Mike J.R. Goens is the editor we all love to hate.
Of course only he and I are old enough to know who J.R. is - And know why this is a complement.
In fact, a few years ago I got so mad I canceled my prescription to the Times Daily. Now I have to drive to the Chevron station at five a.m. each morning and pay full retail price to get my daily dose of Mike's indigestion.
The source of my most resent indignation is Mike's assertion that not one of the candidates has put forth an actual plan.
He claims that in his extensive TV viewership that although no one is opposed to job creation or economic development no politician has put forth anything to actually create jobs to make life better for the people of Alabama.
This may contain a grain of truth as I might indeed not rise to the level of actual politician. I hope not, as this fits my overall philosophy that State Government is far too important to be entrusted to politicians.
This is somewhat akin to one of my lawyer friends in Russellville saying that all the candidates are law and order candidates, to which I replied "Yeah but you get indited a couple of times and it takes the edge off your argument. "
Likewise if you hold office thirty years and do absolutely nothing to create jobs, exports goods, or import dollars it kind of takes the edge off your job creation and economic platform.
Mike, if you choose to turn off the TV and listen for a minute, I do have a plan.
And although you warned me that actually disclosing a plan might cost a candidate votes -
Here it goes.
My plan is:
A block of wood!
That is correct.
A twelve inch by twelve inch by twelve inch block of wood.
Or a ten gallon aquarium filled with wood chips, About the same thing. .
Mike, Tele-port yourself, mentally if you will, to a random point in District six. The area roughly sixty miles wide and one hundred miles long in the Northwest portion of the state. More than five thousand square miles containing less than one hundred thousand people. Open your eyes. What do you see?
Lots and lots of trees. Pine. Oak. Locust. Cedar, Scrubbrush. Now - be aware that one cubic foot of that forest is equal to one gallon of gasoline. One acre of the tops and scrub left after a good lumbering is eighty thousand pounds. The total standing timber in Northwest Alabama is equivalent of Ten Billion Gallons of gasoline. Forest byproducts left to waste and rot each year could be money in Alabama's pocket if there were a market for low grade wood chips.
My proposal is to offer a bond issue to a company that will build wood chip electrical generating facilities in District Six. Each fifty million dollar bond issue has the potential to put five hundred workers directly in jobs and indirectly employ another thousand. The demand for clean energy is so great that plants can be profitable and the loans can be repaid within three years. Add to this the latest EPA regulations that effectively destroy the potential of coal as an electrical generating fuel and you see we are left with. Nuclear plant licenses are forty years and have to be amortized over fifty. Wind farms are controversial and expensive, and wind in Alabama is seasonal. Solar is even more expensive and requires massive federal subsidies.
But wood is CO2 neutral. Clean Burning, Potash (fertilizer) Producing, Available and Renewable. In fact, wood chips can be added to existing coal facilities to help meet EPA requirements.
Now Mike that is a plan. And before you go shooting it down take a look at Haley Barbour in Mississippi and the fifty million dollar bond that Mississippi issued to take away Alabama jobs. When I see a newspaperman whining "Where's the Beef?" I feel kinda like asking "Ain't it easy to criticize the hypocrites from the outside? "
So Mike..Turn off the TV and tell me. " What is your plan? "
Of course only he and I are old enough to know who J.R. is - And know why this is a complement.
In fact, a few years ago I got so mad I canceled my prescription to the Times Daily. Now I have to drive to the Chevron station at five a.m. each morning and pay full retail price to get my daily dose of Mike's indigestion.
The source of my most resent indignation is Mike's assertion that not one of the candidates has put forth an actual plan.
He claims that in his extensive TV viewership that although no one is opposed to job creation or economic development no politician has put forth anything to actually create jobs to make life better for the people of Alabama.
This may contain a grain of truth as I might indeed not rise to the level of actual politician. I hope not, as this fits my overall philosophy that State Government is far too important to be entrusted to politicians.
This is somewhat akin to one of my lawyer friends in Russellville saying that all the candidates are law and order candidates, to which I replied "Yeah but you get indited a couple of times and it takes the edge off your argument. "
Likewise if you hold office thirty years and do absolutely nothing to create jobs, exports goods, or import dollars it kind of takes the edge off your job creation and economic platform.
Mike, if you choose to turn off the TV and listen for a minute, I do have a plan.
And although you warned me that actually disclosing a plan might cost a candidate votes -
Here it goes.
My plan is:
A block of wood!
That is correct.
A twelve inch by twelve inch by twelve inch block of wood.
Or a ten gallon aquarium filled with wood chips, About the same thing. .
Mike, Tele-port yourself, mentally if you will, to a random point in District six. The area roughly sixty miles wide and one hundred miles long in the Northwest portion of the state. More than five thousand square miles containing less than one hundred thousand people. Open your eyes. What do you see?
Trees.
Lots and lots of trees. Pine. Oak. Locust. Cedar, Scrubbrush. Now - be aware that one cubic foot of that forest is equal to one gallon of gasoline. One acre of the tops and scrub left after a good lumbering is eighty thousand pounds. The total standing timber in Northwest Alabama is equivalent of Ten Billion Gallons of gasoline. Forest byproducts left to waste and rot each year could be money in Alabama's pocket if there were a market for low grade wood chips.
My proposal is to offer a bond issue to a company that will build wood chip electrical generating facilities in District Six. Each fifty million dollar bond issue has the potential to put five hundred workers directly in jobs and indirectly employ another thousand. The demand for clean energy is so great that plants can be profitable and the loans can be repaid within three years. Add to this the latest EPA regulations that effectively destroy the potential of coal as an electrical generating fuel and you see we are left with. Nuclear plant licenses are forty years and have to be amortized over fifty. Wind farms are controversial and expensive, and wind in Alabama is seasonal. Solar is even more expensive and requires massive federal subsidies.
But wood is CO2 neutral. Clean Burning, Potash (fertilizer) Producing, Available and Renewable. In fact, wood chips can be added to existing coal facilities to help meet EPA requirements.
Now Mike that is a plan. And before you go shooting it down take a look at Haley Barbour in Mississippi and the fifty million dollar bond that Mississippi issued to take away Alabama jobs. When I see a newspaperman whining "Where's the Beef?" I feel kinda like asking "Ain't it easy to criticize the hypocrites from the outside? "
So Mike..Turn off the TV and tell me. " What is your plan? "
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