Friday, April 25, 2008
EARTH DAY 2008: PREDICTIONS OF ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER WERE WRONG
Another Earth Day has passed, so this is a good time to look back at predictions made on the original Earth Day about environmental disasters that were about to hit the planet, says the Washington Policy Center (WPC). Most Earth Day predictions turned out to be stunningly wrong.
In 1970, environmentalists said there would soon be a new ice age and massive deaths from air pollution. The New York Times foresaw the extinction of the human race. Widely-quoted biologist Paul Ehrlich predicted worldwide starvation by 1975. More predictions of impending disaster:
- "...civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind," biologist George Wald, Harvard University, April 19, 1970.
- By 1995, "...somewhere between 75 and 85 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct." Sen. Gaylord Nelson, quoting Dr. S. Dillon Ripley, Look magazine, April 1970.
- Because of increased dust, cloud cover and water vapor "...the planet will cool, the water vapor will fall and freeze, and a new Ice Age will be born," Newsweek magazine, January 26, 1970.
- "We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation," biologist Barry Commoner, University of Washington, writing in the journal Environment, April 1970.
- "By 1985, air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half..." Life magazine, January 1970.
- "Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make," Paul Ehrlich, interview in Mademoiselle magazine, April 1970.
Source: Press Release, "Earth Day 2008: Predictions of Environmental Disaster Were Wrong," Washington Policy Center, April 22, 2008.
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“What is at risk is not the climate but freedom. I see the biggest threat to freedom, democracy, the market economy and prosperity now in ambitious environmentalism, not in communism. This ideology wants to replace the free and spontaneous evolution of mankind by a sort of central (now global) planning.”
—Czech president Vaclav Klaus
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Why We Serve: Sailor Shares Deployment Experiences
Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Emily K. Klinefelter said she volunteered for the deployment because, as a leader, she knew she would have to one day ask her sailors to deploy, and she wanted to have the experience first. “It was really not a hard decision for me to make,” she said.
Klinefelter re-enlisted for another six years while she was in Iraq, and she hopes to become a warrant officer shortly after being promoted to chief petty officer next year, she said. For now, her goal is to spread the message that the Navy is involved in the war on terror right alongside its fellow services, and that troops around the world are proud to serve their country.
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The Afghanistan success story
... I have shown that statements from NATO leaders have gone almost completely ignored when they do not sustain the "losing in Afghanistan" narrative. I remember one article in which the writer declared that the Taliban had "vast swaths of unchallenged territory, including rural areas." The truth of the matter was that NATO forces had pushed the Taliban out of the towns and villages and into the wastelands...
Last week at a NATO/International Security Assistance Force summit in Bucharest, ISAF leaders reaffirmed their commitment to Afghanistan and released a report which supports my argument. The report, Progress in Afghanistan, belies the current media dictum in its' very name. But the revelations in the report shred the media template to the point of making it incontestable that the American public is the victim of journalistic malpractice concerning Afghanistan.
The report begins with this salient foreword:
The conclusion we draw from this report is simple: this broad international effort to help Afghanistan build a more stable and secure future is achievable, and it is being achieved. Of course, real challenges remain, and this will be a long-term effort; but the information contained in this report gives reason for optimism.Yet all of this good news goes nearly unreported in the American media in favor of a "resurgent Taliban" narrative. At some point, media consumers must not only question the media narrative but the cause of this distorted reporting. We can only conclude that the disparate nature of the facts from the reporting points to nothing less than purposely biased reporting at America's journalistic institutions.
We are now experiencing another Tet Offensive in Afghanistan, not from the enemy forces, but from an enemy media that seeks to put a Democrat in the White House by discrediting anything our military has accomplished, as long as the Commander-in-Chief is a Republican.
[Recommended >]
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Attack Wing: Glider Makes Waves With Stealth and Speed
It weighs only 30 pounds and can be fully weaponized for assault and rescue. It has a 6-foot jet-wing that is steered with handheld rotary controls connected to its rudder. And it can hide more than 100 pounds of combat gear in a built-in compartment. The Gryphon attack glider, designed to penetrate combat zones at 135 miles per hour, could revolutionize the art of parachuting. (Snip) A vision straight out of "Batman," the carbon-fiber stealth glider quadruples the speed of similar craft...
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Palestinian 'Moderates' Ensure Extremism
“Rice Wins Concessions from Israel,” read the Washington Post headline after Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s recent visit. Rice herself told reporters her goal was to further Israel-Palestinian Authority (PA) talks by getting Israeli concessions to “improve the quality of life” for Palestinians. She listed ten different Israeli concessions including: removing 50 roadblocks, easing checkpoint procedures, increasing travel and work permits, backing economic projects, letting 700 U.S.-trained PA security men deploy, and giving the PA armored vehicles and night-vision goggles. Rice claimed success, saying talks are now "moving in the right direction."
Are they? Will these concessions make the PA more stable or moderate? No. One wonders if we’ll ever see the headline: “Rice Wins Concessions from Palestinians.” I doubt it...
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Hamas rejects Israeli recognition
[now who could have seen that coming...]
Mr Carter had said Hamas was prepared to accept the right of Israel to "live as a neighbour next door in peace".
[...everybody but Jimmy...]
Speaking in Syria, where he lives in exile, Khaled Meshaal said that this did not mean recognising Israel, but he said: "We have offered a truce if Israel withdraws to the 1967 borders, a truce of 10 years as an alternative to recognition."
[...after which they'll resume the war - just closer and better entrenched]
"The problem is that Israel and the United States refuse to meet with someone who must be involved," - said Carter.
[right: Hamas refuses to recognize Israel's right to exist and it's... Israel and America's fault.]
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Report: Russian bombers intercepted off Alaska
Moscow - NATO forces sent jets to escort two Russian long-range air force bombers patrolling neutral skies near Alaska on Wednesday, Russian news agencies quoted the defense ministry as saying. (Snip) Accompanied by two Il-78 refueling tankers, the two Tu-95 Bear bombers flew for 15 hours over the Arctic and Pacific oceans, Interfax news agency quoted Russian Air Force spokesman Alexander Drobyshevsky as saying.
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Bush a Master Diplomat Strengthening U.S. Relations All Over
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"The world owes President Bush a debt of gratitude in leading the world in our determination to root out terrorism," said British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, a man whose recent elevation to office was supposed to denote a "cooling" of relations with the U.S. and a tilt toward Europe. But Europe isn't really "cooling," either.
France is now led by a man elected as "le Americain." Like Brown, President Nicolas Sarkozy had nothing but good things to say about Bush. [...]
In Italy, all we can find is another enthusiastically pro-Bush prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, who won high office this week in a landslide. "What I did counted in my relationship with Bush," he said this month in his campaign.
In Germany, led by conservative and U.S.-friendly Chancellor Angela Merkel, the sentiment has also gone pro-American, as it has in the Netherlands, Denmark, Belgium and Canada.
Outside of Western Europe, the reviews are even warmer because there's a focus not just on terror-fighting but standing up for democracy— as ties with Estonia, Poland, the Czech Republic, Romania, and Albania show. [...]
Bush has also boosted ties with strategic Asian countries such as Vietnam, Cambodia, Japan, Indonesia and Singapore, and broken new ground with some very big players globally, like Brazil and India, both of whose leaders have the most cordial of relations. [...]
So what was that again about Bush alienating 'the world'?
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Financial markets global-tax could aid world’s poor
A tax of one-hundredth of a percentage point on global financial transactions could provide hundreds of billions of dollars for developing countries facing the challenges of soaring commodity prices and climate change, the United Nations heard this week. The food price crisis that has sparked unrest in some of the world’s poorest countries.
[one-hundredth of a percent - for now - are we really foolish enough to allow the one-world-government folks to take what funds they deem 'necessary'?]
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Climate change claims exaggerated: Minchin
A KEY federal opposition frontbencher has voiced his skepticism about climate change. Opposition defense spokesman, and leader of the opposition in the Senate Nick Minchin said there were still doubts on the science used to back up claims about climate change.
"I do think that the claims being made in relation to climate change generally are often very exaggerated," he told ABC Television.
"And even Ross Garnaut in his report makes it clear that there are many, many scientists who doubt the voracity of the IPCC's (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) findings, and he called for greater debate about the scientific evidence...
[greater what? whatzat - 'debate'? {it's still occurring in other countries}]
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Global Warming Petition Project
More than 19,000 scientists have signed a petition which 'urges':
"The United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan in December, 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind. "
And states:
"There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth."
The complete of signatories can be seen at www.oism.org/pproject.
[that's 19K scientists in addition to the over 4000 from 106 countries which signed the Heidelberg Appeal in 1992, those that signed the Leipzig Declaration on Global Climate Change in response to Kyoto's drafting {forgot count, apologies}, and the meticulously vetted Oregon Petition begun in 1998 that now has in excess of 20K signatories itself. Ok, suspect there's some overlap in signatories and no, I'm not going to parse 'em - point is it's yet another association of predominantly climate related scientists that dwarfs the few thousand of the IPCC and else where - but which is routinely ignored by the MSM - why?]
BACK TO THE '70S?
Wasn't it two years ago that then-Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi vowed, if her party took over Congress, to cut energy prices -- especially gasoline? Since then the cost of energy is up more than 70 percent. Under Pelosi's "common-sense plan," Congress has achieved nothing. Actually, less than nothing, considering that what little has been done has hurt, rather than helped the United States to become more energy self-sufficient:
- This year alone, we'll spend $431 billion to buy 3.7 billion barrels of imported oil to run our economy.
- And in so doing, we are enriching some of the world's most unsavory regimes.
- At least 10 billion barrels in Alaska's National Wildlife Reserve. [Caribou could trip on a rig; off limits]
- 30 billion or so offshore. [not in sight of my beach house; off limits]
- 1.2 trillion in Rocky Mountain oil-shale. [classified 'alternative' fuel, carbon footprint must be less than liquid oil, isn't; off limits]
Democrats have focused instead on a global warming plan that would cost $1.2 trillion. Meanwhile, subsidies and other breaks for biofuels have helped send food prices soaring. As in the 1970s, this is a human-made crisis -- one that has solutions. But it's the Democrats, along with a few equally misguided Republicans, who steadfastly refuse to implement them.
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