I just got back from a quite large No on Prop 8 march in San Francisco. The march was spontaneously organized in just three days after the loathsome Prop 8 passed.

Among other things, I expect there will be organized boycotts of businesses owned by LDS and of businesses owned by Mormons that gave substantial money to Yes on 8. The crowd was alive, proud, and ready for the sustained fight it may take for full equality.

Best sign, carried by a woman, “If Mormons can have ten wives, why can’t I have one?”

Prop 2 passed on Tuesday. It guarantees better treatment for farm animals.

More photos on Flickr

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Obama doesn’t just get it about the net and global warming, he lives there. It’s part of his world. This is a welcome change indeed from the tech and science clueless Dubya.

Obama’s long-time photographer, David Katz took photos of the Obama family on election night. They are now on Flickr for all to see for free and are licensed under Creative Commons for noncommercial use.

Social Median has a comprehensive post on how Obama is the first social media president, and how this helped him win.

BP says they will concentrate all their wind energy efforts in the US. Why? One reason was the tax credit that (finally) got extended. The other was Obama’s strong pledge to invest in cleantech and renewable energy.

Obama’s response to Brian Williams when asked what he was doing personally to end global warming

‘Well, the truth is, Brian, we can’t solve global warming because I f—ing changed light bulbs in my house. It’s because of something collective’.”

Absolutely. Energy conservation at a personal level is laudable and needed, but we need to do so at the societal level too. That means an upgraded smart grid and renewable power everywhere. For starters.

How nice to have a president-elect who lives in the 21st Century.

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Sails with solar panels.

Tequila into diamonds.

Corn cobs into biofuel via mushrooms.

Bioheat more efficient than heating oil.

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Buzzflash

Emanuel may very well prove an effective choice in dealing with a Congress that is too often tied up in knots by the Republicans. Remember that Emanuel will be carrying out Obama’s policies, and Rahm won’t be bringing a steak knife to the fights ahead; he’ll be shooting a bazooka.

Jeffrey Goldberg in The Atlantic

Rahm, precisely because he’s a lover of Israel, will not have much patience with Israeli excuse-making.

It will be very hard for right-wing Israelis to come back and accuse him of being a self-hating Jew.

Assuming he does challenge them. But anything Rahm does presumably will be based on Obama policy.

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Little Shop of Horrors fractal. While fractals do have an underlying pattern, it can be difficult to discern what it is.

Global Guerrillas on the differences between the current financial crisis and the Great Depression

- Global and not national. Unlike the previous, this potential Depression will be global — aka HUGE, FAST, and COMPLEX — and not national. This means that the solutions needed to mitigate its impact will only occur on the global stage.

Nation states can only work within their borders. But the instantaneous flow of information and money across borders now means things can happen at warp speed and with little warning. This genie can’t be put back in the bottle, either. Plus, the financial models used by supposed experts were both wrong and so complicated that humans barely understood them anyway.

- Systemic disruptions. The second difference is that we will continue see numerous systemic shocks on a global scale. These shocks will increase in frequency as the dynamic instability of the global system becomes acute. Organizational structures that aren’t resilient will be washed away.

We’re already seeing this in financial markets. No one knows where the risk is or - to make up a outlandishly exaggerated example - if the collapse of an investment bank could end up bankrupting a country. Oh, wait. That already happened, didn’t it? (Lehman and Iceland.)

- Post-ideological. Mass movements and ideologies are dead. Global markets and social fragmentation now rule. This means that we can’t expect a repeat of the 20th Century solution set.

Mass movements and ideologies, I think, require fixed, strong governments and institutions to be in opposition to (or in support of, for that matter.) But as governments and institutions hollow out or morph into new forms, the focus for any mass movement would have to keep changing too. Decentralization and being highly mobile and loosely linked is the new paradigm.

The nimble, flexible, and prepared will best survive the coming economic hard times, not the rigid and unbending.

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Scientists have discovered that peridotite, a rock found on the surface of the planet in some areas and which is occurs hugely underground, can naturally store CO2 permanently.

CO2 could be piped underground where peridotite would turn it into limestone or marble.

The researchers say that the discovery of previously unknown high rates of reaction underground means CO2 could be sent there artificially, at far less expense. “This method would afford a low-cost, safe and permanent method to capture and store atmospheric CO2″

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