It’s the end of the year and it’s mighty slow for those of us looking for a job.  Things started drying up dramatically around Thanksgiving and then it trickled to next to nothing on Christmas Eve.  I guess it’s to be expected.  I hope things will pick up shortly after New Years.

Sigh … I wonder how the latest financial problem involving that Madoff guy will affect everything.   How many more are out there like him?  And how many companies will soon find out that the money they’ve “lent” out evaporated?  I hope this doesn’t erode the little bit of confidence that could have been built up in the past few weeks.  I realize that it’s going to take a while to unwind everything and figure out how much money there really is in the system.  I imagine a lot of money is being double counted now.  My feeling, though, is that it’s time for a return to sanity and for the world economy to be based on actual trade again rather than debt swapping.  We’ll see if that actually happens.  The US isn’t in the best position to actually manufacture much of anything anymore.  Plus, there aren’t enough creative business people and managers who can envision cost effective manufacturing in the US that pays a good wage, is safe for the environment, and provides cost competitive products for consumers.  It takes a strong will to change things and it takes courage to act.  Right now, though, I see a bunch of flimsy spined folks running around who only know how to cut costs with a chainsaw or beg the government for corporate well-fare.

( Hahaha … irony of ironies … spreading personal wealth to corporations.  There are so many out there who don’t have a pot to pee in blinded by the thought of  the stereotypical “Well-fare Queen,”  who have been fooled into thinking that they are middle class or even rich.  Hahaha!!!  It blows my mind!  I guess this explains the state we are in.  Everyone was  living beyond their means because so many people deluded themselves into thinking that they had means.  Welcome to reality and enjoy the global “three finger salute.”  Not everyone can and should own a house and a car … that’s why there are apartments and public transportation.  The rest of the world seems to understand this.  Anyhow, there are some nice stats on Wikipedia about household incomes in the US — link.  I wonder how many people have actually looked at their finances to understand their true situation.)

So what comes next?  It’s clear that the rate at which people are accumulating stuff is not sustainable because there’s only so much matter on the planet.  Which leads me to some “Duh!” moments I’ve had in the last few days:

Duh! #1:  My husband says to me after thinking really hard about it,” What if there were some way like plants and trees to convert the CO2 to oxygen and water, then we wouldn’t have to worry about carbon so much anymore.”  My deadpan response, “Uh, why not just plant enough trees and plants to cover your carbon usage …Duh …”  The carbon makes more plants (literally) and the water and oxygen makes things cool and breathable for the rest of us on the planet.  Dear Gosh!  What is wrong with the town I live in?  They want us to get rid of all of our landscape, not realizing that planting plants in the desert is what has caused us to have more humid summers and rain.  By the way, stop clear cutting in the areas that you want high snow-pack and replant the trees … get a clue and learn how to manipulate the environment!  It isn’t rocket science!  Really, think about it — carbon is the basis for life, so put it back into life to get it out of the atmosphere.  Plus plants are natural storage for the sun’s energy.  So as long as you recycle the carbon back to life, there should be a balance.

Duh! #2:  My Dad was telling me about how my uncle uncle accounted for the climate change in the state of Georgia.  He said the drought really didn’t get bad until they started cutting down ALL of the trees.  Duh!  You want water to fall from the sky, plant trees … there’s a reason it called a rain-forest and not a rain desert … Geez …

Duh! #3:  why the heck aren’t we actively mining landfills?  We have already made so much stuff, so why make more and why can’t the stuff we have now not be reworked when we are done with it?  What the heck is wrong with us?

Anyhow, I hope with the passing of 2008, some of the madness ends and sanity can begin to come back in 2009.  Instead of pushing everyone to eliminate carbon emissions, behaps we can work on the other end to restore the balance by planting trees and landscaping the planet — you, know, redistribute some of that ocean water to places where people need it.  Perhaps we can reclaim our waste rather than wringing our hands about building more landfills and dumping in the ocean.  Seriously!  Are we really that mentality flacid?!!!!