Kona Kohala Blog

That title is such a good question, just where do good ideas go?  In the private sector, in successful businesses, good ideas get vetted and put into play in the bigger picture to increase productivity or efficiency.  In the public sector, they seem to get lost in the tiers of bureaucracy.

There is much talk and hand wringing about the oil spill and what we should do about it.  I was listening to the Sean Hannity Show a couple days ago where he interviewed two people with simple and effective ideas to deal with the problem.  Both had submitted their ideas to the feds and after a great gurgling sound followed by a belch, they were gone, probably never to be seen again.

The first idea was from a certified genius.  A young woman who at 10, entered college and by age 18 was a tenured professor.  Her idea was to use those robots they have down there to insert a tire or inner tube like device, lots of them actually, into the hole then inflate them all at once, shutting off the hole, creating a simple plug.  She has provided schematics and other drawings showing the validity of the idea but is still waiting to hear back.

The second idea was how to deal with the mess.  Since the government didn't provide the requested booms to collect the oil nor permit the building of the sand islands to prevent the oil from coming to shore, this company tried their own experiment.  They spilled oil into salt water in a large tank.  They then dumped in straw, right out of the fields straw.  They demonstrated this on the Hannity TV show and what they got when they removed the straw was crystal clear water.  The straw could then be processed to remove the oil.

This too, was presented to the government.  Along with the gurgling sound and the belch, it also has disappeared into the mire that is Washington D.C.

I had been thinking that I do a lot of complaining about how things are.  What if I worked on a solution for each problem I complain about?  Wouldn't that be a good thing?  Then I listened to the Hannity show and decided that good ideas don't seem to go anywhere.

I've found that in business, the very best ideas aren't worth a dime if no one considers them and implements them.  I'm afraid that the good ideas, the ones that would actually fix some of the problems we have won't be fixed.  If they were, Rahm Emanuel's oft quoted phrase, "Never let a crisis go to waste", would no longer be of benefit to this group of socialists.

Real estate wise, if you're going to retire and you want to get away from it all there are some great buys out there.  South Kona has some large lots, 1 to 3 acre subdivisions, which are on catchment water and can be a bit barren at first glance.  If you install a couple of good sized catchment tanks, one for the house and one for the yard, you could irrigate a very lush garden.  Just a thought if you want to get away from it all . . . which I'm thinking about right now.