These are just thoughts, but what if we pulled thoughts together of visions for the United States, from taxes, to politics, to forest management, to education, to water management, to reducing the size of government, to prison reform, to ecological rebuilding and management? These are just diamonds in the ruff, but ideas dug from deep reservoirs are then shaped by professional gem cutters.

Flood Control:
We have problems with flooding in the United States. Take and cut huge underground water ways across the United States to release the increase of swollen rivers. Starting with the Mississippi, cut huge tunnels, that are concrete lined, across the United States to divert water during times of flooding to dry and drought stricken area. These tunnels would have filters to keep out heavy materials, logs and rocks, yet would allow water to be diverted into huge culverts, located across the United States. During the dry months the tunnels could be cleanse with specialized bulldozers that have the shape of the bottom of the tunnels. These tunnels would be hundreds of feet in diameter. The mud and debris would be put onto dump trucks and used for fertilizer and land fill. The culverts themselves could be sealed off at times and the debris dredged from the bottom by bulldozers. If some culverts were set aside and designed to collect mud and debris with sloped sides and with roads heading down to the bottoms, bulldozers and scoops could load the debris into dump trucks to haul to the surface. The clean water would collect in culverts across the U.S. especially in drought stricken area. This would be a massive project and cost billions, but would save us billions in flood relieve damages and economic woes. This would also provide for maintained water for draught stricken areas. Let us control our floods and not let the water control us. If we can send a man to the moon we can surely and easily do this. Once we get the main line set up, then we can tap into other rivers and streams that flood and divert billions of gallons of water into water storage areas. Instead of letting all the flooding rivers run back into the sea, let us seize it, and use it for our good, instead of letting it use us to our detriment and destruction. The Mississippi at the bottom of the state of Illinois is at 110 meters elevation and lower parts of Texas are below that. The distance from the bottom of Illinois to Texas is less than five hundred miles. Let’s say that the base of the drainage pipes were set at 30 meters above sea level and the culvert bottoms set just above sea level then excess could be directly sent into the sea if necessary. Putting all the drainage pipes at the same level is necessary to eventually connect them across the United States.

Public Education:
Setting up voluntary schooling for children from sixth grade on that would propel them into their careers. Colleges have all this testing for careers planning on which careers are good for which types of personality profiles. Using this add the end of fifth grade or so, and only by a voluntary basis, testing a child on their personality, their abilities, and interests, and having them start studies in the field of their choosing. We tend to teach so many generalities in our school system that very few of our children are proficient at anything when they enter the market place. How many subjects like foreign language and algebra have you forgotten since high school? If a child is gifted in math why make him suffer through Spanish if he is never going to use it? Why not train him in the deep things of math a use the abilities that he has and not try to train him in areas he has no interest or gifting in. Cookie cutter education is fine for some, but limit those who already have ambitions and desires for specific greatness. No wonder there is so much depression amongst our teens. Look at our Olympic gymnast hopefuls; they are among the best in the world. When did they start getting trained in their areas of expertise? If we can do that with sports; why not education? Why not train an Einstein to be the next Einstein? I don’t know about you but I got board in school. Then I dropped out, with other mitigating circumstances, but receiving best math student in my Jr. High School of 2000 people and was involved in gifted student classes, still I was lost to the academic world for 22 years. What if Window Microsoft supported a six year junior high and high school strictly dedicated to teaching young adults about computer programming and engineering (plus other studies), what type of computer programmer and engineers would they get to choose from in six years? Do you think it would be worth in their best interests to support a school like that? I say, definitely.

Endangered Species Revitalization:
Since we are having problems with species being endangered, let us set up schools and colleges around endangered species zoos. These schools and colleges would teach children and young adults about animal husbandry of all animals, while rebuilding the bases of endangered animals. Come on environmentalists but your money where your mouth is. This is a win-win situation. People will pay to get top notch training in environmental sciences, conservation, scuba diving, biology, science, and veterinary schooling. Plus, the schools and colleges would get labor at reduced prices through work study programs.

Forest Fire Management:
In our forests cut 100 foot or so fire breaks into our forests, like we allow for power lines. These lines would be mapped out by the Forest Service, BLM, and the Top Fire Crews. Cutting curving fire breaks in strategic lines, so that when a fire breaks out in one section it only burns so much and the fire breaks are already maintained. These lines would be cut in curving patterns to that people and animals only see a short distance. The lumber companies who volunteer to maintain these paths keep the center 100 yard (this width can determined by the Fire Crews according to the particular needs of that type of forest) and the logging companies are allowed to cut marked trees up to 100 feet on either side of the cleared path. While only allowing logging companies to harvest with helicopters, mules and low impact equipment, then giving these companies fair tax breaks. This would save us millions in the budgets of fire suppression crews.

Lumber Exports:
Have hardwood lumber companies supply residential property and farms with hardwood saplings of trees on a least basis. Then in a number of years they are allowed to return and cut down the trees for lumber to sell. The property owners get all the benefits of the trees (i.e. a property owner gets all the benefits of the cherry trees for thirty to fifty years) then at the end of the lease the company comes and harvest the trees at makes a huge profit. Hmmm… black walnut trees. If the lumber companies are smart and keep supplying saplings each year, then get to harvest then according to the lease contracts. If they need money they could sell the contracts to other lumber companies at a rate according to the type and age of the trees, or the leasers could buy them back at a pre determined market price and the company still makes money.

Ocean Management and Recycling:
If we take certain objects that are not harmful to the environment like concrete cinder blocks and drop then scatter then lightly across the ocean, object that have holes in them where small sea life can hide, then we start to build nature reserves for ocean life. Old railroad containers and semi truck boxes might will work well also, as long as the rust and corrosion is not harmful, or cover then with some kind of stuff like they use on truck bed liners.

Remember these are just ideas for us to work with.

Now onto Pirated Music:
What if music CD’s were protected like computer programs CD’s. If the industry would start encrypting their CDs and DVDs and installing instillation programming to their equipment like computer operating systems, their stuff would stopped getting pirated. Would this entail making new hardware to play these CDs and DVDs? Yes, would they cost more? Yes. Would people pay for it to get the newest music? Yes. Does the music industry and musicians have the money to do this? Yes. Will it increase profits? Yes. Will it stop foreign countries from pirating music? Yes. Will it cause increased revenues to be generated for the U.S. economy? Yes. Will people try to copy the music via normal sound recording issues? Yes, but it will not be of the same quality. Plus they could add sounds into it that are picked up by recording the music so the sound has irritating buzzing and the like in it. Will that be a difficult task to come up with sound recording blockers? Yes, but can they do it? Yes. One tip for them is to look at the whole process of music differently.

Taxation:
If we set up a federal sales tax, like states that have sales taxes and only tax people and businesses according to what they spend then we could reduce most of the IRS down to almost nil. See article on reducing taxation.
http://www.xomba.com/simplifying_the_tax_system_by_james_wood

U.S-Mexico Border Control.
The ancients built the Great Wall of China, why can’t we build the Great Mexican-U.S. Wall. A concrete and stone wall forty feet high and wide enough for border patrol to drive on, and forty feet deep. The wall would be set back 100 yards back into our territory. Stretching from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico. Where the Rio Grande passes into Mexico have a dam stile by pass to allow water to travel under. Or just dig a huge shipping trench from the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific and then charge all the ships us it instead of traveling all the way down to the Panama canal. The canal and maybe the wall both might be a good idea, with inlets under the walls to make ocean resorts in the middle of Texas. This is not really too practical since the United States border with Mexico is 1969 miles long, but it sure would make for some really nice beach resorts.

All these are but diamonds in the rough. Are we looking to what we need at this very moment or do we look to the future to make this country an oasis is a dry and weary world. A 3.79 million square mile paradise, we can do it, if we put our minds to it.

Anybody know of any think tanks I can join? :)

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