Wow, V the K. I’ve never heard that point made so succinctly and persuasively–that’s going to stick with me, thanks. It jumped out because it made me remember one of those pivotal moments in my life when I had one of many realizations that ended up forming the basis of the beliefs I have now. I remember getting an e-mail from a friend from college and I think Bush had just been elected (1st term). It had this way-too-dramatic desperate warning about Bush planning not to ratify the Kyoto Treaty and what a horrible decision that will be, blah, blah, blah. Now, I knew my friend was a liberal, but Clinton was elected right before I graduated–things weren’t nearly as polarized as they are now. (I look back at her e-mail as the start of the BDS to come.) She knew I was a Republican, and my general perspective on the environmental issues was environmentalism should not stand in the way of human progress particularly considering how rapidly industries had stepped up to the plate and made a reasoned conclusion that it’s just not profitable to pollute, etc. So, when I saw that this global Kyoto thing was about emissions, I viewed the situation the same way–humans should be (and are) wise stewards of our environmental resources–but I do not have a moral obligation to drive a Yugo so that “future generations” won’t inherit a damaged planet, blah blah…I also had developed a healthy inclination to presumptively reject anything proposed as a “global” solution.

But I wanted to read more about the issue, so I printed out the e-mail about Kyoto, and the actual “treaty” itself (I’m a lawyer, so I thought, let’s see what this treaty actually says). I had dinner with my parents that night and I brought it up and their discussion of it helped me make that leap to realizing that environmentalism had truly changed from hysterical tree huggers who really needed to re-examine their priorities (but really did have the intention of “saving” the environment), to a really sinister, sophisticated, well-funded, global movement seeking to rob wealthy Western nations (particularly the U.S.) and socialize the globe. That was a real eye-opener and I’ve always remembered that moment–it’s NOT a bunch of well-intentioned hippes that should have a little more love for humanity than snail-darters. Those granola types have been utterly eclipsed by the globe-trotting elitists like Al Gore, Cheryl David, George Soros, etc. For dilettante-divorcees like David, it gives her something to do that makes her feel morally superior, without having to actually change her ways like a new religion might require. She can fly around in private jets and feel good about herself, AND she’s easy pickens’ for all that Seinfeld cash she’s got piled around the house that she can tithe to Messianic activist grifters. Gore needs it because he blew his shot at the Presidency and he’s a more legit spokesperson than someone like Soros, who’s in it for the truly base, sinister purpose of just undermining the U.S. however he can.

It is a really sick racket, and when anyone ever says that it sounds just like the new-world-order conspiracy theories the lefties come up with–all you have to tell them to do is read Kyoto. It’s all right there in the text. Each nation gets a certain amount of credits, but if you come up short, no problem, you can buy credits from your global friends all over the world. Isn’t that sweet? Then you start doing the math in your head and you realize that before the ink is even dry, the U.S. will owe billions to a bunch of commies with their red hands out. The thing that bugs me most today is the speech Bush made to explain why he wasn’t going to ratify–at the time, I thought he was just being careful and politically savvy–new President and all, don’t start a war with the tree-huggers. Now that terrorism has shown us just how few “friends” we really have in the world–either they’re jihadists, or they’re commies perfectly willing to sell nukes to jihadists–I want Bush to go back and say, “Ummm, nice fuc*ing try you sicko Marxists. Go sell that snake oil to France or the Aussies.”

And they’re still plugging away at us. The good news is that when Global Warming was at its crescendo and seemed unstoppable (seducing people like McCain), it got derailed by the exposure of Al Gore’s unbelievable hypocisy–they still worshipped him, but it made it harder to recruit newbies, AND the fact that the weather just wouldn’t (and still won’t) cooperate with the agenda. It’s stalled, at least for now.

These Democrats are such evil pieces of shit.

That is, if you’re not a hypocrite.

jack abramoff can take much of the credit for the demise of the republican party. out of control and corrupt as hell.

How about the liberals who got cash from Abramoff such as:

Patty Murray (D-Wash) – $40,980
Charles B. Rangel (D-NY) – $32,000
Patrick J. Kennedy (D-RI) – $31,000
Harry Reid (D-Nev) – $30,500
Byron L. Dorgan (D-ND) – $28,000
Tom Daschle (D-SD) – $26,500
Brad R. Carson (D-Okla) – $18,300
Chris John (D-La) – $15,000
Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) – $14,500
John Breaux (D-La) – $13,750
Mary L. Landrieu (D-La) – $11,500
Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md) – $11,000
Dale E. Kildee (D-Mich) – $10,500
Barney Frank (D-Mass) – $9,000
Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo) – $9,000
Max Baucus (D-Mont) – $9,000
Peter Deutsch (D-Fla) – $8,500
Dick Durbin (D-Ill) – $8,000
Frank Pallone, Jr (D-NJ) – $6,000
Nick Rahall (D-WVa) – $6,000
Jon S. Corzine (D-NJ) – $5,000
Fritz Hollings (D-SC) – $5,000
Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md) – $5,000
Daniel K. Inouye (D-Hawaii) – $5,000
Deborah Ann Stabenow (D-Mich) – $5,000
Xavier Becerra (D-Calif) – $4,523
Tim Johnson (D-SD) – $4,250
Kent Conrad (D-ND) – $4,000
Maria Cantwell (D-Wash) – $3,000
Kalyn Cherie Free (D-Okla) – $3,000
Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif) – $3,000
Richard M. Romero (D-NM) – $3,000
Ed Pastor (D-Ariz) – $3,000
John B. Larson (D-Conn) – $3,000
James L. Oberstar (D-Minn) – $3,000
Brad Sherman (D-Calif) – $3,000
Earl Pomeroy (D-ND) – $2,500
Max Cleland (D-Ga) – $2,500
Gene Taylor (D-Miss) – $2,250
Doug Dodd (D-Okla) – $2,000
Jay Inslee (D-Wash) – $2,000
John D. Dingell (D-Mich) – $2,000
Joe Baca (D-Calif) – $2,000
Carl Levin (D-Mich) – $2,000
C. L. “Butch” Otter (R-Idaho) – $2,000
Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark) – $2,000
Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss) – $2,000
Robert Menendez (D-NJ) – $2,000
Robert T. Matsui (D-Calif) – $2,000
Rodney Alexander (D-La) – $2,000
Sander Levin (D-Mich) – $2,000
Ron Kind (D-Wis) – $2,000
Ronnie Shows (D-Miss) – $2,000
Rosa L. DeLauro (D-Conn) – $2,000
Willie Landry Mount (D-La) – $2,000
Tom Carper (D-Del) – $2,000
Thomas P. Keefe Jr. (D-Wash) – $2,000
Nita M. Lowey (D-NY) – $2,000
Maxine Waters (D-Calif) – $2,000
Ned Doucet (D-La) – $2,000
John Neely Kennedy (D-La) – $2,000
Lane Evans (D-Ill) – $2,000
Norm Dicks (D-Wash) – $1,500
Rick Weiland (D-SD) – $1,000
Ron Wyden (D-Ore) – $1,000
Tim Holden (D-Pa) – $1,000
William J. Jefferson (D-La) – $1,000
Patrick Leahy (D-Vt) – $1,000
Paul Wellstone (D-Minn) – $1,000
Pete Stark (D-Calif) – $1,000
Peter DeFazio (D-Ore) – $1,000
Mike Thompson (D-Calif) – $1,000
David Phelps (D-Ill) – $1,000
Derrick B. Watchman (D-Ariz) – $1,000
Charles S. Robb (D-Va) – $1,000
Bill Luther (D-Minn) – $1,000
Barbara Boxer (D-Calif) – $1,000
Brian David Schweitzer (D-Mont) – $1,000
Charles J. Melancon (D-La) – $1,000
Eliot L. Engel (D-NY) – $1,000
Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif) – $1,000
Gloria Tristani (D-NM) – $1,000
Grace Napolitano (D-Calif) – $1,000
Joe Lieberman (D-Conn) – $1,000
Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif) – $1,000
Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) – $1,000
Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) – $500
John Kerry (D-Mass) – $500
Loretta Sanchez (D-Calif) – $500
Shelley Berkley (D-Nev) – $500

Oh I forget. Democrat corruption is a resume enhancer.

how did environmentalism come to be a left vs right debate?

Round about the same time environmentalism ceased being about protecting the environment and became a tool for implementing socialism and destroying individual freedom. It’s absurd for the Federal Government to be dictating the kinds of lightbulbs and toilets we use. It’s absurd that a remote, inhospitable expanse of mud, bogs, and mosquitoes is off-limits to drilling in the name of Gaia. It’s offensive that celebrities and politicians fly around the world on private jets to lecture us on our “selfish” use of fossil fuels.

The environmental left is only interested in “solutions” that expand the power of the government, distort the free market, and disempower the individuals. Socialism has failed everywhere it’s been tried. Leftist “solutions” have failed the poor in this country, have failed in the public schools, have failed at health care, failed to govern our large cities, and, frankly, failed to protect this country from terrorism. Why do we think left-wingers are better equipped to protect the environment?

The best tools for protecting the environment are property rights (there’s never been a forest fire in a privately-managed forest) coupled with a limited amount of common-sense regulation subjected to a cost-benefit analysis.

no, you doesn’ts.

Now, let’s debate why the GOP failed. Is it bushco’s fault alone? or does Larry Craig, David Vitter, Mark Foley, Bob Taft, Tom Noe, Bob Ney et al the other criminals in the gop ranks share some of the blame?

methinks it’s a combination of factors, including the ongoing republican hypocrisy and their failure to nurture an positive econcomic environment.

face facts, the new day is upon us, and you and your ilk will forever be linked to the criminality of bushco.

a hundred years from now, peeps will be shaking their heads saying, “they used it for transportation???”

It will probably take that long to come up with an alternative.

But if you think that’s funny, wait till they find out that dumbass liberals pushed for using corn for transportation and starving the poor they pretend to give two shits about.

Yes, markie, what a shameful waste it will all seem like 100 years from now. Using all of that oil for something as silly and frivolous as…transportation. When all that time we could have been using it for currency, or making jewelry or giving it to the homeless. How could we have been so short-sighted, markie? Future generations will never know the simple pleasure of enjoying it sprinked on a Caesar salad or a waffle. And think of all those fathers and sons who could have shared a frosty cold mug of thick, bubbling crude on the son’s 21st birthday but WON’T because all of us selfish, frivolous Americans were busy pumping it out of the ground, refining it, pouring it into internal combustion engines and driving 100 miles an hour with the touch of a button, or flying from continent to continent in a matter of hours for godsakes!? What were we thinking?! How could we have taken this slimy, goupy mysterious liquid we found in nature and shamelessly harnessed it’s power to travel to the Moon when we could have been saving it for future generations to use as moisturizer or in their decorative terrariums? Oh, markie. When I think of all the things that oil could have been used for other than transportation, I just want to put on a traditional cherokee tribal headdress, stand on the side of freeway and cry–one tear.

By the way, markie, you SUUUUUUHHHHCKED on Night Court. Zero comic timing, undetectable chemistry with Harry Anderson and lousy tits. There, I said it.

Wow.

That is amazing.

if only bushco put the trillions of dollars spent in this immoral war in iraq into finding alternative energy solutions.

How about the trillions of dollars the liberals have spent destroying low-income families (mostly black) in this immoral “war on poverty”? And what of the $847 billion Barack Hussein Pussama wants to spend on “global poverty” Why not use that?

drilling in alaska is stupid and dangerous.

And that’s based on what?
Seems to me what’s even more stupid and dangerous is sending our money to Venezuala to prop up a Communist dictator. Even more stupid and dangerous is sending our money to the ME.

it won’t alleviate the supply problem.

Explain to me how adding more supply won’t help. It may not alleviate the problem, but it sure as hell will put a big enough dent in it. What’s more, If we started drilling there in the morning, I think I can say without hyperbole that the price of oil would fall close to, or below $100 by tomorrow afternoon.

anyone for drilling there is unpatriotic. period.

Let me see if I follow your thinking: America providing for itself is unpatriotic. America adding jobs to work the rigs, transportation, refineries etc. is unpatriotic. Keeping more of our money here in our own country is unpatriotic. Having “Made in the USA” fuel is unpatriotic. Putting more of the “evil oil company” profits into the retirement accounts of millions of Americans (most who make under $50K/yr) is unpatriotic.

I think I’ve got it, right? By your measure, one could say that outsourcing business overseas *is* patriotic, right?

BTW, aren’t the wildcatters usually union? And isn’t it interesting how the liberals hate the oil companies, but have no problem accepting cash from them?

Have I got that right, RIW? If not, please help me out.