Presidential Errors

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Presidential Errors
Tweet Topic Started: Feb 19 2006, 07:48 PM (850 Views)
cmoehle	Feb 20 2006, 12:08 PM Post #16
Chris - San Antonio TX Posts: 36,959 Group: Members Member #1 Joined: June 6, 2004	That's our problem, depending on leaders, government leaders, which is an oxymoron.
	Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order. --Barry Goldwater


cascade	Feb 20 2006, 12:09 PM Post #17
Lloyd...Michie,Tennesse Posts: 351 Group: Members Member #45 Joined: July 12, 2004	My #1, (not listed) would be using hundreds of millions of tax payers dollars, to advance North Korea's nuclear program, under the Clinton Admin, not to mention the sale of Super Computer to China.
	"[Do not] suffer yourselves to be wheedled out of your liberty [to publish] by any pretenses of politeness, delicacy or decency. These, as they are often used, are but three different names for hypocrisy, chicanery and cowardice." --John Adams


Stoney	Feb 20 2006, 12:30 PM Post #18
Huntsville, AL Posts: 2,771 Group: Members Member #216 Joined: October 22, 2005	Lon, about global warning. Other than cutting some trees I don't know what this administration has done a lot different than those before it. And by the way, I'd say leave the trees. They've tried to expand drilling with no success. I've read a lot over the last year of so about global warming, trying to step over the obvious political agendas on both sides. And I think the obvious political sites add to the distrust of the issue with exaggeration. But I do see a need to develop other forms of energy. My guess is this administration is doing about as much towards that end as any before it. I would agree it's not enough. I suggest making it an issue of them versus us with not get it very far, and is why it hasn't been taken very seriously. It will take pressure from the public (republicans and democrats) to get politicians on board.
	The character inherent in the American people has done all that has been accomplished; and it would have done somewhat more, if the government had not sometimes got in its way. Henry David Thoreau


cmoehle	Feb 20 2006, 12:38 PM Post #19
Chris - San Antonio TX Posts: 36,959 Group: Members Member #1 Joined: June 6, 2004	Since the topic is drifting this way, an interesting piece on the so-called Consensus About Consensus on Global Warming. In short, there is none.
	Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order. --Barry Goldwater


5thwheeler	Feb 20 2006, 12:50 PM Post #20
Get the message? Posts: 1,018 Group: Members Member #161 Joined: March 16, 2005	Quote: Those who know a little about me, know that I've been a professional environmentalist all my adult life. My resume is rather heavy, with some very serious players. In the early 1990's I started preaching that mankind, and the U.S. in particular, must begin to evolve beyond our dependence on fossil fuels. In the late 90's, I started telling people that global warming was indeed a reality (regardless of the then current 'science' countering it, produced by oil compaies). Nice post Lon, but you can stop patting yourself on the back. The "save the environment" movement started in America well over a century ago by the likes of John Muir, Teddy Roosevelt, and other notable people. Anyone living in, or around a large industrial city saw, and felt the effects from breathing polluted air, and drinking bacteria laden water and sewage. Concerns about global warming were brought to the publics eye long before the early 1990's. I am a tree hugger and much prefer the smell of a Ponderosa Pine over that of Asphalt, but to lay the blame solely on GW's administration for not doing enough about it is just plan wrong.
	History 101: When a popular myth is believed to be factual, teach the myth. Its not possible to underestimate the intelligence of the voting populous. Hummm, after seeing the results of the 06 election, I may have to modify my perception of the voting populous and refer to them as "Late Bloomers".


Lon Frank	Feb 20 2006, 01:27 PM Post #21
Member Posts: 782 Group: Members Member #109 Joined: October 23, 2004	Stoney, I agree that like global warming itself, the leadership or lack thereof, has been complex and fractured. The Bush Administration, however, has been in my opinion, culpable of misleadiing the issues for the gain of political supporters. I distinctly remember GW himself, on television saying we weren't going to support the Kyoto agreement because 'his' team of scientists were unsure of global warming in the first place. That was the same week which the Woods Hole Institute (about as good a group of scientists as exist) released its report of the increasing temperture of the Gulf Stream and its possible repercussions. Within the first few months, the Bush Administration replaced many experienced governmental evironmental managers with ex-executives of the oil and timber industries. The trickle-down anti-environment policies of Bush has affected many agencies and even private study groups which rely upon federal monies for support. Two years ago, a major NASA scientist complained that the Bush Administration was trying to silence his opinion as to the seriousness of global warming - did you hear about him? I wonder why not. As to global warming itself, one of the major problems with it, is it's complexity. Unlike most environmental issues, it crosses all borders of physical and predictability based science domains. To attempt to fully understand it's impact, a biologist has to talk to a geologist, who has compared notes with a meterologist, who has examined data from oceanologists, who talked to vulcanologists, .... ect, ect. Even last night's 60 Minutes report gave into the public tear jerking ploy of playing up the polar bears' sad situation. While this is great fodder for the people who may give global warming about 60 seconds worth of thought, the whole idea diminishes the concept. Have you ever seen a polar bear in the wild? I haven't, and I don't expect to. If we lost every single one of them tomorrow, I'd still eat lunch, and I imagine you would as well. Same goes for the little obscure Alaskan village which has a couple feet of higher water right now. Who really cares in the global scheme of things today?!! Now, when you start talking about the seriousness of hurricanes, that's a different thing altogether, because it may affect US where we live. It did me, this last year, in fact, to the tune of $50,000. And I had been preaching about just that sort of thing! I guess I didn't really believe it, when it came to my house. Again, the complexity of global warming is the problem. Some people say we have questions about it, so it must not exist. We have questions about it because it DOES exist, and there are no concerted efforts to study it. This is my biggest beef with Bush. We are supposed to be world leaders. Where's our leadership in this? Perhaps submerged beneath oil company profits? My prediction of the melting of the arctic ice cap is grandstanding on my part. It's a slam dunk; I can't lose. The ice is melting now, the temp is still going up, and everything we could do right now would not change it for a year or so. Polar ice REFLECTS over 90% of the sunlight heat. Polar water ABSORBS over 90% of the sunlight heat. Right now, we have a shrinking mirror. Soon, we'll have a great new heat sink. The ice will melt, and it will melt faster and faster. Climate change is NOT lineal. The melting ice will release huge amounts of fresh water into the north Atlantic. The great ocean currents are driven by fresher water circulating near the surface, then giving up their heat in the north Atlantic and gathering salinity, sinking to return at deeper levels around the world. This is what makes Europe livable. This is why London is warmer than Fargo, North Dakota. Will the influx of fresh water affect the ocean currents? Will Europe be faced with another ice age? Will the United States be affected, or will it become the global scape goat? My personal worry point is about tectonic plate movement as the weight of the ocean alters. Who knows? Who's studying, compiling, reporting, comparing? This is my problem with Bush - we had the opportunity to provide world leadership, and we burried our head in the ground, because what we might find may disrupt life and profit as we like it.



Lon Frank	Feb 20 2006, 01:53 PM Post #22
Member Posts: 782 Group: Members Member #109 Joined: October 23, 2004	5thwheeler, I'm sorry you think I'm patting myself on the back. Maybe if I'd been more vocal, more active, had more vision, I would have a reason to gloat. As it is, while I'm certainly no Muir or Carson, I did partcipate in the first Earth Day, over 30 years ago, and have an active record for some time back. I have worked for two governmental agencies, founded two environmental corporations in America. I invented the methodologies for a company which is now the largest of it's kind, providing leak detection to petroleum facilities. My clients include the largest corporation in the world, and I was the sole manager for a specialized remediation at the biggest refinery in America. My company accomplished over 300 site remediations in 9 states. With my own money, I founded a corporation in Costa Rica, in the early 90's, to promote astute environmental use of the rainforest ecosystems. I have on occasion, made a slight difference, and I have more often found myself alone on a dead end trail. Patting myself on the back? Maybe. But as a bona fide 'insider', I can assure you that the Bush Administration has done more to stall, dismember, and disimulate the environmental movement you fondly speak of, than all the individual corporate and special interest pressures of the last 20 years. I'm a very, very, little fish. When I feel like George W. Bush cares enough to do even what I have done, I'll get off his case.



Stoney	Feb 20 2006, 01:57 PM Post #23
Huntsville, AL Posts: 2,771 Group: Members Member #216 Joined: October 22, 2005	You want to blame all this on GW, but who in the republican party champions this cause? Why? Because of the way the argument is framed. It is framed as a partisan issue. If it were framed as �clean air,� �clean fuel� that makes us oil independent, then I think it could get more traction. The politicization of this issue makes it dead on arrival. Blaming republicans or this administration for Global Warming will get the issue nowhere. And from what I've read, the clearing of the rain forests has done much more damage than we have. I don't know that I agree with the concept of Global Warming. But I think we can come together on this issue and make some progress that will satisfy us all.
	The character inherent in the American people has done all that has been accomplished; and it would have done somewhat more, if the government had not sometimes got in its way. Henry David Thoreau


campingken	Feb 20 2006, 02:11 PM Post #24
Member Posts: 1,332 Group: Members Member #56 Joined: July 18, 2004	Over 51% of Americans breath polluted air. We worry about oil but it is my understanding that only 15% of the world's fresh water is potable. I agree with Lon Frank. The Bush admin is way too pro business and business is interested in profits not the environment. This is not being critical of business as they exist to make a profit but without some regulations by the government we foul our own nests. The Earth has seen at least 5 major die offs where up too 98% of life forms go extinct. If we stay on course and kill ourselves off the earth will heal after a few million years. Ken



justme	Feb 20 2006, 02:57 PM Post #25
Member Posts: 434 Group: Members Member #55 Joined: July 18, 2004	NASA and USGS have raised the alarm about global warming over the past few years. They have not been unable to quantized it to a point as to what are the causes and therefore what can we do if any thing anything about it. Man can cut some CO2, but what about water vapor, methane, geo thermal, volcanoes and sun spots? We have the sun that has over the past decade gone through a sun spot cycle. This is significant because Mars has been observed to be in a global warming as well--as indicated by its snow caps receding. I have no problem about doing things to conserve energy, in fact I just purchased a car that gets 50+ mpg and installed solar panels to supplement my water and house heating. I did this because it became cost effective. I am concerned about the hype that "it's too late" and man "is the culprit" and all other rhetorics that are trying to stimulate urgency. These urgency creating tactics in the past have cause us to do crazy things that turned out to be no solution at all-- but the some enjoyed it our expense. I think the Bush administration is finally addressing this issue more strongly, mainly to get us away from foreign influence-- that is the same message he had when he went into offic and is selling a little better these days. I see no problem for us to get more conservation minded and alternative energy--somethin Bush should have promoted in the begining, but I do have a problem with the urgency that seems to be gathering steam-- especially since the science is still unsettled.



cascade	Feb 20 2006, 03:20 PM Post #26
Lloyd...Michie,Tennesse Posts: 351 Group: Members Member #45 Joined: July 12, 2004	Speaking of engery conservation, this looks like a new development in solar panels. http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=...10132138C184427
	"[Do not] suffer yourselves to be wheedled out of your liberty [to publish] by any pretenses of politeness, delicacy or decency. These, as they are often used, are but three different names for hypocrisy, chicanery and cowardice." --John Adams


Lon Frank	Feb 20 2006, 03:31 PM Post #27
Member Posts: 782 Group: Members Member #109 Joined: October 23, 2004	Well again, I appologise for hijacking this thread to something I just wanted to talk about a little. I've read some really good responses and been taken to task for what I've written, which is a good thing as well. I'll just give a little back to the last few posters, and take a break. Ken, like you, I let my mind wander sometimes, to the changes the world has seen or is yet to see. It's interesting to think that life itself may have ebbs and flows, one species rising to dominance, another disappearing. I learned a long time ago, that we cannot save the world anymore than we can distroy it. We can only preserve or prolong the environmental situation which allows us to live, or adversely affect it as we develop. So far, we've done pretty well. Let's hope we still have the capacity to learn and the flexability to adapt. Justme, I admire you for using the alternate energy sources! I think sometimes that I will move to another area and employ a lifestyle of much less impact. But I'm old now, or so my doctors tell me. Perhaps the pessimism of age shows through in what I say or write sometimes. I regret that. I regret that I cannot be more in this worldwide debate. And Stoney, you are absolutely correct. The clearing and burning of tropical forests add more greenhouse gasses than do all of our industrial applications. As the rainforest is cleared, the understory dries and becomes more suseptable to fire, so the cycle continues. Of course, all this is ultimately attributable to man's pressure upon the environment. Then, there's the sun spot thing justme mentioned. I was not even aware of this connection, but I did say it was complex. Were it not for global warming, there's still bird flu, rogue metorites, and the Korean atomic situation to worry about. I may be entirely wrong about global warming, and it may be much worse than any of us believe. It will probably be something in between, and we all can just shake our heads and remember how little we really are. I notice your tag line from Thoreau. I leave you with one of my favorite quotes by him: "January 26, 1853 ...The world has visibly been recreated in the night. Mornings of creation, I call them. In the midst of these marks of a creative energy recently active, while the sun is rising with more than usual splendor, I look back... for the era of this creation, not into the night, but to a dawn for which no man ever rose early enough. A morning which carries us back beyond the Mosaic creation, where crystallizations are fresh and unmelted. It is the poet's hour. Mornings when men are new-born, men who have the seeds of life in them." Lon On edit - thanks cascade, for the solar panel info. I lost so many trees to Rita, that solar may now be feasible. I do have a little wind generator, but tell myself I'm saving it for an emergency. What, I can't imagine.



CalRed	Feb 20 2006, 03:52 PM Post #28
Member Posts: 1,087 Group: Members Member #128 Joined: November 30, 2004	Don't forget John Kennedy making a fool of himself right after he took office by publicly condemning Dwight Eisenhower for not advancing the Nuclear Bomber program. Or Jimmy Carter claiming during a fishing trip that a "killer rabbit" attacked him. Probably helped him lose the 80 election. Or Jimmy Carter claiming he had seen a UFO. Or maybe JFK's big blunder at the Berlin wall when he said "Ich bin ein Berliner!" which means "I am a jelly doughnut." Clinton said on national television that he "did not have sexual relations with that woman." Unfortunately for him, the evidence proved otherwise. Bill Clinton getting impeached by being the biggest liar known to man - only the 2nd president to do so. Or could Andrew Jackson marrying a married woman fit the bill? William Howard Taft once got stuck in the White House bath tub. He weighed 300 lbs and had to have new tubs installed. FDR trying to "stack" the US Supreme Court in 1937. Jimmy Carter again when he botched the attempt to rescue the 52 hostages from the US Embassy in Iran.
	Something instead of Nothing? "I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing." Alan Sandage


Photobitstream	Feb 20 2006, 04:04 PM Post #29
Darron - Austin, TX Posts: 1,025 Group: Members Member #229 Joined: December 15, 2005	cmoehle Feb 20 2006, 11:42 AM All the reasons, including those justifying invasion, were given. Granted, the focus shifted over time, the White House's and ours as the grave threat faded. But all the reasons were given from the start. Now you're practicing revisionist history. The focus shift over time because the reasons stated before the invasion turned out to be bogus. Remember the yellow cake document? You know, the forged one which the CIA and Italian analysts warned the bush administration was unreliable? How about Colin Powell going before the United Nations and stating we knew Iraq had WMDs and we knew where they were? Or George's infamous 16 words in the 2003 SOTU? You've obviously forgotten Dick Cheney's assertions that Saddam had close ties with Al Queda. Do you remember Donald Rumsfeld testifying before Congress that the war would last no more than six months, cost no more than $1.9 billion, and the Iraqi people would greet us with flowers in the streets? George W Bush stated repeatedly, before the invasion, that the War in Iraq was not about regime change, but about removing an imminent threat to the United States and the region. Now he's stating repeatedly that the invasion was all about toppling a tyrant and installing Democracy. Do you see the lie?
	"Their chief weapon, however, was their capacity to astonish. Nobody else could believe, until it was much too late, just how heartless and greedy they actually were." Kurt Vonnegut, Breakfast of Champions


CalRed	Feb 20 2006, 04:06 PM Post #30
Member Posts: 1,087 Group: Members Member #128 Joined: November 30, 2004	Global warming is still just a myth. It's just like evolution. A theory or hypothesis that has not and will not be proven. Something to get excited about but it isn't occurring. In fact the earth presently is getting cooler. "The global-warming hypothesis, is no longer tenable. Scientists have been able to test it carefully, and it does not hold up. During the past 50 years, as atmospheric carbon dioxide levels have risen, scientists have made precise measurements of atmospheric temperature. These measurements have definitively shown that major atmospheric greenhouse warming of the atmosphere is not occurring and is unlikely ever to occur. The temperature of the atmosphere fluctuates over a wide range, the result of solar activity and other influences. During the past 3,000 years, there have been five extended periods when it was distinctly warmer than today. One of the two coldest periods, known as the Little Ice Age, occurred 300 years ago. Atmospheric temperatures have been rising from that low for the past 300 years, but remain below the 3,000-year average. Why are temperatures rising? The first chart nearby shows temperatures during the past 250 years, relative to the mean temperature for 1951-70. The same chart shows the length of the solar magnetic cycle during the same period. Close correlation between these two parameters--the shorter the solar cycle (and hence the more active the sun), the higher the temperature--demonstrates, as do other studies, that the gradual warming since the Little Ice Age and the large fluctuations during that warming have been caused by changes in solar activity. The highest temperatures during this period occurred in about 1940. During the past 20 years, atmospheric temperatures have actually tended to go down, as shown in the second chart, based on very reliable satellite data, which have been confirmed by measurements from weather balloons. Consider what this means for the global-warming hypothesis. This hypothesis predicts that global temperatures will rise significantly, indeed catastrophically, if atmospheric carbon dioxide rises. Most of the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide has occurred during the past 50 years, and the increase has continued during the past 20 years. Yet there has been no significant increase in atmospheric temperature during those 50 years, and during the 20 years with the highest carbon dioxide levels, temperatures have decreased. In science, the ultimate test is the process of experiment. If a hypothesis fails the experimental test, it must be discarded. Therefore, the scientific method requires that the global warming hypothesis be rejected." source
	Something instead of Nothing? "I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing." Alan Sandage


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