EPA Says No To California’s Emissions Plan
WASHINGTON - Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Stephen Johnson on Wednesday denied California’s petition to limit greenhouse-gas emissions from cars and trucks, overruling the unanimous recommendation of the agency’s legal and technical staffs.
California officials vowed to fight the decision in court.
A total of 18 states, including Washington, have either adopted or pledged to implement California’s proposed tailpipe-emissions rules, which seek to cut vehicles’ greenhouse-gas emissions by 30 percent between 2009-16.
Johnson said the higher fuel-economy standards and increased renewable-fuel requirements in the energy bill President Bush signed into law Wednesday will do more to address global warming than imposing tailpipe rules in individual states.
“The Bush administration is moving forward with a clear national solution, not a confusing patchwork of state rules, to reduce America’s climate footprint from vehicles,” Johnson said.
The new mileage standard mandated by Congress is aimed at reducing gasoline consumption, which will reduce vehicles’ overall “carbon footprint,” but California’s rules would target total greenhouse-gas emissions, including those that stem from vehicle air-conditioning units. Experts said tailpipe regulations are a more comprehensive way to address vehicles’ contribution to greenhouse gases.
Johnson said California standards would produce a mileage average of 33.8 miles per gallon (mpg) by 2016, while the new federal energy law would require an average fleet fuel economy of 35 mpg by 2020. California officials said EPA miscalculated, estimating that its emissions standard would achieve an average of at least 36 mpg by 2016.
California, which is allowed under the Clean Air Act to set its own air-pollution policies as long as it obtains an exemption from the federal government, had never been denied a waiver in the act’s 37-year history.
The EPA decision effectively kills Washington state’s attempt to follow California’s lead with rules forcing automakers to start cutting greenhouse-gas emissions from new cars sold in Washington starting in 2009.
Washington’s Legislature adopted the California rules in 2005.
Even if states prevail in court, it would surely postpone the start of stricter greenhouse-gas standards, said Stuart Clark, head of the state Department of Ecology’s air-quality branch.
Environmentalists and state officials lambasted the EPA decision and pledged to sue to overturn it. In the past three months, federal judges in Vermont and California have twice rebuffed automakers’ attempts to block state tailpipe regulations.
“Governor Schwarzenegger and I are preparing to sue at the earliest possible moment,” California Attorney General Jerry Brown said, saying the Bush administration had no legal justification to deny the state’s request.
EPA’s lawyers and policy staff had reached the same conclusion, said several agency officials familiar with the process. In a presentation prepared for the administrator, aides wrote that if Johnson denied the waiver and California sued, “EPA likely to lose suit.”
If he allowed California to proceed and automakers sued, the staff wrote, “EPA is almost certain to win.”
The technical and legal staffs cautioned Johnson against blocking California’s tailpipe standards, the sources said, and recommended that he either grant the waiver or authorize it for three years before reassessing it.
The sources spoke on condition of anonymity.
Asked about his aides’ recommendations, Johnson said, “My staff provided me a range of options, with a lot of pros and cons with each of these options.”
The decision also infuriated Washington state officials and local environmentalists, who accused the Bush administration of cynically using the newly signed energy bill as an excuse to kill tougher restrictions on vehicle emissions that were also set to take effect in this state.
“I’m pissed,” said Dennis McLerran, the normally soft-spoken head of the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency and a lead proponent of the California-style rules. “This is a political decision, not a fact-based decision.”
He also predicted that states would sue the EPA to overturn the new ruling.
U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., who sits on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, joined the criticism. “Time and again this administration has sat on the sidelines in addressing the serious effects of climate change,” she said.
Gov. Christine Gregoire was noncommittal about a lawsuit Wednesday. Her spokesman, Aaron Toso, said nothing had been decided.
Washington’s leading business lobby, the Association of Washington Business, had opposed the state law.
“It’s always advantageous to have a federal program, especially when you’re dealing with an international product such as automobiles,” said Grant Nelson, governmental-affairs director for the association. “To try to mandate a different standard state by state simply doesn’t make sense.”
The decision comes from an administration that has long resisted regulation of such greenhouse gases as carbon dioxide, saying it favors a voluntary approach. Most recently, U.S. representatives at an international global-warming conference in Bali, Indonesia, reportedly fought an effort to lay out specific targets for future greenhouse-gas reductions.
Seattle Times reporter Warren Cornwall contributed to this report.
Material from The Associated Press and Los Angeles Times is included in this report.
Copyright © 2007 The Seattle Times Company
Sometimes I reminisce about the old days when logic and sense ruled the day. If you said, “The stove is hot,” it meant that the stove was hot. If you proposed clean-air legislation, it was designed to clean the air.
The biggest loss for many in the post-Bush America must be the loss of meaning in our language. Nowadays, you can say anything to anybody and meaning has no importance. Lewis Carroll would be perplexed. I imagine if Congress ever impeaches any of these clowns, they’ll first redefine “impeach” to mean “worthy of high accolades.”
I’m suggesting that Californians do the only sensible thing–secede!
From a legal standpoint, perhaps the environmental regulation offer the best opportunity for states to reclaim and clarify their “rights”.
There is a solution to this: We need to work our butts off to elect leaders who are not supported by the biggest polluters. This is something we are capable of doing.
Funny how states rights disappear when the corporate Gods decree that their puppets in the Executive branch dance.
Bush and all of his ilk need to be out of here - NOW.
We can’t wait for his term to end.
Far too many things need to happen that are not happening and are not going to as long as he is sitting at the top of the food chain.
Electing him is one of the biggest mistakes this country has ever made.
I know:
we didn’t elect him. He stole the election . . . Yeah, but I maintain that if it was not as close as it was, that would not have happened.
We are going to be paying for this mistake for countless years to come.
What really gets me is that probably a majority of us STUPID Americans will never connect the dots or even realize anything is wrong.
Ya know? Arghhh.
The bottom line here is-the frigging automotive industry will have to start making cars that meet California’s clean-air legislation as it would be cheaper than making one emission set-up for California, which is probably one of the Auto Maker’s largest markets, than it would be to have one for California, (and those other pesky States that want to have California Standards) and another for the rest of the Nation. States making strict environmental laws is the only way the U.S. will be forced into any meaningful movement towards reducing emissions that contribute to the Green House effect while this idiot is in the White House.
The Feds have been trying to subvert States rights for years, especially when the states don’t play by the corporate neocon rules. The Feds have been harassing California for years over it’s medical marijuana laws, now they want to undermine their attempts to pass more aggressive greenhouse gas laws.
There was a time when the republican’s agenda advocated strong states rights, now they only advocate corporate rights. Let’s hope that the Terminator and his consigliere, Brown, stuff a wet rag up the tailpipes of Bush and Co.’s SUV’s, and lock them inside.
Migration is not immigration, so I guess I can move there. Maybe they’ll secede. If all the blue states did that, the ruling red ones would be out of work.
Repugs say they’re for state’s rights when things like evolution and abortion are concerned, but pollution? That they’ll leave to Big Government. The hypocrisy is mind-boggling, but understandable when we have an oligarchy controlling the public mind.
Please someone, for us.
Define the word : Enviromental
Define the word : Protection.
KEM - It should be obvious by now.
I remember the last time CA adopted a fuel law (something like 10% of cars sold in CA had to be altfuel) and we got the electric car. It was so wonderful that GM canceled all the leases and crushed the cars.
Meaning it WAS wonderfull, but it sure did scare the hell out of GM.
well if you know about mass transit, you know GM is a big reason why we are now in this big problem…
GM ought decide to be part of the solution in my humble opinion…otherwise, who knows what is going to happen…
hells bells, all i can say is: CARS SUCK IT
and then they blow a whole bunch of crud out all the while the occupants live in the car universe weighing orders of magnitude more then they….
pathetic..
pathetic i say…where is everyone….oh well….don’t you think..
And where the FUCK are the Democrats in DC on this issue? I cannot imagine that the DLC and Blue Dog HACKS in the party would even bother to go pro-environment given all the funding they’re getting from BIG Oil and Auto.
The probelem with leaving it all to the states is that, California aside, most states would cave in to big business and considerably relax their environmental protection if given the chance.
Does this include “light trucks”? If not, people can just buy an SUV or Mini-van (classified as a light truck) to get around it. That gap should have been plugged early in the Clinton era.
Instead, let’s tax gas to pay for the war TRILLIONS. Tax gas and you’ll see bicycles and mopeds pretty quickly. Yeah, yeah, I know, taxes don’t leave anyone with extra money to buy junk we don’t need in the first place…. Happy Shoppa-Holiday America!
Why is your Federal Government interfering with what is basically a State matter? If Arnold gets this passed, there are Provinces which are going to follow suit.
California has a big enough market that if it passes this law, if the automobile companies refuse to comply they will lose a lot of business.
If Vermont passed a law like this, the automobile companies could just ignore them. Likewise with Manitoba.
I wonder if Manitoba Hydro (which now owns Manitoba gas) will have a program for cars like they do for LED christmas lights. I can see it now “You get a $5,000 coupon for turning in your old gas gusler, but the car has to be working or the deal’s off!
PJD, I think there’s precedent on this that states can only override fereral law if the state law is more stringent. This is certainly the way it works for OSHA, the same could be applied to this law, I believe.
Perhaps California considers the last option; temporary succession from the US until Jan 2009 OR until the constitutional republic is restored.
WASHINGTON (AFP) — The Lakota Indians, who gave the world legendary warriors Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, have withdrawn from treaties with the United States, leaders said Wednesday.
“We are no longer citizens of the United States of America and all those who live in the five-state area that encompasses our country are free to join us,” long-time Indian rights activist Russell Means told a handful of reporters and a delegation from the Bolivian embassy, gathered in a church in a run-down neighborhood of Washington for a news conference.
Sounds like Stephen Johnson and Kevin Martin must have come out of the same mold. The mold caused by rot and decay that is, like all Bush appointees. Johnson and Martin are just the current poster boys of cronyism. Their direct opposition the the very mission of their posts clearly qualifies them as what our Constitution describes as domestic enemies. They should wake up tomorrow morning in some Gitmo-orange jammies. Maybe a feeding tube for breakfast.
who is Kevin Martin? Tell more if you know.
Kevin Martin is your corporate media representative at the FCC. Trained as a lawyer and loves media ownership by everyone but the people and small media business. Hates diversity in news, whether it be radio, newsprint and perhaps later the internet. Also part of the Bush election team in 2000 and 2004. Took over the FCC after Michael Powell, but on steroids. Wears John Lennon glasses. Never served in the military, republican, deeply religious and a danger to civilization.
sung425 - thank-you.
I should have known that, but i don’t think i could have ever summed it up as well as you.
Peace
EPA new job is to protect corporations from environment of angry citizens.
Bring the Revolution!!
Just another CRB attack on American citizens by Toxic George & Co.
What should be obvious Buf-Ken?
kem patrick - the mere fact the you need to ask the question begs the question. What don’t you get????????
Come on. You talk so strong, but then you don’t seem to understand.
Don’t you sense what is happening? Honestly, what are you fighting?
If you want to be a patriot, then good.
If you want to just shoot the shit, then the shit will bounce back.
Hey, tell me if i’m wrong, but my girls are just growing up now. Honestly, Kem, you started out as something that you were not, so why should i believe a thing you have to say.
Say all you want, but in the end, the People will.
The People will decide with or without you. With or without me.
The People will choose.
Myself, I declare INDIGNATION and independence from all of this insane bullshit that has been going on for too long. Too long.
The time is now.
Merry Chistmas and Happy Holidays everyone. Really.
10-4 big buddy, signing out.
cactuspie said it well. Twice in one week we’ve had the Bush hitmen totally ignore the advice of their entire departments to pursue Bush’s total destruction of both our Constitution and our environment. Domestic enemies, indeed.
This corn ethanol mandate by Dr. Russell Long, REAP and for Pacific Ethanol will increase oil imports and profit
* Growing corn for fuel ethanol in California will use lots of water and will result higher priced food
* Clean Air Performance Professionals
BUFFALO KEN That first post I wrote, the question was directed for any who may work for the EPA and read here.
I have no idea of who who are BUFFALO KEN, or what other name you may have used here previously at CD. From the 14 of 34 comments you have posted here, it is fairly obvious you need medical help, especially from your 5:27pm post. Don’t know what you are on but hope you stay on it and forget how you found this site. Sorry to hear about your two girls though, hopefully they are grown up enough to get away from you.
I feel like I somehow got switched to a world where everything is opposite. Our evenviromental agency is fighting against states adopting stricter standards to protect their people. If the EPA had been doing their job all this would have been unecessary.
Our whole government is rotten from top to bottom. Evil that we are compelled to finance.
kem - sorry you are so confused about the numbers. Also you have no idea about my two girls.
Also, I would like to apologize to everyone else here for distracting this conversation.
It seems as if the leadership of EPA is in shambles, just like the rest of DC.
In fact kem, who do you think you are talking about the two children who came from me. Have you no empathy?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shambles_(York)
Why do we even permit a federal government at all? All it does is spread tyranny, oppression and hatred throughout the world (most of all in the USA.) All it is, is a facade over the misdeeds of the Fortune 500.
Now my conscientious Californians are doing something to save our environmental bacon (because they don’t want to breathe poison,) and this very same Federal Bully is going out of it’s way to get us all killed.
This government is a domestic threat to the constitution.
Toyota
Laughing all the way to the BANK
GM - Ford - Chrysler *UAW* RIP
Willo,
I feel like I somehow got switched to a world where everything is opposite
I used to feel like that a couple of winters ago when the Iraq War had just started. You know, 2004? I felt like I was walking through a time warp. I kept imagining what would it be like if Gore had been really recognized as President? Would I be seeing men in army uniforms strutting around? would I see all the “Support the Troops” and red, white and blue ribbons everywhee? As you may have guessed, I live in a southern state. Virginia would never even THINK of adopting California’s fuel efficiency requirements. Puh-leeze. That would be bad for business.
Mary
wow, most wait for the democrats to save us when we
the people aren’t willing to stand up to save us. don’t
think it’s going to happen. a US police state will wake
more of us up so bring it on.
See Democracy Now today? Harry Reed standing by Ray McGovern, and Harry is defending his decision NOT TO IMPEACH.
Ray on the other hand laid out a very good case for; starting with King George bragging about wire tapping U.S. Citizens!
Another sop to the foundering US auto industry!
The EPA should be spending 100% of its time protecting the enviroment. They have done some good things, such as insuring people clean up oil spills on our highways and automatic car washes recyle the water used, lots of little things. But the reallly big problems are often ignored, or given lip service, depending upon who is in the White House.
Hi there nutcase, it was you who broght up the subject of your two girls. and asked me to tell you if you were wrong. All I said was, I hope they are old enough to get away from your home and or you, you are quite possibly dangerous, you’re obviously deranged. Don’t be afraid to seek professional help.
I guess Limbaugh and Hannity don’t know what to make of the Governator. Hanging around with former Governor Moonbeam too long? Their former darling is sounding like a “li li li lib - ber - al”! Saints preserve us!
Seriously, my first reaction was there isn’t a lot of difference between the new CAFE standard and the California proposal, and California shouldn’t rock the boat when we are 80% there.
I was wrong and really surprised. The proposal is substantially more ambitious, and a number of state governments led by both parties are taking up the cause with popular support.
Any reasonably intelligent person can plainly see “we the people” means nothing to the rapacious murdering swine “leading” The United States of Amnesia. So why don’t you lemmings demmand your state legislators bring in a bill to LEAVE the sinking, (or is it stinking?), ship? The same should be true for Louisianna. The corporations and their knee walking whores in washington steal their oil and gas, then shaft them, (and CONTINUE to shaft them), after Katrina. Demmand your state “leaders” withdraw! Then you can sell your natural resources for Euros,($1.65 to one), or British Pounds Sterling, ($2.10 to one), and become the next Dubai.
Bali & Related misinformation:
For seven years, this unelected president has sold us out by invoking unprecedented blockage of progress in vital global warming mitigation and related environmental reforms through deception and manipulation of science–not to mention outrageous deprivation of hope from millions with incurable diseases by his zealot obstruction blockage of stem cell research, this misguided war, and the list goes on. He has corrupted the EPA which was chartered as a non political environmental watchdog body by President Nixon, and functioned as such until this administration.
Now without shame, in his 12/20/07 press conference, he states that our recent watered down requirement to increase the average fleet mileage standards to 35 mph (sic) by 2020 reflects the US lead in mitigation measures to curb climate change–after rejecting Kyoto and stalling progress in te Bali conference, and even blocking nearly half of our population from setting more effective standards.
Despite the horrific consequences of his policies, he cannot be blamed . Instead blame falls on the apathetic and unlearned voters who helped his team steal the elections, the five supreme court justices who placed politics over principal and planted this unfit person in office, and our legislators for allowing these outrageous actions against our planet.
Stephen Johnson and Kevin Martin, names that will live in infamy.
Please go ahead and secede California and set an example for the rest of the States.
It’s amazing how many “conservatives” actually believe that environmental concerns are part of a liberal conspiracy. An editorial in my local newspaper denounced Al Gore and called global climate change, “globaloney”. I don’t understand these people, They still believe everything they learned in Sunday school and western movies: Magical thinking and rigid adherence to dogma. I mean, isn’t it in the best interests of the greedy to keep the planet livable? To at least maintain its resources to have something to exploit in the future? The American plutocrats are the worst in the world, and their embrace of Christo-fascism makes me want to learn Spanish and move to Venezeula or Bolivia.
The EPA should change it’s name to the CPA - Corporations Protection Agency.
WTF! and again WTF!!
sorry if you dont do F, here is an interesting youtube video F! F! F!
OSHO — strange consequences
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6D7rWLzloOI
YOU TAKE THE NASTIEST SPECIES AND YOU PUT THEM IN CHARGE AND YOU GET A COMPLETELY TOXIC PLANET. NO OTHER SPECIES IS EVEN CAPABLE OF POLLUTING this sweet earth AS HOMO SAPIENS CAN.
lets be earthlings.
restoration is the way.
i pledge allegiance to planet earth.
mitakuye oyasin
In this story I am writing and speaking publicly it becomes clear that the lag time of science to accurately report its findings is part of the problem of action and understanding. But even if the public had this data and were aware of the understanding that the planet was dying, the special interests in Washington and the corporate world would have scoffed at the science and continued to put future generations at risk by obfuscating the evidence and denying the truth. This science is now acceptable because the world has agreed that the findings of global warming are finally an inescapable and the truth.
Like Bali the USA has done its utmost to put profit, money and business before the well being of not only America but the world. It has trained its little greed puppy Canada to do the same. The people that George Bush, the anti life president, has appointed to fill the American agencies as watchdog for pollution, greed, avarice, health and any other group of people who should be looking into the abuses of business, science and the military and prtect the population are absent.
The time lag of a thousands years abut some sciences before the global human adventure ends or other science that talks about space exploration is mute when this kind of science affecting the oceans or anything else is measured by a decade left to take action for climate change. When a lag of only ten years to reduce emissions is the time James Hansen of NASA puts out there all events other than that and Bali take a backseat. Because of economic consideration the human race will die! George Bush is a man for no human beings he is the president of the American Money printing press. If we are to avoid the positive feed backs loops, scoffed at because of economic reasons and based upon special interests. If we fail to look at the picture clearly, we face a catastrophe because of money alone. To parphrase Hitler GELT UBBER ALLES!
The acidity in the oceans is bad news not only for the life within the ocean but for the fact that it makes the ocean less able to absorb the excess carbon dioxide we are producing and thus exacerbates global warming and climate change.
The UN like most organizations is built around the G8 nations and economics. There formulations are designed to do two things try the save humanity and try to save the world economy at the same time. The problem is that Kyoto is problematic in that its policies promote continued pollution aimed at keeping the world economy afloat. If they were really interested at saving this planet the UN would do away with pollution trading altogether and institute a crash rapid change to alternative energy and an end to global toxicity. But politicians say, with businessinterests say, we don’t give them the truth; we let them think, as all diplomats do, that we are really interested in change rather than profit, money and power.
I have talked with delegates from the UN member nations and many of them have said to me privately, if they really said what some NGO’s are saying at the UN they would be recalled and never have a job again.
Most public comments are very nice to hear they tell people what the powers want them to know with the help of the media they control. But like the Congress they also come down beside the point as most politicians do. Most comments from the present Congress and in the blogs avoid reality and don’t deal with the issue head on. Most are still looking for the magic technological bullet or some disingenuous politician that will save all and we can continue on the way we are going with ever more growth and ever more and greater GDP as the bankers advise. Any candidate that does not talk about environmental issues first on the agenda, including Kucinich, betrays America and the world.
But there really isn’t any quick fix. I am a filmmaker and have worked on the environmental change issues since 1978 so I have a fair amount of experience to speak. While LED light-bulbs is good and 40 MPG for cars is better it is not the at 80MPG minamum from vehicles that is necessary! It also requires the legislated refits for all existing cars to the minum of 40 MPG or more rather than exporting them to the developing world which is presently being done. This will pick up speed as restrictions rise in the western world on carbon emissions and rejected in the third world. We continue to export the problem from the USA to other countries as if we don’t share this world with other people. And while Jesse Jackson talks of the rights of black Americans of the world, his particular crusade, its the people of the entire world at issue.
It was GE that killed the electric car not long ago who in Congress complained about that? Whether health care, big business, environment, energy alternatives, toxicity in the environment or any and all of these issues it comes down to who has the courage to talk about all of them rather than focusing on the head of a pin looking atone important issue. You want to hear about health care for America; how about the advance of environmentally based health problems by a toxic environment and air related pandemics. This is what we can expect from climate change in the next few years as global temperature rises. The candidates are discussing universal health care? Try one for the globe and all the sicknesses the policies of the USA have caused, three percent of the world’s population the USA produces seventy three percent of global toxicity. You wonder where cancer comes from?
The people of the USA have been so ill informed as to what a change would really do and mean to this country and the change in leadership, they have forgotten that no one could be worse than George Bush. . . No one; not even the dog catcher, at least the dog catcher has compassion for animals!
The problems with the US future leders, is not Kucinich as president, the problem is that he puts his emphasis on the wrong problem at the wrong time. The problem is getting him to address a credible platform of ideas. He wants to get rid of Chenney the time was 2004. While impeachment is necessary, it is unlikely. There is not enough time and the issues most pressing are again avoided, like the environment and those really important issues before the congress now like kids health care!
The issue of this election will affect the environment, economy and the future of the USA as no others. Yet if more than 50% of eligible voters cast their votes it will be a miracle because of regressive US election laws. It is compulsory for every one to vote in Australia. None of the candidates are really talking about the major points, the environment in association with the economy or health care and reform laws for elections.
The environmental news coming out is not new but it is very grave and keeps being pushed to more urgency as new research comes to light. If any one reading this comment cares to look at the website of NASA, the research papers of James Hansen in particular that were published long before Gore was on the scene and many since, they would understand that we really can not deal with much more than one degree to two and half degrees Fahrenheit of warming at its maximum to ward off the most serious effects of industrial societies pollution and to offset this growing catastrophe.
At about two and half degrees farenheit of warming total some of which is presently in the pipeline, we will be dealing with about 550 ppm of carbon in the atmosphere, a rate actually above the tipping point of one and half degrees warming. This is the absolute figure to avoid the major positive feedback loops that are starting and scheduled to kick in by 2020 or earlier if nothing is done quickly. Positive feedback are starting now with Methane now being released on the tundra into the atmosphere in Russia a four times addition to greenhouse gasses and causing the poles and glaciers to melt more rapidly, or has no one noticed?
The below scenario excerpted from the climate articles here on Common Dreams tell us clearly rapid changes to the world caused by runaway climate change and their feedback loops are in reach within 10 to 30 years if nothing is done rapidly. The positive feedback loops will melt the remainder of the glaciers and perhaps dump Greenland into the sea as well. Also, the melting of additional ice-shelf’s at the poles. That means perhaps a 3 to 30 foot ocean rise by the end of this century or much sooner as now being mentioned at Bali.
The process is beginning now and in 20 years or less without rapid change in economic direction the human race will reach a point of no return. The so called news and other media continue to bend the information toward the global economic agenda thus minimizing its importance. India for example is less concerned about climate change than they are about economic production thanks to the G8, although their neighbor Bangladesh is slipping into the sea . Still in India, there are several moves in the direction of smaller is better concepts of reality.
There will be sufficient human displacement of people on this planet to bring American citizens into a nightmare scenario that makes the present Mexican border problem a walk in the park. What about the transfer of health risks as a result of this problem? Not to mention water and food related issues, exacerbated by the bio-fuels concept another disater to make the auto industry solvent and the economy, always the economy.
Yet is seems the political discussion rests on the complete list of talking points in isolation, such as Clinton’s health package and its cost, rather than what is really at stake which is human survival. These folks on the stage wanting to be president rarely talk to the complete interrelated package of all these issues and more. The media reduces the public debate to its most simplistic level and all here are arguing about one issue or another rather than the entire package which a true leader must address. The media keeps the public dumbed down for obvious reasons they represent the money people. As a result we become unable to talk about moving radically to deal with climate change. This is the first and major issue which affects all other issues and is completely related to economic change.
The world does not have (much later) before a more aggressive approach to all the issues beginning with climate change now! Remember New Orleans? Within next 10 to 20 years is where it all hangs. If nothing is done very soon it will mark the beginning of the end for the human race. Those appear to be the facts and no technology will stop runaway climate change once it begins, indeed if we look at the melting poles the worst case is much more apparent than formerly believed . . .it has already begun!!
Perhaps it might be too late now, according to James Lovelock, in his view it has begun. James Hansen at NASA makes a very compelling case for the time frame for action within the time in office of the next president of the USA and so does the UN. I think anyone who really wishes to be informed should go to the websites of these people mentioned here or the IPCC. It is technical information but worth taking the time to inform yourself. The answer is to start working quickly for change and vote for those candidates who speak of change and another direction and who represent ideas rather than special interests. For example the best work would be to defeat the pro-business Clintons and elect Kucinich or Obama or possibly a joint ticket while we know they have an outside chance they are the best possibility for change.
But we all know business interests will prevail with Clinton capturing the vote and a pro-business vote is a vote against the environment. No one running on the democratic side could be worse than Bush. But anyone who can think understands that the business interests control the environmental agenda and most candidates. The republicans will continue the work of burying the planet as will pro-business democratic candidates most of whom have been bought, whether by health interests or anything else concerning big money.
The facts concerning climate science is what is important. What the environmental facts really suggest is economic depression in the West in the near term if we really want to deal with climate change. THIS IS THE FACT! That is if we are really serious about saving the planet (no one wants to hear that if they are connected to big money) it means voting for economic and environmental legislation limiting pollution and green house gasses. . .in any event that is change!
But the environment,water,energy production these are the real issues of this election campaign of the world in peril or as my documentary states it „World On Edge“ but no one would dare mention them in association with change in economic direction for fear of defeat. A redirection and a retooling of the global economy and of America is in order and that is not a popular issue on Wall street or people invested in Wall street. . .most everyone in one way or another.
We have to change rapidly and move to a none-stop production of environmental invention and energy alternatives for the western world and developing nations rapidly. It also means rapid technology transfer for the developing world without delay, this may save us some time. A cut of 80% of the carbon emissions within the next 10 years is in order and it must be done beginning now and well on the way before 2012 the next date for Kyoto. Kyoto is a western world fabrication to tell us we can keep polluting while where figuring a way to deal with this crisis economically.
A change of the present direction of economic production and fast move in a different direction economically is required by anyone that can think and put simply in context of this crisis. The world is waiting for this move by the Americans and watch the dollar rise rapidly against other currencies once this plan would be announced if ever. This is why this upcoming American election is so critical and the results of it will determine whether the human race survives. . . . It is that important!
The economic change in direction could possibly reemploy a lot of people who have lost their work in the polluting industries. This is the challenge to America to remake itself after eight years of the Bush/Cheney regime. It is equivalent to a fight for survival that required the retooling of America at the outbreak of WW 2. It requires change in the so-called war on terror, a Bush fabrication advanced by the media which is a money centered mind conditioning creation and finally, it means leaving Iraq, and using those resources to fight the real enemy to survival, the western consumer, hydro carbon based, societies of the western world.
Who knows that might mean less of an investment in China and more of an investment the western world for a healthier environment? And the Chinese might follow that example as well.
Which candidate will say this to America? Which candidate will really tell the truth? If they did they wouldn’t have a chance in this election because Americans don’t want to hear that! Any one having the courage to really tell the truth would find themselves on the next train to Siberia; they would be shouted down by the crowds of people on the stump and many on this blog people would shout the leaders down, saying what the hell do you know anyway? “This is too scary for me!”
But the economy is the issues and that is determined by big business who wants the war in Iraq because it continues the hydro carbon based industry which all these young people were maimed and died for. To keep santa going full belt. The illegal Bush-war that Kucinich wants to impeach Bush/Cheney for creating but takes us into another direction and one not well thought out. He is focused on the lies of Bush and big business rather than the future of the world.
The production of alternative energy will soak up the idle job market, indeed it is doing so now! With a shift to the priority of economic production and development directed at saving this world and its equilibrium, means in simple terms a crash economic change which is vitally necessary, without that we are done. If any one thinks that we can continue with an oil economy and business as usual with a consumer based society, they are living in the world of denial which so much of the western world occupies. The below is a light message compared with what the truth really is: from UN sources of information!
“The world needs to spend 1.6 percent of global economic output annually through 2030 to stabilize the carbon stock and meet the 3.6-degree Fahrenheit temperature target. Rich countries, the biggest carbon emitters, should lead the way and cut emissions at least 30 percent by 2020 and 80 percent by 2050. Developing nations should cut emissions 20 percent by 2050, the UNDP says.”
The above is letting you down lightly is really not what the actual projections are. The world crisis will crash in on its regional global populations is what the information below is saying. There really is no place in this discussion for a 5.4 to 7.2 Fahrenheit degree rise in temperature. . . .this scenario painted with the these numbers below is a different planet closer to Mars not Earth. The news media play with numbers like the lottery. We can tolerate one degree and perhaps two and half degrees warming at the outside, . . .in the next 50 to 90 years. . .that’s it!!!!! An additional 3 degrees to four degrees Fahrenheit is three more degrees greater than this climate and its creatures can sustain or endure without collapse!! This quoted from the recent UN assertions here in Common Dreams and from the real information by scientists not political organization quote:
“a temperature rise of between 5.4 and 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit (3 and 4 degrees Celsius) would displace 340 million people through flooding, droughts would diminish farm output, and retreating glaciers would cut off drinking water from as many as 1.8 billion people, the report says.” this is an understatement and conservative.
The above report is economically associated and conservative as well as misleading!!! Forget this idea of 5.4 to 7.2 Fahrenheit of warming that is the Martian landscape because it allows for the runaway positive feedbacks to take hold. Whomever believes this world can sustain this degree of warming is either working for the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank or is gathering this information from the laboratory at XXON/Mobile or its publicists!!??????
Meanwhile the group here is discussing who will give us better health care on a dying planet and impeachment of Bush a good way to avoid dealing with the truth. We can be suspect of anyone who says they have the truth. The need for understanding this current cast of characters wanting to be president is important. None of this group has the faintest idea of what we are really dealing with in terms of global warming numbers concerning the environment, and if they did they would not tell the public. They are advised by their experts, the lawyers who can only think of big business. They know it’s bad and their advisers are telling them they can’t deal with this issue to get elected by the masses.
The masses? Unless you have not heard, these are the people above who are worrying where their next bag of groceries comes from and the money to pay the rent! They really don’t give a damn about the environmental issues. . And have no time for thinking about 10 to 20 years from today that has no realty attached to it for most Americans or the rest of the four and half billion people on this Earth in the same situation. . . .
Or, for the rest of the population working for and controlled by big business and big money. . .that is what this election is really about and if one thinks about the complexity of all these interrelated issues we know that we can not beat the odds business will win. That means the future for humanity is limited even for the one percent that has everything.
Sure elect Edwards, Obama, or Kucinich or any combination of most of the Democrats that are not funded by big business for this election. This is the reality of this time we still live, on this, still beautiful planet.
As always, it is the Bush nightmare that suspends and forestalls human action forward. if there was a single problem for this world in the past eight years it has been this throwback from the Jurassic period that occupies the Black House in washington and the Capital Black Dome steeped in the blood of untold millions in this world both present and future. How much I like the call to optimism, to human adventure and responsible action. It rings like the bell of the angels and like so many I am happy for your optimism out there. More people at Bali should get your vibes and act responsibly. Having said that I have written here on the problem and tried often to get the powers to be accept we have a really serious problem. I work at the UN and UNESCO in Europe.
I must say, I loathe the establishment because my concerned friends it comes down to vested interests, greed and the economy as so many know here. I am afraid that we have lost this little game of truth or consequences. But if the truth really be known, the power elite and the one percent who have everything and own everyone really don’t care if some three billion people on this globe perish.
This is the reality of the circumstances of this situation of climate change and its results, my friends,the carbon producing industry want to burn every resulting carbon atom they can release, the atomic energy plants will continue mining uranium and the horrendous amounts a carbon produced to provide the fuel and the last tree in the Amazon will be cut as well as every other rain forest.
Most democrats are what moderate republicans used to be. There is no such thing as reason at the court of Alice in Wonderland. it is time for a new congress and a new party. A three party system would not hurt and the Green Party has a platform of survival with Climate change at the top of the list that affects every issue on the table today and focuses on Wall Street which I have no doubt most of the people writing here are invested.
A person’s faith or belief system has nothing at all to do with well thought out content. The content of this article looks carefully at the problem of US economic world hegemony. What is said is correct as I see it. However, to change this direction would require a one day strike of all systems on the globe.
Someone, tell me what police forces would alow shut down, or the military, or any other service that sees to it that the society and its people continue to do what they are told. As I look at the problem the natural forces that are gathering exclusive of any human control, other than there creation of attempted control of nature and that will not stop. All this will decide how the world rights itself or if it rights itself after most life is extinguished. But it will take many thousands of years in any case. The probability of life renewing itself is dependent upon how severe the human interference of the natural systems of this planet are and later become and how severe the positive feedbacks loops will be!
The possibility of a Martian environment is happening. We want to explore Mars . . .it is not necessary for we have the begining of the process here. But the systems devised to explore Mars are being developed. The time for survival in that kind of environment have not been sufficiently developed for extended life. But think of it there are people who care to exist in that way and willingly put themselves in that environment as a way of life. Technology still reigns supreme.
Take heart there will be some means of living for a while for some regardless of how difficult it becomes. It has been said by many there are too many people on this planet in any case. What matter to those persons if four fifths of the population perishes.
„We can learn too from our elders. They remember a time when “disposable” wasn’t part of our lexicon, when we lived with far less but family and community were the keys to happy, fulfilled lives.
Ever since the end of World War II when the transition from a war economy to a peace economy was made by making consumption a North American way of life, we have been caught up in the notion that life is all about having more stuff, though every indicator shows that greater material wealth does not mean greater happiness and fulfillment. Most people in the world grew up in this time of unprecedented growth and change, so to them, this is normal and must be sustained at all costs. And since more and more of us live in cities, our understanding of our biological dependence on clean air, clean water, clean energy and other living things becomes subsumed by the notion that the economy is the source of everything that we need. I was told by the Alberta environment minister years ago that without a strong growing economy, we can’t afford to protect the environment. So even the environment minister saw the economy as a higher priority than the very things that keep us alive and healthy.“
IKE
There is at least one car and one SUV that should already meet the future GHG regs. The Prius and the Escape Hybrid. I believe the Ford has a Mazda engine and Toyota electricals, but it works.
Small and boring, but they are out there.
When even Toyota complains the reg is too strict, maybe it is, but if you aim at nothing, that is probably what you’ll hit. Go get ‘em Governator!
Please read this, it’s two brief paragraphs. A seven year old would understand within less than a minute why the subject matter is vitally important that we don’t destroy them further. ___ We don’t have much time left.
http://whyplankton.com/