April 20, 2004
Harry's Phoenix Project Documentary can now be viewed on BrauforPresident.us Website

Harry Braun ’s remarkable 45-minute Phoenix Project video documentary can now be viewed on the BraunforPresident.US website. The video can be accessed under the Policy Briefing section of the website, along with Harry’s other recorded policy briefings.

After the credits, on the Phoenix Project video, there is an ABC News Report (that you can fast-forward to) by Peter Jennings about John Lorenzen, an 82-year old farmer with a 6th grade education who built his own wind machines in his barn, and used batteries to store some of the power for his lights and electrical appliances. 

But in order to power his pickup truck, Lorenzen placed the electrodes from the wind systems into a barrel of water to make hydrogen fuel, and he with his 6th grade education and no one's help, modified his pickup truck to use the hydrogen fuel.   John Lorenzen is truly an inspiration. 

What John Lorenzen did on a small scale on his farm, is what Harry Braun’s Phoenix Project will do for Spaceship Earth, which is to shift to wind-powered hydrogen production systems that are pollution-free and inexhaustible.

April 20, 2004
Saudi Oil Production Peaks

The sense of urgency of shifting from oil to solar hydrogen with wartime-speed was underscored in a recent page one article in The New York Times (February 24, 2004), which documented that the production of Saudi Arabia’s primary oil fields (some of which are more than 50 years old) is already declining, and it is only a question of time before an “uncontrolled decline” occurs. This refers to a dramatic reduction in output, which will send shock waves through the global economy, and make people long for the days when gasoline was only $2.00 per gallon.

U.S. oil production peaked in 1970 and has been declining ever since.

America now has less than 3% of the global oil reserves, which is why most oil companies are no longer investing in the U.S., but in other countries that do not have such depleted fields and environmental controls. But even ExxonMobil, acknowledges that half of all oil production by 2010 will have to come from vast new oil fields, that as of yet, have not been discovered – assuming they exist at all.

Analyst and author Harry Braun is the only presidential candidate who has a “ Phoenix Project” plan will accomplish this “transition of substance.” The “trigger mechanism” is to pass Fair Accounting Act legislation that will provide the necessary incentives for oil companies mass-produce wind-powered hydrogen production systems, including sea-based Windship systems, like the Liberty Ships in World War II.

Images of the remarkable Windship systems are on the BraunforPresident.US website. Compared to the depressing images now coming out of Iraq, the Windship image is like breath of fresh air, literally, because by making the U.S. energy independent with solar hydrogen, we will have crystal-clear air in our cities, even in rush hour traffic.

These are strategically important technologies because their large-scale deployment will employ millions of Americans and save the remaining ocean and wilderness ecosystems from being driven into extinction -- all while making America energy independent of not only imported oil from Iraq, but all fossil and nuclear fuels by 2010.

These are significant issues.

As Harry points out, the focus needs to be on hydrogen because it is the only pollution-free fuel that is inexhaustible – assuming it is made from water with the electricity generated from the wind and other solar technologies. Every green plant is a solar hydrogen machine that uses solar energy to extract hydrogen from water, and this system has been successfully working on a global scale for over 3.5 billion years.

But instead of focusing on the clean and renewable solar hydrogen technologies, both President Bush and senator Kerry plan to make “dirty” and non-renewable hydrogen from oil, coal, natural gas and other fossil and nuclear fuels -- which will do nothing to resolve the critical supply and environmental problems.

Indeed, Senator Kerry’s strategic energy initiative proposal only calls for 20% of our electricity to come from renewables by 2010, which is about 6 % of our total energy used. Harry’s Phoenix Project plan, by contrast, will have 100% of our energy coming from renewables by 2010.

Harry ’s plan will put an end to the practice of using bulldozers to rip the tops off mountains, which devastates the surrounding streams and valley ecosystems, in order to acquire a relatively insignificant amount of coal.

Harry ’s plan will put an end to the tragic environmental devastation that comes from natural gas wells and compressor stations that roar like jet engines 24-hours a day.

Harry ’s plan will put an end to the air and water pollution that comes from using fossil and nuclear fuels, and Harry’s plan will put an end to the highly secret nuclear power plants, that according to investigative reports by The New York Times reporter Matthew Wald, are all suffering from serious levels of stress corrosion. This makes them ticking time-bombs that are just waiting to go off, and when they do, the catastrophic impact will make the 9/11 event look mild by comparison.

There are also the even more insidious radioactive waste problems that have been out of control for years, and some of the deadly isotopes, such as Iodine 129, will be spreading their poison in our water and air and people for the next 160 million years.

Bush’s policies are analogous to the captain of the Titanic steaming full-speed ahead into the iceberg, and Kerry wants to rearrange deck chairs. Either way, the net result will be catastrophic. Only Harry has a specific plan to “change course” with a new heading for the solar hydrogen economy, yet The New York Times has thus far refused to make America aware of Harry’s stunning vision for the future of our country, as well as Spaceship Earth.

March 18, 2004
Corporate Tax Evasion

Mortimer Zuckerman , the Editor in Chief of U.S. News & World Report, wrote a scathing editorial about corporate tax evasion, “An intolerable free ride” on May 17, 2004.

As Zuckerman points out, in the boom years of 1996 through 2000, when profits went through the roof, over 60% of American companies, doing more than $2.5 trillion in gross income, paid no income taxes. None. And over 70% of the foreign companies doing business in the U.S. also paid no federal income taxes. As Zuckerman concluded, “this is outrageous, intolerable and unfair. And at a time when federal tax cuts are contributing to enormous budget deficits, this situation must be ended as quickly as possible.”

While the Members of Congress should be leading the charge to solve the problem, they have in fact paved the way for this corporate fleecing of the individual taxpayers by passing laws and regulations that allow corporations to avoid paying taxes. Zuckerman points out that the Congress has placed constraints on the IRS to enforce corporate compliance, and has added a bewildering array of complexity to the tax laws. While the “complexity obviously benefits tax cheats, the rich, the well advised, and the well connected; ordinary taxpayers drown in the dense tax-code verbiage.”

If that were not bad enough, Zuckerman points out that the investment bankers, accounting and law firms are, in the words of former IRS commissioner Charles Rossotti, busy selling a wide range of tax schemes and devices designed to improperly reduce taxes to corporate and other business taxpayers, based on the simple premise that they can get away with it. This is because less than one percent of the corporate returns are audited, which is why and additional $250 billion to $300 billion goes uncollected each year. In addition, in the year 2000, more than $5 trillion passed through some 7.5 million partnerships, many of which were created just to save on taxes, and the IRS audited less than 30,000, which is less than one-half of one-percent.

One of the best ways to avoid paying taxes is to outsource profits overseas. Corporations are allowed to create offshore shell companies that provide a “subsidiary status to the former U.S.-based corporation, where the real headquarters are still located, so that the company can reap its profits in the offshore tax-free jurisdiction.

In 1983, these offshore shell companies held $200 billion. Now its over $5 trillion, and less than one-half of one-percent of these offshore companies even file with the IRS.

As President, Harry Braun will end this abuse by properly funding the IRS to go after corporate tax evaders, and work with Congress to change the rules that allow corporations to avoid taxes by creating foreign shell corporations and stop allowing profits made in the U.S. to be “outsourced.”

Professor T. Nejat Veziroglu, President of the International Association for Hydrogen Energy, has endorsed Harry Braun for President and his “Windship” proposal that will save the oceans while transforming America into a Saudi Arabia-class hydrogen energy exporter.

T. Nejat Veziroglu, Ph.D., (305-284-4666) is President of the International Association for Hydrogen Energy (iahe.org) and Editor in Chief of its International Journal of Hydrogen Energy, which is comparable to the Journal of the American Medical Association. The International Association for Hydrogen Energy (IAHE) was founded by Dr. Veziroglu and other distinguished scientists and engineers over 30 years ago, and is now an international peer-review technical society that has hundreds of chemists and engineers as members from over 80 countries.

For the past 30 years, Dr. Veziroglu has been a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Miami and serves as its Director of the university’s Clean Energy Institute. He has known Harry Braun since 1979, and after reviewing his Phoenix Project book and related hydrogen research, he invited Mr. Braun to become an Advisory Board Member of the IAHE in 1981. Dr. Veziroglu is all too aware that the energy and environmental problems are global in nature, and as such, he has endorsed Harry Braun’s campaign for President in the hope that American voters will empower Harry to have America lead the world into a solar hydrogen economy that will provide sustainable global prosperity without pollution.

Harry Braun’s presidential campaign is focused on solving America’s economic and environmental problems with a 5-year multi-trillion dollar plan to turn America into a Saudi Arabia-class energy superpower and exporter of hydrogen, the only fuel that is safer than gasoline, non-toxic, pollution-free and inexhaustible. In addition, the liquid hydrogen pipelines that will need to be built will also be able to transport electricity with virtually no energy losses, thereby eliminating the need to build any new high voltage electricity transmission lines across America’s majestic vistas.

As President, Harry Braun will introduce Fair Accounting Act legislation in the U.S. Congress. This legislation is the critical “trigger mechanism” for shifting to a solar hydrogen economy because it will stop taxpayer subsidies to fossil and nuclear fuels, and factor in the military, environmental and health care costs that come from using such fuels. With a fair accounting system, hydrogen made from wind and other renewable energy sources will be the least expensive fuel, and as such, oil and utility companies will then invest in the mass-production of Windships and other renewable hydrogen production technologies that are pollution-free and inexhaustible.

The large-scale deployment of Windships will make America energy independent while simultaneously providing a critical sanctuary for the fish and other marine organisms that are now being driven into extinction by oil and chemical pollution and unregulated destructive fishing practices. American voters now have the opportunity to elect a President who will initiate a “transition of substance” that will fundamentally resolve America’s economic, environmental and foreign policy problems, that will result in sustainable prosperity without pollution. In addition, Braun has detailed significant innovations in education, health care and urban planning to minimize traffic congestion and urban sprawl in America’s major urban areas.