Obama's hard sell on climate change
Wichita, Kansas
Kansas is notoriously flat, the monotony of its endless fields broken only by buildings, cows and dark, nodding machines, almost like a scale model of some child's toy.
Under the flat Kansas soil still lies a crushed forest, and these machines are dipping into a sea of oil and sucking it to the surface.
Dick Shremmer, the president of Bear Petroleum, has two working machines in the fields behind his office, a total of around 400 scattered around the state.
He shows me how to put my fingers, lightly, on top of the rod driving into the ground, and to feel for the vibrations that show it is pulling up the oil.
With their car wheel-sized cogs, solid steel heads and gleaming pistons there is something rather loveable about these machines, like an old car or a printing press.
They seem from another time, of rag and spanner, far from the microchip and semiconductor.
Some would like to make sure that the carbon fuel they exist to draw above ground soon becomes a relic from another age.
Dick, who's recently become president of the Kansas Independent Oil and Gas Producers Association, hopes and believes they will fail.
He has worked in the industry since he was 15, he loves oil and profoundly disagrees with those in Copenhagen who cast it as a villainous pollutant, a threat to mankind.
He says it is all the biggest hoax since the millennium bug. He doesn't doubt that the climate is changing, but doesn't accept carbon is the villain, or that there is a villain in the piece.
"I wouldn't say the climate isn't changing. But, you know, it is always changing. We once had an ice age thousands of years ago, and during that ice age where we are standing used to be covered with an ocean. So I think it is just a normal climate change, I don't believe in this global warming thing.
"I think it is something that is going to drive up the price of energy, people's electrical bills, people's fuel bills and I don't see any reason for it.
"I don't think we should do anything to burden our economics right now. We are trying to come back from a big recession. I think we ought to leave things alone until the economy picks up and we can afford to make some changes."
There is lots of oil in Kansas but it isn't big business anymore. Dick describes it as "a mom and pop" affair.
But throughout the US, coal, oil and gas are very big business with very big budgets.
Oil and oilmen have played a huge part in American politics and they are not about to roll over now.
Given that many powerful senators come from states where one of the carbon fuels is a major industry, the political terrain President Obama faces is more mountainous Alaska than pancake flat Kansas.
Powerful interests are at stake, but so are powerful convictions.
Senator James Inhofe from Oklahoma has long believed man-made climate change is what he calls "a Hollywood hoax" perpetuated by a liberal elite.
He's going to Copenhagen to tell them the president can't deliver on his promise to cut greenhouse gases by 17% by 2020. He told me of the plan:
"It's dead. In the Senate it's dead. Let me restate that so that nobody has any misunderstanding, there are two pieces of legislation, one is the Waxman-Markey bill from the House, the other is the Kerry-Boxer bill. Both are dead. They will not pass the United States Senate. The closer you get to the (Midterm) election, the further away from this thing they'll want to get because the American people understand this issue now."
It has been widely argued that the president has a big stick in his back pocket: the Environmental Protection Agency recently confirmed that greenhouse gases were a pollutant.
So they could simply issue an edict to make the cuts.
The senator says the recent kerfuffle over e-mails between climate change scientists has cut off that route.
"The Obama administration-appointed Director of EPA Lisa Jackson has emphasised and stated that the science on which the endangerment finding is based is the International Panel on Climate Change science which has been debunked. So the courts would look at that, and I would think, throw it out. If they don't, it would be tied up in the courts for years anyway."
That's why he's going to be in Copenhagen to tell the world the president won't deliver:
"I think it's unfair for the 100 countries to leave Copenhagen when the big party is over believing that we are going to do something we aren't going to do, so I think it's a mission of honesty."
For Dick, tending the machines in his fields with as much care as a farmer gives to his cattle, the price of oil means it's scarcely liquid gold.
But it is a cash crop of sorts and there is lots of it under the United States. He says WWI was won on the Kansas fields, WWII on those in neighbouring Oklahoma.
It's certainly true America's might in the world has partly been built on its rich resources of fossil fuels.
It is still a power source that is relatively plentiful and cheap, when money is tight and jobs hard to come by.
For the president to live up to his promise, he will have to shift the argument, and convince people that green power is the power of the future and means, not threatens, American security and wealth.
The machinery of the senate will have to be greased with lots of money. But it will be a while before the nodding donkeys of Kansas are put inside a museum's glass case.
I’m Mark Mardell, the BBC's North America editor. These are my reflections on American politics, some thoughts on being a Brit living in the USA, and who knows what else? My 
~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~57~RS~)
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Kansas is notoriously flat
Shades of Noel Coward: "very flat, Norfolk."
"I think it's unfair for the 100 countries to leave Copenhagen when the big party is over believing that we are going to do something we aren't going to do, so I think it's a mission of honesty."
Doesn't this rebut that statement?
No-one is going to wave a wand and change gears overnight; it's a gradual process, just as was the introduction of electric light and telephone communications. It's easy enough to mandate change in the UK because it is geographically small and has a centralised government which covers every aspect of the lives of its residents. Not so in the USA, however well reasoned. If it takes as long to "green" America as it did to bring electricity to every town and hamlet, then we are looking at decades, not merely the current administration.
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1 David Cunard wrote:
"I think it's unfair for the 100 countries to leave Copenhagen when the big party is over believing that we are going to do something we aren't going to do, so I think it's a mission of honesty."
Doesn't this rebut that statement?
Not necessarily, since it depends on how many Senators are willing to approve any commitment the President signs. I'm guessing not enough. If the Senate votes against the President, that means no deal and no $100b for Hillary.
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Hmm, Kansas isn't known for oil, but there is obviously some out there if there are 400 wells accross the state; lucky for them they also get to keep the royalies because the oil is underground rather than beneath Federal waters. Louisiana has over 3,300 platforms in the gulf and yet is allowed to keep only 37.5% of the oil and gas royalties for all plots leased after the Domenici-Landrieu Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act passed in 2006. All previous leases (the majority) still are contracted for 20% royalties to the state. Louisiana has been bled dry of our resources and stolen from since the 1920s, and what we got in return was a ravaged coast and a fraction of the oil and gas royalties states like Texas recieved.
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Why is climate chance a tough sell? Look at the circus in Copenhagen.
You have people who don't know what they are talking about, ignorant celebrities who fly on their private jhets giving press conference.
several legislators who instead of working on healthcare and the economy are flying to Copenhagen to be seen.
Hugo the Dictator doing a ditrabe on how the U.S empire is abot to invad e his country(I wish it was true)which has nothing to do with climate chief
You have Morales the thief not content from stealing from his countryman demanding reperations.
Enough reasons to be skeptical?
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As in many rural states, Oil is a fundamental part of our economy, and has been for generations. It represents a good paying job in counties where cash income comes from being a land poor starving farmer, a school teacher, or an oilman.
Oil pollutes - anyone who has met the animal will have to admit the fact. It is cheap fuel, the substitute for my grandfather's coal and my great-grandfather's wood. But it is, like these others, essentially a nonrenewable resource. Like wood, which was burnt at such a rate that it became too expensive to obtain in most places, it does have many other valuable uses. A lot of our modern physical environment is made from it, and these uses are much less polluting than destroying the stuff for its energy.
We need to find efficient, cheap, clean renewable sources of energy. The oil industry will have to retool, but there will always be a health demand - and a healthier demand at that.
KScurmudgeon - husband, son-in-law, father-in-law, cousin and nephew of the oilpatch.
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Come have a look at the La Brea Tar Pits.
That's where the dinosaurs got stuck and died.
I don't know if their brains were better or worse than Inhofe's, but I'm quite certain they, too, imagined they could hold on forever...
What Inhofe says illustrates everything that is wrong with the American legislative process. They simply do not imagine there is any greater force operative on earth.
Unless the USA finally accepts that the entire planet requires them to change how they do business, so that we can all survive (USA included), American commercial interests, as well as other interests, will be on the receiving end of a refresher course in the first principles of economics, including the one that says, "The Customer is always right."
The US depends on all of us to purchase its products -- and even to read these stories that enlarge upon the importance of men like Inhofe, for example.
Unless reason prevails, the United States will face a twister of such universal opprobrium, even Kansas won't be Kansas anymore -- and Dorothy will have no Kansas to return to.
Because in real life, there aren't that many second or third chances. The present is all you get, take it or leave it.
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Kyoto sham went down in U.S. Senate 99:1.
So will Kopenhagen sham.
And in the meantime temperatures on both Mercury and Venus are rising.
"Incovenient Truth."
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I think this is the kind of blinkered thinking that excludes the interest of the majority in the world and just thinking that one is just standing on one's own word all by oneself and there\s nobody else around. Why is the world so concerned about its preservation for the common good, the good of all. Is it possible everyone else is wrong and the self-interested person the only one to be right? Why don't people just listen to each other and see how we can adjust for each one's need even if that means foregoing much of your self-interest but in the end it serves one's interest much much better in the long term.
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Powermeerkat – That’s actually quite interesting, so you have a source for Mercury’s and Venus’ temperature rise? I was not aware of any current probes* checking this data and a quick check of the internet (including NASA) could not locate any info. This temperature rise would torpedo the sunspot theory, unless we have actually reached the end of the low activity period when it would help prove it.
Even NASA only gave me a very fluffy temperature (870 degrees F), which seemed a tad exact for my liking. Getting proper figures would be quite cool.
* NASA states Mariner 10, which made an orbit of Mercury in 2008 & 2009, goals were to check composition, inner structure and magnetic fields. They suggest that because of its thin atmosphere it cannot regulate its surface temperature, instead it is entirely down to whether that part of the surface is facing the Sun or not, resulting in the greatest temperature range of any of the planets.
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Well I don't know exactly what the great-great-great grandchildren of these Kansas oil operators are going to be saying about the attitude of their forebears, but it certainly won't be polite!!! Why should three generations of mankind remove a resource that took millions of years to make without caring a tiny little tad about people living on exactly the same planet 200 years from now? Unlivably high summer temperatures will have killed off a great deal of domestic and wild life, and there will be wars over water and livable living space as Kansas folks fight their way Northwards. But then, these Kansas oilmen won't be around to hear the curses of the future generations, will they!
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You know what the funny thing was about Kyoto? America, inspite of not signing, actually reduced its immessions while the EU (who's various countries did sign up) didnt!
But lets not be fools here. Copenhagen isnt about global warming (tm) its about little tinpot dictatorships getting as much cash as possible out of the west to line their swiss bank accounts.
Thats all this boils down to, how much money can be made.
Also, BBC with your near £4billion budget when will you guys start looking in to the many conflicts of interest of those who form the IPCC? Im pretty sure the chair has some very close ties to carbon trading companies.
What a pity journalism is no longer about finding the truth but is now about pushing an agenda...and the BBC's agenda is VERY clear on global warming (tm).
Mailman
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People believe what they want to believe: It's just a shame that religion and science have somewhat blurred edges in America. It's no surprise that the political right turn the climate issue into a matter of belief. I'm sure they think that stopping gays from marrying and having other simple basic rights and keeping out foreigners, and generally kicking arse around the world are far more important political issues!
Meanwhile, Rome burns!!!
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I am disappointed in this column. The issues of economic transition away from oil and other fossil fuels are real and will be felt across North America. However, giving individuals a media platform to deny that climate change exists in the face of the World's largest scientific consensus in history is bad journalism and bad practice by those who will be impacted by the transition. If you wish to report on the nature of the debate between oil interests in the US and the President's position on Climate Change I would suggest that the BBC can do this without giving the article over to the denial of the principal issue.
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Between the e-mails from UEA, the shuffling and gaffawing in its aftermath, the talk of 100 billion dollars a year to the same corrupt people who have stolen much of the aid we've donated in the past, China's obfuscation and weasel words which don't commit to any reduction in its CO2 output nor to its rate of increase in CO2 output, no coherent plan to achieve any of the CO2 reductions without doing major damage to America's economy has just about put this puppy in its grave where it belongs. To the climate alarmists I say go back to your laboratories and don't come back until you have real science next time, not junk science and a plan that will work, that is fair and equitable, that won't destroy our economy, without weasel words or unshared sacrifices. And don't darken our door again until you do.
President Obama's administration is turing out to be a disaster just as I and many others feared it would. His highly vaunted health care plan is being kept secret in Senator Reed's office (undoubtedly for good reason) which the Democratic leaders expect to jamb down America's throats in a vote where no one has even seen what they are voting for on Christmas eve. Republicans who've seen part of it swear it will cut 450 billion from medicare over ten years. If true, it will just prove to be one more of President Obama's campaign pledges that turned out to be a lie. At the rate things are going, in the unlikely event that it even passes and is signed into law, it will most likely be nullified by the next administration and Congress which will be Republican from the look of things before it goes into effect in 2014.
The economy continues to sputter, the war in Af-Pak is not going well with Pakistan suddenly showing aloofness and defiance to America in the aftermath of Obama's tepid committment to successfully win the war. North Korea and Iran continue to quietly present growing threats to America's security and world peace, the terrorists in GITMO are being given the upper hand in their struggle to be released and rejoin the battlefield, and of course the conflict between the Palestinians and Israelis is at its lowest point since 1992. All in all, it was quite a year.
And who did Time Magazine choose as man of the year? Ben Bernanke who supposedly rescued the US economy...after this so called expert on the depression was among the chief architects of its recent demise. It's not about energy or global warming Mr. President, it's about the economy stupid. And national security.
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ref #12
Mark wrote:
People believe what they want to believe: It's just a shame that religion and science have somewhat blurred edges in America. It's no surprise that the political right turn the climate issue into a matter of belief. I'm sure they think that stopping gays from marrying and having other simple basic rights and keeping out foreigners, and generally kicking arse around the world are far more important political issues!
Meanwhile, Rome burns!!!
______________
After Islamic facism the biggest zeolits are the global warming crowd who have compared their opponets to Holocaust deniers.
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I have followed all this, and have gradually changed my position over time. I have come to conclude that we should be paying very close attention to conservation not only of energy but of materials as well.
Conservation of energy includes things like cutting the "turned off" consumption of TVs, PCs, and other electronics. Many appliances like this draw far too much power when turned off, because nobody has required that they do intelligent system design to avoid it. It's built cheap cheap cheap, when the actual cost to do intelligent power supply design isn't that much higher. Need better technology in this area, and by now we should have it.
Conservation of materials perhaps is actually more important. We don't have, for example, an infinite supply of the rare earths used in making some magnetic materials, or an infinite supply of the dopants used in making semiconductors. Folks should be paying a LOT of attention here, and they are not. Biggest enemies: Stuff going into landfills that could be reused. I haven't seen a good way to harvest some of the stuff headed into the landfills, but we need to be thinking beyond quarterly profits on that score.
Where I part company with the climate-change crowd is the point where they begin to substitute emotions for logic and opinions for facts. In 1971 the first head of the Sierra Club led that organization on a decades-long push against nuclear power. In 2006 (35 YEARS later!) he finally steps up and says, "Well, we were against nuclear power because we equated it with nuclear weapons..." (from the Washy Post article). That's a prime example of the non-thinking and utter stupidity that has come to completely dominate the discussion. As a practicing engineer, it's appalling to me that any of this could pass for science. In my dreams, I round up everyone involved (deniers, supporters, and everyone else trying to stake out a position) and run them through the Klingon mind-sifter in order to boil away the nonsense and the twisting of facts and out-and-out lies to get to the core of the truth. Obviously, that's not going to happen.
Basically we commoners are being offered two packages: we either worship the Earth or pave it over. The offerors of those two packages are absolutely committed to their positions, and would destroy the "other side" if they could. Well, I refuse to buy into either one. I'll do those things that have a demonstrable benefit commensurate with their cost. I will demand real science (complete with all the probability distributions on the variables, thank you very much), real economics, and above all a REAL PLAN on whatever issue is being decided. Finally, I will continue to resist strenuously all the never-ending attempts by the partisans to use this issue as just another lever to begin forcing folks into one ideology or another.
It's supposed to snow heavily here around the Capitol Beltway tonight and tomorrow. Now that's a "climate change" that I can enjoy...time for snowballs, and shoveling driveways...
Regards to all.
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Well, the parents of the 22nd century's wealthiest families are coming to understand that there's plenty of money to be made in retooling the energy supply of an entire world, so I'm not too worried about the holdovers from the 19th. Those who didn't inherit the genes for business acumen will fall by the wayside and give place to others who did.
Meanwhile it seems to me that it doesn't really matter how we distribute blame for changing conditions -- the fact is that humans live best in a narrow band of temperature and water availability and this world has never guaranteed that those requirements will be met. We can see that the climate has been very different in the past, and it's not much of a leap of faith to suppose it can be very different in the future, human influence or no. So we may as well learn to use our growing influence constructively, to support our long-term survival, instead of wasting it carelessly. An expanding population can't take the continued beneficence of nature for granted.
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It seems to me that the oil industry has little to fear either way. Oil is an important feedstock for all sorts of chemical processes, as well as for motor fuels, and global oil supplies are already fairly limited. So even with a strong international agreement on greenhouse gas emissions the price of oil is likely to continue to go up. It is coal that is the big issue. Global coal reserves dwarf global oil reserves and it is coal-burning power plants that are the main cause of excessive global emissions. However, oil men are naturally conservative and hate to be told what to do by governments - they prefer to dictate to governments and are willing to use some very nasty tactics to get their own way. So, as far as I am concerned, they should all be locked up anyway!
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#15 MagicKirin wrote:
After Islamic facism the biggest zeolits are the global warming crowd who have compared their opponets to Holocaust deniers.
__________________
I have to agree, there are some fiesty zealots in the global warming camp, it's certainly attracted people who feed off the doomsday elements. That, however, does not undermine the importance of the issue.
On another note, the fact that many of those in the anti-warming camp think the email fiasco was some kind of 'debunk of the science' just does to show they do not know the science, or the politics of the science, very well.
The simple truth is that we cannot afford to be wrong about this. And if the US alone can throw $700 billion at the banking sector to avoid an economic crisis (with some estimates by Congressional overseers putting it at a more realistic $27 trillion), then that really makes the $100 billion committed over the next ten years to avert this crisis by the entire world seem rather poultry. Of course, this isn't the total bill, this is more what the rich nations are making available to help poorer nations tackle the consequences of the warming and to go green themselves.
Sustainability and environmental responsibility are not 'liberal luxuries', they are the human race finally reaching some level of maturity in their managing of their surroundings. Let's hope it doesn't come too late.
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Is James Inhofe working for the Chinese?
In 50 years time the only oil and gas left will be as expensive to take out the ground as any of the existing renewable energy options are to run and will only get more expensive. It may take that long for Americans to come round to the idea that oil dependence cannot be sustained and do something about replacing it.
The same flat-earthers who are protecting big oil now will be shocked to find the US reliant on other countries for almost all of its energy, even though they only have themselves to blame. Imagine if the US had given the Soviets a 50 year start in the space race, or the arms race.
On the other hand I find it comforting that the biggest chance the world has to reduce carbon emmisions (while switching from fossil fuels) will not be interfered with by the United States Senate.
Also, the idea of man made global warming being a hoax is equivalent to the assertion that smoking doesn't cause cancer. The real debate is, how much of an effect are we causing and do we need to do anything about it?
The overwhelming majority (if you can find five counter examples worldwide I'd be surprised) of independently funded research places the effect at between 0.5C and 5C to mean temperatures by 2050. The lower end of that means no big deal, the upper end means very bad things.
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Bruce said: "However, giving individuals a media platform to deny that climate change exists in the face of the World's largest scientific consensus in history is bad journalism and bad practice by those who will be impacted by the transition."
Good journalism means presenting the facts, presenting the story, without editorializing. This was a good piece for that reason - it presented a side of the story that, frankly, isn't getting much coverage. I would argue that there is not in fact a "consensus" regarding climate change. Plenty of scientists have argued that it is simply cyclical.
If the BBC were to only present one side of a story, then *that* would be bad journalism.
This piece was well done and most thought-provoking.
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Mark Mardell's reflections: "It's certainly true America's might in the world has partly been built on its rich resources of fossil fuels. It is still a power source that is relatively plentiful and cheap, when money is tight and jobs hard to come by. ............................ The machinery of the senate will have to be greased with lots of money. But it will be a while before the nodding donkeys of Kansas are put inside a museum's glass case.
Wordsmithing hardly worth reading, as it delivers a column that is maybe described as grinding water.
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I love the BBC. The reasoning is simple. Smarter people read it and the comments are from educated, reasoned people. With a caveat, they love to talk.
Whether you believe in global warming or not, the issue really is much more simple. Do we continue to pump untold, and unmeasurable, pollutants into the atmosphere? Or, do we not. You cannot deny that it is harmful.
That is all.
Except that I never met anyone from Kansas who had a lick of sense. Religion, oh hell yeah. Sense, nope.
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Nero – Who exactly has stolen what aid? Sorry but the first part of the rant is not quite clear regrettably. There is really little reason to assume that CO2 reductions should greatly damage the US economy, if that reduction is made through developing new technologies. The problem is at the moment the country making the greatest effort to produce these new technologies is China, rather than the US. As for those climate alarmists I assume that includes NASA, which agrees (like everyone else, as a world class engineer I would have thought you would have kept abreast of current research rather than out of date ones) that global warming is happening, again if school children can prove this you would have thought educated men could. Sorry I had not realised that you know more than people with doctorates in physical sciences AND rocket scientists, with a brain that size why do you waste your time here?
• Regarding your fair and equitable plan, I assume this means one where the richest countries remain the richest countries and percentage wise the poorer countries pay more, ensuring that they remain poor. After all isn’t it fair that everyone pays exactly the same irrespective of how much money they have and where they gained this wealth from?
• Woohoo healthcare again, keep beating that old drum, who needs a new tune when the old one sounds so good?
• As for NK and Iran, let me get this right making your country more efficient and giving healthcare to those that need it will bankrupt and ruin the USA, but paying for two more wars is a good idea? I mean it only requires a huge investment of capital and manpower and obviously at the height of the biggest economic downturn the US has that coming out of it ears. Where are you going to get the money needed? China (that horrible nasty semi-communist state you just maligned as thieves and liars)? Europe (the continent of wretched appeasers and ne’er do wells only saved by the glorious US of A, who single handily has saved the world time and time again – by the way you do know that the Lone Ranger and Captain America are fiction, right)?
• Obviously you are the Emperor with all the answers you know more about climate change that some of the best minds in the world, how to avoid a massive economic downturn (shame you did not speak up before the recession) and how to punish all those evil countries that don’t necessarily kowtow to the US! So come on rather than rant from the sidelines like some aging armchair warhorse, one who has never seen the combat he glorifies, tell us poor mortals how exactly things should be done. You want a plan that works so rather than sniping, give us one, put some meat on the bones of your complaints.
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Mark, Did you check on Schremmer's assertion that Lisa Jackson "has emphasised (sp) and stated that the science on which the endangerment finding is based is the International Panel on Climate Change science which has been debunked."? I could not find a Jackson statement to that effect on either official or news sites. Is this another straw dog like many from the political fundamentalists (def: someone who invents a history that never existed, then creates a false nostalgia for it)? Where does the responsibility of the press lie in checking such assertions before printing them as fact?
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Ref 22, Magic
"If you read the first line it show why the conference is a joke. Why ddo they allow these two and others a forum when they are not discussing the issue. Plus you don't invite the other side your conference has no credbility. That was the point"
Your alleged point makes no sense. The main goal of this conference is, I believe, to reach global consensus on an issue of critical interest to humanity. Why should the Presidents of two countries, who were elected by the overwhelming majority of their constituents, be denied participation? Just because the USA, who along with China, happens to be the largest polluters and contributors to global warming and climate change don't like left-leaning politicians is not enough reason for the rest of the world to exclude them from anything.
In the scheme of things, the contributions of small countries with limited industrial capacity are almost irrelevant to the solution of the problem at hand, but that is no reason to deny them a voice, particularly when our contribution is limited to hot air...literally and metaphorically.
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There is no earthly reason to put the "nodding donkeys" in a museum case....Well unless you are talking about the NODDING DONKEYS OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY...they don't belong in a museum case, they belong in that fancy new federal maximum security prison in Illinois!
The Green Energy revolution is a lie. Green energy is massively expensive and the only way you can make it worth doing is by keeping the price of oil and coal high..they way to do that is by carbon taxing. This is the very opposite of a free market.
Obama is working hard to drive the cost of oil, natural gas, and coal UP. If Green Energy made economic sense, it wouldn't need the government driving it...our capitalist society would leap into it. It is ONLY massive government investment that will "encourage" companies to enter this otherwise unprofitable field. Obama is a snake-oil salesman...making the same pitch snake-oil salesman have always used..GREEN ENERGY is good for what ails you...neuritis, neuralgia, arthritis, lumbago, the catarh, mumps, measles. According to Obama, it will cure what ails America, unemployment, foreign oil, the enviroment, and GLOBAL CLIMATE CATASTROHE...yessiree, step right up folks and buy a bottle!
Obama is a huckster! Are you a rube?
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I'm writing from the US state of Kentucky. I've heard the comments/arguments, etc. of folks like Shremmer and Inhofe before. In our case, it was tobacco farming. We *were* one of the top tobacco-producing states in America.
Folks like Shremmer and Inhofe denied any impact of tobacco on people's health and predicted a massive collapse of Kentucky's economy if we tried to change over from tobacco to other crops.
Well, today few - if any - would deny the first point (health effects) and the second never happened.
Change comes hard for a lot of folks, especially if you have the kind of vested interests that Inhofe has. We changed from tobacco to soybeans and Shremmer needs to start thinking alternatives, as well.
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#21: PartTimeDon: it is entirely possible that Sen. Inhofe is working for the Chinese. A college roomie and friend of 40 years recently retired from the higher levels of government service (read here: the Dems won the last elections and GOP staffers took lobbying jobs or went into exile) and has some very interesting things to say about the relative vibrancy of the US and Chinese economies.
It is also possible -- in fact, probable -- that Inhofe's position on every issue is suspect because he has bought onto the GOP/teabagger strategy of opposition to everything President Obama does. This is essentially racially motivated fearmongering at its very lowest and most nasty and showed up during the primary campaign in '08, when we saw a small percentage of Hillary Clinton supporters slither over to the Republicans because they would rather vote for McCain/Palin than a black man. You will notice that Inhofe's much ballyhooed "Truth Squad" for Copenhagen fizzled: instead of a Senatorial triad, buttonholing and jawboning the global warming-denier party line, Inhofe alone spent a whole 3 hours in Denmark, Thursday before turning around and flying home. One wonders what sort of duty-free shopping he did.
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Shivering…….. – Still shouting I see, I advise laying of the coffee not good for the blood pressure.
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Just when I was convinced BBC has become like CNN - everything they cover from Afghanistan to Obama and the birthers is one-sided, along comes Mark Mardell who writes a really refreshing piece with the other side of the story for a change. What happened? So - its true then - there is another side to the story. Thank you Mark Mardel. Lets hope what happened to Lou Dobbs doesn't come your way too.
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ref #28
SaintDominick wrote:
Ref 22, Magic
"If you read the first line it show why the conference is a joke. Why ddo they allow these two and others a forum when they are not discussing the issue. Plus you don't invite the other side your conference has no credbility. That was the point"
Your alleged point makes no sense. The main goal of this conference is, I believe, to reach global consensus on an issue of critical interest to humanity. Why should the Presidents of two countries, who were elected by the overwhelming majority of their constituents, be denied participation? Just because the USA, who along with China, happens to be the largest polluters and contributors to global warming and climate change don't like left-leaning politicians is not enough reason for the rest of the world to exclude them from anything.
In the scheme of things, the contributions of small countries with limited industrial capacity are almost irrelevant to the solution of the problem at hand, but that is no reason to deny them a voice, particularly when our contribution is limited to hot air...literally and metaphorically.
_____________--
Because it gave a forum for Hugo to spread propaganda that had nothing to do with the conference. They should have shut off his mic and kicked him off the stage, it was also not a forum on reperations. so yes they had no busy being there as they were not there to deal with the issue.
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Ref 33, ianflux
"Lets hope what happened to Lou Dobbs doesn't come your way too."
Mark Mardell does not seem to be fixated on Hispanics, or anyone else, like Lou Dobbs and a few others seem to be.
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Let's be honest. Obama isn't exactly putting much energy into implimenting his policies, is he? He makes fine speeches, which temporarily impress people, then he's gone. Does he ever stick with anything and see it through? I think he lacks determination and grit. He's too intellectual, and has a confused and mistaken belief in the power of his own oratory and pusuasive powers.
I think he's both a weak and ineffectual leader. In fact he doesn't lead at all. Instead he "balances" and then chooses the path of least resistance. On healthcare he caves in to determined opposition and waters down his moderate proposals until they soak into the sand and become invisible, invisible reforms, that tinker with a grotesquely expensive and wasteful system, which needs fundamental, structural, change, not tinkering.
On Afghansitan he bends to the will of the military establishment and chooses to re-launch himself as the Commander in Chief with a heavy burden to bear. Sigh, we've heard this all before, from Bush playing the western sheriff, whilst Obama prefers the role of district judge, in the fantasy western. The truth is, the sheriff and the judge are both owned by the cattle barons.
Put simply, Obama doesn't like to get his hands dirty, by getting out and actually explaining his policies to the American people, after all with them behind you anything is possible. Only Obama doesn't like that style at all. He prefers talking to the power brokers in Washington. He's turned his back on the only real powerbase he ever had; the millions who voted for him, and de-mobilized them. So now, in relation to the powerful vested interests in American society, people who don't give a damn about his polished rhetoric, he stands naked and almost powerless, if he ever had any real intention of implimenting real changes. Real changes would require a president of a totally different mold than Obama. A man with ideas and policies, a man ready to fight for what he believes in and rally the American people behind him and his reforms. That person isn't Obama.
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Ref 31, carolinalady
"One wonders what sort of duty-free shopping he did."
Maybe they sell Cuban cigars with polluted Chinese labels in Copenhaguen.
In the interim, glaciers and icebergs continue to melt while every effort is spent to preserve our dependence on oil and our polluting factories, sea access to areas that were covered by thick ice 20 years ago is now possible; and the air we breathe is so polluted and the water we drink is so loaded with chemicals that mutations may become the norm in the not too distant future...for those that are not living in low coastal areas who should enroll in scuba diving classes ASAP.
The problem is not figuring out how to prevent global warming, but finding ways to mitigate its effects, and since the solution involves considerable investment - which we can not afford under the present circumstances - and technological changes that may affect the profit margins of our corporations nothing will be done.
Well, we could always blame a few irrelevant minions, preferably foreigners, for our failure to do the right thing.
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Americans will simply not buy into any Copenhagen deal - end of story.
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Clearly the oil lobby in the US will block what needs to be done and there are insufficient educated American voters to overcome the power of this lobby. Once again the greed of a few American capitalists stands to destroy the lives of millions around the world. The only way to attack this greed is to "speak their language", which means imposing an effect on their profits. The rest of the world needs a binding agreement to impose punishing import taxes on all foreign products related to a heavy carbon footprint and only then will the inhabitants of this planet have the power to save themselves.
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Mr Mardell's comment about Obama's troubles with climate change should be extended to every piece of legislation the President will undertake. This counry lives in the 16th Century. Calvin was forgotten in Geneva by the 17th Century; he came over to the New World and is thriving here.
The late Akio Morita founder of Sony Corp. is reported to have said in a private letter to his friends that eventually Europe will become Asia's boutique and the US her agricultural hinterland. He is wrong about Europe, since Europe remade herself after WW2, gave herself Universal Health Care etc. etc. and developed a political system that is efficient and forward-looking - witness the principled politics of both the Center-Right and Center-Left.
But Mr Morita's aphorism seems right about America, if Sen.Inhofe and his party get their way. As History shows us cultures DO collapse into stagnant fundamentalism. God Save the United States!
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Global warming is now called climate change as the world is not warming after all. Some parts are but others are cooling. It's happened for billions of years.
It's such a con and any anyone who disagrees with the global warming fascists (ironic as they are mainly lefties) is compared to a holocaust denier.
Can anyone confirm a period in time when the climate was "normal"??
People are making a lot of money out of this global warming nonsense and as usual it'll be the taxpayer who coughs up.
Why not concentrate on a world with less pollution, cleaner air, seas, rivers etc and at least everyone will then agree.
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Mark,
Unfortunately America never has and never shall follow the lessons about history it should have learned from it's European pilgrim forefathers.
Okay, internally it managed to have just one civil war that was North v South to eventualy surmount the one major problem, but today with the comparative "royalists and the blockheads" working together, circling the wagons in Congress to protect their own personal sacred cash cows, what hope is there for the general population of today and the future to get a look in. [ I do believe I am slowly understanding the need of some Americans to keep personal weapons to protect oneself from government, but abhor the thought it would ever get so far]
"I am alright Jack; No insurance for medicines- let them eat cake; Not in my lifetime" etc etc seem common proclamations that emerge. Why, for a country that produces so many firsts on the scientific and technical front do it's senior figures or political representatives appear brainless.? Here I omit the lawyers degrees that abound there- perhaps a necessity to thwart the aspirations of the people who require and deserve something better.
The Toms, James, Harrys but especially the Dicks you list above do seem to have a blinkered approach and understanding of the sword of Damocles that hangs over our heads. They would appear to be happy to cook the golden goose of present day oil supplies without regard for the necessity to treasure it and support others who look for an alternative to build a better future.
Thankfully there are still many average Joes who do not have their heads firmly stuck in the sand, and realise the investment involved will pay double and treble regarding their ascent from the present economic worries..
Perhaps after the oilmen,[ who look forward to the eventual hike from 2.5 -3.00 dollars a US gallon for gas to a 7.25 dollars a US gallon we pay here]. you can wander over to the farmers and ask them about other EPA greenhouse gas considerations on the table.
http://www.businessandmedia.org/articles/2009/20081230165231.aspx
http://beefmagazine.com/government/1124-epa-proposes-cow-tax/
Of course it might be difficult to get a balanced answer when they too have their hands in the pot receiving large subsidies themselves.
http://www.taxfoundation.org/blog/show/24012.html
In Copenhagen I believe the cost of a Big Mac is 60% more than the States, so this summit should teach a different slant on individual health, as well as that of the planet, for those who dislike foreign food.
It is unfortunate that an America that is being milked dry by a few at the top must be dragged kicking and screaming into the realities of the 21st century .But if only they will stop beefing, I feel sure they will eventually come to enjoy their greens and the benefits of slimmer waistlines.
Just think, a healthy America in comparrison with it's present day plutoed image could rule the universe! Surely that must be an incentive.
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While there are many things that can be done and worked for to make the earth a cleaner better place. There is no place now or ever for policys that destroy jobs, limit production of needed products, tax broadly everyone except those who don't cooperate in cleaning up the mess that they have made.
Did you know that the US pollutes the environment about one quarter as much as China? One half as much as India and Indonesia together? No I would bet you don't.
Did you know that petroleum products are not replaceable now and won't be for at least 15 to 20 years at the present growth and knowledge gains in "green technology". No I would bet you don't.
Only the engineers, manufacturers and inventors know that. But nobody ever asks their opinion nor believes them when they do say anything. But why will millions believe so called "scientists" who are a small part of the total of scientists when they say that the world will end or be forever degraded if we don't believe what they say. It is a mystery to me especially after seeing how these few (sixty to eighty) scientists (who most of them don't even have the educational background to be working in the climate sciences) do their research and come to their very unscientific loony conclusions. Of course they had/have help from the U.N.and other politicians who want to use this climate disaster to gain control not only of our money through taxes but control of governments and their economy.
The next big push for these people is population control. In case you don't know what that means that means pushing birth control and abortions to extreme limits, beyond most people's belief and acceptance.
A little point that most don't know but is covered here. Most volcanic activity on this planet is under our oceans. 80 percent of volcanic activity occurs under the surface of the oceans. There is more "pollution" from these volcanos on a daily basis than all of mankind's daily pollution put together.
Are we now supposed to spend trillions of our tax money to find a way to stop these underwater volcano polluters.
Mother Nature laughs at you.
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"I wouldn't say the climate isn't changing. But, you know, it is always changing," says this wonderful gentleman from Kansas whose views you have chosen to air.
I take it that he is probably unfamiliar with the concept of the Holocene, and certainly has no idea of its compatibility (or lack thereof) with his (doubtlessly informed and well-reasoned) notions about Earth's climate?
If the BBC absolutely must, even now, continue to file more and still more stories like this, regardless of how many times the "skeptics" (who still claim that their views are repressed and unfairly marginalized) have been given the microphone to make these same statements before... please, please, please provide some sort of reminder that there are such things as "facts," even in climatology.
The facts that most of human civilization's history has played out during a remarkable period of climate stability (even with ice ages included), or that James Inhofe's notion of climate change being a "hoax" requires a complete suspension of any kind of logic or critical faculties, may seem too obvious to be worth mentioning. From Anglophone society's increasing divergence from the rest of planet Earth on recognition of climate change, however, one may safely conclude that such information is far from "obvious" to many people, and deserving of at least as much repetition as the groundless opinions of "skeptics."
As long as such opinions continue to be published, without any context, there will inevitably be a widespread perception that the issue of climate change is entirely a matter of opinion in which any choice is as legitimate as any other, and that there are no objective facts involved. I sincerely hope that you are not trying to give that impression.
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# 20 Mark wrote:
"The simple truth is that we cannot afford to be wrong about this. And if the US alone can throw $700 billion at the banking sector to avoid an economic crisis (with some estimates by Congressional overseers putting it at a more realistic $27 trillion), then that really makes the $100 billion committed over the next ten years to avert this crisis by the entire world seem rather poultry."
Mere chicken feed perhaps?
;-)
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7. At 11:29am on 18 Dec 2009, powermeerkat wrote:
"Kyoto sham went down in U.S. Senate 99:1. So will Kopenhagen sham."
What Kyoto vote are you referring to? According to Wikkipedia the Clinton administration, which signed the Kyoto Protocol, never even submitted it to the Senate for a vote (presumably because they knew it would not be ratified) and I'm certain the Bush administration didn't submit it for a vote either.
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#4. MagicKirin: "Why is climate chance a tough sell? Look at the circus in Copenhagen.
You have people who don't know what they are talking about"
Pot, kettle.
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Another one who thinks The Economy is bigger and more important than The Environment....a "category error"
May we live in "Interesting Times"
Season's greetings to all
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RE: U.S. Senate possible ratification.
It's quite likely that Mr. Obama will have nothing to present for ratification once the Kopenhagen hot air generator shuts down.
It's about as likely as, come New Year, the Senate will reject health care reform bill, as currently formulated.
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The US has had many years to assume responsibility in this area and has 'refused' to do so. They have also had ample time within upbeat economic times to boost their infrastracture. When I lived there I wanted to take the train from Santa Barbara to LA for a meeting. Having come from the UK I assumed it would be an easy ride... 4 Hours later (90 miles journey) with a colleague collecting me from Van Nuys (another long journey from our meeting place) it did seem as if the US had deliberately missed out on a chance to build travel routes that would lessen the load on the individiual and the car.
GW Bush snubbed everybody on Kyoto - wouldn't even bother to chat about the subject.
While we await an eco-cure for climate change ailments travel infrastructure needs to be built. Make it all pretty and efficient and we not only are contributing but there's more jobs to add to the pot.
I dream about cars with a new completely differently designed constant sealed-in water-filled-with-something-in-it system driven by sub-supersonic vibrational power such as all manner of music e.g. Wagner for starting & higher speeds and Bach for regulation etc. Water does react and have a language to say so!!
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Scott0962 (#46) "What Kyoto vote are you referring to?"
There was a "Sense of the Senate" resolution on the subject which was passed 95 to zero:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d105:SE00098:
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#44
"As long as such opinions continue to be published, without any context, there will inevitably be a widespread perception that the issue of climate change is entirely a matter of opinion in which any choice is as legitimate as any other, and that there are no objective facts involved. I sincerely hope that you are not trying to give that impression."
Well, actually there are no objective facts involved. Only sham science with a large dose of corruption and bad scientists.
Most of the people in the western world are not climate nor earth eco-terrorists who are willing to subject their family and friends to poverty and going back to 19th century living standards.
Quite unlike people like you.
Perhaps you didn't understand my previous comment, but most likely didn't read or want to believe it.
"A little point that most don't know but is covered here. Most volcanic activity on this planet is under our oceans. 80 percent of volcanic activity occurs under the surface of the oceans.There is more "pollution" from these volcanos on a daily basis than all of mankind's daily pollution put together."
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/article6961323.ece
Or maybe... just maybe, you are that uneducated and informed.
Papa Ray
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The effects of oil based energy source has on the planet goes way beyond CO2. The uses of oil go far beyond burning it for energy. There is no doubt that the supply in finite. As more none energy uses for oil emerge the supply becomes more valuable.
There is no reason to believe if we stop burning oil that there will be no oils trade (its silly to this that oil will go away).
For some demands of energy oil will never be topped. I say save it for the best purposes.Ask your self do you really need 300hp to go to the store to get a loaf of bread.
Electric cars are far from green when you consider the rare earth .And where is the electricity coming from?. Spend money on research and give the youth of today the chance to solve the problems caused by senseless consumption. Drive half as much and you sa 50% of the oil your using.
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Sen. James Inhofe, Another redneck ludite howls in protest with an attitude of self interest and greed, preaching the ultra porocial US view. Another drop of US arrogance, WW1 was won on the fields of Kansas and WW2 by Oklahoma. It should be remembered that had they commited themselves 3 years earlier in each case, millions of lives might have been spared.
Here we go again.We will go our way and to hell with the rest of the world. Chris G. France.
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The Senate is not going to sign onto anything done in Copenhagen. It would be nuts for Obama to even submit it.
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Not much of an analysis of Obama's situation. You throw some teasers out there but do not link them up.
First the US is far more dependent on oil than most european countries; the distances people travel are just much greater and the weather is much more extreme. That doesn't mean that we should not improve our use of oil and all fuel but it does mean that it will take a fairly long time. It also means that big gestures and calls for drastic change will get sandbagged.
Second Obama is fighting a major domestic battle on stimulus, Tarp and jobs. Announcing support for a $100bn (p.a?) fund for what most see as voodoo science is political suicide ahead of mid-term elections. Even California will object. The relevance of Chavez, Morales & co? They stir up American patriotism (much stronger than what you have across the pond). Link them to demands for money as reparations for climate change and you really tar and feather Copenhagan. It won't just be Fox News which raises a stink.
Third and perhaps most important, Obama has staked his presidency on health care reform. It is not going well and he is going to have to use every trick in the book to get it through Congress. He cannot do that and twist arms on climate change.
So the Inhoffes of the world matter. Copenhagan could not be worse for environmental responsibility. It has polarized the issue and focused on dreams instead of working for gradual, practical steps in husbanding natural resources and cleaning up the planet. Small steps, at a local level, have a much better chance of convincing people the cost is worthwhile. They also get something done.
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BTW I am a believer in global warming but I don't see the vast majority of the western world giving up their lifestyles in the name of conservation. Not at the level necessary to combat it. Not just the US. My personal gut-feeling is that the EU set such enormous goals of carbon reduction because they know the US government will never get on board. That way, the politicians can go back home and say "Hey, we tried! But what's the point now?"
Maybe I'm being too cynical - usually I am more left wing. But this just strikes me as realistic. The average European lives a way more luxurious life than the average American. I don't see any of them wanting to give that up - and fair enough. Would a German autoworker lower their living standards to that of an American autoworker if someone told him/her it would help the environment? I have my doubts.
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Re 43# Papa Ray
Did you know that petroleum products are not replaceable now and won't be for at least 15 to 20 years at the present growth and knowledge gains in "green technology". No I would bet you don't.
I didn't know that, but I also fail to see why that's an excuse for not trying to develop replacement for (and this is the important bit) when the oil is gone.
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No matter what the science says, you can't make people believe what they don't want to believe. Believing we're poisoning the planet when we're pouring tonnes of poisons into the land, sea, and sky every day, should be a no-brainer, but people have invested so heavily in self-delusion that they're unwilling to admit the scale of their own follies or to accept even small inconveniences in order to save the planet.
Living sustainably is not that hard, but doing so takes determination and the willingness to be lied about, condemned, vilified, and bullied by those who think they might profit less if you succeed. They are blind to the fact that they stand to gain as well, because they only see the immediate incentives, which all reward fast, grossly inflated profits for a few at the expense of the many. Remove these incentives, and the few will suddenly find new ways of conducting business. Built-in obsolescence is an excellent example of unsustainable corporate common practice: Goods that have to be replaced frequently make more profits than those that last. Healthcare that treats symptoms without addressing the underlying causes of disease is more profitable than healthcare that cures you by removing the cause of disease. Foods that don't nourish you are more profitable than those that do, since you then have to buy nutritional supplements and more healthcare in order to remain alive and functional. All of these practices generate immediate profits, mostly at the expense of the masses, but they cannot be sustained because living a disposable lifestyle presumes limitless resources when we live on a limited planet.
On a deep level, most people know this already. They're just hoping the train wreck happens to someone else. How they reconcile this with their religious beliefs is the real mystery to me. But then, religion has also become corporate, so no doubt the proper rationalisations are in place.
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"because the American people understand this issue now."
The Senator's statement there is patently, flatout untrue. I say this having taught college biology laboratories for four years, and if the average level of our current freshmen's education is any indication, then the public has no CLUE about the science behind climate change.
I frankly stopped reading the interview portion of this with Dick Shremmer, for one simple reason. He uses totally unrelated past phenomena to try and refute working scientific theory.
Sure, we have had past Ice Ages. All of those historic changes have no real bearing on the RATE at which we are seeing changes happen NOW.
The current RATE of climate change is unprecedented in the hundreds of thousands of years of data that we can go back and draw inferences from.
Carbon dioxide has been PROVEN in laboratories to function as a heat sink in regards to solar radiation (heat from light).
Those are facts based on empirical non-biased research. It's tragic, once you realise the majority of my fellow countrymen are ignorant enough to actually believe the misdirections and falsehoods opposing them. This reminds me of Christianity once refusing to accept a heliocentric solar system.
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"42. At 3:07pm on 18 Dec 2009, watermanaquarius wrote:
Mark,
Unfortunately America never has and never shall follow the lessons about history it should have learned from it's European pilgrim forefathers."
And unfortunately some Europeans still doen't seem to get that America won it's war for independence and we don't want or need to slavishly copy the way things are done in Europe.
Contrary to some people's misgivings, Americans skeptical of climate change do not hate the environment but like all Americans they do hate being pushed around. The resistance to the politics of climate change in this country is caused as much by the proponents' tactics as it is by any doubts about the science. The proponents do everything they can to stifle discussion or debate on an issue that will have a huge impact on people's lives and skeptics resent it. Climate change proponents regularly belittle anyone who questions any aspect of their position: calling people ignorant or stupid never wins their hearts and minds, indeed it comes across as arrogant and elitist which only makes matters worse. Telling us we must "act now" is another thing that only makes some people cautious; we grew up with advertising and we're all too familiar with high pressure sales tactics.
Opponents' concerns aren't helped either when they look at international conferences like Kyoto and Copenhagen and see people pushing for treaties that impose strict limits on America and would have noticable effect on our economy while leaving other nations free to continue polluting almost without hindrance, the same treaties which expect America to make a massive transfer of wealth to developing nations with abysmal records of political and social stability, rampant corruption and poor human rights.
The developing nations insistence of direct government transfers of climate mitigation aid doesn't go over well in America either. Americans hate taxes, it's our heritage. The idea of paying more taxes to send the money to countries with those abysmal records I mentioned puts people off big time. That does not mean that Americans are stingy or unconcerned for others. Historically Americans have preferred to donate to NGOs doing specific projects rather than hand money over to governments. If you add donations to NGOs to official foreign aid America's record of aid to developing nations is actually quite good. There is no reason to believe that would change for climate change mitigation, especially with some well crafted appeals which NGOs are quite good at.
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It may be that normally the oceans could abate atmospheric CO2, even ours. However, the oceans are in desperate trouble. The ability of the oceans to mitigate is hampered. It is likely that other factors (man made) are responsible for the decline in ocean health. I guess we will not know unless we do the science! The money for that is going to have to come form those that have it.
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Even without the issues of climate change, and international security it's crazy that US society even tolerates car makers like GM churning out vehicles which average 20Mpg 40 years after the last oil crisis. Anyone would think oil were an infinite resource which it obviously isn't as it'll soon be back to 150 dollars a barrel and then some as it gets rarer.
Even if everyone in the USA switched from SUV to Toyota Prius overnight the need for oil in every aspect of our lives for say anything made of plastics means we should be doing all we can to conserve what's left of this precious resource and invest in replacement technologies.
If Japan can innovate in these areas while going through the biggest recession in it's history there is absolutely no reason why the USA can't.
The international co-operation on the environment over CFC's, where the US actually assumed a leading role during the Carter administration while the EU dragged it's feet, proves that such measures are possible and can work.
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At 4:56pm on 18 Dec 2009, powermeerkat wrote:
"RE: U.S. Senate possible ratification.
It's quite likely that Mr. Obama will have nothing to present for ratification once the Kopenhagen hot air generator shuts down.
It's about as likely as, come New Year, the Senate will reject health care reform bill, as currently formulated."
As written the health care reform bill doesn't deserve to pass. One of the big emotional heartstrings Obama and the Dems pulled on to justify their plan was the number of people without medical insurance; the numbers ranged up to 54 million depending on whose set of talking points was being used. By the government's own figures the bill in the senate would still leave up to 24 million people in the country without medical insurance. What's up with that? If its going to be done it should be done right.
The Dems need to stop trying to ride roughshod over the Republicans and sit down and work out a compromise. A bi-partisan bill is much more likely to be fiscally responsible and much less likely to be thrown out or amended away the next time the Republicans are in power. And this time both sides need to put everything on the table--including tort reform. Health care reform needs to provide a high standard of medical care, lower costs and cover everyone. I think most Americans could get behind that. The question is, can Congress?
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refDavid Cunard wrote:
#4. MagicKirin: "Why is climate chance a tough sell? Look at the circus in Copenhagen.
You have people who don't know what they are talking about"
Pot, kettle.
____________-
Yes senator Kerry could not fit me on the plane. But I do know more about sustainability than many of those clowns up there.
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Scott0962 # 61,
I think you got hold of the wrong end of the stick.
Lord forbid that I was attempting to lecture you on suggesting you copy the way Europeans did things.
I was mearly suggesting that after many, many centuries of Europeans doing much of it wrong, America did not have to bury it's head in the sand and repeat our mistakes.
But you are, and unfortunately doing it far worse. The American bigger and better concept strikes again, though in this respect with a greater negative influence on your own lifestyles.
Look on the bright side. When the oceans rise and we all go under, you Americans will not miss the boat that's waiting.
BTW.The captains name is Charon.
http://www.theoi.com/Khthonios/Kharon.html
Hope you have got your silver dollar ready.
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51. At 5:01pm on 18 Dec 2009, GH1618 wrote:
Scott0962 (#46) "What Kyoto vote are you referring to?"
There was a "Sense of the Senate" resolution on the subject which was passed 95 to zero:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d105:SE00098:
OK, thank you for the clarification. Not quite the 99-1 ratio the original post claimed but certainly enough to prevent a formal vote on ratification.
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Behavioral change will be nasty. Beyond that, you should see the US blogs about the idea of contributing "Guilt Payments" to the developing world. With the deficit, debt, rising taxes, state and municipal bankruptcies, health care failure, persisting consumer debt bubble, commercial real estate bubble, and everything else, IT AIN'T HAPPENING! Not my preference or position, but my read of public opinion. KYOTO II. We're not coming to the table (ya'll).
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Regardless of your (their) stance on climate change, you should work towards reducing the garbage every single one of us pumps into the atmosphere. And to do that, we need proper incentives and proper leadership.
Oil & gas is so 70's - we should reserve these resources for (recyclable) packaging and other (recyclable/biodegradable) products and concentrate on getting our fuel from somewhere that reduces the amount of garbage emitted.
Currently there is neither proper leadership nor proper incentives. Consider the country where I live - the decision to tax bio diesel so that it will be as expensive (or more) than normal diesel on the grounds that it will cause starvation. We'll all be starving if we keep polluting like we do with fossil fuels.
And don't get me started on the scam that is carbon trading. Sigh.
Hugh
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"Some would like to make sure that the carbon fuel they exist to draw above ground soon becomes a relic from another age." Is Palin ghostwriting for you now?
Ah yes, S.P.E.C.T.R.E. is now out to destroy the oil industry. Forget that it is a finite and reducing resource that pollutes the environment which will have to be replaced, now or later.
Also, oil is a relic from another age (or was that wit?)
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At 4:59pm on 18 Dec 2009, LE Mental wrote:
"The US has had many years to assume responsibility in this area and has 'refused' to do so. They have also had ample time within upbeat economic times to boost their infrastracture. When I lived there I wanted to take the train from Santa Barbara to LA for a meeting. Having come from the UK I assumed it would be an easy ride... 4 Hours later (90 miles journey) with a colleague collecting me from Van Nuys (another long journey from our meeting place) it did seem as if the US had deliberately missed out on a chance to build travel routes that would lessen the load on the individiual and the car."
Please forgive us for not creating an extensive system of heavily subsidized passenger train service to make our European guests feel at home but if we're going to subsidize a transportation system we much prefer one that takes us directly from our departure point to our final destination. I suspect Europeans would too if they had the choice.
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ref #69
Hugh Jorgan wrote:
Regardless of your (their) stance on climate change, you should work towards reducing the garbage every single one of us pumps into the atmosphere. And to do that, we need proper incentives and proper leadership.
Oil & gas is so 70's - we should reserve these resources for (recyclable) packaging and other (recyclable/biodegradable) products and concentrate on getting our fuel from somewhere that reduces the amount of garbage emitted.
Currently there is neither proper leadership nor proper incentives. Consider the country where I live - the decision to tax bio diesel so that it will be as expensive (or more) than normal diesel on the grounds that it will cause starvation. We'll all be starving if we keep polluting like we do with fossil fuels.
And don't get me started on the scam that is carbon trading. Sigh.
Hugh
___________-
I agree with your fiirst last points. Many of us in favor of saving the eviornment we just don't buy that Oslo knows what they are doing.
Carbon credits are a joke, it basicly says if you are rich you can use more resources.
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Dick Shremmer has adopted the mantra of the ignorant who are driven by greed. It is simply untrue that the climate change currently being experienced by the planet is 'natural'. Going back several hundred million years, the average temperature has indeed varied, but today it has reached an unprecedented level. Ignorance will prevail as long as people choose to be ignorant by 'believing' what they want to believe. Harmful emissions are causing the earth to warm up - this is a fact and not a matter of 'belief'. Even with the pressing concern of global warming aside, how can anyone justify continuing as a society to rely so heavily on a limited energy source such as oil?
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As ever the two extremes get all the airplay .....
Firstly....
Mark wrote
"Senator James Inhofe from Oklahoma has long believed man-made climate change is what he calls "a Hollywood hoax" perpetuated by a liberal elite."
One may of course "believe" what one wishes, but Inhofe has an agenda....
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=James_M._Inhofe
"James M. Inhofe has accepted $311,800 in oil contributions during the 110th congress. $160,800 of those dollars were from industry PACS. In total, Inhofe received $662,506 from oil companies between 2000 and 2008, which makes him a top recipient of oil money. In addition to oil, Inhofe has received $152,800 in coal contributions during the 110th Congress. $94,500 of those dollars were from industry PACS."
"James M. Inhofe has voted in favor of big oil companies on 100% of important oil-related bills from 2005-2007, according to Oil Change International. These bills include Iraq war funding, climate change studies, clean energy, and emissions."
Inhofe's use of pseudo-science terminolgy to attempt to debunk climate change is equivlent to the "intelligent design" rubbish put out by creationists (like Inhofe, who is a known "biblical literalist") to attempt to debunk evolution.
Secondly...
A big problem is that there are loonies and charlatans on the environmentalist/green side of the debate as well.
However it is important to remember that just because some charlatans have got on the bandwagon, it does not mean it is rolling in the wrong direction!
Another problem is the media, who as ever give the biggest airtime to the most extreme (and often least representative) views.
And then we have politicians ..... and their constant need for a quick-fix solution to a problem that requires a major long-term strategy. This desire for a quick-fix for the media and the voters is what brings out the charlatans and the businessmen with their schemes for new and expensive lightbulbs, carbon trading (who really understands that?) and so on. (I'm not suggesting all the scheme are from charlatans of course, but some people are making alot of money off the back of this).
Again, just because some bad ideas come out, it does not mean the target is in the wrong place.
Back to science ... yes, there are a few (very few) scientists who deny climate change, but the vast majority know it for a fact.
Man-made (or man-accelerated) climate change. The problem is what to do about it ..... not whether it exists. The deniers are just trying to move the goalposts .... and look who funds them!
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52 papa ray
"A little point that most don't know but is covered here. Most volcanic activity on this planet is under our oceans. 80 percent of volcanic activity occurs under the surface of the oceans."
"There is more "pollution" from these volcanos on a daily basis than all of mankind's daily pollution put together."
The first bit is backed up (and very interesting) by the article you linked to.
The second bit is not.
But even if the second bit were true, CO2 from volcanoes is part of the natural ecosystem of the planet, and has presumably been going on for millions of years.
The issue is man-made climate change, and thus is it irrelevent if natural CO2 emissions are greater than man's emissions or not. It is man's emissions which have tipped the eco-system over the edge.
The problem is not whether climate change exists, or whether mankind has accelerated or caused it .... that is accepted by the vast majority of the scientific community globally.
The problem now is :-
A) can we do anything about it?
B) should we do anything about? (speaking economically not morally/ ethically)
To A) the answer is that we don't know if we can solve the problem, but we certainly won't fin out if we don't try.
To B) the issue is whether we mortgage our children's future by starting things now, even if it costs us money, or whether we let them sort it out in the future, if they can.
How do we want to judged by history in 200 years?
Unfortunately the politicians are more worried about elections in the very near future and so the long-term strategy is political suicide.
Also the preponderence of oil lobby-funded misinformation is on a par with the "health care = socialism" or the "intellignt design" lobbies. Not helpful, but very good at scaring the ignorant.
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"It's certainly true America's might in the world has partly been built on its rich resources of fossil fuels"...and partly built on the rest of the world's rich resources of fossil fuels. And that's the vicious cycle - extremely vicious! Amerika's misused might is used to expropriate other countries' resources, and expropriating other counties' resources funds much of Amerika's misused might. And the new politically correct president is as vicious in his pursuit of these riches as his redneck predecessor, escalating in Afghanistan and continuing in Iraq and Palestine and elsewhere. "Oil and oilmen have played a huge part in American politics and they are not about to roll over now"...and they have a huge convergence of interests with the imperial foreign policy establishment. Which spells huge trouble for the rest of the world, not only in Copenhagen but well beyond. "For the president to live up to his promises"...to his corporate patrons..."he will have to" use typically shifty arguments, "and convince people that green power is the power of the future and means, not threatens, [corporate] security and wealth."
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Ref. 73, Baeey Dolan:
"Going back several hundred million years, the average temperature has indeed varied, but today it has reached an unprecedented level."
No, the planet has been much warmer than it is now. I think you mean "several hundred thousand years" and even so it's CO2 (not temperature) that has reached an unprecedented level.
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Oh this is absolutely delightful. China is indifferent offering only weasel words, India is the same, the poor countries as usual have their hands out for more money blaming their problems on the rich countries, America isn't buying any of it and Europe is furious. Good, let them stew in their own juices, Copenhagen was a fiasco for them. Even President Obama whom they were pinning their hopes on won't give the store away so easily. He knows he couldn't if he wanted to. It's over. Time for everyone to go home and forget the whole damned thing. Europe will just have to find another way to bankrupt America. The global warming scheme whether it's scam or real won't work. America won't fall on its sword for anyone.
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ref #79
too true, and Obama did not get any points for denigrating his predessors.
He got the same insults and lies by Hugo the Dictator who should have been tossed out on his ear.
Please people of Venezuela ovewrthrow this menace!
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"You know what the funny thing was about Kyoto? America, inspite of not signing, actually reduced its immessions while the EU (who's various countries did sign up) didnt!"
What utter tosh. The US has barely dented growth in it's emissions levels from 1990 levels, whereas the EU as a whole has achieved a good proportion of it's Kyoto level cuts, and is on track to cut about a third of it's 1990 emissions by 2020. The target of a 17% reduction from present levels for the US is in fact a 3% real reduction from the 1990 benchmark that every sane nation on the planet uses in making climate change targets.
That's how far behind the US is compared to the rest of the developed world. Too many oil-hungry corporations lobbying in Washington for the US to make any real difference without it's incumbent government committing political suicide. Thanks a bunch, America.
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75 RomeStu,
The problem now is :-
A) can we do anything about it?
B) should we do anything about? (speaking economically not morally/ ethically)
To A) the answer is that we don't know if we can solve the problem, but we certainly won't fin out if we don't try.
How nice of you to destabilize entire economies based on such sound reasoning.
To B) the issue is whether we mortgage our children's future by starting things now, even if it costs us money, or whether we let them sort it out in the future, if they can.
Well, since some scientists are suggesting the magnetic field of the Earth might flip in 2012, which would result in real global warming, I vote for waiting. In fact, if they're right we should start burning everything we can now before it's too late!
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The fact that there are volcanoes under the oceans and that they emit more Co2 than mankind is not really all that relevant to the arguments that are used by the green lobby.
Their argument is that the carbon production and carbon absorption mechanisms present on the Earth have always been present and have evolved such that they have been historically held in approximate balance. They argue that Mankind's carbon production (the volume of which is, yes, trivial by comparison with natural sources) is upsetting that balance and causing a gradual and continuing warming. Rather like putting a small coin on one side of a perfectly balanced see-saw. The change you made is not great, but you screwed up the balance of the machine just the same.
I'm not really 100% convinced myself about global warming, but I'm alarmed at the misinformation and misrepresentation that often attends the debate - and of course that is made worse by the media's need to fill airtime and column inches with something, anything, and the crazy way we fund science ("grab a headline - get a grant").
To some of the contributors here responding to Mark's story I would say one thing. Please have a good read of David McKay's (free to download) book "Sustainable Energy Without the Hot Air":
http://www.withouthotair.com/download.html
You will at least understand the upcoming problems we will face when fossil fuels run out, and you'll be better informed (even if you're not convinced) about the proposed science behind the bio-panic we are all being invited to indulge in.
Have a good Christmas folks!
Alan T
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How come the EU isn't a slave to lobbying oil corporations too?
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I vote we all stick our heads in the sand, allow the vaste polar caps to melt and set this beautiful planet further down the road to extinction.
The fact of the matter is that we live on a planet which the governing powers are all motivated by short term greed, with their blinkers firmly on.
They all say "We can't afford to right now." The truth is we can't afford not to, but the cobbled together compromise they have come up with is not worth the paper it is written on if it is not legally binding.
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The 'green energy will ruin us economically' argument challenged here.
The 'oh, don't worry, there's lots of oil' argument put in context here.
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# 81 rodidog wrote:
"Well, since some scientists are suggesting the magnetic field of the Earth might flip in 2012, which would result in real global warming, I vote for waiting. In fact, if they're right we should start burning everything we can now before it's too late!"
Which scientists? Where? In which respected journal have they published their research findings?
Granted, something like that did happen in the recent film '2012', in fulfillment of Mayan prophecy, and starring John Cusack - but I'm fairly sure that wasn't a documentary.....
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So those with a vested interest in preserving the fossil fuel status quo are in denial over climate change. Why be surprised? This is the same regime that conducts a 'war on terror' whilst in denial over Israel's criminal (according to the UN) behaviour in Gaza. Sounds like you've gone native, Mr Mardell. Oh, 'The horror, the horror.'
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The EU countries have generally had declining populations in the recent 50 years; the USA now has over 310 million. Most of the increase in the last 3 decades in th USA has been immigration from other countries.
The EU can pledge itself to reduce CO2 gradually and still maintain its standard of living. The USA, with a still increasing population, cannot reduce total CO2 without a much more severe decrease in average standard of living.
Those in the USA who want to enable a sharper decline in use of fossil fuels should really start removing obstacles to construction of new nuclear plants. Both Japan and France get (I believe, subject to correction) more than half of their electricity from nuclear power. The supply of uranium ore in the earth's crust, like the supply of fossil fuels, is finite; but we could buy several more decades of time to develop increased efficiency, particularly in regard to transportation, if nuclear power became the dominant source of electricity in N. America.
This is one area where Obama is a real disappointment. He could have enabled more nuclear construction, and fast-tracked construction of more transmission lines in areas subject to power failures. Both of these actions would help the depressed construction industry in the US. Increased use of electric or hybrid vehicles doesn't reduce fossil fuel use if the electricity is generated by burning fossil fuels.
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A couple of comments to the crowd:
1.) Europe was built in the time of the horse. So was the Atlantic coast of the U.S., but most of this country was built during the time of the automobile. The automobile provided a huge boost in individual mobility, and we took advantage of that to build sprawling cities that gave us all more personal space. It made for a terrific standard of living. Nobody knew anything about peak oil or global climate change. We simply took advantage of what was available to us, just as humans have always done. Providing mass transit for such huge, relatively sparsely populated areas is highly problematic (though we're trying). We also used cheap energy to artificially cool dwellings and businesses, which allowed us to heavily populate very warm areas like Houston (our fifth largest city) in ways we never could before. Surviving in such large numbers in a climate such as Houston's requires the consumption of prodigious amounts of energy. We can boost efficiency (and we should), but even if we do, we will still need to consume vast amounts of energy to live down there. And there's no turning the clock back. The people and the cities are already there. It's no surprise the U.S. is having more trouble adapting.
2.) Ever since Homo erectus learned how to control fire, hominid species on this planet have been for all intents and purposes a one trick pony. If E.T. were asked when he returned home to sum up in one sentence what humans do, he could do worse than to say, "They burn things." We've been releasing stored solar energy (as wood, oil, coal, etc.) for as long as our species has existed, and it's worked really, really well, so well that humans don't really know how to do anything else. Except for nuclear and photo-voltaic technologies, we haven't come up with a replacement, let alone an improvement, and those newer technologies have serious drawbacks in comparison (expense and radioactive waste for the former, expense and inefficiency for the latter). We're going to need a miraculous technological breakthrough, something on the level of the taming of fire, to get us out of this mess. So, start praying.
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<RICHPOST><i>"It is man's emissions which have tipped the eco-system over the edge.<BR /><BR />The problem is not whether climate change exists, or whether mankind has accelerated or caused it .... that is accepted by the vast majority of the scientific community globally."</i><BR /><BR />No one has <b>Proved</b> that man has tipped the eco-system over any edge. No one-even the hard believers think that is tipped at this time.<BR /><BR />Now if you want to say that man has polluted the earth...fine I and most people will buy that. If you want to say we need to find ways to clean it up and have energy sources that don't pollute. I don't think anyone would disagree with that.<BR /><BR />No one says that climate change is not real and occurring. NO one. <BR />But...<b>and it is the big but that will cause terrible hardships on not just this generation but the next and the next.</b> The but is that every person in the western world will have to put his/her money in the pockets of politicians under the guise of cleaning up the world and changing from polluting energy to clean energy. <BR /><BR />Which sounds to way too many OK, but if they don't think their money will not only be corrupted and wasted and the situation barely changed, they have not been paying attention and don't have the knowledge to see what they are trying to do. <BR /><BR />The major backers of this man made climate scare are not only the U.N. but socialist organizations all over the world and of course the "developing countries" which just want the money to squander and line their bank accounts with. The EU and South America and other nations may think that is fine and dandy and will represent a new world order, but they are socialist countries even if they call themselves democracys.<BR /><BR /> Want a taste of what they want, and how they view the west- in particular- the U.S.? Take a look...[Unsuitable/Broken URL removed by Moderator]watch and listen to this.</a> Listen to the applause. Just listen to the worlds leaders and the U.N. crowd applaud what he says. Obama didn't even get that kind of applause.<BR /><BR />But you will never convince most Americans, Australians and Canadians and others that socialism is the answer or that man has to mortgage his future (more than it already is) to "save the earth" in the next ten to twenty years.<BR /><BR />Work toward cleaning it up, develop new and attainable alternate resources and continue to clean up oil, gas and nuclear resources...YES WE CAN and we will, but not to the extent that we kill whole economies.<BR /><BR />And look who is stopping nuclear plants from being built...<BR />THE ECO-TERRORISTS. The cleanest power source available and they don't want it used. And don't bring up the waste. France and others recycle all of their waste back into more energy. Others can learn to do it too.<BR /><BR />Your statement about how many scientists believe in the catastrophe of man made climate change due to Co2 is incorrect in many different ways.<BR />First off, most of the scientists that have come forth to champion this catastrophe are not even climate scientists. The nearly three thousand scientists that have signed a petition to not only discredit the believers of man made climate change <b>ARE Climate Scientists.</b><BR /><BR />I've wasted enough of my time here. I have grandkids to take care of and they are hungry. And at the present time I have the resourses to take care of them but if the Socialists-Markists and the eco-terrorists win....<BR /> I won't.<BR /><BR />Papa Ray<BR /> </RICHPOST>
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# 78. MarcusAureliusII: "Europe will just have to find another way to bankrupt America."
Isn't true that the USA is the greatest debtor nation in the world? If everyone called in their chips, it would be bankrupt through no fault of Europe but rather but its own efforts. What happened to Britain in the 1950s can be repeated on the other side of the Atlantic; no nation is impervious.
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EPA has once again far overstepped the law which defines its powers and mandates. By defining CO2 as a polutant they have commited an absurdity. CO2 is a natural constituent of the atmosphere and is not toxic at the levels we will experience. By EPA's reasoning water is also a polutant because too much water in the wrong place can also kill.
I think EPA should be required to file an environmental impact statement explaining how the proposed reduction in America's CO2 output will affect the earth's climate if China does not reduce its output and is even more likely increases their output. It should also be required to file an economic impact statement explaining what will happen to the American economy if the 17% CO2 reduction target is complied with. I'd bet both reports would be grim reading for most Americans.
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"I'm not really 100% convinced myself about global warming, but I'm alarmed at the misinformation and misrepresentation that often attends the debate - and of course that is made worse by the media's need to fill airtime and column inches with something, anything, and the crazy way we fund science ("grab a headline - get a grant")."
Pretty much where I sit. My huge problem is people being adamant about the fact that it is man-made global warming and then their models cannot predict anything with accuracy. Last time I checked, if your model does not match reality you go back to the drawing board because you are clearly not understanding the system completely enough to conclude *anything* (that means both ways). In light of that, until the workings are understood enough for us to be able to confirm models/theory I do not see how any position outside of "inconclusive either way" is reasonable.
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According to this web site:
http://www.geology.sdsu.edu/how_volcanoes_work/climate_effects.html
Volcanoes contribute far less CO2 to the atmosphere than human activity.
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For some reason I'm watching Frosty the Snowman on T.V.
Frosty just said to Karen, "The only place I'd never melt is the North Pole."
Guess Frosty's goose is cooked.
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re: 89 Andy Post We're going to need a miraculous technological breakthrough, something on the level of the taming of fire, to get us out of this mess. So, start praying.
Ok, that's sort of true. Geo-engineering. Solar. Hydrogen. Fusion. All big ticket, cool stuff.
But never underestimate the usefulness of the humble condom!
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Time to stop breeding, then and consider the concept of carrying capacity or we could just wait and see
We live in interesting times
Happy holidays!
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"We once had an ice age thousands of years ago, and during that ice age where we are standing used to be covered with an ocean."
This post says more to me about the sad, sorry state of science education in the United States than anything else. If even a basic sense of the geological scope of the past escapes us, then how can we expect the general public to grasp the nuances and variables of data analysis? While Kansas was once under the inland sea, and yes, there was an ice age, they missed each other only by about 63 million years (give or take a few hundred thousand...)
This lack of knowledge- even an incuriosity- about basic facts, about principles and the scientific method, coupled with the "don't trust anyone" meme that has taken over culture in the last 4 decades and we end up with a society ripe for following any convincing sounding misinformation, even if it is patently false.
And this is exactly where the anti-anthropogenic global warming messengers fit it, along with the proponents of the Mayan calendar doomsday, and the tobacco-doesn't-kill crowd.
It's a simple formula. take your basic conclusion first- there is no such thing as global warming. Cloak it in some reasonable-sounding but pseudo-scientific claptrap, enough to convince enough of those whose understanding of science is minimal. Devise conspiracy theories about how it's all a plot, and jump on any misstep of the opposition as "proof" of ulterior motives. And constantly shift ground- if someone provides irrefutable evidence against one point, don't admit you were wrong, just jump to attack another point. And if you run out of talking (shouting) points, don't worry, you can always jump back to the early points, and repeat ad nauseam. Yes, repeat, repeat, repeat (and repeat)- the more your message is heard, in smart-sounding sound bytes, the more it sinks in.
#94 GH1618, your rebuttal of the volcanoes produce more C02 than humans meme is just going to be caught up in this cycle. Bet dollars to doughnuts no one will respond, but just move on to another attack.
All this seems to imply that this is a conscious process. For some- and the petroleum industry would be prime suspects- it most likely is. But for others, the merest hint of conspiracy is enough to immediately overrule all other considerations. Logic isn't a part, because it's more logical to believe in conspiracies than hard, factual science.
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#97 Crataegus Monogyna
"Time to stop breeding, then..." But, have you heard of this? Hard to believe this is 21st Century U.S.A...www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102005062
(btw, I've been wanting to ask for ages- any relation to Nathaniel?)
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81 Rodidog
"Well, since some scientists are suggesting the magnetic field of the Earth might flip in 2012..." Please, please tell me that this was meant tongue in cheek...
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92. At 01:19am on 19 Dec 2009, MarcusAureliusII wrote:
EPA has once again far overstepped the law which defines its powers and mandates. By defining CO2 as a polutant they have commited an absurdity. CO2 is a natural constituent of the atmosphere and is not toxic at the levels we will experience. By EPA's reasoning water is also a polutant because too much water in the wrong place can also kill.
__________________________________
I have worked in and with EPA regulations for 25 years, and the cleansing transformation in the American environment is very impressive and worthwhile. But it is not beyond them to be very ridiculous at times. They are currently attempting to enforce the PM10 limit on particulate matter here in Kansas, where every farmer plows every fall, and June harvest throws up a haze of microscopic as well as visible chaff. We will always fail that one, which is why some at EPA are so interested.
However, the process of environmental regulation is mitigated (pun fully intended) by an extensive process of comment and discussion, so that the final rule is actually something that the affected industries can both implement and live with. I cannot imagine an economy surviving if the bureaucrats and politicians were allowed to regulate, without themselves being regulated.
KScurmudgeon
survivor of the third third
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"It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it." -Upton Sinclair
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100. At 03:19am on 19 Dec 2009, Via-Media wrote:
81 Rodidog
Please, please tell me that this was meant tongue in cheek...
Yes it was. Pole reversal, however, will happen as it has many times in the past. We seem to be entering into another pole reversal. Should this occur during the maximum output of radiation by the Sun, planet Earth might not have a strong enough magnetic field to deflect the cosmic ray's hitting our planet.
Should the Earth decide to demagnetize or shift the magnetic field to coincide with the solar maximum, well, greenhouse gases could be our best friend. The next solar maximum is due in 2012.
http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/38822
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/magnetic/about.html
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86. At 11:19pm on 18 Dec 2009, John_From_Dublin wrote:
# 81 rodidog wrote:
Which scientists? Where? In which respected journal have they published their research findings?
Granted, something like that did happen in the recent film '2012', in fulfillment of Mayan prophecy, and starring John Cusack - but I'm fairly sure that wasn't a documentary.....
--------------------------
See post #103.
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I think IMPLEMENTATION failed the Green Effort and not economics or fixed amounts of individual worry as talked about during the segment. Perhaps the media should stop reminding people of how ignorant our species really is to be so fickle about burning our earth!!!
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Smudge;
"I have worked in and with EPA regulations for 25 years, and the cleansing transformation in the American environment is very impressive and worthwhile. But it is not beyond them to be very ridiculous at times."
It is impressive. When I went to school in NJ, I had a commanding view of the NYC skyline right on the Hudson. Every day I'd see a brown cloud of haze over the city. That was 40 years ago. Not anymore. It is clean and clear and I understand there are fish in the Hudson again that are actually fit to eat. America's environment has been wonderfully cleaned up. A lot has changed in my lifetime. That is why it is so angering to see EPA have the audacity to try to tag CO2 with a pejorative to achieve a political goal for the Administration that it cannot achieve through legal means. It has in effect tried to circumvent the law, do an end run around it by lying about the definition of words in order to impose restrictions it has no legal right to. CO2 is not a pollutant by any stretch of the imagination. If it were, then every manufacturer of carbonated beverages, every place that served them, every distillery, brewery, and winery would have a lot of polluting substance around because CO2 is part of all of it. In fact CO2 is vital for both plant and animal life, they couldn't exist without it. But like all other vital biotic substances, salt, sugar, water, Nitrogen, Oxygen, too much at the wrong time and place can be very dangerous. That does not make them pollutants however. If it did, every object in our environment is a pollutant because it is potentially dangerous. The government is just plain out of control. It is time to chop it back, to prune it of its unnecessary powers and people. It's also costing far too much money.
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Although Oslo is a joke, President Obama tried to negoiate a compromise which would have placed on unfair burden on the U.s who blocked it?
The greedy socialist countries of Latin America. That right Dominick Cuba, Hugo the dictator, Morales the bigot, Ortega the terrorists are blocking reform.
Why because these thieves want to exploit money from the rest of the world not content from robbing their own people.
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As I have predicted in #49 there's nothing for U.S. Senate to consider since Kopenhagen sham has turned out to be even a bigger fiasco (legally not-binding) than the Kyoto Protocol no signatory has ever adhered to.
And it seems that extorsion attempt by so called 'developping countries'
hasn't succeeded, either.
P.S. I'll look at more reliable and less politized climate change models (once developed) as soon as I dig out myself from under 2 feet of snow and manage to restart my frozen engine.
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The simple fact is that climate change is a scientific fact. Temperature gauges have demonstrated irrefutably, with further data from satellites, that the earth's temperature is rising. Sunspots have been disproven as a cause for climate change, causing only marginal rises or falls in global temperatures, and cannot explain the rapid increase in temperature over the last 100 years. Only two things have increased on the same scale, our use of carbon fuels and the population of the earth. This has created an imbalance, and the Earth WILL right itself sooner or later (see Lovelock's "Gaia hypothesis") and this does not bode well for mankind. The scientific debate over the cause of climate change is over, it is closed. the more data being gathered, the more evidence we find that the rise in global temperature is being caused by our use of fossil fuels.
The Copenhagen summit is historic, although the result wasn't nearly as comprehensive as hoped. Perhaps a further summit will iron out the problems in what is admittedly the largest global operation ever attempted. Evidence that the actions of man not only affect our habitat, but that we can reverse these ill effects, can be found in our actions to repair the ozone. We have to accept that all countries have to participate in weaning off fossil fuels, with industrialised nations leading the way. The USA remains the only superpower in the world, and one of the greatest users of carbon fuels. I find it unfortunate that Obama, a statesman of rare quality, is facing opposition from members of the senate who clearly lobby for the oil industry. The scientific argument is over, these people are using fear tactics and cynicism to block developments which will aid mankind and the US people, but hurt their own pockets. If America fails to act, it WILL drag the rest of the world down with it, the days of isolationism are well and truly over.
As for blaming Obama for the lack of money, for his timing in trying to solve a world crisis during a depression, why not stop and blame the previous administration (which, judging by some of the comments here, a number of Americans consider superior to the Obama administration). That Obama has refrained from pointing out the blame of the Bush administration is to his credit as a person. Bush blocked all progress to halt climate change during the wealthy years after the Clinton administration. As a clear advocate of the oil industry, with a following of other oil lobbyists, he opposed early action to stave off climate change despite the growing evidence that action was needed. His mishandling of the economy, his ignorance of the growing inefficiency and cost of the health service, and his cynical invasion of middle eastern countries with no connection to the events of 11 September 2001 contributed greatly to the current recession and world crisis. 8 years were wasted by the Republicans, who left America in as poor a state as it was during the Vietnam war. And now, after 1 year in office, you blame Obama for trying to solve the problems left to him? He has already guided America through the worst of the recession, and if the Republicans in the senate weren't trying their best to hamstring the current administration, healthcare and energy reform would already be well underway. It scares me slightly that so important and influental a country is governed by people in the pocket of industry. They should be doing what is best for the American people, and people all over the world, instead of cynically exploiting people's fear and reluctance to take action. Changing our relationship with the planet will be the defining challenge of the 21st Century. Success will launch mankind to new heights of technology, progress and enlightenment, while failure will wipe away our history, our culture, our way of life and our species faster and more completely than we can imagine.
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VM,
Virtually.
;-)
Meanwhile,
Small cult-like group (right) discusses evil plan to call for slight cutbacks in greenhouse gas emissions."
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George,
Well said, and worth repeating! [my emphasis
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Ref 109, George
Thank you for articulating so effectively and eloquently what so many of us believe.
Although Democrats deserve to share blame for the calamities we are enduring because of their timidity - and subsequent complicity - in the implementation of policies that led to the mess we are in, most of the blame lies on the champions of deregulation, and those that support big business even when their actions contribute to the destruction of our environment and the collapse of our economy.
Unfortunately, ideology, political contributions, and winning elections are often more important than patriotism to those who cynically call themselves conservatives.
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I wish Mr. Mardell could have seen a little more of Kansas. Most of it is not at all flat. I wonder how he reached the location for this story, which is admittedly in a more flattish part of the state. It is unusual for people who travel around this region of the country to think of Kansas as the flat part. Much of it can certainly seem empty of people. Coming from Denver one would observe more flatness in eastern Colorado than in western Kansas. Coming from Kansas City, passing through the Flint Hills would surely remind him of the Malvern Hills (except alas, nothing like the Morgan motor car factory is there). Perhaps coming from a farm in southwest Oklahoma that has been extensively and carefully leveled for irrigation gives me a different reference for "flat". I also have a small income from oil leases in Kansas and found the article well written except as noted above. There are other energy stories in Kansas, including a long running fight over building another coal burning power plant in the west, whether the increasing numbers of windmill farms are wonderful or horrible, whether corn should be fed to automobiles or livestock, and an old nuclear power plant with an excellent safety and reliability record.
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Jan Tinbergen
and perhaps we should consider the ethics of the situation?
Garret Hardin
Happy Holidays!
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Ref 109, George
"The scientific argument is over, these people are using fear tactics and cynicism to block developments which will aid mankind and the US people, but hurt their own pockets."
Unfortunately, the tactics used by the GOP to derail Democratic initiatives work very well, and are not limited to environmental issues. The pathetic state of the healthcare reform bill is a prime example of what happens when politicians let demagoguery and re-election considerations drive their decisions.
As bizarre as it may seem, claims of death panels, euthanasia, infanticide, socialism, having to deal with bureaucrats instead of insurance clerks, and suggesting the public option would be too expensive compared to the current out of control spending, stick in the minds of those that can be easily persuaded or are convinced ALL our systems and our standard of living are second to none. Even a hint of progress could be easily shot down by claiming healthcare reform is designed to promote abortion and help illegal alliens!
Can you imagine what would have happened to President Obama if he had pledged $7B, like the EU did, to mitigate the effects of global warming? What is shaping up to be a major election victory for the GOP in 2010 would have turned into hysterical calls for impeachment on the basis of high treason and evidence of collusion with "socialist" leaders.
What is happening is not surprising, and distortions such as President Obama blaming President Bush in Copenhagen, are certainly not unprecedented. Republicans tend to be ineffective when they have the reins of government, but they are second to none in winning elections...and the Dems know it.
Don't forget, we are the people who did not blink when President Reagan warned us of an impending Nicaraguan contra invasion of the USA, or when he decided to attack the tiny island of Grenada because of unacceptable threats to our security and that of our medical students on the island, or our ambivalence when President George W. Bush used blatant deceit to invade a Third World country that was, allegedly, a major threat to our security and the security of the world.
In many countries, leader that use hyperbole or deceit like those mentioned above would be removed from power and confined to an asylum; in the USA we name airports and highways after them and long for a sequel.
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Oh Sainted One;
"Unfortunately, the tactics used by the GOP to derail Democratic initiatives work very well, and are not limited to environmental issues. The pathetic state of the healthcare reform bill is a prime example of what happens when politicians let demagoguery and re-election considerations drive their decisions."
Yes it is amazing that pointing out that when all you have is numbers for targets like 100% health care coverage or 17% reduction in CO2 emissions with no coherent plans to achieve them, with no proof there is a scheme that will work without wrecking the country, when those who develop the plans keep them secret less they get debated to see if they make sense, and then what does emerge in small pieces would certainly create an unmitigated disaster that would affect tens of millions of Americans such as a $450 billion dollar reduction to Medicare or the carbon tax/cap and trade fiasco that has proven a complete fraud in Europe they are not only not persuaded to support them but come out in angry droves to kill it. Yes those Republican tactics work very well. When the energy bills are discussed, even many in his own party will abandon the President. The Constitution is ingenious that way forcing politicians to often choose between loyalty to their party and loyalty to themselves by looking out first and foremost to the interests of their constituents as their constituents express them directly. Not like Europeon parliamentary systems at all, nothing like them.
Effective tactics just like running for President as a cyber-demagogue/celebrity who would fix everything with nothing more to his resume than his supposed facility for "charm offensive." Will President Obama set a new record for being the worst President America ever elected surpassing even Woodrow Wilson in that regard? Only time will tell.
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Ref 117, MAII
In my opinion, pursuing alternative fuel sources and creating energy efficient - non-pollutant - industry may very well be the key to solving our current economic and unemployment problems.
The mass exodus of American industrial capacity overseas, including our willingness to give away state of the art technology, has caused irreparable damage to our industrial might and our ability to provide meaningful employment to our people.
I am convinced that our insistence in preserving the fossil fuel and coal industries, while resisting the development of industry that use 21st century technology is very short sighted and a threat to our long term security, let alone our privileged position in the world.
The benefits and risks of healthcare reform deserve debate, but not what has dominated the discussions on this subject thus far. What I have seen are deliberate attempts to guarantee our expensive and exclusionary healthcare system remains in place regardless of consequences to our economy and the welfare of our people.
I reject the suggestion that we are unable to build efficient and dependable products - including cars - the problem is that we are so focused on high sale and profit margins that we don't hesitate to cut corners to achieve our goals. One of our greatest problems is our emphasis on short term goals and the way we ignore the challenges we are going to face 10 or 20 years from now.
Global warming is not a chimera, much less a hoax, there is plenty of scientific evidence available to confirm this phenomena; and the fact that pollution is doing irreparable damage to our environment can be discerned by simply looking at the water in our coastal areas, lakes and rivers, or by taking a short ride over places like Cajon Pass leading towards the L.A. area.
Our national focus should not be whether or not we can afford to pursue sound environmental policies, healthcare reform, energy independence, and improvements in the quality of our education system, but whether or not we can afford to ignore them while unhesitantly spending trillions of dollars in crusades.
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#117. MarcusAureliusII: "Will President Obama set a new record for being the worst President America ever elected surpassing even Woodrow Wilson in that regard? Only time will tell."
Considering that he's only been in office for less than a year, it's far, far too early to even be considering that question. I suggest there are worse presidents than Wilson; how about the one in office twelve months ago?
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Marcus wrote
"Yes it is amazing that pointing out that when all you have is numbers for targets like 100% health care coverage or 17% reduction in CO2 emissions with no coherent plans to achieve them, with no proof there is a scheme that will work without wrecking the country"
There is plenty of proof that 100% healthcare coverage will work .... try
UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain etc etc Canada, Australia, NZ, Japan .... in fact any industrialised nation EXCEPT THE USA.
How hard is it that you Yanks are the only ones who can't do it?
But sir ..... it's too hard! I can't do it! Waaaaaaaaah.
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Marcus
"The Constitution is ingenious that way forcing politicians to often choose between loyalty to their party and loyalty to themselves by looking out first and foremost to the interests of their constituents."
Perhaps you don't realise, many of us consider "constituents" to mean the voters not the lobby groups and corporations who fund the politicians.
It's a disgraceful system - why can't you see it.
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ref #116
Dominick I believe you are wrong.
The Dems conduct during the healthcare doomed it.
As of 8:00 AM eastern time, Harry Reid still had not released the bill to Senators.
No discussion was given to two major points for the GOP- Tort reform and interstate selling of insurance to increase competition.
We saw the shameful conduct early this week when a junior Senator would not show courtesy to a well respected Senator Joe Lieberman and allow him to finish his statement violating the spirit of the Seante.
Dems knows how to steal elections
Witness the Senate race in MN when recount votes suddenly appered only for Franken
Same thing happening in a governor's race in Washington
The notorious attemp by the Dems in FL 2000
and the sucessful theft in 1960
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Oh sainted one;
"In my opinion, pursuing alternative fuel sources and creating energy efficient - non-pollutant - industry may very well be the key to solving our current economic and unemployment problems."
Lots have tried, lots have failed. If you think it's so easy, why don't you go out and do it instead of just talking about it? Look at the incentive you have. You are clueless. I once met this fool who wanted me to help him with his great idea for an invention, a wind powered car. When I tried to explain to him what a perpetual motion machine is, he said that would be my problem to solve. I told him to go bug off. People who do not know technology think you wave a wand and magic happens. Nuclear power was supposed to be that panecea...50 years ago. It hasn't worked out that way. Got any other billiant idea...like covering the entire state of Arizona with solar panels or covering half the Sahara desert with mirrors and solar boilers, then transmitting the power one third of the way across Africa and across the Mediterranean Sea to Europe? Well, what's stopping you?
"The benefits and risks of healthcare reform deserve debate, but not what has dominated the discussions on this subject thus far."
The Democrats control the White House and both houses of Congress. If all that mattered was party loyalty, it would have easily passed long ago. That there is more to it is why Senator Reid has it bottled up in his office and won't let anyone see it. What little has leaked out has many Americans up in arms. Now why do you suppose that a bill that would affect one sixth of America's economy has to be kept a secret by the leader of the United States Senate in what is supposed to be a democracy? The answer is because it is a poltical atom bomb that will go off as soon as it sees the light of day.
Canard;
"Considering that he's only been in office for less than a year, it's far, far too early to even be considering that question. I suggest there are worse presidents than Wilson; how about the one in office twelve months ago?"
You may have learned enough American history to have passed your citizenship test but you have much yet to learn. America was far better off before President Wilson ignored President Washington's warning to stay out of Europe's affairs. We've all been paying a terrible price for that mistake ever since he made it almost a hundred years ago. There is nothing about Europe which is in America's self interest. We'd be far better to distance ourselves from it completely.
Stewed in Rome;
"There is plenty of proof that 100% healthcare coverage will work .... try
UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain etc etc Canada, Australia, NZ, Japan .... in fact any industrialised nation EXCEPT THE USA."
When I lived in France, I visited French Hospitals, I've seen the inside of them. Other Americans and I promised each other that if one of us got really sick, we'd get him back to the US one way or another as quickly as possible. By American standards, regardless of what you hear, foreign medical care stinks. That is why even Canadians come to the US for care when they need more than their limited system can deliver. Wait for a hip replacement in the UK up to a year. In the US, a day or two, a week at most. Four times the survival rate for breast cancer in the US as the UK. No thank you.
"Perhaps you don't realise, many of us consider "constituents" to mean the voters not the lobby groups and corporations who fund the politicians."
You mean lobby groups like AARP and the labor unions?
Mr. Mardell;
"Kansas is notoriously flat, the monotony of its endless fields broken only by buildings, cows and dark, nodding machines, almost like a scale model of some child's toy."
The rich bountiful soil of Kansas and so many other places like it in America's heartland has kept much of the world from starving to death. And the people who live and lived on it are in large part the reason why your nation and many others are not now involuntary captives of a Nazi or Soviet empire today. Among the many things that are planted in the soil of Kansas are the missile silos with their "Peacekeeper" MX missiles that defended your nation for fifty years againt the USSR. Never forget it. America also has proven reserves of far more energy in the form of natural gas and coal than it could use in hundreds of years. There is probably vast amounts of oil within its borders still to be discovered. There are still many places in America where no human has ever set foot. All it needs is the will and incentive to put it to use.
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# 122
I know I shouldn't feed the troll, but one just gets tired of Magic Mushroom's endless production of the substance which, AFAIK, is usually placed on mushrooms to make them grow.
No doubt if he has evidence that eg Franken stole the election, or that Gore made a 'notorious attemp' [sic] to steal the presidency from Bush, he will provide it to the authorities - on his planet.
'But when anyone tried to talk truth or sense, the Sheep, high on magic mushrooms, began their mendacious, defamatory and relentless bleating - 'Democrats bad, Republicans [and Lieberman] good, Obama bad, Bush/Cheney good, correct spelling bad, knot rite speling goooode'. [From George Orwell's Animal Farm - sorta.]
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ref #124
It probaly a wasted effort to educate a moonbat
But here is the proof:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124640687950076679.html
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“The outcome of the Copenhagen COP 15 summit has demonstrated that the politicians representing the people of the only current super power, previously known as Americans, will now be considered by a great number of global residents as American'ts.
The USA still wants to play a global role, keep the US dollar as the international trading currency and yet maintain a totally self interested stance when it comes to the critical international issue of our time, global warming.
As a non-activist in terms of politics, I can only see that the world's masses could turn against the current world regime and that could really result in changes to the global scene on a scale even greater than a 2 degree rise in the Earth's atmospheric temperature, caused by anthropogenic activity, by 2050.
Politicians didn't decree the advent of the industrial or oil revolutionary ages, it was commerce. So again, we may find that it is the business sector that creates the drivers for a low carbon economy where politicians have (so far) failed miserably.”
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123 marcus
"When I lived in France, I visited French Hospitals, I've seen the inside of them."
Some of us have moved on since the 1970s or whenever it was that you famously unravelled the mysteries of Europe.
Also you may have a higher survival rate for certain cancers ... but we Europeans have a higher survival rate of a) infancy and b) life.
Oh, and no one gets left out either.
Look at the big picture .... it's right there.
you continue
"You mean lobby groups like AARP and the labor unions?"
I made no party-bias in my statement ..... however I would be surprised to see that AARP and union "contributions" to politicians was anything like as high as corporate/industrial contributions.
Either way the system is bad, and few politicians actually represent the people who actually vote anyway.
Instead of throwing an irrelevent comment back, what is your opinion on the level of corporate/industrial/union funding of politicians? Do you believe that democracy is best served when politicians vote in the interests of their sponsor organisations.
You constantly criticise Obama - but much of his funding for the elections came from millions of actual people who donated money personally.
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# 126 Magic Mushroom
"It [sic] probaly [sic] a wasted effort to educate a moonbat [sic]
But here is the proof:"
[a] Spend your effort on learning to spell. You cannot impart education until you acquire it
[b] An opinion piece in a right-wing Murdoch-owned paper is no more 'proof' than 'I saw it on Fox, so it must be true'. As one of the comments under the article puts it, "This entire opinion article cites no fact or source on how this election was "stolen."" If you ever buy a dictionary, try looking up 'proof'.
[c] A Moonbat is not in my dictionary, and you clearly don't own one. Would that be someone who wants the USA to invade Venezuela? [See #4]
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If any one who noticed, all those plastic cups, bottles papers and the huge amount of garbage these climate people left behind on their conferance tables, should now finally realise that these people werent serious at all..To go to a meeting for a few hours on planes have produced a lot of carbon emmission...
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Post 118.Saint Dominick.
'The mass exodus of American industrial capacity overseas, including our willingness to give away 'state of the art' technology has causeed irreparable damage to our industrial might and our ability to provide meaningful employment to our people'.....
After 100 years of production the last British piano manufacturer has recently closed, resulting in 90 skilled artisans out of work...
This is the depressing story of manufacturers upping sticks and relocating to the far east,then exporting the same products back.
This scenario is repeated time after time and overseas manufacturers the net winners.
Politicians and top management seem remote from the despair and hopelessness that the resulting unemployment brings.
Yes, there will be retraining and training of course is needed, it helps to give hope for a future.But sometimes you cannot teach an old dog new tricks, and anyway how many IT specialists and sports science people are really needed?
The unemployed enter a labryinth of retraining, a maze of courses with no job opportunities at the exhausted end.If you fall by the wayside of this mind numbing procedure, it's your fault.
Actual jobs = sanity and community.
A side effect of this non-job creative training, and trainers, is it all makes for bigger government which never reduces. A tipping point will be reached resulting in more government than private enterprise.
Where wealth creation is not understood, the surviving businesses have to deal with increasing legislation and taxation burdens to pay for the above, loaded on them by officials and politicians who could never earn their own living by honest toil outside of their increasing institutions.
If all work is government and government schemes it will be like the old communist East where the state pretends to pay and the people pretend to work...
Surely a Country is what it makes and does.large and small manufacturing companies are the wealth creators, pride in what you make and do is an ingredient to a happy life and successful country and should be assisted and encouraged as vigorously as the financial side of things.
I am so sick of seeing 'Made in China' on everything...
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ref #128
[b] An opinion piece in a right-wing Murdoch-owned paper is no more 'proof' than 'I saw it on Fox, so it must be true'. As one of the comments under the article puts it, "This entire opinion article cites no fact or source on how this election was "stolen."" If you ever buy a dictionary, try looking up 'proof'.
[c] A Moonbat is not in my dictionary, and you clearly don't own one. Would that be someone who wants the USA to invade Venezuela? [See #4]
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Johny boy the piece gave several facts on how the recount methods were slanted in favor of Franken in which disputed ballots were considered. And considering the promoters of teen prostitution ACORN was involved that is more proof. Did you even bother to read it or just because its WSJ and Fox you disregardit?
A moonbat (so you know what you are) is a liberal who refuses to acknowledge facts that don't conform to his world view. In your case that covers a wide area.
The conservative version is called a Wingnut.
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I am so sick of seeing 'Made in China' on everything...
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Its another project of usa gone wrong...outsourcing was done to lower the cost of things, to safe the local envirnoment and to start a 21st century slavery, where rich could enjoy the luxury with low cost...The project back fired..
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#123 "I once met this fool who wanted me to help him ". Yes, a fool indeed.
"regardless of what you hear, foreign medical care stinks". Ah, the, regardless of the facts argument. A sure sign of a winning hand.
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ref #129
colonelartist wrote:
If any one who noticed, all those plastic cups, bottles papers and the huge amount of garbage these climate people left behind on their conferance tables, should now finally realise that these people werent serious at all..To go to a meeting for a few hours on planes have produced a lot of carbon emmission...
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Is there a full moon out we agree for once. last year I attended a Green conference and there was a major effort of being evironmentally responsible. I would be curious about the venue and if it has the equivilent of a LEED Platinum rating.
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Is there a full moon out
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actually, its the first day of the new moon.. a new month for the muslims and this month is the first day of muslim's new year, and the first day of the ten days beseige of the grand son of Mohammad at karbala...The start of ten days of mourning of Hasan son of Ali and grandson of Mohammad..One of the most refered to example in history of islam of not giving in to bigots, hypocrites and tyrants.To wage just wars is easy but to die for the just cause is not at all easy...
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ref #135
135. At 8:50pm on 19 Dec 2009, colonelartist wrote:
Is there a full moon out
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actually, its the first day of the new moon.. a new month for the muslims and this month is the first day of muslim's new year, and the first day of the ten days beseige of the grand son of Mohammad at karbala...The start of ten days of mourning of Hasan son of Ali and grandson of Mohammad..One of the most refered to example in history of islam of not giving in to bigots, hypocrites and tyrants.To wage just wars is easy but to die for the just cause is not at all easy...
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Then lets see how many leaders of the Moslem faith will stand up to Iran and its terrorist surrogates and to Al Quada.
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Crataegus Monogyna: I've read that the plant is very tolerant of being cut and of neglected and is able to regenerate if cut back severely.
Sounds like certain posters I know! It grows well except in the very north of Scotland.
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"The conservative version is called a Wingnut."
I don't think so. A "wingnut" is a person on the extreme end of either "wing" who has nutty ideas, and who generally cannot be reasoned with.
"Moonbat" could also reasonably be applied to persons of any persuasion who refuse to let facts interfere with their world view, but it seems to be used only by conservatives to describe liberals. I don't use the term myself; name-calling is not helpful to a debate.
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Ref 123, MAII
"Well, what's stopping you?"
Age, a debilitating condition, and lack of financial resources would make a personal attempt to solve our energy problems an insurmountable task. Moreover, solving our environmental problems and our dependence on foreign oil can not be achieved by a single person. It would take our collective commitment, and considerable investment, time and effort to achieve what I believe is an absolute necessity to provide our children the tools needed to meet the challenges that lie ahead.
In my modest opinion, solving these problems require the implementation of multiple technical initiatives, changes in lifestyle, and considerable investment in R&D by the federal, state and local governments, private industry, and a national commitment.
More nuclear plants would not solve all our problems, and may actually aggravate our nuclear waste challenges, but they would help. Tax breaks for people buying hybrids or installing solar panels for heating purposes would help. Wind farms would help, but they only offer a tiny fraction of the energy levels we consume. A close look at the development of bio-fuels in Brazil would be a step in the right direction, but the oil and auto industries would not allow such an ambitious project to take place in the USA.
Improvements in public transportation to make that medium more economical, accessible, and reliable would go a long way towards achieving energy independence. Walking instead of driving to the grocery store two blocks away would do wonders to reduce our dependence on foreign oil, not to mention our waist line.
Your response suggests a lack of confidence in humanity and the ingenuity of the American people that is perplexing for someone who claims to be an expert in history and technology.
Developing energy efficient vehicles and houses is not as difficult as crossing the oceans or the American continent 4 or 5 centuries ago, or developing the medical techniques and medicines used today to eradicate or treat diseases, or our ability to put a man on the Moon.
Our biggest problem is not our ability to achieve goals, or even our willingness to undertake daunting tasks, but the pervasive influence of large corporations and the ability of their sycophants in government to thwart every attempt to deviate from the status quo.
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# 139 GH1618 wrote:
""Moonbat" could also reasonably be applied to persons of any persuasion who refuse to let facts interfere with their world view, but it seems to be used only by conservatives to describe liberals. I don't use the term myself; name-calling is not helpful to a debate."
On the subject of MagicMushroom, and"persons of any persuasion who refuse to let facts interfere with their world view", and the helpfulness or otherwise of name calling, I am reminded of a comment attributed to 'Big' Ron Atkinson, a former soccer coach. Something along the lines of 'I have a strict policy of not commenting on referees - and I'm not going to break it for that pillock...'
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David (138)
And has Mohican connections too!
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136. At 9:05pm on 19 Dec 2009, colonelartist wrote:
This comment has been referred to the moderators. Explain.
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Which first cousin of obama refered by post 136 to the moderators? Unfortunately I am not here to win the hearts and minds of people..and whoever refered my post about shia's rememberence of martyrdom of Hussain and sanctions imposed on his partners and family in the middle karbala is not going to get anything from hiding it...Iran is a shia country, and shia remember Imam Hussain and the sanctions imposed on him by the aggressor..
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Then lets see how many leaders of the Moslem faith will stand up to Iran and its terrorist surrogates and to Al Quada.
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Why dont we lets see for a change, and see how many of you follower of democracy will stand up to your bush and blair for starting a war on lies, lets see also if the military of not so great anymore britain stand up to blair and charge him for treason, treason against the military...unless you show us what you can stand up to and not just go along making more excuses, you have no right ask or even request leaders of moslem faith to show you anything..If you want to lead the world, then grab the chance and stand up or for ever be quiet..
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144 colonel
"Why dont we lets see for a change, and see how many of you follower of democracy will stand up to your bush and blair for starting a war on lies, lets see also if the military of not so great anymore britain stand up to blair and charge him for treason"
I and many others would be delighted to see both Bush and Blair take the stand to actually get the facts about the start of the Iraq War.
However we do not live in a mioitary dictatorship (thankfully) so the idea that the army will rise against him is a non-starter.
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However we do not live in a mioitary dictatorship (thankfully) so the idea that the army will rise against him is a non-starter.
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Did you know that there are more than one way(the way mentioned by you) the military can hold blair accountable, go to court against him, act of treason is an act of treason.Before people call blair's war a just war, he should be held accountable..Show us that democracy is more than once every five year body count ritual..On the other hand, by not doing anything against blair, it just supports that democracy is just another corrupt system..blair, bush, obama, karzai..
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ref #168
"The hotest year in the last 100 was not 1998 it was 1934."
The most devastating hurricane hit U.S (Galvestone) in 1915. :-)
BTW After "Katrina" we've been authoritatively told that "because of the man-caused global warming from now on powerful hurricanes will be much more frequent" unless, of course, we cough up muchos dineros.
Well, check the statistics for the last couple of hurricane seasons and judge for yourselves.
And Einstein claimed that "God is sophisticated but not malicious"?
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ref #168
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Unless you are some kind of nostradamus, you cannot know what post number 168 would be....So what I want to know is, are you reincarnation of nostradamus?
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