Hot off the press

Tim of the estimable Democratic Left Infoasis made some interesting comments in response to this post from Friday which mentioned the planned concert to promote awareness of global warming. I started to answer in comments, but I realized both that I wanted to give a couple of the points he raised a fuller response and that the points themselves deserved more attention. So I'm moving it things up to a post.

In what follows, you should realize that I have just pulled out the two quotes to which I'm responding; they do not constitute Tim's entire argument. To really get that, you should read the comments at the linked post and follow the links he provides.

But - with that in mind, here is what Tim said to which I wanted to respond:

I think it's highly mistaken to believe elite global warming critics like Al Gore who may lead people to believe that this is a problem of individuals' "lifestyles". There are those of us out here who don't get our voices heard very often in the corporate media who contend that global warming and other ecological crises are also systemic and will likely require more profound remedies than Gore and big business green washers will admit. ...

I am interested in the thinking of John Bellamy Foster that "By recognizing that it is not people (as individuals and in aggregate) that are enemies of the environment but the historically specific economic and social order in which we live, we can, I believe, find sufficient common ground for a true moral revolution to save the earth."

I wouldn't be a democratic socialist if I didn't rather strongly doubt that capitalism can ultimately deal with issues of the environment and justice. In fact, even in theory capitalism struggles to deal with pollution issues: It will always be more profitable in the short run to externalize costs of pollution, so in their own economic self-interest producers should seek to do so.

The usual response to this is that the market will force more responsible choices if enough people want them, that is, corporations will be more environmentally responsible if there is enough of a market demand from consumers that they be so. However, at least initially those more responsible products and/or services are going to cost more than less responsible ones due to the costs of investment in pollution controls or other forms of amelioration. So for there to be such a market demand, a sufficient number of consumers have to be paying a premium for a non-quantifiable benefit, that is, acting against their own economic self-interest - and we're back where we started: Capitalism as expressed in theory cannot in the long run deal with environmental issues because doing so requires producers and/or consumers to act against their own short-term economic self-interest.

(I suppose it's worthy of a parenthetical note to say that therefore, the fact that a market for more expensive "green" products exists, which it does, is empirical proof that theories of pure capitalism simply cannot explain actual consumer behavior.)

However, I say the statement of John Bellamy Foster which you quote is wrong in three ways:

One, it treats people and that economic/social order as if they were two completely disconnected entities. But they aren't. They can't be. That order, any order, is, at the end of the day, nothing more than a summation of the accepted rituals and beliefs of that society, the ones commonly (and often unconsciously) held and that one generation seeks (again, often unconsciously) to pass on to the next. Or, as I said one time,

every system has a few basic preconceptions of reality on which that system is based. A few preconceptions about the proper order of things; in a sense, a few prejudices, prejudices in the sense that they are so rarely challenged and indeed can't be challenged without threatening the existence of the entire system.

As a result, that socioeconomic order can be analyzed as an aggregate of the population, that is, as if it were a single entity, in the same way that the behavior of a fluid can be analyzed and predicted without reference to the individual molecules that comprise it. But that is only for analysis - neither system nor fluid can be said to exist independently of their constituent parts.

Two, by making that separation between people and the socioeconomic order in which they live, Foster does indeed absolve individuals of any responsibility for their environmental impact. "Oh, it's nothing to do with me or what I do, it's the system." In fact, it's nothing to do with what a lot of us do, even with what all of us do. It's "the system." The only way to maintain this is to say that we as individuals are slaves to that system; indeed, less than slaves, rather automatons, incapable of action in violation of its dictates. But even as it remains true that our lifestyles are largely driven by "the system" in which we live and to which we are socially trained, it also remains true that we are not automatons and we are capable of independent, even contrarian, action. Yes, the impact of one individual's actions are tiny, negligible even - but as I've noted before, it's a very rare occasion when you are the only one acting and it's the sum total of actions that matters.

Three, it strongly implies that it is only under capitalism that the issue arises. To be sure, not as stridently as the woman some years ago who responded to my extending my criticism of nuclear power to the then-Soviet Union by saying "socialist power plants do not emit pollution," yet the implication is surely there.

But history denies that notion. There are numerous cases of early civilizations that fell at least partly (in some cases indirectly) due to a lack of environmental stewardship. Writing in "Harper's" magazine in June 2003, Jared Diamond lists

such otherwise dissimilar ancient societies as the Maya in the Yucatán, the Anasazi in the American Southwest, the Cahokia mound builders outside St. Louis, the Greenland Norse, the statue builders of Easter Island, ancient Mesopotamia in the Fertile Crescent, Great Zimbabwe in Africa, and Angkor Wat in Cambodia. These civilizations, and many others, succumbed to various combinations of environmental degradation and climate change, aggression from enemies taking advantage of their resulting weakness, and declining trade with neighbors who faced their own environmental problems.

(In fairness, I hasten to note that in some of those cases, particularly Easter Island, the assertion that environmental damage, especially the self-inflicted kind, was a significant factor in the decline of the civilization has come under challenge. But in others the case remains strong.)

The present day provides examples, as well. Not quite a year ago, the director of China's State Environmental Protection Administration said

China must sharply improve environmental protection or it could face disaster following two decades of breakneck growth that have poisoned its air, water and soil....

"Facts have proved that prosperity at the expense of the environment is very superficial and very weak," Zhou Shengxian said at a news conference during the annual meeting of China's parliament. "It's only delaying disaster."

China's cities are among the world's smoggiest, and the government says its major rivers are badly polluted, leaving hundreds of millions of people without clean drinking water.

Now, again in fairness I'll note that some will argue that this is actually the result of China becoming more capitalist, but I would remind those people that when the push for rapid growth began, it was celebrated as proof of the dynamism of a "socialist economy."

My bottom line here is that, contrary to John Bellamy Foster, there is no either/or here, no "not this, but that." Certainly the socioeconomic order in which we live pushes us to consumption; it promotes profit as a controlling value and growth as a central organizing principle. All of that is harmful to our present and dangerous to our future. But that does not absolve us as individuals of our responsibility to do what we can. As long as the imperatives of corporate America remain unchanged, what we as consumers can do is inadequate to the task. But that does not mean it is either unhelpful or, worse, unnecessary. As I said in my first comment on the original post, "the old bumpersticker 'Live simply that others may simply live' still has relevance, even in this different context."

Hot flash

Lordy, and here I was thinking I could move to something else besides global warming for a time. But the news won't let me just yet. This is from today's The Independent (UK):

The long-term stability of the massive ice sheets of Antarctica, which have the potential to raise sea levels by hundreds of metres, has been called into question with the discovery of fast-moving rivers of water sliding beneath their base.

Scientists analysing satellite data were astonished to discover the size of the vast lakes and river systems flowing beneath the Antarctic ice sheets, which may lubricate the movement of these glaciers as they flow into the surrounding sea. ...

"We've found that there are substantial subglacial lakes under ice that's moving a couple of metres per day. It's really ripping along. It's the fast-moving ice that determines how the ice sheet responds to climate change on a short timescale," said Robert Bindschadler, a Nasa scientist at the Goddard Space Flight Centre in Maryland, one of the study's co-authors.

A couple of meters per day? Wow. That is really moving and no, that is not sarcasm. Scientists admit that the relationship between the water movement below and the ice movement above is not well understood. It could be that this is the way it has been for many years. Or this could be a recent change driven by global warming. If it is, it's an extremely ominous change.

But in either event, it's a troubling discovery because, as Dr. Bindschadler noted, there being a greater amount of faster-moving water than previously thought also means that movement of the ice sheets is more sensitive to climate change than previously thought.

It also means that the charge by some scientists prior to its release that the IPCC report was sugarcoated may well be right and our situation is more dire than even that report argued.

The dispute here revolves around the numbers in the report for predicted sea level rise. The predictions in the new report are below those of the previous one. The reason, apparently, is that not enough is known about ice sheet melting to accurately model a prediction, so to be as scientifically conservative as possible, that factor was left out and the projected rise of between 5 and 23 inches is based solely on expansion of water due to warming and glacial melt. (Glaciers and ice sheets are not the same.) Which means the figures

"don't take into account the gorillas - Greenland and Antarctica," said Ohio State University earth sciences professor Lonnie Thompson, a polar ice specialist. "I think there are unpleasant surprises as we move into the 21st century." ...

The prediction being considered this week by the IPCC is "obviously not the full story because ice sheet decay is something we cannot model right now, but we know it's happening," said Stefan Rahmstorf, a climate panel lead author from Germany who made the larger prediction of up to 55 inches of sea level rise. "A document like that tends to underestimate the risk," he said.

Some speculate that the ice sheet melting may be temporary and will ultimately have little effect. If so, good. But if they're wrong, if we experience more cases like the loss of the Larsen B ice shelf in Antarctica in 2002, we could easily within the century be seeing sea level rises more efficiently measured in meters rather than inches.

Another hotfoot

Something many folks don't realize is that the IPCC report released February 2 was just the opening chapter, the so-called Summary for Policymakers - or the SFP if you want to sound like you're in the know. That one summarized the scientific basis for the conclusions drawn. The next report, due out in April, is to address the consequences.

According to a leaked draft obtained by the Australian newspaper The Age, those consequences ain't pretty, as this Reuters dispatch shows.

Rising temperatures will leave millions more people hungry by 2080 and cause critical water shortages in China and Australia, as well as parts of Europe and the United States....

[C]limate change will bring water scarcity to between 1.1 and 3.2 billion people....

[A]n additional 200 million to 600 million people across the world would face food shortages in another 70 years, while coastal flooding would hit another 7 million homes.

"The message is that every region of the earth will have exposure," Dr Graeme Pearman, who helped draft the report, told Reuters on Tuesday."

And all the while too many of the governments of the world play Nero while their corporatist allies and masters feed them grapes - and feed us baloney.

However - still trying to keep that hope thingy going - I note that the Financial Times (UK) reported just yesterday that

[p]lans for a global day of concerts and events to promote awareness of climate change to more than 2bn people were unveiled on Thursday by Al Gore ... and leading lights of the entertainment industry. ...

More than 100 artists are lined up to play in a 24-hour concert, known as “Live Earth”, which will be carried on television, radio and the internet.

MSN ... will broadcast the concert on the web. In the US, NBC-Universal, the television network, and the radio groups SIRIUS and XM will take part. In the UK, the BBC will be the event’s broadcast partner.

Shanghai, Sydney, Johannesburg and London were confirmed as the four concert-hosting cities. Other locations in Brazil, Japan and the US are yet to be determined. It is estimated that more than 1m could attend the live events. ...

The organisers also plan to use only electricity from renewable sources, employ recycling and biodegradable materials where possible, and offset travel via carbon credits.

I'm feeling my age - I didn't even know some of the performers listed in the article - but I expect I'll be listening.

Footnote to the foot- never mind: About a week and a-half ago the humor site All Day Coffee had an FAQ about "the global warming hoax." This was my favorite part:

When did the global warming hoax come about?
In the late 1970s, Greenpeace had convinced the world to stop hunting whales. Having lost the single issue that brought them the most donations, they made the preposterous claim that the earth is getting warmer.

Why would Greenpeace want to do that?
In a top-secret meeting with the world's whaling fleets, they decided to link global warming to petroleum-based emissions. If people stopped using petroleum, they'd have to switch back to whale oil. Which would be mutually beneficial to G-WHAC (the Global WHAling Consortium) and Greenpeace, who would again be able to launch significant anti-whaling fund raising campaigns.

Check out the rest for a smile.

Hotfootnote to the preceding

The United States is hardly the only candidate for criticism regarding its commitment to resisting global warming.

China is the world's second largest producer of greenhouse gas emissions, trailing only the US - and those positions are now predicted to be reversed in just a few years due to China's aggressive economic expansion, which is generating ballooning demand for electricity. Some 70% of that energy is produced by coal-fired power plants, many of which lack adequate pollution controls.

As a result,

China is failing to make progress on improving and protecting the environment, according to a new Chinese government report[, said the BBC the end of January]. ...

The Chinese report, prepared by academics and government experts, ranked the country 100th out of 118 countries surveyed.

Some 30 indicators were used to measure the level of "ecological modernisation" including carbon dioxide emissions, sewage disposal rates and the safety of drinking water.

Despite that, and despite having officially acknowledged both the reality and the risks of global warming, just a week after that report was issued, the New York Times reported that China declared that

wealthier countries must take the lead in curbing greenhouse gas emissions and refused to say whether it would agree to any mandatory emissions limits that might hamper its booming economy.

Jiang Yu, a spokeswoman for the Foreign Ministry, said China was willing to contribute to an international effort to combat global warming but placed the primary responsibility on richer, developed nations that have been polluting for much longer.

Chinese officials say that their nation's per capita output of greenhouse gas emissions remains below that of the wealthy nations, but that is as bogus an argument as some of those coming out of Washington and other industrialized nation capitals. In some cases, comparing per capita outputs can be revealing, such as where local concentrations of pollutants are what's significant. But that's not true here; here, what nature cares about is the total output - not the relative size of the economy or population that produced it.

China's countryside is, by the government's own admission, heavily polluted. Its plans to address that have repeatedly fallen short of the avowed goals. Even now, it continues to describe global warming as "ultimately a development issue" and continues to resist agreements that might affect its industrial expansion.

But the fact is, developing nations such as China are in the best position to deploy alternative energy sources and enhanced pollution controls precisely because they are developing: There is no expense involved of uninstalling previously-existing infrastructure. Yet rather than call on the industrialized nations to provide technological assistance to enable developing nations to do that and despite its own acknowledgment of global warming, China digs in its heels, continues to plan for a new power plant every week, and plays a self-defeating game of "you first."

In that, let it be said, China is hardly alone. This is from Reuters from earlier this month:

The president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, said Tuesday that wealthy countries were responsible for global warming and that they should stop telling Brazil what to do with the Amazon rain forest.

"The wealthy countries are very smart, approving protocols, holding big speeches on the need to avoid deforestation, but they already deforested everything," Mr. da Silva said during the announcement of a public works project in Rio de Janeiro.

Da Silva said wealthy countries should switch from fossil fuels to fuels such as ethanol and biodiesel.

Guess which nation is the world’s leading producer of ethanol. Go ahead, guess. I bet you'll be right.

Footnote: Even here, however, the US cannot escape criticism:

Secretary of Energy Samuel Bodman rejected the idea of unilateral limits on emissions. "We are a small contributor to the overall, when you look at the rest of the world, so it’s really got to be a global solution," he said.

This despite the fact that the US generates roughly a quarter of the total of greenhouse gas emissions.

I keep wanting to be hopeful but more and more I'm inclined to agree with those scientists who are starting to say that it's already too late, we're already so screwed, and what we need to be doing is thinking of how we're going to adapt to the coming changes. That doesn't mean doing nothing, but it does mean the goal can no longer be preventing the disruptions but preventing the worst of them and learning how to deal with the rest.

If you can't stand the heat

Well, the report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released earlier this month certainly was frightening. (A .pdf version is available here.)

The words of warning about global warming from the top panel of international scientists Friday were purposely blunt: "warming of the climate system is unequivocal," the cause is "very likely" man-made, and "would continue for centuries." ...

The report said man-made emissions of greenhouse gases can already be blamed for these current problems: fewer cold days, hotter nights, killer heat waves, floods and heavy rains, devastating droughts, and an increase in hurricane and tropical storm strength (particularly in the Atlantic Ocean). ...

And the report said no matter how much civilization slows or reduces its greenhouse gas emissions, global warming and sea level rise will continue on for centuries.

Impressive words. What made them even more impressive was that this was a conservative, a cautions, report, as the Christian Science Monitor informs us:

[T]he main science report ... was compiled by 150 scientists as main authors, another 400 scientists as contributing authors, a team of review editors, and some 600 reviewers. The document went through two rounds of reviews. And unlike past efforts, review editors required chapter authors to respond to each responsible review comment.

This combination of strong words in a carefully-reviewed document was impressive enough, in fact, to very likely have been responsibile for playing a decisive role in spurring some rather dramatic responses, such as these:

- The day after the report was released, 46 countries at a conference in Paris agreed to work to establish a new environmental body that could single out - and perhaps police - nations that abuse the Earth.

- On February 8, Nancy Pelosi told the House Science and Technology Committee during its hearing on global warming that the US needs to cut its greenhouse gas emissions in half by mid-century - and what's more, mandatory control are the only way that will happen.

- On Tuesday, New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine issued an Executive Order that by calls for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the state below current levels by 20% by 2020 and an additional 60% by 2050.

- Also on Tuesday, Iona Campagnolo, Lieutenant Governor of British Columbia, declared at the opening of the new session of the provincial Parliament that global warming "leaves no room for procrastination" and the provincial government aims to cut greenhouse gas emissions by at least a third by 2020 - which would put them 10% under 1990 levels by that time.

- Speaking of Canada, the House of Commons passed a bill Wednesday to force the government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper to achieve the steep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions Canada agreed to under the Kyoto Protocol. Passage in the Senate is expected.

In addition, there was activism on the issue. Timed to coincide with the release of the report, the Climate Week of Action involved about 50,000 students at nearly 600 schools across North America,

from the University of Saskatchewan, to Coral Reef Senior High in Miami, to Collin County Community College in Plano, Texas.

"It's the largest youth mobilization on climate, and one of the biggest coordinated youth actions of any kind in a long time," said Billy Parish, a Yale dropout whom [Mother Jones magazine] recently named "Student Activist of the Year."

Events often revolved around a showing of An Inconvenient Truth.

All this activity and response has clearly given a sense that, as the Boston Globe said today, "the global warming debate has changed significantly in recent weeks." Indeed, it has shifted enough that even Exxon-Mobil is budging.

In a speech at a major industry gathering, [Exxon Mobil CEO Rex W.] Tillerson acknowledged that the planet was warming while carbon dioxide levels were increasing, suggesting a more accommodating position than the hard-nosed stance Exxon had held. ...

Mr. Tillerson's tone, if not the substance of his remarks, at times broke with the rigid positions of his predecessor, Lee Raymond, who has long been considered a skeptic in the global warming debate.

"That's Exxon-speak," said Barbara Shook, an analyst for Energy Intelligence Group, a publishing and information services company. "It's their own dialect, but if you look at where Exxon was one and a half years ago they may not have shifted their position 180 degrees, but they are moving."

And it's clear that all this is, as I said at the top, really, really frightening. Especially to certain people frightened that the facts are challenging their ideology.

One such frightened person is David Asman, host of "Forbes on FOX" (the title alone should tell you what you need to know), who in a column on the FoxNoise (copyright Keith Olbermann) site on Monday described global warming skeptics as having the "gumption to stand up to the status quo" in spite of "some of the nastiest insults and character assassinations." For their "audacity," he says, "they have been censured, excoriated and labeled as lackeys for the oil companies."

[Alabama meteorologist James] Spann was particularly upset with the charge that only those with ties to big oil could argue the way he and his colleagues do. In fact, he says, the truth is exactly the opposite: "Billions of dollars of grant money is flowing into the pockets of those on the man-made global warming bandwagon ... For many, global warming is a big cash grab." ...

Billions of dollars have been invested so far in studying climate change ($20 billion from the Bush administration alone), and very little of that money has landed in the laps of those outside of the global warming orthodoxy.

Instead, Asman insists, it's gone to "an enormous number of scientists who have already cashed in on it."

(Sidebar: I believe his last name is pronounced like Az-mun, but I think the other pronunciation that suggests itself is more apt.)

Interestingly, that same "follow-the-money / poor, beleagured, truth-seeking skeptics" argument was made the very next day by another frightened man, Thomas Sowell, writing at the National Review website. Having first tried to connect scientific findings about global warming with "the political Left" on the grounds that Marxism was once called "scientific socialism," he declares that

[n]ot all the advocates of "global warming" are on the Left, of course. Crusades are not just for crusaders. There are always hangers-on who can turn the true believers' crusades into votes or money or at least notoriety. ...

Government money is falling on those who seek grants to study global warming and produce “solutions” for it. But that money is not as likely to fall on those skeptics in the scientific community who refuse to join the stampede.

Apparently, "scientists who believe in global warming are the ones who are really in it for the money" is going to be a new right-wing meme, similar to the "liberals are the real racists" and "wingnut warmongers who send soldiers into meat grinders for no damn good reason are the ones who really support the troops" ones with which we are already familiar. (By the way, researchers who take part in the IPCC process are volunteers who actually take a hit to their careers by seeing their own research projects postponed, leading to failure to publish journal articles.)

And it's not only nitwit columnists who are trembling in fear, it's nitwit members of Congress. Susan Soloman, a senior scientist at NOAA, a recipient of the US National Medal of Science, the nation's highest scientific honor, and co-chair of the IPCC, was a witness at the same House Science and Technology Committee hearing at which Pelosi testified. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-SomePlanetSomewhere) went after her:

Mr. Rohrabacher asked Dr. Soloman how much human activity contributed to greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and interrupted repeatedly when she tried to answer, accusing her of "dodging" and questioning her honesty.

When Dr. Soloman asked for a chance to finish a sentence, he said: "I control this time. You don't." ...

Eventually, Dr. Soloman said atmospheric carbon dioxide had held steady at 280 parts per million for almost 10,000 years, until the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. Today, the level is 380 parts per million and increasing, she added, with "greater than 90 percent" of the increase because of people.

Talking to Fox later, Rochabacher

said Solomon's answer was "a total obfuscation" that "tries to exaggerate the actual amount of pollution being put into the atmosphere by human beings as compared to what nature does itself."

(By the way, speaking of Some Planet Somewhere, Fox's lead on the story about the hearing was this:

Not enough evidence exists that humans are responsible for global warming, so current laws should not be changed to limit greenhouse gas emissions, critics of a global climate change report told a House panel Thursday.)

Rohrbacher's question is a clever one for the nanny-nanny naysayers because the answer sounds damning: Humans contribute a relatively small portion of overall greenhouse gases, on the order of 5-10% of the total. It's sufficiently clever that I suspect the question was supplied to Rohrabacher rather than being something he came up with himself: It said a great deal about his scientific knowledge when he equated all greenhouse gases with "pollution." But in fact it's not a valid question, it's an ideologically-driven attempt to confuse the issue with irrelevancies. Nature has established cycles of greenhouse gas production and absorbtion that had kept the climate relatively stable for centuries. Human activity has added to production without adding anything to absorbtion, upsetting that balance. Imagine a water tank with both an in pipe and an out pipe. Water is pumped into the tank at a rate of 90 gallons a minute - and drains out at the same rate. The level stays the same. Now someone starts adding buckets of water at a rate of 10 gallons per minute. "Well, gee," Congressman Boobbacher would say, "the human contribution is only 10% of the total." But that additional, relatively small, contribution is what's going to cause the tank to overflow. It's the change that's important.

Dr. Soloman tried to answer the relevant question, not the ideological one - and Rohrabacher didn't like it. How bad was it?

When Mr. Rohrabacher again accused her of dodging his question, the committee chairman, Representative Bart Gordon, Democrat of Tennessee, told him to put it in writing and added, "My belief is the answer lies in what the lady just said."

If you know Congress, you know how unusual it is for the chair of a committee to tell a member to, in effect, knock it off.

(Sidebar: Dr. Soloman was one of four witnesses speaking on behalf of the report. The others were Richard Alley, professor of geosciences at Penn State, and Kevin Trenberth and Gerald Meehl of the National Center for Atmospheric Research. One science blogger commenting on the hearings - unfortunately, I have misplaced the link - said he thought Dr. Soloman was the least effective of the four. I strongly doubt it was a coincidence that she was the one Rohrabacher went after.)

Okay, so we know various right-wing nutbags are scared of the IPCC report. But of just what are they scared? What is the root of that fear? Here's a hint, from Automotive.com:

A lot of people in Europe are worried that draconian car emission laws now being considered by the European Commission could mean the death of sports and luxury cars.

Omigod! Not that! Not the end of gas-guzzling, over-priced, "hey-peons-looka-me-I'm-rich" cars! Don't tell me we'll have to drive (gasp!) efficient vehicles that can't lord it over common folks! How will we live? No wonder they're scared. (I wonder if that's the sort of thing Rohrabacher had in mind when he said that curbing greenhouse gas emissions would be to "dramatically change our way of life.")

And how scared are they? Well, for one thing, as the Guardian (UK) for February 2 told us, they're prepared to offer bribes for the "right" answers.

Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world's largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report due to be published today.

Letters sent by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), an ExxonMobil-funded thinktank with close links to the Bush administration, offered the payments for articles that emphasise the shortcomings of a report from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Travel expenses and additional payments were also offered.

That's scared. Then there are those who are either scared out of their minds or just nuts to begin with. The Sydney Morning Herald (Australia) reported back on January 29 about a little-noticed proposal for the IPCC report:

The US wants the world's scientists to develop technology to block sunlight as a last-ditch way to halt global warming.

It says research into techniques such as giant mirrors in space or reflective dust pumped into the atmosphere would be "important insurance" against rising emissions, and has lobbied for such a strategy to be recommended by a UN report....

Possible techniques include putting a giant screen into orbit, thousands of tiny, shiny balloons, or microscopic sulfate droplets pumped into the high atmosphere to mimic the cooling effects of a volcanic eruption.

(Thanks for Talking Points Memo for the link.)

The US apparently also whined that the report tended to "focus on the negative effects of climate change."

It was, again, a case of the US being, as I wrote in the wake of the State of the Union address, "all hat and no cattle" on global warming. In fact, not only is there no cattle, but the range is being plowed under: One promising form of energy is geothermal, with the potential to meet 10% of US electricity demand by 2050 with virtually no greenhouse gas emissions.

There are just two major catches. First, about $800 million in research and development is needed over the next decade to make the drilling technology cost-effective. Second, the Department of Energy is trying to kill the program by ending its funding.

The excuse is that geothermal is a "mature" technology ready to compete in the marketplace without additional support. This comes even as the White House proposes to continue to fund work on other forms of energy - including nuclear.

This is idiotic. Fearfully idiotic. What are they trying to protect? In place of the wholly rational fear of the effects of global warming, right wingers and their corporate fellow travelers are being guided by the most base sort of fear, that of unadulterated selfishness. Oh yes, we'll do something about global warming - if it doesn't cost me anything, if it doesn't hurt my profits, if it doesn't require me to actually do anything.

A few years ago I had an email exchange with a woman who told me that she wasn't concerned about global warming because by the time the bad effects were hitting, in 30 or 40 years, she'd be dead. While I'm sure at least some of the small number of skeptics among scientists are sincere, I believe that many of the corporate, economic, and political hangers-on truly feel the way she does: They are convinced that effective action against global warming will have some measurable impact on their lifestyle and they just can't get their small minds around the concept of having less than they do or (even worse!) of sharing some of it.

Well, they're likely right that we can't battle global warming without some impact on our lifestyles. But I think back on my lifestyle from the '80s - or hell, even the '60s - and yes, I had less in the way of hi-tech goodies, but was my life really that much more limited, that deprived? Was yours? Compared to protecting the environment for, and safety of, future generations that seems a damn small price to pay.

Iraq: Sadr and Sadr

Okay, the pun is rather obvious but Moqtada al-Sadr is back in the news.

According to senior military officials, [ABC News reported on Tuesday,] al Sadr left Baghdad two to three weeks ago and fled to Tehran, Iran, where he has family. ...

Sources believe al Sadr is worried about an increase of 20,000 U.S. troops in the Iraqi capital. One official told ABC News' Martha Raddatz, "He is scared he will get a JDAM [bomb] dropped on his house."

Sources say some of the Mahdi army leadership went with al Sadr.

"Fled" is an interesting word choice. It appears to have been AP's word: In looking at different versions of the story, every one that used that word was either the AP story or said AP "contributed." (And one that did not rely exclusively on AP did not use the term, saying rather that al-Sadr "had left.") And it's one that AP repeated today when it reported the denials of the original claim:

Officials linked to Muqtada al-Sadr denied Wednesday that the radical Shiite cleric had fled to Iran ahead of a security crackdown in Baghdad.

An Iraqi government official said al-Sadr was in the Shiite holy city of Najaf Tuesday night, when he received delegates from several government departments.

Al-Sadr didn't leave for, depart for, go to, or travel to, he "fled to" Iran. The term implies fear, surrender, and at least a certain amount of guilt. It's one of those "us/them" word choices that impart judgment as well as description: Our side "withdraws." Their side "flees." The impression it gives is one of, if you will, a "surging" victory for our side.

That was made more explicit by the statement in today's story that he "fled ... ahead of a security crackdown." So the picture being painted for us of late is this: Iranian-supplied Shiite militias are now the biggest enemy of the US in Iraq and the head of the biggest of those militias, Moqtada al-Sadr, has "fled" to Iran ahead of the "crackdown." We're winning! We're winning! The President's Plan Is Working!

Don't forget to clap your hands and say "I believe!"

Footnote One: Prof. Juan Cole has done an excellent job of undermining the claims that al-Sadr in is Iran rather than Iraq. Besides the newspaper accounts he assembles, he tellingly notes that

[h]e and his family have endlessly made fun of the al-Hakim clerical leaders for fleeing to Iran to escape persecution by Saddam Hussein, when the al-Sadrs insisted on staying in Iraq. ... So it would be a lot of crow to eat for Muqtada to go to Iran to escape the Americans.

Footnote Two: The Fox News lead on the story is unintentionally funny:

Anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has fled his Baghdad stronghold for the friendly confines of Iran's capital, FOX News can confirm via a senior United States official.

Oh, right. Fox "The Big Scoop" News "confirmed" it. Along with everyone else at the press briefing. That is assuming Fox was actually there; the article coyly notes that "the Associated Press contributed to this report."

To the author

I assume that most everyone has by now heard about or come across the article in Friday's Washington Post by Eric Fair, who worked as a contract interrogator in Iraq in 2004.

A man with no face stares at me from the corner of a room. He pleads for help, but I'm afraid to move. He begins to cry. It is a pitiful sound, and it sickens me. He screams, but as I awaken, I realize the screams are mine. ...

Despite my best efforts, I cannot ignore the mistakes I made at the interrogation facility in Fallujah. I failed to disobey a meritless order, I failed to protect a prisoner in my custody, and I failed to uphold the standards of human decency. Instead, I intimidated, degraded and humiliated a man who could not defend himself. I compromised my values. I will never forgive myself.

At the end of the article, the Post printed his email address. For whatever it might be worth to him or anyone else, this is the email I sent to him:

I just wanted to thank you for your piece in the Washington Post. It could not have been an easy thing to write and I commend the courage it took to do so - and more, the courage to include an email address despite the vituperation I expect you will receive that way.

I don't know if it will provide any comfort to know that I suspect there are a fair number of other people who have an ache in their soul for something they did - or, as in my case, failed to do - even as their conscience demanded something else, something better, of them. But in case and to whatever degree it can, there it is.

I don't mean to equate our experiences: Your pain is clearly deeper than mine, which despite its age sometimes still haunts the isolated hours but has never caused the sort of nightmares you have had - for which I can only feel sorrow for you and, for my own selfish benefit, relief for me. I just want to reassure you that you (and I) are by no means alone in such regrets.

That, and to offer one piece of advice: You say "I will never forgive myself." Perhaps not - but you must try. You must never, ever forget - but you must try to learn how to forgive.

Yes, you failed to follow your conscience, as so desperately many of the rest of us have as well, to our regret and shame. But for whatever small solace it gives, take refuge in the fact that at least it means you have one.

Fair ended his piece by saying

[r]egardless of how many young Americans we send to war, or how many militia members we kill, or how many Iraqis we train, or how much money we spend on reconstruction, we will not escape the damage we have done to the people of Iraq in our prisons. ...

The story of Abu Ghraib isn't over. In many ways, we have yet to open the book.

True, but it goes even further: Too many of us want to forget the book was even written. We want to forget all the Abu Ghraibs, all the secret prisons, all the Bagrams, all the "extraordinary renditions," all the Guantanamos, we want to wrap them up, bag them, bury them, desperately oh so desperately pretend, desperately oh so desperately tell ourselves, that this is not us, this is not who we are, this is not what Americans do, yes it's what others do but no we're not like them, we can't be, no....

But it is us, it is what we do (and have done), we are like "them." That does not mean that as a people we are uniquely or even unusually evil except as our greater power (and therefore greater responsibility) provides for greater opportunity. But it does mean that until we as a people face up to the darkness in our national soul, not in some abstract, philosophical sense but in terms of the real effect that real policies are really having on real people, until we on a national level feel and work through the kind of shame and regret that Eric Fair is feeling and working through on a personal level, there will continue to be Abu Ghraibs, Bagrams, and Gitmos for us to urgently forget.

Footnote: I have previously "meditated" on we "shouldn't be surprised" by such atrocities.

Oh by the way

The lists in the right-hand column have received no attention in over a year. They are going to be gradually updated (changed, expanded in some ways, edited in others) over the next couple of weeks.

Finally

So here I am, back at it and with no idea of where it’s going to go or even if it will at all. (That was a real vote of self-confidence, wasn’t it?)

Since I have been away for a while, I thought I’d ease back in by rehashing some thoughts from when I first started this blog, the better to give some idea of what can be expected here.

In my very first post, I said I was finally moved to start a blog after a phone conversation with a friend

in which the morass in Iraq came up. As such conversations do, this one then veered off in several related directions at once, all revolving around a core of our mutual distaste for George Bush. After a few minutes, my friend sighed and said there was no point getting all worked up about it.

"Yes, there is," I replied. "The truth is, my hope is nearly gone. My anger is the only thing that keeps me going."

So now I have an outlet to express that anger, to discuss what I'm angry about, why I'm angry, and, in my calmer moments, to try to rediscover that hope and offer a different vision of what we as a people, a nation, a culture, might do, might be, might become.

I don’t know how well I succeeded in that latter part, perhaps I’ll do better this time around. It is, in any event, one of the goals. Others include posting on a regular basis (although not necessarily every single day) and writing with enough flair and/or style as to make this blog a good read even when the subject matter is depressing or the anger quotient is high.

In my posts I try to provide enough information so that no one has to actually go to the linked article to understand what I’m talking about. (I get irritated with posts that consist of something like “Oy!” with a link.) At the same time, I try to avoid posts that are essentially just a long quote from another source: If I have nothing to add or contribute, I might as well just link to it with the comment “This is an interesting article on such-and-such.”

Something else I try to avoid is spending a lot of time covering particular items that I think are already being adequately covered in the well-traveled blogs. Again, if I don’t see where I’m actually contributing anything in the way of information or analysis or commentary, why do it? On the other hand, I think at times in the past I have been a source on issues that were not getting enough attention from the most popular blogs, which often enough are too wrapped up in presidential or congressional politicking or some back-and-forth snipe-fest with some conservative writer. I hope to maintain a broad enough view that things that are not immediately relevant to party politics or even the US as a whole do not escape notice. Or maybe that would be better phrased as things that should be relevant but are not necessarily seen as such. Or wait, even better - things that should be relevant to us because of our humanity, not because of our nationality.

Which brings up the question of attitude, of the political orientation you can expect to find here. The subheading of the blog refers to a “nonviolent, radical Left perspective.” (Which should at least do away with any wingers responding to some post by declaring “your view is laid bare for all to see” or some such crap like it was some deep secret that they have brilliantly uncovered.) To flesh that out a bit, I’ll say that

I am, in many ways, a child of "the 60s," having come to political awareness during that brief (and, some would have it, mythical) time marked at one end by the Sgt. Pepper summer and at the other by Altamont - or, politically, by Flower Power and the Days of Rage. Like most (at least male) members of my generation, it was Vietnam that initially drew me beyond vague "concern" into concrete involvement: Even for those of us "safe" with draft deferments, the war was always there, swirling around us like a fog, tugging at us like an undertow, threading in and out of our lives/futures/consciousnesses, ignored only by being repressed. And each "answer" our government offered to the whens, wherefores, and, most importantly, whys of the war seemed to raise at least two new questions.

I had been to that time what I now call a "right wing liberal," that species of American political animal that's clearly liberal on domestic issues and clearly conservative on foreign policy, a type whose philosophy I later summed up as "hooray for justice, beauty, truth, and Kill Commies." But increasing alienation as the war dragged on amid repeated promises that it was, really, already over and mounting evidence of what the governments we supported in South Vietnam were really like eventually prompted me to - very shyly - attend a meeting of a local peace group. That was, if memory serves, in the fall of 1968.

You can relax; it's over now. I've no intention of inflicting my autobiography on you.

But as I said at the time, “knowing the roots of my involvement in the movement may help to explain where I've wound up. ... I am a democratic socialist-feminist with an anarchist bent, a civil liberties absolutist, an environmental advocate who generally agrees with the ecological basis (but despairs at the politics) of bioregionalism, and, at the heart of it all, by both intellectual conviction and moral compulsion, a radical pacifist.”

In doing this column I'll be guided by four editorial principles:

1) "To thine own self be true." (Shakespeare)
2) "The US isn't the worst - but it is the biggest." (Joan Baez)
3) "Sometimes a bit of humor contains more inner truth than the most serious seriousness." (Aron Nimzovich)
4) "No one but no one, no matter their ideology, political perspective, or status as 'left' or 'right,' 'revolutionary' or 'counter-revolutionary' can be by that reason exempt from either criticism or praise." (me)

Welcome to Lotus, Take II.

Footnote: One addition to the what I am list: A few years ago, a co-worker plopped down on the breakroom couch next to me and grinningly asked “Did you used to be a hippie?”

I gave him my best glare and said “What do you mean - used to be?”

Hold on

Okay, so it won't be in a week. But there's a reason.

One of the reasons I gave for no longer doing Lotus was that "I don't think what I'm accomplishing here is worth the effort I'm putting into it." (It's just a couple of posts down - you can read it for yourself if you like.) A specific reason for that was the lack of a high-speed connection. Simply put, doing this via dial-up meant taking an inordinate amount of time waiting for information to come up.

But at long last, I'm getting a DSL connection and so intended to plunge in again. "Succumb[ing] to the addiction" is how Kevin Hayden of The American Street put it.

However - after a couple of delays and a frustrating series of four phone calls totalling three hours to tech support, during which one person insisted my computer was at fault and another seemed to have only the vaguest idea of that they were doing, they finally concluded my brand-new DSL modem, which they supplied, is defunct.

So now I have to wait to be sent a new one - after which I will have more interesting experiences, I expect, trying to set up my half-set-up account.

Bear with me a little longer. It is coming. Really.

Hey, everybody!

Watch this space!

In another week or so, the lights are going to be turned back on and Lotus will be returning, better than ever!

Well, okay, maybe not better, but just as good. I think. I hope.

But anyway, it'll be excitingly different!

Then again, I guess "excitingly" is kinda overstating it and well, yeah, different? Yeah, in a way.... Kinda.... I suppose....

Yes, fear not! Lotus will be back!

In about a week. Or so.

In the meantime, if you want to see what I've been up to, check out TheCore4.

Miss me?

Just in case you do, you may care to know that I'll be putting in an appearance about once or twice a week at TheCore4.

Come by and check it out.

Just for fun

That's all, folks

Well, I guess that's it. I've been doing this for over two years now. When I started I said I hoped it would be something that would be of use, not just navel-gazing. I've wondered all along if I was succeeding in that.

I've decided I haven't been.

When I first wrote this, at this point I started to go into the reasons why, how what I had hoped to accomplish would make Lotus stand out from other blogs, but then I deleted the whole paragraph because it sounded like an odd combination of puffery and whining. Suffice it to say that - particularly lacking a high-speed connection - I find I no longer have either the time or the energy to put in the effort required for this blog to become what I wanted it to be.

So a little over two years. During that time, not counting Jeopardy! posts, I've averaged just about three posts a day. In all that number, there were some, I expect, worth reading - and there were some people who were, at least for a time, regular readers. I thank you, one and all. But frankly, to you and to myself, I have to say that I don't think what I'm accomplishing here is worth the effort I'm putting into it. I have to find another way to be useful.

I'm going to leave the blog up for at least a while, long enough at least for me to scan back through two years' posts to see if there's anything there worth preserving. After that, who knows.

In the meantime, again, thank you all for reading, especially those of you who found the time to make a comment either here or by email. The joys and blessings of the season be on you all.

Footnote: I could hardly leave without one, could I? If there is any group blog that would be interested in having another member, someone who could offer some commentary once or twice a week, please let me know. My email is above.

A farewell gift

This is my backlog of quotes for "Quote of the Week." Perhaps you'll find something of interest among these.

==

Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is man's original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress had been made, through disobedience and through rebellion. - Oscar Wilde

==

When even one American - who has done nothing wrong - is forced by fear to shut his mind and close his mouth - then all Americans are in peril. - Harry Truman

==

I'm often amazed at the way politicians, who spend hours poring over opinion poll results in a desperate attempt to discover what the public thinks, are certain they know precisely what God's views are on everything. - Simon Hoggart

==

How many does it take to metamorphose wickedness into righteousness? One man must not kill. If he does, it is murder.... But a state or nation may kill as many as they please, and it is not murder. It is just, necessary, commendable, and right. Only get people enough to agree to it, and the butchery of myriads of human beings is perfectly innocent. But how many does it take? - Adin Ballou

==

It is the common fate of the indolent to see their rights become a prey to the active. The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt. - John Philpot Curran

==

If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. - James Madison

==

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. - Benjamin Franklin

==

Voting is no substitute for the eternal vigilance that every friend of freedom must demonstrate towards government. If our freedom is to survive, Americans must become far better informed of the dangers from Washington - regardless of who wins the Presidency. - James Bovard

==

A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both. - Dwight D. Eisenhower

==

The tyranny of a principal in an oligarchy is not so dangerous to the public welfare as the apathy of a citizen in a democracy. - Montesquieu

==

It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by the dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions and spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who, at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly; so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat. - Theodore Roosevelt

==

There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty. - John Adams, 1772

==

There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest. - Elie Wiesel

==

Noncooperation with evil is as much a duty as cooperation with good. - Gandhi

==

Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves. - William Pitt (the younger)

==

Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never - in nothing great or small, large or petty - never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy. - Winston Churchill

==

One man with courage makes a majority. - Andrew Jackson

==

The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to always be kept alive. It will often be exercised when wrong, but better so than not to be exercised at all. - Thomas Jefferson

==

The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in a time of moral crisis, maintain their neutrality. - Dante

==

All of us have heard this term 'preventive war' since the earliest days of Hitler. I don't believe there is such a thing; and, frankly, I wouldn't even listen to anyone seriously that came in and talked about such a thing. - Dwight Eisenhower

==

A people living under the perpetual menace of war and invasion is very easy to govern. It demands no social reforms. It does not haggle over expenditures for armaments and military equipment. It pays without discussion, it ruins itself, and that is an excellent thing for the syndicates of financiers and manufacturers for whom patriotic terrors are an abundant source of gain. - Anatole France, pseudonym for Jacques Anatole Thibault

==

When we finally know we are dying, and all other sentient beings are dying with us, we start to have a burning, almost heartbreaking sense of the fragility and preciousness of each moment and each being, and from this can grow a deep, clear, limitless compassion for all beings. - Sogyal Rinpoche

==

Another nation is made out to be utterly depraved and fiendish, while one's own nation stands for everything that is good and noble. Every action of the enemy is judged by one standard - every action of oneself by another. Even good deeds by the enemy are considered a sign of particular devilishness, meant to deceive us and the world, while our bad deeds are necessary and justified by our noble goals, which they serve. - Eric Fromm

==

In the struggle of Good against Evil, it's always the people who get killed. - Eduardo Galeano

==

The fetters imposed on liberty at home have ever been forged out of the weapons provided for defense against real, pretended, or imaginary dangers from abroad. - James Madison

==

What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or in the holy name of liberty and democracy? - Mohandas Gandhi.

==

Strike against war, for without you no battles can be fought! Strike against manufacturing shrapnel and gas bombs and all other tools of murder! Strike against preparedness that means death and misery to millions of human beings! Be not dumb, obedient slaves in an army of destruction! Be heroes in an army of construction! - Helen Keller

==

Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so, whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such a purpose - and you allow him to make war at pleasure. If today, he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada, to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him, "I see no probability of the British invading us" but he will say to you, "Be silent; I see it, if you don't." - Abraham Lincoln

==

Evil when we are in its power is not felt as evil but as a necessity, or even a duty. - Simone Weil

==

You're not to be so blind with patriotism that you can't face reality. Wrong is wrong, no matter who does it or says it. - Malcolm X

==

Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservative. - John Stuart Mill

==

Laws, like the spider's web, catch the fly and let the hawk go free. - Spanish proverb

==

It is the greatest of all mistakes to do nothing because you can only do a little. - Sydney Smith

==

Law and justice are not always the same. When they aren't, destroying the law may be the first step toward changing it. - Gloria Steinam

==

There is more to life than increasing its speed. - M. K. Gandhi

==

Principles do not begin and end. - R. Buckminster Fuller

==

Each of us is the other to the others. - R. D. Laing

==

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke

==

Indeed it is part of the general pattern of misquided policy that our country is now geared to an arms economy which was bred in an artificially induced psychosis of war hysteria and nurtured upon an incessant propaganda of fear. While such an economy may produce a sense of seeming prosperity for the moment, it rests on an illusionary foundation of complete ureliability and renders among our political leaders almost a greater fear of peace than is their fear of war. - Douglas MacArthur

==

I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments on those in power than by violent and sudden usurpation. - James Madison

==

The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress. - Frederick Douglass

==

War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today. - John F. Kennedy

==

Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds. - Albert Einstein

==

In matter of conscience, the law of majority has no place. - Gandhi

==

The time comes when silence is betrayal. - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

==

It is the common fate of the indolent to see their rights become prey to the active. The conditions upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime, and the punishment of his guilt. - John Philpot Curran

==

No man survives when freedom fails/The best men rot in filthy jails/And those who cry "appease, appease"/Are hanged by those they tried to please. - Hiram Mann

==

In times of peace the authority of the assembly, the dignity of the magistrates, the force of the laws stand in the way to some extent of the ruler doing what he likes. But once war is declared then the whole business of state is subject to the will of a few ... They demand as much money as they like. Why say more? - Erasmus of Rotterdam

==

One of the best ways to get yourself a reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go about repeating the very phrases which our founding fathers used in the great struggle for independence. - Charles Austin Beard

==

It is not what a lawyer tells me I may do; but what humanity, reason, and justice tell me I ought to do. - Edmund Burke

==

Action is the antidote to despair. - Joan Baez

==

The most commom way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any. - Alice Walker

==

We Americans have no commission from God to police the world. - Benjamin Harrison, address to Congress, 1888

==

Unless you become more watchful in your States and check this spirit of monopoly and thirst for exclusive privileges, you will in the end find that the most important powers of Government have been given or bartered away, and the control of your dearest interests have been passed into the hands of these corporations. - Andrew Jackson

==

Government is the Entertainment Division of the military-industrial complex. - Frank Zappa

==

To fight evil one must also recognize one's own responsibility. The values for which we stand must be expressed in the way we think of, and how we deal with, our fellow humans. - Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands

==

Many that live deserve death. And some die that deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then be not too eager to deal out death in the name of justice, fearing for your own safety. Even the wise cannot see all ends. - J.R.R. Tolkien

==

As scarce as truth is, the supply has always been in excess of the demand. - Josh Billings

==

Cowardice asks the question - is it safe? Expediency asks the question - is it politic? Vanity asks the question - is it popular? But conscience asks the question - is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular; but one must take it because it is right. - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

==

To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. - Theodore Roosevelt

==

Everything, everything in war is barbaric - but the worst barbarity of war is that it forces men collectively to commit acts against which individually they would revolt with their whole being. - Ellen Key

==

We used to have a War Office, but now we have a Ministry of Defence, nuclear bombs are now described as deterrents, innocent civilians killed in war are now described as collateral damage and military incompetence leading to US bombers killing British soldiers is cosily described as friendly fire. Those who are in favour of peace are described as mavericks and troublemakers, whereas the real militants are those who want the war. - Tony Benn

==

Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all others because you were born in it. - William Shakespeare

==

As I write, highly civilized human beings are flying overhead trying to kill me. They do not feel any enmity against me as an individual, nor I against them. They are only doing their duty, as the saying goes. Most of them, I have no doubt, are kind-hearted law-abiding men who would never dream of committing murder in private life. On the other hand, if one of them succeeds in blowing me to pieces with a well-placed bomb, he will never sleep any worse for it. He is serving his country, which has the power to absolve him from evil. - George Orwell, London, UK, 1941

==

Mark! where his carnage and his conquests cease, He makes a solitude and calls it peace! - Lord Byron in "The Bride of Abydos"

==

A vision without action is merely a dream. Action without vision just passes the time. Vision with action changes the world. - Unknown

==

War paralyzes your courage and deadens the spirit of true manhood. It degrades and stupefies with the sense that you are not responsible, that "tis not yours to think and reason why, but to do and die," like the hundred thousand others doomed like yourself. War means blind obedience, unthinking stupidity, brutish callousness, wanton destruction, and irresponsible murder. - Alexander Berkman

=

It seems that "we have never gone to war for conquest, for exploitation, nor for territory"; we have the word of a president for that. Observe, now, how Providence overrules the intentions of the truly good for their advantage. We went to war with Mexico for peace, humanity and honor, yet emerged from the contest with an extension of territory beyond the dreams of political avarice. We went to war with Spain for relief of an oppressed people, and at the close found ourselves in possession of vast and rich insular dependencies and with a pretty tight grasp upon the country for relief of whose oppressed people we took up arms. We could hardly have profited more had "territorial aggrandizement" been the spirit of our purpose and heart of our hope. The slightest acquaintance with history shows that powerful republics are the most warlike and unscrupulous of nations. - Ambrose Bierce

==

When people speak to you about a preventive war, you tell them to go and fight it. After my experience, I have come to hate war. War settles nothing. - Dwight David Eisenhower

==

The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little. - Franklin Delano Roosevelt

==

The enemy aggressor is always pursuing a course of larceny, murder, rapine and barbarism. We are always moving forward with high mission, a destiny imposed by the Deity to regenerate our victims while incidentally capturing their markets, to civilise savage and senile and paranoid peoples while blundering accidentally into their oil wells. - John Flynn

==

It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs. - Albert Einstein

==

War is the symptom, not the disease. — L. M. Heroux

==

The men the American people admire most extravagantly are the most daring liars; the men they detest most violently are those who try to tell them the truth. - H. L. Mencken

==

Our country is not the only thing to which we owe our allegiance. It is also owed to justice and to humanity. Patriotism consists not in waving the flag, but in striving that our country shall be righteous as well as strong. - James Bryce

==

Our country is the world, our countrymen are all mankind. We love the land of our nativity, only as we love all other lands. The interests, rights, and liberties of American citizens are no more dear to us than are those of the whole human race. Hence we can allow no appeal to patriotism, to revenge any national insult or injury. - William Lloyd Garrison

==

Give me the money that has been spent in war and I will clothe every man, woman, and child in an attire of which kings and queens will be proud. I will build a schoolhouse in every valley over the whole earth. I will crown every hillside with a place of worship consecrated to peace. - Charles Sumner

==

War is a waste of time. - old French proverb

==

Reporter: Mr. Gandhi, what do you think of Western civilization?
Gandhi: I think it would be a very good idea.

==

War begets poverty; poverty begets war. - Henry Burke

==

The world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron. - Dwight Eisenhower

==

The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed. - Steven Biko

==

You can build a throne of bayonets but you can't sit on it long. - Boris Yeltsin

==

Memories are short and appetites for power and glory are insatiable. Old tyrants depart. New ones take their place. Old differences are composed, new differences arise. Old allies become the foe. The recent enemy becomes the friend. It's all very baffling and confusing. - Harry S Truman

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The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. ... Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that. - Martin Luther King, Jr.

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The things that will destroy us are: politics without principle; pleasure without conscience; wealth without work; knowledge without character; business without morality; science without humanity; and worship without sacrifice. - Mohandas Gandhi

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They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. - Benjamin Franklin

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The coward wretch whose hand and heart / Can bear to torture aught below, / Is ever first to quail and start / From the slightest pain or equal foe - Bertrand Russell

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Force is the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism - Thomas Jefferson

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In order to rally people, governments need enemies. They want us to be afraid, to hate, so we will rally behind them. And if they do not have a real enemy, they will invent one in order to mobilize us. - Thich Nhat Hanh

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The strength and power of despotism consists wholly in the fear of resistance - Thomas Paine

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The mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few to ride them. - Thomas Jefferson

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All that talk about "liberation" twenty, thirty years ago, all the plotting, all the bodies, produced this, this impoverished broken-down country led by a gang of cruel and paternalistic half-educated theorists. - Former Vietcong General Pham Xuan An

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I cannot tell anyone else how to live his or her life but I have determined how I want to live mine: by not participating in war any longer. - Monica Benderman

Running down the road

One of the biggest downsides of not being a full-time blogger (In yer dreams!) is there are just so many things that you can't get to discuss. Just to give an idea, here are eight items over the past week and a-half that I would have liked to have said more about (and in a more timely fashion) than I do here.

November 14: The FDA "didn't follow normal procedures" in rejecting an application for sales of an over-the-counter morning-after pill

and some documents suggest the decision was made even before scientists finished reviewing the evidence, congressional investigators reported Monday. ...

In December 2003, FDA's scientific advisers overwhelmingly backed over-the-counter sales for all ages, citing assessments that easier access could halve the nation's 3 million annual unintended pregnancies. But the following May, FDA leaders rejected that recommendation....

The independent Government Accountability Office reviewed FDA's first rejection, uncovering what they called "unusual" decision-making. Among the findings:

- Conflicting accounts of whether the decision was made months before scientific reviews were completed.

- Unusual involvement from high-ranking agency officials.

- Three FDA directors who normally would have been responsible for signing off on the decision did not do so because they disagreed with it.

The morning-after pill contains a very high dose of birth-control meds and works by preventing implantation of a fertilized egg - which leads conservatives to consider it a form of abortion. And, of course, ideology trumps science. (See Design, Intelligent.)

November 15: I told you this was coming.

The former chairman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting repeatedly violated the organization's contracting rules and code of ethics in his efforts to promote conservatives in the system, according to an internal investigation released today. ...

[Kenneth] Konz[, the corporation's inspector general,] and his nine-member staff documented numerous occasions in which [Kenneth] Tomlinson circumvented the corporation's contracting procedures in trying to hire his own handpicked candidates to study the political balance in public broadcasting.

Where I disagree with the report is that it labeled him a "rogue politico." I don't think there was anything "rogue" about him; I think the other board members knew exactly what they had and their smarmy praise of him when he quit says they just didn't care.

November 16: Remember this the next time some red-faced and vein-bulged White House mouthpiece is ranting about how outrageous it is to suggest they have ever told us anything other than the unvarnished truth about Iraq.

On May 31, 1970, a month after [Richard] Nixon went on TV to defend the previously secret U.S. bombings and troop movements in Cambodia, asserting that he would not let his nation become "a pitiful, helpless giant," the president met his top military and national security aides at the Western White House in San Clemente, Calif. ...

In a memo from the meeting marked "Eyes Only, Top Secret Sensitive," Nixon told his military men to continue doing what was necessary in Cambodia, but to say for public consumption that the United States was merely providing support to South Vietnamese forces when necessary to protect U.S. troops.

"That is what we will say publicly," he asserted. "But now, let's talk about what we will actually do."

Like I've been saying, plus ça change....

November 16: I assume the corporatists and their "dismal science" flaks would have some way of maintaining this shows the self-correcting nature of the "free market," but I have to admit I can't think of what that way might be.

DuPont Co. hid studies showing the risks of a Teflon-related chemical used to line candy wrappers, pizza boxes, microwave popcorn bags and hundreds of other food containers, according to internal company documents and a former employee.

The chemical Zonyl can rub off the liner and get into food. Once in a person's body, it can break down into perfluorooctanoic acid and its salts, known as PFOA, a related chemical used in the making of Teflon-coated cookware.

The Environmental Protection Agency has been trying to decide whether to classify PFOA as a "likely" human carcinogen.

DuPont officials insist the products are "safe for consumer use" because they were approved by the FDA. The fact that they were approved without knowing of the company's suppressed studies seems to have slipped their profit-über-alles minds.

By the way, the FDA says it's "continuing to monitor" the safety of the related chemicals and the EPA says it has "an extensive effort under way" on the matter. We all know what that means.

November 16: Under the "What, You're Surprised?" heading we find the news that

[a] White House document shows that executives from big oil companies met with Vice President Cheney's energy task force in 2001 - something long suspected by environmentalists but denied as recently as last week by industry officials testifying before Congress.

The document, obtained this week by The Washington Post, shows that officials from Exxon Mobil Corp., Conoco (before its merger with Phillips), Shell Oil Co. and BP America Inc. met in the White House complex with the Cheney aides who were developing a national energy policy....

The liars in the White House defend themselves by saying it's necessary for the president to be able to get "confidential advice." But apparently, only from those who pull their strings.

November 17: U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer waxed poetic about how "the transcendent importance of a free press" enables reporters to "report the news and express opinions without fear of government oppression or interference." And then

found Washington Post reporter Walter Pincus in contempt Wednesday, saying the journalist must reveal his government sources for stories about the criminal investigation of nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee.

Because, y'see, while the press is free to report the news without government interference, it's not free to gather the news from confidential sources without government interference.

I sympathize with Lee, who is seeking the identities of reporters' sources for his suit against the departments of Energy and Justice after he was apparently falsely accused of leaking classified information to China during a wave of paranoia about supposed Chinese espionage. But I do think there is a higher priority here.

Now, let me be clear: I don't think Pincus (or any of the other reporters from who Lee is seeking information) should feel obligated to protect his source since he was apparently being used to leak embarrassing information about Lee. There was no real story here, just manipulation for political (and possibly personal) ends. But that's a different question from if he should be forced to reveal that source. That, I believe, is an extremely risky course that reaches far beyond any individual case, as much as lawyers might like to argue otherwise.

For much the same reason, I stand apart from most of my comrades on the left in the case of Judith Miller. Certainly, she should have felt no obligation to Libby to keep his identity a secret; I think reporters' attitude should be "I find out you were using me, I'll burn you." But I disagree with those who applauded her contempt citation and even more with those who said she was not only legally obligated to reveal his name, she was ethically obligated to do so. The real basis of this "obligation," it seemed to me, was that people thought it would get Karl Rove. Particularly at a time of increasingly fierce efforts at shrouding much of government from the prying eyes of the interested public (see preceding item), I think that attitude is classically penny wise and pound foolish - and as confidential sources become harder and harder to come by (as some reporters insist they already are), that shroud will be wrapped ever tighter.

November 17: This is probably the one that I most regret not having been vocal about here. (It is something on which I can be confident my own Congressional reps will go the correct way - they usually do - but they did hear from me.) But ultimately, I wonder if it would have made any difference no matter how vocal any of us were, whether here, there, or anywhere else.

House and Senate negotiators reached a tentative agreement yesterday on revisions to the USA Patriot Act that would limit some of the government's powers while requiring the Justice Department to provide a better accounting of its secret requests for information on ordinary citizens.

But the agreement would leave intact some of the most controversial provisions of the anti-terrorism law, such as government access to library and bookstore records in terrorism probes, and would extend only limited new rights to the targets of such searches.

In fact, the "More power!" crew got pretty much everything they wanted. Not everything, but close enough. And why do I wonder if anything would have made a difference?

Three other measures - including one allowing law enforcement agents access to bookstore and public library records - would be extended for seven years, or three years longer than the Senate had agreed to. The House initially extended the provisions for 10 years but later voted to accept the Senate's four-year extension.

That is, the Senate passed a four-year extension. The House passed a four-year extension. The conferees' "compromise" has a seven-year extension. Increasingly under one-party rule, the conference committee doesn't come up with a "compromise," it comes up with what the misleaders (who choose the committee) want.

On the other hand, I suppose I'm a touch too pessimistic: If it hadn't been for the noise made all summer, I frankly expect it would have been much worse.

November 18: Just as a wrap-up, in what must mark a new low for pettiness, the Senate's GOPper misleadership

refused to bring up for consideration a resolution, introduced by Sens. Frank Lautenberg and Jon Corzine, [both D-NJ,] that honored [Bruce] Springsteen's long career and the 1975 release of his iconic album, "Born to Run."

Resolutions like this are passed by the dozens, the hundreds, every year, usually by unanimous consent. Although no reason was given for blocking this one, the belief was that the GOPpers are still "miffed" about Springsteen having supported John Kerry.

Footnote to that footnote

Cheney also engaged in a little - what shall we call it, how about rambunctious logic? - in that speech. He

shrugged off the failure to find weapons of mass destruction. "We never had the burden of proof," he said, adding that it had been up to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to prove to the world that he didn't have such weapons.

So it was up to Saddam Hussein to prove a negative. Even after the inspectors found nothing, he had to prove a negative. Even after the inspectors were prepared to regard any discrepancies as the result of sloppy bookkeeping, not deception, he had to prove a negative. We could make charges, but had no obligation to back them up because they were based on "intelligence" from people we knew to be liars. Even though to this day the White House still will not say that Saddam had no such weapons in the runup to the war (they will only acknowledge the "failure to find them," which is not the same thing), he had to prove a negative.

"Hello. I'm from the IRS. We say you had $500,000 in undeclared income last year and owe beaucoup bucks in taxes. Prove that you didn't or we'll take your house, seize your bank account, and garnish your wages. Well? We're waiting."

The burden of proof. What a wonderful thing to not have.

Footnote to both of the preceding

AP reported today that "The Big" Dick Cheney

accused critics of "corrupt and shameless" revisionism in suggesting the White House misled the nation in a rush to war, the latest salvo in an increasingly acrimonious debate over prewar intelligence. ...

"What is not legitimate - and I will again say is dishonest and reprehensible - is the suggestion by some U.S. senators that the president of the United States or any member of his administration purposely misled the American people on prewar intelligence," Cheney said.

Corrupt. Shameless. Dishonest. Reprehensible. Have you noticed how the White House and its minions have reserved their harshest language for the suggestion that they manipulated intelligence?

That's because this is a sore spot, a vulnerable spot. Many people have been willing to put up with the war, with the deaths and the cost, because they cling to the belief that even if the Shrub team did the wrong thing (majorities now consistently say the war was a "mistake" and generally agree that it is "not worth the cost") they - the Bushites - thought they were doing good. Fracture that conviction and Bush and Co. are in really deep trouble. Back in June, the Zogby poll found that 42% of Americans would favor impeachment if it was shown that the White House lied about the war. By mid-October, an Ipsos poll found that had climbed to 50%.

And people are coming to realize that they were, indeed, bamboozled. Five major polls since the end of October have found majorities of the public agreeing the Bush administration "deliberately" or "intentionally" misled the country about Iraq before the war:

CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll, 10/28-30
CBS News Poll, 10/30-11/1
ABC News/Washington Post Poll, 10/30-11/2
NBC News/Wall Street Journal Poll, 11/4-7
Newsweek Poll, 11/10-11.

(The first two results are available here, the latter three here.)

Even the poll by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, 11/3-6, which used the harsher word "lied" rather than "misled," had a 43-41 plurality recognizing deception.

The Shrub gang sees their position evaporating. They are running scared. You can see it in their postures, you can hear it in their increasingly shrill, increasingly desperate, denunciations of war opponents.

Now, this does not mean Bush or Cheney will be impeached (although they should be) and it does not mean that everything will work out for the best in the foreseeable future. (See previous item.) They still have that base of fanatical believers who will tune into Sean Hannity in order to be told what to believe so they don't have to figure it out for themselves. Shrub and the Shrubberies are playing to that base and playing for time.

But they are running scared.

Footnote to the preceding

The sad fact is, in the short term we are still oh so screwed. A couple of weeks ago, on November 2, the Los Angeles Times ran an article about the increasing challenges to the war and how formerly timid and intimidated Dummycrats are starting to find their voices.

But most of the big names in the Democratic foreign policy establishment - ranging from Sen. Joseph R. Biden of Delaware to retired Gen. Wesley K. Clark - still fear that this push for a fixed timetable for withdrawal would hurt the war effort in Iraq and the Democratic cause in the 2006 election.

"I think the only thing that can rescue Bush from the consequences of his inept handling of Iraq is overkill by zealous Democrats," said Will Marshall, president of the Progressive Policy Institute, a centrist Democratic think tank.

In other words, the party establishment, in its smug reticence, is trying to achieve exactly that of which the Mean Machine is accusing those who are speaking out: the obtaining of partisan political advantage. Their concern is not with Iraq or the people of Iraq or even the US forces there or their families and friends, not with the stain on our nation, on our honor as citizens and as human beings, not with the damage we've done, not with the terrorists created by our stupidity, our cruelty, our callousness, but only with what will play well next November.

Scum.