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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: neolib who wrote (158409)	2/23/2005 7:46:03 PM
From: Bilow	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Hi neolib; Re: "Nuke power should be handled the same way. Each consumer's use of nuke power is logged, and a potential longterm liability for cleanup should be incurred. If people are concerned with the risk of this "unfunded liability", they won't buy the power. End of problem." I love how the liberals always manage to come up with these "heads I win, tails you lose" proposals. Okay, then the people who insist that their power come from those giant bird killers should agree to pay the short term costs of them (that are now covered by tax advantages), as well as the long term unfunded liabilities. The simple fact is that there isn't enough wind power to give people the power that they want. The only solution is either nukes, or raising rates high enough to price most people out of the market. If you want the Democratic party to revive, I suggest building lots of nukes. If you insist instead on raising prices high enough that people will cut back on their expenditures, you'll discover that California can be a red state too. Education does have an effect, but when I drive around I sure see a lot of big SUVs with only the driver. I really don't think that there is a feasible political solution. Instead, we will simply burn through the fossil fuels, and deal with whatever changes to the climate result. Rather than try and sweep back the ocean (and make a significant change in world CO2 emissions), it would be better to spend effort trying to figure out how, for example, Florida is going to deal with being underwater. By the way, the latest (March 2005) Scientific American cover article claims that human modification of the climate (due to greenhouse gasses) predates the industrial revolution by 5000 years. The author makes a pretty good case. Here's a short form: newscientist.com Scientific American's latest issue is here: (temp) sciam.com Here's the book: whfreeman.com Also see: whfreeman.com In the absence of this human intervention, the climate would have already followed its natural tendency to return to an ice age. Fossil fuels, to some extent, are keeping Canada livable. The article includes a chart indicating that when fossil fuels run out (supposedly in about 200 years) the earth will return to the ice age pattern. I think that the estimate for fossil fuel burnout is early by many centuries. I would think that we'll be burning coal for quite a bit longer. Nevetheless, the eventual problem is staving off the ice. But by that time, I expect we will have developed the technology to do it. -- Carl P.S. Even in a world without humans, climate change will cause extinction of species.