The Bloom Box: either too good to be true or likely to change the world.

Lesley Stahl of 60 Minutes interviewed K.R. Sridhar from Bloom Energy about their potentially world-changing Bloom Box — a small fuel cell that produces cheap electricity with zero emissions on demand and an on site. Sridhar envisions a Bloom Box providing electricity for homes all over the world — in just 5-10 years.

It sounds too good to be true, but Bloom Energy has raised hundreds of millions of dollars from top-tier investors. AND, the first version of the Bloom Box is already in use by Google (providing electricity for one of it’s data centers) and Ebay (providing 15% of the electricity for it’s massive campus and saving over $100,000 per year in energy costs).

This could really change the world. Check it out:

• The 60 Minutes segment
• More Bloom Box info from 60 Minutes
• Bloom Energy website

William Hurt signing autographs at the 2005 Toronto Film Festival (photo by sheksay)

Among many other things, he discusses working and Raul Julia to film Kiss of the Spider Woman — a role that earned Hurt a Best Actor Oscar. He also shares a story about an excursion he made during a filming break in Brazil during which he and a date were held hostage and lmost executed by thieves during a home robbery. He also discusses how he managed to turn a cameo in A History of Violence into the “shortest Academy Award nomination in history” — he was nominated for Best Supporting Actor.

He also shares many personal details about his roller-coaster, multinational upbringing and his close relationship to his mother, his father and his step-father. Throughout the interview, he gives a glimpse into his world view and personal life philosophy. This highly recommended interview is quite an intriguing look into the life and mind of a thoughtful, bright, and very unique personality.

This one is definitely worth your time:

• Listen on demand
• Download the mp3 podcast
• Read the transcript

Terry Gross interviews Def Jam Records founder Rick Rubin about his 10-year collaboration with icon Johnny Cash to create the American Recordings series of Johnny Cash Albums. Quite interesting, and well worth a listen.

Check it out here:

• Listen on demand
• Download the mp3 podcast
• Read the transcript

Johnny Cash by Joel Baldwin for LOOK Magazine April 29, 1969

Terry gets some fascinating insight into Johnny, as he talks about a wide range of topics such as growing up poor, the incredible confidence and assertiveness with which he got his first recording gig, and how he came to make the American Recordings series of albums with Def Jam Records founder Rick Rubin. He also talks about his series of prison concerts — including recording the song Folsom Prison Blues for the live album At Folsom Prison — which he said “…was far and above anything I had ever had in my life, the complete explosion of noise and reaction that they gave me with every song.

As always, Terry does a fantastic interview and Johnny Cash is fantastic guest. This well worth a listen (or read).

Check it out here:

• Listen on demand
• Download the mp3 podcast
• Read the transcript

There has been an endless stream of criticism of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor for saying that she would “hope that a wise Latina woman…would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male.” This prompted many to call her a “clearly” biased judge.

But this argument is ridiculous. She was merely saying that a person’s life experience impacts their judgments and beliefs. Of course this must be true. That’s why some judges are more conservative and some are more liberal and some are in the middle. That’s why the Bush-era Supreme Court nominees have shifted the court to the right. Their life experiences affect them in a way that makes them more conservative in their interpretations of the law.

People have tried to argue that judges should be completely unbiased. Of course, they should not let their personal views and beliefs directly impact their legal judgments. But the whole point of judges is that they are making judgments. They are interpreting the law. Naturally, they must do this objectively and not subjectively. But even their objective view will be colored by their life experience. That’s why different judges come to different conclusions. When there is a 5 to 4 Supreme Court ruling, as has happened often in recent years, does that mean that the 4 judge minority was biased and “wrong.” Of course not. It means that they came to a different conclusion based on their interpretation of the law.

If there was no room for interpretation, then we wouldn’t need judges at all. Everything would simply be true or false, black or white, right or wrong.

McCain and Palin are out of control. For the last few days, Palin has been saying,

“We see America as the greatest force for good in this world. Our opponent though, is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect that he’s palling around with terrorists who would target their own country.”

She is, of course, talking about Obama’s interactions with Bill Ayers, who happens by chance to live in Obama’s Chicago neighborhood. Ironically, while she quoted the New York Times to make her case, the very article that she quoted concluded that

“…the two men do not appear to have been close. Nor has Mr. Obama ever expressed sympathy for the radical views and actions of Mr. Ayers…”

This association by Palin is ridiculous. How can the by considered “pals?”

Even if – for the sake of argument — it were true, how bad an association would Ayers be? Charges against Ayers were dropped, he has shown remorse for his actions, and he is now a college professor. Ayers may have been an overzealous advocate for his views who should have read more Gandhi and less Mao, but he never even went to trial, and now seems to be dedicating himself to good causes. For goodness sake, a primary source of interaction between Obama and Ayers was a school reform project meeting.

Let’s look at my “pals.” I happened to attend Princeton University at the same time as Lyle Menendez, who was convicted of murdering his parents with a shotgun. I loosley knew one of Lyle’s roommates and consequently I briefly met Lyle a few times and once I even went to a party at a nearby house that Lyle owned. I even drank some of his beer. Does this mean that I am pals with Lyle or that I support or in any way condone murdering your parents? Come on.

For argument’s sake, let’s take a look at John McCain and his relationship with Charles Keating. The Keating and McCain families took several vacations together, McCain accepted $112,000 in campaign contributions from Keating, and McCain intervened with congress on Keating’s behalf. Unlike Ayers who never even had a trial, Keating was convicted of fraud, racketeering and conspiracy, went to jail, and had to pay $1 billion in civil penalties. Check the facts yourself at CNN.

Keating and McCain were clearly pals and Keating is a convicted felon. Now, does this mean that McCain condones banking fraud?

I don’t think so. But people in glass houses should not throw stones. McCain looks much guiltier to me than Obama.

It seems that 166 economists agree that the “crisis” is not so dire and that that bankruptcy is preferable to a bailout.

Here is Harvard University senior economics lecturer Jeffrey A. Miron’s spin:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/29/miron.bailout/index.html

Looking at the big picture, I think this whole “financial crisis” is overblown and being fueled in large part by the instant, overabundance of the modern media. You won’t find a bigger advocate than me for freedom of the press, but the modern media is definitely subject to the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. This “crisis” is clear proof of that. It’s big news, and the media tends to sensationalize EVERYTHING. This serves to add fuel to the fire and results in a self-fulfilling prophecy.

In a close 5 to 4 decision, the US Supreme Court did the right thing and ruled against the Bush Administration for the 3rd time regarding the detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. It seems that they do have the right to challenge their detentions in federal court. To me this reaffirms some of the most fundamental protections that we enjoy in the United States. The government can’t detain someone just because they want to, and that can’t skirt the law by exporting people to a military base on foreign soil.

I am ashamed that our government has been trying (relentlessly) to sacrifice civil liberties and the rule of law in the name of security. But at least there is hope that we can sometimes do the right thing.

And, with luck, this hopefully means that Bush will not get another crack at the Gitmo detainees. It seems likely that the detainees will immediately file appeals that will halt the current proceedings, and seems the appeals will not be resolved before Bush leaves office. This will then fall to the next President who will hopefully show some respect for the core values that make America great.

Although it has become cliche at this point, I firmly believe in the remarks attributed to patriot Benjamin Franklin that

Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.

The gas tax holiday proposed by Hillary Clinton and John McCain is nothing but a pathetic pander. The tax has no realistic value to anyone — in fact it will hurt us.

We won’t get the full 18 cents
First, it’s unlikely that the pitiful 18 cents a gallon will all be passed on to consumers. Who knows how much of it we’ll see, but I’d bet (and most experts agree) it won’t be 18 cents by the time the gas gets to the pump. But guess what, I bet it will go up exactly 18 cents on the day the “holiday” ends. After it’s all done, we’ll be paying more than we would have without the tax!

It won’t help anyway
And it won’t really help anyone anyway. Assuming we get the entire 18 cents, that’s only 5% of a $3.60 gallon of gas. Let’s assume we get the full 18 cents and do some math. Say you fill your 18 gallon tank once per week. That will save you $3.24 per week. Over the 12 week summer, that’s a whopping $38.88. Is $3.24 a week for 12 weeks really gonna make a difference for someone?

Create jobs instead
Instead of putting a hold on the tax, keep that money going to road and highway maintenance and projects. That creates jobs which are worth much more to people than $3.24 a week.

Tax the oil companies anyway
You want to tax the oil companies to pay for the holiday? We can debate (another time) whether or not that’s a good idea. Personally, I think it’s fine — the most profitable companies in the history of the planet certainly don’t need any tax breaks. And despite what former oilman George Bush says, we don’t need to give anyone incentives to find more oil — high prices and world record profits are incentive enough. So keep the gas tax where it is, tax the oil companies anyway and put the money to good use.

Create carbon free green jobs!
Why not keep the gas tax money to pay for creating jobs in highway construction, and use new oil company taxes to pay for incentives to push companies to focus on renewable, carbon free energy sources. Sure, high oil prices will give the green companies plenty of incentive. But why not spur them on? This will create even more jobs — jobs worth much more than $3.34 a week that will help decrease our dependence on oil, help the environment, and help us climb our of recession all at the same time!

And as a bonus, wouldn’t it be pretty nice for the US to be a world leader in green energy? Being the world leader and top exporter of green technology seems to bode a brighter future than being the home of the most profitable oil company in the world.