The countries that have taken on these issues most seriously are in the European Union. The refusal to deal with these issues comes from the anti-democratic Bush administration and dictatorships like China. It appears ONLY democracies can cope with these problems or if they can't no one can. There's no point in hoping to replace corrupt authoritarians with better autocrats.

Are you kidding? NOBODY has taken these issues on seriously. I'm not entirely sure, but I'll grant that the European Union has been better than most other countries. But that doesn't mean they've been good. Emissions in the EU have maybe fallen 5 to 10% at best. That's a joke. The science is clear that this simply is not enough. And just wait until people start to go cold in the winter - all that conservation stuff will be out the window with people screaming for their oil and gas.

Democracies have not dealt seriously with the issues, nor will they.

Surprisingly, as I've mentioned before, I agree with you. The autocrats we will get (and we will be getting them) will of course make things worse.

Speaking only theoretically, we need someone like James Hansen in charge of climate policy, and we need someone like Matt Simmons in charge of energy policy. These guys know the score, and know what to do. We can no longer wait for the masses to get educated and vote the right way. They haven't, and they won't. It's too late for that approach.

I can't seem to italicize any text without italicizing the whole post. Am I doing something wrong, or is the formatting not working?

Thanks - I've done this successfully before, not sure what I did wrong. I bet I used the wrong slash to close the block, I've been known to do that before.

Of course Tom Friedman is a troll - he's always been a cheerleader for US misadventures overseas.

Israel may or may not be trying to punish the Gazan population. If they are doing this in the hope of cowing the Palestinians into submission, they are doomed to failure. The conflict is driven by resource scarcity, primarily land and water, and the pressure on these limited resources grows every day as the population grows and the Israeli economy grows.

This is not the only driver of the conflict, but it is a major driver, and one that is sure to get worse, not better. All this talk of terrorists and punishment and defending the borders, etc., etc. is so much rationalization. The real issue is access to resources.

Sadly, the entire world will be faced with this situation soon enough. There already pockets of intense competition for resources that have becomre violent, the Israeli/Palestinian conflict being just one example. The Israeli/Palestinian war is merely an opening act to a larger worldwide struggle for access to increasingly scarce resources.

This kind of thing makes me physically ill. White phosphorous is a cruel, cruel weapon. In a just world, those who gave the orders to use the weapon would be locked away for the rest of their lives.

The dance is always the same - there are "rumors", or "unconfirmed reports" of the X using Y in Z. For X you can substitute Israel, or the US, or Britain. For Y you can substitute white phosphorous, depleted uranium, or cluster munitions. For Z you can substitute Gaza, Lebanon, Iraq, or Afghanistan. Then the media just drops the ball, no investigation. Six months to a year from now, there might be an article somewhere that confirms the use of white phosphorous during the current Gazan campaign. Then is will disappear completely.

I have never understood why so many on the left adopt the fatilistic death-cult-like economic idea of resource scarcity as an unstoppable reason for aggressive war. There is, rationally speaking, no such thing as a resource in its own right.

Well, unfortunately we say so because it is true. While it is true that there is no such thing as a resource absent human need, that doesn't change the fact that you will die of thirst if denied water for a week. Human life, ALL life, depends on access to resources.

A further tragedy is that some who should be vehemently opposing this murderous megalomania, will excuse it by appealing to "resource scarcity" as if it were some irresistable force in human affairs.

I'm not excusing it - I agree it is a tragedy. But you can't solve a problem unless you understand the root causes. Resource scarcity is at the core of this conflict. You can't solve it without addressing this issue. It is a necessary, but not sufficient, precondition to ending the fighting. Ignoring that reality ensures the continuation of the conflict.

Dershowitz has become so twisted that he'll justify any Israeli action and condemn any Palestinian response except complete submission to Israeli authority.

He's a classic example of how emotion can consume an otherwise rational mind. I wrote him off completely a long time ago.