Great interview in one of the local free sheets, with a gentleman who did a couple years for the high crime of crashing a land auction. What's particularly galling about this case is that not only did the judge rig the jury selection process by stocking it with people who pledged their allegiance to his decree rather than their consciences, but that it wasn't even allowed to be discussed at the trial that the auction in question had been ruled illegal.
There are other worthy tidbits throughout, not the least of which involves a cop who, in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, realized his basement was being shoveled out by on of the Occupy kids he had been told to truncheon in Zuccotti Park.
I differ from Mr. DeChristopher in his hope or belief that the cop might have been transformed even a little bit by such an encounter. Oh, it might have made him think a bit, but probably not enough to question seriously why he mindlessly did what he had "been told" to that kid and others like him, not enough to change the trajectory of his ways or beliefs.
DeChristopher's dismay (I was hoping for more palpable contempt, but the guy is simply too nice) for the chickenshit bien pensant liberal baby boomers is also choice -- and also not enough to get them to change their ways. They are clearly content to believe that shopping organic and voting Democratic is sufficient, that climate change is a problem for the next generations to figure out. They hung on, made their money, and they're going to by-god take as much of it -- as well as the health care and Social Security funding of the next generations -- with them as possible.
The problem is, since they have most of the money, they have most of the political power, and so pay for a system that keeps inert just long enough for them to finish their days in comfort, and then everyone who's left can start sacrificing.
I don't think Americans of any generation will start to take climate change seriously until there's a truly catastrophic -- and I mean like mid-five figures of casualties -- event, something like twenty Katrinas or Sandys all at once, on an "important" US city like Los Angeles or New York. Somebody famous will have to perish.
And even then, because the system more than anything counts on inertia, counts on people's willingness to be distracted from their fate for just one more day, there's always the chance that it'll go away. Think of the huge events of this new century already, man-made or natural -- 9/11, Fukushima, Katrina, the extended wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. After all the news coverage and the hand-wringing in the aftermath, what actually changed in the wake of any of these things?
Did 9/11 change our approach to dealing with the Muslim world? No, we still prop up corrupt petrocrats, sell them weapons, let them oppress their people into a senseless rage, and then wonder what the fuck is wrong with "those people". Did we take any measures that showed that we take seriously the clear ramifications of global warming and carbon concentration in the atmosphere after Katrina or Sandy or the 2004 tsunami? You tell me.
Consider -- in the space of a few minutes, nearly a quarter-million lives in fourteen countries were ended, and hundreds of thousands more transformed, by the tsunami. Yes, it was caused by an earthquake, and no, there wasn't anything man-made about an undersea subduction. But it should have been a potent reminder of the power of nature, and the powerlessness of humans to stop it.
It's not just Americans, though we certainly set the stage for all this. The Chinese and Indians, after all, are just following our model, empowered by the blessings of globalization and the credo of The Chicago Group. It's difficult to blame them for wanting to catch up with us in standard of living.
Yet that bears consequences, when 1 in every 3 humans lives in China or India, and 1 in every 2 -- think about that, especially if you're in America, which has comparatively sparse population density overall, every second human being -- lives in Asia. And most people live in cities, and most cities are near oceans, and the levels are rising, and will take as long or longer to reverse than they did to set in motion.
We don't all have to go full eco-activist and go to prison, in a system that's rigged to begin with. But if enough people, just in the US, looked at the three primary factors -- what/how we drive; what/how we eat; what/how we consume in general -- all of which are within lost people's control, a real dent can be made in this very real and growing problem.
There are other worthy tidbits throughout, not the least of which involves a cop who, in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, realized his basement was being shoveled out by on of the Occupy kids he had been told to truncheon in Zuccotti Park.
I differ from Mr. DeChristopher in his hope or belief that the cop might have been transformed even a little bit by such an encounter. Oh, it might have made him think a bit, but probably not enough to question seriously why he mindlessly did what he had "been told" to that kid and others like him, not enough to change the trajectory of his ways or beliefs.
DeChristopher's dismay (I was hoping for more palpable contempt, but the guy is simply too nice) for the chickenshit bien pensant liberal baby boomers is also choice -- and also not enough to get them to change their ways. They are clearly content to believe that shopping organic and voting Democratic is sufficient, that climate change is a problem for the next generations to figure out. They hung on, made their money, and they're going to by-god take as much of it -- as well as the health care and Social Security funding of the next generations -- with them as possible.
The problem is, since they have most of the money, they have most of the political power, and so pay for a system that keeps inert just long enough for them to finish their days in comfort, and then everyone who's left can start sacrificing.
I don't think Americans of any generation will start to take climate change seriously until there's a truly catastrophic -- and I mean like mid-five figures of casualties -- event, something like twenty Katrinas or Sandys all at once, on an "important" US city like Los Angeles or New York. Somebody famous will have to perish.
And even then, because the system more than anything counts on inertia, counts on people's willingness to be distracted from their fate for just one more day, there's always the chance that it'll go away. Think of the huge events of this new century already, man-made or natural -- 9/11, Fukushima, Katrina, the extended wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. After all the news coverage and the hand-wringing in the aftermath, what actually changed in the wake of any of these things?
Did 9/11 change our approach to dealing with the Muslim world? No, we still prop up corrupt petrocrats, sell them weapons, let them oppress their people into a senseless rage, and then wonder what the fuck is wrong with "those people". Did we take any measures that showed that we take seriously the clear ramifications of global warming and carbon concentration in the atmosphere after Katrina or Sandy or the 2004 tsunami? You tell me.
Consider -- in the space of a few minutes, nearly a quarter-million lives in fourteen countries were ended, and hundreds of thousands more transformed, by the tsunami. Yes, it was caused by an earthquake, and no, there wasn't anything man-made about an undersea subduction. But it should have been a potent reminder of the power of nature, and the powerlessness of humans to stop it.
It's not just Americans, though we certainly set the stage for all this. The Chinese and Indians, after all, are just following our model, empowered by the blessings of globalization and the credo of The Chicago Group. It's difficult to blame them for wanting to catch up with us in standard of living.
Yet that bears consequences, when 1 in every 3 humans lives in China or India, and 1 in every 2 -- think about that, especially if you're in America, which has comparatively sparse population density overall, every second human being -- lives in Asia. And most people live in cities, and most cities are near oceans, and the levels are rising, and will take as long or longer to reverse than they did to set in motion.
We don't all have to go full eco-activist and go to prison, in a system that's rigged to begin with. But if enough people, just in the US, looked at the three primary factors -- what/how we drive; what/how we eat; what/how we consume in general -- all of which are within lost people's control, a real dent can be made in this very real and growing problem.
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