Letters to the Editor
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...saving the planet...
Well, saving the planet may no longer be an option at our current level of 6-odd billion human beings on earth today, most of them yearning to consume like US citizens do...
But for sure Andrew Leonard is right on ONE count (at least), notwithstanding all the naysayers here: it's definitely NOT lower oil prices that will save us... it is higher, MUCH higher oil prices, say in the region of $ 500 to 1000 per barrel or even more (AND a simultaneous reduction in human population down to 2 billion or so).
But it's probably too late now to think about that...it might have been possible if we had started working on it say 50-60 years ago, when people like Rachel Carson (and Gandhi many years before Rachel Carson) demonstrated that we were choosing a very wrong development path for the human race.
[Nope. I have no idea as to how that needed population decimation can/will come about at this point, except that it's pretty horrible to contemplate. The alternative is probably much more horrible...]
-- GSC
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None of this matters
Whoever is President will be faced with problems allowing only one solution, the equivalent of an economic 9/11. Not to say that the post 9/11 world had to be way it was, but considering the weakness in the political players, the woefully uneducated and reptile brained American public, and a whole stockpile of military hardware, it had to come down that way. Most of the same solutions apply to the economic challenges, we aren't going to sit on our hands the way we did in 1930. We have the printing press, and the new government/private financial (what Jim Willie calls the Mussolini Fascist Business Model) juggernaut is ready to do handstands and tricks you and I can only imagine, like freezing foreign assets, manipulating stock market indexes, the money supply, including intervening in futures markets to move commmodities (I read recently that the volume of trading in many of these commodities far exceeds the ability of the market to deliver on the contracts).
Economics is all detacted from reality, and America will not go quietly into that good night, and surrender her power as the global financial center of the world.
Or why is Goldman Sachs Obamas number one contributor?
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Too late, Barrack Dukakis
Parrotting Hillary's plans won't work in a general. You're dealing with real America here, not the fringe left intent on "punishing Hillary" for voting to protect Ground Zero.
You etched out the primary playing the race-card and divided America on race and YOU and your unhinged supporters made it the issue at a time when Americans were telling you they were worried about their jobs and mortgages, not Iraq and phoney race problems.
Now it's your albatross. I bet you don't even pick up as many states as Dukakis, and you don't deserve to, you slimebag.
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IaintBacchus
Thanks for the link - excellent website
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sorry shawn
Your baiting is not going to work.
We're done with you.
Have a good day.
Please be sure to let all your friends know not to vote for Barak. That's fine with all of us.
And guess what? if he loses, he loses. We're prepared to deal with it. What will you do if he wins? Wait. Don;t answer that. I really don't care.
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Sad day for Democrats
Obama will not win the general election. It's laughable to even think that he will.The party leaders of the Democratic party manage to lose every single election. It's amazing that with all of the animosity towards the Republican party that they have screwed up this badly.
There was such a great lineup of wonderful canidates at the beginning of the primaries. Then Iowa of all places gets to decide who will stay and who will go? And now the final states are not supposed to votee because that's not for the good of the party? The race is very close and everyone should have a say in it.
I wonder what kind of backroom deals the Obama people are offering to all of the super delegates and party leaders? Why do they really want the race to stop now. The election is seven months away. It's really sad that the leaders of the Democratic party (not the Democrats themselves)are such a bunch of losers.
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Burn the Mortgage!
I wish Obama or somebody would finally take the bull by the antlers and say what really did us in on the mortgage-credit-subprime-home equity crisis: easy credit has been essential to the Republican strategy for making people THINK they (can act as though) they are rich. After all, we are what we own, right? But every chicken comes home to roost one day. Too bad the "strategy" is not to make sure the "bottom" 99% of Americans is earning a good and living wage. There's been no real change in nearly all incomes since Bill Clinton was still learning where the mens' room was down the hall from the Oval Office. If people EARN more, they'll spend it, particularly when they believe there is more where that came from. A $600 check is like spitting on a gasoline truck on fire. I wonder if Jenna Bush got a tax cut as a wedding gift? Does Dubya have anything else to offer?
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Lower gas prices
In the long run, I agree that higher gas prices are necessary. But in the short run, they lead electricity producers to switch to coal, oil producers to exploit tar sands, and farmers to cut down rainforests to produce ethanol. Any CO2 savings caused by consumers using more public transit or buying Priuses are easily offset by the extra pollution at production. I think there's pretty good evidence right now that higher prices are making the problem worse, not better. It seems to me that the correct strategy would be to start with taxing the most polluting sources of energy (coal, tar, destructive ethanol, etc.) while encouraging, through other means such as mileage and construction standards, lower gas consumption. Later, when the danger of a switch to coal and tar has been averted, and when the economy has adapted to less energy wasting, ordinary gasoline and natural gas can be taxed to reduce CO2 emissions even further.
In short, Obama is right, at least for the duration of his own presidency.
(I'm not an Obama fan, nor even American.)