Sofa King Smart

After the tsunamis of 2004, in which over 200,000 people died, I was a bit aghast.  I wondered whether it was sheer bad luck that so many people drowned, starved, and succumbed to the diseases reaped from the sewage-strewn death waters that ravaged those (mostly) Asian countries.

But, as these disasters seem to continue to destroy Asia,  I can’t help but start to believe that Pastor John Hagee– America’s Pastor–is right: God (the one, Christian God, that is) is tallying a checklist and exacting His vengeance on this faithless region of the world.  I prefer not to let basic logic cloud my faith, so here is some real evidence for all of you skeptics and liberals on why God hates Asia.

When the cyclone Nargis struck Burma, ahem, Myanmar, I knee-jerkedly chalked it up to bad luck with a touch of plain old bad zoning–why would anyone build a shack in a floodplain?  But it turns out that the military junta of the Myanmarese government angers God’s commandment: Thou shalt have no other government but Mine.

 God: check.

Myanmar and many other Asian countries rely heavily on commercial fishing.  Killing God’s creatures is wrong and will not go unpunished.  So what if many of the Burmese population make their living by fishing? Fishing is a dying industry and rapes the seas of precious species of scenic aqautic life.  Surely, these people can find other jobs to replace their fishing addiction.  I’m guessing that local Myanmar Home Depots and Starbucks, etc. would hire many of these people, and then they could build a hut on higher ground.

God: check.

Ignorance, arghh!!!  Why can’t these people just make sure to check in with their television news programs to keep an eye on any earthquakes or cyclones affecting the ocean near their homes?  Don’t they hear the cyclone sirens?  Open your ears–your life depends on it!

God: check.

Next, while looking up some basic facts about Burma, ahem, Myanmar, I find out that just about everyone in this country has to spend a couple of years as a Buddhist monk learning about Buddha.

Did anyone stop to think that this might make God and His only Son, Jesus, a bit perturbed?  Who is this Buddha chap anyway?  How come the only time we ever hear about this guy is when we see those corny shirnes in Chinese restaurants.  Makes for a pretty silly guy to follow if you ask me–who wants to follow such a fat guy?  Someone explain moderation to this dude.

God: check.

Next, I hear about China’s earthquake, and how so many people died.  First, we’re talking about China–one of the last communist strongholds on Earth.  First of all, communism is abhorred by God (paraphrasing, of course, but I think God said something like “Ye nations of the earth, govern thy selves with kings of strength, and let not thy selves desire to usurp thy masters.  Be gentle and compiant.”) 

God: check.

China is also a very bad country in that they take away jobs from the United States — a country that God has seen fit to raise above others as a superpower.  This is, in effect, taking food out of the mouths of American babes, and God will protect His Chosen People–any way He can.

God: check.

Finally, I think God hates Asia because they all act like they have the best food and are so much better than Americans, who, I’ll admit, are getting more and more obese.  There, I said it, we’re a fat nation.  BUT, I’ll also say that we are fat because God has given us so much for being His chosen people.  You might say that the United Stated is the “Promised Land”  of modern days.

And Asia is not– cue the earthquakes, tsunamis tidal waves, and cyclones.

You cannot escape God’s wrath.

To sum it up, I hope Asia decides to get its act together and stop flaunting its disdain for God and His chosen people.  Not every child can be a father’s favorite, just ask my daughter.  But, they can suck it up and start trying to emulate their smarter, better sibling.

• Edit:  I know there aren’t 10 reasons listed here, but all you have to do is throw in Stalin, Vietnam,  that place where the Killing Fields was, and New Zealand, and you’ve got the rest of the reasons God Hates Asia.

Tags: Asia, buddha, buddhist, buddhists, china, christian, commies, communism, communist, cyclone, earthquake, god, jesus, john hagee, myanmar, pastor hagee, ten commandments, tsunami, tsunamis

As oil and gas prices soar in light of diminishing natural supplies and with the world reeling from increased pollution, I am constantly excited to hear of the many folks out there in the scientific community who are trying to innovate new alternatives to our ever-increasing reliance on natural resources.

Even though I follow the progress of several of the eco-friendly renewable energy horizons, including hydrogen fuell cells, windpower, ocean current energy turbines, and hybrid technologies, I’m even more excited when I hear about that these inventors and innovators are focusing on capturing the most abundant, powerful resource available to us: solar energy.

Well, while watching an eco-tech documentary the other night on the Discovery Channel, I was introduced to a scientist from the University of California Santa Barbara named Alan Heeger.
To paraphrase the video segment, it seems Heeger is a proponent of solar energy, too. So much so that he has his entire roof covered with traditional solar panels. His problem with these –along with most people’s — is that the traditional solar panel is too expensive, not very efficient, and, physically, too rigid for mass consumption.
So, along with several other scientists, Heeger developed a solar-conducting plastic cell that can be made into inks (each color of ink represents a certain spectrum of light) that can be applied in layers to many different surfaces and are much more efficient than current solar cell technology.
Heeger’s company (which he co-founded), Konarka Technologies, is currently producing prototype solar cells that are produced in ribbon-like plastic sheets. These sheets are printed with the solar inks and can conform to the shape of whatever they are attached to.
Heeger also expects these inks to be applied directly to building shingles, tiles, etc.
Price-wise, these cells will eventually cost only about 5% of the cost of a traditional solar cell per watt.

Needless to say, as a supporter of this kind of technology, I am VERY excited to hear of Heeger’s accomplishments, and expect him to garner another Nobel prize once this is more widespread (Heeger “shared the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 2000 for his role in the revolutionary discovery that plastics can have the properties of metals and semiconductors.” –from a UCSB press release) .

Tags: alan heeger, eco friendly, ecotech, geothermal energy, hydrogen fuel cells, nobel prize for chemistry, polymers, renewable energy, renewable resources, solar panels, solar power

In the past ten years, we’ve seen the major annihilation of large populations of people and their homes and possessions by the ocean.
The tsunamis of late 2004 devastated more than 15 countries worldwide and killed more than a quarter of a million people. Although those tsunamis were created by earthquakes offshore, the Earth can use the ocean and weather to deliver an equally powerful “punch.”

–In 2005, Hurricane Katrina ravaged the United States and caused untold amounts of property damage and killed almost 2,000 people.

–In the Spring of 2008, Cyclone Nargis struck the country of Myanmar, and the death toll (still emerging) could reach over 100,000.

Obviously, there have been many hurricanes, typhoons, and cyclones before and in-between those mentioned above, but these account for two of the most publicized recently by the American media (where this blogger is located).

As people stand around the water coolers and breakrooms of America, a common question always seems to rise: what’s the difference between a hurricane, a typhoon, and a cyclone?

I must say that my memory is a little shaky on the matter, and I have likened a cyclone to a concentrated tornado funnel cloud that originates out at sea–sucking up water from the ocean and spewing it down as very turbulent rain and wind. On the other hand, I remember learning that a hurricane and a typhoon are roughly the same thing; namely, they are large tropical rotating storms that form at sea and, when they hit land, they destroy all in their paths.

I guess I’m kind of right and kind of wrong–a cyclone is the same as the other two, it’s just a bit more generalized term and can be tropical or polar (warm or cold).

According to the NOAA’s National Weather Service, the definition of a cyclone is “A large-scale circulation of winds around a central region of low atmospheric pressure, counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere, clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere.”

So, in comparison, what is a hurricane? NOAA defines a hurricane as “A tropical cyclone in the Atlantic, Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, or eastern Pacific, which the maximum 1-minute sustained surface wind is 64 knots (74 mph) or greater.”
and, a typhoon is listed as “A tropical cyclone in the Western Pacific Ocean in which the maximum 1-minute sustained surface wind is 64 knots (74 mph) or greater.”

I have to say that I feel very sorry for the people of Myanmar, and I will write a post about those opinions very soon (I just have to come up with something worthwhile for you to read).

Technorati Profile

Tags: compare, cyclone, cyclones, death toll, how does, hurricane, hurricanes, katrina, myanmar, nargis, storms, tornado, tsunamis, typhoon, typhoons, vs, weather, what is