Obscene quote

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

It is very difficult for me to become interested in elective politics, but when I see a quote like the following from a Presidential candidate, I get the willies:

"We can't drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times ... and then just expect that other countries are going to say OK."

You can read it here.

Since when did Karl Marx start becoming a speech-writer for USA Presidential candidates?

Obscene.

Disgusting.

Arrrgh...

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

I hope he keeps talking.

--Brant

[Mike11]

Unless of course, Global Warming is a man made problem. In which case the quote makes perfect sense.

[Brant Gaede]

Unless of course, Global Warming is a man made problem. In which case the quote makes perfect sense.

Well. It seems humans are responsible for the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, but at best it's a weak greenhouse gas, especially compared to water vapor. CO2 is beneficial to plant and animal life. In any case, we want to avoid a new ice age, so let's pump out more CO2!

--Brant

[tjohnson]

There is some evidence that as the planet warms up it will begin to release trapped methane in areas that have been frozen for ages. Apparently methane is a very strong greenhouse gas and will multiply the warming effect. The danger with simply pumping CO2 into the atmosphere without any control is that we don't really know what will happen - it is like a gigantic global experiment. If we want to try terra-forming that's one thing, but to do this because of economic reasons is quite another. When things are done for economic reasons, like overfishing for example, people don't stop until it's too late. Laisser-faire economics does not consider things like structural changes to the ecosystem which is why it is not in itself the complete answer to our problems.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Mike,

He is asking Americans to sacrifice not even for the sake of sacrifice (altruism) or for concern about the planet.

He is asking Americans to sacrifice so other countries will like us.

It's a popularity contest he thinks America can win.

You think that makes perfect sense?

I don't.

I refuse to give up an SUV if I want one, eat food I don't want to eat and in less quantities I do not choose according to the dictates of others and live too cold or too hot in my day-to-day affairs just so some German or Italian I never met will like me better.

I prefer to have my family and cherished friends like me better when I bother to worry about that.

Michael

[georgedonnelly]

I read that too, and had a similar reaction.

Given that McCain is simply a liar (e.g.

) and a lot of people seem to think we all need to pull together to make a plan work (see Road to Serfdom), we will probably get Obama, even if he does keep talking so openly.

Obama ignores the fact that the emissions from these energy uses constitute people dumping their trash on other people's property. It's a property-rights issue.

People think the USA is so much better than the rest of the world, an example, so he is appealing to that false pride that people like to prop themselves up on as a way to get people to reduce their energy use.

I don't think he is worried about other countries liking us as much as he sees this as a collective property rights issue. In other words, the collective emissions of the USA will pollute the collective lands of other countries.

We can drive our SUVs, eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times no matter what other persons say, as long as we do not dump the resulting waste materials into shared resources like the atmosphere or private property, or demand other persons help us pay for these luxuries.

[Brant Gaede]

There is some evidence that as the planet warms up it will begin to release trapped methane in areas that have been frozen for ages. Apparently methane is a very strong greenhouse gas and will multiply the warming effect. The danger with simply pumping CO2 into the atmosphere without any control is that we don't really know what will happen - it is like a gigantic global experiment. If we want to try terra-forming that's one thing, but to do this because of economic reasons is quite another. When things are done for economic reasons, like overfishing for example, people don't stop until it's too late. Laisser-faire economics does not consider things like structural changes to the ecosystem which is why it is not in itself the complete answer to our problems.

Over fishing is a big problem, like the use of gigantic drift nets that sweep the ocean clean. I don't know what's to be done about that in a free market economy. There is no control that's going to work with CO2, not with China building coal-fired electricity plants as fast as it can. But we do know what has happened with CO2 re global warming: nothing. The gradual warming since the Little Ice Age started long before the elevation of CO2. It now appears that there has been no discernable warming for the last ten years and we may soon have some cooling. The much warmer climate of a thousand years ago didn't result in environmental catastrophe. Climate is always changing. I'm glad you think laissez faire is some kind of an answer "to our problems," even if not a "complete" one.

I'm not sure how methane could "multiply the warming effect" if there isn't one to multiply.

--Brant

[georgedonnelly]

Over fishing is a big problem, like the use of gigantic drift nets that sweep the ocean clean. I don't know what's to be done about that in a free market economy.

In a free market economy, perhaps someone would own that stretch of the ocean, and would sell the rights to fish there with certain limits that he would enforce.

Over-use of a resources seems to happen when there is no owner of the resources, or the owner is a government that is the equivalent of an absentee landlord.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Property rights are only valid within a social structure. No society, there is no property to speak of.

The whole world is your oyster.

Whenever someone speaks of advancing property rights to the ocean, they are speaking of advancing that society and body of laws to the ocean as well.

We divide airwaves according to how they are measured, not the physical space where they sound. One measures the ocean not only by physical location but also by tides, etc., so I imagine these things will become factored in over time. It might be that tide rights will arise and need to be contended with along with physical space if humans can find a practical use for them.

Michael

[Chris Grieb]

With the Obama quote people are starting to compare him to Jimmy Carter. The sad thing is John McCain is no Ronald Reagan.

[georgedonnelly]

Steve Kubby at the LP debate just said something relevant to the overfishing issue.

Consumer action.

You inform the consumer, mount a campaign saying that the consumer will not accept a product that is produced through overfishing.