Interview with T. Boone Pickens on America's Energy Future

T. Boone Pickens is known as the “Oracle of Oil” because of his uncanny ability to predict the direction of fuel prices, and is the author of a new book, The First Billion Is the Hardest: Reflections on a Life of Comebacks and America's Energy Future. Mr. Pickens talks about his "Pickens Plan" to end America's dependence on foreign oil and secure our energy future through renewable energy sources and natural gas among other things. He talks about windmills, pipelines and natural gas for cars among other things.

You can listen directly -- no downloads needed -- by going here and clicking on the gray Flash player. You can download the entire show and listen at your leisure by clicking right here. Or you can get a free subscription via iTunes if you like -- and why wouldn't you?

Music is "Time's Right" by 46 Long, and "69365" by the Nebraska Guitar Militia.

My Thoughts on Sarah Palin

I have a PJM column up on the nomination of Governor Sarah Palin: "Why Palin is a Fantastic Choice."

Ellen Tien: Wife of the Year!

Okay, I've had a number of readers email me and commenter papabear linked to this article originating in the Oprah magazine and now brought to you by CNN.com entitled, "She's happily married, dreaming of divorce." Wife of the year Ellen Tien writes:

I contemplate divorce every day. It tugs on my sleeve each morning when my husband, Will, greets me in his chipper, smug morning-person voice, because after 16 years of waking up together, he still hasn't quite pieced out that I'm not viable before 10 a.m.

It puts two hands on my forehead and mercilessly presses when he blurts out the exact wrong thing ("Are you excited for your surprise party next Tuesday?"); when he lies to avoid the fight ("What do you mean I left our apartment door open? I never even knew our apartment had a door!"); when he buttons his shirt and jacket into the wrong buttonholes, collars and seams unaligned like a vertical game of dominoes, with possibly a scrap of shirttail zippered into his fly....

Don't misunderstand: I would not, could not disparage my marriage (not on a train, not in the rain, not in a house, not with a mouse). After 192 months, Will and I remain if not happily married, then steadily so. Our marital state is Indiana, say, or Connecticut -- some red areas, more blue. Less than bliss, better than disaster. We are arguably, to my wide-ish range of reference, Everycouple.

Nor is Will the Very Bad Man that I've made him out to be. Rather, like every other male I know, he is merely a Moderately Bad Man, the kind of man who will leave his longboat-sized shoes directly in the flow of our home's traffic so that one day I'll trip over them, break my neck, and die, after which he'll walk home from the morgue, grief-stricken, take off his shoes with a heavy heart, and leave them in the center of the room until they kill the housekeeper. Everyman.

Tien's husband may not be Very Bad Man but Tien is a Very Bad Woman or Wife. She says she would not disparage her husband for anything, but she has aired her dirty laundry in front of everyone and disparages her husband in every word she writes. She has called him bad, messy, oblivious and worst of all, announced to the world that she wants to divorce him everyday. Does he know this? Does he care? Does she give a damn about his feelings?

I hope one day that Will is strong enough to file for divorce from a woman who does not love him, for if she did, she would not write this narcissistic diatribe against him and his gender. If I were him, I would take a copy of this article to divorce court as proof of her lack of loyalty and her dishonest feelings toward him. His only crime seems to be smiling too much, being a bit clumsy, and poor choices in women. I would fight for custody of their son and hope that I could have this woman put out of the home, for she is not worthy to be there.

Getting Stronger

If you can treat personal tragedy like a heavy set of 20 squats, you'll do better than someone who has never met any challenge.--Mark Rippetoe

Now that my health is somewhat better, I have been working out more--mainly with light weights, aerobics and Kra Maga once a week. I wanted to take it up a notch so I decided to read up on some tips for strength training more effectively. I was delighted that Glenn received two books by Mark Rippetoe recently in the mail: Strong Enough? Thoughts from Thirty Years of Barbell Training and Starting Strength. I used to weight train religiously in my twenties up until my thirties when I had my heart attack. I am taking it slow but I still love reading about weight training. If you do, you might also enjoy Rippetoe's books.

I picked up the "Strong Enough" book because it looked like it had some good advice. Rippetoe explains that the squat, press, deadlift and bench press have been used by the strongest athletes on the planet:

There is a reason for that. Any program that doesn't use them is inferior to one that does, and an athlete that leaves them out of the program is doing less than possible for performance, and less than absolutely necessary to have the best strength possible.

He describes each exercise in separate sections and gives some pictures and details about how to do each one correctly. Interestedly, Rippetoe does not believe that full squats are bad for the knees and thinks that doctors and physical therapists who warn people against them just do not know how to do a squat properly:

What generally happens is that when one of these professionals explains why you will die if you do squats, he will demonstrate with squat technique so incorrect that even unweighted, it hurts to watch, and then he'll say SEE, THERE, SQUATS ARE BAD FOR YOUR KNEES. This is like saying that if you burn the beans, they stink up the house, so you shouldn't eat beans. You don't get to define the argument in terms that prove you're right, and then charge money because you won the argument.

Apparently, this guy has never been in academia. But that's beside the point. I have often heard that full squats are bad for one's knees but they seem to be the best exercise for me as they really work the back of the legs and glutes. I sometimes do them with no or little weight. Anyway, the rest of the book is good with sections on biomechanics, good form, and "being very alive" in which he makes fun of the term "wellness." Why? "Wellness means having a salad and baked potato after your aerobics class." Rippetoe believes exercise should be mentally and physically challenging. While I concur, I must say that after experiencing what it is to be very ill, I am pretty happy with a baked potato and aerobics class but then, maybe I'm not his target audience.

If you are, check out his books, they are inspirational.

The Democratic Convention: the fun begins...

I have been watching the Democratic convention and laughing my ass off, frankly at some of the hilarity. For example, seeing the look of disdain and disgust on some of the faces of the interviewees of Fox News reporters is worth a laugh all by itself. I saw one woman who (I think) said she worked with Michelle Obama--she was irate with the Fox News interviewer for even asking questions. She kept mentioning that he was "taking things out of context as their opponents, the Republicans often did." She was obviously very much on the defensive and seemed downright hostile. Many of the other Democratic interviewees were defensive and seemed openly antagonistic towards Fox News.

Protesters, including a far left group run by none other than Ward Churchhill , (the professor who believed the victims of 9/11 were involved in provoking the attack and was later fired for research misconduct), were such intellectual giants that all they could do when asked what their message was by Fox News reporter, Griff Jenkins, was chant: "Fuck Fox News." Yes, that will really persuade people. Here is the video, for those of you who would like to see some visuals:



Democrats and those on the left are so used to getting away with saying anything in the media, that they are just plain angry that in this election, it's not working as well. Thank goodness that Fox News and the alternative media are there to cover other views, not just the one the left wants people to hear.

"Fatherlessness can sometimes be a result of the mother's choices."

Finally, a mom who is starting to get it (via Glenn Sacks):

I share this journey with readers because I know men aren't always the only ones to blame when Daddy isn't a part of his children's lives. Women have a larger role in that than we'd like to admit -- before and after conception.

That means single women need to shoulder some of responsibility for having unprotected sex with the wrong men, especially those who have no history of making investments in their other sperm donor deposits.

And women of divorce need to lose the anger so our children don't become unintentional pawns in a game to prove how much we don't need a spouse to survive. At times, a man's character, life circumstances or domestic violence keep children from having access to their father. Sometimes, though, women just need to get out of the way.

There is still a long way to go for women to understand how much children need their dads, but it's a start.

Biden and Obama: Bad for Dads

Gordon Finley, PhD has a piece at Mens News Daily entitled: Obama/Biden: Escalating the war on fathers and families:

Tragically — but true to the radical feminist agenda — the Obama/Biden Democratic ticket portends an escalating war on boys, men, fathers, and families. On Father’s Day 2008, Sen. Obama could have spoken on any number of topics. His choice was to castigate African-American fathers and blame fathers, and fathers alone, for the ills of the African-American family.

He called upon African-American fathers to be more involved in their children’s lives (certainly a worthwhile call) but he also castigated them for failing to endorse “responsible fatherhood” which essentially means signing up for 18 years of overly highly calculated child support. Economists understand, but Sen. Obama ideologically overlooks, the reality that child support currently is calculated at a level far above what the majority of fathers — including poor and unemployed fathers — actually are capable of paying or that children require (see W. S. Comanor, The law and economics of child support payments, 2004).

Remember, Senator Biden is the guy willing to give ex-wives free attorneys to help in their divorce cases. As I asked in a post here:

Why should only women get "free" attorneys basically provided by the government? What about low income men who cannot get custody of their children or men who are falsely accused of domestic violence--where is their free attorney? Isn't this unfair?

It is obvious that Biden does not have men's interests at heart. If he is willing to throw aside men's constitutional rights and due process in order to look chivalrous and get votes from women, what else is he willing to do?