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Will Americans Act to Prevent Economic and Environmental Collapse?
PHILADELPHIA -- I am touring to promote my new book. "The Anti-American Manifesto" lays out America's biggest problems and what we can do to fix them.
Before I started out, I knew that Americans were angry. With a real unemployment rate of 20-plus percent and a government that gave $1.4 trillion to banks instead of people in need, how could they not be?
Americans have lost faith in "their" government's willingness or ability to address their needs and concerns. But Americans' pessimism is deeper and broader than I thought. And their rage is burning white hot.
At the beginning of each event I ask attendees to answer two questions:
Question One: What is the worst problem that you face? Something the government could solve or at least mitigate? The top response is healthcare; either or they or someone they know can't afford to see a doctor. Other answers include making college affordable and improving mass transit. Some are arcane: at the top of one man's wish list is the metric system.
Question Two: What is the biggest problem the world faces today? Whether or not it personally affects you, what should be job one for government? Most people say global warming or ecocide in general. Many complain about poverty and income inequality.
"Now think about your two top issues," I ask them. "Do you think there's any chance--not a high chance, not even a 50 percent chance, but any significant chance whatsoever--that this system, our American capitalist system and the two-party political structure that supports it, will impact either one of those two issues?"
I reset for clarity. "Do you think you will see any improvement, on even one of those two problems, in your lifetime?" I ask for a show of hands. "Raise your hand if you have any faith, any optimism at all."
Depending on the city, between 10 and 30 percent of my audiences raise their hands.
Bear in mind, these are Ted Rall readers. Few if any voted for John McCain. So when the man they did vote for urges Americans of all political stripes "to stick with me, you can't lose heart," as he did in Madison recently, he's wasting his time.
According to the latest Gallup poll 54 percent of Americans expect the economy to be the same or worse by this time next year.
If you're one of those 54 percent of Americans (or 70 to 90 percent of Ted Rall fans) who see the government as unwilling and/or unable to alleviate their suffering, what should you do?
In my "Anti-American Manifesto" I argue that the time has come to stop putting up with a regime so incompetent that it can't protect us from 19 clowns with boxcutters, who are allowed to fly around the nation's airspace for two and a half hours because our military prioritizes killing Muslims over defending the United States. I say that it's insane for the citizens of the richest nation in history to watch their living standards shrink while lawless corporations and a tiny cabal of ultrarich pigs feed off the public trough. Why should we accept a $1.4 trillion handout to wealthy bankers, while the unemployed are told to pack up their children and get out of their homes?
If you don't think the government will do anything for you, why not get rid of it?
There is one logical answer: because it could be reformed. Well? Could it?
Barack Obama is living proof that it cannot, that the system is broken beyond repair. Because, like him or not, this system is never going to give us a better president. We will not end up with a smarter, more well-intentioned person in charge. He's the best they've got.
Unfortunately, as we've seen since he took office almost two years ago, he's not good enough. As I wrote in my book, there's only one difference between Bush's policies and Obama's: opposition. Under Bush, there was a semblance of a Left.
So now Americans are faced with a choice. They can accept that nothing will ever get better, watch the rich get richer while they get poorer, sit on their butts as the planet heats up and the coral reefs die off.
Or they can act.
131 Comments so far
Show AllBarack Obama has done a swell job for the rich but a purposely terrible job for our side. Oh we will do something. While some of us may have very few Democrats worth defending only because we have no third party choices or the choices we have of third parties are fringe rightwing lunatics. Here are my answers for some of Ted's questions.
Question One: What is the worst problem that you face? Something the government could solve or at least mitigate? The top response is healthcare; either or they or someone they know can't afford to see a doctor. Other answers include making college affordable and improving mass transit. Some are arcane: at the top of one man's wish list is the metric system.
My answer is all of the above and this president and Congress have done a horrible job on all of them. The worst problem of those mentioned is OBAMACARE and we must get rid of this unconstitutional fraud.
Question Two: What is the biggest problem the world faces today? Whether or not it personally affects you, what should be job one for government? Most people say global warming or ecocide in general. Many complain about poverty and income inequality.
My answer is not only that but also the direct and indirect effects the Military Industrial Complex not only this nation but also on other nations from trade to wars. I've been to the nations in the Far East getting the outsourced jobs and guess what? Things are actually WORSE there than before the jobs were shipped there from destroying farmlands and compromising cultures to make way for putting forth the corporate slave camps to luring people into yuppie style capitalism. On top of that, there are nations such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, etc... suffering the consequences of our wars and occupations against them. Go see all of this for yourself and then tell us how you feel.
By the way Ted thanks for the trip
in search of the pipeline (TAPI).
What we need is Constitutional
Convention party. Preformed platform
confirmed by national referendum vote that
changes term limits, election bankrolling,
jettisons current (fruit of the poison
tree) supreme court, deinstitutionalizing the
Dim/Repug duopoly and whatever else we deem
unlegislatively fixable ( like the ethics morass)
where both parties pledge not to hold each other
accountable.
Although I agree with the general proposition that the system cannot be reformed, Obama does not provide "proof" of this, as Ted Rall asserts. Obama never tried to reform the system. He is and has been a wholly own subsidiary of the rich and powerful who evinced no tendency to reform anything.
Yes, that indeed needed to be said!
Oilbomber had no intention at all of changing the state of things. He is a thoroughgoing fraud, demagogue, and liar, not to mention a war criminal.
The People are aware of the problems but too ignorant to know what to think or how to act. Democracy requires an informed citizenry. The American citizenry is uninformed. Democracy appears lost. It's over! What's next?
Americans have been forged into mindlessness, the inability and/or not knowing to discern thought from facts. This is by design as mindlessness has been institutionalized, thereby giving it legitimacy by the government, business and the pretend christian churches[towers of babel] with phony preachers with false doctrines[harlots] and congregations of fools. No child left behind is the formalization and the teaching of mindlessness to children.
he Grouping are alive of the problems but too uneducated to pair what to think or how to act. Commonwealth requires an informed grouping. The Earth citizenry is ignorant. Philosophy appears forfeited. It's over! What's close?
===
Shared Ownership Mortgages
A lot of coral reefs will die, sad but true. 30 million in the US who did not have health insurance will. That's good. The banksters are repaying taxpayers for TARP. That's good. (Ted, I enjoyed many of your Dubya comics).
30 million may have the opportunity to obtain a health insurance policy, but will they even be able to afford the premiums, never mind the deductibles and co-payments? Subsidized premiums will be prime targets for deficit hawks, and there never was any plan for the unaffordable deductibles and co-payments.
I'm from another country and my question is: why are you not voting for Ralph Nader? Is he not a very good legitimate contender for the presidency? I almost always likes what he writes!
Most here have done that but unfortunately, most Americans don't know him too well other than what gets fed by the media and the Democratic Party about him. Third parties have been silenced for some years now. He could run as a Democrat but he would be unable to make it through in the primaries. Beyond that, great writers rarely get elected to serve any public office. People generally elect politicians who are too good to be true clowns, end up with failed results, never learn their lessons, and repeat the cycle.
I voted for Nader what now seems like ages ago...
don't think I can do it again, though...I no longer believe in the system...
the crimes are too apparent to ignore...
While I can appreciate the emotion, I have to ask, "Isn't that exactly what the RULERS want?" A 2.5% vote for Nader isn't intimidating, but if 15% voted for Nader (which, of course, wouldn't be a 'win'), the RULERS would be shitting their pants. Please consider the greatest HERO in movies; the cop in the original "Godzilla"(the TOHO production version). Everyone is fleeing the monster. Up walks a NYC cop who takes out his 38 revolver and starts shooting at this 6 story lizard. I thought (as a kid) why does he bother? Then, on Sept. 11, 2001 I saw the same cops running into the Trade Towers, heedless of their own safety. Why did they bother? It was their job. Some 6-story lizard is causing a problem in my precinct? Well, I've got a gun and that's what I'm goin' down using! Please folks. Voting takes a few minutes. What does it cost you? If you make them expend resources voiding your vote... you've done something! DON'T STOP DOING THINGS! VOTE! ORGANIZE! TALK (W/EVERYONE!) GO DOWN FIGHTING!!!
Noli spurios te contundere!
Keep the passion going!
I understand, dubet.
I wonder, tho, what would happen if all those who have given up on the system start working to create a new system. Not a new candidate or a new party, but a new system.
I wonder what the leverage points are to do that. Or, maybe there is only one leverage point.
I also wonder what people do with their time after they have given up. I mean, why do they even bother reading, much less posting, on sites like Common Dreams? If one has completely given up, why not take up golf or crocheting? I can't imagine what people get from endless kvetching with no action in any meaningful direction. It seems like it would be such a sad little life.
Just things I wonder...
Three words - The Corporate Media.
Here in the US, our private, corporation-dominated media have effectively 100 percent control over informaiton and the range of allowable opinion the public hears.
For example, in my home city, we are facing a drinking water quality crisis as increasingly more dangerous non-removable contaminants are found the the Monongahela River - drinking water source for a million people. This is not rumor but from actual reports of environmental engineers at Carnegie-Mellon University and the State Department of Environmental Protection. The contaminants are of the sort that can only be coming from fracturing fluids used for Marcellus Shale Gas-drilling-hydro-fracturing ocurring on upstream.
I can't think of a more important issues of immediate interest to everyone.
Yet, aside from a single brief mention on one TV news program weeks ago, and single brief article in the back pages of one newspaper, the issue is completley ignored by the local media. The only possible reason for this is that the media does not wish to make any powerful corporate intersts unhappy - it will lead to loss of advertising revenue and worse. Consequently, I can ask all my neighbors "what do you think of those high Bromine levels from the Marcellus Shale drillers in our water?" And they will just stare blankly back, and dismess me as a kook. And why not? Surely, if there was any truth to my allegations, they would have hear about it on TV!
Like many others on the left, Nader, and the Green Party is never metioned in the mainstream media. While the Green party has some name recognition in the city, most of my suburban neighbors have never heard of it. There was a major political scandal in my state - called "Bonusgate" where Democrats illegally used state funds to hire workers to challenge Green party ballot petetion signatures and drive Green Party candidates off the ballot. Yet in all the reports of this scandal, the Word Green Party" or "Green candidates" were never uttered. The purpose of the embezzled public funds was alway left completley unmetioned! The result was a major political coup by the Republicans - while the actual victims - the Greens were completely "dissapeared"!
Yes, a major part of the public has access to the internet, but without at least a basic framework rooted in reality being provided in the daily TV, radio and newspapers, the internet is worthless as a source of enlightenment, because most of the US pubilc doesn't have the ability to even put reality-based questions in their search engines.
Sabo Cat:regarding water contaminants..."And they will just stare blankly back, and dismess me as a kook. And why not? Surely, if there was any truth to my allegations, they would have hear about it on TV!"
Don't you think the very same reasonong applies to a 'real' and thorough investigation of 9/11 ?
"Surely, if there was any truth to the conspiracy claims, they would have heard about it on TV!"
Considering during 8 years of Cheney/Bush when it has been exposed that virtually everything stated publiclly by the administration was lies, disinformantion or distortions of the truth at best - WHY would anyone seriously believe that their version of 9/11 (Official Story) was anything but more of the same?
I fully support a new investigation regarding possible high-level obstruction of the FBI monitoring of Atta's cell (and probably other terrorist cells) before their Sept. 11 attacks. I certainly believe that there were people in the Bush Adm. who were very keen on allowing a terrorist action of some sort to happen in the US.
But theories of remote control planes and secretly planted explosives are simply not credible - for many reasons.
The water quality issues are being reported by ligitimate scientists and government agencies who are experts in the technical field in question. The theories of remote controlled planes, planted explosives, and "thermite" are not. Not a single proponent of these theories is a recognized structural engineer. And organizationally, the number of people who would have to be "in" on this plot - most being engineers and technicians and tradespeople who would NOT have the necessary ideological fanaticism to go along with such a plot - would be many thousands.
Are there enigmas and gremlins amongst the details of the buildings' collapsees? Of couree there are. There are enigmas in the Minneapolis Bridge collapse - was it a consporacy? There are enigmas in practically every fatal car crash investigation, are all car crashes conspiracies?
Sabo - I guess you would conclude there were enigmas concerning the explosion of JFK's head in Dallas by your reasoning???
Was the fact that no jet fighters scrambled to intercept, when THAT is the 'OFFICIAL' US Defence Dept. protocol... an 'enigma'? A STAND DOWN order issued... an 'enigma'?
Seems to be only enigma free when issues of your personal concern are raised.
Perhaps the Bromine in the water supply is merely... an 'enigma'?
For a guy who usually has some very well thought-out posts on these boards you seem to have a very large blind spot concerning Bushies "day that changed everything".
And one need NOT believe in remote controlled airliners, nor cruise missles hitting the Pentagram to realized the "Official Story" is contrived BULLSHIT!
For the last, All it takes is looking at the footage broadcast on - of all things - faux news before the wall of the Pentagon fell (to release the demon that pentagons mythically keep held, which is why in an invocation it was to be drawn before the summoning star inside?)
Which Bushie's "day that changed everything" do you mean, 63 or 01?
Part of the problem with the lack of reporting about hydro-fracking is the fact that few, if any, reporters and editors know anything about any aspect of the subject, including the nature of the chemicals used to stimulate production. So unless some disaster happens, stories about the subjct have a low priority.
I dont buy that.
News reporters do seem to be scintifically illetereate on a lot of issues, but a report that something that is bad for us in the Mon river does not require technical knowlege to report on. The scinetiists who reported the contamination could have told the reporter and that Bromine salts are a common additive in frac fluids - plus in the formation water itself, but apprently no reporters even contacted.
Sabo - you seem to be falling all over yourself today.
By your reasoning: "News reporters do seem to be scintifically illetereate on a lot of issues, but a report that something that is bad for us in the Mon river does not require technical knowlege to report on."
Yet you seem to want to conclude that you CAN NOT comment or report on things 911 related unless you are a physicist/structural engineer/metallurgist/thermodynamics specialist or such.
In fact many professionals from those fields just mentioned have contradicted the 'Official Story', but their comments go largely unreported for the very same reasons you mention for your bromine in the river story. The media are largely wholly owned by a brotherhood of 'fat cats' who know 'no news' is good news especially concerning issues like these. And of course they wouldn't be caught dead drinking 'muncipal water'... they likely even bathe and piss in - only Evian.
SABO: You must be drunk!
You wrote: "scintifically illetereate"
and then "scinetiists"
and then apprently
So you're a scientist/engineer who cannot spell scientist? or illiterate?
I guess since you post round the clock it would be too time-consuming to actually edit a post and write words with some vague respect for language.
I seldom correct your spelling, but this is OVER the top. Were you fired perhaps for drinking on the job? Sloppy. Sloppy. Sloppy.
And I'm glad someone called you on your major blindspot.
Your comment about sending all the Jews into the water (posted 3 days ago) was really heart-warming, too.
You're such a well-rounded, progressive fellow, with so much to offer this forum.
Having an, unrelated to TV, Environmental Engineering degree background but very related to TV computer art skills that allowed me to have worked in 3 different broadcast stations that all had local news departments ...not one of the news departments had reporters that had taken any earth science, ecology or environmental classes in college when they were getting their Communication related degrees!....I ASKED THEM... because it showed in their presentations of the "news"! I even gave them my college text books for reference but it was easier to repeat the press releases from polluting industries...with the Sales Dept.'s blessings ...than to do real journalism! It was the same in all 3 stations!
In Nader's last article on CD he seemed to blame China for the USA trade deficit and did not mention NAFTA.
Was or was there not Air Defense exercises away from the Eastern Seaboard that mimiced the hijackings precisely when the WTO attack occured?
It was meant primarily as a financial attack, brokerage firms were bankrupted the same day my M.E. clients not honoring payments due.
The only hope is for someone to do a reverse OilyBomber, act corporate and turn populist after election.
Simplfy, offer a new paradigm, and foster a peaceful transition.
It's almost all true, unfortunately even the few smart bright and honest people don't get it all right.
Global warming is a very temporary issue, since once we've burned all the oil and all the trees, and the massive die-off of Homo sapiens has passed; warming will be a non-issue.
I wonder how the USA ever became somewhat headed in the right direction with such as: progressive taxes and anti-trust laws; and wonder at how far it has fallen and will continue to fall.
The grief turns my stomach that many now would consider Eisenhower to be a "dangerous" liberal.
George Evans MA USA
Boston George sez:
"Global warming is a very temporary issue, since once we've burned all the oil and all the trees, and the massive die-off of Homo sapiens has passed; warming will be a non-issue."
Sorry for being the bearer of bad news, George, but it does not work that way. Global warming will not be "a very temporary" occurrence. It will take centuries for the green house gases that industrial societies have released into the atmosphere to be processed, and during that time, the ecosphere will undergo dramatic modifications, some of which may last millenia. In fact, depending on the gravity of said modifications, some of the gases may stay on for millenia.
Or millions of years. The recovery to former species diversity from the great P-tr extinction took 30 million years.
But the point is that humans will not be around, so it will not matter much how long the recovery takes. Somethings, probably insects, will take over as the dominant species and will do less damage.
Humans will survive, just not so many. If you discount all the horror and grief, it might work out quite well.
Not really, if you consider the fact that humans seem incapable of learning from past mistakes and continue to repeat them ad infinitum.
Actually, my comment was not human-centered. When our species is no longer in a dominant position (even if it is not entirely extinct), things will move along quite nicely. Animals will interact, species will develop, others will become extinct - just as has been happening for the last few billion years. Eventually the sun will go nova and the planet will be destroyed. C'est la vie.
Global Warming is a Temporary Issue ONLY in terms of PLANETARY TIME LINES...HUMAN socieyt time line is INSIGNIFICANT compared to that. we can be talking about "millenia" of human civilization...the "temporary" time of global warming is about TEns, Hundreds of thousands of years...
what is human time compared to THAT?
what will be TEMPORARY if we persist -- is OUR survival...and perhaps disappear or dwindle long before "temporary" global warming "dissipates".
but it is WE who have TRIGGERED it. and that is like waking up a dragon "long before its time to wake up" that spews fire.
but not to FEAR....
AMERICA and its CAPITALISM will come to the rescue!!!!
it will print more money for the banks who will convince everyone to have AUSTERITY measures to "save" resources and "capital" in order to have "teamwork" to "fund" many Giant Spaceships to go to the PLANET GLIERE-50 a few solar systems away that was discovered and confirmed 2 days ago to have
"EARTHLIKE CONDITIONS" complete with H20 OCEANS and CONTINENTS...right smack in the "sweet spot" of life to its sun -- and it's
THREE TIMES AS BIG as the EARTH!!!!
yayyyyyyyyyyyyy
AMERICAN CAPITALISM WILL LEAD THE WAY!!!!
get me out THERE!!!! so I can put a FLAG on 100 ACRES of PRIVATE PROPERTY RIGHTS!!!
thar's gold in them thar hills!!!!
and the GUNS, the GUNS, never leave home without 'em!! or the RUSSKIES and those SOCIALIST FRENCH might STEAL OUR LAND...god bless america!!!!
The American colonies had a rather complete, parallel government in place before the American Revolution.
It's more important to establish a real government than it is to overthrow an unreal government. It's more important to light one candle than to curse the darkness. It's more important to overcome evil with good, than it is to resist evil.
"It's more important to overcome evil with good, than it is to resist evil."
Thus leaving evil in charge and unchallenged.
'"It's more important to overcome evil with good, than it is to resist evil."
'Thus leaving evil in charge and unchallenged'
And therein lies the crux: Becoming Evil to banish it. Just War Theory was devised to overcome that crux. But it really doesn't work, does it?
Not always. At the same time, I ask (rhetorically) how well has the whole strategy of not resisting evil worked out? This is a rhetorical question because I think the answer quite clearly is that it hasn't worked out at all. Look at a lot of the responses to this thread: they're mired in a sort of misanthropy against Americans, offer nothing to the vast majority of people except for the inevitability of suffering at the hands of the ruling class (which they'll do nothing about), and are grotesquely fatalistic.
A catch 22 of sorts. Maybe we need to learn from the banksters. They plan long term. We could focus in getting involved in the welfare of our neighborhoods,followed then by our city,state and finally the country. Neighborhood gardens for instance, are a powerful way to engage people and it has a predetermined outcome. Within 90 days we can successfully grow food! What a great way to empower ourselves. Have a block meeting in the garden while we enjoy the fruits of our labor. Miracles start small sometimes, and if we persevere and more gardens appear in the neighborhoods where we can start relearning what community life was all about. Sharing and caring for each other. Out of that experience I trust we will create governing institutions that will reflect our best nature and collective aspirations. A meeting ground where decisions are agreed upon, that reflect the highest good of all concerned.
Let's see what happens after this November's election. If the Tea Party Animals win huge and a whole lot of crackpot radicals get into Congress and start making serious moves toward cutting all direct payout to the people programs (Social Security, Medicare, Unemployment Insurance, etc., etc., etc.), which is what they dream of doing, sending the economy into a death spiral and pulling the basic income support rug out from under millions of people to prove a point . . . well, then maybe some "T'row dah bums out" outrage will kick in among the non-TeaParty public.
It has been said that Americans don't solve problems until it becomes almost too late. We may learn whether this will prove true again next year when the newly elected representatives take office. People got mad when Newt Gingrich shut down the government in 1996 and that's nothing to where the conservatives want to take us this time.
No, Americans will not act, for two reasons. First, we Americans are too soft. We've lived a life of relative ease, thanks to the system we live with. Secondly, we're too dependant on the system for our existence. 77% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. Good luck getting a protest movement going.
Unfortunately, Americans will probably do too little too late as global warming and corporate feudalism becomes the nightmarish order of the day.
A third party based on a single issue, such as healthcare, may actually have a chance of unseating the two corporate parties. For example if a new party emerged known as the "Universal Healthcare Party" formed with a simple message that said "We will eliminate all healthcare corporations and replace them with a single-payer, universal healthcare program that covers all Americans", then people would listen. It would be obvious from the onset to most people that the new party would A) not be receiving any corporate sponsorship B) not representing a position that either the Democrats or the Republicans support C) a position that the majority of Americans support despite a constant bombardment of misinformation from the MSM and D) a position that according to Ted Rall is the number one concern amongst Americans today.
A recent event north of the border these days is a reflection of how voters are learning to distrust the mainstream media. In Toronto, Canada now, an 'anti-tax but increasing public spending' fool is runnning for Mayor. The media has been very forceful to point out his shortcomings including his mug shots from an arrest in Miami earlier in his career. But despite the insistence by the media that this man is nothing more than a buffoon, his popularity is soaring in the polls. He will win the upcoming election regardless of who else is running.
The point is that once a new 'single issue' party establishes itself as a challenge to the status quo, all the magicians put together at FOX et al may not be able to prevent the corporate parties from being pushed aside. And if this 'one issue party' were able to pass just this one piece of legislation, it might spell the decline for the corporate influence while finally adding a victory for the public interest.
I don't know if this was meant as satire, but, on 1st blush, it strikes me as brilliant. The trick is to make change understandable to an under-informed electorate.How to balance Simplicity with Message is the trick. And your suggestion seems actually workable.
At first I am thinking "if they get a majority and get their issue, then what?" but then I think "well at least they would have had an issue and done something"
I live in what can only be described as a "liberal bastion."
Obama stickers on Volvos and Subees everywhere, next to STUMPS DON'T LIE and I VOTE TO PROTECT SALMON and NO NUKES and PEACE.
I periodically examine the interiors of these cars for evidence of blood, skull, or brain matter, but haven't found any yet.
Apparently, Doublethink is real.
At least for now, their heads haven't exploded.
Well Puffin,
I live close to a "con-serve-ative onclave".
The signs to vote Republicans back in abound along with the Revolutionary era yellow flags with the segmented rattlesnake that says "Don't tread on me!". Well we are all being trod upon and it seems to make no never mind to these DoubleThinkers as well.
However, there is evidence here that we will not see actual explosions but rather implosions as are wont to happen with vacuums.
6.5 of one, and "half-a-baker's dozen" of another. You do not have my best interests at heart as I do not have yours, and the politicos care for neither of us. What does this say about society these days?
However, I wish you luck ahead.
tough for Americans to act on what is kept secret...
http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/subsets/?mosaic=Arctic.2010273.terra.4km
over the last couple of weeks, a bizarre phenomenon has been taking place with these NASA satellite composites...
20 days ago, there was no white spot hiding the pole...
during the period in question, the spot has grown from almost nothing to a disc that completely conceals most of the polar area...
is this intentional, to keep us from seeing iceless areas?
what are we hiding?
once on the site, you can scroll back in time, or change the date in the url...
explanations invited...
you didn't address the recent appearance of the white spot...it wasn't there a month ago, and the size has increased gradually, and dramatically...
Ice and temperature...yes...
currently 55 degrees F in Reykjavik...
Obviously an Extra-terrestrial colony who heard 'bout our fab HOPE & CHANGE.