wrote: Conservation, powering down and switching to renewables, which are available now, strike me as much, much better options.

I agree, although I would argue that this is a type of growth as well.

Yes, it is a huge task, whatever form it takes, but it has to happen, either after a catastrophe or in order to prevent one.

Maybe making hydrogen from solar will be useful; it looks difficult now, but it is very hard to predict what form technology will take in the future.

Can you give me a serious reference demonstrating that we have insufficient energy to build enough solar plants to duplicate the current generating capacity? I am not going to underestimate the many problems in actually doing so, but, really, a lack of energy?

Thanks, I have bookmarked those sites. So I see what you are saying is pretty much what I am saying: it is a hard problem, but we have the energy to do it.

(non-empirical) aspects and get an overwhelming case for doing a lot more than just decriminalizing use. It would be ridiculous to have something you can use that cannot be sold. It is criminal to allow over-enforcement of laws that are already over the top. There are some folks that belong in prison, and not just violent pushers.

"would criminalize peer-to-peer file sharing, subject iPods to border searches and allow internet service providers to monitor their customers' communications."

Perhaps Monday is my most paranoid day, but count me as one who does see national security implications in this. That is: the Bush-mimicking claim that doing so is justified "in the interest of national security" may be "stunning" as Kravets wrote, but rather for this reason: it will just make it that much easier to keep track of security risks, like, well, everyone.

What kind of management team builds a comp plan that rewards execs for catastrophic failure?

One that is operating with insufficient oversight from the stockholders.

K wrote: ...is itself an example of the same black-and-white thinking that characterized the Bush administration. We need to be able to see nuance.

Black and white thinking is not the problem with the Bush administration. Examples of B&W thinking:

Do not torture.

Do not invade other countries in a war of choice.

Nothing wrong with those statements. Do you really believe that there is another another side to these that needs to be "nuanced"?

bernbart: Obama inherited this mess and he must now extract the U.S. from it. This cannot be accomplished overnight, or even in the first 100 days.

True, and therefore one might listen to what he is saying and what his preliminary actions imply. He has sometimes started off in the right direction and then changed course. Sometimes he has not done even started correctly. So what is it you would have us give him time for?

So you you are saying that drugs have been decriminalized in all nineteen of those countries on the list Glenn mentioned?

is EX-VP? You no longer have to apologize if he shoots you.

Vasumurti has not gotten any serious response to his posts. He started by showing what humans are designed to eat, and he continued with a look at, among other things, human behavior.

Apparently no one can argue with what he has posted; it must be totally correct, and he has shamed the lot of you into silence. Not the silence of agreement, but the silence of hypocrisy.

wrote:

During 2007-2008, when he ran for president, he received nearly $104,000 from AIG employees and their families, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan group that monitors money in politics.

So, you are saying he therefore deserves even more credit for opposing excessive compensation?

Yes, it is most important to observe how the evolution of humans has progressed, in particular that the development of a large brain has made specific and complete adaptation of some characteristics much less important than in other species.

wrote:

And as to his diet's effectiveness, articles I've read rank low carbohydrate diets as the most effective for weight loss.

But that does not tell you if it is good for your heart.

I do eat meat, but not as much as in the past, and am not trying to stop you. That is your form of paranoia. My concern was the lack of facts and the low level of reasoning in this discussion. It did improve, with some exceptions.

wrote:

In your concern, you should have been careful not to make up your own facts about Atkins. It makes your level of reasoning quite suspect - which was the point of my original post to you.

OK, you are talking to somebody else. I never mentioned Dr. Atkins.

Or so it would seem from some of the comments here in the previous couple of days. As much as I criticize some of the actions of the current administration, consider the comparison. W received the country in pretty good shape, and proceeded to trash it, both domestic and foreign policy. I find it hard to believe that all of the trashing was accidental, but certainly incompetence was the norm. The result was what Obama inherited. He has made some mistakes, but this stuff is harder than cutting brush.

wrote:

For starters, it would require even more land use and the increased use of fertilizers and pesticides, which usually aren't good for the environment.

I think you have it exactly backwards. Raising grain to feed the animals that people eat takes more land than feeding people directly from the grain or other farm output.

I find it hard to believe that enough cattle to satisfy US meat consumption could be raised by grazing them, in a sustainable way, on land unsuitable for farming, but I cannot prove it. There is certainly some lower level of meat consumption for which that would be true.