“Design with the Other 90% of Cities” is taking a new creative approach to alleviating the status of poor economic living situations. Starting with the favelas in Brazil, they have designed colorful designs to paint across the clustered homes, giving it a lively and enhanced image. Read the full article here. Many of the painters are locals who learn how to paint and realize they can make a career out it, making this project even more sustainable. What I like most about this idea is that it gives these poor communities an uplifting and vibrant environment to live in, at little cost. Creating that kind of environment can help give these underprivileged communities a higher sense of appreciation for their surroundings, encouraging healthy social interactions and hopefully reducing violence and neglect.

I was able to personally visit Guatemala and research this system first hand. Here is an excerpt from a case study of the many indivduals I encountered:

“At 7:00 it’s a cool morning in La Tinta, situated in the northern highlands of Guatemala.  Axel Curcul makes his early walk to the local community center. He is enthused to find three customers already waiting for him. He opens up the building and begins to set up his small campaign for Community…(read more)

The iPad is not new to see competitors. Just to name a few – HP slate, Dell Streak, Asus Eee, and MSI have entered the market as iPad alternatives. What does the NotionInk have that these other tablets lack? Its the ability for the screen to go to full color Black White mode (like the kindle) allowing it be used with the help of sunlight. Finally you don’t have to be a hermit to use the computer! I would find this technology essential for a mobile, tablet device. It also will include some essential components that the iPad irritates you for not having, such as USB ports, Firefox browser, GPS, rotating camera, and Adobe flash.

It will be priced around $399 to $498. The Adam will not been released until the late fall 2010. Until then we can only hope  it is a worthy competitor to the Apple iPad.

“Has America become the land of the double standard?

Lets see: if we lie to the Congress, it’s a felony and if the Congress lies to us its just politics; if we dislike a black person, we’re racist and if a black person dislikes whites, its their 1st Amendment right; the government spends millions to rehabilitate criminals and they do almost nothing for the victims; in public schools you can teach that homosexuality is OK, but you better not use the word God in the process; you can kill an unborn child, but it is wrong to execute a mass murderer; we don’t burn books in America, we now rewrite them; we got rid of communist and socialist threats by renaming them progressive; we are unable to close our border with Mexico, but have no problem protecting the 38th parallel in Korea; if you protest against President Obama’s policies you’re a terrorist, but if you burned an American flag or George Bush in effigy it was your 1st Amendment right.

You can have pornography on TV or the internet, but you better not put a nativity scene in a public park during Christmas; we have eliminated all criminals in America, they are now called sick people; we can use a human fetus for medical research, but it is wrong to use an animal.

We take money from those who work hard for it and give it to those who don’t want to work; we all support the Constitution, but only when it supports our political ideology; we still have freedom of speech, but only if we are being politically correct; parenting has been replaced with Ritalin and video games; the land of opportunity is now the land of hand outs; the similarity between Hurricane Katrina and the gulf oil spill is that neither president did anything to help.

And how do we handle a major crisis today? The government appoints a committee to determine who’s at fault, then threatens them, passes a law, raises our taxes; tells us the problem is solved so they can get back to their reelection campaign.

What has happened to the land of the free and home of the brave?”

- Ken Huber
Tawas City

A pretty amazing concept and a possibility for the future. The space elevator could be the the next greatest invention of our generation – just like the telephone, airplane, and computers. It would be a large feat, but it could make space accessible for energy, business, and common people.

Lets look at the real numbers. In case people haven’t noticed Housing Starts is the number of new home construction in the year. Usually the drop in this number precedes a recession, then it picks back up and after some time the economic slump does as well. Housing Starts dropped in 2008 from 1.7 million to about 450 thousand, that’s lower than housing starts in the 50′s. The expectation was that it would pick up in six months, above 1 million again. News flash, it only at 590 thousand and were over 2 years out – that’s an indicator for a depression, not a recovery.

Second, an increase in the unemployment rate usually precedes a recession, then it drops back down and the economy recovers after that. In case you haven’t noticed because you’ve got good job security, the unemployment rate has been steadily climbing (not to mention how the Gulf oil spill will kill more jobs in the south). You may think “but I heard the unemployment rate is at 9%, that’s stable.” I think our Bureau of labor statistics has been avoiding a big chunk. People who have been searching for some time and have temporarily stopped searching – are not included (they stopped looking, so they must not need a job, right?) Also, people who have had temporary, or part time, jobs are not included. Real unemployment rates have come as high as 17.5% or 22%. By the way, these numbers were calculated with the same criteria that was used nearly 80 years ago, you know, during the Great Depression – when unemployment was at 25 percent! It also took 4 years for the unemployment rate to get that high from the beginning of the depression. Looks like were not far behind.

Keep informed America.

On April 19th, 2010, BP had drilled to the projected pay zone (the area where the drill starts to make contact with the underground oil reserve) and was completing the well for future production. Commonly, when a well is at this stage, you run casing to the Total Depth (TD) and run cement down the casing forcing it up the backside of the casing between the earth and outer casing wall. When the cement is pumped, it is followed by a cement plug that will seat itself at the end of the casing or TD after the calculated volume of cement has been displaced.  The cement and plug are forced down the casing with salt water or even mud if necessary behind them. When the plug is seated, the well is shut-in, giving time for the cement to cure. Next the plug is drilled out and the casing perforated in the pay zones.

What BP did, with permission from US regulatory agents, was not to run a cement plug that would have to be drilled out,  saving a great deal of money. In addition, the fluid that they ran in the casing was not heavy enough to handle the pressure coming from the pay zone.  BP had miscalculated the needed weight of the fluid in the casing, which allowed the natural gas to make its way up through the fluid in the casing. On April 20th, 2010, The high pressure gas rushed up the well pipe and erupted on the oil rig. Blowout preventers, major shutoff valves, that should have automatically sealed off the well, malfunctioned due to failed batteries.  The burning, melting, and collapsing of the drilling platform greatly complicated the matter to resolve the accident.

In conclusion,

BP is responsible, but only for 2/3 of this mishap. The other 1/3 goes against the US Regulatory Agency who bought into all of this and signed off on proper procedure. It has now been almost 3 months and the leak has yet to be contained.

It seems its gotten so extreme that businesses from our sanctioned foe, Iran, are willing to provide expertise on how to contain the oil spill. To be honest, it is humiliating to the US that Iran even feels the need to come out to help. Iran surely has the knowledge for containing spills and is considerate to offer their support. If our president isn’t willing to receive help from this country’s friends it’s much less likely he will to turn to its dissenters.