It's not because global warming is a myth. As the Beeb reports:
Global temperatures for 2008 will be slightly cooler than last year as a result of the cold La Nina current in the Pacific, UN meteorologists have said.
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But this year's temperatures would still be way above the average - and we would soon exceed the record year of 1998 because of global warming induced by greenhouse gases.
As I turn in for the night tonight, there are some good news stories of note...
Jonathan Swift recommended we eat and use the children of the poor as goods, as opposed to letting them be a burden on Ireland's sizable poor. Now there is a new "modest proposal": eliminate trans-Atlantic travel to the US. The DHS is already on the case...
Over this weekend, committal issues arose at the Bali climate change meeting in Indonesia.
The United States will come up with its own plan to cut global-warming gases by mid-2008, and won't commit to mandatory caps at the U.N. climate conference here, the chief U.S. negotiator said Saturday.
...
Watson's comments reaffirmed that the Bush administration views its own talks as the main event in discussions over climate change.
Midway through the two-week Bali conference, many of the more than 180 assembled nations were demanding such firm commitments from Washington as well, as the world talks about a framework to follow Kyoto when it expires in 2012.
BBC:
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has challenged governments to act on the findings of a major new report on climate change.
The panel suggests societies need to adapt to future impacts, as well as curbing emissions.
Without extra measures, carbon dioxide emissions will continue to rise; they are already growing faster than a decade ago, partly because of increasing use of coal.
The IPCC's economic analyses say that trend can be reversed at reasonable cost. Indeed, it says, there is "much evidence that mitigation actions can result in near-term co-benefits (e.g. improved health due to reduced air pollution)" that may offset costs.
The panel's scientists say the reversal needs to come within a decade or so if the worst effects of global warming are to be avoided.
Recently, the United Nations released its major Global Environmental Outlook report.
As this BBC News article explains,
Geo-4 covers the whole range of environmental issues, and the links between them.
In these climate-obsessed times, it is often forgotten that issues like forestry, fresh water supplies, agriculture, biodiversity, and the spread of desert land all connect to each other and to climate change.
In the language of James Lovelock's Gaia theory, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports that have punctuated 2007 allowed us to take the planet's temperature; Geo-4 shows us what is going on in the blood supply, the lymph system, the intestines and the immune defences.
Third, it explores the links between social trends and environmental decline in a way that is not often done. Which other body, for example, asks whether the divergence we are seeing in the wealth of the richest and the poorest is good or bad for the environment?
Eight years ago, general science magazine New Scientist said this:
IT IS hard to measure the methane in a cow's farts. But Dieter Ehhalt has made an estimate. It is hardly an easy task to count how many cattle there are in the world. But the West German chemist has tried to do that too. Ehhalt's answers are, respectively, 200 grams per day and 1300 million. Together, they suggest that the world's cattle emit into the atmosphere approaching 100 million tonnes of methane each year, enough to warm up the planet.
American meat eaters are responsible for 1.5 more tons of carbon dioxide per person than vegetarians every year. ... Livestock are responsible for 18 percent of greenhouse-gas emissions as measured in carbon dioxide equivalent, reports the FAO. This includes 9 percent of all CO2 emissions, 37 percent of methane, and 65 percent of nitrous oxide. Altogether, that's more than the emissions caused by transportation.
A kilogram of beef is responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions and other pollution than driving for 3 hours while leaving all the lights on back home.
Today is Blog Action Day, a day for bloggers to focus on the pressing issue of the environment.
Mr Bush stressed that combating climate change should not damage the economy.
And he again hinted that the US would not commit itself to mandatory CO2 cuts.
Here is an interesting resource on the Earth Day website that calculates your carbon footprint — i.e. amount of CO2 greenhouse gases your activities and lifestyle emits — based on the car you drive, whether you eat meat, the size of your house, and a number of other factors. Not only is it important to take its results with a grain of salt (they're fairly scientific, but I wouldn't bet my life on them), but your impact is probably underestimated due to factors they don't ask about, like what kind of lawnmower you have, or whether you unplug your televisions when they are not in use, or what your electric and water consumption is... there are more things than could be included in a simple quiz.
Still check it out if you want to see which areas that affect your carbon footprint you need work in. One of the more thought-provoking features of the results the calculator gives you is how many planets the world population would need if everyone lived like you. For me, that number is a lot more than two.
But wait, there's more!
There are many more footprint tools out there. Listed below are some of the best I've found on the web. All of them are pretty quick and easy, so feel free to give them a try. (Post your scores and we can compare!)
The UN-led summit that concluded yesterday evening was the largest of its kind. Roughly 150 countries had delegations present and tens of heads of state were in attendance. Not surprisingly, the United States sat this and other major international climate change meetings out.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged action, stating that the there is now a consensus in the scientific community on global warming, and real action is needed. Britain's environment minister, Hilary Benn, gave a particularly inspirational statement on the matter (h/t FP Passport):
Nobody is really arguing about the science. Everybody acknowledges the cost of doing something is a lot less than the cost of doing nothing. Everybody acknowledges that each of us has a part to play.
...
This [global warming] is not just an environmental problem. It's an economic, it's a political, it's a migration problem. What are we going to do as a world, I would say, when people start fighting not over politics, but water? What are we going to do when refugees turn up on the shores of your country fleeing not political persecution, but environmental catastrophe? Economically, what are you going to do when the markets that maybe your constituents earn their living making goods to sell into are no longer there because they're too busy swimming for their lives because sea levels have risen? In other words, whichever way you look at it—because, the evidence is clear, in the end it's going to have impacts on all of us in lots of different ways. Now, that makes for a very strong moral and a practical case for doing something about it. And again, it's going to affect all of us wherever we happen to live.
A BBC World Service poll about the attitudes of the world's people on global warming was released recently. The poll gives some interesting — and surprising — insight on public opinion of such a politicized and scientific issue. India has the most doubt about the effects and apathy on action when it comes to climate change. The Chinese surprise me with their lack of doubt and willingness to take action, as do the Americans, to a lesser extent. The French view the issue as most urgent and the Russians are almost as bad as the Indians.
Here's a graph of the results:
The overall results are:
Major action needed: 65%
Modest action later: 25%
No action needed: 6%
The G8 climate change agreement of course had a catch.
No mandatory target was set for the cuts, but Mrs Merkel's preference for a 50% emissions cut by the year 2050 was included in the agreed statement.
At the close of the summit, the G8 issued a number of statements on other topics, saying:
* It supported "further measures" against Iran if Tehran failed to stop its uranium enrichment programme
* It would back further action against Sudan if Khartoum failed to support international efforts to end the conflict in Darfur
* North Korea should stop testing nuclear-capable missiles and abandon all nuclear programmes
* It had failed to find a common position on the future status of Kosovo
At last G8 leaders have reached an agreement on climate change. Only the US had differing views from the other powers on global warming.
According to an extract from the agreed text published on the G8 website, the leaders agreed to take "strong and early" action.
"Taking into account the scientific knowledge as represented in the recent IPCC [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] reports, global greenhouse gas emissions must stop rising, followed by substantial global emission reductions," the text says.
technorati tags: bush, climate+change, global+warming, g8, united+states, politics, international+relations, diplomacy, foreign+affairs,
US President George Bush. If one called him an environmentalist, one would be considered an absolute idiot. In America, has deregulated modest environmental controls, killed many eco-initiatives, rolled back years of environmental progress while accelarating the detrimental effect the US has on our planet. No, the purpose of this post isn't to go on another environmental schpiel, but the environment — like human rights and all other things not relating to war or money — is one of the subjects Bush is all talk, no action on.
He has proposed action on reducing greenhouse gases, even though he hardly, if at all, believes in global warming. Of course this is to pacify the international community infuriated by the US's inaction on such pressing global issues. Like his other not-so-bright ideas that he doesn't actually believe in, which are basically just rhetoric, there is no goal to actually take action on climate change from within the White House. Bush presented no ideas on cutting greenhouse gas emissions, and outrightly opposed such common and expert-suggested actions like carbon trading and caps — sensible steps that can be taken modestly. In short, he has opposed any action at all. His administration has a track record on blocking progress in the battle against human caused climate change.
Rhetoric has seeped from the White House these past six years possibly more than ever. This rhetoric is often irrational and false. The administration has been unaccountable and the least transparent since Nixon's horrendous time in office. The environment and human rights might not be politically sexy issues like terrorism, but at the end of the day they matter more.
Not destroying the planet we inhabit to the point which we can survive no more should be a goal of governments everywhere — and it is a goal of many. However time and time again the only environmental policies the administration has enacted are either diluted forms of old ones or those in which it eats out of the hands of the agriculture or energy lobbies. And no, corn ethanol is not good for the environment. The only thing it is good for are the American farmers. Pain to the environment is a high price to pay for pleasing special interests — like when Ronald Reagen had the brilliant idea of sacking many of the US's practical and fuel efficient trains and killing the competition of the truck driver lobby. it is actually counterproductive to make because it takes nearly 30% more energy to create than it gives out (another plant Bush has spoken about, switchgrass, uses 45% more energy to make than it ultimately gives out, and that's not Bush bashing, its science. That is energy made by — drumroll please — the same fossil fuels America apparantly hoped to get away from in the first place. Coal has also popped up as a contender to power the US's massive energy usage. Coal is also much dirtier than oil, and is an overall stupid fuel to use in that it is amazingly unenvironmentally friendly.
Sugar ethanol might well be the way to go. One might think it would be easy, with free trade and all, and Brazil — which uses E85 sugar ethanol — only a bit away. The catch-22(s): free trade isn't that free when you have lobbyist and special interests nipping at your political power. One of the many problems in America which I hope to cover soon is indeed the prevalence of special interests and the detrimental affect they wreak on democracy.
Like many, I am skeptical of Bush's new environmental plan. As climate change reaches another 'tipping point' — honestly, hysterics don't help either — action must be taken. And his announcement comes after America refused a sensible G8 action plan on reducing greenhouse gases. Bush has a hard time accepting science. This is in part due to his wanting to reach into the deep pockets of the lobbyists for political and financial gold, but also comes as a result of his stubborn, narrow ideology, the same ideology that rejects scientifically-backed up evolution in favor of a more religious approach. And some people wonder why he has messed up the United States so much.
Every nation but the United States seems to be rightfully worried about global climate change. The warming of the earth is not a light topic, and it is morally negligible for the US to continue blocking any progress wished to be made on the subject.
The US is trying to block sections of a draft agreement on climate change prepared for next month's G8 summit.
Washington objects to the draft's targets to keep the global temperature rise below 2C this century and halve greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
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With UN talks struggling to move beyond the current Kyoto Protocol targets, the G8 summit is seen as a key opportunity to regain political momentum.
COSTS OF STABILISATION
IPCC assesses the likely impacts on global GDP by 2030 if cost-effective routes are used
Stabilisation between 445ppm and 535ppm would cost less than 3% of global GDP, it concludes
Between 535ppm and 590ppm would cost 0.2-2.5%
Between 590ppm and 710ppm would bring anything between a net benefit of 0.6% and a net cost of 1.2%
Different greenhouse gases have different impacts on warming per volume; total concentrations are expressed as the equivalent in parts per million of a certain volume of CO2 (ppm CO2-eq)
Current concentration is about 425ppm CO2-eq
technorati tags: kyoto, g8, bush, al+gore, climate+change, global+warming, science, fear+politics, africa+warming, blair, merkel, abe, IPCC
It's really easy to blame the United States — and just the United States — for a number of things. It's a perfect target. The world's sole superpower, the US makes foreign policy mistakes frequently. Of course it is also easy to blame the big guy: the most powerful, most senior, most vulnerable for criticism, etc. On the subject of greenhouse gas emissions, however, it might be a bit harder to put the whole of climate change blame on the US. The International Energy Agency (IEA) has stated that China could very soon overtake the US as the leading greenhouse gas emitter. Greenhouse gases play a role in global climate change.
The IEA says China will give our more CO2 than the US by 2010. Of course China is developing, less wealthy and more unable to enforce or create environmental standards, and just harder to blame than America. Even staunch free trade activists say that wealth leads to environmental enlightenment (and wealth comes from the exchange of goods, i.e. trade). China is no doubt being reckless in its massive industrial endeavors, but it does acknowledge climate change. But like the Sudan issue (generally), there is more rhetoric than action.
A big issue is the use of coal powered power plants. America also uses coal as a primary power source; coal is one of the dirtiest sources of power. Both economic giants must act now more than ever — especially the developed, wealthy US — to reduce coal dependence and enforce, not just promote, clean environmental policies. At the risk of sounding like a Green: we only have one planet, let's treat it wisely or future humans will pay the price. China and the United States are both huge countries with plenty of wind power potential, plenty of sun, and plenty of coastline and rivers for water-powered energy. I'd say its more cost effective to dish out some money for solar panels and wind turbines than to destroy your planet, thus destroying any economy. Why not pay the relatively small price now so we don't have to pay it later — when it will have a cost in currencies other than dollars, euros, yuans or yen.
When one considers all the factors, America has more of a responsibility to take action on its environmental policies, but China could save itself plenty of money (not to mention other things) if it acted sooner rather than later. At the risk of sounding like Al Gore: it's time for governments to act, now, on global warming. How does it hurt to not destroy our only habitat as much anyways?
I'll be covering alternative energy more soon, as well as free trade.
The US Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) can — and should — do its job. The party spearheading the case against the EPA was a collection of environmental groups, states, along with other individuals and groups. (The EPA is a part, like, for instance, the Department of Homeland Security, of the White House.) The Bush administration had argued the EPA should not regulate greenhouse emissions known to cause global warming created by driving a car. Apparently, in their view, protecting the public interest from climate change is pointless — since it isn’t happening and of course it’s not our fault (so they think).
The Bush administration has even brought California to court in the past because of its tough environmental policies on vehicle emissions and clean air. Just because the EPA doesn’t do its job doesn’t mean the states cannot. In addition, that contradicted the federalist stance of many conservative heavyweights associated with and in power in the White House.
The EPA has even refused to mandate an official policy on potentially disastrous effects of too much CO2 and other greenhouse gases. Such gases are so called because of the earth-warming effect they produce, where sunlight is trapped. The court ruled the EPA had no excuse in overlooking greenhouse gases and global warming, on a policy and regulatory level. The EPA has also given plenty of poor excuses for its lack of initiative on an issue deemed so important by the scientific community. This is yet another judicial defeat — albeit a righteous one — for Bush.
This isn’t the first time the Bush administration and US government has disregarded science: evolution, stem cells, and other issues remain and the White House seems to want to tie religion into all of them. Maybe they also don’t think that driving a big SUV releases gases which — when given out in massive amounts — contribute to climate change. Then again in their view global warming isn’t happening. Just like evolution.
On a similar note, the UN is set to release the second in a string of reports this year on climate change. The upcoming one will focus on the impact of such global change. We already know it hurts the poor the most.
Update:
I thought it good to include some of the majority and dissenting opinions of the ruling, which delt with both the Clean Air Act and the EPA's regulatory power over emissions in the first Supreme Court ruling on climate change-related issues. Expect more to come; and Roberts, Alito, Scalia, and Thomas, the conservative pals on the bench, will continue to hide behind their limited judicial power/review ideology.
IHT:
"EPA's steadfast refusal to regulate greenhouse gas emissions presents a risk of harm to Massachusetts that is both 'actual' and 'imminent,' " Justice John Paul Stevens wrote for the majority, citing two standards linked to standing.
"EPA identifies nothing suggesting that Congress meant to curtail EPA's power to treat greenhouse gases as air pollutants," Justice Stevens wrote. Instead, the agency resorted to "impermissible considerations" in rejecting the plaintiffs' request to regulate those admissions, the justice wrote.
"Its action was therefore 'arbitrary, capricious, or otherwise not in accordance with law,' " Justice Stevens went on. Justices Anthony Kennedy, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer joined his decision.
Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. dissented, along with Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito Jr. The chief justice said his dissent "involves no judgment on whether global warming exists, what causes it, or the extent of the problem."
technorati tags: EPA, bush, politics, supreme+court, environment, government, climate+change, global+warming, news, current, un, united+states, usa, united+nations, greenhouse+gases, auto+emissions, environmental+protection+agency, california, court, justice, white+house
Global leaders have reached a new agreement at a GLOBE, which stands for Global Legislators Organization for a Balanced Environment (website here), forum in Washington, DC. The likes of Senators John McCain and Joe Lieberman were centers of focus as they ambitiously aimed to pass legislation limiting the United States' large role in global climate change, which humans have been affirmed as a major cause of. The US holds the title as the biggest emitter of greenhouse gasses which contribute to global warming, though China, with its accelerating economy is soon to catch up. The meeting dealt especially with getting on target on a succession plan after the current Kyoto agreement on greenhouse gas emissions is expired on 2012; of course something more serious and active than Kyoto is needed, one including major roles of the United States and China.
The GLOBE International meeting lasted two days and included members of the Group of Eight (G8) major industrialized, developed nations — the United States, United Kingdom, Italy, Germany (current president), France, Russia, Canada, and Japan — in addition to major developing countries such as China, India, South Africa, Mexico, and Brazil. McCain, a key potential moderate conservative Republican presidential candidate for 2008 and current GOP senator from Arizona, spoke with fervor at the forum. However, a great deal of American politicians not the least Republicans — and people — are not convinced of global warming, many of them, like the Bush administration, the same people who swear by the Bible Darwin's theory of evolution is absolutely wrong. Those same people should keep in mind global warming may hurt the poor the most, not that those narrow-minded enough to hold such extreme views might care (keep in mind I am not talking about all fundamentalist Christians or people of faith, but some take it to such an extreme it is dangerous to the rest of us). No matter, global warming could hurt everyone's pocketbooks too.
BBC News:
A meeting in Washington of global political leaders has reached a new agreement on tackling climate change.
Delegates agreed that developing countries will have to face targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions as well as rich countries.
The informal meeting also agreed that a global market should be formed to cap and trade carbon dioxide emissions.
The non-binding declaration is seen as vital in influencing a replacement for the Kyoto Protocol, correspondents say.
The forum's closing statement said man-made climate change was now "beyond doubt".
"Climate change is a global issue and there is an obligation on us all to take action, in line with our capabilities and historic responsibilities," said the statement from the Global Legislators Organisation for a Balanced Environment (Globe).
The two-day meeting brought together legislators from the Group of Eight industrialised countries plus Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa.
The BBC's environment analyst Roger Harrabin was at the meeting and says that although the declaration carries no formal weight it indicates a real change in mood.
The legislators agreed that developing countries had to face targets on greenhouse gas emissions as well as rich countries.
US senator Joe Lieberman forecast that the US Congress will enact a law on cutting emissions by the end of next year, possibly this year.
And presidential candidate John McCain, who is co-sponsoring climate legislation with Mr Lieberman, was emphatic on the need for new initiatives.
"I am convinced that we have reached the tipping point and that the Congress of the United States will act, with the agreement of the administration," he told the forum.
Meanwhile, the Canadian parliament moved to force the government to meet its Kyoto Protocol target for reducing emissions.On a positive note, at least Lieberman, whom I have been particularly displeased with lately, is not kissing up to the White House on this one! McCain seems especially serious on this issue though he is not the 'maverick' he used to be. However, he has gotten on the Bush administration's case before on global warming.
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With United Nations climate negotiations in November failing to agree a timetable for mandating new cuts in emissions when the current Kyoto targets expire in 2012, the British-led Globe set up the Washington meeting in the hope of stimulating progress in a less formal setting.
The UN's panel on climate change said earlier this month that higher global temperatures caused by man-made pollution will melt polar ice, worsen floods and droughts and cause more devastating storms.
Dialogue Aim
The Dialogue will draw senior legislators together from the G8, India, China, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa with international business leaders, civil society representatives and opinion leaders to discuss a post 2012 climate change agreement.
Specifically, the Dialogue aims to present a consensus statement from the Dialogue participants to the G8 Heads of State in Japan.
Dialogue Objectives
1. To provide a forum outside of formal international negotiating structures for legislators, senior business leaders and other key decision makers to discuss a 2012 Kyoto Climate change Agreement - importantly allowing the representatives from the non G8 countries of Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa to be represented in the dialogue on climate change.
2. To create a greater understanding between participating legislators, business leaders and key civil society organisations about different country priorities and how any future political accommodation can be reached
3. To allow business leaders to inform legislators on appropriate application of technology required to deliver to markets in +5 countries.
4. To share knowledge and expertise to identify specific measures to address climate change that legislators can support in their respective parliaments.
5. To provide an informal mechanism to engage with a broader constituency of key legislators - with a particular focus on fostering greater contact & understanding with the G8 and + 5 countries.
technorati tags: joe+lieberman, john+mccain, GLOBE, g8, kyoto, climate+change, global+warming, politics, news, international, developing, canada, united+states, UN
Two major topics lately are bird flu (H5N1, aka Avian flu) and climate change (aka global warming). These potential catastrophes have several things in common: they both are at a global scale with vast impact, both are scientific, and both are hyped, in one way or another (downplayed or over-played). More bird flu deaths and spreading have brought that issue back in the headlines and a recent report of notable significance by the IPCC have evermore raised awareness on climate change and its partly human causes.
Some say — or seem to be saying — the demonic West is being selfish about bird flu’s affects on places like Indonesia; some — countries and corporations alike — are controversially commercializing/politicizing a potential pandemic, risking lives for their own profit and selfishness.
Some say rich nations need to work on reducing greenhouse emissions; some are (somewhat) hypocritical for saying other industrial countries are causing all the climate change problems. Some are stating the latest international report on climate change is too rhetoricized and vague (somewhat contrary to the IPCC’s clear standing on the topic, but I get the writer’s point). Some send mixed signals by treating the environmentalism relating to global warming as a new hyped-up religion of sorts and saying nothing in the studies have really changed. Some say the battle against human-caused climate change is a war. Some, including powerful Washington think tank AEI, even offered large sums of money to people in exchange for their disputing the IPCC’s recent report. This kind of scientific corruption is nothing new and some has been linked to the US government and energy corporations like Exxon — whose products promote global warming — in the past.
Me? Well I am worried about bird flu, though I shall not lose sleep over it, and climate change is not the best thing either. Neither are impending doom, a monster that will eat you when you sleep at night, and neither are totally harmless. The sureness about global warming’s impending eventuality, and the fact we know it is already showing its effects, is more than that of bird flu. Bird flu is more chance-related in whether it will be a real danger (i.e. will the disease spread from human to human and in what form).
I think we need to work on climate change by finding alternative energy sources like geothermal power — which could serve ten percent of the United State’s electricity needs by 2050 at minimal cost. Solar-harnessing, as well as sources getting energy from the kinetic movements of wind and water, (solar power, wind power, water power, respectively) are also promising, easy, virtually non-polluting power alternatives that are cost efficient in the long term, especially if they help hamper the economically damaging effects of global warming. While I am not as committed or hyped as Al Gore on the subject, action needs to be taken by citizens, governments, and companies alike.
People, governments, and companies also should be prepared for bird flu. Preparation and preventative measures are fine, they’re moderate; hype, scaremongering, or denial can all lead to great harm, albeit different types of harm, for both the issues of climate change and bird flu. The EU is being tough on both issues, working on the bird flu problem since before it reached Turkey and the Russian Urals — long before the US media finally jumped on the bird flu wagon, although late and with plenty of confusing hype. The EU is not doing a great job with global warming, but it’s a start. They now have proposed arguably the toughest auto emissions standards on the planet. When you really get down to it, bird flu is just another potential pandemic and climate change is coming no matter what, human caused or not. What worries me about the latter is that really humans may be pushing climate change to a dangerous level where its effects will be all too disastrous. What worries me about both is if they are too hyped, it will be like the boy who cried wolf. People, including policymakers, will be tired and confused by the hype and mayhem and any efforts against a real threat would be hampered greatly by such a consequence.
There are the global-warming-is-human-stunted-and-dangerous deniers and the people crying wolf. The latter are promoting and feeding hysteria, for example, saying last summer’s heat and Hurricane Katrina of 2005 were both directly caused by global warming and not just a weather pattern to an extent (then why wasn’t there another Katrina in 2006, I ask). Lastly, there are the people who neither like the hype nor the denial. I am one of those people. It will be easy for those uneducated on these topics, partly by fault of the media and their governments, to be in any of the first two camps and easily switch between them. If there is no unseasonable heat this coming summer I am sure there will be plenty switching from the hype to the denial camp; if there is, I am sure there will be some switching from denial to hype — for the wrong reasons.
Be prepared for global warming; use common sense and preventative measures for bird flu. Don’t buy into the often propaganda hype sometimes utilized by individuals and bodies to promote their causes — whether they are hyping up awareness about bird flu or climate change or playing down either issue. Both are important issues, and one can do more, politically and personally, to work against the inevitable one, human-caused global warming, than the other one.
Songs stuck in my head right now: "I Bet You Would Look Good On The Dance Floor" by the Arctic Monkeys and "Such Great Heights" by The Postal Service.
