maybe it isn't so squishy after all to get a bad bill out the door and then work on making it just a little bit better.

Well the real issue is why we don't have a functional, active legislative process. Greenhouse gas legislation should be a dime a dozen at this point, as our policies evolve and improve. Instead we're still wheezing and huffing and puffing to get the first real law passed.

It's pathetic. This is how societies choose to fail.

We don't have to work up a sweat to get excited about ANY GW legislation. We can just cruise mentally through the last 8 years of big honking Bush lies and zero action. This is a good step, a strong first step - compromised of course, but useful. It puts us on the playing field. Remember a few years back when Al Gore was going around door to door to explain what GW was? And the fight was the Republican majority's to lose?

Well now it's ours to win.

I agree with the NYT op-ed last week: if anyone can get a decent GW bill through Congress it's Henry Waxman, and if Joseph Romm says it's ok, that's 2 reasons to be positive.

Many climate scientists are saying that if action is not taken in the 3-5 years to start significantly curbing emissions than we're out of luck on slowing or reducing the effects of climate change.

The problem is we effectively LOST 8 years of that 'slow incremental' process when Bushco killed Kyoto and killed virtually any initiative related to the environment.

Actually we should have heeded the words of then President Carter back in the 70s on conversation, reducing our dependence on foreign oil and alternative energies. Reagan killed all those initiatives (with the full support of a Democratic congress lets not forget) and Clinton did little to bring them back into play until too late into his Presidency to do any good.

Where do all the "Think of the Children" people disappear to whenever the topic of keeping the planet livable is discussed?

"History teaches us that strong environmental legislation takes years of effort to perfect." Andrew Leonard [2009-07-01]

And to recall the words of J.K. Galbreath, "In the long run, we'll all be dead."

The laws of nature don't follow legislative rules.

Sal si puede!

History teaches us that strong environmental legislation takes years of effort to perfect.

The issue isn't the amount of time it takes to get such legislation right. The issue is how much damage is incurred before any effective legislation is put in place - regardless of whether it is "perfect" or not.

One thing is certain: if you wait long enough you won't need it at all.

Environmental issues and attendant regulation have very long and distinguished history. Benjamin Franklin himself elucidated the legal foundations between "public rights" and "private rights" in the 18th century, and he was not the first. English common law provided for compensation and cleanup of water supplies fouled by livestock before the Norman invasion. Species protection acts were passed in India by the 3rd century BC. Sewer systems were mandated as public health measures in the Roman republic in the 6th century BC. Ancient Hindu and Hebrew sanitary and dietary restrictions have long been interpreted as environmental law in religious context. Laws protecting the depleted forests of Iraq date from 2700 BC. Judging from the present condition of forests in Iraq they may have been a little too late.

http://www.runet.edu/~wkovarik/envhist/

In view of this extensive and sophisticated background the reasons why it takes so long to get environmental justice in contemporary societies have nothing to do with social inertia or some presumed lack of science. It is because those who profit from pollution prefer that it take a long time, the longer the better, and never best of all.

The "baby-step" I would most like to see taken to stop global warming (because it seems to be the only truly effective measure in the long run) is to have people world-wide voluntarily limit the size of their families in order to achieve zero (or even "negative") population growth. Although societies in developed countries apparently have the largest supply and widest variety of means to feed, raise, educate and in other ways care for large families, I believe they should lead by example in taking this step.

Unfortunately, it seems very unlikely to happen in our culture where the prevailing mindset for so long has been that the highest purpose of our species is to "be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth" as well as "subdue" it. Why do we need to "subdue" the planet, our environment, other species...why can't we live in blessed harmony and appreciation of how wonderful nature and the balance within it already are? Are we so misguidedly egocentric and blindfolded by organized religion (as well as other entities) that we devalue other beings or organisms on this planet to the point that OUR comforts and OUR pleasures and OUR dominance (and/or those of our progeny) outweigh all other considerations?

It will take an administration, or perhaps a new generation, with immense foresight as well as an iron will to enact similar measures to those taken in China to ensure that family size is limited. But perhaps we self-proclaimed God-children or "Masters of the Known Universe" have already pushed our planet past the point of no return.

Perhaps we might raise money to compensate those who will lose their jobs b/c or CO2 restrictions by rescinding the tax breaks currently given to the biggest polluters of all - parents.

Take immigration out of the picture and US population growth has been close to zero for a couple of decades. Europe and Japan are either experiencing or close to negative population growth already (the only thing keeping the overall population numbers up is longer lifespans). In the developed world the highest birthrates occur at the lower income levels and among immigrant populations. Among the middle and upper classes, one and two children families are the norm (and increasingly families with no children)

The greatest amount of growth in the population (highest birthrates) occurs the developing world. Something like 30-40% of population many middle eastern countries is below 25. Similar patterns can be seen in Africa and SE Asia.

In other words, the evidence very clearly shows that higher standards of living correspond to lower birthrates. So the people you are complaining about are, for the most part, already limiting the size of their families.