Sara Robinson’s Posts

• Crisis or no crisis, you can't rush change

  Copenhagen: Getting past the urgency trap 4

  Posted 1 week, 3 days agoWe didn't get into this mess overnight, and we're not going to get out of it in one dazzling planetary stroke of universal enlightenment, either.

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  You dump your carcass in the trash? no no no nooooooo The carcass goes into a soup pot, along with a bay leaf and some garlic. Simmer for an hour or so -- *then* you pull out the bones (which are pretty clean by this point), roll them in newspaper, and throw them away. The resulting broth gets put up in the freezer, and becomes the basis for another several turkey soup dinners between now and Christmas. (Also a good way to use up leftover veggies, rice, and potatoes. Toss 'em in the soup.) We still have a lot to remember from our grandparents about how to not waste food.On Martha Stewart blisters meat industry in Thanksgiving show posted 17 hours, 10 minutes ago 7 Responses

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  This is funny, because I just wrote a note to a list explaining the whole J-curve thing, and how awareness of climate change is indeed speeding toward an inflection point. I think I conflated two things here, and that may be where the confusion lies. Action on climate change is approaching Stage Four. Most people are in Stage Three right now -- thinking through their possible responses, getting plans in place. When the tipping point hits, they'll be ready, and things will indeed move about as fast as they did in WWII. (Which, by the way, Americans had been psychologically preparing for since about 1934, as they watched the Nazis overrun Europe. That one went through all these same phases: by Pearl Harbor, nobody needed to explain what was happening, or what would be required by way of response.) But climate change is the leading edge of a deeper structural shift that's going to involve re-making not only the economy, but quite possibly a lot of the basic ontological assumptions that have undergirded western civilization at least back to the Enlightenment and quite possibly as far back as the Greeks. And it's going to be another three generations before that one soaks all the way through, and gets worked out in all of its details. Sorry for mushing those two together. Both the short-term acceleration on this one issue and the long-term structural shift are in motion right now. The first is but a harbinger of the second. Hope that clarifies.On Copenhagen: Getting past the urgency trap posted 1 week, 3 days ago 4 Responses

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  OK, this story needs a major update, coming as it did just hours before our incipient swine flu pandemic was traced back to a Smithfield facility in Mexico.

  The coincidence is beyond intriguing. Are the Chinese still interested in this deal? Will they use it to get a fire-sale price? What are the odds they'll walk away, fearing a new round of regulations?

  Enquiring minds want to know.

   

   

  On Chinese agribiz giant eyes Smithfield takeover posted 7 months ago 2 Responses