By George Miller, November 19, 2009
My response to Tom Friedman’s condescending and sadly misinformed “editorial” of the same name, in the NY Times, of course.
This guy is a horse’s ass.
The earth has been cooling for 11 years, even as Gore claims it was the hottest year on record. The Gorons still don’t realize that solar radiation, not CO2, is the greatest determinate of climate. Solar radiation is at a nadir now, but will probably rebound. As for the imminent 200 ft sea rise– pullleeezzze! I returned to my waterfront boyhood home to look around. In 55 years, neighbors had noticed no difference in the water levels. My current beach house is in no danger of being washed away, unless a tsunami strikes.
Nature has a way of taking care of overpopulation/excesses- disease, war, crime, pollution, will all take their toll, perhaps catastrophically, long before the waters sweep over us, Tom. Just maybe, mankind will do something rational and peaceful about overpopulation, but probably not.
Tom, you’re no engineer and really a lousy economist. We’ll need all the energy resources we can get, since oil is depleting and alternative “green” technologies can’t even come close to scaling up for a long, long time. Abruptly stopping fossil fuel and nuclear development will be real suicide — price and availability-wise. You don’t seem to realize that life on the planet will be even less sustainable without it than with it. You green fanatics have killed nuclear power growth– which is our best source of clean, cheap fuel, and made it financial and political suicide to develop. Fortunately, China and other nations are sprinting forward with it, as we idle in neutral. Natural gas is the best of the fossil fuels– plentiful, as well as relatively cheap and clean. You and Obamanation are discouraging that, too. Coal accounts for a significant percentage of baseload power, but is already under heavy attack by zealots. It should not be phased out until we have secured alternative energy supplies, you fool. Although it is dirty, new technologies are available to make it cleaner, until we have real alternatives. You would create catastrophe with your bumbling fanatacism.
So, yes, it should be drill, baby, drill, just to stay close to even and buy time while alternatives are developed, but the Luddites would succeed in stripping us of the energy we need to even live. Watch and see what happens when energy costs quadruple and quadruple again– the resultant economic stagnation, poverty, starvation, isolation and armed conflict that occur will make you pine for mere “Global Warming,” you idiot.
From: Sandy
Sent: Wed, Nov 18, 2009 10:10 am
Subject: Comments, please
How do you respond to this, global warming aside? I am truly interested.
November 18, 2009
Op-Ed Columnist
What They Really Believe
If you follow the debate around the energy/climate bills working through Congress you will notice that the drill-baby-drill opponents of this legislation are now making two claims. One is that the globe has been cooling lately, not warming, and the other is that America simply can’t afford any kind of cap-and-trade/carbon tax.
But here is what they also surely believe, but are not saying: They believe the world is going to face a mass plague, like the Black Death, that will wipe out 2.5 billion people sometime between now and 2050. They believe it is much better for America that the world be dependent on oil for energy — a commodity largely controlled by countries that hate us and can only go up in price as demand increases — rather than on clean power technologies that are controlled by us and only go down in price as demand increases. And, finally, they believe that people in the developing world are very happy being poor — just give them a little running water and electricity and they’ll be fine. They’ll never want to live like us.
Yes, the opponents of any tax on carbon to stimulate alternatives to oil must believe all these things because that is the only way their arguments make any sense. Let me explain why by first explaining how I look at this issue.
I am a clean-energy hawk. Green for me is not just about recycling garbage but about renewing America. That is why I have been saying “green is the new red, white and blue.”
My argument is simple: I think climate change is real. You don’t? That’s your business. But there are two other huge trends barreling down on us with energy implications that you simply can’t deny. And the way to renew America is for us to take the lead and invent the technologies to address these problems.
The first is that the world is getting crowded. According to the 2006 U.N. population report, “The world population will likely increase by 2.5 billion … passing from the current 6.7 billion to 9.2 billion in 2050. This increase is equivalent to the total size of the world population in 1950, and it will be absorbed mostly by the less developed regions, whose population is projected to rise from 5.4 billion in 2007 to 7.9 billion in 2050.”
The energy, climate, water and pollution implications of adding another 2.5 billion mouths to feed, clothe, house and transport will be staggering. And this is coming, unless, as the deniers apparently believe, a global pandemic or a mass outbreak of abstinence will freeze world population — forever.
Now, add one more thing. The world keeps getting flatter — more and more people can now see how we live, aspire to our lifestyle and even take our jobs so they can live how we live. So not only are we adding 2.5 billion people by 2050, but many more will live like “Americans” — with American-size homes, American-size cars, eating American-size Big Macs.
“What happens when developing nations with soaring vehicle populations get tens of millions of petroleum-powered cars at the same time as the global economy recovers and there’s no large global oil supply overhang?” asks Felix Kramer, the electric car expert who advocates electrifying the U.S. auto fleet and increasingly powering it with renewable energy sources. What happens, of course, is that the price of oil goes through the roof — unless we develop alternatives. The petro-dictators in Iran, Venezuela and Russia hope we don’t. They would only get richer.
So either the opponents of a serious energy/climate bill with a price on carbon don’t care about our being addicted to oil and dependent on petro-dictators forever or they really believe that we will not be adding 2.5 billion more people who want to live like us, so the price of oil won’t go up very far and, therefore, we shouldn’t raise taxes to stimulate clean, renewable alternatives and energy efficiency.
Green hawks believe otherwise. We believe that in a world getting warmer and more crowded with more “Americans,” the next great global industry is going to be E.T., or energy technology based on clean power and energy efficiency. It has to be. And we believe that the country that invents and deploys the most E.T. will enjoy the most economic security, energy security, national security, innovative companies and global respect. And we believe that country must be America. If not, our children will never enjoy the standard of living we did. And we believe the best way to launch E.T. is to set a fixed, long-term price on carbon — combine it with the Obama team’s impressive stimulus for green-tech — and then let the free market and innovation do the rest.
So, as I said, you don’t believe in global warming? You’re wrong, but I’ll let you enjoy it until your beach house gets washed away. But if you also don’t believe the world is getting more crowded with more aspiring Americans — and that ignoring that will play to the strength of our worst enemies, while responding to it with clean energy will play to the strength of our best technologies — then you’re willfully blind, and you’re hurting America’s future to boot.
November 20th, 2009 at 7:35 pm
Increased solar activity causes a portion of the gamma rays headed toward the earth to be deflected. Because gamma rays in the atmosphere encourage cloud formation, fewer gamma rays means fewer clouds - and that means higher average temperatures.
When solar activity is low, more gamma rays enter the atmosphere and more clouds are created. More clouds means lower average temperatures.
Scientists have identified a STRONG correlation between solar activity, clouds, and temperature - much stronger than Gore’s CO2-to-temperature alleged correlations. Rising CO2 levels FOLLOW rising temperatures because of ocean evaporation of the oceans; CO2 does not cause the higher temperatures.)
We have been in a period of reduced solar activity, and the average earth temperature has been falling as a result. We may be facing a lengthy period of lower-than-average temperatures - which would have far more harmful consequences on mankind than rising temperatures - worldwide famine, for example, as crops fail because of cold weather and too much rain.
The facts dispute the global-warming alarmists’ arguments. Of course, the facts don’t support global wold socialism, so they must be ignored by Gore, Obama, and their comrades.
Read The Obama Timeline and be very frightened…
November 20th, 2009 at 7:13 pm
David:
I have done my research and Friedman is partially correct. Although the USA has made discovery harder, our oil reserves are down. Read Peak Oil and Twilight in the Desert. However, we could retrieve a lot more than we are now, but it is unlikely we could ever get back to our former levels. Most new oil here and abroad is far more difficult and expensive to access. Even abroad, in nearly unrestricted exploration areas, cost is getting higher and supplies more scarce. We will have to drill like crazy, even to maintain a diminishing supply, while working on alternatives, like nuclear. Solar and wind will not scale up to replace existing fossil fules inn the foreseeable future, gas and coal will be mainstays for a long time. Ethanol is acruel, expenive, polluting joke, that is also detracting from our food supply and increasing costs mightily.
It is far too soon to kick out the crutch.
November 20th, 2009 at 7:00 pm
Tom and all his green cohort always base their entire argument on a completely false premise of a shortage of oil and “What happens, of course, is that the price of oil goes through the roof — unless we develop alternatives. The petro-dictators in Iran, Venezuela and Russia hope we don’t. They would only get richer.”
The oil shortage (fantasy) in the US is the result of GOVERNMENT control of the ability to drill inside the borders of the USA. We have a very large supply of oil and between our reserves and Canada’s reserves we would not have to buy a drop of Middle Eastern Oil. Just do the research on oil reserves.
Regards,
David M Stewart 11-20-2009