Global warming?

Originally Posted by Undertoad

Another day, another Redux straw man.

Bullshit....This discussion is littered with straw men...and from my perspective, it comes more from the other side.

Start with Merc's most recent article (that led to this latest discussion) that distorted and grossly misrepresented the cost of the current energy/climate legislation under consideration.

Then on to your pretty chart where the years 1947-73 look great. Why is that.....could it be that the post-WWII boom years, from 1947-55, resulted in large part from heavy government subsidies from housing and education (remember the GI bill?) to the infusion of $billions of government funding into the infant tech industry, the infant bio-med industry, etc....followed by the even more massive government investment in the "space age" from the late 50s through all of the 60s, creating and subsidizing the new aerospace industry.....skew the results of that 25 yr period as opposed to the periods of 5-10 years since then....and then onto your econ 101 thesis, which is ridiculously simplistic in its conclusion. Straw men, both.

We can take the easy way out and do little or nothing in the way of a comprehensive national policy as we have for the last 30 years and continue our reliance on fossil fuels and either importing or drilling.

Or we can start now with a serious government supported (initially) effort to develop cleaner and ultimately cheaper sources of energy and mandates to improve energy efficiencies, creating a new industry that could be sold by American companies to countries around the world.

You evidently choose one path (correct me if i am wrong)..."keep on truckin" as is until we are absolutely certain that we have to change our production and consumption habits, just tinker around the edges, and/or just leave it to the affected industries to make that decision in the best interest of consumers and the country. I choose the other....its time to find "a better way" now both for our long term economic security and long term environmental protection.

I agree my way is harder and probably riskier in the short term...but IMO, we have to stop thinking short term. The greater long term risk is postponing any comprehensive action and just sliding by.