Letters to the Editor
human power
Published Letters: 88 Editor's Choice: 26
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@ Traduced!
[Read the article: Women are "worst drivers"?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]There are very few "car accidents". There are however quite a few car WRECKS in the U.S. (2.5 million injuries per year) The word choice is significant. An accident is something which is neither preventable nor easily foreseeable, such as a mechanical failure which is not due to a negligent lack of maintainance on the part of the owner-driver. A car wreck is due to the actions of the driver such as driving too fast for the conditions, tailgating, inattention or otherwise not driving defensively. Also please note that the weather never causes wrecks but it can be a factor that people fail to heed. I live near a fire station (first responders for car wrecks here). I can always tell when the rain starts, the temperature dips below freezing, the sun sets or the sun rises because the sirens start within minutes of such events as drivers fail to heed the conditions. I guess our society is built on the premise that we need not take responsibility for our actions, especially when we are in our fossil-fool powered wheelchairs.
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Who's the Anti-Bush?
[Read the article: No bears for oil]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]“…whoever the next president is, one thing's for sure: He or she couldn't possibly do less for endangered species than this one has. Miller says: ‘There is literally no way that anyone could be worse.’"
I must disagree. When the Bush Crime Family usurped the White House we still had both the time and money to avert the worst of climate change without massively disrupting our modern lifestyle. Sure, cars had to and still have to go, but we could have built a sustainable electricity infrastructure and rebuilt our public transportation systems. The next President will not have the luxury of either time or budget surpluses. She or he will have to act immediately to reduce the average American’s carbon footprint by sixty to eighty percent. Failure means that almost all species will likely become endangered and many, perhaps including civilized humans, will face an irreversible commitment to extinction.
Sadly, not a single candidate seems up to the task.
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Break the Passive Habits
[Read the article: Put a stake in it]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]What a surprise: televisions suck electrical power even when not being watched and suck brainpower when they are watched. I’m not even sure why people still own them.
People should try mentally unplugging everything and then only plugging their toys back in if they would seriously consider powering them by self-generated 100% renewable sources. Such a thought process will either be liberating or demoralizing, depending on your dependence on your toys.
(My family lived in the forest for five years with no electricity and, later, with single digit kwhrs/week from a very small off-the-grid setup. Needless to say, no vampire loads were allowed. No electronic entertainment can really compare to reading Sherlock Holmes aloud by lantern light on a wintry night. Living off-the-grid really forces one to decide which appliances really enhance one’s quality of life and it is amazing how few of our modern contraptions can make the cut.)
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Cars = Extinction, so ethanol is irrelevant
[Read the article: Who do you trust on ethanol?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Since we have about two decades to cut our GHG by 80-90% or face likely extinction, what choices do we have? Ethanol is out. Biodiesel has the same issues. Electric cars will both collapse the grid and lead to even more coal burning (very bad GHG emitter).
It looks like we’re going to be faced with eliminating obesity-caused diseases like type II diabetes and heart disease by ditching unlimited use of personal automobiles or go down in history as the enders of history. At least our generation will be famous until the end of time, even if said end is only a century away. I’m glad the WWII generation didn’t respond to the challenge of their times like we have to climate change with our angry rationalizing of the sanctity of our “modern” way of life.
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Into the abyss we go
[Read the article: TV news is too cool]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The democrats’ proposals fall well short of what will be needed to make a serious dent in climate change, but what can they do? If they tell Americans the truth, they can’t get elected. Who would vote for someone who tells you that you must cut GHG emissions by 80% in the next 10-15 years? We would rather drive off the cliff like lemmings than actually do something effective about climate change.
The genocide of climate change fits rather nicely into the American narrative. When the Jews were being rounded up for slaughter, we did next to nothing until we were attacked. When Rwanda exploded, we did nothing. Ditto Darfur. And don’t even mention Native Americans. So now we will sit back while Bangladesh goes under and Africa experiences genocide-inducing droughts (taking out the deep end of the human gene pool). We really can’t be bothered to stop driving when the death is so far away and the victims’ skin is so dark. By the time the impacts come ashore here, it will likely be too late.