Today’s picture shows a family farm in Custer County, Nebraska. The picture was taken in 1886. The family is the William Moore family. I love this picture, and can not think of ever seeing one that better captures the unshakable spirit of the people of the American West. To be honest, I think we need a little more of that spirit today. You can believe that this family completely provided for all their own needs. Notice that their house looks like it is made of mud, and has a sod roof. Yep, I really admire these people.

It is funny that since I started this blog, I have never done anything, or expressed any opinion that did not make SOMEONE mad. You see some of it in the comments, but the really juicy messages come right to my inbox. Always, someone is offended . . . that is, until last Friday. That is where I showed the picture of my new Solar Panel installation. To my surprise, EVERYONE was happy. Lets break it down. First the tree hugging neuvo-hippy types were flooding me with email, “way to go man, you are saving the earth”. It was like I had been on the dark side and suddenly joined the elite enlightened. Then the Democrats were happy because I had gotten a government incentive to pay for part of the installation. They were happy because Big Government had spent money . . . that is what makes them happy. The Republicans were happy because a small business had done the installation, and that will help the small business, will s! pur the economy, and jobs will trickle down to poor people looking for work. The survivalist were particularly excited, saying that I had a pretty fair looking compound started, and I would be ready when the big one hits. The union men were happy because looking at the installation, they were pretty sure it had been done at least in part by a union shop. The anarchist were really happy because looking at those big sheets of glass, they could just see themselves trashing it with a bat in about 2 minutes.

Could it be that Solar is the one thing that just about everyone can agree on? As you all know, I was very much against the trillion dollar government stimulus, but wonder, if they were going to waste a trillion dollars should they have just used it to build solar farms across the west and midwest, and built the power grid necessary to power the country from solar. I don’t know, but I bet that could have just about been done for a trillion. They could have held back about $50 Billion and used that to develop a better rechargeable battery, which would enable practical, affordable electric cars. If they had done that with the trillion, we certainly would have created jobs, stimulated the economy, become energy independent, and we could stop sending hundreds of billions of dollars a year to countries that hate us. Just a thought.


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