Comments CM Hersh has made

  • It might be that they are in violation of the Hatch Act, which prohibits federal employees from making public statements on pending legislation when they ID themselves as feds and go on to trash out a concept that is currently under consideration in Congress.On EPA demands attorneys remove video critical of cap-and-trade posted 2 weeks, 2 days ago 28 Responses

  • Political vs. technical solutions

    I see the challenge as both technical and political.  Yes, the inertia of the present system is huge.  

    But the technical questions remain. I'm skeptical of the quick fixex.  All the technical quick fixes thus far have not panned out.  

    Part of the reason is simply the fact that petroleum represents a huge source of essentially free energy.  We can't simply replace all gas guzzling SUVs with gas sipping hybrids. How can we replace 20 million barrels of oil a day with renewable methane?  

    We need to drastically make lifestyle changes.    On Hurricane Katrina brings a foretaste of environmental disasters to come posted 4 years, 2 months ago 7 Responses

  • Bill nails it

    One of my favorite pieces of writing is his 1995 essay on global warming in the NYT Sunday Magazine.  I pull it out and re-read it every so often.  He is certainly no Bill-come-lately to this topic.  

    I find myself worrying as much about peak oil these days.  Bill's comment:  

    Not to mention the costs of converting our energy system to something less suicidal than fossil fuel, a task that becomes more expensive with every year that passes.

    assumes that something like this is even possible.  Kunstler makes a pretty compelling case in The Long Emergency that it simply can't be done.  Oil is simply huge volumes of cheap energy.  What could possibly be used to replace it?  Alternative ways to generate electricity can ease the pain, but our unsustainable suburban/automobile lifestyle is based on petroleum.

    It seems that unless someone's Hail Mary pass (cold fusion, nanotechnology, who-the-hell-knows what) is completed--and damn soon--that these environmental disruptions that are going to occur are going to be accompanied by resource wars.  

    The scary thing is that our gov't doesn't even seem to be concerned about looking for the alternatives.  Our energy policy is military-based.    On Hurricane Katrina brings a foretaste of environmental disasters to come posted 4 years, 2 months ago 7 Responses

  • Nature vs nurture?

    Both are in the mix.  There are innate differences between men and women and not all of them are subtle, and not all of them are pretty. There is no sense denying our hunter-gatherer's-shaped brain.  It ain't hogwash.  

    We can, however, strive to make our society and institutions more equitable.  Just because sex differences are "natural" does not mean that all manifestations of them are acceptable in a society of reasoning beings.

    But it ain't all culture.  On Men posted 4 years, 3 months ago 10 Responses

  • I can hardly wait

    until they want to start charging for memberships or some other thing.  What a bunch of leeches.  A good idea, but they just want to create a bureacracy and make a couple of cushy jobs for themselves.  WMI must be laughing like hell.  

    I use craigslist.  Less structure, works great. On ... oh, and R.I.P. posted 4 years, 3 months ago 13 Responses

  • The Onion is required reading

    to remain sane.  No ifs ands or buts.On The Onion posted 4 years, 3 months ago 2 Responses

  • cumulative impacts

    D Roberts wrote in his sustainablog post:

    "If I could remove my ecological footprint entirely, the earth would endure 0.000000000000167% less insult (or assuming I have five times the average footprint, 0.000000000000667%). Let's say I zero out my footprint and refrain from having my two children, and furthermore, all three of us would have had ten times the impact of an "average" person. The earth is thereby spared 0.000000000005% the damage. Big whoop."

    This is the same argument made by every developer looking to fill wetlands, every farmer with cows in the creek, every timber company clear-cutting a parcel, and every SUV driver on earth.  

    If you think the earth has a sustainable number of people, even if N. Americans reduce their resource consumption to the European level, or even less, then I want some of what you are smoking.  On How many kids do I have to have to get your attention? posted 4 years, 4 months ago 11 Responses