Vardaman Virtual Forestry Company
FRIDAY REPORT OF 12/08/06
The Most Direct, Frequent Link to Knowledge Workers in the Eastern Forest Economy
“AIRING GRIEVANCES
The battle over carbon-dioxide emissions goes to court”br />
Portions of an article from Economist.com on 11/29/06
“When the subject is global warming, America is usually cast as the villain. Although it produces a quarter of the greenhouse gases that are heating the planet, it refuses to regulate them. When many other countries agreed on an international treaty to do so – the Kyoto Protocol – America failed to ratify it. But not all American officialdom is happy with the federal government’s stance. A dozen states disagree so fiercely they are suing to force it to impose rules on emissions of carbon dioxide, the most common greenhouse gas…
“The plaintiffs comprise 12 states, three city governments, various activist groups, and American Samoa, a soon-to-be-submerged Pacific territory. They are supported by a further six states, two power companies, a ski resort, and assorted clergymen, Indian tribes and others. They point out that when Bill Clinton was president the EPA decided that it did have the authority to regulate carbon dioxide. The act, they note, states that the EPA should regulate any air pollutant that ‘may reasonably be interpreted to endanger public health or welfare.’ It goes on to define public welfare to include ‘effects on soils, water, crops, vegetation, manmade materials, animals, wildlife, weather, visibility, and climate’- all the sorts of things with which global warming wreaks havoc…
“Environmental groups would like Congress to pass a law tackling global warming. They hope that a favorable court ruling might jolly lawmakers along. And the case has a bearing on several other bitterly contested lawsuits. Carmakers, for example, are trying to get the courts to strike down a Californian state law based on certain provisions of the Clean Air Act that requires them to reduce their vehicles’ carbon-dioxide emissions. If the Supreme Court decides that the act does not apply to carbon dioxide, then the Californian law would also be in jeopardy. That, in turn, would scupper the decision of ten other states to adopt the same standard.
“Even if these attempts fail, they are a good indication of many state governments’ determination to tackle climate change. California, as usual, is in the vanguard. Its legislature has passed another law that will first cap and then gradually reduce industrial emissions of greenhouse gases. Seven eastern states have formed something called the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, which will treat emissions from power plants in the same way. Almost 400 mayors around the country have signed a non-binding agreement to reduce their cities’ emissions in keeping with the Kyoto Protocol. Many members of the incoming Congress, and several of the leading presidential contenders for 2008, are much keener on emissions caps than Mr. Bush. Change, so to speak, is in the air.”
Click http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=E1_RPGDTNV
“WOBBLING, NOT COLLAPSING
Construction drops again, but all is not doom and gloom in America’s housing market”
Portions of an article from Economist.com on 12/01/06
“Woe unto the housing market. That is what many economists have been preaching for over a year. American housing prices have long marched upwards at a remarkable pace, particularly in coastal cities where the growth in home prices has far outstripped the growth in incomes. So many analysts have been waiting for a sharp change of course. Now even those selling the houses, such as David Lereah, the chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, are conceding that prices may have to drop…
“New data released this week indicate, again, that qualified gloom about the housing market is warranted. They show that October sales of new homes dropped to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1m, down by 3.2% compared with the month before. The supply of houses on the market is going up. According to the Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development, who released the data, there are now enough new homes in the pipeline to satisfy seven months of demand. And though prices rose slightly in nominal terms, adjust for inflation and prices actually fell a bit. If you believe anecdotal reports, real prices have probably fallen rather more. Developers are said, increasingly, to be using non-cash incentives such as upgraded fixtures to keep up prices. If so, the high nominal prices actually hide fairly deep discounting. That suggests the new housing market is getting weaker, but not weak enough to force stubborn sellers to cut prices.
“But data on sales of existing homes show a somewhat different picture. Prices fell 3.5% in October from a year ago, but sales rose slightly. Quarterly data may also show a slight decline in prices. Perhaps private sellers are more willing than hard-nosed businessmen to cut prices (nominal ones). Though perhaps they are not willing enough: inventories of existing homes also rose, giving the nation a 7.4-month supply.
To read the complete article, click on http://www.economist.com/daily/news/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8371353
“THE PHONE OF THE FUTURE”
Portions of an article from Economist.com on 11/30/06
“One thing that is clear is that phones will pack a lot more computing power in future, and will be able to do more and more of the things that PCs are used for today – and more besides. Mats Lindoff, the chief technology officer at Sony Ericsson, a leading handset-maker, points out that the processing power of mobile phones lags behind that of laptop computers by around five years. Furthermore, studies show that people read around ten megabytes (MB) worth of material a day; hear about 400MB a day, and see one MB of information every second. In a decade’s time a typical phone will have enough storage capacity to be able to video its user’s entire life, says Mr. Lindoff. Tom MacTavish, a researcher at Motorola Labs, predicts that such ‘life recorders’ will be used for everything from security to settling accident claims with insurance firms…
“Another trend is towards phones that double as both fixed and mobile devices, using cellular networks when outdoors and switching to fixed networks, accessed via a short-range radio link to a small base-station, when indoors. In effect, your mobile phone will double as an indoor cordless handset, both at home and in the office. Early attempts to do this have been clunky, but technology will get cheaper and simpler within a few years. Meanwhile, distance and voice-based pricing are going away too, so that before long many subscribers will probably pay a fixed monthly access fee for unlimited phone calls and data transfers…”
To read the fascinating, three-plus page article, click on http://www.economist.com/science/PrinterFriendly.cfm?story_id=8312260
“WHAT IS CHANGING - AND WHAT ISN`T - IN THE WALL STREET JOURNAL,” A LETTER FROM L. GORDON CROVITZ, PUBLISHER
“Journal readers are the world’s most demanding consumers of business news and financial information, so we at the Journal must constantly look for ways to meet and, we hope, exceed your expectations.
“To this end, over the past year we have set ourselves the task to make the Journal the first newspaper that truly reflects how people now get news and information in this always-on, 24/7 information world…
“What will change reflects suggestions you made in three areas: Much more of the exclusive coverage you expect from the Journal, including what the news means, not just what happened the day before; a more convenient print Journal, in a handier format and with improved navigation; and better alignment between the print Journal and the Wall Street Journal Online so that you can use both versions for what each does best…
“…today perhaps a bit over half of our news space is devoted to exclusive, differentiated information and the rest to essentially what happened the day before. Our goal is to move to 80% exclusive news, with 20% making sure you’re aware of the key developments of the previous day. Journal reporters and editors serve a community of interest -- business executives and other leaders with similar concerns – and look forward to devoting more time and space to keeping you ahead of the news that’s essential to you…
“We’ll move to an easier-to-handle size, narrower in size than the current Journal, to a more standard width…We’ve designed a typeface that takes advantage of new technologies to create a highly legible text – perfect for those of us whose eyes are not what they once were – but that is still distinctively from the Journal…
We’d like print subscribers who aren’t yet WSJ.com subscribers to sample our Web site: Please go to www.wsj.com/freetrial for a free month of WSJ.com to experience the benefits of using print and online together…
Visit our partner Wiley.com to save 15% on How
to Make Money Growing Trees and their entire selection of Forestry and Agricultural titles. Your discount will be applied automatically
upon checkout. If you do you not see the discount being applied, please enter
code aff15 in the Promotion Code field and click the Apply Discount button.
|
