Environmentalists suck

Brownout -Forbes.com

If you think runaway oil prices are upsetting, just wait for what’s in store for electricity. Similar forces are in play. Demand is rising fast; supply is not. The cost to get coal and natural gas out of the ground is going up, and to that expense must be added the cost of the carbon permits that Congress and the presidential candidates are contemplating. Environmentalists are getting power plants scotched. China is sucking up energy. Leave such dynamics in play long enough, and price spikes in electricity follow. But that’s just the beginning. We may be facing brownouts (voltage reductions) and even rolling blackouts.
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Coal is cheap, but it has no friends. Anticoal activists brag that 59 coal-fired plants were canceled in 2007. Nearly 50 more in 29 states are being contested. Recall how the private equity buyers of Texas utility txu agreed last year to cancel eight power plants to defuse environmental opposition. It takes years to plan and at least six years to build a large power plant.
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Nukes produce 20% of U.S. electricity. But there hasn’t been a new nuclear plant started in three decades, and licenses are expiring on existing nukes. Opponents are fighting renewal of those licenses.

Brag.
They brag that they are basically killing our way of life.
Why do we listen to these people? They obviously hate us; in fact, they often freely admit that they hate humanity. Some would say “rope”. I don’t think that really goes far enough.
Whatever we do, do not let these people kill us. Do not give in to evil.

Gar, laptop

So my laptop, the small, and very nice Toshiba m400, is having problems. Unfortunately, I can’t determine if it is a hardware problem or a problem with my linux install. (Yes, I am a Linux user and an open source software supporter: read Eric S. Raymond’s writings to see why this is a expression of free market principles).
Anyway, the symptom is mainly powering off in the middle of me working, which is irritating. I have already done a memtest86+, which eliminated the possibility of it being a memory problem. I am going to do a fresh linux install (good thing I do seperate /home partitioning on all my setups) and see if that solves the problem. My fear is that the motherboard is the problem, which is an inconvenience, even though it is covered under the 4 year warranty (obtained by buying this computer through my high school). Oh well. One way or the other, I will resolve this problem.

Drive Through the Midwest

I got home from my epic drive through the Midwest of America on Wednesday night. The purpose of the trip was to move my Grandmother (on Dad’s side) from Des Moines, Iowa to San Antonio, Texas. We used I35.
We drove through beautiful parts of the country, and I have pictures. I think I will post those pictures both here and on my facebook. I twittered the journey (using my fancy little cell phone: thank you Dad!). Check it out.
Anyway, besides leaving my bag at a Days Inn hotel in Wichita, Kansas, it was a successful, if exhausting, journey. Dad will claim that he drove at the speed limit the entire time, even though we made the 1000 mile journey in about 14 hours of road time.
I looked at University of Texas at the Texas end of the journey. It is a huge place, but it is a good looking, clean campus. I will apply and I think it would be a good place for me.