Is anybody besides me getting a message in this window that says the Blog is down and out? I’ve discovered you can still click on “The Zephyr Blog” and access the entries but that the blog window is down…I’ve left a message with our web guy and we can hope for the best….JS

Below is a story link from the Philadelphia Inquirer regarding an indictment of executives of Synthes, Inc:
The story infers Hanjorg Wyss, CEO of Synthes at the time, is potentially “Person Number 7” of the indictment.
Wyss is a long time board member and major financial contributor to the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. He also serves on the boards of The Wilderness Society and the Grand Canyon Trust.

(In 2007, two other SUWA board members, Bert Fingerhut and Mark Ristow, were convicted and sentenced in separate securities fraud cases.)
You will need to cut and paste the link…

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/health_science/daily/20090617_Indictment_says_W__Chester_firm_tested_cement_on_patients.html

The Zephyr’s Western Australian correspondent, Judy Banks, suggests these words on the inexplicability of Life itself might offer some comfort to our readers…

Maybe in order to understand mankind, we have to look at the word itself: “Mankind”.  Basically it’s made up of two separate words – “mank” and “ind”.  What do these words mean?  It’s a mystery, and that’s why so is mankind.  (Jack Handey)

These thoughts from The Zephyr’s Colorado Plateau Bureau Chief, Doug Meyer…

When it came to “saving the planet,” I always expected the message to come via a Presidential address to the nation—you know, something like: “My fellow Americans, now is the time for each household to ask what sacrifices we might be willing to endure for the good of our country, and indeed Planet Earth,” or words to that effect. But it didn’t happen; when The O should have been warning us that consumption on this gargantuan scale could not continue forever, when did he ever say we needed to reduce the juice? Instead, during the campaign, he implied the hard work would be done for us, through the magic of efficiency.

Now we see what that really means. Waxman-Markey (the cap-and-trade bill) contains language designed to achieve “peak demand reduction”. Automatically. No questions asked. In case you think this was the Democrats’ idea, check out this excerpt from a New York Times article a year ago that described the ideas of Jim Rogers, chairman of Duke Energy:

“Under Save-a-Watt, Duke would, for example, distribute ‘smart’ meters that automatically turn off customers’ appliances during periods of peak power use. For its first experiment, Duke plans to cut the consumption of its customers in the Carolinas by 1,800 megawatts, which is equal to the output of two new coal-fired plants. The regulator would then let Duke charge higher rates for the electricity its customers do use to pay for all the efficiency technology. Save-a-Watt thus turns the power business on its head: rather than charge customers more to build plants, Duke will effectively charge them not to do so.”

Isn’t that neat? Now, last I checked, most of the red states don’t even believe in global warming. So I’ve got some questions I hope the Zephyr readers can enlighten me on: How many folks do you think are going to be aware of this as the bill heads to the Senate in the fall? Will we all be “encouraged” to buy new appliances that work with the “smart” meters? Will Plasma TV’s be included? (If yes, I’m starting to like this.) IF the Republicans really wanted to stop this bill, why didn’t they play this up? Will this be an effective response to global warming? And is this a good way for democracy to undertake cultural change?

What do YOU think?

I thought “widgets” were like ‘thingamajings but apparently a widget is what we needed to make our blog visible on the home page…Let us know if YOU can see it as well…

For more than a month now, we have been trying to post a blog ‘window’ on the home page, so that you can see at a glance, what the latest blog entry is; because it’s NOT visible, this blog is not attracting many readers and I can hardly blame you…very frustrating for all of us. Hopefully, SOON, we can get this blog rolling. In the meantime please use THIS ENTRY to express your comments on any topic within this issue you’d like to discuss or complain about. I need to hear from you. I can see from the stats that we are developing a growing readership but we need FEEDBACK!

from this height, the condos and adventure tour shops and McDs almost disappear!

Zephyr reader Mary Vader sent me the following link…cut and paste the web address into the URL bar to see how this world of ours should be…Thanks Mary.
http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=2539741

I saw this headline today on the web from the UK’s Telegraph…SHRINKING cities and returning them to Nature? I must be dreaming….here is a short excerpt and the link at the bottom (It appears you need to cut and paste the address into the URL bar…for some reason these blog entries don’t create a hot link…JS

US cities may have to be bulldozed in order to survive
By Tom Leonard in Flint, Michigan

Dozens of US cities may have entire neighbourhoods bulldozed as part of drastic “shrink to survive” proposals being considered by the Obama administration to tackle economic decline.
The government is looking at expanding a pioneering scheme in Flint, one of the poorest US cities, which involves razing entire districts and returning the land to nature.
Local politicians believe the city must contract by as much as 40 per cent, concentrating the dwindling population and local services into a more viable area.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/financialcrisis/5516536/US-cities-may-have-to-be-bulldozed-in-order-to-survive.html

Hello Everyone…The readership numbers for the new issue are way up, thanks in part to the email message we were able to send to you via Constant Contact. THANKS…who knows? A cyber Zephyr just might work!
Also included here is the URL to an interview I did recently with Christian Probasco, for newwest.net…just posted. Here is the link:
http://www.newwest.net/topic/article/long_live_the_zephyr/C564/L564/

Hello everyone…as you can see, the June/July issue is posted and ready for your scrutiny. PLEASE if you find typos, do NOT tell me…I’m way too burned out to worry about them at this late date. I’m asking you…begging you to take the time to examine each page. Even the ads and Backbone toons are worth a gander. Tell your friends.
Also Gary, the webmaster, is working on a second non-Adobe option. It seems to work well on PCs but Macs have resisted…we don’t know why. Finally note the Facebook link (god help me)…but you can, if you’re insane enough, join the “Friends of the Canyon Country Zephyr” group.
I welcome your comments. And I hope to update this blog much more frequently. However, if I resort to telling you what I had for breakfast, or that I have a blackberry seed stuck in my teeth, I hope you will all have the honesty to demand I see a shrink.