How many real and serious national problems can you list? And how many obvious solutions can you come up with literally off the top of your head? Now an experiment: list how many of them are being worked on by our DC elites or even discussed my our elite media? The answer is none. Why is this? And what can you do about it?
Tag Archives: global warming
Real Estate Near The Gulf
Fumes.
Right. If you live anywhere near the Gulf the wind is going to be blowing nasty and worst-case toxic fumes in your direction. If you live in Florida it is going to be terrible and possibly even uninhabitable. Yes we are talking refugees in large numbers if this oil leak continues.
I was already concerned with the effect of global warming on real estate prices when it suddenly sinks in that a lot of land is going to be underwater. Seriously, would YOU buy a house anywhere in a coastal area that has an altitude lower than maybe 30 feet? One of these days everyone is going to realize what that means – all at the same time.
But now, an entire region is going to be covered in (best-case) terrible stink.
Nine Scientific Errors In Gore’s Film?
You may have been hearing that a British court ruled that there are “nine scientific errors in Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth”
Nope. Of course not. Just more of the usual right-wing propaganda.
Deltoid: An ‘error’ is not the same thing as an error,
A UK High Court judge has rejected a lawsuit by political activist Stuart Dimmock to ban the showing of Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth in British schools. Justice Burton agreed that
“Al Gore’s presentation of the causes and likely effects of climate change in the film was broadly accurate.”
There were nine points where Burton decided that AIT differed from the IPCC and that this should be addressed in the Guidance Notes for teachers to be sent out with the movie.
GO read the rest.
Al Gore WILL Be Smeared
If Al Gore Is awarded the Nobel Prize he WILL be smeared. There is no question about it.
On May 15, 2007, we wrote a post titled, We Guarantee Al Gore Will Be Attacked Next Week, We Absolutely Guarantee It. We wrote,
Al Gore has a new book coming out next week, titled, The Assault On Reason.
Because he is standing up, telling the truth and because he simply is a Democrat and progressive leader, Al Gore will be smeared mercilessly by the right-wing smear machine. He will be ridiculed, made fun of and mocked. They will tease and make fun of him.
They will rush to say that he is bitter about 2000, crazy, insane, pontificating and out of touch.
They will bring up his utility bills and the boards he is a member of.
They will talk about his kiss with Tipper, her crusade against vulgar rap lyrics.
They will bring up his weight and the beard. And say it’s all about 2008.
Fox Attack Game Show Video
Reporting Live Earth News Or Shaping Opinion?
Organizers say Live Earth’s internet audience may have been as many as two billion people*. But how is it reported today? Earth underwhelmed by environment pop extravaganza ,
They rocked the world, but as the clean-up at nine climate change gigs around the globe begins, many wonder if the galaxy of pop stars did much to change it.
U.S. and British media were generally underwhelmed on Sunday by Live Earth, the mega-concert organized by former U.S. vice president and green campaigner Al Gore, which, though built on the model of Live Aid and Live 8, created a less positive buzz.
Murdoch’s Times of London had this ready, Live Earth fails to pack large-scale punch, and Murdoch’s Fox News was ready with this one, reminiscent of the energy-use smear on Al Gore that came out the day after he won the Oscar for An Inconvenient Truth (see part 2 also), ‘Green’ Means Money, Not Environmentalism to Madonna,
Madonna had better clean up her business before she starts cleaning up the world.
… Madonna, who seems to be on top of all her many business endeavors, has actually invested about $2.7 million dollars in companies that are creating the destruction that Live Earth is trying to raise awareness about. She has invested in several companies named as the biggest corporate polluters in the world.
.. The companies include Alcoa, Ingersoll Rand, Weyerhaeuser, and several others associated with oil exploration, digging, and refining including British Petroleum, Schlumberger (a chief competitor of Halliburton), Devon Energy, Peabody Energy, Emerson Electric, Kimberly Clark and Weatherford International.
… one has to wonder why Madonna has put even a penny into the company if she has any feeling for environmental causes. But that’s an inconvenient question for the material girl as she prepares to close the Live Earth show live from London.
Nice try, but people do understand the problem and are going to continue to pressure the government for action.
*P.S. MSN reports 9 million streaming, AOL reports 5 million. AND,
Control Room, producer of Live Earth and Live 8, said it found that the on-demand streams in the days after the Live 8 had the most impact, especially after clips were passed around by e-mail.
Live 8 was streamed by users more than 100 million times in the six weeks following the shows.
Live Earth is predicted to be three times bigger with organizers expecting more than 80 percent of the viewership will be on-demand in the days after the event.
So two billion seems high, but one heck of a lot of people did and will tune in for sure.
Op-Ed Or Op-Lie?
By Dave Johnson and James Boyce of Smoking Politics
What could be more important than dealing with the threat of global warming? Exposing the companies and groups that continue to try and distort the issue for financial gain and holding the media accountable for their role and complicity in the continuing distortion of the truth.
Let’s be perfectly clear. Global warming is a scientific fact – it is not a political issue. But a few corporations are bringing in incredibly high profit margins from the status quo. These profits depend on Americans and people worldwide burning more and more oil instead of working to put less carbon into the air. So they pollute the “marketplace of ideas,” deceiving people by spreading the lie of doubt that global warming is a real problem.
Just as Big Tobacco was willing to spend hundreds of millions of dollars denying for decades that cigarettes caused cancer while hundreds of thousands died from their product each year — spreading the same lie that the science was not clear — so too is Big Oil willing to invest heavily in the global warming deniers.
“Doubt is our product” said the tobacco companies, and citizens continued to die. Now doubt is the product again – and the planet continues to grow hotter.
Gore Accused Of Scaring Children
Shorter version – Conservatives tried to soothe people, telling them not to be afraid after 9/11, but Al Gore is scaring people about global warming, which scientists don’t even agree is real. No, this is not a joke.
Emily Yoffe – Gloom and Doom in A Sunny Day,
It doesn’t seem sustainable to expect people to remain terrified by such a disinterested, often benign — it was so nice eating out on the patio! — and even unpredictable enemy. (I understand we’re the enemy, but the executioner is the weather.) Recall that the experts told us last year would be a record-setting hurricane season, but the series of Katrinas never materialized.
… It’s also hard to believe assertions that the science on the future of our climate is settled when climate scientists can’t agree about the present — or the past (there is contention about the dates, causes and even the existence of the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age that followed). Now, Gore and others say that Katrina was a product of global warming and that we can expect more and bigger storms. But there is actually brisk scientific debate over the role global warming plays — if any — in the creation of hurricanes.
OK, we know that Exxon is paying $10K a pop for stories that spread doubt about global warming. And here it is in the Washington Post.
A Global Warming Suggestion: Fewer Babies
In the movie, An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore says that we are “entering a period of consequences.” (No, this isn’t another Housing Bubble Subprime Mortgage post). And yes, the world is beginning to understand the consequences of global warming. From today’s news story, Global warming story hits critical mass,
The next section of an Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, focusing on global warming impacts, is due to be released at a meeting in Belgium next month. A draft version of the report says that, within a few decades, hundreds of millions of people will face water shortages, while tens of millions will be flooded out of their homes. Tropical diseases like malaria will spread, pests like fire ants will thrive and by 2050, polar bears will mostly be found in zoos. By 2080, hundreds of millions of people could face starvation, according to the IPCC draft report.
But here’s the thing – the worst of these consequences are not immediate. Yes, hundreds of millions of people will face water shortages and starvation by 2080 — but only if those hundreds of millions of people are alive in the first place.
What am I getting at? One solution to the crisis is for people to stop having so many babies. We’re already using up the fisheries. The cattle being raised to feed so many meat-eaters is as big a problem as the cars we’re all driving.
There is plenty of time between now and 2080 to dramatically cut the population of the world by simply limiting how many babies we’re all having. If there are fewer people around then fewer people face starvation, disease, dislocation and the rest of the consequences.
Edwards Campaign Announces Will be Carbon Neutral
Edwards again doing the right thing: John Edwards for President-Edwards Increases Efforts To Fight Global Warming; Announces Campaign Will Be Carbon Neutral,
As part of his efforts to combat global warming, Senator John Edwards announced today that he will make his campaign “carbon neutral.” Edwards believes global warming is one of the great challenges facing America and the world and that we can all take immediate action to decrease the amount of carbon we produce. By conserving energy and purchasing carbon offsets, the Edwards campaign will offset the carbon emitted by Edwards and his staff’s campaign travel, and the energy used in his campaign headquarters and field offices.
“Global warming is an emergency and we can’t wait until the next president is elected to take action,” said Edwards. “Each of us can take responsibility in small ways to make a big difference. I encourage all Americans to conserve energy in their own homes and workplaces and help fight global warming.”
More Bad Global Warming News Coming
Take this seriously.
Climate change: scientists warn it may be too late to save the ice caps | Climate change,
A critical meltdown of ice sheets and severe sea level rise could be inevitable because of global warming, the world’s scientists are preparing to warn their governments. New studies of Greenland and Antarctica have forced a UN expert panel to conclude there is a 50% chance that widespread ice sheet loss “may no longer be avoided” because of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Such melting would raise sea levels by four to six metres, the scientists say. It would cause “major changes in coastline and inundation of low-lying areas” and require “costly and challenging” efforts to move millions of people and infrastructure from vulnerable areas. The previous official line, issued in 2001, was that the chance of such an event was “not well known, but probably very low”.
Translating for Americans: four to six “metres” is about 13 to 20 feet. This report says the oceans WILL rise. EVERY coastal city in the world WILL be another New Orleans. Take this seriously.
Two weeks ago I was at a meeting of a committee of the City of Menlo Park, where they were discussing whether to join the Mayor’s Climate Protection Agreement. This is an attempt to bypass the Republican-controlled federal government and start working to reduce carbon emissions. I suggested that if they want to move this idea along, they should distribute maps showing which parts of Menlo Park will be underwater and when. (Menlo Park is on the San Francisco Bay.)
YOU, yes, YOU can help by checking whether YOUR city is part of the Mayor’s Climate Protection Agreement. If they are, ask how you can help. If they are not, start working to get them to join up.
President Bushes “Ozoned” Al Gore. And The World Is Paying The Price.
Co-written with James Boyce
It’s a day of celebration and sadness for those of us who follow the global warming issue. On one hand, Al Gore’s movie, “An Inconvenient Truth” received a well-deserved Oscar nomination. Congratulations to all involved but especially Laurie David and Lawrence Bender for their wonderful work in bring the Vice-President’s presentation to the big screeen.
However, tragically, today the summary and highlights of the definitive report on global warming was leaked. This 1,600 page report will showcase once and for all, that global warming is real, we are causing it and “the future is dire.”
So how is it, one might ask, that we didn’t take global warming seriously earlier? Especially when we have an an advocate like Al Gore on the national stage.
It’s because the right wing ozoned Al Gore. They mocked him for his concern. The called him “Ozone Man.” Like pathetic schoolyard bullies, they picked fun at him, made him uncool.
Who led the charge?
In 1992, the first President Bush:
“This guy is so far out in the environmental extreme we’ll be up to our necks in owls and outta work for every American.”
In 2000, the second President Bush said of Al Gore
He “likes electric cars. He just doesn’t like making electricity.”
So when President Bush stands up and talks about global warming, think of Al Gore. He stood up fifteen, twenty years ago, and got mocked for his courage and vision.