The year 2010 was a very eventful year! Some thoughts about 2010, from an almost 78 year old
Fire, Gutenberg press, the transistor and the iPad are key points of man’s evolution toward a civilized society. Well maybe not the iPad, but it was one of the highlights of 2010. The iPad is so new my 2011 copy of Word things iPad is a misspelled word. In early December I went to a Renewable Energy conference at The University of Minnesota and at the opening session at a table of six there were three iPad. If I had brought mine (actually Joan’s), it would have made four. This was the trend at the entire conference, it almost seemed like an iPad conference. The iPad was introduced in April 2010!
In the lame duck congressional session the Bush tax cuts were extended. Will this help iPad sales? Maybe, but they will also help Mercedes sales. Because those having earned income over $250,000, say $3,000,000 could buy a Mercedes S series with the tax savings, instead of a US made Lincoln Hybrid that gets 41MPG. The only redeeming virtue is sales tax would be recovered from the Mercedes sale. But if one believes in trickle down economics, maybe one could argue that a Mercedes Benz dealership is a small business.
Innovation is what drives the economy! Innovation is the core of the capitalistic economic system. It is the way to redistribute wealth. Without innovation the primary attribute needed to attain wealth was inheritance, stagnation and greed. The iPad was the work of Steve Jobs and a dedicated group of innovative engineers and scientist. They gained wealth but that was incidental to their goal of making “cool” products. But wealth was redistributed in the process. “Cool”.
Dixiecrats were a fragment of the Democratic Party organized in the 1950’s as a states right party and rejecting the Northern ever more liberal Democrat. The south became Democrat during the depression but did not want to be told how to spend the money from Washington. States rights party is south culture because one hundred fifty years ago they were divested of their property by the federal government. Many of the southern leadership then used fear politics to form the Christian Collation and now the Tea Party. Only a small percentage of the South votes Democrat. This explains the horror Senator Jim DeMint Republican from SC felt when Obama took the oath of office as President. What his relatives called property was now sleeping in the Whitehouse. And I wonder how many iPads were sold in the Deep South.
The most effective negative promotion I have seen in my seventy-seven years was the campaign used against ethanol. As a volunteer corn grower and a State Director Minnesota Corn Growers, I lobbied both Minnesota legislators and Federal Legislators for favorable legislation for corn based ethanol. The amateur corn growers were confronted with a professional team of lobbyist funded by big oil. They knew that we were after ten or twenty percent of their business. While we had a message of jobs, improving the environment and a renewable energy source they demonized our message with miss information and lies. The effectiveness of big oil still plays out its message today. Thomas Friedman, New York Times editorial writer often writes column about the need for better education, more innovation and protection of the environment, dissed corn-based ethanol. A simple search on Google reading recent data laden reports would have how corn based ethanol is a very good source of renewable energy. Simply stated it is one hundred fifty percent energy yield on corn ethanol compared to sixty to thirty percent equivalent yield on crude oil. And if crude is extracted from the oil sands the yield goes negative. It ‘s important to remember a pile of manure carefully spread on a farm field, grows an excellent crop of corn/ethanol while sequestering carbon. If you own an iPad use the Safari App to access Google and check it out.
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