Around Christmas time, I tend to have a surplus of peppermint candy canes lying around. They also last well into the new year because they keep very well (and go on sale after the holidays!). I like this about candy canes because if you’re a fan of peppermint, they make fantastic coffee stirs and it’s nice to have them around to infuse a little flavor into an otherwise plain cup of coffee.

This Double Chocolate Peppermint Mocha – inspired by the various peppermint-infused drinks I’ve had from coffee shops this season – is far from plain, however. It is a rich, creamy hot chocolate made with both dark and white chocolate. Milky white chocolate really adds a creaminess to the drink, while the dark chocolate makes for a very deep chocolate flavor. Truthfully, I rarely measure out any of the ingredients when I’m going to make up a batch of this drink. I just add a bit of white chocolate, a bit of dark chocolate and add more if I feel I need to. I recommend adopting the same strategy so you can make this at a moment’s notice, but use the recipe below as a jumping off point. Don’t forget to use the candy cane as a stirring stick to really infuse that peppermint flavor. It also adds some extra sweetness to the mocha, and most candy canes have a better flavor than simply adding in peppermint extract.

I garnish this with whipped cream and crushed peppermint, but a candy cane alone is a nice touch. A mini candy cane makes a cute garnish as well, especially if you want to double or triple the recipe for a bigger crowd.
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I was out shopping recently and saw a really cute candy jar. I thought it was cute until I saw the price tag. Rather than spend my money on that candy jar, I decided that I could make one just as nice, and I was right. I have a real cute candy jar for you to make and it didn’t cost anywhere near as much to make as the one that I was going to buy.

Kathy Zengolewicz

Here is what you will need to get started:

• A plain glass jar with a removable top
• Plaid glass paint in Wicker White and Engine Red
• Rubbing Alcohol or an ammonia glass cleaner
• A hot glue gun
• Red satin ribbon

Clean the glass jar with the rubbing alcohol or window cleaner. Your jar should be clean and grease free. Using the Wicker White glass paint randomly paint about 8 to 10 snowflakes on the jar. Make the snowflakes different sizes. To make a snowflake, paint a horizontal line, a vertical line and two more diagonal lines. Let them dry for about an hour and then paint dots on the end of each snowflake line.

Using the handle of the paint brush and Engine Red, paint dots around the edge of the jar lid and let it dry. Paint a few snowflakes on the jar lid and let that dry.

To make the candy cane I used a candy cane stencil, tape the stencil to the side of the jar and paint it using the Wicker White, let it dry. When it’s dry, use the Engine Red to paint the stripes on the candy cane.

Cut two pieces of red satin ribbon to fit around the top and the bottom of the jar. Use your hot glue gun to adhere the ribbon to the glass. Fill your jar with candy, pop the lid on and there you have it. It looks great when it’s finished.

This is a very inexpensive and nice looking finished project. You can fill it with candy, cookies or any other type of goodies. It’s also nice enough to give as a gift.

Post from: Blisstree

Christmas Candy Jar

Eric Zeman from Information Week has tied together some interesting thread which led him to the inescapable conclusion that LG is announcing a Windows Mobile-powered WIMAX smartphone to run on Sprint and ClearWire’s network.

His evidence? Sprint has scheduled a press conference for Wednesday, January 6 — the day before the Consumer Electronics Show kicks off.LG and Microsoft factor large in the presentation, and Brooke Shields is involved, too. Remarks will  be made by Sprint CEO Dan Hesse and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. Sprint and LG have sent out a separate invitation for a big party taking place the following evening, hosted by Brooke Shields. Sprint has been pitching this event hard to tech journalists as the "must-attend" event of the entire show, calling it the "Hottest Spot at CES!"

All this build up to a pretty big announcement, and to Eric that means a new WIMAX handset. To date the only WIMAX handset on Clearwire is the Samsung Mondi, and of course that is more a MID than a phone.

See if you can follow Mr Zeman’s logic here.

Back in May the “lifetime achievement” award winner (many times over) in vaporware, Duke Nukem Forever, officially went onto the permanent vaporware list as developer 3D Realms shut down. So what happened? How could one video game be under development for a dozen years, and despite promos from over a decade ago, still never come out? Clive Thompson, over at Wired, tried to piece together an autopsy of Duke Nukem Forever.

As with just about anything Thompson writes, it’s a great read, with some interesting lessons. While the crux of the story is that 3D Realms boss, George Broussard, had the earlier success stuck on his brain, it seems like there are a few other things to be learned. There is definitely this undercurrent of “this game must be perfect before it can be released” that runs through the whole story. And, in fact, that probably only got worse with time. Every year the game wasn’t released, the more it would have to “prove” to eventually live up to its reputation. But even more interesting is the constant changing of game engines. Basically (according to the story) Broussard kept focusing on why the game had to be the absolute best, and so every time a new (better) gaming engine came out, he wanted to use that, and dump all the development done on earlier engines. In some ways it’s a story that shows why just copying what other people do isn’t enough. By the time 3D Realms “caught up” with others (often by licensing their technology), someone else had already jumped ahead and gone further — leading 3D Realms to pull back and jump on board the next platform… leading to the same situation yet again.

The simple fact was that no one was ever going to be that far ahead of the game any more, and so there are times where you just release what you have and iterate. But 3D Realms put itself in the impossible position of both needing to be leaps and bounds ahead of everyone else, while at the same time relying on the technology of others they hoped to leapfrog. That’s a recipe for disaster. You can use others’ technologies if you want to be incrementally better, and to then continue to improve. But you’re simply not going to be so far ahead of the game that no one is ever going to catch you. And it appears that 3D Realms never got past that contradiction.

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Filed under: Motorsports, Coupe, Audi

When Audi announced its new GT3 class R8 LMS race car late last year it was expecting 2009 to be a year of learning and development. As it turned out, it was a hugely successful season, landing championships in the FIA European GT series, along with the German and Belgian national series. All told, the R8s captured 23 race victories.

In 2010 the new GT Challenge class for GT3 type cars will become a permanent fixture of the American Le Mans Series as the GT1 class is consigned to history. During the 2009 season, GT Challenge was mainly the province of Porsche 911s. However, with the R8s success in Europe this year, Audi is considering offering the car to North American customers for the 2011 season. While the car could probably be competitive in 2010, Audi wants to set up a customer support infrastructure first.

[Source: American Le Mans Series]

Audi R8 LMS could be racing in ALMS GT Challenge class in 2011 originally appeared on Autoblog on Tue, 22 Dec 2009 18:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Federal Reserve today took a step toward improving the plumbing of the short-term funding markets for banks and securities dealers that locked up during the heat of the financial crisis. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York has set up a task force of Wall Street banks to figure out how to make this market less vulnerable to shocks, and the group issued a status report today.

The market in question is the tri-party repo market, in which banks and dealers use their securities holdings as collateral for short-term funding from cash-rich investors and other banks.

Borrowing in this market soared during the credit boom. It also made Wall Street extremely vulnerable to modern-day runs on a bank; as the crisis worsened, lenders in the tri-party repo market pulled their cash back amidst worries that borrowers would fail or that the securities they used as collateral would fall in value.

In 2008, more than $2.8 trillion in securities holdings by banks were being financed with short-term money in this market. At the center of it all are two clearing banks – J.P. Morgan and Bank of New York Mellon – which manage the transactions and collateral.

The new group could push for tougher collateral requirements on these loans, the equivalent of demanding that a homeowner put down more equity on a mortgage. They’re also narrowing the kinds of securities that can be used as collateral.

The group hopes to complete its work by the end of March 2010 and hopes to make banks less vulnerable to another shock, as tougher rules in the tri-party repo market would make it harder for banks and securities dealers to go on another drunken borrowing binge when the next asset boom emerges.

The participating firms and associations in the “Reform Task Force” are: Bank of America Securities, The Bank of New York Mellon, Barclays Capital, Citadel Investment Group, Citigroup Global Markets, Credit Suisse Securities, The Depository Trust & Clearing Co., Deutsche Bank Securities, Federated Investors, Fidelity Management & Research Co., Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Investment Company Institute, Invesco Ltd., J.P. Morgan Chase, Managed Funds Association, Morgan Stanley & Co., SIFMA, State Street Global Advisors and UBS Investment Bank.

The Internet is global, and so are threats to digital freedom. Over the past year, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has fought Internet censorship, oppressive copyright laws and privacy violations wherever they’ve been under threat around the world.

With the help of our global partners and supporters like you, EFF has been able to achieve great things over the past year:

• Protecting Freedom of Expression. EFF helped establish the Global Network Initiative, garnering commitments from leading technology companies worldwide to resist pressure from government censors in repressive countries and to advance freedom of expression in their products and services.
• Making Information More Accessible. EFF helped make knowledge and information accessible to more people across the world by fighting for exceptions and limitations to copyright for the reading disabled, for libraries and archives, for educational purposes, and for innovative services.
• Assembling the World’s Copyright Laws. EFF helped create Copyright-Watch.org, the most comprehensive publicly available database of international copyright laws ever assembled. Currently including the laws of 187 countries, Copyright-Watch.org was created to strengthen the global network of copyright experts, to facilitate comparative policy research, and to provide for national advocacy support.
• Creating Global Privacy Standards. EFF worked with public interest organizations from every continent to create international standards for privacy that ensure the priority of civil rights in the face of increasing surveillance and monitoring.
• Influencing European Internet Policy. EFF collaborated with digital rights and consumer protection advocates in Europe to preserve judicial oversight and due process in IP enforcement efforts and to fight Three Strikes proposals.
• Promoting Access to Knowledge in Developing Countries. EFF promoted access to knowledge in the developing world by encouraging government bodies to create interoperability standards that encouraged universal access.
• Exposing the Lack of Transparency in Trade Negotiations. EFF led the battle to shed sunlight on the proposed Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, a secret multi-national pact that could severely limit digital rights.
• Fighting Against Abuse of Cybercrime Legislation. EFF supported local activists in Brazil, Kazakhstan, and Thailand fighting against the abuse and misuse of cybercrime laws to suppress legitimate activity. EFF also fought to secure privacy rights and civil liberties protections in the legislative implementation of the Council of Europe Cybercrime Convention.

This is but a sample of the things we’ve worked on in 2009. For more information about our international mission, see http://www.eff.org/issues/international.

Please donate to EFF today, and join us in the fight for a free and open Internet:

http://www.eff.org/give

Thanks in advance for your support!

Happy Holidays from EFF’s International Team

South Africa, Africa | Inspired Inventions

The thing about goats, is that they really like to climb stuff. Goats have been known to climb up on top of livestock, just for a slightly better view. In 1981, Fairview Wine and Cheese owner Charles Back, who had a herd of some 750 Saanen goats had a genius idea. Why not build something the goats can climb on? In this way, the goat tower was born.

Built out of brick and mortar with a steep metal roof, and a spiraling wooden staircase the goat tower even has windows, and the goats enjoy both climbing and resting inside the two story tower. In honor of its goats, and the tower which has become a famous symbol of the winery, Fairview produces a wine called “goats do roam” a play on the French wine growing region Côtes du Rhône.

Though the first known purpose built goat tower, others followed in Fairview’s foot steps and three other goat towers are known to exist.

The other goat towers include the six story, 31 foot tall Tower of Baaa, constructed by farmer David Johnson, to serve his herd of 34 Saanen milk goats in Findlay, Illinois. (As Johnson says “Goats are the most curious animals in the world so they use the tower a lot. They come and go, passing each other on the ramp as needed.”) Johnson plans to also utilize the tower as an amateur observatory, which would make this certainly the only goat tower/ observatory in the world.

There yet is another goat tower on the Ekeby Farm, in Moss Norway, built by Finn-Erik Blakstad, based on and with permission from Fairview owner Charles Back. His goat tower serves as a advertisement for the restaurant he runs which utilizes the goats milk and cheese.

And last but not least, there is the goat tower in the back of Silky O’Sullivans a bar in Memphis Tennessee, where patrons sneak beers to the goats who happily chug them down and then go climb the tower. Though the goats climb this tower while sauced, the goats can apparently hold their beer, as there has yet to be a single accident involving a falling goat. The same cannot be said about the bars simian patrons.

Filed under: Detroit Auto Show, Podcasts, Audi, BMW, Buick, Chevrolet, Chrysler, GM, GMC, Spyker, Rumormill

‘Twas a couple nights before Christmas, and in the Autoblog house, Paukert and Shunk got Roth off the couch… For episode #158 of the Autoblog Podcast! What better way to get into the holiday spirit than an hour and a half of new Podcast? It’s fresher than egg nog this week, as the trio chews on the return of the 5.0 in the Ford Mustang, Audi’s more sane torque numbers for the E-Tron, and what may yet be a Christmas miracle: Spyker’s dogged pursuit of Saab. Rounding out the sextet of topics are the Alfa Giulietta and its potential as a Chrysler, the BMW Z4 GT3, and General Motors’ plan to bring the Buick Regal GS to the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, where it will also debut a Chevrolet Orlando-based vehicle called the GMC Granite.

For the long holiday drives, our colleagues at Joystiq and Engadget do fine work. Let us know what you think of our podcast by dropping us an email at Podcast at Autoblog dot com, reviewing the show in iTunes, filling out our survey, or even leaving us a voicemail on our Google Voice line 734-288-8POD (734-288-8763). Thanks for listening!

Continue reading Autoblog Podcast #158 – ‘Twas a few days before Christmas

Autoblog Podcast #158 – ‘Twas a few days before Christmas originally appeared on Autoblog on Tue, 22 Dec 2009 18:17:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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As of today a federal appeals court is upholding the judgement to bar Microsoft from selling current versions of Word and Office. The question is, what does the patent actually entail? The original patent can be summarized as covering a “method and system for manipulating the architecture and the content of a document separately from each other.” With this broad an abstract, it appears that the patent could affect a lot more than simple word processing. But, as with all patents, the devil is in the details.

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As of Jan. 11, 2010, Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft will no longer sell its flagship word processing products in their current format. In August, a Texas jury filed in favor of i4i Inc. finding that Word infringes on the Canadian company’s software patent.

Microsoft announced that it is already taking steps to remove the “little-used” infringing software feature from Microsoft Word 2007 and Microsoft Office 2007.

The removal would make these versions of Word unable to open XML files for editing. An additional workaround may already be planned. In early August ZDNet UK’s Rupert Goodwins covered Microsoft’s patent for an SML Schema Document – a way of creating rich XML files so that word-processing applications recognize the file as a native document. Microsoft is also taking this opportunity to direct users to the beta versions of Word and Office 2010.

It’ll be interesting to see if this patent resurfaces to block additional consumer products or if the Word trial will be an isolated incident.

Discuss

This past September, California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed an executive order directing the California Air Resources Board to adopt regulations increasing California’s energy from renewable sources to 33% by 2020 and 20% by 2010.


On December 18 the states regulators approved a request by Southern California Edison to construct a 173 mile long electricity transmission line to bring wind power generated in the Tehachapi Wind Resource Area in Kern County to Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties.


“California leads the nation in developing renewable energy” said governor Schwarzenegger. “The thousands of megawatts of renewable energy capacity this transmission line will add to our grid will help California meets it ambitious renewable portfolio standard, protect our environment, increase our energy security and further the growth of our green economy” he added.


After evaluating environmental impacts of 11 different projects and alternatives, the final report identifies the approved project as the environmentally superior alternative.


About 70% of the approved projects route is on existing right-of-way in compliance with the state policy, known under state law as the Garamendi Principles, to site and expand transmission infrastructure within existing right of way.


The California Public Utilities Commission, set a maximum cost of $1.5 billion for the project, excluding allowance for funds used during construction, estimated at $261.82 million, for an estimated total project cost of $1.8 billion for the project.


This brings to 500 miles the total of new transmission approved by the CPUC for the states investor-owned utilities. Five major lines capable of carrying 9,000 megawatts of power have been approved in the past three years with an infrastructure investment of more than $4.5billion.

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related.posts:

1. Texas, Iowa Slam California in Wind Turbine Growth
2. State By State Clean Energy Leaders
3. Top 5 Businesses Using Alternative Energy

Despite what you may hear from skeptics, there’s no better season in all of sports than college football bowl season and the complete television schedule for the bowl games is right here on Fanblogs, brought to you by BangTheBook.com.

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Date/Time/TV Bowl Site Matchup Saturday Dec. 19 2 :30 pm ET ESPN New Mexico Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Albuquerque, NM University Stadium Wyoming vs. Fresno State Saturday Dec. 19 8:00 pm ET ESPN St. Petersburg Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks St. Petersburg, FL Tropicana Field Rutgers vs. Central Florida Sunday Dec. 20 8:00 pm ET ESPN R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks New Orleans, LA Louisiana Superdome Southern Miss vs. Middle Tenn St Tuesday Dec. 22 8:00 pm ET ESPN MAACO Bowl Las Vegas Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Las Vegas, NV Sam Boyd Stadium BYU vs. Oregon State Wednesday Dec. 23 8:00 pm ET ESPN San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks San Diego, CA Qualcomm Stadium Utah vs. Cal Thursday Dec. 24 8:00 pm ET ESPN Sheraton Hawai’i Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Honolulu, HI Aloha Stadium SMU vs. Nevada Saturday Dec. 26 4:30 pm ET ESPN Meineke Car Care Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Charlotte, NC Bank of America Stadium North Carolina vs. Pitt Saturday Dec. 26 5 :00 pm ET ESPN Little Caesars Pizza Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Detroit, MI Ford Field Ohio U vs. Marshall Saturday Dec. 26 8:00 pm ET ESPN Emerald Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks San Francisco, CA AT&T Park Boston College vs. USC Sunday Dec. 27 8:15 pm ET ESPN Gaylord Hotels Music City Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Nashville, TN LP Field Clemson vs. Kentucky Monday Dec. 28 5:00 pm ET ESPN AdvoCare V100 Independence Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Shreveport, LA Independence Stadium Texas A&M vs. Georgia Tuesday Dec. 29 4:30 pm ET ESPN EagleBank Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Washington, DC RFK Stadium Temple vs. UCLA Tuesday Dec. 29 8:00 pm ET ESPN Champs Sports Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Orlando, FL Florida Citrus Bowl Stadium Miami vs. Wisconsin Wednesday Dec. 30 4:30 pm ET ESPN Roady’s Humanitarian Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Boise, ID Bronco Stadium Bowling Green vs. Idaho Wednesday Dec. 30 8:00 pm ET ESPN Pacific Life Holiday Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks San Diego, CA Qualcomm Stadium Nebraska vs. Arizona Thursday Dec. 31 2:00 pm ET NFL Network Texas Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Houston, TX Reliant Stadium Missouri vs. Navy Thursday Dec. 31 Time TBA ESPN Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Fort Worth, TX Amon G. Carter Stadium Air Force vs. Houston Thursday Dec. 31 12:00 pm ET CBS Brut Sun Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks El Paso, TX Sun Bowl Stadium Stanford vs. Oklahoma Thursday Dec. 31 5:30 pm ET NFL Network Insight Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Tempe, AZ Sun Devil Stadium Minnesota vs. Iowa State Thursday Dec. 31 7:30 pm ET ESPN Chick-fil-A Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Atlanta, GA Georgia Dome Virginia Tech vs. Tennessee Friday Jan. 1 11:00 am ET ESPN Outback Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Tampa, FL Raymond James Stadium Auburn vs. Northwestern Friday Jan. 1 1:00 pm ET CBS Konica Minolta Gator Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Jacksonville, FL Jacksonville Municipal Stadium FSU vs. West Virginia Friday Jan. 1 1:00 pm ET ABC Capital One Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Orlando, FL Florida Citrus Bowl Stadium Penn State vs. LSU Friday Jan. 1 5:00 pm ET ABC Rose Bowl presented by Citi Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Pasadena, CA Rose Bowl Ohio State vs. Oregon Friday Jan. 1 8:30 pm ET FOX Allstate Sugar Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks New Orleans, LA Superdome Florida vs. Cincinnati Saturday Jan. 2 12:00 pm ET ESPN2 International Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Toronto, Canada Rogers Centre South Florida vs. Northern Illinois Saturday Jan. 2 2 :00 pm ET ESPN PapaJohns.com Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Birmingham, AL Legion Field Connecticut vs. South Carolina Saturday Jan. 2 2:00 pm ET FOX AT&T Cotton Bowl Classic Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Arlington, TX Cowboys Stadium Oklahoma State vs. Ole Miss Saturday Jan. 2 5:30 pm ET ESPN AutoZone Liberty Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Memphis, TN Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium East Carolina vs. Arkansas Saturday Jan. 2 9 :00 pm ET ESPN Valero Alamo Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks San Antonio, TX Alamodome Michigan State vs. Texas Tech Monday Jan. 4 8:00 pm ET FOX Tostitos Fiesta Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Glendale, AZ University of Phoenix Stadium TCU vs. Boise State Tuesday Jan. 5 8:00 pm ET FOX FedEx Orange Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Miami, FL Dolphin Stadium Georgia Tech vs. Iowa Wednesday Jan. 6 7 :00 pm ET ESPN GMAC Bowl Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Mobile, AL Ladd Peebles Stadium Troy vs. Central Michigan Thursday Jan. 7 8:00 pm ET ABC BCS National Championship Game Bowl Tickets Flights + Hotels Odds & Picks Pasadena, CA Rose Bowl Alabama vs. Texas

The 2009 college football season will be capped by exciting college football bowl games, including the 2009 Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, the 2009 Fiesta Bowl in Phoenix, Arizona, the 2009 Sugar Bowl in New Orleans, Louisiana, the 2009 Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida and the 2009 BCS National Championship Game in Pasadena, CA.

The best college football teams from the major conferences, including the Big10 conference, Big 12 conference, Pac 10 conference, ACC conference, Big East conference, SEC conference, and Mountain West conference will face off in college football bowl games throughout December and into January.

If you’re looking for updated matchups, odds, insights, betting lines and online wagering for the college football bowl games, please be sure to try BangTheBook.com.

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by KC Golden

“There is no time to waste. America has made our choice. We have charted our course, we have made our commitments, and we will do what we say.”—President Obama, speaking to world leaders in Copenhagen December 18

“Kan Han?” (Can He?) So implored the headline and full-page picture of President Obama on the front of the Copenhagen MetroXpress on December 18, the day the President flew in to rescue the climate summit.

With negotiations on the verge of collapse, Obama narrowly averted a total disaster with a strong show of determination and some deft eleventh-hour negotiating.  The talks failed to produce a formal and comprehensive commitment to climate solutions, but they did deliver some important pieces of the puzzle. Top-level engagement from the world’s two largest emitters, the U.S. and China, is new and essential. And negotiators took a real step forward on financing adaptation and clean development in the global South, the moral and practical imperative at the heart of any fair global deal.

President Obama was dealt a weak hand by the Senate’s failure to adopt comprehensive climate and energy legislation before the negotiations. Other factors contributed, but the Senate’s punt set the stage for the tepid result in Copenhagen. The world will not move forward decisively until the U.S. is in with both feet – and both houses of Congress.

Understanding the U.S.‘s pivotal role, Obama leaned forward and made a definitive-sounding pledge: “We have made our commitments, and we will do what we say.” But he can’t make it stick until Congress finishes its work. The window is short: scientific, diplomatic, and political imperatives demand immediate action.

The President is clearly engaged—a huge step one on America’s road to recovering its credibility in the international process, after having walked away from Kyoto. Six of his cabinet Secretaries came to the summit and impressed the world with their focus and administrative actions to date. But the inconvenient truth about our weak standing in the negotiations remains naked: The nation that has contributed the most to global warming still has no national climate policy.

I went to Copenhagen in part to demonstrate the breadth of action and commitment to climate solutions in the U.S., especially at the state and local level. But international colleagues and delegates cross-examined me about our broken legislative process, and why it has been so slow to deliver. I have a lot of theories, but no remotely adequate excuse. The U.S. must step up—and in a stark, defiant, powerful sentence, the President promised we would: “We will do what we say.”

To be clear, “what we say”—the emission reduction target the President put on the table—is not nearly enough to do our part in staving off catastrophic climate disruption. It’s far less than other developed nations have pledged. We will need to do much more. But it was the effective constraint that Congress imposed and the President accepted on the U.S.‘s ambition in Copenhagen.

So the immediate question is, “How?” How will the President make good on his commitment? Will he rely on existing executive authority? Partly. EPA Secretary Lisa Jackson was in Copenhagen a day after the agency’s landmark “Endangerment finding” to affirm that the Administration will use the Clean Air Act to reduce climate pollution. But Jackson and the President have also made it clear they don’t think current executive authority is enough. And they’re right.

We know what the problem is: the Senate’s paralysis—a symptom of the polarized, dysfunctional politics that has turned this urgent global imperative into a political football in Washington. The only really meaningful test of whether “we will do what we say” is whether the Senate gets cracking on it immediately after health care. But they won’t do it unless the President leads the charge with a lot more gusto.

Senate leadership is afraid of this issue. They’re afraid of losing seats in the midterms. They’re afraid that opponents will successfully frame the climate and energy policy as a job killer. They’re afraid of another bruising political battle after health care.

This is where FDR (and some WWII-like urgency) would come in handy: fear itself is what’s killing them. While they cower, they are squandering the opportunity to frame this as what it really is: the most effective, politically galvanizing strategy for job creation and economic renewal available to them. Opponents of climate policy are rushing to fill the void with all manner of lies about climate science and energy economics. The nay-sayers’ arguments are weak, but their resolve is firm. The opposite is true of the proponents (if we can even really call them that yet).

A short term jobs package won’t deliver a fraction of the economic punch that a real climate and energy policy packs. A cap on carbon emissions will yield a lot more “cash for caulkers” than a one-time, near-term public outlay. Instead of pushing a jobs bill out ahead of the climate and energy bill, Congress should do them together. The climate and energy package – with short-term job stimulators and long-term job drivers – can be the main engine of economic and political recovery. The President has argued for a systematic transition to a clean energy economy repeatedly and eloquently, but he hasn’t broken through yet. Pushing jobs, energy, and climate together instead of sequentially would make his case much more persuasive.

Americans know that fossil fuel dependence is a dead end street, and they’re ready for leaders to get real about what it takes to turn onto a clean energy path. The President has demonstrated the winning politics of this: Democratic and Republican rivals offered campaign lollipops last summer—gas tax holidays and drilling binges – while candidate Obama called for a bold energy transformation. He won.

It is certainly possible to lose this fight. The best way to lose it is to recoil from having it—the strategy Senate leaders and Democratic political operatives seem to be pursuing now. This only emboldens opponents and demoralizes supporters.

The President ran on this issue. He believes in it. He understands its transformative economic power and the moral imperative to tackle it. He mined the rich political ore of our frustration with Washington’s chronic failure to address our fossil fuel addiction. The question now is whether he will forge that raw material into the steely resolve he’ll need to get an effective climate and energy bill done.

Losing this fight because he won’t have it would undermine the President. He was elected in part because he picked it. Now he needs to have it and win.

Related Links:

A conversation with Indian youth activist Ruchi Jain

Sarkozy scrambles to salvage carbon tax

Brazil’s Lula signs law cutting CO2 emissions

Filed under: Wagon, Paris Motor Show, Mercedes-Benz, Rumormill, Design/Style

German automakers have apparently all developed kyphosis, as witnessed by the BMW 5 Series Gran Turismo, the impending Audi A7 Sportback, and the Porsche Panamera. It seems the time is right for humpty-backed automobiles from Deutschland. Mercedes used the ConceptFASCINATION to spearhead the launch of its redesigned E-Class, and while it got everyone all excited during auto show season in 2008, few thought it would amount to anything productiony. That’s all changed now. Sure, there are wagons; it’s hard to name a more proper Estate Car than the E-Class wagon; but that’s not the brass ring everyone seems to be stretching for here.

Expected at the next Paris Motor Show in October 2010, Autointernationaal reports that a new CLS will debut with the expected rakish form – as well as a shooting brake version. While we’re all ogling pictures of the fetching three-door concept shown above, the production version is expected to carry four doors and a liftgate. While the show vehicle is fetching with its paucity of points of entry, four doors are apparently important for interesting the Asian market. Don’t think of this rumored model as a replacement for anything else utilitarian in the Mercedes lineup; the CLS Brake is unlikely to usurp the R-Class and its unsalability. Rather, it will offer another stylish option in a package that is more car than bus. The world could do with more brakes – shoot on, we say.

[Source: Autointernationaal.nl (Google Translated)]

Rumormill: Mercedes-Benz CLS shooting brake in the works? originally appeared on Autoblog on Tue, 22 Dec 2009 17:58:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Copenhagen was a disaster. That much is agreed. But the truth about what actually happened is in danger of being lost amid the spin and inevitable mutual recriminations. The truth is this: China wrecked the talks, intentionally humiliated Barack Obama, and insisted on an awful “deal” so western leaders would walk away carrying the blame. How do I know this? Because I was in the room and saw it happen.

China’s strategy was simple: block the open negotiations for two weeks, and then ensure that the closed-door deal made it look as if the west had failed the world’s poor once again. And sure enough, the aid agencies, civil society movements and environmental groups all took the bait. The failure was “the inevitable result of rich countries refusing adequately and fairly to shoulder their overwhelming responsibility”, said Christian Aid. “Rich countries have bullied developing nations,” fumed Friends of the Earth International.

All very predictable, but the complete opposite of the truth. Even George Monbiot, writing in yesterday’s Guardian, made the mistake of singly blaming Obama. But I saw Obama fighting desperately to salvage a deal, and the Chinese delegate saying “no”, over and over again. Monbiot even approvingly quoted the Sudanese delegate Lumumba Di-Aping, who denounced the Copenhagen accord as “a suicide pact, an incineration pact, in order to maintain the economic dominance of a few countries”.

Read the whole story at The Guardian — >

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See Also:

• Copenhagen Was A Total Failure And It’s Barack Obama’s Fault
• Carbon Offset Futures Tank After Copenhagen Fiasco
• Copenhagen Ends With A Deal That Won’t Do Jack

Long term friend and former colleague Robert Scoble (who’s now with Rackspace) came by to interview the Altimeter Group. Although Deborah Schultz and Charlene Li were off traveling the globe, Ray Wang (who covers enterprise strategy) and myself were able to sit down with Robert and discuss the trends we see happening in the industry. Big wave to Rocky who’s the show producer, and also a former colleague.

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