Climate Change Added to US Government "High Risk" List

[MizMotown]

Published on Saturday, February 16, 2013 by Inter Press ServiceClimate Change Added to US Government “High Risk” List

by Carey L. Biron

WASHINGTON - For the first time, a U.S. government auditor has added climate change to a list of issues that pose the greatest financial risk to the government and country. It is also warning that Washington is markedly unprepared to deal with the scope of the problem.

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/02/16



.”It is the nature of the ego to take, and the nature of the spirit to share.”~ Proverb

“Anytime there is a struggle between doing what is actually right and doing what seems right, then your ego is interfering with your decision.”
~ Darren L. Johnson

Show me someone without an ego, and I'll show you a loser.
~ Donald Trump, How to Get Rich

[Jimaz]

Heh, you're on a roll, MizMotown.

Persevere!

[Ray1936]

"Any bird can build a nest, but it's not everyone can lay an egg."

-- Stan Laurel

[Jimaz]

^ Yeah, like that. LOL!

[Papasito]

Climate change is another reason to tax people and burden the economy and struggling populace during a faltering recovery, with initiatives paid for by an underfunded, oversized and overbearing Government who needs to borrow money just to fulfill their basic budgetary needs.

[Jimaz]

Attachment 18820
Noam Chomsky: How Climate Change Became a 'Liberal Hoax'

17:36: It's quite striking that, for a while, after the financial collapse, the super rich were kind of playing it cool, so they were trying to be not too ostentatious, but now it's over. The New York Times a couple days ago had a front-page article describing exactly this phenomenon: back to great parties, gala events, showing off how rich we are. Another article in the same issue said corporate profits have broken records, banks have so much money they don't know what to do with it. Well, you know, people may not know the details but they can see this. And they can see what's happening in their own lives. In manufacturing industry, unemployment's about at the rate of the great depression. I'm old enough to remember that. It was bad, but there was a kind of hopefulness. My relatives were mostly unemployed workers, but they were not desperate. They were poor but not desperate. Because it looked like something could happen. We could do things together, there's a better future. My seamstress aunts who were unemployed were in the garment workers' union and they got some benefits from that and they also felt that, there were also some educational programs, some cultural programs, they felt we could get out of this working together. People don't feel that now. And those manufacturing jobs are not coming back — not unless we have quite a different social order here. There's plenty of need for them. In fact, what's happening in this respect is sometimes almost surreal.

Look, the government effectively owned most of the auto industry for awhile. And the policies they were pursuing was closing down plants, just like GM had been doing. At the same moment, Obama's Transportation Secretary was in Europe, traveling around in Spain, trying to get contracts using stimulus money for Spanish factories to produce high-speed transport for the United States, which we desperately need, as anyone who has taken a train here knows. These things could be produced very well in Michigan and Indiana. Maybe not profitable for the bankers but certainly good for the workforce and the communities. But that wasn't even considered an option....

• Chomsky.info

[old guy]

Climate change is another reason to tax people and burden the economy and struggling populace during a faltering recovery, with initiatives paid for by an underfunded, oversized and overbearing Government who needs to borrow money just to fulfill their basic budgetary needs.

You were correct in some of your thoughts Papasito my friend. But give me an alternative. Where would you go from here? Chomsky makes some good points. We're in a hole, and need to dig our way out. The logical way isn't popular, nor is it easy.
I just don't see any other avenue we could take at this point. A recovery is the main focus, right. We have good reason to all pull together and try to make it work. A true recovery will probably be painful.
We need to change things, that's obvious. The politics and ideals of this country have fallen by the wayside over the last few decades. We need to fix it. And we need to work together to do it. There's no other way.
I know this might sound simplistic, but hey.... why not.

[TKshreve]

You were correct in some of your thoughts Papasito my friend. But give me an alternative. Where would you go from here? Chomsky makes some good points. We're in a hole, and need to dig our way out. The logical way isn't popular, nor is it easy.
I just don't see any other avenue we could take at this point. A recovery is the main focus, right. We have good reason to all pull together and try to make it work. A true recovery will probably be painful.
We need to change things, that's obvious. The politics and ideals of this country have fallen by the wayside over the last few decades. We need to fix it. And we need to work together to do it. There's no other way.
I know this might sound simplistic, but hey.... why not.

Old Guy -

Your premise is correct. It may sound general, but the underlying concept is exactly the issue.

What needs to be done will not be popular. It will fly in the face of big business. It will battle against the bottomless pockets of special interests and then face the scrutiny of our paid-for public servants. It will need the backing of the people. Many of these very people who have formulated opinions from dubious sources no less. It will take a LARGE following working together to overcome the aforementioned hurdles. And only then will we find our if out actions are not only in time, but swift enough to make a difference moving forward.

The human race has let its destiny fall by the wayside. Where once we had exploration and advancement at the forefront of our motivation to exist, we have replaced it with this sense of personal enrichment and a negligent/ignorant attitude towards preserving our planet. Space exploration is all but dead. And quality of living is now at battle with burgeoning populations who consume unending levels of resources. Our ethical compass is not pointed in the correct heading, and I wonder if it ever will again.

[ghettopalmetto]

Climate change is another reason to tax people and burden the economy and struggling populace during a faltering recovery, with initiatives paid for by an underfunded, oversized and overbearing Government who needs to borrow money just to fulfill their basic budgetary needs.

Climate change is a reason to tax people? No, what taxes people are:

*building gold-plated interstate highways all over kingdom come so we can drive 30 miles each way to work and Walmart

*building airports in every town of 100,000 people or more, because we refuse to build electrically-powered rail like every advanced nation on earth

*allowing companies to clear-cut forests and remove mountaintops on public lands for their own profit

*buying food from factories instead of local farms

*outlawing walkable and bikeable neighborhoods through zoning, forcing us to drive for the simplest tasks

*tearing down reusable buildings, wasting the construction materials, just to erect a new building with all brand-new materials

*abandoning inner city neighborhoods with existing infrastructure so we can build new, unneeded neighborhoods and accompanying infrastructure on our most productive local farmlands

*buying goods manufactured in nations thousands of miles away


All of these things cost MONEY. So much money, in fact, that very few nations can actually afford to subsist so wastefully.

[TKshreve]

Climate change is a reason to tax people? No, what taxes people are:

*building gold-plated interstate highways all over kingdom come so we can drive 30 miles each way to work and Walmart

*building airports in every town of 100,000 people or more, because we refuse to build electrically-powered rail like every advanced nation on earth

*allowing companies to clear-cut forests and remove mountaintops on public lands for their own profit

*buying food from factories instead of local farms

*outlawing walkable and bikeable neighborhoods through zoning, forcing us to drive for the simplest tasks

*tearing down reusable buildings, wasting the construction materials, just to erect a new building with all brand-new materials

*abandoning inner city neighborhoods with existing infrastructure so we can build new, unneeded neighborhoods and accompanying infrastructure on our most productive local farmlands

*buying goods manufactured in nations thousands of miles away


All of these things cost MONEY. So much money, in fact, that very few nations can actually afford to subsist so wastefully.

Didn't want to include any runaway entitlements? Here:

* Rewarding "parents" who cannot afford to have children with increasing gov't subsidies for each and every thereafter child [[usually out of wedlock).

*Propping up a welfare system that is rife with fraud and abuse. Not to mention our government condones this system being a way of life opposed to a second chance.

*The rampant fraud that exists within Medicare. Tens of BILLIONS of dollars are blindly handed out to people for years on end. The "Accountability Department" must cost too much to chase down these BILLIONS of dollars.

*Sending BILLIONS of dollars overseas in foreign aid.

*How about these cadillac health plans and lifetime pensions for public officials who serve anything over 2 years in office?

[ghettopalmetto]

Didn't want to include any runaway entitlements? Here:

* Rewarding "parents" who cannot afford to have children with increasing gov't subsidies for each and every thereafter child [[usually out of wedlock).

*Propping up a welfare system that is rife with fraud and abuse. Not to mention our government condones this system being a way of life opposed to a second chance.

*The rampant fraud that exists within Medicare. Tens of BILLIONS of dollars are blindly handed out to people for years on end. The "Accountability Department" must cost too much to chase down these BILLIONS of dollars.

*Sending BILLIONS of dollars overseas in foreign aid.

*How about these cadillac health plans and lifetime pensions for public officials who serve anything over 2 years in office?

The entitlements you cite don't contribute to global warming.

[TKshreve]

The entitlements you cite don't contribute to global warming.

Really? C'mon GP

Climate change is a reason to tax people? No, what taxes people are:

[ghettopalmetto]

You're missing my point, TKShreve. Papasito is claiming that fighting global warming is some sort of BS excuse to raise taxes. In reality, we're paying a LOT of money to CAUSE global warming, in the form of the examples I described.

If we want real change in the climate, we're all going to have to live a lot simpler and a lot less petroleum-dependent. That might mean recreating smaller local economies and people learning how to make and grow things again. Cutting down the length of supply chains, reducing petroleum use, using land more intensively--these things are all cost SAVING measures in the long run.

We're spending money to create a problem that is wholly unnecessary. Stop spending the money, and the problem betters itself.

[wolverine]

Climate change is another reason to tax people and burden the economy and struggling populace during a faltering recovery, with initiatives paid for by an underfunded, oversized and overbearing Government who needs to borrow money just to fulfill their basic budgetary needs.

These initiatives should have been paid for long ago back when we had a strong economy. Fact is climate saving technologies are close to a tipping point where they will pay for themselves. So we must invest alot of money upfront for technology that will save much more money in the long run but also help the environment. I heard some people whining recently about my city's decision to eliminate coal sourced power generation from their portfolio. Hence around 200 workers fired and the plants shuttered. But that's only 200 workers and coal power isn't exactly cheap anymore. Why not for the same price switch to solar and hire say 600 workers for the same price?

[JBMcB]

These things could be produced very well in Michigan and Indiana. Maybe not profitable for the bankers but certainly good for the workforce and the communities. But that wasn't even considered an option....

It's almost as if no company in Michigan or Indiana [[or the US for that matter) knows how to build a high speed passenger rail engine. Weird.

[wolverine]

It's almost as if no company in Michigan or Indiana [[or the US for that matter) knows how to build a high speed passenger rail engine. Weird.

The US is really good at building parts for them though!

[TKshreve]

These initiatives should have been paid for long ago back when we had a strong economy. Fact is climate saving technologies are close to a tipping point where they will pay for themselves. So we must invest alot of money upfront for technology that will save much more money in the long run but also help the environment. I heard some people whining recently about my city's decision to eliminate coal sourced power generation from their portfolio. Hence around 200 workers fired and the plants shuttered. But that's only 200 workers and coal power isn't exactly cheap anymore. Why not for the same price switch to solar and hire say 600 workers for the same price?

A paradigm shift such as this on a national level would be ground to a halt with our bureaucracy. Sad but true.

[Richard]

It's almost as if no company in Michigan or Indiana [[or the US for that matter) knows how to build a high speed passenger rail engine. Weird.

Not true,contract says must be made in US by US workers,the recent round could have been built in Detroit,even at that loss Michigan still makes the majority of the components and did recieve those contracts.

All fed contracts must be made in US.

The statements of manufacturing not ever coming back are also not true , everything is in place but the workforce and a prepared city.

Propaganda at its best.

[JBMcB]

Not true,contract says must be made in US by US workers,t

You're right, after some research I found the two Acela Express engines were built in the US. It didn't go well:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/24/na...cela.html?_r=0

All fed contracts must be made in US.

That's patently absurd. The Army uses APCs and machine guns built in Europe. Where do you think all the computers and cell phones the government uses are built? Domestic manufacturers might get preference, but it's not exclusive.

[/QUOTE]Propaganda at its best.[/QUOTE]

What propaganda? It's a simple fact, the US isn't great at building *everything* We're great at building medical and industrial equipment. China is excellent with small electronics. Russia, for some reason, is excellent at welding tungsten, which is why a lot of vacuum-tube style components are built there. Taiwan is the capital of injection molding. And France and Spain are fantastic at building high speed rail engines.

[wolverine]

You're right, after some research I found the two Acela Express engines were built in the US. It didn't go well:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/24/na...cela.html?_r=0



That's patently absurd. The Army uses APCs and machine guns built in Europe. Where do you think all the computers and cell phones the government uses are built? Domestic manufacturers might get preference, but it's not exclusive.

Any of those foreign companies could set up shop though in the US. Bombardier is a Canadian company, but Chicago bought $1 Billion worth of new subway trains from them last year. Those trains are manufactured in New York, not Canada, China, or anywhere in Europe.

[rb336]

I think Siemens has a plant in the US too

[Richard]

I think Siemens has a plant in the US too

GE also, Michigan has many component suppliers for rail, which makes it ripe for a car builder.

Bomadiar used millions in state pension funds to have A Khan build a factory in the south a few years back then built a couple of rail cars then bolted leaving everybody holding the bag for the cost of the plant, just to circumvent the rule.

IMO they should be banned from the U.S.

Solair? The largest manufacture of solar panels was bought by the Chinese then the manufacturing aspect moved there but assembled here to abide by the rules.

The battery company in Detroit was also purchased by the Chinese.and now can supply the U.S military.

Climate change is 99% politics ,DuPont held the patent for freon exclusive,the patent was running out on this billion dollar a year industry boom freon eats the ozone ,it was the fault of DuPont R12 call it ozone eater then you can open up a whole new market ,which is what happened.

Millions of gallons of clorine which is also a ozone eater evaporates every year but that part is okay because it is already an open market.

Climate change may be there or not but it is a different tool to gain funding to serve ones agenda verses scamming a hedge fund or comming up with a large mortgage scam, if it all goes south nobody goes to jail it's just another day.