If we CAN'T, maybe Canada CAN!
Build the Continental living Corridor of Canada (CCC)
SOS #147 -- J. Morris Hicks -- (3-1-22)
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Concluding that we must have a back-up plan in case the USA drops the ball on the GBN (Great Big Northern) ultra-green living corridor -- Canada may be the place we will want to be.
Right now, I have doubts that our dysfunctional federal government in the USA will get much of anything accomplished when it comes to totally reinventing the way we live. The dearth of true leadership in these troubling times is disheartening -- and the horror show taking place right now in Ukraine is an example of what happens when leadership fails.
On a brighter note. While in Burlington, Vermont, last weekend, I was thinking about this SOS Memo -- and could see Canada in the distance from our hotel room.
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That's Champlain College -- in Burlington (in the image above) and my oldest granddaughter is a junior there. We were in town with another young family member (a high school senior) who expects to be a freshman this fall at the neighboring University of Vermont (UVM) -- just 44 miles from the Canada-USA border.
Meanwhile, back to the business at hand. I begin with a question:
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Why have I been publishing these SOS Memos every week for the past three years? What do I want you to do? What actions would I like to see you take?
I simply want to help people everywhere better understand the unprecedented dilemma in which we find ourselves. This is not a time to be rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic; it's the time to urgently repair what's wrong with our spaceship -- our only home -- that is rocketing around the sun at 67,000 miles per hour. If Earth's ecosystem fails, all eight billion of us are in trouble.
Once folks grasp what our dilemma is all about -- it will be much easier for them to understand what they should be doing to help resolve the life-threatening dilemma that all Earthlings are facing.
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Click image above to visit the book's Amazon page where you can purchase this 2020 book for seven bucks. For environmental reasons, it is only available as an e-book. Take a look at this short, unsolicited endorsement from a professor emeritus of history at Ohio State University.
As for today's Canada-related SOS Memo, I want to begin by sharing a ten-minute video that first aired in 2009. The reason I am sharing it at the beginning of this SOS is because if I put it at the end, not many of you would even open it, much less watch all ten minutes.
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Click the image to watch the video and discover why Dr. James Lovelock believes that Canada will be able to support human life long after the cornfields of Kansas have dried up.
He was in his late 80's when that video was produced and, God bless him, he is still alive and well at 102.
Statistically, less than 10 percent of the people who "open" this SOS Memo will actually click on any of the links herein -- and I really want you to watch this video. It features Dr. Lovelock being interviewed on an evening talk show in Canada in 2009.
This short film is not about doom and gloom. It's more about viewing reality through the lens of research and wisdom from perhaps the greatest big-picture scientist who has ever lived. Click image below to watch this 10-minute video on YouTube.
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In the video, Dr. Lovelock has a lighthearted way of talking about a dismal future. That said, Dr. Sailesh Rao and I still believe that our situation can have a happy ending -- but ONLY if most humans begin taking the actions like the ones described later in this memo.
The reason for our greater optimism (compared to Lovelock) is the incredibly powerful ecological shift toward sustainability that would soon follow an urgently executed, five year...
Global Elimination of Animal Agriculture
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You may be wondering why I am talking about Canada? Have I suddenly lost my mind? Have I given up on the USA? No, but noticing how dysfunctionality has become the norm in our federal government in recent years, I am just doing a little contingency thinking.
The idea for this SOS Memo came to me at 3 a.m. on February 8. As I lay in bed, two hours before the scheduled alarm, I began to think about the sad realization that our beloved USA is not what she used to be -- and that my two-year old vision of the Great Big Northern living corridor (the GBN) across America was almost certainly never going to happen.
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In that chapter, we describe how the original vision of "GRATOLA" morphed into one single, mega-corridor across the USA, running from Seattle to Boston.
The GRATOLA idea began in September of 2018 and it was followed by the GBN revision one year later. Here is a link to my first SOS Memo in which the GBN was mentioned -- on September 4, 2019.
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Now I am re-thinking the whole idea |
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And that's where the Continental Corridor of Canada (the CCC) comes into play. You might be thinking that I am giving up on a perfectly good idea -- and that I am giving up on the USA.
Well, here's the deal, I am a realist, a former officer in the United States Coast Guard, an engineer and a career business executive -- and I believe that problem solving and system design all begin with data, science and an understanding of reality.
A lot has happened since I first wrote about the GBN idea in 2019. So I won't try to describe what has taken place when one picture is worth thousands of words.
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Just for the record, what you see in this January 6 photograph is not an example of legitimate political discourse. What we have here is a situation in which the "American Experiment" is being severely tested.
Even prior to that fateful day, I was having serious doubts about the ability of an ultra-divisive population and dysfunctional government to ever come together and thoughtfully create a sustainable plan for sustainable living in the future.
Prior to January 6, I was thinking that the northern part of the USA would be the ideal place for that ultra-green, futuristic living corridor that I lovingly named the Great Big Northern. Now, I am beginning to feel that Canada might be a much better place for a narrower version of that corridor.
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First of all. Canada is huge -- but the population is only 38 million. Did you know that Canada has fewer people than California but more land area than the entire United States?
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Well, Google knows: Canada has a larger land mass than the United States. Almost 3.9 million square miles compared to the USA's 3.8 million -- making Canada 1.6% larger than the USA.
Secondly. The people in Canada seem to be more thoughtful and respectful than we are here in the USA; the recent trucker disturbance notwithstanding. And, their government, with universal healthcare, seems refreshingly efficient compared to the political nightmare we have in this country.
Thirdly. The entire country is well north of the USA which means that they are more likely to have productive farmland long after most of the land in our lower 48 has become parched desert. Dr. Lovelock speaks to that point in the featured video above.
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So what about the Continental living Corridor of Canada (the CCC)? |
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I am not going to get into the details of the CCC except to compare it to the Great Big Northern idea here in the USA. Since it's in Canada, think "hockey stick" graph and imagine a hockey stick-shaped corridor in the image above -- running from Newfoundland, via Montreal and then due west to British Columbia on the Pacific coast.
Speaking of hockey sticks, this photo is from my daughter Diana's Atlanta wedding in 2007 -- a wedding for which the groom (Michael, a Canadian) chose the "arch of hockey sticks" pictured below. My son, Jason, is on the far left looking up, aligning his stick, as he was the only groomsman who had never played hockey.
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As for the details associated with our vision of sustainable living in the future, I refer you to the 2020 book OUTCRY that is available as an e-book on Amazon. Or, you can just visit this SOS Memos page that features about three hundred weekly memos on this crucial topic.
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This SOS Memo is all about what is technologically possible when it comes to designing, building and populating an entirely new, ultra-green system of living for humans.
Whether we intend to build the first model in the USA or in Canada, we are running out of time. If you didn't watch that Lovelock video provided earlier, I encourage you to scroll back up and watch it now. Or click here to watch it.
In that video, with a smile on his face, he states that he really does not think that more than one billion humans will survive this century -- possibly a lot less than that.
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Dr. Sailesh Rao and I believe that our chances are much better -- but only if we begin urgently taking the easiest, fastest and most powerful step in the near future.
Of course, I am talking about the urgent need to figure out a way to totally eliminate the horrendously despicable and unsustainable system of animal agriculture around the world.
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Dr. Rao is heading up a grassroots approach to getting that done -- while I am focusing primarily on the power of exceptionally well-known and respected leaders to make it happen. Maybe we will meet somewhere in the middle and get it done.
To clarify, we're not trying to prevent the end of "civilization as we know it." Because it is that ultra-wasteful and harmful civilization that is now threatening our very existence as a species.
We're talking about replacing it with an entirely new, ultra-green civilization of the future -- and we do our best to paint a picture of that way of living in OUTCRY.
In closing, I encourage you to scroll down to the "Big Picture" Data & Info section below that follows all of my weekly SOS Memos.
What else can you do? Scroll on down past the "Big Picture Data" section until you see another list that is entitled: "What can you do?"
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Finally, contact me directly at the email address below with any questions you may have.
J. Morris (Jim) Hicks
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The section below will continue to provide you with handy reference materials on this most crucial of all topics.
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"Big Picture"
Data and Info Section
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This section has been appearing at the end of my weekly SOS Memos for several months. It contains links to relevant information that form the foundation of what our options for responding quickly and appropriately to our global crises appear to be.
In order to respond appropriately, we must first grasp the all-important "big picture" regarding how we got to where we are in the first place. The various links below will help you do that.
Next is a half-hour video that was published in November of 2021. It as produced by Michael Dowd, a non-scientific researcher like me who does a very fine job of explaining the many facets of the obstacles standing between us and survival as a species.
Dowd has a pretty good handle on most things, but he seems to be unaware of the simple weapon that we can all use to fight the leading driver of climate change. Our forks.
That said, he does a terrific job of describing our ever-worsening dilemma. Click the link below to view this very informative 33-minute video, published November 15, 2021.
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This next item is a free 83-minute documentary film that is all about the findings that were documented in Dr. Stephen Emmott's 2013 book. TEN BILLION. |
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This powerful film will certainly help more people grasp that all-important "big picture." Just click on the hourglass image.
I will continue sharing this TEN BILLION link in future weekly SOS Memos
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More Data re Leading Driver of Climate Change.
Beginning in September of 2021, I have been including links to world-changing scientific information that thought leaders everywhere should read and and share with others.
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What can you do? For starters, you can buy the new documentary -- Eating our way to Extinction for $6 on Netflix -- and watch it often with your friends and family.
Also, you can:
- Share this SOS Memo with everyone you know.
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Get an e-copy of OUTCRY. Visit Outcry page on Amazon and get a much bigger understanding of the situation in which all humans find ourselves.
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Inform all the young people in your world that you are deadly serious about this topic. Urge them to read these SOS Memos and our latest book, OUTCRY.
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- Completely stop eating meat, dairy, eggs and fish today and tell everyone why you are taking such a "radical" step. You're doing it for the innocent children of the world.
- As noted above, do yourself a favor and make sure that your plant-based meals of the future consist of whole plants -- the kinds of foods that prevent or reverse most chronic diseases AND enable your body to effortlessly seek its optimal weight.
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A final word. Hopefully, the kind of crucially serious situations expressed in these SOS Memos will soon replace meaningless and trivial topics that dominate a ridiculously large percentage of all of the conversations in the world.
We must all start talking much more about what's really important. That is , we must start doing everything possible to maximize the chances of a meaningful and pleasant life ahead for the young people of the world.
I volunteer to help you do that. For Free. Invite me to collaborate with you and your group via Zoom. To help you jump-start that all-important conversation, I will be happy to present and discuss this topic at length. Here's an advance link to my standard presentation: 65 slides.
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The image above is a clue regarding the essence of my "family game plan" that is revealed only in my talks. I do not put that in writing.
Want to share some of my SOS Memos with others? Visit my SOS Memos page where the most recent ones are listed first.
Finally, I am confident that if a few million people carefully read and digested OUTCRY, that there might at least be a more robust conversation taking place about our grossly unsustainable way of living in the developed world -- and what it will take to get us focused on maximizing our chances of survival as a species.
To be sure, we must do a lot more than change what we eat -- and OUTCRY helps explain the "why" and the "how" of that proposition.
To my knowledge, OUTCRY remains the only book ever published that features an envisioned, totally-green, ultra-sustainable, super-desirable, future way of living for humans -- along with ideas for how we might get there as quickly as possible.
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Regarding the free Zoom conferences with your group,
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Our book, for a host of environmental reasons, is only available as an e-book on Amazon. As such, it contains hyperlinks to hundreds of references and videos, is less expensive, does not kill any trees and does not have to be manufactured and delivered.
The links below to earlier SOS Memos will help you understand how these ideas unfolded since 2018.
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One more thing. I first started learning about the supreme importance of our food choices in 2002. After studying the topic for eight years and getting to know many of the medical and ecological experts in the field, I co-authored the book below with my son Jason.
You can find it on Amazon in all formats by clicking on the image below:
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Promoting health, hope and harmony on planet Earth |
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