America’s energy policy is the real lost ball in high weeds. I think America’s lack of an energy policy is pathetic. We have no leadership. And it doesn’t appear that the two losers we have chosen to fight it out for the oval office is going to be much help. (Obama? McCain? Honest to effing god is that the best we could do in a time when this country needs a great man to lead it? Apparently.) Anyway, I believe the single biggest problem this country has is energy. I also believe that Congress and the White House are spending more time opposing each other than working together and helping to solve this mess. I don’t think we are in a “crisis”. I haven’t had any problem getting my car fueled up. My house still has electricity. But I do think we are heading for some big problems if we don’t start working on some solutions.

I’m not certain why the government doesn’t throw every resource at this problem that they can. They won’t open up more areas to drill offshore. We can’t drill in ANWR. They won’t support funding of new initiatives like wind and solar. Yet this is a country that clearly uses and abuses a shitload of energy. We need to try everything. We need to do everything. It’s so stupid to hear people talk about drilling, like “if we drill today the oil won’t become gas for your car for another 10 years.” So? WTF are we going to be doing in ten years? Paying $300/barrel for dwindling Middle Eastern oil? Drill now and work on alternatives in the mean time. Let’s do it all.

So I’m supporting The Pickens Plan. T.Boone Pickens is a Texas oilman. He sees where the lack of planning has gotten us. He wants a change. He’s not running for office. He’s simply offering a plan that no one else has provided. Pickens says  that neither Obama or McCain has offered any plan of their own. It’s truly amazing as this is the biggest problem this country is facing. I guess we are in denial. Maybe the collective believes that it’s just a matter of time before oil and gas comes back down in price. Think you’re ever going to pay $1.25/gallon for gas again? Think again.

Take some time and read his plan. Maybe sign up and show your support. If you prefer an energy policy put out by the bozos running for president then I guess do nothing. Obama’s great plan is a windfall tax on big oil. Brilliant guy that one. McCain’s isn’t much better. But at least he later said he supported building more nuclear plants. It’s something. We should do that as well.

On January 20th, 2009, a new President will take office. I’m getting behind the Pickens Plan to help ensure that our voices will be heard by the next administration.

Thanks for telling me about John Reese’s videos. Why I must have had 10 emails alerting me to the fact that they are FREE! People are really nice aren’t they? All these people rushing to email me about something that is FREE! They are all quick to point out that he’s not trying to sell me anything today. So go watch for FREE! Cool huh?

Somehow I doubt these people would have emailed me about this FREE! video if there wasn’t something to gain. When I get a surge of emails telling me about FREE! this or that, I just tune out. The video I watched was pretty slick but didn’t say much that you probably don’t already know. Plus it didn’t really show you how to do what he was talking about. I’m guessing that is where you part with your money for his membership. Every single email talked about how much value this video provided. I dunno guys. Maybe I’m simply a dumbass and just don’t get it. Did any of you really not know that you can go to Ebay and find out what is hot and worthy of creating a website on? Are you really not paying attention to your competitors and not looking at how they make it #1 in Google?

I’m a hype curmudgeon. It makes me grumpy. They’re like, look what a nice guy I am by bringing this to your attention. It’s FREE! The tactic now is to let you know that they know that there is a backside, upsell, side deal somewhere in there. But it’s cool because this part is FREE! But if they didn’t stand to gain some affiliate dollars in the bargain somewhere then I’m doubtful they would have been so generous. But everybody has to make a living I guess. And so it goes.

The bottom line is you gotta figure out if paying hundreds of dollars a month is worthwhile for his course. It’s not for me. Maybe it should be. It’s not like I get a million viewers to my sites. Hell, I can’t even figure out how to keep my sites from vacationing at Google Beach.

The effing Google sandbox is a pain in the ass isn’t it? Is there anything more frustrating and disheartening? I have two, month old Blogger blogs that I have really been working. There isn’t anything special about them but I’ve pushed them to the head of the class to see how far I can get with them. I am trying to generate affiliate sales from them. No Adsense. I’ve written three articles and submitted them to directories. I’ve submitted the links to over a hundred, maybe two hundred directories. I’ve bookmarked them across maybe 5-6 profiles. One a week. On different IPs even. I’ve made comments on blogs. Nothing spammy. I don’t even see how the head assholes at Google could fault what I was doing.

But no. Their algorithm has caught my little sites. Just when I was making inroads to top 10 glory. My sites are taking a break at the beach while the visitors I had yesterday are clicking someone else’s links.

Then again maybe the sites have been banned. Maybe Google has decided that they aren’t worthwhile after all. Maybe I got too many links too quick.

I sniped a keyword. I had an article, a Blogger blog, Wordpress.com blog and a Squidoo lens all ranked in the top 10 at one point. 300 searches a day. 323 to be exact if you believe nichebot. I had over 500 page views last Monday on one of those blogs. Traffic is already looking to be at least half of that today. By Friday I’ll be lucky to have 20 people visit those blogs. The article listing,  WP blog and lens are all still hovering around the top 15-20. But not the Blogger blog.

I don’t know what the formula is to keep your sites from taking the beach vacation. Not all links I add to directories and blogs count. I mean, some are no follow. Some directories won’t get around to adding your listing for months. It seems like the thing to do is jam as many directory submissions as you can because your eventual inclusion, if at all, could trickle in over the course of months. So the hundred, two hundred, submissions I’ve done really only amount to what, 30 actual listings right now? Maybe bookmarking is a bad idea. Maybe 5 different profiles with the same URL is bad over a month. I doubt it. I hide my links. I even got off my lazy butt and wrote up new articles for submission to EZine and GoArticles just yesterday. I almost never do that.

Whatever. I’ll keep adding posts. I’ll keep adding comments. I’ll keep submitting my links to directories. Hopefully the vacation will be short. It’s not like am the only one who feels the pain. And I bet the damn things will be listed by the end of the day. It’s just how Google does. And this is just how I whine.