Amidst all the chatter and news stories about who said what in the Presidential race and how SUVs have become undesirable, there was a story last week that will be one that 2008 will be remembered for, at least in the scientific community.  NASA’s Phoenix Mars lander found ice on Mars!!

As long as humanity has known about the solar system there has been conjecture as to whether there was life anywhere else.  Mars has always been the prime suspect and has led to many books, movies and one famous radio event about Martians.  Most of the time such life forms …

It was just reported that, as expected, there are now more Internet users in China than in the U.S. As of last month there were 253 million Internet users in China as compared to 220 million in the U.S. What is striking is that in just the last year, the number of new users in China was 90 million, or a growth rate of more than 50%. That annual increase in users is more that the total number of users in most countries in the world.

There are several interesting aspects to these numbers. Of course, since …

Two weeks ago I said that I would be writing several columns about transportation in the U.S. This is the final one of that series, at least for now. In the life of this blog I have written about the future of transportation and what it will and should look like. I am sure I will revisit the topic again as it is one of the most critical transitions this country will have to make over the next ten years.

In January, I wrote about high speed trains with the recommendation that they become a cornerstone …

GM, Ford and Chrysler represent to a large degree the Industrial Age legacy of manufacturing in the U.S. “What was good for General Motors was good for the United States” was, for decades in the 20^th century a very true statement. The manufacturing might of America post WWII was an economic miracle and the apotheosis of the Industrial Age. Supported by the explosive growth of television and the American advertising business, the consumer market of wondrous new goods exploded. The Big Three auto companies rode this wave to unprecedented success.

Every year, there were the exciting new …