environment: assholes corporate irresponsibility EPA idiots
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Year 3, Month 7, Day 9: IT’S NOT FAIR!!!!!!
The Detroit News reports that the National Association of Manufacturers HAZ A MAJOR SAD about the EPA ruling:
The National Association of Manufacturers – which filed suit to block the rules, as did the Michigan Manufacturers Association, expressed disappointment with the ruling.
“The EPA’s decision to move forward with these regulations is one of the most costly, complex and burdensome regulations facing manufacturers. These regulations will harm their ability to hire, invest and grow,” said NAM president and CEO Jay Timmons. “By moving forward, the EPA is adding to the mounting uncertainty facing manufacturers of all sizes.”
Coming from the Party of Individual Responsibility, this should be a surprise. But Individual Responsibility only applies to Individuals, don’cha know. Corporate Responsibility is a Blow Against Freedom! Sent June 28:
The National Association of Manufacturers’ response to the Appeals Court ruling upholding EPA authority to regulate greenhouse emissions demonstrates an extraordinary lack of confidence in American initiative and ingenuity. Repetitively claiming that regulations hurt industry’s ability to “hire, invest, and grow,” they sound like a child whining about having to clean up his room.
The core of the ruling is extremely simple: the Environmental Protection Agency has the right to, well, protect the environment. And at the moment, one of the biggest threats to the planetary environment is climate change, a very slow natural process that’s been accelerated drastically by human emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases. To be sure, EPA regulation of GHGs will make it harder for industries to be wasteful polluters. Good. I’m pretty sure American manufacturers can figure out how to be clean and efficient; those which cannot should be allowed to fail.
Warren Senders
environment Politics: denialists idiots rising sea levels timescale US Geological Survey
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Year 3, Month 7, Day 7: History Is A Bunk Bed
More on rising East coast seas, from the Andover (MA) Eagle-Tribune:
If you think there are flooding problems in the region now, just wait — it’s going to get a whole lot worse, according to a study released Sunday by the U.S. Geological Survey.
Scientists have found that our coastline is part of a unique, 600-mile-long “hot spot” along the Atlantic Coast where sea levels are rising at a significantly faster rate than the world as a whole — three to four times faster. The hot spot stretches down the Atlantic Coast from north of Boston to North Carolina.
“Flooding right now is an annoyance, but it will be more of an annoyance and bad enough that you’ll think twice about parking your car in the driveway if there’s a storm coming and it’s the spring tide,” said Peter Howd, a co-author on the study and a contracted oceanographer with the U.S. Geological Survey.
This letter was inspired by the comments (q.v.). Sent June 26:
When human society pays attention to time spans larger than an individual lifetime, that’s called “civilization.”
For a quick and dirty education in the problems inherent in short-term thinking, watch climate-change denialists’ reactions to the U.S. Geological Survey’s study showing drastic sea-level rises along the East coast. While a few may stubbornly cling to their repeatedly-debunked conspiracy theories (Al Gore’s gonna confiscate your SUV!), the majority will loudly assert that since the problems are predicted to happen over the next hundred years, it’s pointless to worry about them.
Climate change is a significant threat already, and it’s projected to get a lot worse within our lifetimes. Those who use cheap faux-populist rhetoric against the dedicated work of climate scientists undermine the civility essential to public discourse; those who would bequeath our posterity a ruined and inhospitable planet are choosing to opt out of the multi-millennium project of human civilization.
Warren Senders
environment Politics: denialists idiots Republican obstructionism rising ocean levels rising sea levels
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Year 3, Month 7, Day 6: Keep Your Eyes Wide
The Boston Globe:
As temperatures are projected to climb, polar ice to melt, and oceans to swell over the coming decades, Boston is likely to bear a disproportionate impact of rising sea levels, government scientists report in a new study.
The seas along the East Coast from North Carolina to New England are rising three to four times faster than the global average, and coastal cities, utilities, beaches, and wetlands are increasingly vulnerable to flooding, especially from storm surges, according to the US Geological Survey study published Sunday.
“Cities in the hot spot, like Norfolk, New York, and Boston, already experience damaging floods during relatively low-intensity storms,” said Asbury Sallenger, a Geological Survey oceanographer and lead author of the study in the journal Nature Climate Change. “Accelerated sea-level rise,” he said, will add to “the height that storm surges and breaking waves reach on the coast.”
Figured the times were ripe for a little bit of old Prophet Bob. Sent June 25:
The times they are indeed a’changin’. Climate-change denialists must be finding it difficult to cling to their bizarre conspiracy theories in the face of the latest reports from the U.S. Geological Survey, predicting that rising ocean levels will radically alter the East coast of the United States over the next few decades, a forecast entirely congruent with other scientific analyses of the effects from a melting Arctic ice cap.
The insurance industry’s changing its coverage model to account for damages caused by climate change; the American military’s developing new strategic protocols for a post-greenhouse-effect world; US intelligence agencies are trying to anticipate the geopolitical impact of global warming. These bastions of liberalism are all following Bob Dylan’s advice to “…admit that the waters around you have grown, and accept it that soon you’ll be drenched to the bone.”
When will our Senators and Congressmen “please heed the call”?
Warren Senders
environment music Politics: humor idiots Republicans
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Colbert takes on North Carolina…
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environment: denialists idiots rising sea levels
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Year 3, Month 7, Day 3: Today Is The Tomorrow You Worried About Yesterday
The Appleton Post-Crescent (WI) has a shrill editorial from a chap named Howard Brown, titled, “Commentary: Climate change isn’t fictional.” Indeed:
Is it just me, or has it been a little warm around here lately? Or warmer earlier? The early and unusually mild spring here in Wisconsin may be nature’s way of reminding us that the clock is ticking on climate change and we need to take action before it’s too late.
While stationed in Kangerlussuac, Greenland, 50 years ago, I noted my airbase was 4 miles west of the Russell Glacier grinding down from the ice cap. Looking at today’s satellite images, this glacier has retreated to the east toward the ice cap, easily noted from the satellite. The retreat averages 1,000 feet per year, producing a torrent of melt water that flows down the fjord and to the sea.
Glacial retreat is one indicator that global warming is taking its toll. Today, in more populated areas of the earth, disappearing glaciers are responsible for drought, loss of irrigation water and less drinking water. As much as 54 cubic miles of ice disappear each year in Antarctica, 24 cubic miles per year in Greenland. As this ice melts, ocean levels rise and coastal regions flood.
Read the comments for the full flavor. SOS. Sent June 22:
When we listen to climate-change denialists, we hear it over and over again: while the planet’s climate is changing, there’s no reason to worry; it’s all happened before, and anyway, there’s no way humans’ greenhouse emissions could be involved.
Well, Earth’s climate has indeed been changing for billions of years. But in general, those changes have happened over many thousands of years, giving ecosystems a chance to adapt. Fossil evidence and the geological record strongly suggest that when an external event accelerated those slow transformations, the resulting climate change was catastrophic for many of the world’s inhabitants (65 million years ago, an asteroid hit the Earth — and the dinosaurs lost the world they’d lived in for eons). The overwhelming climatological consensus is that we stand on the brink of a similarly abrupt and equally devastating shift.
With our civilization now having transformed almost fifty percent of the planet’s surface, it’s increasingly apparent that humanity has inadvertently crafted its very own asteroid. If we wish to sustain our species over the tumultuous environmental disruptions promised for the next ten thousand years, we can no longer afford the luxury of denial. The dinosaurs probably thought they’d live forever, too.
Warren Senders
environment Politics: assholes economics idiots sustainability
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Year 3, Month 6, Day 29: There’s A Reason I Don’t Buy Those Shitty Chisels At The Borg
Sigh. The Marysville, CA Appeal-Democrat offers us a confirmation of the old saw: another day, another dullard.
Enjoy:
Real life is foiling climate alarmists’ schemes to transform the world into a green Utopia. About 130 world leaders will gather in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, this week to establish more rules, regulations and transfers of wealth, ostensibly to eradicate poverty and protect the environment.
This is yet another U.N. attempt to advance its war against what first was demonized as “global warming,” then “climate change” — when temperatures flattened out. The movement now frames its mission as “sustainable development.”
Make no mistake, what they hope to sustain is the same tired attempt to move mountains of wealth from nations that create it to nations that don’t, along the way enriching government budgets and lining pockets of facilitators, opportunists and cronies. Think Solyndra.
Changing the real world into an imaginary green holy land has run up against reality. Europe is in economic crisis. Emerging economies in China, Brazil, India and Russia grow more resistant to underwriting costs that would retard their economies.
The conference is a misguided movement directed at an inappropriate demon. If climate zealots got their way, they would retard living conditions, not improve them.
With a 250-word limit, I let myself go a bit. Sent June 18:
Leave aside the question of whether it’s really a pejorative to describe people concerned about the survival of our civilization as “climate alarmists” (everyone agrees that fire alarms are a good thing). Leave aside the fact that the change in terminology from “global warming” to “climate change” was suggested and promulgated by Republican strategist Frank Luntz as a way to make the problem seem less threatening (and only accidentally coinciding more closely with reality).
Let’s look for a moment at your editorial’s outrage at the idea of “sustainability.” Everyone knows: you can’t live beyond your means. Spending more than you make can also be described as “wasting your resources.” Citizens of wealthy nations currently waste more resources than those of poor nations; recognition of this fact is not reflexive anti-capitalism, but a willingness to describe reality clearly.
The common sense underlying our willingness to buy better tools, sturdier clothes, and healthier food even if they’re a bit more expensive (since we save money in the long run) has a name: “sustainability.” With seven billion people on the planet, it’s sensible to figure out ways to stop wasting resources while reducing the sum total of human misery. That’s called “sustainable development.”
While there are undoubtedly “profiteering opportunists” running “sustainability” scams, it’s hard to compare them with the real profiteers: giant oil companies which garner astronomical returns from encouraging all of us to burn their products without regard for the consequences.
Warren Senders
If it’s your birthday today, happy birthday.
environment Politics: assholes conspiracy theorists false equivalency idiots Republicans
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Year 3, Month 6, Day 28: Greedy Old Plutocrats
The Tulsa World’s Associate Editor, Mike Jones, is a tad shrill, in an article titled, “Can’t We Agree To Do Something About Climate Change?”:
In Virginia, it can’t even be referred to as “climate change.” It is now “recurrent flooding.” That is the term the Virginia Legislature came upon in order to agree to even discuss the problems plaguing that state.
In the last 100 years, the Virginia coast has seen a 14-inch rise in sea level. That, combined with some wicked rain, has caused the flooding. Whether the Virginians eventually settle their squabble and attempt to solve their problems remains to be seen. It does, however, illustrate the problem the entire country has when it comes to “global warming,” “climate change” or “recurrent flooding.” We can’t even decide what we want to call it.
There are two very stubborn sides in this debate. There is the great majority of scientists, including those with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, who believe that the Earth is changing, getting warmer, and believe that humans have something to do with it.
While the phrase “climate change” is very much present in the article, the word “Republican” is not. Funny how that should happen, no? Sent June 17:
Many of the obstacles to “doing something about climate change” are beyond our control: we cannot alter the amount of CO2 already in the atmosphere, the amount of heat our oceans have absorbed, or the laws of physics and chemistry. Other aspects of the problem are solvable — in theory.
In theory, the people who’ve promulgated conspiracies about SUV-confiscating environmentalists could wake up one morning and realize they’ve been duped. In theory, conservative politicians who’ve embraced climate-change denial could recognize that their human (as opposed to corporate) constituents are suffering — and decide to do something about it.
But as Yogi Berra famously said, “In theory, theory and practice are the same. In practice, they’re not.” As long as half of America’s political system is controlled by authoritarians who cannot admit error, the reason for our inability to act on climate change can be summed up in three letters: G.O.P.
Warren Senders
environment Politics: assholes denialists idiots Republicans
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Year 3, Month 6, Day 25: What Was It You Wanted, When You Were Kissing My Cheek?
Raise your hand if you think Mitt Romney has changed:
June 13–WASHINGTON — During his first 18 months as governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney spent considerable time hammering out a sweeping climate change plan to reduce the state’s greenhouse gas emissions.
As staff briefed him on possible measures and environmentalists pressed him to act, Romney frequently repeated a central thought, people at those meetings said: That climate change is occurring, that the United States has the resources to handle its vast impact but that low-lying poor countries like Bangladesh would suffer greatly.
“It was like a mantra with him,” said a person who attended those meetings who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the topic. “His Cabinet members would look at him like, ‘What?’ He was the radical in the room.”
Before doing an about-face toward the end of his term as he began to prepare for his first run for president, Romney pushed to close old coal-fired plants, encourage the development of renewable energy and contain sprawl — steps similar to some President Obama has taken.
If Romney weren’t such a flaming asshole, I’d find that story reassuring. But he is such a flaming asshole, so I’m still scared. Sent June 14:
During his tenure as Governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney was distinguished for his readiness to be all things to all people. Given the Bay State’s high percentage of environmentally-conscious voters, it’s not surprising that Romney catered to their concerns. Now that his previous readiness to accept the overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change threatens to alienate him from the ultra-conservatives to whom he must appeal, he’s singing a different tune.
What this demonstrates is not that Romney is a closet environmentalist, but that science means nothing to him unless it serves his electoral ambitions. Climate-change denial is Mr. Romney’s current position of convenience; who knows how many contortions we’ll see over the next few months?
If Mr. Romney saw a house on fire, he’d take a public opinion poll before calling 911. The climate crisis is too crucial an issue to be subsumed by the political maneuvering of a hypocritical presidential aspirant.
Warren Senders
atheism Education environment Politics: assholes denialists idiots morons Republicans
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Year 3, Month 6, Day 24: If There’s A Hole Behind Your Face, Why Not Rent Out The Empty Space?
The STUPID is really thick on the ground in North Carolina. The Charlotte Observer for June 13:
With virtually no debate, the state Senate on Tuesday nixed restricting development on the state’s coast based on global warming science.
Lawmakers passed a bill that restricts local planning agencies’ abilities to use climate change science to predict sea-level rise in 20 coastal counties. The bill’s supporters said that relying on climate change forecasts would stifle economic development and depress property values in Eastern North Carolina.
The bill has sparked outrage in some circles. It was ridiculed this month on the television show “The Colbert Report.” Despite the controversy, it has repeatedly cleared every hurdle in the GOP-led legislature. In the Senate Tuesday, the only comments were a few brief remarks in favor of the measure as a victory of common sense over alarmist research.
The practical result of the legislation would be that for the purposes of coastal development, local governments could only assume that the sea level will rise 8 inches by 2100, as opposed to the 39 inches predicted by a science panel.
This story will never get old. Sent June 13:
It is easy enough to mock the ludicrous attempts of North Carolina politicians to legislate measurement, and certainly the property owners and residents of coastal areas will need something to laugh about after four or five decades of steadily rising sea levels. But it is also important to recognize that this is part of a long-standing battle: ideologically-driven conservative politicians — versus facts and experts.
Republicans have embraced anti-intellectualism with steadily increasing fervor for decades. Science, once extolled as the source of American technological might, is now viewed with fear and suspicion. Nowhere is this more evident than in the GOP’s rejection of climate scientists — whose inconvenient predictions have a habit of turning into inconvenient realities.
A Bush administration official once mocked writer Ron Suskind as a member of the “reality-based community,” noting, “That’s not the way the world really works anymore. We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality.” While the North Carolina legislature has learned Karl Rove’s lesson well, the Atlantic Ocean may not be so obliging.
Warren Senders
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Year 3, Month 6, Day 23: Above Us Only Sky…
Heh. Here’s a head-scratcher, from the Christian Post:
When it comes to the issue of global warming, the label conservative and liberal won’t necessarily help you determine if an evangelical Christian is a proponent or skeptic. Why? Because even within the inner core of conservative evangelical circles people are divided over the issue, with both sides asserting that science is clearly on their side. Take The Christian Post, for example: Dr. Richard Land, CP’s executive editor, is among those who are skeptical that humans tip the scales toward global warming, while Dr. Joel C. Hunter, CP’s senior editorial adviser, believes controlling human behavior may be in order.
Moreover, the prospects for a global decision to control carbon because of warming have dropped precipitously over the last three years because of a worldwide economic downturn, much to the consternation of evangelical and secular activists alike. Skeptics are delighted. But activists also point to a recent article in The New Yorker, which reports that President Barack Obama will make climate change a priority if he gets elected to a second term.
So which side is correct? And how should Christians view the future of the global warming debate, both inside the Christian community and out?
These god-botherers make my guts tired. Imagine there’s no heaven. It’s easy if you try. Sent June 12:
When it comes to climate change, believers face two crucial questions.
The first addresses their relationship to scientific expertise: since climatologists are, in effect, planetary physicians, can members of the faith community accept the data and analyses of climate scientists just as they accept the advice of a medical specialist?
The second addresses an pillar of many Christian faiths: are believers who eagerly anticipate the Rapture ready to concede that our civilization is instead threatened by global warming — a wholly profane immolation of believers and infidels alike?
As an atheist, I’ll take my chances with an End Times of genuinely Divine origin, but describing a civilizational collapse caused by industrial CO2 emissions as a fulfillment of the Book of Revelations is the eschatological equivalent of cheating at solitaire. If evangelicals look forward to the End Times, they must combat climate change, lest they find themselves fooled by a secular Apocalypse.
Warren Senders