Environment

A new book suggests that "It's the economy, stupid," may be more than political strategy; it may also be the key to environmental sustainability. The book is "Green Washed: Why We Can't Buy Our Way to a Green Planet," by Kendra Pierre-Louis. The argument developed is not just that the consumer choices of an individual won't save the planet without collective action, but also that the only collective action that will save us is abandoning the whole idea of consumer choices.

The International Forum on Globalization has published the most concise, useful, readable, and damning denunciation of nuclear technology I've seen.  And it's available for free as a PDF right here:

Nuclear Roulette: The Case Against a "Nuclear Renaissance"

Nuclear energy suffers from the following drawbacks:

Weaponized UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles), also known as drones, have their own caucus in Congress, and the Pentagon's plan is to give them their own state as well.

Under this plan, 7 million acres (or 11,000 square miles) of land in the southeast corner of Colorado, and 60 million acres of air space (or 94,000 square miles) over Colorado and New Mexico would be given over to special forces testing and training in the use of remote-controlled flying murder machines. The full state of Colorado is itself 104,000 square miles. Rhode Island is 1,000 square miles. Virginia, where I live, is 43,000 square miles.

Last year I reviewed a book called "Apocalypse Never" that made a powerful case for our options being limited to two: either we get rid of nuclear weapons or humanity will be destroyed. I noted then a deep flaw in the case: the author accepted nuclear energy as something we could survive, focusing his opposition purely on nuclear weaponry.

Come on Irene!

Poor old Michele B
Sounds deranged on the radio, breaks a million rules of logic, so ...
Fox Newsers cry and sing along and blame storms on ...
God yeah God, oh God! now I must say more than ever
Go Toora Loora Toora Loo-Rye-Aye
and they can sing just like they're loon ah tics

Come on Irene
I know what you mean. At this moment you mean anything,
But now I digress, my thoughts I confess verge on kooky
Ah come on Irene.

Dum duh Dum ..

While the evidence suggests that President Obama is not terribly bright and has just benefited from succeeding a downright moron, and while voluminous evidence to which I am privileged suggests that my 9-year-old niece Hallie is extremely intelligent, consider just this one way in which Hallie would make a wiser president than Barack.

Infants live in the moment, and toddlers can't plan much beyond the next day or so, but as we grow we become able to consider longer periods of time.  Obama seems able to manage consideration of the next funding cycle, for example.  Hallie seems to do considerably better than that:

Carefully ignoring Fukushima, Los Alamos, Vermont, and Nebraska, a comforting new announcement informs us that "nuclear energy is safe."

A series of soothing television ads and videos tells us that mining uranium in Virginia would produce jobs and protect us from scary foreigners.

TRANSCRIPT:

DAVID SWANSON: Okay, we’re recording, this is David Swanson, I’m speaking with Harvey Wasserman, long time wonderful activist, author, author among other of wonderful books of "Solartopia," and Harvey, you were emailing me yesterday a little bit about success stories. Do you want to elaborate?

A year ago BP began filling the Gulf of Mexico with oil.

Last week BP blocked a woman from entering its annual meeting.

Which will prove the bigger mistake?

BP may have chosen the right country to hit with the worst oil disaster in world history. If there's any population that will take seeing its land and water destroyed for corporate profit lying down, it's got to be us. We're split between gratitude and indifference: should we thank BP or just stay out of its way?