![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dumb, dumber and Dumbo (aka Thog's Science Masterclass #8)
In the Gray Lady's continuing ill conceived campaign to provide a soapbox for rightist loonies as "balance" to its sane centrist commentators, today's New York Times contains an anti-Obama op-ed, "On Nov. 4, Remember 9/11", by one Jeffrey Goldberg, who's apparently a national correspondent for The Atlantic and author of Prisoners: A Story of Friendship and Terror.
I don't want to get into the stupid, artificial left vs right schoolyard game that too many people regard as politics, but I do want to criticize Goldberg for a piece of monumental imbecility. His op-ed begins:
The next president must do one thing, and one thing only, if he is to be judged a success: He must prevent Al Qaeda, or a Qaeda imitator, from gaining control of a nuclear device and detonating it in America. Everything else — Fannie Mae, health care reform, energy independence, the budget shortfall in Wasilla, Alaska — is commentary. The nuclear destruction of Lower Manhattan, or downtown Washington, would cause the deaths of thousands, or hundreds of thousands; a catastrophic depression; the reversal of globalization; a permanent climate of fear in the West; and the comprehensive repudiation of America’s culture of civil liberties.
In fact, as anyone but a blinkered ideological slave would instantly observe, the Number One deed any incoming president must take in order to save American lives and protect American security is to act swiftly on climate change -- on a number of fronts, from international diplomacy to rapid investment in (a) the various climate-friendly energy technologies already available and (b) the development of new ones. Ignoring for a moment the longer term, when viewed alongside the number of deaths that are going to be caused by global warming even over the next decade or two (many of them directly attributable to the brain-dead inaction and denial of the incumbent Administration) "the deaths of thousands, or hundreds of thousands" is a pretty goddam paltry concern.
And in the longer term, of course, we're looking at human casualties in the billions . . . and quite possibly at the destruction of our species.
Yes, averting the possibility of a terrorist nuclear strike -- anywhere, not just in the US -- is obviously a matter of great importance; only an idiot would say otherwise. Constant vigilance and policing are required. (We all saw what happened when a US Administration lost its focus on counterterrorist intelligence; within a mere 18 months or so there were the 9/11 attacks.) But counterterrorism is not the only priority, and it's very far from the most urgent or the most important. Right at the top of the list, with everything else an inestimably long distance behind, is the matter of global warming; and if Goldberg thinks for one moment otherwise then he's a fool.
no subject
no subject
"as translated by the divinely-inspired King James, who wasn't no homosexual"
How can we be sure? He spoke French.
no subject
no subject
Which leads us to the perpetual mystery of why the Bible wasn't originally written in tongues so everyone desperate to read it could while the rest of us not only didn't have to but actively couldn't, thus saving us a lot of moral dilemmaing.
no subject
no subject
I mean it in the very best sense. :)
Love, C.
no subject
A whole new meaning to the term "bible-thumping", is what you're saying?
no subject
no subject
And then you get people like pastorbear (see below) who're Xtian but, despite that, wonderful.
no subject
no subject
just sayin'
no subject
Me, I'd put healthcare ahead of counterterrorism too -- bad healthcare indubitably kills more Americans annually than the "thousands, or hundreds of thousands" Goldberg talks of. But global warming is THE issue: unless that's tackled real soon now, the casualty figures are going to be in the billions . . . and there isn't going to be an America.
Hard to care about cancer or anything else if you've already died of starvation and thirst.
no subject
no subject
There's a Beeb story today of interest in this context:
Climate inaction 'costing lives'
Failure to take urgent action to curb climate change is effectively violating the human rights of people in the poorest nations, an aid charity warns.
A report by Oxfam International says emissions, primarily from developed countries, are exacerbating flooding, droughts and extreme weather events.
As a result, harvests are failing and people are losing their homes and access to water, the authors observe.
They say human rights need to be at the heart of global climate policies.
Oxfam will be submitting its report, called Climate Wrongs and Human Rights, to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).
Righting wrongs
"Climate change was first seen as a scientific problem, then an economic one," explained report author Kate Raworth. "Now it is becoming a matter of international justice.
The global impacts of climate change meant that nations had to be held accountable for the consequences of their actions, Ms Raworth said.
"Litigation is seldom the best way to solve a dispute.
"That is why we need a strong UN deal in 2009 to cut emissions and support adaption," she added, referring to next year's key UN climate summit where a future global climate strategy is expected to be agreed.
"However, vulnerable countries do need options to protect themselves. Rich country polluters have been fully aware of their culpability for many years."
In its report, Oxfam International said that ensuring basic human rights was essential to lift people out of poverty and injustice.
"Our staff and local partners work with communities in more than 100 countries, and are increasingly witnessing the devastating effects of more frequent and severe climatic events on poor people's prospects for development," it observed.
It highlighted a number of "hot spots" where current climate policies were failing, including: rich nations' failure to cut emissions; funding for adaption initiatives being "woefully under-resourced"; and industrialised countries failing to help poor nations switch to low-carbon technologies.
Twin-track strategy
In April 2007, a working group of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), consisting of hundreds of environmental experts, published a report warning that people living in poverty would be the worst affected by climate change.
Key findings of the report included:
*75-250 million people across Africa could face water shortages by 2020
*Crop yields could increase by 20% in East and Southeast Asia, but decrease by up to 30% in Central and South Asia
*Agriculture fed by rainfall could drop by 50% in some African countries by 2020
*20-30% of all plant and animal species would be at increased risk of extinction if temperatures rose between 1.5-2.5C
*Glaciers and snow cover are expected to decline, reducing water availability in countries supplied by melt water
Oxfam has called for a twin approach of mitigation and adaption to ensure human rights formed a central pillar of climate policies.
To reduce emissions, it said nations had to implement national and international targets to minimise the risk of global average temperatures exceeding 2C (3.6F).
And to help least developed nations build resilience to unavoidable impacts, Oxfam said the international community had to target adaptation measures on maintaining people's access to water, shelter and healthcare.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/7605927.stm
no subject