Climate Change Doubts and Cap-and-Trade Fears

Let me begin by saying I am all for environmentalism. Using less, recycling, using energy saving appliances and driving fuel-efficient vehicles makes sense, not only environmentally, but also economically. That said, I am not a believer of man-made global warming—excuse me—climate change fear mongering, nor am I a fan of the proposed cap-and-trade legislation that congress will debate in further depth later in the year.

Firstly, when I repeatedly hear that the “science is settled” and there is no need for continued debate, I am immediately skeptical, which is a good thing. There are many points to make about why climate change is natural, following a natural cycle, and is not man-made. My personal favorite is the statistic that “Man-made carbon dioxide emissions throughout human history constitute less than 0.00022 percent of the total naturally emitted from the mantle of the earth during geological history.” If we have emitted that little, how are we contributing so much to the demise of the planet? Why did warmer periods in earth’s history come 800 years before significant rises in CO2 levels? Why is it that even though CO2 emissions increased dramatically following WWII, temperatures dropped for the following four decades? How is it that even though earth’s temperatures have been higher than today and CO2 levels have often been higher, as many as ten times higher, we have caused the current changes in climate? These are more than legitimate questions that need to be answered before we move forward, or take action on any proposal that could cost a massive amount of money and possibly cause hard times, and there are many more questions that could be asked.

Please Don’t Feed the Animals!

The title says it all, doesn’t it? Or does it? The picture in front of us is one that is comical when you first look at it, but has a deeper meaning when you actually think about it. The picture itself is funny. The background is red, white and blue with stars along the bottom to signify it is a truly American image. Along the top is the quote “Don’t Feed the Animals!” and in the center lays an elephant and donkey eating cash. The fat, depressed elephant stands for the “Grand Ole Party” and the just as fat, ugly donkey for the democrats! It really looks funny makes you laugh and say “Stupid politicians!” But if you really think about it politicians are animals and the two parties have absolutely failed us. They are greedy, lousy, snorting, good-for-nothing pigs.

The two party system has failed us yet the majority of Americans still believe that the democrats and republicans represent them and their individual values. The politicians in Washington have become so incredibly corrupt and so similar that voting for parties results in no change now. The Republicans failed us miserably under President Bush. We got involved in a stupid war, spent billions of dollars, expanded the federal government, and created the largest budget deficits in the history of the country.

The Case Against the Public Option

Healthcare insurance reform is desperately needed in this country, no one questions that. Costs are sky-rocketing and there are 35.92 million uninsured American citizens. We have politicians in Washington telling us that the only way to effectively cover the 45.657 million uninsured Americans is through a government run public insurance option. Notice the difference in the numbers, the almost 10 million more that politicians cite include illegal immigrants—non US citizens. We face an incredible problem, our people can not be cared for because they can not afford insurance and they can most definitely not afford the costs out-of-pocket. We need a solution, but what is it?

Breaking Now… Nothing

The media in the United States offers much controversy to examine. The news media in particular offers one of the biggest areas of controversy and discussion, with bias, validity, its role, the value of the news it covers and whether or not it is doing the best job it can for its consumers, the American people. We have to ask ourselves the role that the news media plays in our lives, and if it is adequately informing us or if it is time we change our sources of information.

When examining the mainstream news media the first question to ask is: What is the role that the news media is supposed to play? Should the news media be an independent commentator, a press-release reader, a simple informant, or a fourth branch of government providing checks and balances to the other three? The answer is a combination of all four; the most important being the last, and the least important being the second. The US news media should be critical of everything government does, to keep it in line; but it should also inform the people of what the government wants them to know (i.e. press release reader). It should offer separate, independent, varying opinions of people on both sides in addition to being a simple informant. The news media should be a place where people can go to get the full factual account of major news items, how they affect you, the government’s role, and both sides of the story.

The paramount problem with the news media today is that its driving factor is not truthful, accurate, meaningful information – but ratings. Ratings dictate what is aired; the things people are more interested in are better for ratings, no matter how useless the knowledge. People in this country are no longer interested in what actually matters, they are so hollywooded in American Idol, celebrity gossip, and other superfluous garbage, and we have the media to blame for that. Our airwaves are clogged with the information that we want to know about rather than the information that we need to know. That information gets the networks ratings, in turn making them more money – therefore they give us what we want. The literal junk that is fed to us is repulsive. Does anyone else think that it is a little wrong that fifteen percent of all of the news coverage that aired during the first three weeks of October 2009 was concerning “Balloon Boy”? What did we miss that could have been valuable? Information on the health care debate? Energy? $680 Billion in military spending? Afghanistan? We were too busy focusing on the back-story and what was going on with the family, all because of a little boy that went missing for a few hours. Am I the only one who finds this wrong? It’s time we got some REAL news.