please snail mail this gentleman to wake him up

Could somebody please send a letter to this dude about climategate? He obviously spends little time, if any, on the Internet.

Thanks

Before we go warping everything on the false premise

that CO2 is the problem, could we look at our real needs. Just concentrate on the real stuff. Less traffic, more public transportation and better air. Summer temperature inversions are just awful and anything we can do not to contribute to smog is great.

But please people...drop the carbon counting from any considerations. For those of you who missed it, here is Rex Murphy's take on Climategate.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Am3-HpSnE9Y&feature=related

These are treacherous times and if we are going to practice the Precautionary Principle, it should be employed by not proceeding to do anything on the basis of such shoddy and perhaps criminal work without a real investigation first.

"If you believe in global warming or not, a royal commission is a good starting point to determine whether should put WWII like resources to combat this issue or simply ignore it. To make such a determination we need unbiased evidence and analysis. I feel that the only logical course of action is to have a Royal commission."
http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/royal-commission-to-determine-extent-of-global-warming.html

Soleprobe et al

What's with the "climategate" references? You think you've won some major battle with the great Satan or something? Don't you see we're all on the same side, only you don't like the way a majority of people have decided they want to go about it? Don't you "engineers" (using the term loosely) agree with using resources ever more efficiently, inventing the next great wave of mechanical evolution and getting the jump on the competition to produce the next wave of innovation that happens to save money, energy and resources, not to mention reducing waste?

Or are you too married to your 7-litre V-8 individual people-movers to see past your dirty windshields?

Gawd, you guys are boring. Wake up and move on!!! I'm not buying carbon credits, nor is anyone else I know. It's like the refrigerator that orders a carton of milk from the story for you - a solution in search of a problem. Get a little perspective, at least longer than a week.

Rex Murphy

Seriously? I mean yeah, he's an erudite and entertaining guy who panders to populist sentiment, so he's got that going for him, but you want me to reassess climate change because a TV personality chasing ratings tells people what they want to hear?

The Denial camp talks a good game when it comes to relying on science, but when push comes to shove, there's a disconcerting dependence on anything but good research to advance their case.

Majority becoming the minority

Zalm, the majority is quickly sinking into the minority because more of that majority is waking up to realize that they don’t want every facet of their lives scrutinized by a bunch of commie control freaks who have hijacked the environmental agenda to hoard for themselves and deprive everyone else to the point of impoverishment.

Leave me alone. It’s nobody’s business what I drive, how far I drive, where I drive, what I eat, how much I eat, what I wear, what I buy, what I sell, where I live, where I work, where I play, how much money I have, what meds I will or will not take, how many children I will or will not have or anything else. You are not God so stop trying to rule the planet.

These godless commie control freaks want to make normal human behavior a crime so they can pass oppressive legislation for the purpose of plunder in the guise of saving the earth.

Godless? Haven't you heard of the Gore-Zuki idols we worship?

"These godless commie control freaks want to make normal human behavior a crime so they can pass oppressive legislation for the purpose of plunder in the guise of saving the earth."

Damn, you saw right through the great world-control plans. Your prize is this piece of valuable advice:

As long as you stick to distilled rainwater and pure grain alcohol your precious bodily essence should remain un-polluted by the commie global warming thought control nanobots.

soleprobe

You're right. It's nobody's business for all of the above -- until what you get is taken from someone else's mouth.

This is Lifeboat Earth, and there are only so many "rations" to go around. Do what you want with what you got. But when it's gone, it's gone, and you have no right to someone else's share. And believe it or not, it doesn't matter a hoot how much money you may have. If there are six people and six cans of beans, you cannot buy another can.

hey Soleprobe:

You may feel that you behave correctly, but not everyone is perfect, and that is why laws are needed!

The more concentrated our population gets, the more we need laws that restrict what you can do!

Smoking bans finally save people from secondhand smoke (more or less).

Seatbelt laws save lives, and so does all the new safety equipment that is mandatory now.
Maybe your life is of no consequence to you, but if you cannot skid into my lane because your ESP system took over, then at least I am happy.

Do I care if you drive a polluting monster? yup I do care because I need to breathe, and just like inhaling secondhand cigarette smoke does, so will car pollution kill me

beware yourself

blind faith eh?
Let me put it this way: the laws were passed with the best of intentions.
That manufacturers try their best to accomodate the law and still save on parts and labour is another story.
We only know about all the failures because the system eventually does catch up with cheats.
The point was that laws are needed!
I agree that more safeguards are essential, but, please do not let that soleprobe think we are passing laws just to piss him off!

"WE" are passing laws just to piss him off!

It's that WE I don't like. The more laws the bigger that WE gets till it becomes like a parasite sucking the life and freedom out of everyone and everything. That WE doesn’t create anything, doesn't invent anything... all it does is suck off of those who create and produce... that WE is like a cancer killing its host. Every new law requires another department of bloodsuckers to enforce that new law.

The bloodsucking WE wants those who are free individuals and full of innovation, creativity and the spark of life to believe that they are incapable of regulating themselves and need their so called “experts” to corral them into settlement zones where they can be tagged, tracked, traced, culled and monitored… becoming the collective property of the bloodsucking, parasitical WE.

That’s why this essential element of life, CO2, is so important to the bloodsucking WE because it represents life. The WE is anti life. And this WE, being the cancerous parasite that it is, will suck the life out of every free human being on this planet by choking off the life-giving exhaust of life, CO2.

The bloodsucking WE grows bigger and bigger with each new legislation: It has no soul, no conscience, no remorse, no sympathy, no compassion, no reasoning, no flexibility; it’s a cold, callous, all consuming BEAST.

WE… leave me alone… you soulless, bloodsucking, control freak creature that produces and creates nothing. History is littered with the end results of your treachery: war, disease, famine, suffering and death.

you need nobody?

Wow, struck a nerve eh?

"free individuals and full of innovation, creativity and the spark of life " is quite a mouthfull and describe a lot of people who may not agree with you, because I for one do not agree with you!

My life has been full of initiative and I have had no problem realizing that even if I am smart, I still have to conform to certain standards as the price of living in this society.

You see without all those uncreative, soulless parasites you hate so much, there would be nobody to buy the stuff you invent!

You remind me of another poster who maintained that power is might and should precede mere normal human beings.

Sorry to inform you soleprobe that you need to probe deeper still to figure out what gave you the idea that you are so special!

Like it or not this is a living, breathing society and everybody depend on everybody!

If you are convinced you need nobody then make a move to true capitalistic country, and see how you fare in a competitive society where nobody gives a shit.

The WE is not "nobody".

"You see without all those uncreative, soulless parasites you hate so much, there would be nobody to buy the stuff you invent!"

So I need the WE to rob through violence all my produce resulting from my ingenuity and creativity so the WE can give a tiny fraction back by purchasing, if IT chooses to do so, some of what I create.

“You remind me of another poster who maintained that power is might and should precede mere normal human beings.”

The WE is that “power” and “might”. But the WE does not “precede mere normal human beings”. It is a relatively small collection of abnormal, malignant, psychopathic, morally deranged human beings that are terrified by the masses of “mere normal human beings” who are by their nature innovative and creative.

“… what gave you the idea that you are so special!”

All individuals are special, and that’s exactly what the parasitical WE wants everyone to believe, that they are not special, that they are the least special living creatures on the planet, that they are toxic and worthless by nature to their environment and should be corralled and culled into a small manageable heard of homogenous zombies.

“Like it or not this is a living, breathing society and everybody depend on everybody!”

This is true, and if the parasitical, bloodsucking, control freak WE would just leave everybody alone then all the “mere normal human beings” on this planet would achieve their true potential.

“If you are convinced you need nobody….”

No…. I don’t need the WE. My neighbour and I are quite capable of helping each other out with out a control freak parasitical WE sucking the life out of us.

“…then make a move to true capitalistic country….

You do not have a full understanding of what I’m saying but there is no such thing as a “true capitalistic country”

“… and see how you fare in a competitive society”

Societies, when left to themselves, are culturally diverse and distinct from one another according to their family of origin and flourish and prosper in their own distinct ways as nature intended. But the WE control freak parasite can’t leave societies alone. Just like the indigenous peoples of every continent who have flourished for thousands of years until the WE control freak, bloodsucking, parasite arrived with it’s “social planning.” One only need look at the present state of the indigenous peoples of the North American continent to see the near end results that will be foisted upon an unsuspecting planet if the WE control freak gets its way.

“…where nobody gives a shit.”

Here is a perfect example of the arrogance of the WE telling the individual that he/she is immorally decrepit by nature and unable to care for another (the exact same claim it made about indigenous tribes) and only IT can save the earth from the naturally immoral individual.

soleprobe

If you don't want the "we", then you must by nature be a student of anarchism.

Anarchism is founded on the observation that since few men are wise enough to rule themselves, even fewer are wise enough to rule others.
- Edward Abbey

Chris Keam gets to the nut of the matter:

How do you "get around" this simple fact without recognizing the bureaucracy required (the WE you so rail against) to collect and distribute that 6 grand?

Hey -- I for one would love to see a functioning state of anarchism. But (as Alive notes):

We are simply not mature enough to conduct our own affairs, in and among other like-minded people in what we call "society".

If you are not, then you truly blowing smoke.

The more concentrated our population gets

Read UN Agenda 21

That's exactly what the “WE” have been doing and will continue to do..... forcefully move populations out of rural areas and farms and concentrate them into settlement zones (crowded cities and shanty towns). This is done intentionally so the WE can cull the herd.

Humans individually left to themselves are not perfect but history has shown us, like indigenous North Americans, that they can take care of themselves. The problem is when you get a group of these individuals who are not just naturally imperfect but are a bunch of decrepit control freak psychopaths that have positioned themselves for the grand takeover by stealth.

guess he is for real?

Somehow I visaulize soleprobe joining one of those groups that have purchased a lot in a remote area, stocked with supplies and arms, to they can gather there when the mob threatens them.
A group paranoid about regular human beings, imagining that they somehow might get a smidgen of their wealth?
The "we's" that form government to protect themselves from entrepenours who think their contribution is more valuable than anyone elses.
It makes me feel good to know that I am as rescourcefull as you, but not stuck with conceit.
Over and out soleprobe, you can have the last rant

soleprobe

I'll grant you this, soleprobe. Give this a read:
http://ecospheric.blogspot.com/2009/11/green-books-campaign-war-in-country.html

"... paranoid about regular human beings"?

The “WE” are not “regular human beings”: They’re criminal, control freak, bloodsucking psychopaths. I’m not “paranoid” as a result of their existence; I was born under the current criminal establishment. But as with most criminal gangs, I never trust them, believe them or like them. Unlike the online world, in my real offline world I never seem to meet anyone who defends them.

Alive, your passionate defense has been noted.

Thanks RickW

"The War in the Country" is an important subject and I would most certainly like to read this book. Now I gotta see if I can pick it up at a lower mainland bookstore.... I don't shop online.

Thanks for the link

The War In The Country

A good read. It strikes home for me literally, because I'm from the area the author lives in.

I used to just sort of assume that by living in a rural area you somehow live greener. Lately, I've realized how that old rural life is mostly gone. Now along the 401 are a bunch of small towns and rural areas where farm land is severed into lots, homes going up all over. Not subdivisions, but a sort of rural suburb.

Where do these people work? It can't be in the nearby towns, there's nothing there. Do they all drive an hour and a half to the GTA? Are they retirees? I don't know.

All I know is the scenic, but now underused farm land in rural Ontario is being swallowed up. You can't drive down a country road without seeing all the for sale signs on newly severed lots proclaiming 'Build your dream home!'.

People might want to call that growth, but other than the grocery store, gas station, etc., these new homes don't signal any influx of new jobs in these areas. The farms are gone or going, there's no new jobs, so where do these people go?

Now I'm in the GTA, lured by employment, miserable. Rent a room in a basement. Can't afford an apartment despite 'good' salary. I want to go back, but where do I work? Not everyone wants to live in Toronto.

seth

Seth, Utah is probably the most theocratic state in the USA. Are they doing promoting CNG vehicles because it is the right thing to do or because it is dictated?

Calgary has a long way to go

Thanks for the kudos for Calgary, Mike, even if they're misplaced. As a long time resident of this cement city, I can tell you that we are still defined by over the top development and massive unnecessary road systems. Public transportation? support for small electrical generation and reverse metering? Subsidies for home upgrading? Lip service only. Like every other jurisdiction in Canada, the elected representatives here are primarily interested in short term visible "solutions" and in being reelected. If it isn't a photo-op, forget it. We also have our share of those frightened conservative pinch-purses on city council who won't vote for anything that might be innovative or might cost a bit up front.

Maybe some day......