Trying to persuade Americans take the long view by conserving or putting off that trip to Wal-Mart simply won't work, not when we live in a society where people will use two-dollars worth of gas to drive across town to a station that is selling it for two cents a gallon less than everyone else. It's the way we're wired. Given the choice between short-term gain and the greater good, we'll take short-term gain everytime.
Posted by PretzelsOne at September 24, 2007 09:02 AMAl Gore himself has admitted that should Americans stop producing CO2 entirely. China and India would still produce enough to continue the warming process. Nice try, those light bulbs just don't cut it.
Posted by peter at September 24, 2007 09:25 AMThanks for this excellent post on the most pressing issue of our time. Every "informed" person on the Right I've ever met parrots this "India n' China" argument. The propaganda is working.
But as a minor quibble, I have a hard time listening to Bill Clinton gas on about climate change policy and its importance. He did worse than nothing on the issue, he stuffed a sock in everyone's mouth and allowed the situation to get much worse without saying a word about it.
Another reason to question our headlong rush into the Team Clinton Dynasty.
...or set the example...
This administration set an example different from, say, Mussolini? Nope.
It's the "peter principle", and this is the example the "peters" present. Unfortunately, their level of incompetence includes sex with children, denying children health care, death and destruction, and leading by an example they can't comprehend and never exhibit.
Posted by phidipides at September 24, 2007 09:37 AMEvery breath you take expels CO2 Peter. Maybe you could cut back on that, I'm sure it would help a little.
Lets try a math example. My truck can carry 2000 pounds of stuff. Pete, Han, and Jawa are filling it up with drums of toxic waste for me to take to the nearest superfund site for disposal, i.e. dumping in the middle of the night.
It's got 1800 lbs already, and Pete, coz he's so smart, puts another 100 lb barrel in, figures one more from Han and Jawa should top me off. Gee, but they do and I go over the payload limit, but it's a Toyota so it can handle a bit more than they say. But Pete is smart and figures it can take a little more, so in goes another 100, and then one from the others and now the tires won't handle the load and the truck sits there.
Now, if Pete the genius had stopped with that first last barrel, then when Jawa and Han had loaded me with theirs, I could have taken off with the 2000 lbs and made my midnight run before they dumped even more on me.
Get it?
Posted by Duckman GR at September 24, 2007 10:12 AMWe have to get used to the idea that we only have half a party willing to work for those endangered critters running frantically around; called constituents I believe. Glenn Greenwald has an illuminating and damning profile of Diane Feinstein on his blog. he makes the inescapable point that many of the "Leaders" in the Beltway Party, R or D are actually beholden to each other, not the rubes who voted for them. Diane's current husband is a big defense contractor. Dingleberry has ALWAYS been the tool of the ever-dininishing auto industry, Biden is a handkerchief for Insurance and banking, generally Dodd as well, Lieberman for AIPAC, Insurance and sanctimony, Who knows about Hillary, Barack Bill and John. I do think we can count on Dennis.
The point is that the most entrenched Democrats and therefore, the most powerful ones, with a few exceptions, are traveling in the same social and economic circles with the businessmen and power brokers. They can not be blindly trusted will not likely be helpful.
The genius of the American political system is that there are 50 quasi-independent "political laboratories" where ideas can be tried and movements can begin. We've just seen the courts clear the way, maybe, for states to set their own CAFE standards and most of the most populous ones are already trying to do it.
Prying the political limpets of the body politic in Washington will be a long and arduous task, perhaps generational. I suggest we find state level programs that are being tested and work to make them models for A New Way Forward.
Oh, and elect Al Gore.
Posted by DeminNewJ at September 24, 2007 12:31 PM