This Bus Is Getting Crowded June 11, 2009March 15, 2017 YIN AND YANG In Shanghai, they are replacing bicycles with cars. In New York, they are replacing cars with bicycles. BUY A CONDO IN DENVER? BUFFALO? PITTSBURGH? So if Miami and Manhattan will be underwater (“Earth 2100”) – New Orleans is already eight feet below sea level – then truly long-range planners may want to stake out vacation and retirement homes on higher ground. Click here for elevations. TOO MANY PEOPLE What environmental problem wouldn’t be made better with fewer people? (“Yeah,” says Jerry Seinfeld in that wonderful moment with George Costanza: “People. They’re the worst.”) The problem is, getting from today’s 6.8 billion (up from 2.5 billion in just the few years I’ve been breathing!) down to some more manageable number in any relevant time period is – let’s hope – impossible. I say “relevant time period” meaning the crucial decades ahead, before we’ve learned to produce nearly-free energy and (say) colonize space. And I say “let’s hope” because, of course, there are ways to reduce population – four of them, to be precise – and each of them rides a horse. We don’t want that. Indeed, world population is likely to hit at least 7.5 billion before turning down . . . and very possibly 9 billion or more. It’s getting awfully crowded on this bus. There are no attractive solutions. (Witness China’s pragmatic yet troubling one-child policy.) But what if you could find a group of people who frequently volunteered to be childless uncles and aunts. Who frequently volunteered to be adoptive parents. Oh, wait! There are such people. (I think you know where this is headed.) BOREF Why do I always have to start with, “I know, I know. But still . . .” Well, for obvious reasons. But still . . . here is the latest WheelTug® press release. It even includes a photo of the motor. (Meanwhile, the iron deposits at Roche Bay may yet have some value – here.) ALTU Craig D.: “ALTU is back to where you recommended it, 50 cents. I hope we can make a little money on it.” ☞ It closed at 68 cents last night, and this could be a good time to call it quits. My guru was initially bullish because of a specific drug in development that a cash squeeze forced them to offload. The stock may do fine, but he feels the compelling reason for owning it is gone. Nibble at INCY instead?