"but, hell! We'd rather drive SUVs."

There's a lot concealed beneath this last sentence ... and it maybe gets to the heart of the matter (if we're talking about causes for a moment).
We all know that the US consumes about 25% of all fossil fuels (less discussed is that Germany is in the top 5) and it's easy to blame a certain US attitude about consumption in general.
But this is more a consequence of cheap oil, I think. We pay about $1.20 for petrol, so a 5-litre hog is just too expensive for most people. Then again, Germany is certainly protecting its own interests in that BMW and Mercedes DO produce gas guzzlers and sell them all over the world.
Most people would choose to have a big car, air con in the house, cheap air travel etc. and their concience wouldn't prevent them from polluting even though they know it's causing problems. If I were an American, I'm not sure I'd hold on to my old bike just for reasons of concience - although I'd like to think so.
You hit a point though, about the economy which maybe will turn the tide: when the cost-benefit analyses start proving that global warming and the wars entailed in securing oil supplies aren't cost effective, we could see a shift to more planet-friendly energy supplies.
I hope this happens before a major disaster befalls a densely-populated urban region, because that could make Katrina look like a storm in a tea cup.

lots of us americans have bikes,,problem is though we put them on the top of our SUV to get to the area we want to ride them.

Greenhouse gases? I’ve yet to see any problem with a greenhouse. Visit a local greenhouse and marvel at the “greenhouse gasses” The functioning of an actual greenhouse does not factor on added gasses but UV heating the plants & other surfaces.

Any one remember the term “Nuclear Winter”? The idea is that if too much crap is in the atmosphere will have a cooling down effect on the planet.

In the 1970’s people were protesting that pollution (greenhouse gasses) was going to set off another ice age.
Seems that the same people have now turned the protest signs over and added warming.

So to sum up we can end the war by using enough nukes and thus offset global warming.
Please don’t flip your sign back over to ice age coming & ice age gasses are the problem.
Is this all a big political fight over the planets thermostat?

Washington Heights in NYC is one of the poorest sections of Manhattan.

I don't recall going there, could it be that it's considered to be so far from "where the action is" that prices start falling again?

"what are we going to do long-term to deal with an apparently worsening climate situation?"

The climate is getting worse? Or is it just our perceptions? If it really is getting worse, is it our fault and, if it is, can we do anything that will totally "fix" the problem? The following is my answer to above the question, "what are we going to do?"

-------------

These days, every time there is a flood, hurricane, tornado, or anything else, people want to blame it on global warming. How about the fact that there were far fewer hurricanes in the past thirty years, before we entered this cycle? Did global warming just start?

Does anyone here know of a weather forecaster who can tell you, with better than a 50/50 chance of being correct (the same as a random coin toss) whether it will rain in London one week from today? Given that the answer to this question is no (or close to that), why are so many people willing to trust that same branch of science when they predict what consequence will result -- decades from now, not next week -- from the slight increase in global temperature that appears to be occurring?

Another thought to ponder, even if you believe that global warming is occurring (assumption number one), and even if you believe that it is entirely due to mankind (even bigger assumption), and even if you believe that as a result, the oceans will rise (which hasn't happened) or we will have horrendously and permanently warmer or colder weather (which will be tough to prove, since we've had periods of droughts and floods since the beginning of time), even if you believe ALL of this:

WHAT CAN MANKIND DO ABOUT IT?

If the answer is to eliminate CO2 emissions, you can't just stop the growth in these emissions by industrialized countries: Instead you have to stop the emissions altogether. Completely. Totally.

Kyoto only mandated that the U.S. reduce emissions by 7%, which is pretty close to the status quo. How the heck is that going to help anything??? If you believe in global warming and all the dire predictions of what is going to happen, then emitting roughly the same amount of CO2 for generations to come won't help anything at all.

Thus, as a method for reducing "greenhouse gases," Kyoto is a total joke.

As I look in vain to the naysayers for solutions. I find the following suggestions:

Hybrid cars. They are a small help, but even if you mandated that everyone scrap their SUVs and instead drive Prius hybrids, you still haven't made much of a dent. More symbolism.

Solar. You can mandate switching to solar and other "renewable" sources, but this technology just can't produce much energy (solar is incredibly inefficient, costly, the materials are not all environmentally friendly, and it only works on sunny days).

Electric Cars. You can mandate that everyone drive electric cars, but because of the inefficiencies of converting energy into electricity, transmitting that energy to the point where it is used, converting that into battery energy, and finally back into kinetic energy, far more fuel has to be burned per mile to power an electric car than if that same fuel is simply put into a regular automobile and burned there. Net result: even more CO2 than without electric cars.

Thus, lots of people are worried about global warming, but even if you believe all of their assumptions (and I believe a few of them, but certainly not all of them), there is nothing being proposed by that same group that will solve the "problem."

However, there is a solution:

Switch 100% to nuclear energy.

This source of energy emits 0% CO2 and 0% hydrocarbons. It is cheap, abundant, and far safer in every respect than fossil fuel. We could afford to switch to electric cars and live with their inefficiencies, because nuclear fuel is so plentiful and so cheap.

But nuclear is so dangerous, some say.

Really? In forty years of operating nuclear power plants in dozens of countries around the world, Chernobyl was the only nuclear accident that had major consequences or loss of life. Three Mile Island was a complete non-event, in terms of public health.

Also, nuclear power is already a major source of power. The U.S. still gets about 20% of its energy from nuclear; France about 75%. Changing to 100% nuclear would not be asking people to accept something that isn't already widespread. Actually, there are far, far fewer unknowns with nuclear than with any other proposal already mentioned.

Also this industry has as good a track record as any large-scale industry in the world (compare the safety record to the chemical, steel, or petroleum industries -- nuclear safety is comparable or, in many cases, far better).

Of course, many people have this fear, born almost entirely from watching 1950's B-movies or watching the movies "Silkwood" and "The China Syndrome," that nuclear power has the potential to do something far more sinister than other industrial processes. Ask the people near Love Canal (big time chemical dumping ground) whether they would have preferred living next to a nuclear power plant instead (which, other than Chernobyl, has never affected anyone). The point is, any industry can hurt people, damage the environment, etc. To say that nuclear power is worse, when the facts don't support that conclusion, is to show that you have fallen prey to emotion and superstition.

For a wonderfully rational, balanced discussion of the various aspects of nuclear energy, see this paper by one of my old professors (and I mean old - he must be 90 by now):

FAQ about Nuclear Energy

Finally, if you Google "nuclear power global warming" you will find lots of stories about how nuclear power contributes to global warming because of the gas used to enrich uranium prior to its being consumed in a nuclear reactor. However, this is another one of those Internet stories that gets written once, and then passed around without anyone bothering to look into the scientific citations. I couldn't find any credible scientific paper with citations that supports this. I cannot say for certain, but I strongly suspect that this is story is about 99% bunk.

So, if you believe in global warming and that these hurricanes are entirely the result of man's consumption of fossil fuels, and you want to do something that will create a change that will actually make a difference, rather than support a silly symbolic act like the Kyoto agreements, and rather than just sit around and complain, write your congressperson and ask them to support investment in the nuclear power industry.

Alex,
The actual attitude of our govenment toward the needs of the rest of the world is exactly the same as your imprsssion of it in Europe. To hell with the rest of the world - America first. Not all of the people here feel that way, but plenty of them do. They do because the attitude of the government (not the people) is reflected in the media. They fill people's heads with trash and it takes a very dedicated listener to take the time to dig for the truth after being presented with falsehoods and government spin by the media. Some are more subtle than others. Fox News is the most blatant abuser of the truth. Europe bashing is a favorite passtime on Fox even in light of European tragedies.
For example:
When the London terrorist bombings occurred early in the summer some of the responses from Fox were as follows:
Bill O'Reilly (probably Fox Viewer's favorite "news" person) on July 7 following the London Terrorist attacks had this to say:

"O'REILLY: The "Talking Points Memo" this evening is about sanitizing terror. ... Generally speaking, the European media is viciously anti-American when it comes to the war on terror. The garbage these people are throwing out to a largely clueless public is astounding. ... The anti-American press both here and in Europe is actually helping the terrorists by diminishing their threat. "Talking Points" urges you to begin holding people accountable for their position on the terror war. Walk away from media that excuses or sanitizes these brutal acts. USA is not the problem in this world. The terrorists are. And if you don't agree with that, you are helping killers like [Abu Musab] al-Zarqawi. Enough's enough. London should be the last straw."

Later in expressing his opinion about The Guardian, O'Reilly said this:

O'REILLY: I mean, you know, for four years we here in New York, where I live, have -- particularly people like me who know people who were killed, all right, we lost a lot of people here -- this growing anger toward Europe particularly and the European media, which doesn't get it, and demonizes the USA.
.......
Have you read The Guardian lately? ... I mean, it might be edited by Osama bin Laden. I mean, that's how bad that paper is. And a lot of the British press, particularly the BBC, echo this kind of garbage."
-----
Later he further attacked the BBC when he was interviewing a discredited terrorism expert - Steve Emerson

O'REILLY: Now, what good does it do to Al Qaeda to alienate Europe when Europe has basically been, not on their side, but certainly putting the U.S. as the big villain and de-emphasizing, as I say sanitizing, what Al Qaeda has done. What good does it do Al Qaeda to alienate, you know, the BBC and all of these major organizations that have basically not dealt with the threat in a realistic way?
-------
EMERSON: The BBC should -- in certain respects, BBC almost operates as a foreign registered agent of Hezbollah and some of the other jihadist groups.
--Later O'Reilly interviewed Jamie Rubin (former Secty of State) and said:

"Mr. Rubin, I submit to you, Europe is a cowardly continent. They know what the stakes are. They don't care."


That is an example of the mentality we are dealing with in the United States.

John

Yes, Washington Heights is far north of north end of Central Park.

In New York City historically, the richest people lived furthest from the river. Since Manhattan is a port, the poor folks tended to live and work near the docks and industry tended to be right near the docks too. So by the water was the noisest, dirtiest part of the city. The reason a 5th Ave address was so fashionable, is 5th Ave is pretty much the center of the Island. So the Astors, Vanderbilts, etc tended to live on 5th Ave and then after that Park Ave

>http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3994

>I don't know if the article is "true" or not.

On NPR this morning, they interviewed a Swede and he verified that portion of it.

>On the people side of things, it seems more and more to me that the mayor of New Orleans really blew it big-time (not getting the remaining people out in time). They had action plans for this scenario, but the plans were never followed. The governor made some mistakes, too, but at least you can see she was/is competent. But the mayor has made some bizarre comments that make me wonder how he became mayor in the first place.

The mayor is the one non-ass-covering non-politician I've seen out of the lot. He actually comes from a solid business background, although he walked into a corrupt and incompetent situation, i.e., NO local govt. Yeah he surely screwed up plenty (e.g., the drowned school buses), but have you heard anyone else say in an interview "I'll take whatever responsibility I'll have to take?" (www.cnn.com, Browser/Search the videos, look for 'Nagin still outspoken"; its worth it)

As for the Louisiana governor, I will toast her destruction. I have a brother in law who was 4th underneath her who was absolutely disgusted because she only cared about "how will I appear". She instituted a control structure where everything had to go "up" before it could go "across". My brother in law would wait weeks to talk to "Bob" because Bob had a lower rank than he, so he had to first get permission from Bob's boss. He said it was impossible for anyone to get anything done. Sounds familiar? P.S. My brother-in-law moved to Colorado a month ago after finally giving up...yet he got on a plane this morning to go back to NO and try to convince the NO police to stop putting their own bullets in their brains.

The NO thing is a direct result of global warming which our goverment denies exists; this whole senario was forecast in a National Geographic issue not 6 months ago. That coupled with NO's image as the depths of human depravation is probably having a good few Europeans snikering rather than reaching into their pockets.

Synical as always,

Mike Stevens

The NO thing is a direct result of global warming which our goverment denies exists; this whole senario was forecast in a National Geographic issue not 6 months ago.

Big hurricanes existed long before man. It is silly to blame one particular hurricane on global warming. See my earlier post on this (it got buried in the strange "thread" structure of this forum's software):

"Climate Change"

Hi John,
I agree with you, but I'm more of the Chomsy school in that I feel that our first responsibility is to criticise our own government and society in order to bring about change. It's prudent for non-Americans to avoid sweeping judgements about the US - but I think it's fine for Americans to take a critical look at their government.
One thing I would note though, is that - as far as I know - Germany held the first non-military trial of a September 11 suspect - he was released for lack of evidence. The offer made by the US was to extradite, but they wouldn't share any of their 'evidence' with the German courts to help put this guy away.
Maybe one thing that's forgotten by O'Reilly is that the Arab world is more or less on our front doorstep - we are neighbours with Turkey and have Muslim countries within the European continent (Bosnia, Albania). The middle east is within shooting distance too. So it's not so much about cowardice, but common sense - just as the US has realised that cooperation is more fruitful with its direct neighbours than colonial incursions. Nobody wants a war on their doorstep, and before introducing the extremely strict entry laws and trial without jury one sees in the US, Europe is tending to employ a softly-softly approach. It could backfire, but since we have a few million muslims living here already, we have to give it a try.

Just to finish, O'Reilly drops a clanger with his comments about Al-Queda - or did he miss 'Farenheit 911'? Saudi Arabia is by, definition, a terrorist state - it harbours terrorists, they train there, and the Bin Laden connections are well known. It is also the most important US ally in the region. That is of more significance, and does more to blur the lines of engagement than a year's-worth of 'biased' Guardian articles.

Has anyone here considered that maybe all the hot air and greenhouse gases given off in this thread might be contributing to the "global warming"?

I agree with you, but I'm more of the Chomsy school in that I feel that our first responsibility is to criticise our own government and society in order to bring about change.
==========
"Manufacturing Consent by Noam Chomsky has been an inspiration to me. I place the media at the root of all of our problems. Because they collectively spin the news to cover for the government the public doesn't put pressure on them to resolve large problems because they are unaware of the root causes or they have the root causes misplaced for them BY the media.
===========

O'Reilly drops a clanger with his comments about Al-Queda - or did he miss 'Farenheit 911'
==========
Just so you know, our media across the board discredited that film AND Michael Moore because it criticized George Bush in an election year. The media is the reason Bush got re-elected. I have approximately 1000 pages of notes and video footage to prove it. During the campaign I posted details on several political forums and none of the Bush supporters were able to effectively challenge my detailed notes especially with the video clips to back them up. I also correctly predicted the outcome of the election throughout the campaign maintaining that there was absolutely no way the media would let John Kerry win. I have also brought the same information to Republican party meetings in my district. What I maintain with my party is that the lying is bad for America and that "what goes around comes around". It has received "mixed" reaction to say the least.

As long as media merger regulations continue to be systematically relaxed and the number of corporations controlling communication (down to five now) continue to shrink governments that cater to big business and corporate greed will be elected and kept in office for selfish reasons BY the media through deception, distortion, and outright lies. As I said some (like Fox News) are more obvious than others, but they have all bases covered in terms of how they present their distortions to the public. It is truly too much work for most people to dig for the truth after hearing the initial story in the media. One has to believe (as I do) that they are ALL engaged in this disgraceful sham and then actually WANT to spend an inordinate amount of time doing research just to get the story straight. Truthfulness shouldn't be that hard to ascertain, yet it is. I spend a lot of time with Brits here who readily see the contrast in media objectivity between Europe and the United States. Those who are just visiting aren't as aware of it as those who have relocated. But you should know that the notion of "dumb Americans" is a false one. The cluelessness you observe comes DIRECTLY from our media. We aren't inherently "dumb".

John

I came across this article that doesn't say very many nice things about the Nagin fellow, the mayor of New Orleans. I know this is "monday-morning quarterbacking", but it seems to me that he failed to do what was prudent at the time, either from incompetence or perhaps because the New Orleans bureaucracy was incredibly corrupt (or perhaps both).

Has anyone here considered that maybe all the hot air and greenhouse gases given off in this thread might be contributing to the "global warming"?

... or might be contributing to the smell of NO swamp for that matter?

PS FEMA chief relieved of Katrina duties. Coast Guard Vice Adm. Thad Allen is the new FEMA chief as of 20 minutes ago.

Coast Guard Vice Adm. Thad Allen is the new FEMA chief

Not exactly. Brown was relieved of his local command, and the White House refuses to say whether he has the President's confidence.

Apparently Arabian horse breeder Brown got the job because he was a good buddy of Bush's 2000 campaign manager, but I don't see how he could survive this.

Coast Guard Vice Adm. Thad Allen is the new FEMA chief=(meant it as) the new Katrina duties FEMA chief that is.

Ah, the decomposing mankind never passing a chance to make it seem there's always a panacea... the travesty of this blame game... politicians shuffling the pawns, looking for a usual incompetent scapegoat... predictable but equally disturbing in the aftermath of any disaster.

My scapegoat vote goes for the La governer, from what I have read ,pretty sure she earned it . I dont care if she is dem or rep and frankly I don't even know, but she can blame everyone ,when the fact is (in my world) she will come out of thing as an indecisive buffoon. Just another worthless opinion

We finally got several hundred evacuees here in Charlotte , and they seem to be in good spirits considering they have nothing but the clothes on their back,, ,,man I have zero problems .

>Big hurricanes existed long before man. It is silly to blame one particular hurricane on global warming.

Right John. Sorry Mike, you're spouting nonsense. There is some concern that global warming will make hurricanes more frequent and more powerful, but thats it. The National Geographic article presented the worst-case scenario as a perfectly "natural" inevitable occurrence. Made worse by Man, of course, but the loss of Louisiana coastline is vastly more significant than a little extra CO2 in the air.

Speaking of evacuees, we just got one here in Carmel Valley (California). 15-year-old kid. The newspaper article says he needs a computer and a trumpet. Sounds like the contents of one of my closets ... hmmm.

As to the FEMA head guy, he didn't impress me much, and the resume is pretty strange, if not fraudulent. All that said, if he really is that incompetent, and if FEMA is really all that screwed up, how come Florida was able to clean up from four big hurricanes last year -- without a peep from anyone about FEMA or Brown -- when this guy was already running the show? If things are really that bad, the problems sure as heck would have showed up then.

Also, why no complaints from Mississippi or Alabama?

This in turn leads me to heartily agree with the earlier comments about the possibility that the main problems lie in the state, county, and city governments, and the people that head them up.

John,
Give what ever out of your closet(s) that you think a 15 year old would think was cool. Any old PCs sitting around with old copies of Vegas?

OK, I've been civil about the other posts on the board. I've given thousands of dollars in clothes, mostly childrens clothes, and cash to Katrina victims. Now my turn to express my thoughts, since I was in 3 hurricanes the past 12 months in FL, I'm owed<g>.

The local news here is filled with complaints from Mississippi and Alabama for lack of support. Watch Scarborough Country on MSNBC, and Joe has been in and out of Mississippi since the storm hit. He lives 30 miles west of me in Pensacola. He is mad at the administration for the lack of support for those states. Republicans are calling him to tell him to cool it, and he is telling them to stuff it. His words.

Now as for my thoughts of what happened, I think one or more of three possibilities:

- Selective Government Incompetence
- Hurricane Ivan's pristine response was last year, just before the election, in GW Bush's brother's state (FL).
- The "prepositioned" supplies and equipment were positioned too close to landfall, and were subsequently destroyed, and they won't tell us.

As stated in previous posts, I was in a Hurricane Ivan "refugee line" and just 8 weeks ago, went through Hurricane Dennis, the eywall just 10 miles from my house. FEMA response was fantastic.

A true "Independent" investigation will uncover the truth. Until then, I ask everyone to save their breath for the 2006 congressional elections and 2008 presidential elections.

Just help those in need. Please.

Dave