Getting Political… | Green Veterans
Green Veteran is an oxymoron. Two actually.
Taken one way after all, how can one be Green (new and inexperienced) if they are a Veteran (older and experienced)?
Taken another way it exemplifies a divide between political parties.
After all, most military people are Red-State and most Greens are Blue-State (or Ralph Nader fans). Conventional Wisdom does not consider a Red-Stater being an avid proponent of renewable energy. I describe myself, an Independent voting person, as a Green Veteran.
Red State | Blue State | What’s a Green Veteran?
After careful analysis for the past six years I believe energy is the next dot com and also the glaring strategic vulnerability that must be developed. We must become more self-reliant, period. For a lot of reasons, national security ranking the highest. I am agnostic to political parties in obtaining this goal. There is no Big Oil to me, only Big Energy.
My initiative to address this is Vets2Vines. Training active duty veterans in preparation for their eventual departure into civilian life. Retaining them in California and offering a smooth transition into an agricultural supervisory position that helps keep that management and leadership knowledge here in Cali. Getting farmers and vineyards to embrace renewable energy by seeing the cost savings.
This morning I met with Mike Reagan, the Solano County Supervisors Board Chairman today for about half an hour - unexpectedly. This was my first time meeting him; in the past I’ve dealt with his staff and just advised them of what we wanted to accomplish because I thought that was adequate for my stage in the game.
Today I had thought that would continue; after all, it was an afterthought to stop in once I was finished with my stop into County Planning / Building Resource Management. Sort of like being asked to give your elevator pitch of your project completely impromptu yet it went quite well.
Mike Reagan - Renewable Energy Visionary & Rural Use Advocate
It turns out that Mike is also a Green Veteran. I didn’t ask which party he votes; if he has served his country, is for national security, and for green power he’s a Green Veteran and that’s all that matters to me.
Mike was a zoomie who got in about the time I was born as an enlisted guy who went Officer. In the Navy we call those guys Mustangs. He used to run things over at Travis AFB located in Fairfield.
Mike Reagan has some great ideas and good resources to share and he’ll be an asset going forward. Check out his 80 ideas he wants to work on in his next 5 years as an example.
Disruptive Technology - Again
We talked about analog versus digital radar and how windmill blade design affected radar returns. Hydrogen bolt-on hybrid fuel usage for today’s cars. He trumped my H2 turbocharger concept by chunking a hockey puck-sized bit of hard ceramic material on the desk and told me about the technology behind it. It’s dirt, mixed with a high-tech phosphorus compound just going onto the market. Build anything anywhere by adding this powder to mud.
Revolutionary. Very cool stuff. Basically we geeked out for about twenty minutes.
Surprisingly Mike believes in the same strategy I do and has done parallel research into things like 25x’25 - an initiative providing 25% of our nation’s energy from the Agricultural sector by the year 2025, and sustainable building methods. We both believe that decreasing foreign oil usage is paramount to national security; therefore we must produce more energy locally.
Mike also believes Solano County is poised to be the Renewable Energy Corridor for NorCal. Between UC Berkeley and UC Davis, both centers of talent and research funding. Solano County has plenty of sunshine and plenty of wind - Stage 4 and Stage 5 at my site consistently.
It’s always nice to have another big stick in the golf bag. Now I know the Chairman of the Supervisors board is also a veteran and really wants to push concepts like Vets2Vines through in order to broaden the usage of agricultural land.
I envision one day handling a room full of ‘no’ by leaning back in my chair and saying to nobody in particular, as the old Michael Jordan commercial goes… ‘I want to be like Mike…’ just to make any Solano County opposition to my Vets2Vines plan twitch.
Farmers are getting it stuck to them
The key issue our conversation made me aware of is that there is controversy and an adversarial position that has developed by a vocal, nonestablished minority against land use of any kind; in fact there are some very vocal factions that strategize about how to squeeze farmers simply out of business by tight legislature and have their lands revert back to wetlands and preserve.
Not exactly a fair way to operate however I happen to have my own nonprofit organizations I support which may well pave the way to victory without any confrontations being necessary.
I think and speak ‘ 1960s Radical’ as my second language. And I strategize like Sun Tzu. It helps to have Berkeley graduated parents when dealing with radical environmentalists. It helps even further to have a strong background in military tactics and history.
My non-profit organizational friends have got my back.
I have been working on providing this type of support for years, following up on what my Dad started when he was a founding member of the Ecological Farming Association in the early 1980s.
Shyaam Shabaka’s EcoVillageFarm Learning Center and Strong Roots non-profits. They want farms to belong to farmers, primarily because inner-city folks need nutritional food sources grown close to the community. It makes no sense to anyone why organic foods cannot be provided when they’re grown a short drive away from a community.
Shyaam is working on changing the distribution network while providing an educational experience for Richmond inner-city kids. He’ll be exploring some joint ventures with 3nW Corporation and Vets2Vines to bring kids into the site and educate them on the organic farming operation. The catalyst for all of this is the amount of money viticulture has to offer. It’s a career choice that just might make a difference in his kids’ lives.
Posted by Charles in 21st Century Farm Project, Dad, GWOT |
