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Showing posts from 2011

2011: The Year of The Forest?

In 2012, the year of the forest, at least 50,000 (check number of trees) have been felled on the Table Mountain National Park and within Cape Town.  The reason given is that the trees consume precious water resources.  However, this is only one variable in a complex equation.  Millions of birds, their chicks, snakes, other fauna and hundreds of millions of flora that live under the forest canopy have been murdered in this process.  Billions of essential bacteria living in the ground has been destroyed.  And we are left with a more acidic environment, with less ground cover and fewer trees holding the soil, thus erosion will be increased radically.  Trees remove toxins from the ground, provide oxygen to the air, provide an environment where people can go walking and stay fit, and provide a myriad other environmental needs.  Removing the trees has also dramatically increased South Africa's carbon footprint, just at the time that ministers are saying South Africa needs help from the

WHERE IS GOD IN THE WORLD?

Apparently the White House referred to Christmas Trees as  Holiday  Trees for the first time this year which prompted CBS presenter, Ben Stein, to present this piece which I would like to share with you. I think it applies just as much to many countries as it does to  America  .   The following was written by Ben Stein and recited by him on CBS Sunday Morning Commentary. My confession: I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees, Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are, Christmas trees. It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, 'Merry Christmas' to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it .  It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is

The Fight for Clean Air - Article in Tabletalk 16 Nov 2011

Dear Editor Your article about Chevron and pollution refers. It says that Chevron "complies with SA air quality laws."  But where are Chevron and other big corporations Values, Morals, Ethics, Social Responsibility? The world is in a huge financial mess because many large banks, corporations and governments have "obeyed the law" but have left the really important things called values and ethics out of their business dealings in the singleminded pursuit of profit.  The huge loss is to humankind and nature.  This loss is becoming more and more visible each day as many corporations and governments destroy the very environment that supports humankind by creating laws which ignore nature and ethics. Chevron's values statement, on the internet, says: "We are honest with others and ourselves. We meet the highest ethical standards in all business dealings. We do what we say we will do. We accept responsibility and hold ourselves accountable for our

Day 2

The Mayan Calendar Ended on the 28th October 2011 The world ended on the 28th October 2011. Actually the world as we know it ended. The world will never be the same again. In the past month, Desmond Tutu said that the new regime is worse than Apartheid. And ANC NEC member Fikile Xasa called for an end to corruption . World wide Photovoltaic production doubled . We are already at parity with City of Cape Town electricity under certain circumstances, ie the price of buying electricity is the same as producing it yourself! Every Day is a Bonus Day. We are now in Day 2. Love Day 2. Embrace it. Nurture it. A Jewish "Niggun" or rhym: "Return to the land, return to the land, return to the land of your soul. Return to the land, return to the land, return to the land of your soul. Return to who you are, return to what you are, return to where you were born and reborn again." This is not about going back. It is about finding out who you are, why you are here,

The Crash of September 2011

Who needs to be bailed out anyway? The usual rhetoric on the radio from the managing director of the EU Central Bank. "Banks balance sheets are weak and they need to be bailed out so that they can lend to business which keeps the economy going." The only true bit here is that business keeps the economy going. The USA, with its QE1 and QE2 bailout programs has pumped TRILLIONS ($1.7 per annum) into banks over the past 3 years. Most of that money went into the stock market pushing up market prices. Now the market crashes because there is no QE3 which means the US$ increases in value and becomes worth something again. So now the banks have weak balance sheets again because their stock market investments have just crashed. If the USA and EUCB really want to help, they should lend the money that they want to give to banks directly to the people who create the jobs and make the world a better place - sustainably.

If you don't vote you vote for the winner

South African Municipal Elections: 18th May 2011 If you don't vote you vote for the winner. Why? Assume 10 people are eligible to vote: * 4 vote for party A * 3 vote for party B * 3 don't vote If any of the 3 people who didn't vote had voted for party B, there would either have been a draw or party B could have one. Therefore by not voting, the 3 people who didn't vote automatically voted for the winner. Note that with 4 people voting for party A, party A gets 4/7 of the vote, ie 57% of the vote, not 40% of the vote as one might expect. So please vote today and in every future election. Have your say. Be heard. And in future, when you have a grievance, address it to the party you voted for. Otherwise you don't have a say and you aren't involved.

Impacting Goverment and Saving Money

Suppose that everyone bought a geyser timer and suppose that everyone set these to work outside peak hours. Users would send an immediate signal to Eskom that this peak energy is not required thus saving several new power stations. It's time for us to take responsibility for the costs that government incurs on our behalf. The fastest way for us to do this is to change our behaviour.

Treason, Recession, Freedom, Energy, Employment, Health

We just heard that the UK is entering a "double dip recession." The recession that most of the Western World is in is not going to stop. It cannot end while our focus is on the tertiary services sector, whilst our secondary productive sector's resources are outsourced to the cheapest bidder, partly because of minimum wages, and partly because our capitalist leaders and government think they can make more money and profits by this outsourcing. It is narrow minded, myopic thinking and it is treason! Part of our productive resources are our power stations. South Africa will spend about R2 trillion over the next 20 years on new power stations. Most of this money will leave our country; it will create relatively few permanent jobs; it will ruin our environment; our balance of payments will continue to skyrocket; and it won't help the recession to end; because we will be beholden to our major creditors, China and Germany. China is growing at 10% whilst the rest of t