Recent comments
ADHD: Hunter in a Farmer's World
Thom Hartmann has written a dozen books covering ADD / ADHD - Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder.
Join Thom for his new twice-weekly email newsletters on ADHD, whether it affects you or a member of your family.
Thom's Blog Is On the Move
By webmaster
Hello All
Thom's blog in this space and moving to a new home.
Please follow us across to hartmannreport.com - this will be the only place going forward to read Thom's blog posts and articles.
Mr. Bliss, I wholeheartedly share your seething hatred of capitalism. It breeds narcissism, psychopathy, greed and genocide, and it sucks. (Not quite as eloquent as your assessment, but I had to throw in my two cents!) In the meantime, before our species fades into oblivion, we can still enjoy a toke or two while we "smell the roses". Try as they might, the oligarchs can't rob us of all life's pleasures! - Alice I.W.
Don, I can't be a total vegetarian without becoming anemic. But if everyone ate as much meat as my husband and myself, corporate farms would go out of business in a heartbeat, and meat production would not be a factor in the issue of global warming.
Kend ~ Forget about Global Warming for a minute. Think about the carbon cycle. When you burn fossil fuel you don't only create CO2; but, you use O2 (Oxygen) to do it. You take O2 out of the air and replace it with C02. If you do that long enough without any regard to converting the CO2 back into O2 you run out of O2. That is common sense. Fossil fuels will no longer burn without O2. Of course, that won't matter anymore because now you're dead.
As responsible custodians of the environment we have to achieve a balance of nature in order to sustain ourselves and live in harmony with it. The simple fact of the matter is that using fossil fuels is unsustainable. We have to end this addiction before it ends us.
Kend ~ Lefty? There you go with the insults again. Please don't LABEL me.
Kend ~ Where is the proof? Lets start with the USGS (United States Geological Survey) They rate the overall emissions from human beings (called yearly Anthropogenic emitters) at 35 Billion Metric Tons (Gigatons). Of that figure only 3 billion is directly attributed to cars and light trucks. The rest is from industry and other activities of man.
According to the report, the overall carbon emissions of mankind for the year 2010 is equivalent to 3,500 eruptions of Mt. St. Helens, or, 700 eruptions of Mt. Pinatubo. That's right! Every year, you, I, and the rest of us are producing Mt. Pinatubo 700 times. What is the source of this data? The United States Government. Our tax money at work.
The definition of insanity is peeing in your own pool for a year and then going for a long swim in it without a care in the world.
http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/hazards/gas/climate.php
bobcox ~ The scientific reason for that is simple, plants feed on CO2. The more CO2 the more plants. The carbon cycle is balanced. The plants consume the CO2 and produce O2. That is why the temperature remained steady. Now introduce into that context a bunch of greedy capitalists who are hell bent on cutting down all the rain forests for wood and paper. No more ability to cycle the CO2 back into O2. CO2 levels are no longer constant and start to raise.
bobcox ~ I have to wonder if you closely watched Thom Hartmann's video at lasthours.org? If so, you might want to watch it again. You will notice that under every testimonial given the person's credentials are shown. Among them are Dr. Gerald Dickens, Professor of Earth Sciences (Rice University), Dr. Jason Box, Climatologist, Geologic Survey of Denmark and Greenland, and Dr. Peter Ward, Professor of Geological Sciences (University of Washington)
It was Geologists who discovered that CO2 and CH4(Methane) is abundant in mass extinctions, especially the Permian extinction. That is a fact. Man made CO2 thrown into the atmosphere is over 35 metric tons (gigatons) per year. Over 100 times any other natural source. That is a fact. Man has been clear cutting rain forests for centuries; and, does not produce O2 or consume CO2. That is a fact. The concentration of CO2 is raising in the atmosphere. That is a fact. Buried frozen sources of CH4 are being released into the atmosphere that weren't before. That is a fact.
One can only wonder whether high levels of CO2 and CH4 present in the atmosphere during times of warming and extinction was the cause or simply another symptom of a different problem. That is where the true mystery lies. I for one want to know the truth. Mass extinction is nothing to play around with. According to the scientist in the video the peak temperature rise by 2100 will be 5 degrees. 6 degrees is the calculated tipping point. We have time to examine this theory without panicking. Let's keep our heads and learn as much as we can. After all, its our planet, shouldn't we learn to take care of it; or, should we just let it take care of us.
As far as the fallacy of "Old Adam" is concerned, I think that it is a healthy approach to assume the worst and proceed accordingly. That is the way I have driven my car my entire life. It's a strategy that has kept me alive so far; and, so far, I still trust it.
Sorry, I guess to a lefty that was a huge insult. My apologies.
My point about the massive amount of money spent on green, well everything, is the whole movement is again oil. There is always climate change but where is the proof that it is from a car. Trillions have been spent and there is no change at all. That is the definition of insanity.
Kend ~ No, I'm not calling trillions loose change; and, yes, you are reading me very wrong. What I said, is that compared to the $4-6 trillion spent to kill 136,000 innocent people several $BILLION spent to save the human race is no more than loose change.
Perhaps I should have said petty cash.
PS Please don't call me a 1%er or a Koch brother. This is a family blog and that kind of name calling is uncalled for.
No, no and no. This is how they cut programs that they can't do in the normal way, like they did with sequestration and now say that only 1 in 4 people say the sequestration has affected them? By my calculation that's almost 80,000 people and all the cuts haven't hit yet.
Daily Kos had a letter sent to Speaker Boehner from Congressman Ribble and signed by 50 House Republican regards "saving SS".
4 ideas proposed.
1. Adjust the inflation formula for future COLA's - chained CPI
2. Means testing
3. Gradually raise retirement age
4. Restore the cap on wages subject to FICA to the Reagan era.
1981: 29,700: 1982: 32,400: 1983: 35,700: 1984: 37,800: 1985: 39,600: Year Amount; 1986: $42,000: 1987: 43,800: 1988: 45,000: 1989: 48,000:
This last one would totally destroy SS.
If this is their idea of saving SS I'd really love to know their version of how to destroy it. We can never allow them to control the Senate, ever.
Jeffinwonderland, I love the way you think. Your posts convey beauty of mind and spirit. The world needs more like you.
Johnbest- I LOVE your comment! Kochroaches... Ha-HAH! Beautiful. - AIW
DanneMarc if you are calling trillions loose change I read you wrong. You are a 1%er. You sneaky little devil. Are you a Koch brother ?
The Koch's Flint Hill refineries along the Gulf Coast of Ted Kruz's state are designed to handle only tar sands type heavy crude, the same kind Kend's Alberta area can supply via the Keystone XL pipeline. Alberta is one of the dirtiest sources of carbon emissions on the planet. It's known as the "biggest dirt smoke stack on the planet"......Greg Palast
The Koch's stand to make two billion per year off this pipeline. I believe Kruz is likely on the offshore Koch payroll right along with the dip sht speaker of the Koch/Teabagger vast minority.....
I'd truly like to know why these old bastards think two more billion per year is worth the torching of the planet.....Caligula had mental illness too.......his Praetorian Guard fixed the problem.
Mored you forgot when they where going to spray insulation all over the arctic because we where all going to freeze to death. Sorry but we are spending trillions.
Mored ~ Scared into spending billions of dollars for nothing?? What about the Iraq and Afghanistan wars??? They cost us an estimated $4-6 Trillion. Of course that wasn't for nothing. We gained control of the oil fields and got to slaughter 132,000 innocent civilians and poison and injure countless other innocent bystanders including women, children, and the unborn. Don't tell me that was money well spent.
Perhaps its just me, but personally I would have rather flushed the money down the toilet. Now that we've bought all that easy oil, don't you think it's worth some loose change to see if it will destroy our future?
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-03-28/world/38097452_1_iraq-price-tag-first-gulf-war-veterans
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/06/afghanistan-iraq-wars-killed-132000-civilians-report-says/
Evn in the impossible case that Carbon Dioxide is harmless, or natural in current levels, it remains that we don't want harmful industrial pollutants in our air and elsewhere in our environment anyway.
I dont get to reply often and I have to confess I havent studied the science of potential global warming but I do remember the world wide scare when we were all going to burn to death because the ozone layer was eroding away. I also remember the global scare when we were informed of the mass of human suffering and death becase we soon couldnt feed the exploding population. I also remember the global scare of Y2K. Just saying we were scared into spending billions of dollars well before global warming...or should I say climate change.
While government employees are laid off, who is watching that the Koch Brothers aren't going ahead with the pipeline?
thanks Bobcox finally some science. All I ever hear is theory. I always enjoy reading your comments please keep them coming.
Mark, Maybe no one believes me but what if I am right. Thirty years ago everybody didn't believe we where going to freeze to death from global cooling went through exactly what I am going through. I just believe the science.
Besides isn't Carlin awsome?
I have seen estimates of the CO2 levels and the average temperature is a graph that covered the last 250 Million years. During the Carboniferous age the CO2 was estimated to be 1500 PPM and the temperatures were not much above today's. Layers of coal were laid in many of the continents of the world and provide much of today's power, though inefficiently. The carbon and hydrocarbons came about because in periods of high CO2, the plant life is very dense and apparently nutritious since many dinosaurs began to be developed about then. CO2 is also stored in limestone. In some parts of the world limestone layers are up to 400 feet think. This CO#, now in the form or Calcium Carbonate, had to come from somewhere. Also CO2 is given off by volcanic action. Being heavier than both nitrogen and oxygen, massive bubbles of CO2 have been given off by volcanic lakes. this massive amount of CO2 flowed down the volcano slopes and suffocated sleeping villager below before being dissipated below poisonous level.
These occurrences have to be explained by scientist and geologists before the purported Global Warming Theory can be accepted. Unfortunately most of the "scientists" approving the Global Warming hypothesis are neither Geologists or Geo-archeologists or chemists. Much of the arguments follow the fallacy of "Old Adam".
Bob Hearns ~ You are right. Greed and population aren't the major underlying issue. Culture is. Greed is the only aspect of the culture we can work with to affect change.
Our culture is in it's infant stages and has been corrupted in it's development by the commercial media and corporate greed. There is no such thing as an "American" culture. We have a "way of life." Two different things. It takes patients and generations to develop a real culture. It takes interaction with the environment and other real people to form a culture; not interaction with fantasy in an electronic box. You change culture you affect thought.
Like I said, that takes generations to develop. Culture is a complex recipe. You cannot develop a favorable, functional culture without the right ingredients and the time. We don't have the right ingredients or the time. All we can do is contribute to the society we have in the best way we have to help cultivate the best culture we can imagine for the future. With time and the right ingredients our culture will take care of itself.
In the meantime we can gather those ingredients by bringing about change from the top down and effecting the main contributing factor that is perverting culture and preventing progress. We can't effect change in people at large--like is observed with any rational and mature culture--by any known practical means. However, we do have the means to remove the biggest obstacle to cultural development from our system of governing. Obscene greed. It is greed that is the biggest obstacle for rational behavior and cultural development. It is greed that is spread like like a Cancer from the top down and distributed like an assembly line through the commercial media. Through greed we are taught that violence solves anything. That might makes right. That money buys happiness. That wealth buys salvation. That kindness is weakness. That intelligence is stupidity. That charity is waste. That fairness is failure. That winning is everything. That crime is success. That bribery is influence. That bad is good.
To affect change in our society and banish these destructive norms we must begin by legitimizing our system of government. You cannot blame the tail for something the head decides to do. Cutting the money strings in our government isn't really that hard to do. Our representatives are already answerable to We the People. Money has twisted this obligation into We the Investors. We have to remove this corrupt influence in order to even begin to affect meaningful change in our culture and society. The thoughts of citizens are dysfunctional because the way we are governed is dysfunctional. If the head decides to do the right thing the tail will follow.
Once we remove money from governmental decision making then we will have governance by popular demand. The needs of the many will take the place of the needs of the representative's puppet masters. This driving ethic will "trickle down" through policy into every nook and cranny of society, affecting every aspect of life. Change in thought, action, and especially culture will take generations to create; however, it will have begun.
The human mind and soul are the most elusive parts of the human being. You cannot affect direct change on such a complex creature. You can only facilitate the means and environment for that being to change themselves. The key to affecting the thoughts of the person is affecting their culture. Right now, the only thing we have control over changing is the level of greed in our government. Remove that Cancer from the head, and the body will heal itself.
Yes johnbest. Cockroaches and Kochroaches AND - did you see Tim Flannery's review of Stung! at the NY Review of Books? - jellyfish.
Excellent statement. We must do something about gerrymandering. The other day I proposed on a blog that States should be required to have a slate of candidates from which to choose and the entire State would vote on the slate of candidates. The number of successful candidates would be selected based on population of the State. The top vote getters would be the number chosen. Some form of this would, I think, prevent gerrymandering.
The global One Percent is obviously using climate change to exterminate what it considers surplus population -- that is, people too numerous to be easily subjugated in corporate slave pens and/or otherwise exploited for maximum profit.
This genocidal intent -- equally obvious everywhere on the planet (whether in the USian war on lower-income people or in its austerity counterparts on the other continents) -- remains obscure only because we have been conditioned to believe in capitalism as benevolence and to assume the One Percent is rendered blind and stupid by its greed.
The hideous truth, of course, is that capitalism is the ultimate form of terminal cancer and its One Percent is the most brilliantly, purposefully evil aristocracy in all of human history.
Its evil was there for all to see in Nazi Germany, which was in fact the logical fulfillment of capitalist ideology. It was likewise obvious in Pinochet's Chile. But we are brainwashed into forgetfulness, even unto our inability to see how the One Percent (again) relies upon the ignorance and violence implicit in Abrahamic religion to ensure our powerlessness.
Thus the real question is whether the One Percenters are merely serving their own long-term interests: capitalism as infinite greed elevated to maximum virtue; capitalist governance as absolute power and limitless profit for themselves, total subjugation for all the rest of us.
Or are they (as some science fiction writers suggest and many alleged crazies fervently believe), deliberately trashing the planet to make it more readily inhabitable by some alien, probably insectoid species?
After the last extinctions on the planet I read that the Cockroaches were the only living thing left on the planet. I predict that the Kochroaches will be the only ones left on the planet when the next extinction occurs. A lot of good their blood money will do them then.