurance.
And guess what:
If I leave the state I am living in now I loose my Health Insurance.

I have to apply anew in the other state, and since I had cancer I am in trouble because of precondition, even if I did live and work in this other state when I got cancer and my surgery was in this other state.

If I would move, I will have to pay nearly double the premium I am paying now and I still have a deduction which triples the amount I have to pay in case I get seriously ill.

So I have to stay in this state where I am living now.
This system makes me and everybody else in this situation a subject of the state, having the right to move denied by a premium penalty.

Really odd in the land of the free.
Guess something got wrong.
Somebody dropped a letter.
Now it is the land of the fee.

But there is still hope.

China is showing the way.

China is a really innovative country. People over there are eager to do better.

That's what they did:
On April 6 2009, the government published a new medical reform plan. By unleashing the new health care reform---dubbed “universal healthcare”-- ... , the Chinese government is showing the light at the end of the tunnel to many people in anticipation.

The new health care reform is supposed to end all these dire quagmires. It will plug the current gaps between urban and rural residents in the medical system. People will be viewed as individuals rather than members of a household. It will greatly ease the trouble of highly-mobilized people. Change of work？ Change of residence? Or even change of city? No problem. You will still be covered in the medical system.

“The government is to throw in 850 billion in the next three years to fulfill this medical reform despite the dim financial outlook.” The head of Chinese Health Ministry Chen Zhu disclosed in an interview in Ifeng.com.

The key incentive for China's health care system is to protect people's health, not make money.

Remember the times of the Sputnik Space Race?
A race was started between the United States and Russia.
Kennedy fought for it.

A Universal Healthcare was proposed for all Citizens.
Kennedy fought for it.

Is there a race starting between the United States and China now?
Who will win?
Or are we giving up this time?

Let's strive for Universal Health Care and make it happen.
Let's show the world that the United States are still there.
Let's proof that the United States are caring for their citizens.

Let's do it!

Let's change our attitude from "Yes we can!" to "Yes we do! "

There are so many things going through my mind, every thought telling me that affordable Health Insurance for everybody will be there soon.

What country are we living in?

Is this country really the richest country of the world?
Is the richest country not rich enough to have all citizens equipped with Health Insurance?

How come that all other countries which have mandatory Health Insurance for every citizen are not that rich as the United States?

I guess what you are thinking:
They are not as rich as the United States because they are making Health Insurance possible for all their citizens!

The United States may get poor
giving Health Insurance to all their citizens!?
That has to be avoided.
So many people died in fighting for this country.
If this country is getting poor, they died in vain!

Is this the truth behind?

Is the Health Care Reform a triage?
A decision who is worthwhile to get Health Care and who is not?
A decision if we are getting poor in giving Health Insurance to everybody or dying not getting Health Insurance?

Don't be confused!

No nation which expects to be the leader of other nations can expect to stay behind in this race for better Health Care!

And is not Health Care, in the last analysis, basically a matter of human rights — the right to live out our lives without fear to get ill — the right of our and future generations to a healthy existence?

When John Fitzgerald Kennedy had his Special Message to the Congress on Urgent National Needs 48 years ago, he did know it was a lot of money he asked for to send a man to the moon.

Now it was his brother's, Senator Edward Kennedy's goal to finally get Health Insurance for everybody. Should this cause be denied now?

Now this is a choice which this country must make, and I am confident that under the leadership of the Congress, and the Appropriating Committees, this matter will be considered carefully.

The Israelites went forward to their promised land,
even after Moses died.
40 years they needed.

Our time is up now. Waiting for 40 years is enough!
Are we Americans to cowardly to go ahead
after our Moses passed away?

Finally: Bluebee's Insights

Eight months from now we have Christmas - isn't that a nice Insight to start with?

When I have chosen the name for my blog, I had a lot of Insights, but these Insights I had were merrily observations, not Insights why this happened. One of my Insights was that what we were experiencing is the result of mistakes made over the last thirty years, but when I read about the failing US-Automakers, my opinion was that it would be unpatriotic to let these companies going bankrupt. I had a lot of followers in this my opinion, but meanwhile there are voices telling going through bankruptcy will give the only chance to survive, at least for one of them.

This morning I had a revelation.
An observer with mindful awareness must have seen since a long time that vanishing of these companies is system immanent.

Isn’t it the credo of capitalist preachers that companies are coming and going? Why should this be different for the biggest ones? Because there are so many layoffs when a really big company closes its doors? Who really cares?

This was only a part of my revelation.
I am sure you are thinking this was not a revelation at all, everybody knows that.

But here is the point:
Look again what I wrote.
The vanishing of these companies is system immanent!
Analyzing the situation will lead us to the recognition that in our society companies are now driven by shareholder value. That means, the manufacturing focuses on parts and equipment which gives the most payback per buck invested. How it is known what gives the most payback? There is the experience of the past, market research, and customer surveys - all data gathered about results of the past. But times are changing, and when time changed, as it did “suddenly” last year, these presumptions break down like a house of cards, suddenly, and fast.

Our whole society is modeled after that. If somebody has an idea, he gets money from Venture Capitalists, if these VC’s are sure that they do not burn their (or their institutional investors) , but get paid back within a reasonable time. Background of their decision is the experience of the past, extrapolation of past experience.

Einstein once said "The problems that exist in the world today cannot be solved by the level of thinking that created them." Will Einstein, if he would come here today, have the chance to be recognized as an asset to this country? Would he have any idea recognizable as worthwhile exploring with an enterprise? Franklin, Faraday, Edison, Tesla, Ford, Firestone, Burbank, would they get Venture Capital? If JFK would be President of the United States today, would Congress grant him the money to send a man to the moon? Certainly not. That’s the point. Think about it. This our society has changed.

Changed from being a society always looking for new ventures to make life easier and more bearable to a society always looking for cheaper stuff and higher surplus value - that’s what's driving jobs overseas and lowering workers and employees income with the result our people do not have the money to buy things they need or like to have - or they try to outsmart the system and get a loan: the outcome we have seen lately.

Henry Ford once said “I will build a car ...low in price that no man making a good salary will be unable to own one”, and it worked. Ford made a point of paying his workers a high enough wage that they could afford to buy the cars they were building. Forgotten? Forgotten that people need money to buy products? Forgotten that people earn their money having jobs and get paid?

What now?
Attitudes need time - or dramatic events - to change. Some days ago I heard a speaker reasoning about her childhood memory when she was in awe about the results of JFK’s speech
"I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth", and asking where is this challenge today? As a result of this challenge four dozen years ago Silicon Valley and the computer industry developed and gave new prosperity to this country.

An observer with mindful awareness will be able to see the challenge we are able to choose today: A world without poverty!

Let me prepare the speech of the one who will proclaim this goal:

"I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of ending poverty in the world and therefore finally bringing peace to the Earth. No single project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range stability and peace in this world; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish.
We choose to go to end poverty in this decade and do the necessary things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win.
To those people in the huts and villages of half the globe struggling to break the bonds of mass misery, we pledge our best efforts to help them help themselves, for whatever period is required — not because the socialists may be doing it, not because we seek their votes, but because it is right. If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.
The supreme reality of our time is our indivisibility as children of God and the common vulnerability of this planet. Freedom is indivisible, and when one man is enslaved in poverty, all are not free.
And is not living a decent life, in the last analysis, basically a matter of human rights — the right to live out our lives without fear of poverty — the right to breathe air as nature provided it — the right of future generations to a healthy existence?
Thank you, and good night."

Sounds familiar?
I used a Ghostwriter.