They want a “solution”, but have no understanding of what that means. I often wonder how many of them understand that the stuff they want to get rid of is essentially our entire economy and civilization. Which I understand and would like changed, but if the machine breaks down, we all break down. How many of them are ready for that? I propose the number is zero.
I have lived most of my 76 years in reasonable proximity to the largest naval base in the world. It has served as home port for multiple nuclear powered aircraft carriers and submarines for at least 50 of those years without incident. Those power plants are small modular reactors, which should form the backbone of our electricity future. Other than hydrocarbons, nuclear is the only other source that can provide base load power on a large scale. All the dams that have been built are only regional resources. Modern society cannot exist without base load power.
Nuclear is safe as long as rigorous safety protocols are followed. And who trusts government and/or private industry to do that indefinitely? The world averages around one major incident every 15-20 years (Windscale/Kyshtim in the 50s, Three Mile Island in the 70s, Chernobyl in the 80s, Fukushima most recently). If nuclear reactors proliferate you can expect there to be more serious incidents, with each one making a part of the earth unlivable for hundreds or thousands of years.
Yeah, we really need to find a way to foolproof Nuclear. Aviation industry is a gold standard for a regulated, inspected safe industry that has made flying around in metal tubes at 30,000 feet safer than driving a car on the ground. So I believe a safe system can be set up.
Not really. With regards to “1000” year effects. People really don’t understand radiation etc. that uranium is everywhere, that radiation is everywhere, and that generally speaking it doesn’t hurt you.
It is estimated that Chernobyl will be safe for humans in about 20,000 years. Fukushima is probably in the same ballpark. I'm not sure how the existence of background radiation has any relevance to these fact.
Well you also have to take into account that ALL of those reactors were built before 1970. They are built around ancient technology relatively speaking. The activist environmental movement has seen to it that no new tech in nuclear could be implemented and thus we haven’t been able to implement the huge theoretical designs and ideas that physicists and engineers have come up with in the past 50 years! Nuclear was already safe then relatively speaking.
Yep, at least until we can suspend or transcend the laws of thermodynamics or invent the room temperature superconductor, we won’t be capable of storing the abundant energy of the sun. The environmentalists also tend to be entirely non-pragmatic while simultaneously rejecting any adaptations we might take in the mean time to mitigate climate change while we figure out a long term energy solution.
With a small number of facilities built and operated by an inordinately concentrated wealth of humanity's best engineers, we have still managed a pair of enormously devastating nuclear disasters. The area around Chernobyl will be uninhabitable for 20,000 years. 1.25 million tons of nuclear wastewater from Fukushima are scheduled for release into the Pacific. And that's not including 250,000 tons of highly radioactive waste already in the world.
These problems persist for spans greater than that of human history, so each disaster stacks with the last. Again, that's with the best and the brightest manning the facilities. To scale all human energy consumption to nuclear, you'll have to start giving out these construction jobs to the lowest bidder. And eventually many will be staffed by Homer Simpsons. On top of that, you'll drastically increase the number of tickets you're buying in this apocalyptic lottery.
We can barely manage to not make the Earth unlivable with fossil fuels. Maybe pump the brakes on meddling with atomics.
I'd swim in the ocean after the waste water is discharged to it. It is kinda like my basement: until I put in an active vent system to exhaust the radon gas below the slab, I did not hang there much. Now? Eat, sleep, watch TV and all the rest of life. It is about risk and risk management.
You make good points. We don't want to use the nuclear power plant technology from the 1970s. To all the people suggesting we use nuclear power technology from the 1970s, we OPPOSE you!
Chernobyl and Fukishima are small potatoes compared to the destruction of the entire planet.
Reactor coolant pumps had to run; dependent on electricity; earthquake knocked out primary source of power, secondary failsafe was diesel generators which were taken out by flooding from the tsunami. I think we could come up with a better failsafe than that, some designs do not need pumps to avoid meltdown at all.
It wasn't just the reactor, the spent fuel pools require water cooling too. Even if they had a better reactor the spent fuel pools would still be a problem.
Then we need to change licensing requirements here. In the U.S., utilities each present their own reactor designs. In France, only 1 design is used. Our approach adds years and $ hundreds of millions more than in Europe. So much for the free market.
I'm not sure what you're talking about. The NRC has approved 6 reactor designs, 2 of which have expired. It's just false to say that every utility designs their own reactor from scratch.
Companies with expertise in reactor design such as GE and Hitachi (utilities most definitely aren't in the business of designing nuclear reactors reactors) submit their designs to the NRC for approval. When a utility wishes to build a nuclear reactor, they can choose from the available approved designs.
Our international competitors, are putting a lot of research into Molton Salt Reactors (MSR) based on Thorium. MSR have a built in failsafe against meltdown and the waste products frontiers Thorium reaction have a halflife measured in the hundred year rather than tens of thousands of years. From what I can tell, we are still throwing out money at solar and wind while simultaneously trying to destroy currently cheaper forms of energy by driving those prices up so that solar and wind appear more competitive economically
Even thorium powered reactors need massive concrete. Vice just did a story about organized crime stealing sand in Bangladesh. Thorium is still theoretical. The dictatorial regime of China is trying to start it. Please pull the sand out of your own asshole to make it sustainable.
I've always struggled to reconcile certain protests with the inherent lack of humility associated with them, which by definition attracts a specific subset of the population. When I lived in Kansas City, for example, there would be these anti-Israel/pro-Palestine protests in a conspicuous part of town (at the Country Club Plaza for those familiar with the city) every couple months or so. During my musician days, I spent most of free time reading about the Arab-Israeli conflict, the history of the region, etc. I did this for a good six years, reading hundreds of books and essays from all the different sides I could find. And every time I would drive by those protesters I found myself thinking "I know enough about this to know that I don't know enough to take a side this passionately."
This, then, is the paradox of protesting in the information age as I see it. You have to be ignorant enough of at least some elements of a given issue, willfully or otherwise, to take that passionate a position with anything resembling genuine commitment. For those that are willing to consider a given issue in all (or at least some) of its complexity, we'd likely never allow ourselves to participate in such an endeavor.
Am I the only person who feels like the crunchy modern activist is doing absolutely nothing, and their willfully ignorant, and loud, crude and obnoxious manner is making any potential allies repulsed by "the movement" instead?
I lived with one of these types around the beginning of the Iraq War, and he was getting arrested at protests outside our state capitol building almost daily for blocking traffic. He was one of the sweetest people I've ever known, and one of the dumbest. He couldn't really articulate a reasoned opinion about the matter and looked for all the world like a stoned dingbat. Most reasonable people who would maybe be sympathetic to an anti-war cause instead became team "can someone get these annoying kids out of the street when I'm trying to go to work?" My old roomie may not have changed any minds, but hey, at least he met some chicks.
At the very least today, activism is like masturbation, makes you happy that you are "doing something", but has little impact on anything else. I know some people have done this or still do this, i'm sorry, i'm not attacking you as a person, it's my point of view. Our system is not responsive to the will of people really, it's responsive to conventional wisdom as defined by the political class, which is why firm control over the media is a requirement. Conventional wisdom may come to include a popular desire, but only after it's been accepted by the political class. Their objective is bread and circuses to keep the plebs working toward their glory. It's as if it were designed to purposely ignore those who are marching in DC or wherever. A whole system constructed to entirely ignore the activist.
I think the last time an activist impacted anything was the night that Nixon went to the Lincoln Memorial and queried the longhairs protesting there on why they didn't like his Vietnam policy and trying to explain himself. Tricky Dick he may have been, but that's more than anyone after him ever did.
As someone who has done a fair amount of on street protests, mostly anti-war and anti-nuclear, I am not shocked by selective punishment by police. I am still amazed there is such ubiquitous agreement on Climate Change. I personally am quite afraid of the impending Climate Crisis — right up until I walk outside and see that nothing has changed at all in 50 years.
Invariably we end up gearing ourselves to fight our last war.
I don't know about you, but when I was a kid you used to see fallout shelter signs all over the places. They still exist in some places. There was a lot of money and effort spent on civil defense against nuclear war, which never happened. The electrical grid was not fortified during that time, though. The reason why was the existence of high-altitude detonation of nuclear weapons, which would wipe the grid out whether we liked it or not, and pretty much without consideration for how much effort we put into protecting it.
One of the things I did in the past was plan for comms during initial entry scenarios, when a country had been either bombed into oblivion or some other calamity had come to pass. We could not expect anything - electric, networking, undersea cables, cellular infrastructure - to still be functioning. It would be a good idea to prepare oneself for that scenario in the event of disaster. Killing the grid and comms is the easy button.
Iraq had its connectivity to the rest of the world sliced off in 2003, and it was only really restored by the laying of a new undersea cable in 2009.
For most folks...meaning pretty much everyone... electricity is what is necessary to get those other things. Is this like that thing the Reagan aide said back in the 80's about nuclear war? I recall him saying all you needed was to dig a hole, put some plywood over it, cover it with a little dirt, and there you go....civilization returns.
This is a great topic for a very lengthy discussion - book length, at least - of what it would take to recover civilization in such an environment. Luckily, some novelists have tackled this. "On the Beach" if you'd like depressing. "Alas, Babylon" if you'd like hopeful. "A Canticle for Leibowitz" if you'd like weird.
It certainly is. All those protesters wanting an end to all the stuff that is the foundation for civilization. I’m not saying we got a brilliant civilization by any stretch; what we’ve created is an absolutely horrible model for civilization. But, what we got is what we got. Per climate change, Jonathan Franzen wrote a great essay about maybe we should just accept the condition as having already gone way past any inflection point, and base decisions on where we need to go from the point we are at, not some imagined fantasy world where we eliminate fossil fuel energy and the world just keeps on humming along like nothing happened.
IPCC is very clear. Climate Change is Man-Made...it is getting worse...and will eventually become Irreversible. But it's like a Pandemic, by the time you "see" the problem, it's too late.
The IPCC is wrong. Their underlying baseline assumptions are wrong. The number of hot days have lessened not increased. The environment has hot noticeably changed in 50 years.
By how quickly you responded, I assume you did not spend much time perusing it. The main point of the section I linked is that temperatures in the USA from 1918 to 1965 were higher than they are now.
In fact, the IPCC and NASA graphs consistently start in the 1970s in order to make it appear that temperatures are up. In fact, if you start the graphics sooner, you can see that they are not.
You are quite insane. Too stupid to live, but you will whine with the worst of them when the shit is hitting the fan. You know, like towns burning to the ground, storms, floods.
hmm -- 10,000 to 3.5 scientists and ALL data seems to me a pretty close and full consensus.... Extra effort (see below) since I like your other comments ;-))
Honestly, I don't think it matters if MAN is causing climate change. What we're seeing is far less of an impact than is being stated. It makes sense that higher levels of carbon are associated with human activity. On the other hand, Carbon is a relatively heavy gas and will stay near the surface, so will not greatly impact the amount of heat from the sun that the Earth holds onto. While it will cause growing seasons and reduce the amount of water needed to grow crops.
Only one at the beginnings of the hairless apes's rise to power???
No, this planet has had thousands of ice ages.
Also... thousands of warm ages.
Taxing people and making them buy goods and services from the donor class isn't going to do anything except line the pockets of the RNC and DNC donor-class pockets.
Good to see you found a cause, but man... they don't need your help
What does IRREVERSIBLE even mean in terms of climate? You're talking about we will be able to lower the global temperature now, but will not be able to lower it later. Do you have any idea how silly that sounds.
Not Lower. Limit the increase. Irreversible as in Hysterisis. Bottom line I defer to 100's of very smart Climate Scientists since I don't know much about Climate.
It's one thing to say that scientists should assess raw data and create hypotheses and quite another to say that after experts weigh in and debate that you are unwilling to look at their arguments and decide which has more merit. What you are saying is not following the science, it's bowing to authority.
This contribution from a post on Quora (I confess to not thinking much of the site, normally) pretty well sums up my feelings about the climate hysteria:
Climate is, in fact, the consequence of an incredibly complex interaction of massive and diverse forces, from variations in solar radiation intensity, to eccentricities of Earth’s orbit, axis precession, and rotation, atmospheric absorption and reflection, to ocean heat absorption, mixing, currents, and thermohaline circulation, and plate tectonics and volcanism, radiation and heat convection from Earth’s core, and many other massive forces interacting.
The agenda by climate alarmists to claim that this entire spectrum of massive forces is somehow insignificant next to a change of a mere .0001 over 250 years in the concentration of a trace gas in Earth’s atmosphere that in total represents just .ooo4 of the atmosphere, is prima facie absurd. This gas is essential for life, and has at other stages in Earth’s history been as much as ten times more in concentration without any ill effect. In fact, times of higher concentration are times of incredibly lush, vibrant, and diverse plant and animal life whose fossilized carbon remains actually created the vast oil and gas reserves we today depend on to fuel human civilization.
This statement by the IPCC is one of the few truly honest sentences in their otherwise propagandized literature. If it were to be erased, that would be at the behest of those who misrepresent climate science in a quest to redistribute the world’s (Read: American) wealth and replace capitalism with global Marxist Socialism, as admitted by IPCC Chairman Ottmar Edenhofer and UN Climate Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres.
I tend to agree with much of your comment. If you look at the work of Tony Heller, however, he demonstrates that temperatures have not gone up particularly much. And I think personal observations cannot be discounted. I live at the beach. A vies has which is unchanged in 50 years.
My perspective is that things have warmed in the Northeast of the US in the last 50 years, which is close to the sum total of my life experience. It's small but appreciable. That said, there's no guarantee that the reason it is warmer is AGW. There are lots of reasons why this might be the case. I quoted yesterday about the extreme number of nuclear tests happening during the late 50s and early 1960s. Not only were oceanic and freshwater tritium levels at times 1000x what they are today, but also there were other atmospheric pollutants as a result of this. There was enough action that the Earth's temperature could easily have been affected. Multi-megaton blasts underground throw a lot of crap into the air. I do know that Northern Hemisphere tritium levels are still 4x what is normal for the Southern Hemisphere overall as a result of this, since the testing was mostly there.
Coal dust was far more prevalent over North America when I was a kid in the 70s. Everyone in the city seemingly used coal for heating and power generation. Used to be i'd get in the car in south Jersey and drive up to NYC, when you got in the car the air was clean, when you got out in the city it was disgusting, brownish-tinted, thick and took a while to get used to. You could literally see the cloud as you drove into it, about 35-40 miles from NYC. People born after 1980 probably don't remember this. Anyway it wasn't just NYC, find an old picture of a US city from that time and you'll likely see the haze i'm talking about. Cities in China look like that now. Since city temperatures are always recorded, I have a hard time imagining this did not have some impact on recorded temperatures. I would expect a cooling effect in summer with less direct sunlight and more impact in the winter with more coal being burnt.
I have not carefully read every report from the IPCC. I have read much of it and much about it. I am not a climate scientist. I don't pretend to be able to go through the raw information and make assertions. But once experts have debated and their arguments are clear, I can use my solid math and science skills to determine which points are valid which are not.
The IPCC baseline assumption as that coal will be the predominant fuel for the rest of the century, including powering cars. This underlying mistake, which they are aware of, makes all of their projections overblown. https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/abcdd2
What does peer reviewed even mean any more? If the powers that be want it to be a certain way, all those that get funding through them will say what they want.
Nothing will change until every iota of easily available fossil fuel is burned. Energy is power, in the political and military sense, and nothing will stop humankind from seeking power.
I don't even see the point of fighting the issue from either side. It changes nothing except, possibly, who will be the winners and losers at the great game.
That seems overly cynical, things are already changing and have been for a couple of decades. Renewables, EVs, etc., Just not changing as fast as the climate doomsayers would like.
Nothing will change until an alternate form of energy becomes more economical to produce than fossile fuels. It's simple economics.
Also-- take a break from the EV koolaid, it isn't clear if they are any better than fossil fuels. Why? Well, where do you think the electricity comes from? A power plant that's subject to the same laws of thermodynamics as your car. Some power plants are actually less efficient than a modern ICE found in today's vehicles. And then that electricity the power plant produced has to travel down transmission lines where another 5% is consumed in the process. More if you live far away from the power plant, and less if you're close. But nobody wants a power plant in the back yard, right? Once those electrons get to your house they charges your battery which is around 70% absolute best case Real life numbers are probably much worse than that, but let's be charitable. Hopefully you're not fast charging, which is much less efficient. Another 10% or so is lost as the battery discharges and the electric motor converts electrical energy into kinetic energy. There's also a nontrivial amount of energy lost due to self discharge as charged batteries sit unused. On top of all this you have to compare the energy cost of producing an electric car vs. a conventional ICE. Those rare earths are expensive and energy intensive to produce. I have tried in my free time to research how much benefit EV's really provide, and it all seems to be a wash.
Renewable energy sources such as solar and wind are also energy intensive to produce, and unfortunately not reliable. You can't expect every day to be sunny and windy. Sadly there is no clear path away from fossil fuels yet.
They'll become totally economical and ubiquitous at the precise moment when the fossil fuels run out.
I know you think this is cynicism, but it's not. It's just reality. Trying to manufacture demand and get the economic forces working without running out of this stuff has not worked to date and will continue not to work.
The protests arise from Joe Biden's likely psychotic break with reality. He tried to have it both ways, first shutting down US fossil fuel production, then begging Saudi Arabia and other countries with a separate atmosphere from ours to increase their production, and expected no one would notice. He was correct only to the extent that the mass media and Big Tech ignored the fictions involved. The rest of us noticed.
The press clearly recognizes that unless Democrats hold onto complete control of the U.S. Government, the game is over. Thus, criticism from anyone - environmentalists, social justice warriors, even other Democrats - must be quashed. The blatantly partisan nature of the coverage is unlikely to make any difference. The only hope is to keep the bubble going as long as possible to further enrich the US Nomenklatura.
Once I saw the Gates wedding featured Coldplay and realize again for the big names it is performative. These protesters got no coverage because they are good people with small footprints.
bill... the notion that "he" did anything, is disconnected from reality. "he" is a puppet.. a figure head, just like those before him, trump, obama, bush, clinton, etc. the "he' in these instances is generational wealth, corporate money, as seen on tv
I suspect we are agreed that he did nothing. About
- Securing our border
- Preventing a regressive tax known as inflation.
- Calling out left-wing violence and intolerance
- Managing to achieve empty grocery shelves in a country that is a net food exporter. Or, perhaps, all those ships are full of food we must import from China because we stupidly forgot how to produce food and move it. This list could go on for many days.
Oh, Biden actively promoted the insecurity of our southern border and took steps virtually designed to send energy prices skyrocketing, which is a huge part of the inflation we're experiencing (I live in Maine, and my propane has been getting progressively more expensive since late last winter).
Of course, you're right that he's done nothing like calling out the left for anything whatever, nor anything to alleviate the supply chain issues. Nor, as you note, done anything on any number of issues. Which, considering how what he DOES do turns out for us, may be a good thing.
And there's the elephant in the room - Biden calls for employers to mandate COVID vaccines for U.S. citizen-employees, while accepting all manner of illegal immigrants from parts south, refusing to vaccinate, test, or treat them for COVID, and then transporting them round the country for "relocation" in the dead of night.
IMHO the only way these people relate to one another is through protest. There is no hanging out together, there is no talking and listening; I could go on. I just think the only way these losers know in their mind and believe how to get their message across is to chase a US Senator into a bathroom, to confront someone in a Target store, to scream and spit at people. I am so tired of protest. Did any of these assholes volunteer anywhere without a camera on them? Did they volunteer to tutor kids falling behind or drive someone to their cancer treatment? OF COURSE NOT!
Protest is not even a cottage industry anymore. It is Wal Mart. In my lifetime, Dr. Martin Luther King. I am blessed.
Centralised Obscene Wealth is at the root of our collapse.
The notion that if we just unleashed and deregulated those that already had the majority of wealth, they would use it benevolently.... is childish, naive, ABSURD at best, in direct conflict with simple wisdom and understanding of human nature.
Remember that spoiled kid in school, the one who was given everything by shitty parents, doted on by administrators and power? were those sick kids EVER satisfied? NEVER.
Give them an inch, they will always take a mile. when did we forget this age old wisdom?
Governments have become NOTHING but proxies for those with the money to buy their desires, which, coincidently, usually means an even larger slice of the pie. Blaming governments, without acknowledging the money and power that is paying for the policy we endure, is nuts.
Government is supposed to stand in the breech between us, the majority, the 99%, and those that aspire to monopoly, totalitarian control of everything, the spoiled kids, because we already know, human nature is built like that. But money figured out, they can buy their way into control over the government. So incrementally, over time, the "spoiled kids" literally became the government. not the puppets we "elect", those are proxies, scare crows, props in a giant shakespearean tragedy.
Were things really much different before Bezos, Gates, Musk, Zuckerburg, et al? I don't think so. Some of their companies are creating societal problems but to say that wealth is the root of our collapse is quite a stretch I think.
Once upon a time, in a place far, far away...Anti-Trust Legislation was used to break up Railway companies, and Oil Companies. When Clinton De-Regulated the Financial Industry that was the beginning of the end (not a slam against Democrats, it could just as easily have been a Republican). SEC/Banks....FAA/Boeing...FDA/Opioids.... Regulatory capture now extends all the way to the very top.
Biden pounds his chest on raising taxes on the rich. What a joke the Elites just use tax loopholes to offshore their money or get out of paying taxes. TAX LAWS HAVE TO BE CHANGED. Rollback taxes on the wealthy to pre 1981 levels. Regan wrote The Economy Recovery Tax Act of 1981, get rid of it. They then want to watch everyone's bank account for movements of $600, so they can catch tax cheats. Who are they kidding?
We are having bad relations with China? Are they kicking our ass with missiles? So why do we consider them a developing country and have the most favored trading status with them? The FTSE tells you to keep on investing there because it would screw up their indexes. Black Rock said triple your investments there on August 18. Hey, I have very little money. Why are the wealthy in China? Are elites like Bloomberg, Black Rock, and Mark Cuban enemies of the state?
How can't you trust someone that constantly lies and beats you?
It's funny how he rails about taxing the elites, then ignores the Pandora Papers, which show exactly HOW the rich hide their assets. Hint: It's not in US-facing bank accounts or bitcoin.
The corporations that went offshore also do not repatriate their money or profits. Google, Facebook LinkedIn are all in Ireland and do the double Irish, Dutch sandwich.
Clinton gave us the “Bank Modernization Act”. It basically destroyed the Glass-Steagle bank laws that kept us stable for 50 years after 1929. Now we have financial chaos again.
spot on. glass steagall was an obstacle to the financiers wet dreams. they removed it. and made certain, derivatives etc, were never to be regulated. brooksley born was slaughtered for even suggesting it.
quite a stretch? lolwut? so, you trust the spoiled kids to be benevolent? really? interesting.
this is basic simple human psychology.
conservatively estimated at over $50 trillion squirreled away in the caymans.. like a battery.. stored force.. but they only want what's best for you and your family? rofl.
do you know anything about the difference between earned income and unearned income?
"As soon as the land of any country has all become private property, the landlords, like all other men, love to reap where they never sowed." - Adam Smith The Wealth of Nations, Book I, Chapter VI
No I don't trust them to be benevolent, their companies need to be regulated but our corrupt Congress is incapable of doing that unfortunately. Most of their wealth is tied up in shares of their respective companies, what would you do, confiscate and distribute those shares to US citizens?
Centralised Obscene Wealth is at the root of our collapse.
--------------------------------
And it was only possible after going 'full fiat' in the 70s. Since then we double the money supply about every 11 years, and that is accelerating. Who do you think GETS those trillions of dollars?
I have noted that my house, and everyone else's, is more full of shit than it was in the 70s. Whether that shit equals valuable goods is another question. Consumerism changed society, and employed more people around the world. The fact that it can only be sustained by government interventions into the economy on a regular basis does not bode well.
A few weeks back I read an article equating people who are anti-vaccination with people who are anti-GMO. They lumped both groups as "anti-science."
So my question is, these days what is an environmentalist?
Also, when you have a world system that runs entirely on fossil fuels, what do environmentalists expect to happen? Even if the US does everything environmentalists want them to do, what real effect will that have on global climate when Russia, China & India don't play along?
When the initial "Covid models" turned out to model nothing but the fantasies of the model builders why isn't there, at the very least, a modicum of doubt about climate models?
If the US had any real interest in science why aren't they testing the unvaccinated for anti-bodies before they a. give them an unnecessary shot and b. threaten the employment & living ability of people who don't need the shot?
Lastly, when it's obvious that every news organization has chosen the last UN climate report to wax hysterical over while ignoring the climate report that immediately proceeded it that showed the 1% are, by far, the biggest energy/pollution scofflaws on the planet, why does anyone think anything will appreciably change under any administration, Repub or Dem, that is owned by the wealthy?
"you see, the model we build to show how bad things could get with the climate is showing how bad things could get with the climate under our input assumptions. Quite extraordinary, actually."
There is some genetic defect in a class of people that causes them to over-count the impact of a few extra carbon molecules in the atmosphere and under-count the impact of running out of other people's money.
It seems so rational to me that one US-technology-made Chinese supersonic nuclear missile exploding would harm the environment much more that all of the gas-powered redneck pickup trucks these nuts want to ban.
I would put it differently. CO2 is a greenhouse gas, there is no question about that. It's not transparent to infrared energy as O2 or N2 are, the much larger portion of our atmosphere. It'll heat up the planet, though the amount is debatable and remains unsolved with any precision. We are liberating more by burning fossil fuels. The Earth has sinks for CO2, capturing it again in liquids or solids, which we do not understand fully, nor do we understand their limits.
With this in mind, there are natural fluctuations in temperature that have nothing to do with greenhouse gases. The Earth's average temperature is not stable. It warms, and it cools into Ice Ages.
One side of this debate wants to freeze the Earth at a state it existed in say, 1970, or pre-industrialization, though I would point out that the early 19th century was a fairly cool period and I don't think people today would like it very much. On the other, people either say it isn't much of a concern since it changes anyway, or they refuse to acknowledge that CO2 based warming exists. I don't think either side is right. But expecting nuance and intelligent conversation when people can use the public debate to further other ends is expecting too much. It's a proxy battle for totalitarian control of society, really.
To wit: All Democrat politicians past and present, and their staff, flying around the world to preach and screech about the dangers of anthropogenic climate change, pollutes more than the lowest 145 or so countries on the planet.
To wit: there’s been a dog and pony show going on for DECADES now, blaming either party is just plain silly, ie the largest voting block in US are non voters so assuming environmental activists are partisan is highly inaccurate.
Of course - any news that reflects poorly on the Biden Administration is no news to the NYT's, WAPO, LAT and the like... It seems that FOX is the only outlet that as least makes an attempt at "fair and balanced".
In Louisville, Kentucky there were five months of protests there were 850 arrests when protesters broke nearly every window in downtown Louisville.
In Portland, Oregon, between May 28, 2020, and February 26, 2021, the DA's office said they received 294 civil unrest demonstration-related cases. I'm that Portland, protesters continuously assaulted the Federal Courthouse and Federal Marshals with missles and molotov cocktails. It is worth noting that the Portalnd Federal Courthouse is the house of the Judicial Branch.
684 protesters arrested for January 6, 2021 at the Capitol building.
There are three Branches of Federal government: (1) Executive (President), (2) Legislative (Congress), and (3) Judicial. This is our checks and balances system intended to keep any one branch from allowing the other to take power. This is our guard against tyranny. Pay close attention to the arrests and killings of protesters and you will see the value placed on the Judicial branch and our nation of laws.
Consider the serious discussion regarding "packing" the U.S. Supreme Court.
This was the path used by Chavez in Venezuela. He undermined Venezuela's Supreme Court and "packed" it. He enforced the laws against opponents and allowed supports to wreck havoc. He took control of the media. Sound familiar?
Ok, a bunch of people protest, an interesting story, as far as this piece goes. What would be more interesting to see, and learn, is who are these people?
It would be interesting to follow the activities of, for the sake of discussion, 5 of the “leaders” and 5 random participants, to see where they go after their thrill fades into nothing. Are these poor people who risk all to participate in an effort they believe needs to be accomplished; or are they the spoil brats many of them appear to be?
How do they get from point A to point B? How do they feed themselves and handle the cost of their activities? That is information that is part of the story, even if we are not made privy to said facts.
No matter their status in life, they have every right to be there and make their voices heard. But as we listen to them it would help to know who they are and why they are there.
It would also be interesting to know how much overlap there is between this group of activists and people who were BLM activists in the summer of 2020.
The Government is reacting, by creating shortages. Biden's alienation of Saudi Arabia had the Saudis saying they were not increasing oil production to meet demand. The president also created policies that stunted oil and gas exploration. The 30x30 plan also is taking farmland out of production and putting it into conservation. Land in western Kansas, Nebraska, and South Dakota is being targeted. Food prices will be going up because of a lack of feed and range for cattle.
You are being nudged to consume less food, and energy. They then tell you Americans have to expect less. The thing that bothers me is they use negative behavioral techniques. They never offer an incentive to have approved behavior. A stimulus of $1000 to prove you got the shot instead of mandates. A stimulus for solar energy, a stimulus for buying an electric car then by 2035 it would be mandated. People not taking the stimulus would have regret for not having the approved behavior. Instead, they are creating distrust and anger.
What's more, is they make stupid promises like saying they would raise taxes on the wealthy. Elites just find loopholes or offshore their money. They have to change the TAX LAWS, no more loopholes, and roll back Regan's Tax Recovery Act of 1981 to 1970s levels to tas the wealthy. Stop hgh frequency trading. GIVE THE PEOPLE A STIMULUS FOR THE BEHAVIORS YOU WANT. STOP KICKING US IN THE ASS. Maybe we will TRUST YOU instead of hating your guts.
They are doing what their base would like them to do. The truth, that it won't please the base (nothing would), is not very convincing to those implementing the policies.
Our Senator Toomy is retiring from the senate to work on K Street as a lobbyist. They all have insider information. One guy on Tik-Tok follows Pelosi's trades and makes money. Politicians have power but no money and the elites have money and want power. By doing what is right for the people, it probably won't enrich them but it will give them power.
Fauchi likes power. He was head of the NIH since 1982 and had the power through the Bayh/Dole act of 1980 to advocate which drugs were researched and which weren't. He pushed AZT and some say it killed more people than AIDS did. He liked stuff from Gilead (Which he had stock in), pushed Tamaflu and made US stockpile it. Pushed Remdesovir. He funded research and you had to kiss his ring to get funding. Funding provides papers in SCIENCE and New England Journal of Medicine. Fauchi is only worth 10 million but the world dances to the power he has in medicine. Look at the Matt Taibbi article about Molnupiravir and cronyism at the NIH.
Roger Stone went to prison for lying to congress, Steve Banon will be tried for contempt. Fauchi Lied about a gain of function research to Congress. NOTHING will happen to Fauchi. Just like nothing will happen to Biden for corruption from Hunter's laptop. Nothing will happen to Gov. Cuomo for the death of thousands in old age homes. It is not what is just, it is who has power.
We are losing trust, in our government. That means the dollar will become weak and the rich would lose their money. Could you see sociopaths like Bezos, Zuckerberg, Gates, and Bloomberg running this country? Europe or Russia would be better than those globalist, social justice assholes.
Nobody in this country does anything to develop trust. If you want to develop trust, you need to have a character that develops trust. I advocate everyone passing on "THE SIX PILLARS OF CHARACTER"
Here is what they are:
1. Trustworthy; (don't cheat, don't steal, reliable, dependable, be faithful to your family and your country, do what you say, be honest),
2. Respect; (tolerance, listening to others, use good manners, no bad language, be considerate of the feelings of others, don’t threaten, hit or hurt anyone • deal peacefully with anger, insults),
3. Responsibility; (self-control, be self-disciplined, think before you act, consider the consequences, be accountable for your words, actions, and attitudes)
4. Fairness; (play by the rules, take turns and share, be open-minded; temperate, analytical, sincere, truthful, don’t blame others carelessly. treat all people fairly or equally, objectivity)
5. Caring; ( Be compassionate and show empathy, express gratitude, forgive others , Help people in need)
6. Citizenship; (Volunteerism, the environment, paying your taxes even though there are loopholes, honoring ideals country was founded on, get involved in community affairs • stay informed; vote, be a good neighbor, obey laws and rules, respect authority)
If more people and corporations would follow this, you would have trust, peace, love, and tolerance. We lost this with sex drugs and rock and roll. This is what kids need to learn in school not SEL bullshit.
When the conservation movement (life long member here)morphed into the radical environmentalist movement it made a mess out of what could have been a slow (by necessity) constant change for good. Like Joe Biden the fucked it up.
Agreed. I still have my original Earth Day button.
We have supported a lot of environmental groups in our modest ways over the years, because we always assumed it was helpful in DC for groups to say they had so many members when they talked to the PTB. (Yes; we aren't very bright.)
But after Trump was elected and my Sierra Club renewal had "Resist" gear as the incentive, when my National Audubon email told me "Silence is violence," and offered to send me free of charge what's his name anti-racism book, I decided our modest resources and numbers had more value closer to home.
Everything is now local where we concerned. The other groups don't need us. they have Greta T. What's more enlightening (and convincing) than having a privileged child from cold Europe preach to us.
*In an effort to get my facts/spelling on Greta T correct, I went to Wikipedia. She has a section called "Early life." F'in hilarious.
When you are conveying your message peacefully you are protesting. When you are conveying your message through violence, intimidation and destruction of private and public property you are rioting. You're tolerance would end the moment protesters destroyed your ability to earn a living or burned your house.
If you truly want to save the planet, rebrand climate activism to "Nuclear Power, NOW!!!"
This assumes that the protesters (or at least all of them) actually want a solution to the problem they are protesting
They want a “solution”, but have no understanding of what that means. I often wonder how many of them understand that the stuff they want to get rid of is essentially our entire economy and civilization. Which I understand and would like changed, but if the machine breaks down, we all break down. How many of them are ready for that? I propose the number is zero.
I have lived most of my 76 years in reasonable proximity to the largest naval base in the world. It has served as home port for multiple nuclear powered aircraft carriers and submarines for at least 50 of those years without incident. Those power plants are small modular reactors, which should form the backbone of our electricity future. Other than hydrocarbons, nuclear is the only other source that can provide base load power on a large scale. All the dams that have been built are only regional resources. Modern society cannot exist without base load power.
No one seems to ever talk about that.......
Nuclear is safe as long as rigorous safety protocols are followed. And who trusts government and/or private industry to do that indefinitely? The world averages around one major incident every 15-20 years (Windscale/Kyshtim in the 50s, Three Mile Island in the 70s, Chernobyl in the 80s, Fukushima most recently). If nuclear reactors proliferate you can expect there to be more serious incidents, with each one making a part of the earth unlivable for hundreds or thousands of years.
Yeah, we really need to find a way to foolproof Nuclear. Aviation industry is a gold standard for a regulated, inspected safe industry that has made flying around in metal tubes at 30,000 feet safer than driving a car on the ground. So I believe a safe system can be set up.
Molton Thorium Fluoride Reactors.
To be honest 5 major accidents across all reactors over 70 or so years isn't too bad. The problem is that accidents have thousand year= consequences.
Not really. With regards to “1000” year effects. People really don’t understand radiation etc. that uranium is everywhere, that radiation is everywhere, and that generally speaking it doesn’t hurt you.
It is estimated that Chernobyl will be safe for humans in about 20,000 years. Fukushima is probably in the same ballpark. I'm not sure how the existence of background radiation has any relevance to these fact.
Well you also have to take into account that ALL of those reactors were built before 1970. They are built around ancient technology relatively speaking. The activist environmental movement has seen to it that no new tech in nuclear could be implemented and thus we haven’t been able to implement the huge theoretical designs and ideas that physicists and engineers have come up with in the past 50 years! Nuclear was already safe then relatively speaking.
Yep, at least until we can suspend or transcend the laws of thermodynamics or invent the room temperature superconductor, we won’t be capable of storing the abundant energy of the sun. The environmentalists also tend to be entirely non-pragmatic while simultaneously rejecting any adaptations we might take in the mean time to mitigate climate change while we figure out a long term energy solution.
With a small number of facilities built and operated by an inordinately concentrated wealth of humanity's best engineers, we have still managed a pair of enormously devastating nuclear disasters. The area around Chernobyl will be uninhabitable for 20,000 years. 1.25 million tons of nuclear wastewater from Fukushima are scheduled for release into the Pacific. And that's not including 250,000 tons of highly radioactive waste already in the world.
These problems persist for spans greater than that of human history, so each disaster stacks with the last. Again, that's with the best and the brightest manning the facilities. To scale all human energy consumption to nuclear, you'll have to start giving out these construction jobs to the lowest bidder. And eventually many will be staffed by Homer Simpsons. On top of that, you'll drastically increase the number of tickets you're buying in this apocalyptic lottery.
We can barely manage to not make the Earth unlivable with fossil fuels. Maybe pump the brakes on meddling with atomics.
"1.25 million tons of extremely dilute nuclear wastewater from Fukushima are scheduled for release into the Pacific. "
There, fixed it for you.
Would drink from one of those diluted tanks?
No, I don’t drink seawater. It’ll kill ya.
Many gallons will kill you, not one cup.
Okay. Would you swim in one of those tanks?
I'd swim in the ocean after the waste water is discharged to it. It is kinda like my basement: until I put in an active vent system to exhaust the radon gas below the slab, I did not hang there much. Now? Eat, sleep, watch TV and all the rest of life. It is about risk and risk management.
You make good points. We don't want to use the nuclear power plant technology from the 1970s. To all the people suggesting we use nuclear power technology from the 1970s, we OPPOSE you!
Chernobyl and Fukishima are small potatoes compared to the destruction of the entire planet.
Nuclear Power, NOW!!!
What feature of the newer models would have prevented the Fukushima disaster? Which features guarantee there will be no future incidents?
Reactor coolant pumps had to run; dependent on electricity; earthquake knocked out primary source of power, secondary failsafe was diesel generators which were taken out by flooding from the tsunami. I think we could come up with a better failsafe than that, some designs do not need pumps to avoid meltdown at all.
It wasn't just the reactor, the spent fuel pools require water cooling too. Even if they had a better reactor the spent fuel pools would still be a problem.
We can agree it was a bad design.
Even better is to not build reactors in earthquake zones.
How about cities?
That rules out a lot of the world, at least around Pacific coasts.
Then we need to change licensing requirements here. In the U.S., utilities each present their own reactor designs. In France, only 1 design is used. Our approach adds years and $ hundreds of millions more than in Europe. So much for the free market.
I'm not sure what you're talking about. The NRC has approved 6 reactor designs, 2 of which have expired. It's just false to say that every utility designs their own reactor from scratch.
Reference for those who are interested:
https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/new-nuc-plant-des-bg.html
Companies with expertise in reactor design such as GE and Hitachi (utilities most definitely aren't in the business of designing nuclear reactors reactors) submit their designs to the NRC for approval. When a utility wishes to build a nuclear reactor, they can choose from the available approved designs.
Thank You!
Hey did you use to write on the PBS NewsHour Disqus comments?
Our international competitors, are putting a lot of research into Molton Salt Reactors (MSR) based on Thorium. MSR have a built in failsafe against meltdown and the waste products frontiers Thorium reaction have a halflife measured in the hundred year rather than tens of thousands of years. From what I can tell, we are still throwing out money at solar and wind while simultaneously trying to destroy currently cheaper forms of energy by driving those prices up so that solar and wind appear more competitive economically
Molten
Says Michael Shellenberger in his book "Apocalypse Never"
Exactly Under-Reported. I wonder why.
Even thorium powered reactors need massive concrete. Vice just did a story about organized crime stealing sand in Bangladesh. Thorium is still theoretical. The dictatorial regime of China is trying to start it. Please pull the sand out of your own asshole to make it sustainable.
I've always struggled to reconcile certain protests with the inherent lack of humility associated with them, which by definition attracts a specific subset of the population. When I lived in Kansas City, for example, there would be these anti-Israel/pro-Palestine protests in a conspicuous part of town (at the Country Club Plaza for those familiar with the city) every couple months or so. During my musician days, I spent most of free time reading about the Arab-Israeli conflict, the history of the region, etc. I did this for a good six years, reading hundreds of books and essays from all the different sides I could find. And every time I would drive by those protesters I found myself thinking "I know enough about this to know that I don't know enough to take a side this passionately."
This, then, is the paradox of protesting in the information age as I see it. You have to be ignorant enough of at least some elements of a given issue, willfully or otherwise, to take that passionate a position with anything resembling genuine commitment. For those that are willing to consider a given issue in all (or at least some) of its complexity, we'd likely never allow ourselves to participate in such an endeavor.
Human beings, everybody! WOOOOOO!!!
"The best lack all conviction, the worst are full of passionate intensity."
Cop-out.
You’ve read a lot but you learned nothing.
Not true…I learned that ignorance is bliss. 👍
Yes, what would an 11-year-old Native American know about a pipeline laid out through her tribe's sovereign territory? It's all too complex.
Very well said.
Yeah. Things are complex. Best to do nothing.
So you drive by.
Do you cross picket lines too?
Nobody said best to do nothing. Nobody even said best not to do this. Just an observation.
And I don’t follow the picket line comment…
Am I the only person who feels like the crunchy modern activist is doing absolutely nothing, and their willfully ignorant, and loud, crude and obnoxious manner is making any potential allies repulsed by "the movement" instead?
I lived with one of these types around the beginning of the Iraq War, and he was getting arrested at protests outside our state capitol building almost daily for blocking traffic. He was one of the sweetest people I've ever known, and one of the dumbest. He couldn't really articulate a reasoned opinion about the matter and looked for all the world like a stoned dingbat. Most reasonable people who would maybe be sympathetic to an anti-war cause instead became team "can someone get these annoying kids out of the street when I'm trying to go to work?" My old roomie may not have changed any minds, but hey, at least he met some chicks.
At the very least today, activism is like masturbation, makes you happy that you are "doing something", but has little impact on anything else. I know some people have done this or still do this, i'm sorry, i'm not attacking you as a person, it's my point of view. Our system is not responsive to the will of people really, it's responsive to conventional wisdom as defined by the political class, which is why firm control over the media is a requirement. Conventional wisdom may come to include a popular desire, but only after it's been accepted by the political class. Their objective is bread and circuses to keep the plebs working toward their glory. It's as if it were designed to purposely ignore those who are marching in DC or wherever. A whole system constructed to entirely ignore the activist.
I think the last time an activist impacted anything was the night that Nixon went to the Lincoln Memorial and queried the longhairs protesting there on why they didn't like his Vietnam policy and trying to explain himself. Tricky Dick he may have been, but that's more than anyone after him ever did.
Activism is a big psychotherapy session where everyone talks out their frustrations and feels better afterwards.
As someone who has done a fair amount of on street protests, mostly anti-war and anti-nuclear, I am not shocked by selective punishment by police. I am still amazed there is such ubiquitous agreement on Climate Change. I personally am quite afraid of the impending Climate Crisis — right up until I walk outside and see that nothing has changed at all in 50 years.
Agree. Not a concern of mine. I am worried about the grid. It needs to be upgraded and fortified.
Invariably we end up gearing ourselves to fight our last war.
I don't know about you, but when I was a kid you used to see fallout shelter signs all over the places. They still exist in some places. There was a lot of money and effort spent on civil defense against nuclear war, which never happened. The electrical grid was not fortified during that time, though. The reason why was the existence of high-altitude detonation of nuclear weapons, which would wipe the grid out whether we liked it or not, and pretty much without consideration for how much effort we put into protecting it.
One of the things I did in the past was plan for comms during initial entry scenarios, when a country had been either bombed into oblivion or some other calamity had come to pass. We could not expect anything - electric, networking, undersea cables, cellular infrastructure - to still be functioning. It would be a good idea to prepare oneself for that scenario in the event of disaster. Killing the grid and comms is the easy button.
Iraq had its connectivity to the rest of the world sliced off in 2003, and it was only really restored by the laying of a new undersea cable in 2009.
If you can figure out how to make a fire, get clean water and eat... electricy is a secondary concern
For most folks...meaning pretty much everyone... electricity is what is necessary to get those other things. Is this like that thing the Reagan aide said back in the 80's about nuclear war? I recall him saying all you needed was to dig a hole, put some plywood over it, cover it with a little dirt, and there you go....civilization returns.
This is a great topic for a very lengthy discussion - book length, at least - of what it would take to recover civilization in such an environment. Luckily, some novelists have tackled this. "On the Beach" if you'd like depressing. "Alas, Babylon" if you'd like hopeful. "A Canticle for Leibowitz" if you'd like weird.
It certainly is. All those protesters wanting an end to all the stuff that is the foundation for civilization. I’m not saying we got a brilliant civilization by any stretch; what we’ve created is an absolutely horrible model for civilization. But, what we got is what we got. Per climate change, Jonathan Franzen wrote a great essay about maybe we should just accept the condition as having already gone way past any inflection point, and base decisions on where we need to go from the point we are at, not some imagined fantasy world where we eliminate fossil fuel energy and the world just keeps on humming along like nothing happened.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_electromagnetic_pulse
IPCC is very clear. Climate Change is Man-Made...it is getting worse...and will eventually become Irreversible. But it's like a Pandemic, by the time you "see" the problem, it's too late.
The IPCC is wrong. Their underlying baseline assumptions are wrong. The number of hot days have lessened not increased. The environment has hot noticeably changed in 50 years.
https://realclimatescience.com/are-government-temperature-graphs-credible/
That site is anything BUT "real climate science". That site is purified essence of horseshit.
By how quickly you responded, I assume you did not spend much time perusing it. The main point of the section I linked is that temperatures in the USA from 1918 to 1965 were higher than they are now.
In fact, the IPCC and NASA graphs consistently start in the 1970s in order to make it appear that temperatures are up. In fact, if you start the graphics sooner, you can see that they are not.
Clearly you're not a farmer.
Clearly you have nothing to add to the discussion.
Yet another conversation here that would be better served by subtraction, not addition.
Yet another conversation here that eos be served by you having an argument or any kind of salient point to make.
"...has "hot" noticeably changed in 50 years." Is that your subconscious asserting itself?
In that it HAS NOT.
You are quite insane. Too stupid to live, but you will whine with the worst of them when the shit is hitting the fan. You know, like towns burning to the ground, storms, floods.
Hey, four out of five dentists once recommended Crest toothpaste as well... so fuck your argument.
Again, I have no interest and discussing anything with a vulgar person.
Ha, not discussing anything with you. Just commenting.
If you think for a second that any kind of science is or could ever be "settled", you don't science.
You religion.
So you believe that towns will burn because of rising temperatures? That's interesting. What towns do you believe will burn?
I don't bother responding to rude people. You are just demonstrating your lack of education and lack of an argument.
Glad to hear it. Now STFU.
I would say that you are NOT a rude and moronic person. I would say that, but I can't.
Hahaha
IPCC is clear alright, clearly corrupt.
The IPCC is clear, but there is nothing even closely resembling "a consensus" regarding man's impact on the earth's climate.
hmm -- 10,000 to 3.5 scientists and ALL data seems to me a pretty close and full consensus.... Extra effort (see below) since I like your other comments ;-))
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiw6_JakZFc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbR-5mHI6bo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipVxxxqwBQw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhAemz1v7dQ
Last time I checked, arguments lad populum was still a logical fallacy. Popularity does not equal truth.
YES - and the Earth is flat... ;-))
Your head is brainless.
Honestly, I don't think it matters if MAN is causing climate change. What we're seeing is far less of an impact than is being stated. It makes sense that higher levels of carbon are associated with human activity. On the other hand, Carbon is a relatively heavy gas and will stay near the surface, so will not greatly impact the amount of heat from the sun that the Earth holds onto. While it will cause growing seasons and reduce the amount of water needed to grow crops.
How many ice ages has the earth had?
Only one at the beginnings of the hairless apes's rise to power???
No, this planet has had thousands of ice ages.
Also... thousands of warm ages.
Taxing people and making them buy goods and services from the donor class isn't going to do anything except line the pockets of the RNC and DNC donor-class pockets.
Good to see you found a cause, but man... they don't need your help
The idea that government even knows what the 'optimal' temperature on Earth is -- that's shady.
The idea that government can get and keep the temperature there with enough money and power -- that's fucking madness.
Disappointing to see that one of my favorite commenter is digging himself into ever deeper hole by poor "arguments"... ;-))
What does IRREVERSIBLE even mean in terms of climate? You're talking about we will be able to lower the global temperature now, but will not be able to lower it later. Do you have any idea how silly that sounds.
Not Lower. Limit the increase. Irreversible as in Hysterisis. Bottom line I defer to 100's of very smart Climate Scientists since I don't know much about Climate.
It's one thing to say that scientists should assess raw data and create hypotheses and quite another to say that after experts weigh in and debate that you are unwilling to look at their arguments and decide which has more merit. What you are saying is not following the science, it's bowing to authority.
Spot on Steve!!
This contribution from a post on Quora (I confess to not thinking much of the site, normally) pretty well sums up my feelings about the climate hysteria:
Climate is, in fact, the consequence of an incredibly complex interaction of massive and diverse forces, from variations in solar radiation intensity, to eccentricities of Earth’s orbit, axis precession, and rotation, atmospheric absorption and reflection, to ocean heat absorption, mixing, currents, and thermohaline circulation, and plate tectonics and volcanism, radiation and heat convection from Earth’s core, and many other massive forces interacting.
The agenda by climate alarmists to claim that this entire spectrum of massive forces is somehow insignificant next to a change of a mere .0001 over 250 years in the concentration of a trace gas in Earth’s atmosphere that in total represents just .ooo4 of the atmosphere, is prima facie absurd. This gas is essential for life, and has at other stages in Earth’s history been as much as ten times more in concentration without any ill effect. In fact, times of higher concentration are times of incredibly lush, vibrant, and diverse plant and animal life whose fossilized carbon remains actually created the vast oil and gas reserves we today depend on to fuel human civilization.
This statement by the IPCC is one of the few truly honest sentences in their otherwise propagandized literature. If it were to be erased, that would be at the behest of those who misrepresent climate science in a quest to redistribute the world’s (Read: American) wealth and replace capitalism with global Marxist Socialism, as admitted by IPCC Chairman Ottmar Edenhofer and UN Climate Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres.
I tend to agree with much of your comment. If you look at the work of Tony Heller, however, he demonstrates that temperatures have not gone up particularly much. And I think personal observations cannot be discounted. I live at the beach. A vies has which is unchanged in 50 years.
My perspective is that things have warmed in the Northeast of the US in the last 50 years, which is close to the sum total of my life experience. It's small but appreciable. That said, there's no guarantee that the reason it is warmer is AGW. There are lots of reasons why this might be the case. I quoted yesterday about the extreme number of nuclear tests happening during the late 50s and early 1960s. Not only were oceanic and freshwater tritium levels at times 1000x what they are today, but also there were other atmospheric pollutants as a result of this. There was enough action that the Earth's temperature could easily have been affected. Multi-megaton blasts underground throw a lot of crap into the air. I do know that Northern Hemisphere tritium levels are still 4x what is normal for the Southern Hemisphere overall as a result of this, since the testing was mostly there.
Coal dust was far more prevalent over North America when I was a kid in the 70s. Everyone in the city seemingly used coal for heating and power generation. Used to be i'd get in the car in south Jersey and drive up to NYC, when you got in the car the air was clean, when you got out in the city it was disgusting, brownish-tinted, thick and took a while to get used to. You could literally see the cloud as you drove into it, about 35-40 miles from NYC. People born after 1980 probably don't remember this. Anyway it wasn't just NYC, find an old picture of a US city from that time and you'll likely see the haze i'm talking about. Cities in China look like that now. Since city temperatures are always recorded, I have a hard time imagining this did not have some impact on recorded temperatures. I would expect a cooling effect in summer with less direct sunlight and more impact in the winter with more coal being burnt.
Have you carefully read the full IPCC reports? Or just the Executive Summary which is not peer reviewed.
I have not carefully read every report from the IPCC. I have read much of it and much about it. I am not a climate scientist. I don't pretend to be able to go through the raw information and make assertions. But once experts have debated and their arguments are clear, I can use my solid math and science skills to determine which points are valid which are not.
The IPCC baseline assumption as that coal will be the predominant fuel for the rest of the century, including powering cars. This underlying mistake, which they are aware of, makes all of their projections overblown. https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/abcdd2
What does peer reviewed even mean any more? If the powers that be want it to be a certain way, all those that get funding through them will say what they want.
Nothing will change until every iota of easily available fossil fuel is burned. Energy is power, in the political and military sense, and nothing will stop humankind from seeking power.
I don't even see the point of fighting the issue from either side. It changes nothing except, possibly, who will be the winners and losers at the great game.
That seems overly cynical, things are already changing and have been for a couple of decades. Renewables, EVs, etc., Just not changing as fast as the climate doomsayers would like.
Here's cynical: none of this is sustainable.
Let me be crystal clear: none of what we have going on is sustainable.
Doesn't matter if it's coal-powered battery cars or fossil fuel; there are just plain too many of us and eventually it'll come crashing down
They're working on that. It's no accident that birth rates have fallen below replacement in every industrialized nation.
Did the Club of Rome have it right? We need to find a way to depopulate, perhaps by throttling the food supply or engineering a pandemic or something?
Nothing will change until an alternate form of energy becomes more economical to produce than fossile fuels. It's simple economics.
Also-- take a break from the EV koolaid, it isn't clear if they are any better than fossil fuels. Why? Well, where do you think the electricity comes from? A power plant that's subject to the same laws of thermodynamics as your car. Some power plants are actually less efficient than a modern ICE found in today's vehicles. And then that electricity the power plant produced has to travel down transmission lines where another 5% is consumed in the process. More if you live far away from the power plant, and less if you're close. But nobody wants a power plant in the back yard, right? Once those electrons get to your house they charges your battery which is around 70% absolute best case Real life numbers are probably much worse than that, but let's be charitable. Hopefully you're not fast charging, which is much less efficient. Another 10% or so is lost as the battery discharges and the electric motor converts electrical energy into kinetic energy. There's also a nontrivial amount of energy lost due to self discharge as charged batteries sit unused. On top of all this you have to compare the energy cost of producing an electric car vs. a conventional ICE. Those rare earths are expensive and energy intensive to produce. I have tried in my free time to research how much benefit EV's really provide, and it all seems to be a wash.
Renewable energy sources such as solar and wind are also energy intensive to produce, and unfortunately not reliable. You can't expect every day to be sunny and windy. Sadly there is no clear path away from fossil fuels yet.
Yes, but EVs and such hide the truth from the ignorant, that there is no free lunch.
They'll become totally economical and ubiquitous at the precise moment when the fossil fuels run out.
I know you think this is cynicism, but it's not. It's just reality. Trying to manufacture demand and get the economic forces working without running out of this stuff has not worked to date and will continue not to work.
The protests arise from Joe Biden's likely psychotic break with reality. He tried to have it both ways, first shutting down US fossil fuel production, then begging Saudi Arabia and other countries with a separate atmosphere from ours to increase their production, and expected no one would notice. He was correct only to the extent that the mass media and Big Tech ignored the fictions involved. The rest of us noticed.
The press clearly recognizes that unless Democrats hold onto complete control of the U.S. Government, the game is over. Thus, criticism from anyone - environmentalists, social justice warriors, even other Democrats - must be quashed. The blatantly partisan nature of the coverage is unlikely to make any difference. The only hope is to keep the bubble going as long as possible to further enrich the US Nomenklatura.
Once I saw the Gates wedding featured Coldplay and realize again for the big names it is performative. These protesters got no coverage because they are good people with small footprints.
bill... the notion that "he" did anything, is disconnected from reality. "he" is a puppet.. a figure head, just like those before him, trump, obama, bush, clinton, etc. the "he' in these instances is generational wealth, corporate money, as seen on tv
I suspect we are agreed that he did nothing. About
- Securing our border
- Preventing a regressive tax known as inflation.
- Calling out left-wing violence and intolerance
- Managing to achieve empty grocery shelves in a country that is a net food exporter. Or, perhaps, all those ships are full of food we must import from China because we stupidly forgot how to produce food and move it. This list could go on for many days.
Oh, Biden actively promoted the insecurity of our southern border and took steps virtually designed to send energy prices skyrocketing, which is a huge part of the inflation we're experiencing (I live in Maine, and my propane has been getting progressively more expensive since late last winter).
Of course, you're right that he's done nothing like calling out the left for anything whatever, nor anything to alleviate the supply chain issues. Nor, as you note, done anything on any number of issues. Which, considering how what he DOES do turns out for us, may be a good thing.
And there's the elephant in the room - Biden calls for employers to mandate COVID vaccines for U.S. citizen-employees, while accepting all manner of illegal immigrants from parts south, refusing to vaccinate, test, or treat them for COVID, and then transporting them round the country for "relocation" in the dead of night.
IMHO the only way these people relate to one another is through protest. There is no hanging out together, there is no talking and listening; I could go on. I just think the only way these losers know in their mind and believe how to get their message across is to chase a US Senator into a bathroom, to confront someone in a Target store, to scream and spit at people. I am so tired of protest. Did any of these assholes volunteer anywhere without a camera on them? Did they volunteer to tutor kids falling behind or drive someone to their cancer treatment? OF COURSE NOT!
Protest is not even a cottage industry anymore. It is Wal Mart. In my lifetime, Dr. Martin Luther King. I am blessed.
Centralised Obscene Wealth is at the root of our collapse.
The notion that if we just unleashed and deregulated those that already had the majority of wealth, they would use it benevolently.... is childish, naive, ABSURD at best, in direct conflict with simple wisdom and understanding of human nature.
Remember that spoiled kid in school, the one who was given everything by shitty parents, doted on by administrators and power? were those sick kids EVER satisfied? NEVER.
Give them an inch, they will always take a mile. when did we forget this age old wisdom?
Governments have become NOTHING but proxies for those with the money to buy their desires, which, coincidently, usually means an even larger slice of the pie. Blaming governments, without acknowledging the money and power that is paying for the policy we endure, is nuts.
Government is supposed to stand in the breech between us, the majority, the 99%, and those that aspire to monopoly, totalitarian control of everything, the spoiled kids, because we already know, human nature is built like that. But money figured out, they can buy their way into control over the government. So incrementally, over time, the "spoiled kids" literally became the government. not the puppets we "elect", those are proxies, scare crows, props in a giant shakespearean tragedy.
Were things really much different before Bezos, Gates, Musk, Zuckerburg, et al? I don't think so. Some of their companies are creating societal problems but to say that wealth is the root of our collapse is quite a stretch I think.
Once upon a time, in a place far, far away...Anti-Trust Legislation was used to break up Railway companies, and Oil Companies. When Clinton De-Regulated the Financial Industry that was the beginning of the end (not a slam against Democrats, it could just as easily have been a Republican). SEC/Banks....FAA/Boeing...FDA/Opioids.... Regulatory capture now extends all the way to the very top.
Biden pounds his chest on raising taxes on the rich. What a joke the Elites just use tax loopholes to offshore their money or get out of paying taxes. TAX LAWS HAVE TO BE CHANGED. Rollback taxes on the wealthy to pre 1981 levels. Regan wrote The Economy Recovery Tax Act of 1981, get rid of it. They then want to watch everyone's bank account for movements of $600, so they can catch tax cheats. Who are they kidding?
We are having bad relations with China? Are they kicking our ass with missiles? So why do we consider them a developing country and have the most favored trading status with them? The FTSE tells you to keep on investing there because it would screw up their indexes. Black Rock said triple your investments there on August 18. Hey, I have very little money. Why are the wealthy in China? Are elites like Bloomberg, Black Rock, and Mark Cuban enemies of the state?
How can't you trust someone that constantly lies and beats you?
It's funny how he rails about taxing the elites, then ignores the Pandora Papers, which show exactly HOW the rich hide their assets. Hint: It's not in US-facing bank accounts or bitcoin.
The corporations that went offshore also do not repatriate their money or profits. Google, Facebook LinkedIn are all in Ireland and do the double Irish, Dutch sandwich.
https://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/google-used-double-irish-to-shift-75-4bn-in-profits-out-of-ireland-1.4540519
Yet the leaders will never close down those loopholes, because they were paid to create them in the first place.
Clinton gave us the “Bank Modernization Act”. It basically destroyed the Glass-Steagle bank laws that kept us stable for 50 years after 1929. Now we have financial chaos again.
"clinton", in concert with his Koch bros. benefactors, greenspan, summers, etc.
Jimmy Carter deregulated trucking, breaking the back of the teamsters. Truckers now burn out and there is a high turn over in the industry.
spot on. glass steagall was an obstacle to the financiers wet dreams. they removed it. and made certain, derivatives etc, were never to be regulated. brooksley born was slaughtered for even suggesting it.
quite a stretch? lolwut? so, you trust the spoiled kids to be benevolent? really? interesting.
this is basic simple human psychology.
conservatively estimated at over $50 trillion squirreled away in the caymans.. like a battery.. stored force.. but they only want what's best for you and your family? rofl.
do you know anything about the difference between earned income and unearned income?
"As soon as the land of any country has all become private property, the landlords, like all other men, love to reap where they never sowed." - Adam Smith The Wealth of Nations, Book I, Chapter VI
No I don't trust them to be benevolent, their companies need to be regulated but our corrupt Congress is incapable of doing that unfortunately. Most of their wealth is tied up in shares of their respective companies, what would you do, confiscate and distribute those shares to US citizens?
Centralised Obscene Wealth is at the root of our collapse.
--------------------------------
And it was only possible after going 'full fiat' in the 70s. Since then we double the money supply about every 11 years, and that is accelerating. Who do you think GETS those trillions of dollars?
I have noted that my house, and everyone else's, is more full of shit than it was in the 70s. Whether that shit equals valuable goods is another question. Consumerism changed society, and employed more people around the world. The fact that it can only be sustained by government interventions into the economy on a regular basis does not bode well.
A few weeks back I read an article equating people who are anti-vaccination with people who are anti-GMO. They lumped both groups as "anti-science."
So my question is, these days what is an environmentalist?
Also, when you have a world system that runs entirely on fossil fuels, what do environmentalists expect to happen? Even if the US does everything environmentalists want them to do, what real effect will that have on global climate when Russia, China & India don't play along?
When the initial "Covid models" turned out to model nothing but the fantasies of the model builders why isn't there, at the very least, a modicum of doubt about climate models?
If the US had any real interest in science why aren't they testing the unvaccinated for anti-bodies before they a. give them an unnecessary shot and b. threaten the employment & living ability of people who don't need the shot?
Lastly, when it's obvious that every news organization has chosen the last UN climate report to wax hysterical over while ignoring the climate report that immediately proceeded it that showed the 1% are, by far, the biggest energy/pollution scofflaws on the planet, why does anyone think anything will appreciably change under any administration, Repub or Dem, that is owned by the wealthy?
"you see, the model we build to show how bad things could get with the climate is showing how bad things could get with the climate under our input assumptions. Quite extraordinary, actually."
When you tell the model masks work, the model tells you masks work!
There is some genetic defect in a class of people that causes them to over-count the impact of a few extra carbon molecules in the atmosphere and under-count the impact of running out of other people's money.
It seems so rational to me that one US-technology-made Chinese supersonic nuclear missile exploding would harm the environment much more that all of the gas-powered redneck pickup trucks these nuts want to ban.
I would put it differently. CO2 is a greenhouse gas, there is no question about that. It's not transparent to infrared energy as O2 or N2 are, the much larger portion of our atmosphere. It'll heat up the planet, though the amount is debatable and remains unsolved with any precision. We are liberating more by burning fossil fuels. The Earth has sinks for CO2, capturing it again in liquids or solids, which we do not understand fully, nor do we understand their limits.
With this in mind, there are natural fluctuations in temperature that have nothing to do with greenhouse gases. The Earth's average temperature is not stable. It warms, and it cools into Ice Ages.
One side of this debate wants to freeze the Earth at a state it existed in say, 1970, or pre-industrialization, though I would point out that the early 19th century was a fairly cool period and I don't think people today would like it very much. On the other, people either say it isn't much of a concern since it changes anyway, or they refuse to acknowledge that CO2 based warming exists. I don't think either side is right. But expecting nuance and intelligent conversation when people can use the public debate to further other ends is expecting too much. It's a proxy battle for totalitarian control of society, really.
To wit: the US military, (the whole ball of wax,) pollutes more than the lowest 145 or so countries on the planet.
To wit: All Democrat politicians past and present, and their staff, flying around the world to preach and screech about the dangers of anthropogenic climate change, pollutes more than the lowest 145 or so countries on the planet.
To wit: there’s been a dog and pony show going on for DECADES now, blaming either party is just plain silly, ie the largest voting block in US are non voters so assuming environmental activists are partisan is highly inaccurate.
To wit: this shit show is probably going to end badly
Thanks Matt and Ford for making sure stories like this have a chance to be heard.
Of course - any news that reflects poorly on the Biden Administration is no news to the NYT's, WAPO, LAT and the like... It seems that FOX is the only outlet that as least makes an attempt at "fair and balanced".
400 is a very large number arrests.
Five days of protests and 400 arrests.
In Louisville, Kentucky there were five months of protests there were 850 arrests when protesters broke nearly every window in downtown Louisville.
In Portland, Oregon, between May 28, 2020, and February 26, 2021, the DA's office said they received 294 civil unrest demonstration-related cases. I'm that Portland, protesters continuously assaulted the Federal Courthouse and Federal Marshals with missles and molotov cocktails. It is worth noting that the Portalnd Federal Courthouse is the house of the Judicial Branch.
684 protesters arrested for January 6, 2021 at the Capitol building.
There are three Branches of Federal government: (1) Executive (President), (2) Legislative (Congress), and (3) Judicial. This is our checks and balances system intended to keep any one branch from allowing the other to take power. This is our guard against tyranny. Pay close attention to the arrests and killings of protesters and you will see the value placed on the Judicial branch and our nation of laws.
Consider the serious discussion regarding "packing" the U.S. Supreme Court.
This was the path used by Chavez in Venezuela. He undermined Venezuela's Supreme Court and "packed" it. He enforced the laws against opponents and allowed supports to wreck havoc. He took control of the media. Sound familiar?
Ok, a bunch of people protest, an interesting story, as far as this piece goes. What would be more interesting to see, and learn, is who are these people?
It would be interesting to follow the activities of, for the sake of discussion, 5 of the “leaders” and 5 random participants, to see where they go after their thrill fades into nothing. Are these poor people who risk all to participate in an effort they believe needs to be accomplished; or are they the spoil brats many of them appear to be?
How do they get from point A to point B? How do they feed themselves and handle the cost of their activities? That is information that is part of the story, even if we are not made privy to said facts.
No matter their status in life, they have every right to be there and make their voices heard. But as we listen to them it would help to know who they are and why they are there.
It would also be interesting to know how much overlap there is between this group of activists and people who were BLM activists in the summer of 2020.
project veritas?
The Government is reacting, by creating shortages. Biden's alienation of Saudi Arabia had the Saudis saying they were not increasing oil production to meet demand. The president also created policies that stunted oil and gas exploration. The 30x30 plan also is taking farmland out of production and putting it into conservation. Land in western Kansas, Nebraska, and South Dakota is being targeted. Food prices will be going up because of a lack of feed and range for cattle.
You are being nudged to consume less food, and energy. They then tell you Americans have to expect less. The thing that bothers me is they use negative behavioral techniques. They never offer an incentive to have approved behavior. A stimulus of $1000 to prove you got the shot instead of mandates. A stimulus for solar energy, a stimulus for buying an electric car then by 2035 it would be mandated. People not taking the stimulus would have regret for not having the approved behavior. Instead, they are creating distrust and anger.
What's more, is they make stupid promises like saying they would raise taxes on the wealthy. Elites just find loopholes or offshore their money. They have to change the TAX LAWS, no more loopholes, and roll back Regan's Tax Recovery Act of 1981 to 1970s levels to tas the wealthy. Stop hgh frequency trading. GIVE THE PEOPLE A STIMULUS FOR THE BEHAVIORS YOU WANT. STOP KICKING US IN THE ASS. Maybe we will TRUST YOU instead of hating your guts.
They are doing what their base would like them to do. The truth, that it won't please the base (nothing would), is not very convincing to those implementing the policies.
If you knew what a politician does vs what he promises to get elected, he would not get elected. Why can't they do what is right for the people.
Would that make them more likely to get re-elected? Would that enrich them?
Our Senator Toomy is retiring from the senate to work on K Street as a lobbyist. They all have insider information. One guy on Tik-Tok follows Pelosi's trades and makes money. Politicians have power but no money and the elites have money and want power. By doing what is right for the people, it probably won't enrich them but it will give them power.
Fauchi likes power. He was head of the NIH since 1982 and had the power through the Bayh/Dole act of 1980 to advocate which drugs were researched and which weren't. He pushed AZT and some say it killed more people than AIDS did. He liked stuff from Gilead (Which he had stock in), pushed Tamaflu and made US stockpile it. Pushed Remdesovir. He funded research and you had to kiss his ring to get funding. Funding provides papers in SCIENCE and New England Journal of Medicine. Fauchi is only worth 10 million but the world dances to the power he has in medicine. Look at the Matt Taibbi article about Molnupiravir and cronyism at the NIH.
Roger Stone went to prison for lying to congress, Steve Banon will be tried for contempt. Fauchi Lied about a gain of function research to Congress. NOTHING will happen to Fauchi. Just like nothing will happen to Biden for corruption from Hunter's laptop. Nothing will happen to Gov. Cuomo for the death of thousands in old age homes. It is not what is just, it is who has power.
We are losing trust, in our government. That means the dollar will become weak and the rich would lose their money. Could you see sociopaths like Bezos, Zuckerberg, Gates, and Bloomberg running this country? Europe or Russia would be better than those globalist, social justice assholes.
"losing trust"?
Only the young trust the government. The rest of us have figured out the game, mostly, and try to protect ourselves from its impact.
Nobody in this country does anything to develop trust. If you want to develop trust, you need to have a character that develops trust. I advocate everyone passing on "THE SIX PILLARS OF CHARACTER"
Here is what they are:
1. Trustworthy; (don't cheat, don't steal, reliable, dependable, be faithful to your family and your country, do what you say, be honest),
2. Respect; (tolerance, listening to others, use good manners, no bad language, be considerate of the feelings of others, don’t threaten, hit or hurt anyone • deal peacefully with anger, insults),
3. Responsibility; (self-control, be self-disciplined, think before you act, consider the consequences, be accountable for your words, actions, and attitudes)
4. Fairness; (play by the rules, take turns and share, be open-minded; temperate, analytical, sincere, truthful, don’t blame others carelessly. treat all people fairly or equally, objectivity)
5. Caring; ( Be compassionate and show empathy, express gratitude, forgive others , Help people in need)
6. Citizenship; (Volunteerism, the environment, paying your taxes even though there are loopholes, honoring ideals country was founded on, get involved in community affairs • stay informed; vote, be a good neighbor, obey laws and rules, respect authority)
If more people and corporations would follow this, you would have trust, peace, love, and tolerance. We lost this with sex drugs and rock and roll. This is what kids need to learn in school not SEL bullshit.
Lose money, you lose nothing
Lose health, you lose something
Lose your character, you lose everything.
The courage of the heroic Alyssa Milano in her brave protest must be noted. Like the other protesters, Ms. Milano has risked so much in bringing attention to herself. https://pagesix.com/2021/10/20/alyssa-milano-arrested-at-white-house-voting-rights-protest/
I liked her better when she was on Charmed.
When the conservation movement (life long member here)morphed into the radical environmentalist movement it made a mess out of what could have been a slow (by necessity) constant change for good. Like Joe Biden the fucked it up.
Agreed. I still have my original Earth Day button.
We have supported a lot of environmental groups in our modest ways over the years, because we always assumed it was helpful in DC for groups to say they had so many members when they talked to the PTB. (Yes; we aren't very bright.)
But after Trump was elected and my Sierra Club renewal had "Resist" gear as the incentive, when my National Audubon email told me "Silence is violence," and offered to send me free of charge what's his name anti-racism book, I decided our modest resources and numbers had more value closer to home.
Everything is now local where we concerned. The other groups don't need us. they have Greta T. What's more enlightening (and convincing) than having a privileged child from cold Europe preach to us.
*In an effort to get my facts/spelling on Greta T correct, I went to Wikipedia. She has a section called "Early life." F'in hilarious.
When they inconvenience people who actually matter, they're called rioters, not protestors.</sarcasm>
When you are conveying your message peacefully you are protesting. When you are conveying your message through violence, intimidation and destruction of private and public property you are rioting. You're tolerance would end the moment protesters destroyed your ability to earn a living or burned your house.