Where is T. Boone Pickens?

Formally under the Title:

The .20 cent tags MADE IN USA = A New Classic Black T-shirt?

If you were privileged to find yourself in the nail biting moments- leading up to the 2008 election in the Hanging Chad State…. sorry, Sunshine State, er, umm… Florida!

Then amongst the barrage of Left and Right propaganda streaming thru the television and radio, you were subjected to the well timed random ads of one, T. Boone Pickens.

A man, TBP in short, who if you were under the age of 20, 30, 40, even 50, 50+,
Or, at least haven’t followed oil commodities, or Texas News, you most likely were left wondering who the hell this guy was, sounding an alarm call for Americans-
To wake up, and decided to make change for the Environment.

Now, just for a little back story.

Here in America, I grew up in the age of the late 80’s and early 90’s when we had the Regan Years of the growing media markets and the nuanced negotiations of the New pro-American rhetoric of the age.
[even if I have learned of the age, post puberty]

I lived thru one of the most publicized programs in youth America.
The D.A.R.E. program.*

A program funded by the Safe and drug-free schools act (Improving Americas Schools Act of 1994) to teach kids, its not only OK, to Just Say No to Drugs, but to also teach everyone else about saying No, or at least, tell everyone else, when someone, Is doing drugs.

The Three R’s: Recognize, Resist, Report. [ lets ignore the fact that a child in the 90's landed herself in DCF custody and her parents in Jail, when ousting them to the cops, as they were growing a marijuana plant in their home]

Now aside form the nifty D.A.R.E. T-shirt, awarded to students in the U.S. and other countries who complete the D.A.R.E. program and pledge to stay Drug-free. The classic black T-shirt, adopted from the ‘Black Concert T-shirt’ marketing Phenomenon. We have little gained from the program that has ballooned its budget to over 1 Billion in US dollars each year.

A program that the US Surgeon General in 2001**, placed in the category of “Does not Work”.

I also lived thru, one of the largest American Surpluses.

-remember the Clinton years?-
-surplus upward of a mere $559 Billion US dollars-

A period of time fostered by the philosophy of the Third Way.
An embraced mix of Market and Interventionist elements that make up the Radical Center.
A time when we stressed technological development, education, and competitive elements to create economic progress, as well as further governmental objectives.

So now after the past two Bush/Cheney terms, with a stalled market and deregulations galore.

Final acknowledgement of a ‘gasp’, Recession!

At times, the lowest GDP for years, under their care.
An environment in peril, attacked from the onset of first term, with Bush:
‘Taking a stand’ against the Kyoto Protocol,
Lifting bans on offshore drilling
[even with 100's of millions of barrels in reserve for the ready, if we actually wanted to reduce foreign oil addiction]

Committing the meager sum of $2 Billion US Dollars to cover the next three years, towards an ‘International’ fund. Not solely a US, domestic fund.
Sending money to promote clean energy technologies and help fight climate change in the world.
[ lets not make the $2 billion dollar analogy to the US military fighting a War in Iraq and fighting without any kind of sufficient Armour]

but, lets look at it like this…

[The $2 billion is the equivalent of % 0.002 of our 11 Trillion dollar National Debt.
I'll rephrase this for those who are just gleaming this,
$2 Billion in US Dollars, is equal to:
The number 11 with twelve Zeros behind it,
Minus a Zero with a decimal point, followed by two more zeros and then the number two, 11,000,000,000,000 - 0.002%, its like asking for .20 cents out of a thousands dollars.
$0.20 from every $1,000.00 we spend in Wars and Domestic Issues.
And, this 0.002% is a commitment for three years....
Apprx. .06 cent for every $1,000.00 US Dollars.
Each of these three years, a sum estimated to comparatively grow smaller,
As the US deficit speculatively grows larger]

[ let's now make the analogy of $1,000 Armour with $0.20 tag that says MADE IN USA - may fade with washing- ]

In addition to fractional pennies on the dollar, we spend domestically and abroad, on any number of wide poorly received US Environmental Interests, the Bush/Cheney environmental doctrine has announced ‘plans to reaffirm the United States’ commitment to work with major economies, and, through the United Nations, to complete an international agreement that will slow, stop, and eventually reverse the growth of greenhouse gasses,’ and that ‘the agreement will be effective only if it includes commitments by every major economy and gives none a free ride.’***

And apparently, that includes the United States.

Back to T. Boone Pickens, the man with the Plan.

In the last few months leading up to the Super Tuesday Elections in the US, TBP and his Plan were at the forefront of any cohesive, semi-transparent ‘viable’ initiative, that might actually follow thru after the inauguration.
TBP, who planned to spend apprx. $58 million on his multi-media effort to promote the Pickens Plan (over 2x’s the amount the Mormon Church spent on defeating Proposition 8 in California) during the 2008 presidential campaigns.

TBP’s media plan, included newspaper and television ads and newer media outlets such as YouTube and Facebook. Appeared on ABC’s Goodmorning America, and Night line, the CBS Evening News, CNN’s Lou Dobbs Tonight, CNBC’s Squawk Box, CNN’s Larry King Live, Fox News, The Tonight Show, Mad Money with Jim Cramer, and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, just to name a few.

After such a media barrage as we’ve seen from TBP, his image has almost faded away, just as fast as we have seen him come to our attention.

But where is the plan today?

PickensPlan.com has a boldly typed splash screen when you first land at the site declaring:

WE MUST BREAK AMERICA’S ADDICTION TO FOREIGN OIL
The Pickens Plan will do it, but we need your help.
Lend your voice to the call for American energy independence.

following with

entry fields for

your first and last name
email address
your zip code

-And then, with the lightest colored font and smallest type,

We are organizing the New Energy Army in every Congressional District. Because of this, it’s necessary for us to collect your zip code. This information will not be sold to or shared with anyone.

After selecting to hide this splash screen, and continue to pickensplan.com- visitors are offered opportunities to view videos from the BooneCam, via the video blog. View whiteboard presentations of the plan. Review the latest ads. A countdown clock to inauguration day -included is a link- to Help Grow the Army, via a form to enter your friends to receive an email from you from the TBP site with the message:

I support T. Boone Pickens’ Energy Independence Plan to reduce our foreign oil dependence by at least 30% within ten years. Please join me as a supporter at http://action.pickensplan.com/taf/. Also, please urge your Members of Congress to sign a pledge in support of the plan by visiting http://action.PickensPlan.com.

A link to Email Obama, contact link for Congress, Push the Plan-Join our Community links, as well as ways to keep in touch via, Facebook/LinkedIn/Myspace/Push/Twitter/YouTube/Digg/CafePress/ including the Daily Pickens RSS.
The site is hoping to reach two million members by the inauguration, and currently holds just under 1.4 million.

While anyone can help organize the ‘New Energy Army’ by signing up to be a ‘District Leader’, it would be nice to hear how TBP’s Plan is currently on track, or is it off?

Without the deluge of media messages like subliminal memes, popping up as the little queen of diamonds, how will we know that TBP and environmentally concerned Americans are really making progress. 1,374,961 members of the pickensplan.com Vs. all the uninformed in the US concerned about how a Bush/Cheney Petrol-Enviromental legacy, will set Americans and the world back by decades, is few.

A New Environment, in the New Administration- Needs to Thrive and Succeed. The new Administration, needs

The Three R’s: Recognize, Resist, Report.

The New Administration, need to see the errors of the old environmental policies and radically change course.
The New Administration, needs New Voices, New Hands and New Shoulders to carry the Crusade of Stewardship, and resist the temptation to cave into pressure of greed and apathy.
The New Environment, Must Not become a Meta-Media rich event with the only reminder, a Newer Eco-friendlier ‘Classic Black T-shirt’.

As the next few months and years come to pass,

You and everyone you know need to find in yourselves,

Room to care for environmental issues- just as much as you would, any other part of your life!

All of our interests and passions in life, whatever they may be,
All exist in many different facets of the environment.
All of our interests and passions in life, effect the environment,

In Many different ways.

The world is on the cusp of being technologically free, to enjoy all that we can dream.

And, on the cusp of waking up to find while we were dreaming, we nearly destroyed all chances to ever fulfill our dreams.

MDP

—-
D.A.R.E. References:
* http://www.surgeongeneral.gov/library/youthviolence/chapter5/sec4.html
** http://www.surgeongeneral.gov/library/youthviolence/chapter5/sec4.html

Bush/Cheney Environmental Doctrine:
*** http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23125585-401,00.html

T. Boone Pickens:
Pickens Plan Website http://www.pickensplan.com