EPA's CO2 Ruling May Have Huge Impact

I'm a vegan bicyclist, buddy, so watch your generalizations. I care about the environment a great deal and said nothing to the contrary. I simply find it amusing that we humans think we can seriously stop climate change. Warming and cooling phases have occurred since the earth was formed, and they're not going to stop because there is more government out there to force people to comply to environmental laws that should be common sense. Phrases like "Greenhouse Gases" have been made dirty words by propaganda. "Global Warming" is to the "War on Terror" as Democrats are to Republicans. Both start with a valid claim and go too far in their use of scare tactics that their followers blindly believe instead of informing themselves and looking at both sides of an argument. The climate is changing. The climate will change. We may affect it, but we do not and cannot control it. Reply

So you agree that GWB should have kept a campaign promise that could have affected climate change? Reply

To avoid having your comments interpreted as agreeing with those of the likes of TIMINATOR2K perhaps you should craft them more carefully. I'd be interested in knowing your position on the following NEWSER story: [A simple $20 stove may be the ticket to slowing global warming by nearly a fifth, the New York Times reports. Soot—otherwise known as black carbon—is the second-biggest contributor to climate change, and it spews from hundreds of millions of simple stoves in developing countries daily. Installing solar-powered or simply more efficient cookers would drastically reduce the emission of soot particles that both ruin villagers' health and land on glaciers thousands of miles away. There, the particles absorb the sun's heat and cause significant melting—Himalayan glaciers are expected to shrink 75% by 2020. Scientists see the improved stoves as one of several cheap fixes that could be made while developed nations wrangle over the more difficult task of cutting carbon dioxide emissions, and a quick one at that: While CO2 lingers for years, soot only remains in the atmosphere for a few weeks. "We’re driving fast toward a cliff, and this could buy us time," said a leading climatologist.] Reply

That's not really the issue here. Bush is out and regulation is in. Whether he should have initiated the regulations in '04 or not is now a moot point. My personal position is that we would all be better off if there were less government. So, I just can't get excited about things like this no matter how good for the environment they may be. If the government hadn't been telling people what to believe for so damned long, a greater majority of people might actually still be guided by their own intellect and common sense. Because of the understanding of the populace that neither mass CO2 emissions nor the ravenous consumption of fossil fuels is sustainable, we would already be supporting businesses and industries with a conscience-driven use of energy. In that scenario, those who would pollute without thought for the environmental consequences of their actions would have been squelched by their wiser competitors. Reply

I can't very well stop people from generalizing. I craft my words carefully, and yet the human brain loves to compartmentalize. If you're an environmentalist, you're a liberal. If you're pro life, you're a conservative and you can never see eye to eye with a liberal. The list of associations goes on. I don't think we'll ever get anywhere as a species or as an integral part of the larger ecosystem we call Earth, if we can't see past the groups we have placed ourselves, and others in. We all (including myself), could benefit greatly from the overcoming of our own biases. Reply

Aloha meliska, & Mahalo for these wise words in response to my concerns. It's not the government that has been telling the populace what to believe as much as the corporate media, our friends at FOX most negatively. What "we would already be" doing if... not... but... for... is likewise not the issue at this juncture. The issue is what to do now. I have great affinity for the Libertarian perspective, but the hope for preventing a worst case future climate change scenario lies in mobilizing millions at the soonest possible time to take steps like renewable energy sources, converting the third world to cooking with clean fuels, switching to vegetarian food sources, halting deforestation, protecting the oceans, and slowing population growth. Churches, non-profits, and businesses can help in this, but the role of governments will be crucial. Reply

It's not the global warming that I'm concerned about. That'll happen with or without regulations or humans. What I'm excited about is the attempt to curb pollutants. If they want to be more effective, they should set their sites on Monsanto and their systematic destruction of plant life. Reply