lorna salzman’s Recent Comments

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  Where's the coalition? Energy that is.

  Did Roberts just discover this? For the past year or more I have hassled numerous climate groups to get their act together and formulate their own energy legislation to counteract the Boxer-Lieberman gruel that passes for global warming legislation.  They just sat on their butts. Mostly they didn't answer me; those that did were nasty and told me not to complain or that I was a "purist". So much for environmental activism. And since then nothing has changed. Some groups support carbon trading. Some oppose carbon taxes. All supported the "80% reduction by 2050" in CO2 emissions, knowing that by that date the game is over. There is no leadership.
  Even 350.org, Bill McKibben's group, has no clear plan for getting down to the 350 ppm the scientists urge. Do these people think that we should just sit around and pray for a miracle?      Isn't anyone embarrassed?   Or maybe they aren't scared enough? Or just lazy? Whatever the case, we have failed collectively. We complain but propose no alternative. No wonder the politicians are in control.  The activists are sitting in front of their computers instead of storming the doors of congress and marching in the streets.  We have put ourselves at their mercy even though science is on our side. We should just crawl away in shame.On Progressives discover there is no coherent energy movement to take advantage of this moment posted 1 year, 4 months ago 16 Responses

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  More must-reads

  Loren Eiseley: The Star Thrower
  Carl Safina: Eye of the Albatross
  Ernst Mayr: What Evolution Is
  Richard Dawkins: The Blind Watchmaker
  Jerry Mander: In the Absence of the Sacred
  Christopher Hitchens: god is Not Great
  Susan George: The Lugano Report
  James Gustave Speth: The Bridge at the Edge of the World
  Joseph Romm: Hell and High Water
  Edward Abbey: Desert Solitaire
  Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Infidel
  On Seven green leaders reveal their favorite reads posted 1 year, 4 months ago 6 Responses

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  Building in flood plains

  Mary Kelly doesn't go far enough in her recommendations. The federal flood insurance program should be eliminated completely. It allows people to rebuild damaged homes in floodplain areas with minimal restrictions, thus enabling people to collect money over and over. Building or rebuilding in flood plains, including coastal barrier islands,should be denied  federal insurance, mortgages and infrastructure. Taxpayers should not pick up the bill for such folly, including any rebuilding of New Orleans. The same goes for fire-prone and landslide-prone areas like chaparral and coastal zones in California. Global warming will continue to induce more severe climate events and taxpayers should not be required to pick up the bills for those who deliberately build or live in these areas. Let private insurers decide if they want to insure these homes. If they don't (and more and more they are cutting back coverage), then homeowners will bear the full cost. On The Midwest will suffer if we don't change our approach to flood protection posted 1 year, 4 months ago 3 Responses

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  Response to Richard Grossman

  I don't dispute the urgent need to put corporations back in chains, under democratic control. Gus Speth's book underscores this. But I want to address Richard's rhetorical question about whether we will recognize the "rights" of Nature. It is probably useless to address this question to the free marketeers and other components of corporate capitalism. It is more important to address this to traditional liberals who have studiously ignored Nature and the earth's ecosystems in favor of various social justice issues such as sexism, racism, poverty, etc. It isn'tthat these should be ignored. It is that these need to be addressed in the CONTEXT of nature.  Ecological sensibility and consciousness is a rare trait among liberals, who have preferred to put ecology on a laundry list of Things We Like rather than at the center of their world view and values. Since Earth Day 1970 ecological understanding has radically decreased even as progressive social justice movements and campaigns have accelerated. Too many liberals still see the environment as an amenity, not as our life support system. Calls for political change start from the viewpoint of human needs and demands, not from a biocentric viewpoint that places humans in an interconnected web where nonhuman species and systems are afforded the rights and deference we afford to humans under the guise of "the rights of man". Overcoming anthropocentrism and the assumption that humanity must take precedence, and that progress is measured only by the improvement of human society, must be our first order of business. In the light of ecological necessity, democracy becomes a subset of an ecologically based society as well as a mechanism to defend all aspects of nature and the earth's ecosystems.On Hansen's message to the planet posted 1 year, 4 months ago 17 Responses

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  Ward comments on 350 campaign

  Yes, 350 is a good shorthand for a public campaign. The challenge to us is concretizing it:  getting it into public policy and most important of all congressional legislation.  Next year the flimsy Boxer bill will be reintroduced and predictably supported by the big, compromised enviros like NRDC and ED as well as USCAP. Phasing out coal powered plants via a steeply declining cap on CO2 emissions from each plant should be our top priority, but if we get business as usual, and that mucky system called carbon trading, this goal will elude us. Even using 2030 as the final date for ending coal violates, in my opinion, the 350 strategy; does anyone believe we can get back to 350 ppm if we burn coal for another 22 years? The coal and nuclear gangs are still pushing for subsidies and tax breaks, which will prolong their life time (if not ours) and squash the emergence of renewabl energy for decades. These are the concrete realities that McKibben's campaign and all the others need to confront. What happens or doesn't happen in the US congress will determine what happens in the rest of the world. We can't afford to accept political deals designed to keep us reliant on coal and fossil fuels for the foreseeable future, and only a united uncompromising legislative agenda, as opposed to a global treaty requiring hundreds of nations to sign on to it, will cut the mustard. I sincerely hope McKibben and all others will put their efforts behind specific strategies and legislation, to be prepared for hot battles next year by adversaries seeking token solutions that protect their profits and control.On The 350ppm challenge to U.S. environmental organizations and the importance of McKibben's 350.org posted 1 year, 5 months ago 2 Responses