I had a friendly cab taking me to the hotel, but he was definitely not a progressive. He started asking me about Sarkozy, and the conversation was friendly enough, but then he started going about how he was so much better than his predecessor, who should have been jailed for his part in the oil for food scandal, and was responsible for the death of millions of Iraqi kids...
I kept sagely silent, and the discussion moved to oil and gas prices - at least the guy was favorable to stringent CAFE standards and any other way to get better mileage for cars. We discussed European taxes and as I noted that it was those taxes (which he initially labelled as insane) that got us better MPG cars, he thought about it. He was favorable to drilling ("I'm all in favor of the environment, but we can't give up on resources just for a couple squirrels") but was also open to my arguments that it would not do much of anything as there wasn't that much oil in there.
So there's a lot of work to be done, but the moment seems ripe for smarter energy policies, if they are explained just a bit, I think. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
"I'm all in favor of the environment, but we can't give up on resources just for a couple squirrels"
[Sigh...]
Which is scary, but, you know, baby steps.... Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to your country.
I'm in the middle of watching the Godfather (Coppola Restoration, upon which i'll comment later) so i know what i'd do. But that would then be in favor of environmentalism and against morality. So, what to do?
For me, the best solution would be US wide grid failure, so people couldn't watch Fox for a few weeks. I think it's time to fuck with people's assumptions. But then, i'm a hard ass mofo, only thinking about the future, and not about the elderly's food decaying in the fridge. (Though my vision does include both coral reefs and grandchildren.) Skennah Kowa
For me, the best solution would be US wide grid failure... for a few weeks.
At some point, it's not just those in power who need to be reminded that we're talking about real live human beings with the capacity for pain and suffering and not just these walking talking bits of mass who represent for you an idea or position or problem, based on a few sentences out of the millions he's probably uttered his whole life.
We don't teach people who do not agree with us a lesson by encouraging their suffering.
We teach them by educating and empowering them. Fortunately, while we have more problems than we can possibly comprehend, this is America and not Nazi Germany. The wrongest humans are entitled to the right to have an opinion. We do not limit speech or say people shouldn't be entitled to an opinion about something. The problem isn't that the cabbie has an opinion he's not entitled to hold, but that it is an uninformed opinion. So INFORM him.
Throughout history man has tried to solve the problems he sees before him by killing people or shutting them up or otherwise oppressing them, because they are perceived to be in the path of evolution. We all know how this turns out. Having a noble cause does not justify the inhumane treatment of anyone. Despite what George W. Bush would have you believe.
I wouldn't expect to see such sentiments, like wanting to off mafia-style those people who you deem are not entitled to an opinion, here. It's the same insensitivity you'd readily condemn if you read it on RedState. Who are we saving the environment for? Just the people who agree with us? Just the smart people? Just the well-educated? Just those who don't rely on the power grid to run their breathing machines? What kind of brave new world do we have in mind here? "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
i've spent my entire life INFORMING (and even empowering) people about energy issues. i could even be considered a sort-of new age humanist, or at least an inveterate hippie. i abhor violence, and turn the other cheek, even when there's been a machine gun pointed at my head. i have seldom killed cabbies who's views differed from mine, mostly because i didn't want their blood on my dearly purchased suits. i have rarely cemented deals by signifying that "either your signature or your brain will be on that contract."
btw, my comments about grid failure are not really what i'd like to see, only what i know is already coming (because i have such detailed insider info on the current situation), so sometimes, in the Netz world, on an Open Thread where riffing is allowed, i riff.
Me born in Chicago, poemless. Watch out for my connected friends (not counting that i convinced my parents to leave the city when i was just over a year old.) If you keep writing good shit about Russia and exile, we might let you live.
(Where exactly does the smiley go here?) Skennah Kowa
And you can make all the mafia jokes you want, but I am in the Teamsters and my dad is Sicilian and I know people who've been killed by mafia, so you're probably talking to the wrong person if you are trying to impress. "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
that would then be in favor of environmentalism and against morality. So, what to do?
So people would not watch FOX.
The power was out for several days in a row in Chicago as a result of/during a heatwave. Something like 600 people died, mostly the elderly and poor. Like mostly the elderly and poor died during Katrina. There was a storm that knocked out power for a week in a small town in southern IL where my brother was an emt. They were working 24/7 trying to take care of people with breathing machines, people with various illnesses. They could not save everyone. Many people would not be able to work with the power down, and people who stand a paycheck away from homelessness. Emergency communications would be effected. Hospital equipment would be effected. There would be deaths, many, and not humane, if we were to embrace this "solution." His word, not mine. These are not lives anyone has the right to determine to be collateral to the higher purpose of solving the environmental problems. Which may very well happen even despite our best efforts. But that's a lot different than imposing this as a "solution."
And again - people are entitled to their opinions. By birth. Not because someone on a blog deems their opinions worthy. "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
He wrote that, so yes, I am ascribing it to him. Normally, that's how it's done. "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
I'd like to chat up crazy horse, actually. I will be in Deutschland for a bit next summer...assuming my banks stay solvent, the power grid is online, the farms can still deliver food to the city, the airlines can afford jet fuel, the US allows me to leave the country after they find out I read this web site, Bush hasn't declared himself emperor in late October, highway 101 up to SFO isn't barricaded by Mad Max fashion conscious survivalists, my neighbors haven't killed me for my caloric content, I haven't shot myself out of fear, my dessicated body isn't found in the deserts of Nevada after a heroic escape from post apocalyptic San Francisco filled with mutated zombies, and Planck's constant stays, well, constant.
That's what I like to call a fuckload of issues to contend with. The deck is stacked against me - I've got lottery odds at best that I'm on that plane to New Zealand on November 3.
you are the media you consume.
Whoa.
I don't know you at all. "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
Doesn't the Mississippi run through the ATL suburbs, though? Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to your country.
It may have in the Cretaceous but you'd have to ask Nomad for a considered opinion.
:-) Insert appropriate quote here
There was a nice Cretaceous ocean covering the heartland of the States, but I don't recall the extent of it.
