YouTube - Why Are Republicans Against The Science?
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Re: Climate change could mean the extinction of our species
.....and Gaia will give three exhausted cheers when it finally happens. We don't deserve this place.
Global climate change is the least of our worries compared to the irresponsible who refuse to reform entitlements. When our "government" defaults will our businesses be far behind?
Wow...just fucking wow. This may be the dumbest post ever. You're saying Social Security and Medicare (entitlements is just a CON buzzword meant to demonize them) are going to do more damage than GLOBAL climate change.Quote:
Originally Posted by w1s2x3
Let's see...the first two are perhaps the most successful and beneficial programs the American government has ever produced. They've hugely reduced poverty for our elderly, granting a level of security and dignity in old age. Grandma has a guaranteed income and can actually afford to see a doctor.
Climate change will have severe to cataclysmic effects on the entire planet (that's where the GLOBAL part comes in, lad).
How fucking twisted - or stupid - must you be to make that comparison?
If you choose to believe in a religion so be it, but to force your religious beliefs on the rest of the population is where we draw the line. No other religion is trying to tax the worlds population so there high priests can profit. All the while why they live in lavish palaces, drive 8 suv's and fly around the world in private jets.
Christians don't believe that. You don't believe that. You are willing to ignore the findings of science and to sacrifice the well being of others on the altar of Ayn Rand and her lame-brain religion of libertarianism. You don't believe there's a global climate shift because if there is it might cost money,__we might have to work together to deal with it,__ the extreme conservative, "every man for himself" rational-self-interest approach to governance might not be able to address the problem adequately. But political postures are not scientific arguments; they can settle the issue of what idiots will believe and what nations will decide to do, but they bring us no closer to truth than did the inquisition's trails by ordeal.Quote:
If you choose to believe in a religion so be it, but to force your religious beliefs on the rest of the population is where we draw the line.
Huh?Quote:
Originally Posted by trish
Go tell it on the mountain.Quote:
Originally Posted by Faldur
Have you heard the good news?
Win souls for Christ.
Onward Christian soldiers.
Give yourself to the ministry of the word.
Gay marriage offends God.
Ensoulment occurs at conception.
We are a Christian nation.
Our laws are based on the Ten Commandments.
There should be no Mosque's within four blocks of ground zero.
etcetera, etcetera, et-fucking-cetera.
The Bible instructs Christians to share the gospel. But there is this little thing called free choice, it is completely up to you what you believe. And as a Christian I could really care less what you believe, its YOUR belief.Quote:
Originally Posted by trish
Sexual immorality is a sin, no where does it say Gay marriage offends God. Everyone has to deal with their own sin, or choose to ignore it. But I firmly believe God loves all sinners.Quote:
Originally Posted by trish
Correctamudo!Quote:
Originally Posted by trish
Our nation was founded on Christian principles. God's name is present in each and every founding document. You want an interesting read sometime read the founders statement of purpose at Harvard University. http://www.constitution.org/primarys...rstfruits.htmlQuote:
Originally Posted by trish
Think that one is non religious, I don't believe the Nazi's have a right to build a statue dedicated to Hitler near a WWII concentration camp. I don't think the Japanese have a right to build a WWII monument to their Air force near Pearl Harbor. To me its not a religious thing, IMO its just damn poor judgement to want to do it.Quote:
Originally Posted by trish
Tell that to the witches Christians burned at the steak. Tell it to woman who claim the right to make their own medical decisions. Tell it to gays to want to marry but are obstructed by the religious right.Quote:
The Bible instructs Christians to share the gospel. But there is this little thing called free choice, it is completely up to you what you believe.
But hey, not all Christians are extremist assholes, just the ones making the most noise.
This is a beautiful example of how Christian theology is being used by extremist Christians to force and bend others to their will.Quote:
Originally Posted by trish http://www.hungangels.com/vboard/ima...s/viewpost.gif Ensoulment occurs at conception.
Reply by Faldur
Correctamudo!
The war on poverty has only been successful in creating more poverty. 10 Trillion dollars has been spent since the Johnson Administration and the Great Society on "helping the poor." No where has anyone defined "the poor." The measure continues to be relative to those who are successful instead of an absolute "enough." The war on poverty has truly been a war on the "rich." and a desperate attempt to bring everyone to some unobtainable "equal" - which will most likely resemble "1984." Global climate change and other boogieman are being used to help achieve this goal. The math disproves global climate change (not to mention the emails of collusion reported) and the solvency of entitlements as currently structured. By allowing freeloaders to pose as "the poor" these programs become unworkable. People of sound mind and body should be working not participating in leftist plantations of beholden voters for more political insanity.
In the wonderful world of capitalism the worth of any good is determined by market forces alone; to a capitalist there is no such thing as the intrinsic worth of a resource, a good or a human being for that matter...all is determined by the market. Consequently, in any capitalist system there can be no definition of "poor" that is independent of the relative wealth of everyone else. So duh, of course measures of poverty in a capitalist state are going to depend on the buying power of the income of those making the least amount of money, which in turn depends on how much people who are more successful are willing to pay for goods and services.Quote:
The measure continues to be relative to those who are successful instead of an absolute "enough." The war on poverty has truly been a war on the "rich."
We don't need everyone to have everyone to be the economic equal of everyone else, but money is power. When 35-40% of the wealth of a nation belongs to 1% of the people, then roughly 35%-40% of the political power also lies the hands of 1% of the people. The war on poverty is a war for political equality and equal representation in government.
Once again, look at the science. Political argument cannot determine the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter; political argument cannot determine the age of the Earth, nor can it prove global climate change doesn't exist. Indeed and unfortunately, the mathematical models assure us that the global climate has been shifting since the beginning of the industrial age and continues to the present.Quote:
Global climate change and other boogieman are being used to help achieve this goal.
Happy Sunday everybody.. enjoy your worship of choice!
http://blog.balder.org/billeder-blog...l-Gore-500.jpg
Happy trolling anti-science buffoon.Quote:
Happy Sunday everybody.. enjoy your worship of choice!
Not quite at the buffoon level, but thanks Trish..Quote:
Originally Posted by trish
As Keynes said 'In the long run, we're all dead'...isn't planet Earth scheduled to go crispy in a couple of billion years anyway?
In a capitalist system people would be free to contribute to the others without a tyrannical government stealing from people. The current socialist system rewards failure and thereby creates more failure - more people leaching off the government. Your "duh" supports the very definition of the attack on the rich. In any rational program there must be an exit criteria. The "war on poverty" has none - except for the left's need to destroy the rich. It would be so much better for millions of individuals to have a job and to provide for themselves. The war on the rich is a result of the left's vanity for their own intellect. This same intellect that won't admit their mistaken notion on climate change as well.Quote:
Originally Posted by trish
You write of the 40% of the wealth in the hands of the 1% as it is a bad thing? Did they steal it? What about the NOWS, AARPS, ACORNS and the labor unions don't they count in the war for power? It's not one sided.
People are emotional creatures and scaring them into adding to their tax burden only benefits another group of slave masters. My argument against the hoax of global climate change is the need for people to prioritize the problems facing us. A bankrupt country will occur sooner than climate change - if ever. I hear the President has FEMA working at a fevered pitch to process the 50 million environmental refugees as a result of global climate change. The UN announced in 2005 that by 2010 these 50 million people would need a new place to live.
The computer models of global climate change are still based on Lorentz's original work, which unfortunately is a system of chaotic differential equations. The models continue to create incorrect data about the future and still do not predict the past weather even though some data from the past is available. This leads many to be wary of the purposes behind the need for radical changes in our economies for incorrect computer models.
Individual freedom, individual responsibility, individual choice, limited government, diversity of ideas and freedom of speech without fear of reprisal are the tools of a sustainable society.
As you write: "The current socialist system rewards failure and thereby creates more failure...." Exactly. So why did we give the banks trillions and trillions of taxpayer money? I mean, Ron Paul said don't bail them out. Don't reward failure.Quote:
Originally Posted by w1s2x3
Do people realize that the Internet came from the public sector? Places like M.I.T. and the University of Chicago.
It started in the mid 60s. So the cost and risk and ideas were publicly funded. Then circa '95 it was handed over to the private sector.
So, the costs are socialized. And the profits and management are privatized.
Same thing with TV, radio etc. etc. The cost and risk is born/carried by the public and then handed over to the private sector. (I mean, the government does interfere in the economy -- all the time. Think patents. Government intervention. Think the illegality of hard drugs: government intervention. I mean, we have selective free markets.
Think: controlling immigration. Think: Stop signs. Think: taxes.
Okay, we should leave this ALL to the private sector. I mean, who will build the roads, the bridges, schools etc. etc.)
This utopian vision of a no government society strikes me as very frightening. Essentially we'd all be at the mercy of unaccountable corporate entities. I mean, no democracy whatsoever. No unions.
At times this debate seems idiotic. I mean, who controls the government? Big and powerful corporations. Who does the government serve? Well, big and powerful corporations. Governments serve power. And the most powerful institutions in our society are corporations. The fact is big business want big government. For themselves, to serve their interests. And not the interest of the old widow down the street.
And now to quote Noam Chomsky at some length: 'Returning to the charges against "greedy bankers," in fairness, we should concede that they have a valid defense. Their task is to maximize profit and market share, in fact that's their legal obligation. If they don't do it, they'll be replaced by someone who will. These are institutional facts, as are the inherent market inefficiencies that require them to ignore systemic risk: the likelihood that transactions they enter into will harm the economy generally. They know full well that these policies are likely to tank the economy, but these externalities, as they are called, are not their business; and cannot be, not because they are bad people, but for institutional reasons. It is also unfair to accuse them of "irrational exuberance," to borrow Alan Greenspan's brief recognition of reality during the artificial tech boom of the late '90s. Their exuberance and risk-taking was quite rational, in the knowledge that when it all collapses, they can flee to the shelter of the nanny state, clutching their copies of Hayek, Friedman, and Rand. The government insurance policy is one of many perverse incentives that magnify the inherent market inefficiencies.'
Noam Chomsky sums it up nicely:
YouTube - Noam Chomsky and Bill McKibben on Global Warming
I mention limited government in my comments. The bailouts should never have happened.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ben
The ruling class as represented by George, Bill, George and Barry have bailed out their buddies - businesses. Why does one company get bailed out over another? This flies in the face of the 14th Amendment where legal entities are to be treated equally under the law. If Wall Street and Detroit went out of business someone would have bought them. Free trade has handed us many people who no longer have jobs or low paying jobs.
They were treated equally. That's why TARP went to all the big banks when treasury was only trying to prop up Citigroup. The auto bailout was for the entire industry. Ford refused the money. Ford & GM came back. Chrysler was too far gone & had to sell out.Quote:
Why does one company get bailed out over another? This flies in the face of the 14th Amendment where legal entities are to be treated equally under the law.
From an obituary in The Independent [UK]
Jose Arguelles, who died on 23 March aged 72, was an art historian whose teachings about the Mayan calendar inspired the harmonic convergence event of 1987.
On 16 August 1987, thousands of new agers following the lead of Arguelles gathered at places such as the red rocks of Sedona, Arizona, Serpent Mound in Ohio and the Arthurian town of Glastonbury in England. Arguelles had written The Mayan Factor: Path Beyond Technology, which argued for replacing the Gregorian calendar, said Earth was in the last phases of a galactic beam of light it entered in 3113 BC, and called for meditation to give humanity a chance to enter a new age in 2012
Link: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/ob...s-2269971.html
...But Stavros...
This thread is about the environment & how we live in it. The Maya created an ecological disaster by deforestation. I'm not so sure we should be putting any trust in their prognostications since they didn't see the demise of their own civilization coming.:shrug
Besides: How do any of these so-called "historians", & other assorted "Von Dannekoids", know what the Maya were on about? There's no American version of the Rosetta Stone. Do we really know anything about their mathematics, language, history, or civilization at all?
Oh well... I guess I better get busy if I'm going to have enough crystals & wire pyramid hats to sell up in Sedona next year.
And candles, Hippifried, don't forget the candles...
This will be interesting to some.
Irish-American writer and journalist Alexander Cockburn is far to the left politically. And I mean, far to the left. And: HE DOESN'T BELIEVE IN ANTHROPOGENIC, or man-made, global warming or climate chaos.
At the 2:49 mark he states that the Earth is getting colder. And it has been for 10 years. Remember this is a loony left winger.
YouTube - Alexander Cockburn dumps on nuke loving greens and man made global warming
Alexander Cockburn, a left winger, again is stating: "... the global warmers are the greatest collection of liars in the history of the planet."Quote:
Originally Posted by Ben
Worst Ever Carbon Emissions Leave Climate on the Brink
Exclusive: Record rise, despite recession, means 2C target almost out of reach
by Fiona Harvey
Greenhouse gas emissions increased by a record amount last year, to the highest carbon output in history, putting hopes of holding global warming to safe levels all but out of reach, according to unpublished estimates from the International Energy Agency.
http://www.commondreams.org/sites/co...anada.-007.jpg Economic recession has failed to curb rising emissions, undermining hope of keeping global warming to safe levels. (Photograph: Dave Reede/All Canada Photos/Corbis)
The shock rise means the goal of preventing a temperature rise of more than 2 degrees Celsius – which scientists say is the threshold for potentially "dangerous climate change" – is likely to be just "a nice Utopia", according to Fatih Birol, chief economist of the IEA. It also shows the most serious global recession for 80 years has had only a minimal effect on emissions, contrary to some predictions.
Last year, a record 30.6 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide poured into the atmosphere, mainly from burning fossil fuel – a rise of 1.6Gt on 2009, according to estimates from the IEA regarded as the gold standard for emissions data.
"I am very worried. This is the worst news on emissions," Birol told the Guardian. "It is becoming extremely challenging to remain below 2 degrees. The prospect is getting bleaker. That is what the numbers say."
Professor Lord Stern of the London School of Economics, the author of the influential Stern Report into the economics of climate change for the Treasury in 2006, warned that if the pattern continued, the results would be dire. "These figures indicate that [emissions] are now close to being back on a 'business as usual' path. According to the [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's] projections, such a path ... would mean around a 50% chance of a rise in global average temperature of more than 4C by 2100," he said.
"Such warming would disrupt the lives and livelihoods of hundreds of millions of people across the planet, leading to widespread mass migration and conflict. That is a risk any sane person would seek to drastically reduce."
Birol said disaster could yet be averted, if governments heed the warning. "If we have bold, decisive and urgent action, very soon, we still have a chance of succeeding," he said.
The IEA has calculated that if the world is to escape the most damaging effects of global warming, annual energy-related emissions should be no more than 32Gt by 2020. If this year's emissions rise by as much as they did in 2010, that limit will be exceeded nine years ahead of schedule, making it all but impossible to hold warming to a manageable degree.
Emissions from energy fell slightly between 2008 and 2009, from 29.3Gt to 29Gt, due to the financial crisis. A small rise was predicted for 2010 as economies recovered, but the scale of the increase has shocked the IEA. "I was expecting a rebound, but not such a strong one," said Birol, who is widely regarded as one of the world's foremost experts on emissions.
John Sauven, the executive director of Greenpeace UK, said time was running out. "This news should shock the world. Yet even now politicians in each of the great powers are eyeing up extraordinary and risky ways to extract the world's last remaining reserves of fossil fuels – even from under the melting ice of the Arctic. You don't put out a fire with gasoline. It will now be up to us to stop them."
Most of the rise – about three-quarters – has come from developing countries, as rapidly emerging economies have weathered the financial crisis and the recession that has gripped most of the developed world.
But he added that, while the emissions data was bad enough news, there were other factors that made it even less likely that the world would meet its greenhouse gas targets.
• About 80% of the power stations likely to be in use in 2020 are either already built or under construction, the IEA found. Most of these are fossil fuel power stations unlikely to be taken out of service early, so they will continue to pour out carbon – possibly into the mid-century. The emissions from these stations amount to about 11.2Gt, out of a total of 13.7Gt from the electricity sector. These "locked-in" emissions mean savings must be found elsewhere.
"It means the room for manoeuvre is shrinking," warned Birol.
• Another factor that suggests emissions will continue their climb is the crisis in the nuclear power industry. Following the tsunami damage at Fukushima, Japan and Germany have called a halt to their reactor programmes, and other countries are reconsidering nuclear power.
"People may not like nuclear, but it is one of the major technologies for generating electricity without carbon dioxide," said Birol. The gap left by scaling back the world's nuclear ambitions is unlikely to be filled entirely by renewable energy, meaning an increased reliance on fossil fuels.
• Added to that, the United Nations-led negotiations on a new global treaty on climate change have stalled. "The significance of climate change in international policy debates is much less pronounced than it was a few years ago," said Birol.
He urged governments to take action urgently. "This should be a wake-up call. A chance [of staying below 2 degrees] would be if we had a legally binding international agreement or major moves on clean energy technologies, energy efficiency and other technologies."
Governments are to meet next week in Bonn for the next round of the UN talks, but little progress is expected.
Sir David King, former chief scientific adviser to the UK government, said the global emissions figures showed that the link between rising GDP and rising emissions had not been broken. "The only people who will be surprised by this are people who have not been reading the situation properly," he said.
Forthcoming research led by Sir David will show the west has only managed to reduce emissions by relying on imports from countries such as China.
Another telling message from the IEA's estimates is the relatively small effect that the recession – the worst since the 1930s – had on emissions. Initially, the agency had hoped the resulting reduction in emissions could be maintained, helping to give the world a "breathing space" and set countries on a low-carbon path. The new estimates suggest that opportunity may have been missed.
© 2011 Guardian News and Media Limited
:confused:Why has the name changed from global warming to climate change or has the problem changed
Republican strategist Frank Luntz said Republican politicians should use the term/phrase climate change instead of global warming. Because it's less frightening.Quote:
Originally Posted by russtafa
Global warming, as Luntz says, suggests something that's cataclysmic. Whereas climate change suggests something more gradual.
Language is very important. Especially if you're a politician.
YouTube - ‪Frank Luntz in the Denial Machine (CBC - Fifth Estate)‬‏
"Global Warming" is descriptive of the sort of energy imbalance that is characteristic of the current climate shift. It is also descriptive of the large scale effect of the shift (i.e. melting of ice shelves, glaciers and sea level. It is not so descriptive of the shift in the local weather patterns. In many geographical locations Winters will actually be colder and wetter and the Summers hotter and dryer. Weather will oscillate between extremes. The atmosphere will generally hold more water vapor. So when it rains it will rain hard, but there will also be longer drier periods between rainy seasons as the atmosphere will take longer to reach saturation. I have mostly used the term, "Global Climate Shift" or "Global Climate Change." Some suggest "Global Climate Extreming," though it sounds a bit cumbersome to me. Scientifically, I prefer "Global Warming" because it actually describe[s] the kind of heat imbalance which is the root cause of the shift. I tend to use "Global Climate Shift" when talking to lay-persons for political reasons. Not because it's less scary, but because it's less vulnerable to the inevitable and naive witticisms one hears during a record cold week in the dead of winter or during a fortnight of cold rains in late spring.
Personally I don't find Global Warming, the actual phenomena, all that scary. Either we'll do something about it in time or we won't. Either way it will cost us. It's the price we have to pay for the fossil fuels we've already consumed and continue to consume. Evidently, the world's opinion is that the product was and continues to be worth the price.
"Global warming" rolls off the tongue easier, so thetalking heads glomed onto the one major aspect of what's happening right now as their pet catvh phrase. They need one to talk about almost anything. It just took this long to get them to shut up long enough to pay attention.Quote:
Originally Posted by russtafa
Climate change is a relative term, measured in blocks of years: 50, 100, 500, 1,000 a million and so on. The climate is never really in stasis, so it is always changing, but the politics of the current debate has given the measurement gravitas because the figures are used to compute effects, such as the effects of global warming, based on the belief that we are living through a change which has already seen the mean temperature rise over the last 50-odd years. Global warming will have different effects in the planet's micro-climates, and much of the argument that is raging among politicians and scientists, is either on the macro-historical view that the global warming caused by climate change caused by humans is a myth, or that it is not -if you take the latter position then all of the policy initiatives that have emerged become controversial, because they all cost, and because they are long term measures which, if they work and indeed are based on sound science, will not be confirmed for another 50-100 years or more. You also have the radicals for whom instant action has always been their rallying cry, because if we dont act now, we are all doomed.
I don't have an argument with the general argument that we are living through a warming period, and that it is the generation of carbon emissions since the onset of the industrial revolution that has played a key role. My problem is really with the way that an industry in itself has been created which costs/generates millions, if not billions of $$ a year on non-practical processes such as conferences: similar to the explosion of journals, conferences, and pressure groups that followed the HIV/AIDS crisis in the 1980s. It bothers me because I can't see the point of academics and policy makers burning carbon on flights across the world to attend meetings and conferences they could conduct on the internet.
Crucially, if you take an holistic view of planet earth, and even if you are a climate change sceptic, the real issue that should be engaging everyone is resource management, with water at the top of the list, followed by forests: to give just a few examples: Lima, in Peru, is running out of water, partly due to the increase in population, partly due to the Conquistadores establishing a settlement where there were but meagre sources of water, but far enough from the Inca and other tribes to be safe. The Yemen is another place where water will run out in 10-15 years time. The world is losing forests at an alarming rate, in the northern hemisphere in Siberia, to some extent in Canada although they seem to have a more sensible attitude to it there; it is critical in central Africa where forest clearance for agriculture doesn't make sense because the soil is inadequate, or where human settlement will finally obliterate primates and other species. Indonesia and the Amazon basin are hugely important as the lungs of planet earth, but are being decimated for profit.
The urgency of the challenge to deal sensibly with water is actually of greater practical importance than the short to medium effects of climate change, with the possible exception of low-lying islands; if we cannot manage something so basic, the future looks bleak.
Finally, the major oil companies actually have reduced carbon emissions more than most industries, because they had the capital to do it; coal-fired power stations are far worse. There are solutions to all these problems, they will cost money, but it will be worth it if they can be made to work; and I don't think it needs five years of conferences to agree to it.
Climate is always in flux. What has people worried these days is the speed & intensity of the change. The northwest passage is open. Sea levels are rising measurably. The LA smog is visible from the Colorado River. We're dumping more & more crap into our oceans, which actually provide us with most of our oxygen.
Meanwhile we continue to burn everything we can find as fast as we can. It's a mindset that says short term (single generation) gains & comforts are top of the priority list. I don't see much happening unless we can culturally start evolving past this primitive fire culture we've been stuck in since prehistory. Change the mindset, change the world.
I personally don't give a fuck about climate change because i am very selfish and i don't want to live in a cave because my government say's i should
That's your choice to be selfish. And I don't think anyone is suggesting we all become troglodytes. Are they??? ha! ha!Quote:
Originally Posted by russtafa
It's unrealistic to think we can give up, say, all our technology, our modern lifestyle. It's absurd... for anyone to suggest that.
The likes of Bill McKibben are simply suggesting switching to alternative forms of energy. And, too, it'd bring about competition for the heavily subsidized... and I mean, heavily subsidized fossil fuel industry. We need competition in our markets, as it were. Bringing about more wind, more solar etc... would hopefully bring about that competition.
And, too, the concentration of corporate power -- whether it's Microsoft or Exxon -- isn't healthy for a capitalist society. Capitalism is supposed to be about competition.
What we have is the oil industry being, again, heavily subsidized by the U.S. taxpayers. This isn't capitalism. It's corporatism.
Ron Paul has said we should STOP subsidizing the fossil fuel industry. I agree.
Let's have some competition. Let's stop giving the oil industry an unfair advantage by SUBSIDIZING them.
Ben, I agree that competition is healthy and that it is unfair when one or two firms dominate a amarket, but that would also mean that they contribute a lot of tax revenue to the state and employ a lot of people, even when, as is the case with oil companies who pay billions of $$ into the treasury every year, they employ an army of tax lawyers to reduce it, and have offshore funds as well.
The key point about renewables is that the technology so far, cannot match the scale of oil, gas and coal: you can power a house with solar panels and have so much extra energy you can sell it to the local electricity supplier and make a profit: but you can't power Los Angeles, the same is true with wind power. Until that threshold has been breached, renewables will remain on the fringe, although motor vehicles are probably going to be the first mass-produced commodities using alternative fuels to gasoline. So here's your chance, Ben, to go into engineering or marketing, and be a pioneer in the American tradition...opening up new frontiers...
The thing about fossil fuels is they're cheap. But what happens when, say, oil goes up to $150 a barrel or $200 a barrel or $250 a barrel. (Plus there's a term in economics called externalities. Which is the effect on others in a market transaction.
There are positive externalities. Like, as Milton Friedman pointed out, if you plant, say, a flower garden. (The very rational Milton Friedman did acknowledge that externalities are a serious problem.)
But there are negative ones, too. Like when someone buys a car. The dealer and the buyer are looking for the best deal possible. What they don't take into account is the cost/impact on others. The impact on others is, of course, pollution. Also: gridlock... which leads to more fuel use and thus higher gas prices -- :() There are also fundamental problems with markets. Markets need to keep growing. Well, economics is the only science that believes in perpetual motion. That we can keep growing and growing. Ya know, pollution isn't a problem. Population isn't a problem. Ya know, we can have 10 billion people on the planet. No probs.
Even Bill Clinton, when he left office, said the oil companies have a lock on energy in the United States. There isn't a free market, as it were. And, yes, it's unfair for the government to subsidize a specific industry. I mean, that's not how the market should work. It's corruption -- to the core. (Oh, and I should add: bailing out the banks is not capitalism -- :))
We can -- and should -- have homes that are energy efficient. Okay, I think we all agree that we should reduce our energy consumption. I mean, that has huge pluses: less pollution, reduced energy costs, reduced gas prices -- :)
In the short term, OPEC is committed to raising production to reduce the price of oil, although its members benefit from a staggering inflow of cash when the price goes up, OPEC knows it cannot use oil markets as a hostage -in fact, the emergence of the spot market in the 1970s has given hedge funds/speculators the ability to buy oil futures and inflate the price of oil, as they are doing with food stuffs. The paradox of the 'free market' is that if a player with enough cash wants to, they can buy everything: however even in the temple of capitalism known as the USA, monopolies have been broken: Rockefeller's empire in 1911 being the most famous: should anti-trust legislation break up Wal-Mart? Why are those famous Korean groceries in New York in decline?
In the literal sense of the phrase, the world will never run out of oil and gas, but over the next 50 years the volume of petroleum commercially available at current rates of usage, will decline. There will be no energy revolution, but there will be an evolution -which is why technological advances in renewables is so urgent -moving to biofuels may be part of the answer, but is having a deleterious effect on traditional agriculture and crops. The oil industry did not emerge to dominate energy until the 1960s, even though it began in Pennsylvania in 1859. Between 1859-1969 coal, wood and water were dominant -from 1959-to roughly the 1930s, horses were critical, esp for the military: the Russian front collapsed in 1917 in part because they ran out of horses.
Yes, as individuals we can play our part, but what sounds so simple is so difficult to manage globally; would you really flush your loo just once a day to conserve water? If you have the opportunity to visit Europe, are you going to fly or take the boat? (I am not even sure which of the two is more energy efficient). And so on. The point is not to despair, humans have always had the ability to self-destruct, as well as to innovate our way out of a crisis.
Where are the 50 million global climate change refugees predicted 10 years ago?
The sun is leaving it's peak activity and starting to quiet. We will be burning more oil, coal and natural gas to stay warm.
Can we make these changes in a way that the "ruling class" represented by lefty politicians and their lap dog media have to have the same shortages of resources they want to foist on everyone else - usually through some panel of "experts" at some idiotic international level who are not elected and not accountable to the people they are screwing? They will continue to fly their 757s, ride in limos and drive SUVs.Quote:
Originally Posted by hippifried
President Obama's EPA is about to make coal created electricity go up 50% in price. This will make the electric car owners happy.
What we need is innovation. A leap in energy technology would solve about 80% of the world's problems. Cheap energy would make cheap drinking water directly from the oceans. Engineers are the ultimate conservationists. They want to drive to work in a 100 MPG car because they learn more by building such a car.
We are not stuck in a fire culture. We are in a cheap culture where we want stuff cheap. Cheap crap from China screwed many Americans out of a job. Screwing people at tax time to subsidize an energy solution that is more expensive than oil doesn't work. Changing the culture through conservation arguments is a logical approach and preferred over the "back room of experts"
approach taken with scaremongering on the environment.