Why is the climate change debate a political one in the United States?

[A895]

It can't. There's no "humanity". There's a mix of various civilizations with different structure, mentality and goals. Rich people want their profits, poor people want a roof over their head and a meal on their table. Billions of people live in abject poverty and if they had to chose between improving their economic situation or living on a clean planet, guess what the choice would be. Make a search on pollution in China, look at the photos - do you seriously think we can solve this problem by handing them even more of our manufacturing ? Or do you think the environment conscious Germans will stop buying gas from Russia, which is extracted with little regard to the environment in Siberia ? No, they want to be warm in the winter.

Can more be done to reduce pollution ? Sure. But it will be a slow and steady process with some reverses.

I'm sorry but you are asking stuff none of us can answer. The point of this thread is why politics are intertwined with global warming.

Your questions can't possibly be answered by any of us.

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[A895]

Utopianism substitutes glorious predictions and unachievable promises for knowledge, science, and reason, while laying claim to them all. We now have the progressives "climate change" playbook and we know what they are doing, and we are using it against them. Unlike the Democrats though, we aren't out to destroy our society, we are out to save it..

Doubtful, based on this thread alone.

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[Amamba]

I'm sorry but you are asking stuff none of us can answer. The point of this thread is why politics are intertwined with global warming.

Your questions can't possibly be answered by any of us.

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I am not asking any questions. Kilofoxtrot and especially Not Quite Right changed this thread into "we must admit the problem and do something drastic now" debate. I am merely showinf

 

[Amamba]

HTF do you edit a post on iPad ?

Anyway, I was merely showing what the biggest problem is. And that the politicians from both sides of the debate refuse to acknowledge it. The ultra Reps decry the whole Global Warming as a hoax and some worldwide conspiracy (and look really stupid jn the process) while the Left treat it as some kind of a sacred cow, tend to ignore or downplay the importance of Earth natural cycles, blame everything on greedy Corporations and their pet Conservatives, and completely refuse to raise the debate on the questions I wrote about, or admit tat

 

[Amamba]

... Fat fingered it again, sorry... Or admit that there's little popular support for the kind of the drastic measures required to do what they preach, even if the Conservatives and Corporations step aside, and that it will all likely result in the economic collapse in the West and increased net global pollution.

As to why it's so politicized in the US - well, the US politics had become a real circus in the last 20 years, and the crazy GW related theories are just one of the many idiotic things the opposing parties come up with to advance their agendas. Both parties (or rather coalitions, as neither of the two main US parties is really politically homogeneous) have their own clowns and crazy theories, for every Rush Limbaugh there's a Jesse Jackson or Michael Moore. The American politics are a mess, but I suspect it's not much better elsewhere.

 

[Not Quite Right]

I must bow out of this thread with reference to a favorite quote of mine ...

“The amount of energy necessary to refute bull**** is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it.”

- Alberto Brandolini

 

[Amamba]

I must bow out of this thread with reference to a favorite quote of mine ...

“The amount of energy necessary to refute bull**** is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it.”

- Alberto Brandolini

In other words, you have good intentions and self-righteous slogans but no solutions, and the real issue is more complex than you're willing to admit.

Welcome to the real world.

Peace

 

[Not Quite Right]

In other words, you have good intentions and self-righteous slogans but no solutions, and the real issue is more complex than you're willing to admit.

Welcome to the real world.

Peace

Nope I'm just as tired of your "I'm holier than thou, just playing devils advocate, but not really contributing anything" attitude. You're just as bad if not worse than the ignorant. At least the ignorant have the excuse that they took the wrong stance because they didn't know any better. You don't get that luxury when you simply throw your hands up in defeat because a problem is too complex. The first step to solving this problem would be to do others here & myself have already attempted to do. That would be to educate , and enlightened as many as possible to this issue, then focus on the arrogant assholes that refuse to believe a problem even exists. Only once everyone, or at least a majority is on the same page could one hope to achieve a feasible solution to this problem ...

 

[kch50428]

Nope I'm just as tired of your "I'm holier than thou, just playing devils advocate, but not really contributing anything" attitude. You're just as bad if not worse than the ignorant.

What a pot/kettle moment...

 

[Not Quite Right]

What a pot/kettle moment...

"When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser." -- Socrates

 

[hydrogen3]

Nope I'm just as tired of your "I'm holier than thou, just playing devils advocate, but not really contributing anything" attitude. You're just as bad if not worse than the ignorant. At least the ignorant have the excuse that they took the wrong stance because they didn't know any better. You don't get that luxury when you simply throw your hands up in defeat because a problem is too complex. The first step to solving this problem would be to do others here & myself have already attempted to do. That would be to educate , and enlightened as many as possible to this issue, then focus on the arrogant assholes that refuse to believe a problem even exists. Only once everyone, or at least a majority is on the same page could one hope to achieve a feasible solution to this problem ...
View attachment 67953

Really sad, If we look objectively at what the progressives have done to America with their corruption, divisive race-baiting and poverty-pimping, and promotion of socialism, one would believe that we now live in an alternative universe. How corrupt you ask? Here are useful idiots attempting to nullify the Constitution’s Second Amendment, disarming the law-abiding American public, to create a larger pool of victims in need of big government law enforcement and control.

Now they want to give control to-http://www.un.org/en/globalissues/peacesecurity/

 

[Amamba]

Again, you're dodging the issue. Even if everybody in the US agreed that global warming is real (which I believe it is) and that it's primarily driven by human activity (which I am not convinced of), then you are asking people to chos

 

[Amamba]

I apologize, keep hitting the wrong buttons.

Anyway, even if most Americans agreed that the Global Warming is caused by human activity, it's naive to think that most will be willing to give up their livelihood and that of their children to fix the problem. It's even more naive to think they can influence the rest of the world, or that people in the developing countries will choose poverty in a cleaner world over improvement of their living standards in a polluted world. The worse position in life you start from, the more desperate you are for any improvement at any cost. As I said multiple times, restricting the pollution in the western world to the point it's no longer competitively possible to make things there will force all manufacturing into developing countries and raise the overall pollution levels.

Here's how you fix this, after everyone in the West agrees that drastic measures need to be done now

- impose extremely high tariffs so that only clean producing countries can sell their product here

- forbid companies from freely moving funds outside of Western economic zone

- build cr@pload of nuclear stations in Europe and in the meantime buy tons of blankets for the next 10 winters without Russian gas

There's still this little issue of impending global economic collapse, but I am sur

 

[Amamba]

... I am sure you and I can figure a way to deal with it. Perhaps by suspending political parties until the global warming is over.

Welcome to the United Clean Earth Alliance !

Now if you have better ideas, i'd love to hear them. Can't wait, really.

 

[hydrogen3]

Again, you're dodging the issue. Even if everybody in the US agreed that global warming is real (which I believe it is) and that it's primarily driven by human activity (which I am not convinced of), then you are asking people to chos

If global warming is not caused by Human activity... Why do we need to do anything? I'm confused...

 

[Amamba]

Now, Not Quite Right, I'd love to see your contribution to the Cause. After you educate every American, how do you deal with those of them that will still refuse to take the drastic steps required to stop polluting ? How do you prevent companies from moving manufacturing overseas ? How do you prevent China et al from jumping in to fill the void and doubling the global pollution ? Your heart is in the right place, but it seems you have an empty paper bag where your head should have been.

 

[hydrogen3]

Pollution and climate change aka climate collapse are two different things. Throwing a Coke bottle on the side of the road does not contribute to the rise or fall of the earth's temperature.

 

[A895]

Yup, no headway will be made here. Not on this forum anyway.

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[Amamba]

Some food for thought. Global pollution levels according to WHO. Not in absolute contribution but in overall air quality. This is a link from a left leaning British newspaper.

Global air pollution: what is the most polluted country and city in the world? | Environment | theguardian.com

Note how they say "We can see America is the most sampled place and there is relatively little known about other large countries like Russia and the heavily populated countries like China."

I.e. we can only guess that results for China are not very accurate. I suspect the worst polluted places are also out of reach of air quality monitors.

Some data from the link. The units are ug/m3.
Australia 13
USA 18
Japan 22
UK 23
Germany 25
Brazil 40
World average 71
China 98
India 109

Brazil has surprisingly little pollution, but their problem is deforestation of the "Lungs of the planet", the Amazon rain forests.

So, it's the stupid Americans who cause the problem by politicizing the Global warming issue, right ?

I am too tired to find the absolute pollution levels, but I remember reading that the US contributed 17% of world pollution and China 25%. 1.5x more, and don't forget that according to study, the US is one of the most monitored countries in the world, and there's little real info about China. From what I saw with my own eyes, I think China's pollution levels are much worse.

So, back to square one... how do you fix the issue without moving even more jobs out of US to China ?

 

[A895]

Some food for thought. Global pollution levels according to WHO. Not in absolute contribution but in overall air quality. This is a link from a left leaning British newspaper.

Global air pollution: what is the most polluted country and city in the world? | Environment | theguardian.com

Note how they say "We can see America is the most sampled place and there is relatively little known about other large countries like Russia and the heavily populated countries like China."

I.e. we can only guess that results for China are not very accurate. I suspect the worst polluted places are also out of reach of air quality monitors.

Some data from the link. The units are ug/m3.
Australia 13
USA 18
Japan 22
UK 23
Germany 25
Brazil 40
World average 71
China 98
India 109

Brazil has surprisingly little pollution, but their problem is deforestation of the "Lungs of the planet", the Amazon rain forests.

So, it's the stupid Americans who cause the problem by politicizing the Global warming issue, right ?

I am too tired to find the absolute pollution levels, but I remember reading that the US contributed 17% of world pollution and China 25%. 1.5x more, and don't forget that according to study, the US is one of the most monitored countries in the world, and there's little real info about China. From what I saw with my own eyes, I think China's pollution levels are much worse.

So, back to square one... how do you fix the issue without moving even more jobs out of US to China ?

That doesn't make sense, what the hell does this have to with jobs?

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