DENIAL OF GLOBAL WARMING

Someone who I have known for a long time and have only more recently distanced myself from commented on one of my pages about an article I posted in which a senator from Oklahoma claimed that polls show Americans aren't buying the propaganda on Global Warming. I had said in my post that I'd been hearing about global warming as an environmental issue since grade school. Only more recently has there seemed to be such a backlash to the evidences presented by climatologists. More specifically, I think that the current backlash is one involving rising fuel prices and justification for our current level of usage of fossil fuels. Those denying global warming as a fact don't want to take any responsibility for their participation in its destructive effects, and don't want to feel like they have to cut back on their lifestyles in order to help stop its continued escalation.

The person who is now more of a former friend, who had left comments was quoting facts and using numbers that, even if right, are weak attempts to counter the incontrovertible evidence of melting ice caps, rising temperatures, and the death of many species. Even more disturbing than their denial of the obvious evidence is their basic dismissal of the ideology behind attempts to preserve the environment, that of working to stave of extinctions and help create healthy habitats. These are important whether you believe in climate change or not and are philosophies that pro-gun, pro-death penalty and pro-War in Iraq conservatives can't come close to appreciating.

CANDIDATES/GAS PRICE PROMISES/ALTERNATIVE FUEL SOURCES

The article linked by pressing this post's title is about how the candidates are promising lower gas prices and their strategies to effectively cut those gas prices. Isn't this the same song and dance we've been getting for months? We keep hearing politicians talk about lower gas prices, but the best they've been able to offer is stabilizing prices so that they aren't continuing to rise $.25 a week.

What an accomplishment! I mean the same week that both Bush AND McCain called over and over again for off-shore drilling for oil as a solution to our energy crisis, Honda rolled out the first few dozen of its commercially available hydrogen/electric hybrid.

We have reached a period of critical mass with our energy consumption: Either we continue to follow the archaic political solutions and power plays of the Cold-War Era ideologies of Bush, McCain and their like, or we adapt NOW to this rapidly emerging technology, one which will become widely available very soon, and which will leave us in the dust in terms of our industrial market. While GM still struggles to get their version of this car ready for mass-production, our government leaders have yet to get the clue that gas, oil, and politics in the Arab states are over. US citizens are tired of it and even if they don't all see this new type of technology as the solution, as soon as it becomes more reasonably priced and gains mass appeal, even doubters will see it as a better solution and Big Oil as an industry will see its downfall.

Whoever is determined to vote for McCain: If you do, we'll continue to see delays in critical technology that will free us from all of these energy woes and dependency on foreign powers, that's on top of the environmental impact of further flooding the oceans with pollutants. Think VERY carefully before you cast your vote.

PROGRESSIVE POLITICS AND EVANGELICAL CHRISTIANITY

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080622/pl_nm/usa_politics_evangelicals_dc

This Yahoo article is interesting because it makes me realize that the older conservative Christian Right has controlled the image of Evangelical Christians for decades and to this day they maintain that control. How true is their assertion that they represent the majority? How much of their conservative rhetoric really lies at the heart of those who would identify as the Right?

Perhaps it is a sign of the times that the majority of Gen X and younger people are so dissatisfied with the archaic political practices represented by the majority parties that many people on either side of the political line are identifying as independents. Perhaps it is a sign of our distrust and apathy for the older constructions that have kept us locked in a system where we are so easily controlled by the major corporations and money groups that own our leaders. Whatever the origin, young people with conservative views of big social issues such as gay marriage and abortion are finding themselves in line with progressives on issues like the environment. They identify their faith as being a major part of their political decisions and yet, despite continuing to asset that they represent the majority of religious conservatives, the Republican Party is starting to see an exodus of their younger conservative base over issues that they can't address due to their lack of ability to divorce themselves from big money.

TRY TO COUNTER THESE STATEMENT

I think the video explains itself, but most important, I think that general policy discussions and the positions of our current regime over the last eight years absolutely affirm these statements, or at least it doesn't offer evidence to refute them.

BARRACK OBAMA/COURTING THE BLACK VOTE....

What does it say when conservative black voters, and especially religious conservatives among the black community, refuse to or at least have trouble supporting a black presidential candidate? Are you really having to decide between race politics and your religious values? If Barrack Obama doesn't represent the specific issues of parts of the black community while being a black man talking about poverty issues, than what issues are those conservatives who have a problem voting for him identifying as essential to their racial identity? Is it the same question of 'is he black enough?' or does this go beyond that and identify a deep problem in the identity of the African American communities and their disowning other portions of the community?

While being black doesn't equal being poor and living in urban areas, there are enough people who do that we can say there are historically black neighborhoods and that poverty and violence is still an issue identified by many community leaders as very present in their communities. How does addressing these issues in a progressive way, or at least trying to speak to people affected by poverty equal not being an issue to be addressed by the black community?

I don't think this is necessarily about race politics per se. I think that the important part to remember is that his struggle as a person of color coming from a working class background represents many of the issues and struggles of disenfranchised people all over our society. We, the disenfranchised, are desparate for some hope of progressive change, or at least to have our voices heard over the continual rhetoric of conservative white Christian politics we've suffered through for too many years. More than any other president in modern political history, Barrack Obama has the potential to create drastic change in the discourse of US politics, and in how we view ourselves.

Unless it turns out that he has some secret camp where he sends people to be put to death, I'm voting for him and I'm not ashamed. Yes, I'm voting for him because he's a black man, not because it will add color to an otherwise white-washed White House, but because of his experience in an ethnic class and social class that puts him in a different place than other politicians like Alan Keys, and I'm going to vote for him because he brings those experiences with him into his progressive politics, politics that give the potential for real in our civilization, and not just a new name on an old face.

BIG OIL AND THE REPUBLICANS THAT LOVE THEM

Check out the Yahoo! article today about the Republicans in the Senate blocking legislation to impose a windfall profit tax on the oil industry. This windfall tax imposes a tax when the industry acquires suspiciously high profits for the market price of its product.

The oil industry reported a record setting $40 billion in profits this last year despite the skyrocketting prices at the gas pump and the insistence that it was coming from the price and availability of crude. The prices per barrel aren't going up in comparison to some shrinking demand, however, they're going up in comparison to the weakening US dollar.

Republicans argue that it would cause the lessening of domestic production and an increase in imports. We already import more than 2/3rds of our oil, what's the difference? They also blocked the passage of further tax breaks on alternative energy industries. Why? Because someone called them up and told them to hold on a little longer until they buy their next house in Spain before they impose an extra tax.

My proposal is this: We sued the tobacco industry for the long-term effects of their cigarettes, it's time to sue the major oil companies so that we can all benefit from a lowered fuel price. We are slowly being crippled by some of the most flagrant corporate manipulation of the market and control of the government, so much so that now that we are finally aware of how bad it's getting, it is already too late for millions to lose their jobs and homes, for our food costs to get too high to be able to eat, and for our "great nation" to be crushed under the stupidity of leaders owned by a corrupt industry.

The article is at:
http://http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080610/ap_on_go_co/congress_oil_profits

CORPORATIONS ACCOUNTING FOR KILLING OUR ECONOMY

DUE TO: US Corporations taking advantage of the practice of outsourcing and exploiting cheap labor forces in destitute economies, they have eroded the US job markets, cutting into consumers' ability to spend and proportionally cutting away at the whole of our economy. The mass use of this exploitation was to strengthen their own corporate image among shareholders in a shaky economy, and so the problem isn't circumstantial but instead systematic and has been going on for a long time. Make no mistake: corporations see consumers as a resource for themselves to make money both by their own products and by the confidence of investors. They have no problem with abusing the consumer market as long as they benefit.

On the flipside, they are exploiting the labor of poor countries yet sending away US dollars into foreign markets. While this money is perhaps less than they would pay for equivilant numbers of workers or in providing work environments up to US legal standards and conditions dictated by workers' rights, they would at least help to reduce the amount of money bleeding away.

If corporations refuse to use their own spending ability to increase the amount of money in the US consumer market and thereby create an ACTUAL stability in their own profits, than they should be fined or taxed in proportion to their impact on the job market, taxability and spending of US consumers. The money they make off us is disproportionate to the amount of money they are sending over seas, while at the same time cutting back on jobs we need and money we've earned.

Corporations should be held accountable for their detrimental effects on the US economy. While they might have the short term solution of cutting costs and increasing productivity, they've essentially eroded the basis of their own prophits and lowered the confidence of consumers across the board. If they won't reinvest some of their profits and encourage growth at home, they should be taxed in proportion to the amount of services the government is forced to take to make up for their failings.

CORPORATIONS SHOULD ANSWER FOR AILING ECONOMY

Until the last few years we've been able to take comfort in a strong economy despite the growing number of jobs being imported to cheaper labor forces in other countries. This has been the case for years in the garment industry but now was stretching into corporate America. In the past few years as corporations tried to stem bleeding budgets and recover losses, they began a mass exodus of staple middle-class jobs like call centers, customer service, manufacturing.

Not only have these corporations moved these jobs to other nations, but they've exploited the low wages, standards of living, and lack of workers rights to produce cheaper products, streamline services, and ultimately reduce the economic capacity of middle-America. Fewer jobs equals fewer people who can buy things. This equals lower sales, less homeowners, lower credit, higher rates of people defaulting on loans, etc...

The variable rate mortages were another way of taking advantage of a seemingly strong economy held together by these stable corporate earnings and low interest rates, but ultimately as gas prices started to rise and put a crunch on every other industry, along with the further erosion of the US job market, people couldn't live on the type of credit they'd come to rely on.

Corporations that export labor are one of the most important factors to our ailing economy. Bring those jobs home, and even if they aren't proportionally creating as many jobs here due to minimum wages, at least they'll bring some mobility to the work force. If they don't bring jobs home, and insist on spreading those corporate dollars earned from US consumers, they should be taxed in proportion to the amount of money that they are bleeding away from our own economy.