quote:Originally posted by The Pixiest: God I wish I could vote for Ron Paul. I'd love to see him in the White House vetoing absolutely everything that came across his desk and shutting down the gov't until they passed a constitutionally sound budget. But I can't because of his stand on the WoT.
I have to vote for Giuliani because he's the most gay friendly republican candidate who also supports the WoT.
Look, I know it's usually not considered polite to speak ill of the dead, but seriously, Jordan had run that series into the ground before he died. When taken as a whole it just isn't that good. And besides, letting a candidate's choice in fiction dictate your vote is just a little nuts.
[Edit--too slow! But my phrasing was funnier.]
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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quote:Does that help you understand a Republican voter's view of environmentalism?
See what I got out of that was "Republicans are stupid, that's why." You are all seriously stupid if that's all you get out of the environmental issue. Polluted water means you DIE EARLIER. Polluted air means you DIE EARLIER. It's not fear mongering, it's facts. You see, what happens is, scientists go out and test air and water and find the polluted chemicals in them, then they find out what effects those chemicals have on the body, and doctors tell us what that means. And surprise surprise, pollution is BAD. Pollution is a major environmental issue, so is energy and water conservation, and protecting wildlife, and reducing waste. And all of that stuff cleans up the environment, but also saves us money, makes is healthier, and I think helps us lead better lives.
To say nothing of the fact that the Green movement is making big business tons of money and creating tons of new jobs.
How is that a scam? Seriously, I want to know.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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Lyrhawn: Perhaps you would find it of interest that the Green Party developed as an offshoot of the Democratic party lead by the exodus of Ralph Nader. During the Clinton administration a panel was created to find a way to trim some of the federally employed jobs as a way to halt our deficit spending. This in part is what created the surplus that the Clinton administration left the nation with. MANY of the jobs that were cut during the Clinton years were just the sorts of scientists and lab folks you describe. Men and women who checked food products to make sure they contained the ingredients they said they did. Scientists who checked industrial paints on toys for lead, workers who made sure products were safe for the general population. Along with the departure of these scientists came an increased risk of environmental hazards. Guess who chaired this panel that put all these scientists out of work; Al Gore.
The other thing that happened during the Clinton years was that the Democratic party started cozying up to big industry so that they could get the funds to be competative with the Republican party in elections, (Republicans have for a long time been in bed with big business.) Nader saw it as selling out and pitched a fit about it and was ushered out the doors of the Democratic Party, the environmentally minded wing of the Democratic party followed. The Democrats reaped the results, and Nader took environmental votes away from Gore in Florida during the 2000 election. So now the Democrats are trying to regain their street credentials with environmentalists, and the Republicans have continued to tow the line they have for decades; abject apathy for the environment.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote:Perhaps you would find it of interest that the Green Party developed as an offshoot of the Democratic party lead by the exodus of Ralph Nader.
That's not remotely true. Where did you get this information? The Green party (which exists and has existed outside the United States) was founded in 1984 and Ralph Nader had nothing to do with it. When they decided to run a candidate in the 96 elections, they approached Nader, not the other way around.
edit: Also, as far as I know, Ralph Nader was never really a mover in the Democratic party. He ran in '92 as an alternative to writing in "None of the above" in Republican and Democratic primaries.
edit 2: Because my friend who is on the board for the PA greens would beat me if I left this out, the Green Party has a focus on environmental issues, sure, but that's only one of their platform issues. They are not a single issue party by any means.
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The scientific funding issue is a bit more complex then is presented. It isn't like you just put in x amount of money to "science." The budget can be very specific, so x amount for grad students, y amount for post docs,etc. And so from my understanding things went crazy because of increases in funding in some areas, but not others.
Posts: 1001 | Registered: Mar 2006
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BlackBlade: I would be interested in seeing a source on the sorts of positions eliminated during the Clinton administration.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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Lyr: *sigh* Just because people disagree with you don't mean they're stupid. And Big Environmentalism these days is all about Global Climate Change. You rarely hear them harp on anything else.
BTW, Nuclear plants would stop the other pollution from coal/oil/NG plants as well. Not to mention charging cars powered by EEStor supercapacitors: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eestor thus preventing the multitude of pollutants in auto exhaust such as MTBE. (Gasoline companies were induced to add MTBE by environmental law.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTBE
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That's not a fair argument. I never said just because they disagree with me they are stupid, numerous times I've listed the reasons why, substantive reasons. You ignored all of them and pinned that label on me, and I think it's unfair, and I think you're dodging the real question.
I harp on tons of other stuff all the time, and I consider myself an environmentalist. I think the environmental movement spends too much time on the the scary parts of global climate change, and I think culture is supersaturated with references to it, but that doesn't make the facts any less true, as some pople would like.
Nuclear comes with a ton of its own issues, and those plants take a hell of a long time to build. You're talking a 20 year solution, and I think in the same time frame, renewables will make a huge dent in fossil fuels, which is where the focus should be. I don't mind limited nuclear power, if we can find something to do with the waste. I hear technology is catching up with that, and I hope it does, but it hasn't yet.
Eestor is an unknown quantity. The company refuses to give any details on the project, and many insiders are quietly starting to second guess whether or not they can even come close to what they are claiming. They've pushed back the dates on when they say they'll be able to produce a finished product several times now.
TDP has a lot of promise, but as of now only works with hefty federal subsidies (hey, so does a lot of renewables, so I don't shoot it down for that). It looks good as a possible future way to deal with sewage and our burdgeoning waste disposal problems, but there's only been the one plant build I think, somewhere in the midwest, and they kept getting slammed with complaints from the locals. Hopefully in time they can make it cost effective and get it to work better.
And I still think you're dodging a bit. If Republicans don't like that the debate is always on Climate Change, why don't they change the debate and make it a business issue? It's an excuse.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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Because it's not a business issue, it's a scam. I don't hear ANYONE pushing anything that works. They've even turned on Wind power (bird killers)and just the other day I heard a hit piece from a VERY liberal bay area news station on solar.
What they want is the FEAR. They don't want it solved. If they solve it, grants go away, votes go away, political pull goes away.
The business you're pushing is busy work. You try to solve something that's easily solvable another way. A million Sisyphi do not produce ONE thing.
BTW, that TDP plant you're thinking of is in Carthage Mo. The complaints from locals stem from the fact it's right by Historic Downtown rather than out in the boonies as it should be. (plus there are a gazillion other assorted processing plants in the area. Much of the smell could come from them.)
Posts: 7085 | Registered: Apr 2001
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Actually, there was kind of an interesting documentary on here a while ago in which one scientist commented that, yes, nuclear plants will mean local pollution and increased cancer rates and the occasional meltdown that will probably kill thousands of people... And, taking all that as a given, the consequences are still preferable to the likely results of ignoring global warming, which could result in the deaths of a billion people or more.
Wish I knew the name of the documentary. Or the scientist, for that matter; I realize that without it this is kind of hearsay.
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
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Lyrhawn - I take it what you mean by calling environmentalism a business issue is that businesses can save money through conservation and microgeneration, and potentially get more business from the "green" PR. Correct?
The republican take on that aspect that I've seen is basically "Fine, let the market work it out." They don't want to regulate it so business HAS to go green, they want to let businesses decide to do it on their own accord at such time it becomes beneficial to do so. Bearing in mind that I'm an outside observer here too, does that make a little more sense?
quote:Perhaps you would find it of interest that the Green Party developed as an offshoot of the Democratic party lead by the exodus of Ralph Nader.
That's not remotely true. Where did you get this information?
We covered it in Environmental History of the US in class today. My wording is alittle confusing. I did not mean to say Nadar CREATED the Green Party, but that after his departure from the Democratic Party he became it's figure head. His departure from the Democratic Party came in the early 90s'.
quote:When they decided to run a candidate in the 96 elections, they approached Nader, not the other way around.
They might have asked him to run on their ticket, but to say Nader did NO work in tandem with many men would would later create The Green party would not be accurate. Nader was intimately involved in the most important environmental legislation that passed in 70s as an attorney, political activist, and a prominent Democrat.
quote:edit: Also, as far as I know, Ralph Nader was never really a mover in the Democratic party. He ran in '92 as an alternative to writing in "None of the above" in Republican and Democratic primaries.
He created one very powerful lobbying group, Public Citizen He was not a senior senator or a governor but he certainly had more clout then your average politician.
quote: edit 2: Because my friend who is on the board for the PA greens would beat me if I left this out, the Green Party has a focus on environmental issues, sure, but that's only one of their platform issues. They are not a single issue party by any means.
Oh I understand that completely, the point of the lecture today was, why was environmentalism such a major concern a few decades ago but today we are making alot of the same mistakes we supposedly fixed back then. We learned all about lead poisoning, SO EXCITING!
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Fugu:
quote:BlackBlade: I would be interested in seeing a source on the sorts of positions eliminated during the Clinton administration.
Here is a National Review article about Gore's proposal that ultimately made it through congress.
edit: Interestingly enough in the Republican debates of last night Giuliani proposed the EXACT same strategy in cutting government spending. Allow the bureaucrats to retire and do not rehire for those positions. Consolidate job positions, and use computers to replace alot of the jobs people do now.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote: Actually, there was kind of an interesting documentary on here a while ago in which one scientist commented that, yes, nuclear plants will mean local pollution and increased cancer rates and the occasional meltdown that will probably kill thousands of people...
But we've had plants for decades and they don't do any of those things. The warm water run-off can kill fish so they have to grow their own and put them back. They used to wear paper suits in the reactors which were stored entirely onsite and so were only polluting the storage room. Now they wear cloth suits and don't even make that much garbage.
As for cancer, my dad always said nuke plant workers had less cancer than the general population. Columbia agrees but the Denton-Record Chronicle thinks it's dangerous for others nearby. Google seems to skew more towards the cancer side, but my dad's never been to a funeral of a coworker who had cancer. Anecdotal, true, but at least I trust the source.
As for the occasional meltdown, we've had what? Two? For all the years and all the plants we've got, that's got to work out to one tiny percentage. And in neither case did the material leave the containment building. No one outside the reactor was effected.
So yes, I completely agree that nuclear power is safer than buring coal and aggravating global warming. I think it's safer than this guy realizes, but I'm biased.
Posts: 2283 | Registered: Dec 2003
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That definitely touches on the general tenor of the cuts. I was hoping for something more specific, perhaps mentioning at least a couple of these categories:
quote:Men and women who checked food products to make sure they contained the ingredients they said they did. Scientists who checked industrial paints on toys for lead, workers who made sure products were safe for the general population.
quote:I take it what you mean by calling environmentalism a business issue is that businesses can save money through conservation and microgeneration, and potentially get more business from the "green" PR. Correct?
The republican take on that aspect that I've seen is basically "Fine, let the market work it out." They don't want to regulate it so business HAS to go green, they want to let businesses decide to do it on their own accord at such time it becomes beneficial to do so. Bearing in mind that I'm an outside observer here too, does that make a little more sense?
More the first two points than the third, though that'll probably help too. I don't really have a problem with letting the market work it out, because the market is investing billions in the growing Green sector. The problem is that government hands out billions every year to fossil fuel companies, who are recording ridiculous windfall profits, and they don't give that same money to an industry that could use a little helping hand to speed up development. They provide a lot of helpful services to fossil fuel companies and renewables aren't getting their fair share in a lot of ways, and it's stupid because investing in fossil fuels at a national level will help us all. If we're not going to do it for them, at the very least we shouldn't be doing it for fossil fuel companies, which devastate natural landscapes and poison the environment around us.
That point of view makes more sense to me, but it still doesn't jive with the facts at hand. State governments are picking up the slack in funding, regulatory benefits, and other ways, while the federal government continues to cry foul and say that they can't help because renewables are just money wasters. It's crap.
Pix -
quote:Because it's not a business issue, it's a scam. I don't hear ANYONE pushing anything that works. They've even turned on Wind power (bird killers)and just the other day I heard a hit piece from a VERY liberal bay area news station on solar.
What they want is the FEAR. They don't want it solved. If they solve it, grants go away, votes go away, political pull goes away.
The business you're pushing is busy work. You try to solve something that's easily solvable another way. A million Sisyphi do not produce ONE thing.
I don't know how to talk to you. You're apparently unwilling to change your mind when presented with facts, so I don't see a point in trying at the moment. But I WILL say, that newer wind turbines have fewer revolutions per minute, and pose little or no risk to birds around them, and many wind farms are changing them. Solar is only becoming cheaper and more efficient as time goes on, and most experts think that in a few years they will even reach parity with coal power without federal subsidies, which is a major achievement.
I can certainly see how you'd see the fear thing, and I've discussed this elsewhere on Hatrack. Many of the global climate change crowd spend too much time talking about the negatives and not enough time talking about the solutions, but I'm not one of those people. But I still don't think that excuses being underinformed (in my opinion) enough to make baseless accusations against the cause itself. And I don't think they don't want the problem solved. I see way too many good ideas being bandied about, and way too much time spent coming up with great solutions that don't get adopted because of opponents like you who constantly shoot them down. The solutions are there, they just need to be adopted.
You'll have to explain that part in the bold, because I don't know what you mean. If you're just talking about nuclear power, I don't think that's the answer, not when there are much safer ways of doing it with far more benefits.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote:Originally posted by fugu13: That definitely touches on the general tenor of the cuts. I was hoping for something more specific, perhaps mentioning at least a couple of these categories:
quote:Men and women who checked food products to make sure they contained the ingredients they said they did. Scientists who checked industrial paints on toys for lead, workers who made sure products were safe for the general population.
I'll see what I can do, I'm pretty exhausted, I've done nothing but homework all evening and I've hardly put a dent in my load. I sure do love end of the semester finals.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote:Originally posted by AvidReader: But we've had plants for decades and they don't do any of those things. The warm water run-off can kill fish so they have to grow their own and put them back. They used to wear paper suits in the reactors which were stored entirely onsite and so were only polluting the storage room. Now they wear cloth suits and don't even make that much garbage.
As for cancer, my dad always said nuke plant workers had less cancer than the general population. Columbia agrees but the Denton-Record Chronicle thinks it's dangerous for others nearby. Google seems to skew more towards the cancer side, but my dad's never been to a funeral of a coworker who had cancer. Anecdotal, true, but at least I trust the source.
As for the occasional meltdown, we've had what? Two? For all the years and all the plants we've got, that's got to work out to one tiny percentage. And in neither case did the material leave the containment building. No one outside the reactor was effected.
So yes, I completely agree that nuclear power is safer than buring coal and aggravating global warming. I think it's safer than this guy realizes, but I'm biased.
You may well be right about that. Though it would make sense that if nuclear power became the pivotal replacement for, say, coal, the number of meltdowns and contaminations would increase significantly. And I don't think anyone's come up with a really good answer for disposal of spent fuel rods.
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
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