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Americans Gearing up to Fight Global Warming
TechnoGuyRob writes "Global warming has been one of the most controversial and debated issues in the political and scientific sphere. A recent poll published in the Chicago Sun-Times now shows that 'An overwhelming majority of Americans think they can help reduce global warming and are willing to make the sacrifices that are needed, a new poll shows. After years of controversy, 71 percent of Americans now say they think global warming is real.'" (Jamie adds: and all it took was twelve years of overwhelming scientific consensus.)
The sun is going to burn out in a few billion years. As it does so, it will cool and expand slowly enveloping the earth. The 'global warming' we are experiencing today will be nothing in comparison. The earth will be cooked until it is very well done and once that's over and the sun is completely burned-out, the earth will be frozen solid.
The moral of this story is this: the earth will heat up and cool down based on what the sun is doing. It's pretentious and incorrect to think that something as insignificant as mankind is the main cause of global warming.
end the war in Iraq to free up the funds for the above initiatives
The cost of the Iraq War, along with all other DoD-related expenses (including funding the entire military) is small potatoes compared to spending on social programs. If you really want to free up money in the Federal budget, make real cuts to programs like corporate subsidies, personal welfare, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and other such programs.
We won't see any of these things happen though, given how elected Republicans have become indistinguishable from Socialists with regards to reckless, unending and out-of-control Federal spending.
In case of fire, do not use elevator. Use water!
I'm not sure whom you're referring to. Bush didn't get 71% of any vote, either time. IMO, the votes he got came mostly from fear. The Repugs did a good job of painting the Democrats, and Mr. Kerry in particular, as unpatriotic cowards, despite Kerry's multiple decroations and honorable service in Vietnam, earned at the same time Bush was, variously, safely home in Texas, serving in the "Champagne Unit" of the Texas Air National Guard, or desserting to work a Senate campaign.
But i think he is partially responsible for this change of heart on the part of the public.
Remember, for a long time, people doubted it was even POSSIBLE to change the environment... largely because the only "evidence" they were given was being shovelled down their throats by politicians who told them what they wanted to hear... i.e. That they could continue to drive giant-S.U.V.s getting 6 MPG, get a tax cut, and not cut any government programs, with no negative consequences in perpetuity throughout the universe. Now, that those lies, and the politicians who told them are being unmased as the filthy, lying swine that many of us suspected them to be all along, the people are in doubt of everything they've been told.
If they lied about Iraq/War On Terror/Civil Rights/Wiretapping then maybe they're lying about global warming too. After all, if a President is willing to hazard the members of the armed forces for a political win, you'd have to think his moral-compass was so cuckoo-banannas that something as trivial as the destruction of human civilization might also be considered a "reason to lie."
Who did what now?
Is it a surprise that a huge amount of the U.S. Presidents personal fortune is in oil?
The entire Bush family exhibits "blatant business cronyism" with their ties to big oil.
Asking Bush to stop Fossil Fuel pollution is akin to asking Bill Gates to stop OS pollution.
Since most human-induced global warming comes from the burning of fossil fuels, a 'War on Heat' would probably involve attacking oil-producing countries.
Oh, wait a minute...
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That's rather the point. We're always hearing about how the poor outnumber the rich by some massive percentage point. So if there's so many more poor than rich, then from an environmentalist point of view it makes more sense to target the poor. If we're talking about reducing emissions then it's irrelevant which groups we target to do it, what's important is the overall reduction in emissions. Let's not take an environmental issue and turn it into an environmental-and-poverty-anti-capitalism-anti-war -bush-is-evil argument.