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Not much more can be said, Ron. The science behind likely planet warming from greenhouse effect is rational. But no one knows for sure whether we are suffering from it already or ever will. It is one of those issues where most want to take the safe course because consequences of being wrong are so dire.
I don't know if global warming even matters that much any more. Apparently the earth has done it before and eventually simply comes back, with or without us.
The ugliest truth is that the world is like a village that has chopped down all the nearby firewood and life in the village (or planet if you wish) will never be as easy from here on. It's not anybody's fault and it is everybody's fault.
Not signing the Kyoto Treaty still seems right to me because it would have immediately caused the panic, or more correctly, "scarcity economics" that we have now. G.W. could have looked at it this way, to give him credit to delay the inevitable. Yet, he may be one of the unluckiest presidents we've ever had. The year 2008 may be eventually be remembered as distinctly as 1776. We were the Petroleum Age in our Heyday.... Were.
During "scarcity economics", hoarding is the rule. When it becomes evident that the village is going to be low on firewood, the price of wood goes up catastrophically before the actual shortage hits. Why? Because of hoarding, the fear, the belief that the commodity will be scarce and therefore more valuable.
And the modern day version of hoarding? Futures Speculation.
Oil speculation, electric power speculation, food speculation etc.
We're being Enron-ated from every direction now. Sucks. Easy-does-it Earth is ready to fall like Rome. But Earth itself will go on as did the peninsula. We call them Italians now.
I hope whoever gets in this November has a lot of common sense. Humanity is going to need it. I hope we can still be called humans when this is all over.
We're going to desperately need a sense of humor.
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