Cap Phantom

Crude oil prices have reached $140. The US dollar has lost hugely against the Euro and the Canadian dollar. Petroleum prices will continue their unstoppable surge, which is driven by steadily increasing demand, Wall Street speculation, and OPEC refusal to meet demand.

Present and previous US administrations have made no serious efforts to develop effective countermeasures. The attempt of the Bush administration to gain control of oil in the Middle East has failed. Highly subsidized US ethanol production from corn has not made a dent in petroleum demand, but has led to a huge rise in worldwide grain and food prices.

Instead, the administration and many politicians are demanding energy conservation and a failing “Cap and Trade” permit system. Drilling for oil in Alaska and offshore is another request by oil lobbyists.

Countermeasures have not contributed anything to produce supplies. However, ill conceived solutions have made many politically connected people very rich. Greed has trumped patriotism!

For more than twenty years, politicians, industry, media, and citizens are discussing the issue of oil imports and their pernicious effects on the US economy. In May 2008 the US imported 14.2 million barrels of crude oil per day. At $140 per barrel the USA gives away roughly $2 billion every single day to foreign nations! In addition, a substantial amount of refined fuels is imported. This means that the US is approaching a shameful threshold, when it pays $1 trillion dollars for foreign fuel imports annually. These huge funds could do wonders for the US economy, if they would be spent on energy supplies produced by our own industry, inside the US.

The US has a severe energy problem. It possesses huge reserves of coal and oil shale. However, coal, oil, and natural gas emit large amounts of greenhouse gases when burned. Fossil fuel combustion is the cause of global warming. We cannot dare to continue the continuing the use of fossil fuels for more than a couple of decades. Otherwise, too much carbon dioxide will accumulate in the Earth’s atmosphere and will lead to an acceleration of global warming. Global warming is responsible for climate change and for mounting damages to nature, worldwide assets, and people. Melting of glaciers and ice in the Polar Regions is already a growing and unstoppable threat.

Electricity and liquid transportation fuels are the lifeblood of our economies. Economic growth is not possible without plentiful, affordable, and secure energy supplies. Economies will fail when supplies of petroleum become scarce, when global warming keeps inflicting damages, and when petroleum prices keep continuing their skyward move.

Are there any solutions that can be developed and implemented before petroleum is depleted and before global warming exceeds the 3 to 4 degree Celsius global warming threshold?

Fortunately, there are many alternate approaches for generating electricity that will not emit greenhouse gases.

Surprisingly, there seems to be only one single concept, which has the potential to produce sufficient substitute supplies of liquid transportation fuels. This concept is the conversion of biomass into liquid petroleum substitutes. Unfortunately, early in 2008, this concept has been discredited by the ill conceived production of fuel ethanol from food crops.

Conversion of biomass into fuel is the one and only option, which we may be able to develop to maturity in the next thirty years. We must learn how to use sunlight, water, carbon dioxide, and fertilizer and convert them into biomass. Categorically, food crops are not suited for conversion into fuels. Food crops have been selected, domesticated, and bred to provide storable, tasty, and nutritious foods. Energy crops must be selected based on entirely different properties. Energy crops must have very high energy content, must provide very high crop yields, and must grow very fast. This means that we must find and further breed plants with very high energy yields; i.e. plants with the highest production of energy per acre per year.

Nature has been converting sunlight into biomass for millions of years. In fact, the Earth’s generous fossil fuel reserves are nothing else but biomass converted into coal, petroleum, and natural gas. All we have to do is to imitate nature’s example. Obviously, there must be a major obstacle. We do not know exactly which processes nature used to make petroleum. And we have a major handicap to overcome. We are allowed only hours for conversion. Nature may have taken her time and may have used thousands or even millions of years for the same conversion.

We have learned the hard way that the conversion of food crops into liquid fuels creates market forces, which cannot be controlled unless the world installs huge regulatory bureaucracies. Instead, we must use a concept for producing petroleum substitutes that cannot be manipulated.

Most sunshine reaches Earth near the equator in tropical and sub-tropical regions. Numerous arid regions, without sufficient precipitation, are located in these lands, too. By placing large, industrial scale biomass plantations into these areas, we prevent the abuse of fertile lands for food production. We can also prevent the further deforestation of rain forests and the abuse of other, primeval lands.

Water is the commodity that is missing in these areas. Lack of water is the reason these lands are arid. Therefore, we must use seawater and use heat from the sun to produce desalinated freshwater.

Finally, the US must establish an autonomous agency with the mission, program, and budget to make the US independent of foreign oil imports! The energy industry does not have the means and incentives.

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The Cuba Tobbaco Trading, Thompson Cigar Company, Edwards Pipe & Tobacco, The Ybor City, and Casa Fuente Cigar Bar are among the well-known cigar shops in the USA found in three cigar cities -Tampa, Miami and Las Vegas.

If you are a cigar aficionado searching for some affable city where you can lap up a smoke, you sure can find them. Miami, Florida provides a profuse Cuban cigar ethnicity. Tampa, Florida is celebrated for a vivid history of cigar. Las Vegas offers you recreational galore and smoking delight.

Miami, Florida is one place where the finest cigars are sold. Little Havana is an area of the city that is greatly entrenched in Cuban cigar customs. May Cuban settlers own cigar specialty shops there. The Cuba Tobacco Trading by Pedro and Peter Bello is one of the most sought after shops in Miami.

Tampa is prominent for some its cigar retailers such as Thompson Cigar Company and Edwards Pipe & Tobacco. The Ybor City, on the other hand, was the late 18th century’s Cigar Capital of the World. It is now evolved into a favorite entertainment quarter.

The Edward’s Pipe & Tobacco has also stores in Colorado, and North Dallas. The store has been offering eclectic pipes, cigars and a wide collection of accessories like lighters. It’s been in the business since 1964.

Thompson Cigar Company was established in Key West, Florida in 1915. Thompson is USA’s oldest mail order cigar business, which still carries the Postal Permit number 1 for Tampa, Florida. The company’s commitment to supply an extensive choice of products at sensible prices continues. Thompson Cigar Company also owns and runs the country’s biggest supply storage humidor, which was specially developed to ensure the freshness and quality of each tobacco sold.

The company’s call center that’s consists of 200 customer-oriented, courteous staff provides answers to your concerns regarding cigar. You can place your order online or you can visit Thomson Cigar store in Tampa, Monday through Saturdays.

The Ybor City adjacent to downtown Tampa has a tradition of cigar production. Tired of constant political strife of his country, Don Vicente Martinez Ybor, owner of a cigar factory in Cuba, escaped to Tampa, Florida and set up his cigar territory there. With the flourishing of Ybor’s factories, Jewish, Cuban, and Italian settlers were drawn to either establish their own trades or work in the factories. Renowned as the Ybor City, the locality contained 200 cigar factories and 12,000 cigar makers or tabaqueros generating an approximated 700 million cigars annually. However, the Ybor City went to seed when the ban and depression plagued the region. The Ybor City developed into a National Historical Landmark over the passing of so many years. Nowadays, tourists are fascinated with the vivaciousness of its ambiance, distinctiveness of its history, and idiosyncrasies of its architecture. This bubbly Latin district even takes pride in its own fermented beer referred to as the Ybor Gold.

Cigars are manually rolled even now by expert tabaqueros, and Roberto Ramirez is one of the most illustrious. Born in Cuba, and ranked among the world’s top ten greatest cigar rollers, Roberto is one of the White House’s guests tasked to exhibit his expertise. Ybor City guests can pay a visit to Gonzalez Martinez Cigar Factory found on 21st Street and 7th Avenue and see the handiwork of pro tabaqueros who flaunt their skill everyday.

Casa Fuente Cigar Bar is a smoker’s haven in Las Vegas. When you’re in the city, be sure to stop at Casa Fuente that’s located at the Caesar’s Palace. Casa Fuente is more than just a family store selling Arturo Fuente cigars; it is a bar that offers a choice of beverages like wines and cocktails, too. The Fuente cigars are trendy, exclusive products that come from Dominican Republic.

The Cuban-themed establishment of Casa Fuente is welcoming, with mosaic-designed floors and Fuente family’s portraits adorns the interior.

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The power of black community is rising constantly with black leaders proving their leadership qualities and mettle. The success of black community is entirely based on the positive efforts of black entrepreneurs, black CEO’s, black executives and black business leaders around the world. Their success and vision have inspired the growth of blacks not only in USA but also in the rest parts of the world as well. Here, we’ll highlight the achievements of Barack Obama, who has dominated the political scenario in the US.

The rising success of Mr. Obama has proved that sky is unlimited for those who know how to make a world of their own. Democrat Barack Obama of Illinois has been running the country’s presidential elections, soon to be held this year in US.

For reaching on the top of this electoral battle, he has to beat arch rival Hillary Clinton in the Democratic nomination and Republican John McCain in the general election. Obama would be the country’s first black president if he wins the election.

In 2004 Democratic National Convention, Obama first shot to fame with his roaring speech in which he talked about his personal story in concern with the traditional American ideologies of independence and desires.

Obama, the son of a Kenyan father and a White mother, won with a huge margin a few months later. After his election, Obama became a major attraction of the media industry. In 2007, he declared his candidature for the US presidential election in a rally held in South Carolina. A senator for Illinois, Obama worked on several issues such as AIDS education and prevention with the Republican colleagues.

Early Life

Named after his father, Obama was only six when his parents got divorced. Later his mother married an Indonesian and he moved to Jakarta. In his four years of life in Jakarta, Obama practiced Christianity and attended secular Catholic schools, though his father and step-father were Muslims.

Later, he moved to New York to study political science at Columbia University. In 1988, he joined Harvard Law School and became a famous lawyer. He practiced civil rights laws. There, he met his future wife, Michelle, with whom he has two daughters.

Barack Obama is not a political candidate but he is the hope of many people who know how to fight destiny to make the right path of success.

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Do you think NDC or NPP care about Ghanaians look at their record? NDC ruled Ghana for 8 years and NPP has also ruled for 8 years. Did any of them help to make Ghana a developed country? Did any of them solve the unemployment problem in Ghana? How about education and health? Look at the roads in Ghana. Do we deserve that? Any person who has been to Europe, Asia or America can say for sure that both major parties have not done much for Ghanaians.

Look at the state of Ghana’s manufacturing sector. What do we produce? Virtually nothing. What do we do with the cocoa that we produce? We only export the raw beans for peanuts. How about the gold and the diamond and the many minerals we mine? They are exported to Switzerland and Dubai before Ghanaians go there to buy the wedding rings and bracelets to sell to Ghanaians. Computers, cars, mobile phones, fridges are made in Europe, Japan and the US and it is affordable but Ghanaians cannot buy common chocolate even though the vital raw material which is cocoa is made here. And the same is true about gold and diamond. We cannot buy them even though they are mined right here.

Look at the state of the agricultural sector. How many of our farmers have their own tractors and farming equipments to produce beyond the level of subsistence? Virtually none. Virtually all the important equipments needed to make the agric sector viable and productive have to be imported and how many of our farmers have their own resources to buy even the basic machinery to expand their farms? Although we are in the 21st Century yet our farming practices indicate that we have still not moved beyond the 19th century. This is the more reason why we continue to hunger even though rich soils abound in Ghana. We under utilise our land for lack of political commitment.

Look at the policies of the two major parties and see if they can even put Ghana on the level of Korea, Taiwan or Hong Kong in the next 20 years. Ghanaian business men are frequenting Dubai and China importing every good you can think of. Investigate to find out how the Chinese and co did it and whether any of the parties can help Ghana do the same.

Look at the state of infrastructure in Ghana: roads, harbours, telecommunication, health, education, market and airport. We have neglected the few that Nkrumah built yet we have forgotten that no nation no matter the size of the natural resources that she has can develop without investing in infrastructure. That is why Democratic Republic of Congo has every mineral you can think of yet they are one of the poorest in the world. That is why Malaysia, Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong have developed and that is why President Elect Obama  is talking about building US infrastructures because they are the engines that run the economy. You cannot export if you do not have harbours and airports to support it. You cannot attract tourists if you do not have airport, hotels and other infrastructure that support it.

You cannot move goods from centres of production to centres of consumption if you do not have roads, rail lines and inland water infrastructure to deliver it. You cannot supply the industries with doctors, architects, bankers, lawyers, planners, engineers, teachers, nurses if you do not have the educational infrastructure to deliver it. And you cannot run an efficient and vibrant economy if you do not have the energy and telecommunication infrastructures in place. Ghana has been experiencing serious disruptions in the energy sector for years and no political party has seen any wisdom to solve. As a result factories are folding up and are laying off workers and we are waiting for nature to help fill Akosombo Dam before we rectify the problem. Can these do nothing approaches to problem solving help our nation? What are we doing with the abundance of sunshine in the country? We have not taken advantage of it, have we? We have sunshine 365 days and we have not tap into solar energy which is cheap and more reliable than hydro. It is another indication of the useless institutions that we have and lip service paid by the various political parties and their leaders to development. Look around yourselves and see if any of the goods you see are made in Ghana I mean the mobile phones, computers, televisions, cars and all the flashy things that Ghanaians are crazing for. It is sad to note that almost all the raw materials needed to build these phones, cars etc are obtained from Ghana and other African countries.

How about the state of the housing infrastructure? A visit to any village or town gives the same picture of poor housing and poor quality of public service. People are living in mud/thatched houses with bamboo leaf as roofing sheet with no electricity, potable water and clinics. They live in a subsistence environment without social security, health insurance and are condemned to poverty, desperation and hopelessness. Those living in urban areas are without jobs, without mortgage, and face high utility bills with poor service. They face constant barrage of water and energy disruptions everyday. In every region the situation is not different. On the other hand our MPs, ministers, vice president, the president, their cronies and families live in total luxury with mansions, SUVs, bodyguards, fat salaries, fat bonuses, house servants and they have all the resources of the state at their disposal. Yet they claim to be serving the people. How can it be?

And how about our education sector upon which the development of the nation rest? It is nothing to write home about. Isn’t it? Look at the world ranking of Universities and see where the first university falls. Can we afford to develop the nation with low quality graduates not to mention the millions of illiterates and semi-literates that roam around the country? Of the about 9,760 Accredited universities in the World, Ghana’s prominent universities including University of Ghana and Kwame Nkrumah University of ‘Science and Technology’ only managed to place 5,702 and 6,703 positions respectively in the World University Ranking. Even in Africa, our own backyard they only managed to secure 43rd and 63rd positions respectively.(Source: topuniversities.com) It is abundantly clear that our education system is not producing the architects, engineers, planners, bankers, lawyers, doctors, teachers, social workers, nurses and the scientists that we need in the 21st Century. That is why every major architectural and engineering activity in Ghana is undertaken by foreigners and foreign companies especially from USA, Japan, China, India and Europe. And any nation that depends on foreign expertise for her survival is doom to fail in the long run. The Universities lack well trained lecturers. They lack modern facilities such as state of the art libraries, laboratory simulation facilities, studios, computers, and books. They lack them because we cannot build them; we cannot build them because the curricula have not prepared our students to build them. As a result we have to import the equipments and books from countries that have done their home work well and have invested heavily in education notably in science and technology.

In many of our universities, Polytechnics and secondary schools lecturers/teachers are still teaching students the same way the 19th century academic institutions taught forgetting that we are in the 21st century. The same notes given a final year student four years ago are still being given to first year students with no addition and subtraction.  Lecturers cannot write books for students because they do not have the resources to carry out research that form the basis of any academic material.

Whereas students in advanced countries get their hands on books immediately they are released those in Ghana have to wait 4 years or even more to get the same books. What is more the academic facilities including libraries are in a state too appalling to describe. Not a single of our universities can boast of a million volumes of books in their libraries. Even the few books that they have are so old that information contained in them are useless. Very few books have been published by Ghanaians. Due to this most students have to rely on the notes that lecturers give them. This is state of our universities and the little I say about our Polytechnics and secondary schools the better. Our research institutions have achieved very little because they are underfunded and the researchers do not have the expertise and the facilities to carry out any meaningful research. A case in point is Cocoa Research Institute of Ghana (CRIG) located at New Tafo in the Eastern Region. Despite decades of its existence we still export raw cocoa beans for peanuts. No value has been added to the cocoa. CRIG has not been able to come up with other ways in which to use the beans to benefit Ghanaians despite the mounting evidence that the beans have several potential uses.

Apart from the few things Dr. Nkrumah did in his 9 years of administration virtually nothing has been added to it by the various governments who came after him neither the NDC, NPP nor PNC.

I can continue all day but it is a fact that both the NDC and NPP are bunches of hungry politicians with no concrete economic and social agenda to move Ghana beyond the level of importing used computers, used cars, used televisions, used underwear and any used thing you can think of. What are all these telling you about Ghana, the NPP, and the NDC? Do we have any option not to vote for them? Until we have leaders who have visions and are committed to industrialising Ghana beyond agro raw material production, Ghana will continue to be classified as a developing and poor country and even though we will continue to vote we will continue to wallow in abject poverty.

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To any true blue American, I am sure that this imagination is inconceivable even in their wildest of dreams. Unfortunately, for an Indian, forget dreams, even in reality our sensitivity does not move an inch in the event of occurrence of a similar scenario, which is just about to happen in India. It is nothing but most disgraceful that while our faint hope (or hollow rhetoric, if you will) of cleansing the extant Indian political system is wilting in front of our eyes, we are letting it happen as thoroughly hypocrite spectators. It comes as a blatant slap on the face of the already fractured judicial system and fragmented political structure that an extradited underworld don, Abu Salem, who is accountable for plotting and murdering hundreds of people in one of the most gruesome blasts in Mumbai in 1993, has the audacity to join politics, by contesting in the impending Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections. More pathetic were the ‘arrogantly shameless’ statements that were scripted in posters in Mubarakpur promoting Salem’s candidature (Hum pakke Hind hain, seene mein sher ka dil rakhe hai, agar saath mila aapka to rukh toofan ka more sakte hain, vatan ki abru bachayenge, hum ek khushal Bharat banayenge).
The more I read this, the more I’m bewildered by the audacity of the man, an audacity which arises from our very own home-grown apathy.But then there is nothing surprising as Indian politics anyway was always a haven for criminals (According to reports, almost one-quarter of the over 540 people elected to Parliament in 2004 face criminal charges). But in this editorial, I am not referring to just any other petty criminal. Here, I am talking about a person who has been accused of being one of the masterminds and has been held responsible for the logistics and cold blooded execution of one of the biggest serial blasts in India, which not only killed hundreds of innocent people, but its aftershocks culminated into blood-spattered communal riots (wherein there was a complete massacre of countless people that once again brought back memories of almost forgotten wounds, the sense of constant suspicion and recurrent insecurity). I reiterate, I am talking about a man for whom the CBI spent three torturous years of sleepless nights and won one of the best executed cases in history; and that too against the established lawyers of Europe. This is the same man who has been on a run for years, and who even had plastic surgery done to conceal his identity. And when that man today conceitedly claims to have substance in him to lead a country of a billion, the popular media, which is assumed to be the conscience keeper of the common man, has willingly and deplorably underplayed this grave news by carrying it in the inside pages in form of a tiny story – this sufficiently indicates that there is something inherently and terribly wrong with our sense of ethics and justice.My anger is not against Abu Salem merely, for I know that he is just another coward who is following suit like his predecessor politicians in order to save his neck. My anger is also against the very lawyers who actually advised him to get into politics. Shame that they call themselves lawyers!
My irritation is against the silence of the polity and even the Election Commission, which never spares an opportunity to showcase whatever little it has achieved. My anger is directed against this deafening silence, which is holding each and every citizen to ransom.What more, amidst this conspiracy of silence – of the polity, the regulator and media – unmindful of probity and morality, dangerous political parties like Apna Dal (This is the same party that has supported Bablu Srivastava, another mafia don, and thankfully lost in the last Lok Sabha elections) are eager to associate themselves with Salem and reap political capital (cheap publicity) out of this issue. The party president, Sonelal Patel, has blatantly stated that his party is open and not averse to promote Dawood Ibrahim and other criminals as well, if they abandon the crime path and aspire to do social service by joining politics. If not for the grave consequences upon an under-developed state like Uttar Pradesh in particular and Indian polity in general, this entire episode would be achingly amusing!Well known sociologist Max Weber had lamented that ‘freedom and democracy are only possible where the resolute will of a nation not to allow itself to be ruled like sheep is permanently alive.’ USA celebrated this month for having crossed the 300 million population mark; ironically, around 300 million Indians live below the poverty line. The will seems dead, freedom further so, and if illiteracy, unemployment and poverty are all that our criminal politicians have been able to provide the majority of our countrymen till date, pray tell me what democratic difference remains between us “intellectuals” and Max’s sheep?

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