Chuck52 said:
Bird,You did absolutely nothing wrong. Your post was apolitical.
I agree completely. I would also say, taken as a whole this thread has been civil and educational
Global warming, with or without capitals, should not be viewed as a political subject.
I could agree with this in principle. The fact is, that boat has sailed. Global Warming is now a globally political hot potato. ( Is Dan Quail around? I'm not sure I spelled potatoe correctly....how's that for balance?). There are too many people on both sides of the issue with political and ideological investments in it. It is almost impossible (or even reasonable) to discuss the issue without considering those investments. But, as I said, for a bunch of weekend warrior tractor jockeys we're doing a pretty good job of it.
I think the thread has gone OK. Only two on my list of potential candidates for snide remarks have been hit so far. Not bad for this group. Chuck
We're all big enough to shrug off a snide remark or two aren't we?
I would like to throw a couple of things in the mix that I think worthwhile to consider. First, the nuclear issue. Nuclear energy was very methodically and successfully stifled in this country by left leaning environmentalists. I doubt there would be much debate about that. And god forbid that I point at the Europeans with anything but contempt but they have handled nuclear energy quite well. In any case, fast forward, and you have the very same type of people if not
the very same people telling us that we must now break our dependance on fossil fuel because we are going to fry in our own atmosphere. They killed nuclear energy which for all practical purposes hooked our wagon to the two headed monster, dependance on foreign energy and the middle east. They also assured that our very own resources (Gulf of Mexico, ANWAR) were off limits and even production (refinerys) were hamstrung. And now all they can suggest, in any real or practical sense, is that we just get along without the energy we need and desire. They have no solution to a monster that they created! Why should I believe them now or even consider trusting their "science". How many times does their science and their advice have to be absolutely wrong and disastrous before we quit believing them?
Second point. We (the US) are not going to be the problem child for long. China, India, the Pacific rim and to a lesser degree Russia, are poised to eclipse us economically and industrially. (They will probably eclipse us militarily as they form tacit allegiances with our terrorist enemies upon whose rock our ship has foundered.) And rest assured, China, India, Russia and the Pacific rim have no interest in environmentalism. It is their turn to grow and conquer and prosper. We can wring our hands and gaze at our navels and bask in self contempt about how bad we have been to the environment but these guys are going to make us look like choir boys. And in this regard, is it even fair for us to tell them that they can't have their day? In the 1800's we raped and pillaged this continent to get to the point we are now. Is it fair for us to tell them they can't do the same thing with
their continent? I think not. It certainly opens us to the charge of hypocrisy anyway.
Which brings me to this final point, which is not my own. A few years ago there was an article in Atlantic Monthly about this. The gist of the article was that no one really knows if global warming is real or if we caused it or not. Given our current addiction to fossil fuel and the ascension of Asia, it makes no difference. Even if we did have the power to affect globle climate, we don't have and won't have the power to fix it. There is no government budget, global economy or global will that has nearly the money or science to fix the problem even if we did cause it. So if its real, we better just learn to deal with it.
I'm planning on buying some ocean front real estate in Asheville, NC.