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Comment Re:They WILL FIght Back (Score 1) 516

It lasted six years dude. The effects were even more obnoxious than I listed; I remember dusting the house every bloody day because they were stirring up that much dust and dirt. They destroyed our local roads and paid nothing towards the repair of them. I moved out of that area a full year after they completed construction and the streams still weren't clear. That's what happens when you clear cut thousands of acres of forest. The out-of-towners they trucked in for the job showed no respect to the local community. The complaints ranged from the trivial (speeding, ignoring stop signs) to the obnoxious (unnecessary jake braking at 3am, sexual innuendo on their CB radios) to the criminal (assault and rapes tripled in Wyoming County during this project). ......
I'll repeat: Wind power is a joke.

None of your complaints have anything to do with Wind Power as a technology. It sounds like a poorly run project, with uncaring and inconsiderate project leaders. That has nothing to do with Wind as a power source.

I travel back and forth along the Columbia River all the time. There is a huge amount of wind power and ongoing construction. I've never been inconvenienced. Never had a road closed. Never seen any large amounts of dust. http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-_z61PskCFZU/Tf5MQLBMofI/AAAAAAAABMA/_iJDGCRxHSw/s1600/DSCF2258.JPG

Comment Re:Stupid, trucks cause the problem (Score 1) 554

To reply directly to your analogy: it's wrong. Government spending isn't a household budget and anyone who tries to make that comparison is explicitly demonstrating their ignorance of economics.

I hear that often, and tend to believe it because I hear smart economists say that all the time. However, I really can't explain it to other people. I find articles like this:
http://www.rooseveltinstitute.org/new-roosevelt/federal-budget-not-household-budget-here-s-why

But after reading it, it is still unclear why, for example, debt is required/not required to make a Government budget work.

Comment Re: The UK doesn't have freedom of speech (Score 1) 316

I don't know if it saved lives overall or not. I don't know if dropping it over the water, or on a military base would have shocked them enough to surrender. Who knows? It is hard to redo history as an experiment.

I do know that it most likely saved my Grandpa's life though. He was on a navy boat, days away from attempting to take a heavily fortified beach. The predicted casualties were around 60-70%.

Comment Re:Alternative? (Score 1) 377

When you make the label binary, then what you are really telling the consumer is that all that matters is whether there are GMOs in there or not, and that only makes any sense for people that just think that GMOs are bad in principle.

I think that is exactly what most pro-label people wanted. A binary choice out of principle.

Among people I talk to, and I don't know many that believe GMO's are unhealthy. The main concerns I heard were stuff about patenting food being a bad idea, GMO's leading to higher use of pesticide, corporate control over non-seeding plants, mono-culture crops having increased chance of mass die off if a new disease or pest infects them, etc...

So very much an "in principle" label.

Most people that are serious about sustainable food already know that labels like 'organic' don't mean much without some extra research. GMO would just be one more label. Just a starting place. If you want the specifics about whether GMO X is good/bad, you better do some reading.

Comment Re:So, does water cost more? (Score 1) 377

There are certain types of creative goods and services that it makes no sense to patent. Patents in certain areas hinder new ideas, especially if that good or service is one that favors evolutionary ideas...generational growth and interbreeding / crossbreeding.

Like fashion. There are no patents on any designs in fashion. People are free to 'steal', mix/match, build on others works, etc.. Yet the fashion industry is still huge. And good designers still make a ton of money.

I think agriculture should have a similar free exchange of ideas. Maybe not 100% patent free, but definitely much less locked down than it is today. If that means that companies like Monsanto spend less on researching new GMO's, so be it. If society wants it, society can put more money into Universities and other institutes of basic research. I think that is a much better situation than handing our food future over to companies that want to produce seeds that grow into seedless plants.

Saving seeds, cross breeding, etc.. are a core part of agriculture. I would hate to see a world were every farm is just a clone of the next farm over, and all 100% dependent on patented seeds, with no variety in our produce.

Comment Re:It is all about baseload (Score 1) 488

Someone posted above that by 2025, 50kWh batteries will be 8,000 dollars. That isn't very much per household. Heck, 25,000 dollars per household (the current cost of 50kWh battery) isn't that expensive as a ratio to the house cost where I live right now. Mandating that all new homes must have a 50kWh battery closet, for use by the owner, or the electricity provider, to store energy, would be a good step towards a complete storage system.

But it would be a lot more efficient if the energy providers would have mandates to start building out storage. Right now I don't think there are any renewable mandates that dictate anything about storage. There are a lot of companies working on large scale energy storage right now. It is going to become one of the next big booming businesses. It is basically a given assumption that grid storage is the future. The question is just how long it will take. http://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2013/12/f5/Grid%20Energy%20Storage%20December%202013.pdf

This guy's liquid metal grid batteries have been getting a bunch of hype.
http://www.donaldsadoway.com/ds_projects/grid-level-electricity-storage/

Comment Re:Home storage (Score 1) 488

Ideally, energy producers should be working on installing more and more energy storage, but I don't see why your electric car, plugged into your garage, shouldn't also be able to power your house when you get home if the wind/sun stops shining.

http://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2013/12/f5/Grid%20Energy%20Storage%20December%202013.pdf
http://www.donaldsadoway.com/ds_projects/grid-level-electricity-storage/
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v514/n7522/full/nature13700.html
http://greeneconomypost.com/fifteen-grid-scale-energy-storage-solutions-watch-15924.htm

Comment Re:Are renewable energy generators up to task ? (Score 1) 488

Or increased grid energy storage as technology allows.

http://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2013/12/f5/Grid%20Energy%20Storage%20December%202013.pdf
http://www.donaldsadoway.com/ds_projects/grid-level-electricity-storage/
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v514/n7522/full/nature13700.html
http://greeneconomypost.com/fifteen-grid-scale-energy-storage-solutions-watch-15924.htm

Comment Re:Mayday PAC and their ilk don't want money out.. (Score 1) 224

most journalists* little more than Democratic party operatives

You do know that the largest most viewed news channel in the US is Fox right? And you know that by far the vast majority of talk radio is conservative, right?

You must be referring to journalists that research lengthy pieces, study material in depth, and write long articles for organizations like the New York Times or Rolling Stone I assume? The tiny tiny percent of the modern news industry....

I'll grant you that most modern culture (Hollywood, etc..) has a progressive/liberal predominance. But whose fault is that? Assuming we aren't entering conspiracy land here, why do you think Hollywood is "left"? How did it get that way, and why does it remain that way? I'd be curious to hear your opinion.

Comment Re:Hypocrites (Score 1) 224

That is an argument why the news should have additional regulations about political coverage, especially with regards to libel and slander laws, not why random billionaires should continue to be able to influence elections with unlimited unregulated advertisements.

If we forced candidates to only use a set amount of public funds for elections, they were only given a set amount of public air time, required to attend X public debates... and they didn't have to compete with billions of dollars flooding tv/radio, their actual messages would be a lot clearer to the American people, regardless of what the news and media was reporting.

If I could wave a magic wand, I would limit all election related donations to individuals, and limit the amount. Like 100 dollars per person per year. Warren Buffet, Koch Brothers, anyone. 100 dollars per year directly to a candidate or political party. No TV or radio ads allowed beyond the set public funding dollars and amount raised through the small 100 dollar donations.

Comment Re:Manufacturers can help make this better (Score 1) 321

"You buy the camera, many times you open a port on a router, but you fail to change the password. I am not going to blame the manufacturer for that."

If a large segment of people, for the last 10 years, have continually forgotten to change default passwords, I am ready to blame the manufacturer(s). Make it so the camera won't turn on/work if the password isn't changed. Maybe generate a random password for each device...

Yeah the people not changing passwords are irresponsible... but if 50% of your customers have been irresponsible for a decade, maybe it is time to admit that the users are not going to change. That means technology is the solution, not changing user behavior.

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