 |
 |
|
Most Recent Headlines THE TOP STORY: Next on the Mark Warner agenda ECOLOGY AND YOU: Liberals are too picky to fight global warming  By Erik Curren Democrats are sure getting their groove back. Anticipating big gains in November, some liberals these days have even started strutting around like Andrew Jackson, imagining how they'll split up the spoils of victory in Washington. When it comes to global warming, many are confident that if the Democrats take one or both houses of Congress, America will finally be forced to take real action, like putting in mandatory caps on carbon-dioxide pollution. These folks are positively beaming. But they were grumbling just a few months ago. A DULL ACHE: The land of race-car ya-yas By W.R. Marshall Here's how I know I was wrong - NASCAR on NBC on Saturday night. A while back I wrote a column about how we, as a nation, might not be a subtle as we once were, or, at least not as demanding. Easy answers seem to be the order of the day. I avoided saying we were becoming - dumber. Well, I was wrong. We're just plain stupid. The reasons are plentiful: We elect leaders who continually lie to us, serve a small minority, are accountable to no one, and we don't do a thing. In fact, plenty of my fellow Americans are going to vote for these bozos again for reasons that defy logic ... CARLY AT THE MOVIES: Lewis Black for 'Man of the Year'  By Carl Larsen There are no mediocre Robin Williams movies. Like the little girl with the little curl right in the middle of her forehead, he's either good or horrid. But in "Man of the Year," currently running in Harrisonburg, Wild Man Williams is too mild in the first half, but just fine as Mr. Sensitive Guy in the second. It's the wish-fulfillment story of a sharp-tongued political analyst (think Jon Stewart) getting elected president due to a computer glitch (think the future of the fabled hanging chads) but still turning out to be a decent guy. MOUSE TRAILS: Speed it up  By Ron Doyle The question from our mailbag this week is that the reader's XP computer seems to be running much slower than it did when it was new a couple of years ago. And our friend wants to know how to correct it, or if they need a new computer. And they have tried all the fixes that they can think of - like defragging. So here we are - what do we do? I always suggest starting with Disk Cleanup, then Error-checking (formerly know as Scan Disk) and finally Defragmentation to help out a tired system. There are a couple of other things to try; unfortunately, they are harder to perform. BISHOP'S MANTLE: Stream of semi-consciousness By Jim Bishop To pare a phrase from T.S. Eliot, "Autumn is the cruelest season." This time of year is so fickle, unpredictable, teasing, quixotic, unfair. As I write these lines, it's a glorious, summerlike day. By the week's end, the forecast calls for a frost warning and "a chance of snow showers in the higher elevations." Sounds like an open invitation for colds, hacking coughs and flu symptoms, and I'm not interested in responding with an RSVP. IN THE SCHEME OF THINGS: Making memories By Nan S. Russell It was the perfect evening. The sun's heat replaced by a slight breeze, softly pink-singed clouds resting on the horizon, and after-dinner saunters taking to the street. Out for an evening drive, I saw the little girl trailing behind her dad, savoring an interesting bug here or an intriguing weed there. Her cell-phone-eared father was oblivious to her discoveries. Three blocks later, in the heart of town, two women window-shopped, obviously together but apart, as each engaged in parallel phone conversations. HEALTH MATTERS: Tougher for some than others - genetics and exercise By Caroline J. Cederquist Tall and short, dark and light, freckled and tanned, we come in myriad packages with myriad features, most of them determined by our genetics before we ever draw breath. Very few of these traits can we control, and we just have to play the hand we're dealt. But when people are earnestly trying to lose weight and failing again and again, many ultimately get the sneaking suspicion that they really are playing against a stacked deck. They may be right. THE FLY LADY: A special fortune cookie By Marla Cilley Over the years, I have gotten some really strange fortunes in our fortune cookies. I will never forget the time we were coming back from picking up my husband's car from the repair shop. We had the engine replaced. The fortune cookie we got that night said, "You will not have any car trouble for the next 50,000 miles." We could not believe our eyes. It is so much fun to laugh at things like this. There is another fortune cookie that has become my mantra for living. THE DINNER DIVA: The truth about chocolate By Leanne Ely I was in the grocery store the other day, contemplating which Halloween candies I would pick up for the thousands of trick-or-treaters that will land on my doorstep in a few weeks. The temptation to get the stuff I like is pretty big, especially considering the fact that I am a full-blown chocoholic. As a matter of fact, I've typed the word chocoholic so many times on this computer that the telltale sign of a spellcheck (that obnoxious red underlining) doesn't even come up anymore.
Advertiser Links E-N Computers For more on advertising, click here.
News Partners
News Links Google News |
Liberals are too picky to fight global warming
Conservatives offer unexpected climate activists
Ecology and You Erik Curren
Democrats are sure getting their groove back. Anticipating big gains in November, some liberals these days have even started strutting around like Andrew Jackson, imagining how they'll split up the spoils of victory in Washington. When it comes to global warming, many are confident that if the Democrats take one or both houses of Congress, America will finally be forced to take real action, like putting in mandatory caps on carbon-dioxide pollution. These folks are positively beaming. But they were grumbling just a few months ago. And they could put a frown on my face, too. Back then, whenever I talked to liberals about global warming, I would get depressed. Nearly every conversation seemed to come around by the end to "if only." If only the Democrats had been in power during the last six years, then America's sole remaining source of carbon dioxide would be Coke and Pepsi. If only the public weren't so busy watching "Jackass" to see how urgent it is that we slow our carbon emissions before Dave Chappelle comes out with his next DVD, then the polar icecaps wouldn't be melting faster than a scoop of Cherry Garcia in Ann Coulter's microwave. If only big business could embrace cutting carbon as an opportunity rather than fear it as a threat, then we could all march hand-in-hand into a clean economy where domestic union-made hydrogen will be tripping over domestic farmer-grown ethanol to free America from climate hell, oil jihad and the trade deficit all at the same time. Now, my Prius-driving, Whole Foods-shopping, green-power-buying, lightbulb-changing, and "Inconvenient Truth"-watching greenie friends tell me that even though we have to endure two more years of the Monkey and his handler Darth Cheney, in just a couple weeks Our People could win a majority in one or both houses of Congress. Under one condition, of course: If only environmentalists can band together with other progressives to defeat the conservatives! Aren't pro-choice and anti-carbon two great tastes that taste great together? Conservatives, the liberals say, are the natural enemy of any change to avoid climate change. And there's no changing 'em. David Horton's comment on the Huffington Post Web site at the end of March sums it up: "Businessmen and conservative politicians hate global warming because it is one of those stubborn facts that keep getting in the way of ideology. Global warming is the final exam mark for the difference of opinion between conservationists and the Right, and the Right know that they have failed the exam. The Right are outraged by any attempt to carry out any conservation measure anywhere. But their ultimate outrage is reserved for global warming."
Green or greenwash? I raised this issue with a man who must be one of the least-partisan environmentalists in America, Jim DiPeso of Republicans for Environmental Protection (www.rep.org). Apparently, his group is the real deal. They're not greenwashers who peddle "free market" environmentalism to take the pressure off industrial polluters; instead, they support mandatory carbon caps over voluntary measures that may be more business-friendly but have proven ineffective. They also oppose oil and gas drilling in protected natural areas in Alaska or off the coast and support clean energy and conservation. Indeed, DiPeso sometimes has to convince audiences that his is not a "spoof" group like the Yes Men, who put on dark suits and posed as World Bank reps to in order to mock corporate globalization. DiPeso wants to make the environental movement more effective, too. But he says that "if you put the need for environmental stewardship into the progressive box, you've just alienated half the population." Finger-pointing might help raise money or win elections, but in the long run, "if you put all of our eggs in one party's basket, then you're not going to be able to make steady environmental progress. In the years when the Democrats are in office, everything will be fine. But when voters get tired of them and bring back the Republicans, you'll have to fight defensive actions," as is the case now with Bush-Cheney. "If we don't develop a strong conservation ethic within the Republican Party, then we're dooming ourselves to see boom and bust cycles." DiPeso's words had a special resonance for me because, five years ago, I moved to a Red State. Most people in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia where I live now are just as distrustful of Yankee tree-huggers telling them what they can't do with their land as you'd expect. Yet, the fact remains that many folks in the country - most of 'em conservative - seem to know something about nature because they don't spend all their time in offices or shopping malls. So, I started to wonder, might there be some conservatives who care about global warming? You bet there are. And they're belivable heroes, too. Their street cred on climate and wildlife habitat would inspire homicidal envy in policy wonks from the Natural Resources Defence Council. Their fervor to fight global warming makes superstar NASA climatologist Jim Hanson look timid. And they're optimists, too. But they're not your hippie pals who've stayed off the grid since the '60s. They're hunters and fishermen. That's right, the kind of guys who like to tie Bambi to the hood of their Ford Exeditions and put Spongebob's pals on the grill at the Fourth of July picnic at the Foursquare Church.
Sportsmen take aim at a bigger target In April, the National Wildlife Federation surveyed more than a thousand hunters and fishermen nationwide on climate change. Most of them are men in their fifties. Half are evangelical Christians, and they voted two-to-one for Bush over Kerry in 2004. Yet, more than three-quarters of hunters and anglers agreed that global warming is happening. The same number have seen changes in the field - warmer and shorter winters, hotter summers, earlier spring and less snow - and more than half say they believe global warming is behind these changes. Nearly three-quarters think that global warming will affect hunting and fishing conditions. They're worried, and they want to do something about it. To find out why, I talked to three sportsmen who have volunteerd to help NWF recruit hunters and anglers to fight global warming. Each is a white, male, conservative Republican, who says that he's a Christian, though not necessarily evangelical. They hunt deer, elk and ducks. They fish salmon and bass. And they take only what they can eat. They are all convinced that global warming is a big threat, that it's caused by humans, and that we should fight it in order to save habitat for animals and for ourselves. They agree that Americans need to do what it takes to cut our carbon emissions to a safe level soon. David Carruth, age 46, from Clarendon, Ark., says that "the critters have to have their habitat. It's the canary-in-the-coal-mine philosophy. Animals are the first to show the effects of a bad place to live, and if the critters aren't doing well, I know I'm not going to do well. A healthy place for animals is a healthy place for man." He thinks we should fight global warming out of the Bible's injunction to "good stewardship" of the earth and its creatures. "Some who claim to be good Christians say that he who doesn't shine a light under the bushel and increase his Talents (silver coins) is sinning. But when land-use is driven only by dollars, then that's a bigger sin. God gave us the land to use, but he also gave us a brain to see when we're extracting more than we're putting back." Ed Zygmunt of Tunkhannock, Penn., has been fishing for the last 50 years, since age 3. As an ice fisherman, he's especially worried about winters that are shorter and warmer. "For the last decade, our lakes have been in ice cover two weeks less than the previous year," Zygmunt says. "I like to say that ice fishing could become the first recreational activity known to man that was cancelled because the weather was too nice. Last winter there was really not much of an ice-fishing season. We had a couple weeks around Christmas, but after that it never recovered. "We have to find a solution to our energy problems. We've got to find clean energy sources. Until we break the stranglehold of the oil Companies on this nation, that's not going to happen." Jim Martin, age 59 of Mulino, Ore., hunts waterfowl. "They're not migrating as far south as they used to," which means that now the birds don't even reach his area. This pretty much cancels out any hunting. "What the scientists are saying matches the trend of the anecdotal evidence we're seeing. Most every sportsman I talk to, they're seeing the change out in the field. They're wondering what the political response will be. Are we just going to sit here and watch wildlife go away, or are we going to plan for it?" Martin says sportsmen will take their concern to the polls in November. "The average guys I talk to are disappointed, most are Republicans who voted for Bush, mostly because the NRA said this guy is a sportsman who will protect our rights. Now, with global warming, the biggest loss of all is the loss of time. Most of them feel that America is out of balance, and they feel that we're not leading on this issue. "First, we've got to recognize this problem and begin curbing our emissions on a global scale. Then, in the short time we have left to start helping wildlife, we need to take some of the pressure off from development so they can adapt and migrate."
No need for a liberal litmus test Many Democrats or progressives think that anyone who really cares about global warming will share positions on a basic list of liberal hot-button issues; or at least have the decency to disagree with typical conservative views. Yet, I didn't ask these sportsmen if they supported giving stem cells the vote, whether they thought North Korea's Kim Jong Il or Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had the bigger Axis of Evil or if they favored stringing an electric fence along the Mexican border. So what? These issues have as much connection to global warming as Li'l Kim has to Little Women. To my progressive friends, I say, if you really care about climate change, then dump the lefty litmus test. Unless you want Greenwich Village to become a coral reef, it's too late to play partisan politics with global warming. Sure, the Democrats might do well in November. But whatever happens in the elections, or even in 2008, America will have Republicans and conservatives around for a long time. Even if they lose this time around, they'll be back. We need their help now, and we'll need it in the future. And the best part is: If you get to know some of these green conservatives, you might even like them. As to conservatives, Republicans, Libertarians and John Birchers, I say, if they don't like flag-burning illegal-immigrant gays getting married, that's their problem. But if they want to do something to cut greenhouse gases and fight global warming, then I'm ready to take them out for a beer.
Erik Curren is a regular contributor to The Augusta Free Press. Curren is the author of Buddha’s Not Smiling: Uncovering Corruption at the Heart of Tibetan Buddhism Today. More information about Curren's works is available on-line at www.alayapress.com. The views expressed by op-ed writers do not necessarily reflect those of management of The Augusta Free Press.
What do you think? Share your thoughts on this story at letters@augustafreepress.com. (Published 10-23-06) |
|
||
|
