Much like how we all have to pay rediculously high taxes, and people like harry reid, who's policies would increase our taxes more, while he avoids paying them, through loopholes on his land deals! Hypocrisy is funny like that. We the people are always expected to make all the changes, while the elites get a pass.

 

Certainly, the US will not stay the economic powerhouse of the world forever and that is especially true if we give our markets away to our enemies but my piont is the here and now...right now, we are the market every country wants their goods to be in and that is a powerful tool if our leaders were willing to use it.

 

As opposed to Americans consuming most of the world's natural resources and producing a big percentage of the world's green house gases right now? Remember, in a conference in Japan, big countires like UK and Japan agreed to reduce their consumption and green house gas production...the US refused to sign. There is such a thing as the "world" and everything is not just about the US of A. Yes, China is consuming a lot of oil and natural resources right now, but the US has been doing it for decades already.

 

Please don't bring the trash science that supports "global wraming" into this. That treaty was a farce designed to hinder industrialized nations while letting the rest of the world off the hook; all with the premise of stopping global warming which is primairly supported by a few crackpot scientists and most of Hollywood looking for a cause.

The US consumes a lot...it also produces a lot of the world's goods, services, and technology...no conuntry today or in history has ever given as much of itself to the good of the world as has the US.

 

[QUOTE=Robert_Nashville;4235447]
The US consumes a lot...it also produces a lot of the world's goods, services, and technology...no conuntry today or in history has ever given as much of itself to the good of the world as has the US.[/QUOTE

No country has also taken so much...

 

No country has also taken so much...

I wasnt the one who brought out the oil consumption problems and effects on natural resources w/ this China thing. Whether you like it or not, believe it or not, global warming is happening. Of course we'd all be dead when its full effect comes but who cares, right? So long as we're all prosperous and happy right now...

 

Yes...of course....we are SO knowledgable about the Earth's cycles...we can predict global warming base on all of a 100 years of record keeping while conveniently ignoring a few million years for which we don't have records. I say again, ther is about as much real scientific evidence for global warming as there is that I'm Jesus.

The same scientists predicted that global warming would cause the terrible hurricain season for the season just ended...you know...the one that didn't happen. I remember reading in Scientific American about 20 years ago that NYC would be virtually under water by 2010...anybody want to take a bet on that one?

I'm not debating that China is going to be competiting with us for resources; I'm simply rejecting your implication that it is somehow not "fair" for the US to use the resources it does.

 

Well, Im no scientist so I cant explain. All I know is the climate is changing. Temperature has increased in summer and gottten colder in winter. Weather has become more and more erratic. There are heat waves everywhere. We now buy bottled water whereas it didnt even exist a few decades ago. The air we breathe is dirtier now. Something must be causing all this. Im sure dinosaur fart does not contain more carbon monoxide than what factories and V8 cars spew nowadays.

Im just saying that the US has put profits first before the environment and everything else. Im sure this is the same w/ other countries. Its just that the US consumes and pollutes so much more than the rest of the world. Now China is catching up. Profits is also the reason why jobs are being exported. U say China is the enemy, no they're not. Its inevitable that countries would catch up. Dont hate the player, hate the game

 

As I said...you are basing all your "science" on 100 years of record keeping...even if the global temperature has risen in the last 100 years that proves absolutely nothing about "global warming".

What I hate are countries that would like nothing better than to destroy the United States and its freedoms...it isn't a "game" for China - China IS an enemy; the old fasioned kind...the kind that wants to destroy us and I don't just mean economically. I've no problem with other democratic nations competing with us; countries that have nukes pointed at us and a millitary budget that is increasing almost exponentially; those I have a big problem with.

 

Everybody has nukes pointed at somebody. Just because they have different beliefs and culture does not mean they're the enemy. Democracy is not fit for all countries. Americans have to get rid of the high and mighty attitude of being guardians of the world and everything they do is for the best of the whole planet and stop trying to force feed their beliefs to others. I used to not get why other nations hate the US, but after travelling quite a lot, I actually began to understand why. There are a lot of US policies that, while beneficial to itself, is hurting a lot of smaller countries. Things that you would only find out if you were outside the US. Democracy, while it works for the US and other countries, simply cannot work in others. The US would not be making so many enemies if it didnt meddle too much w/ other countries' business. Anyways, that is politics already. Live and let live.

 

Are you also saying that the hole in the ozone is nothing but scientific bs? And it wasnt caused by indiscriminate use of cfc's? And we still have to wait for a thousand more years of data gathering before we do the necessary steps? And are u actually saying that carbon monoxide and other greenhouse gases, w/c increased exponentially during the industrial revolution, are not harming the earth? Try inhaling the exhaust on your vehilcle. If you're not harmed by it then I'll believe u. But for now, I'd rather believe the scientists who are actually studying this kind of stuff.

 

arjainz,

There are people in this world who simply don’t believe in evil…they honestly believe that if the United States “just leaves them alone they’ll leave us alone”…you don’t have to go back in history more than about 70 years to prove just how wrong and just how dangerous that sort of thinking is. But there are countries, and China is probably the most dangerous one, who are truly evil…who are truly an enemy.

China is openly aggressive and openly hostile to western democracy and is spending an incredible amount of its GNP on expanding its already huge military…do you really think they have no plans; no desire to use that military? Everything China represents is antithetical to every basic principle of democracy that has made the United States great…such things as personal freedom, personal responsibility, personal ownership of property, free markets and free enterprise…the Chinese government would eradicate the US and every other free country today if it thought it could get away with it (as in, survive nuclear retaliation).

How the US is treating China today is not unlike a person opening their home to a thief and not only inviting him in but showing him where all the valuables are kept and then helping him carry them out to his car.

As to the United States position in the world, the United States doesn’t just think it’s superior to every other country in the world, it IS superior to every other country…it is the best, most honorable, most free, most beneficial country that the world has ever known and likely ever will know. It is not perfect and it makes mistakes, but it’s as perfect as imperfect man will every come.

If you wish to disagree, that’s your choice…everyone in this country has the freedom to be wrong.

With respect to the “ozone hole”…is there one? Yes. Do we know what causes it with any degree of certainty? No. It was “discovered” in 1985 but the fact is, we don’t know that it is truly “new” or whether it is a reoccurring phenomenon that has existed for thousands or even millions of years. There is substantial evidence that natural Earth processes (such as volcanic eruptions and normal weather patterns) have much more to do with its existence and its expansion/contraction than anything man has done or can do.

As to global warming, I suggest you stop just reading USAToday and stop listening to Kennedy and Gore (who fly around in their private jest while deriding us “common folk” for having pickup trucks and SUVs) and actually read some of the real scientific papers on the subject…the overwhelming body of scientific evidence does not support the theory…the overwhelming body of climatologists do not support the theory…if you want to believe in global warming and alter your life based on that belief then again, that is your choice but I submit it is more a matter of “belief” than a matter of scientific evidence.

 

Since when has the arguement for global warming been based only on 100 years of record keeping? Sounds like you only want to know enough of the story to believe global warming isn't happening. You know, there is plenty of evidence to the climate of the Earth's many epochs locked in the ground, ice, fossils, trees, etc. Scientists know a hell of a lot more about that Earth's climate than just a measly hundred years back. Give me a break.

A few crackpot scientists? Every read a scientific journal on the subject? Or hell, any number of science based magazines (Popular Science, Scientific American, etc,)? A lot of what is in this magazines is disturbingly left winged, but get past that and you will find that most scientists believe that global warming is happening. Evidence to support it is being identified faster than evidence against it. Smarter minds than you and I have put there time in on this, and to dismiss is based on one popular magazine's sole article on it (was it the Wall Street Journal?) is ridiculous.

Maybe global warming might not be happening after all. Like I said, smarter minds than I are putting their time into this. However, completely dismissing the idea is idiotic. It is like we are strugging off total responsibility to this. What if global warming does become a serious problems to our children or grandchildren? Are you going to sit there and say, "well it isn't my fault. I read something a long time ago that said it wasn't happening." Too late by then.

 

I agree.

Where exactly do you come up with this? How much do you follow up on new scientific discovery? "Overwhelming body of climatologists" huh? Prove it.

*Edit -

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2004Dec25.html

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?art...E983414B7F0000

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0123-01.htm

http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming...rming-faq.html

Here are a few links. Do me a favor an actually read them. I don't expect them to change your opinion, but I do find it humourous that you stated that most of the scientific community believes global warming to be a myth. Funny that the IPCC, NASA themselves (one being a conglomeration of 7 different countries, and one being government run), as well as smaller circles such as CABS (Center for Applied Biodiversity Science, which has a rich scientific portfolio), as well as many others I don't have the time to name, seem to think global warming caused by humans is a very real problem. The only scientific sources I could find against global warming (and I did look) were small groups of scientists or individuals, nothing on a larger scale.

I am not an expert on this. You definetly are not either (100 years of documentation ), so when you write something dumb, to the extent of "everyone is entitled to their opinions, even if yours is wrong", it irks the hell out of me. People are too eager to **** responsibility away, and there is certainly no conclusive evidence that global warming isn't happening.

 

RussStang,

Frederick Seitz, the past president of the National Academy of Sciences and President Emeritus of Rockefeller University has a very revealing paper on “global warming” and has, in fact, sponsored a petition disputing “global warming” that has been signed by over 17,000 scientists. His introduction is here: http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p41.htm and the paper itself is here: http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm. There is also detailed information there about the petition itself and its signatories. You might want to read it.

You might also be interested in knowing that in the past 18 months or so, Congress, specifically the committed that has oversight responsibility on environmental policy, has called the global warming temperature studies and their underlying calculations into question based on the work of many other scientists who believe that the proponents of global warming have purposefully not adjusted their temperature records for such known items as urban center temperature heating (which has been a known phenomenon for many, many years). In other words, a lot of scientists believe that the group most responsible for the global warming theory (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) has, effectively, “cooked the books” to support their conclusions.

I was being a bit disingenuous when I said a “100” years of data although I’m not sure why you find that such it to be such an illegitimate number – detailed climate/temperature measurements and records simply haven’t been kept all that long...most actual records begin around 1860 which means we have about 145 years worth of detailed, reliable records.

My point, however, was that whether we have 100 or 200 or 500 years worth of data, that hardly compares to thousands, tens of thousands, 100s of thousands or millions of years the Earth has existed (depending of course on how you believe the Earth came to be here in the first place)…even if one believes the Earth’s age can be measured in the thousands or tens of thousands of years, extrapolating a “global warming’ theory based on such a tiny fraction of that time borders on the ridiculous.

I don’t claim to be an expert; in fact, I definitely am not and expert. I am also not a neophyte and I don’t buy into theories just because the popular media needs something to report.