WIP

Somehow I don't think I'd like the taste of Ham Rove. But then again, I never could stand ham anyway! Striking resemblance to Karl anyway. When I was following the U.S. Election news, there were a lot of stories about the Republican attempts of voter suppression -- some through photo ID laws, some by way of illegal but difficult to prosecute tactics like vote caging, not to mention lots of questions about new voting machines that have no paper trail to verify afterwards. We know from past experience, like Ohio in 2004, that Rove had developed an expertise in fixing election results through selective voter suppression, and my best guess about Rove's strange behaviour on Election Night, was that he was sure the fix was in, and there would not be enough ballots cast in the more Democratic-leaning districts that were returning the results at that time. It makes no sense that Rove didn't know the polling data, and didn't have a detailed knowledge of the districts in the battleground states. So, I still go with the conclusion that he tried and thought he had fixed an election for another Republican candidate, but this time his, and especially Republican governor's efforts to suppress black and latino votes, just caused too much outrage in those communities, and gave them more resolve to get their votes counted than they otherwise would have been.

You don't understand the scale and the scope of the problem. Here's the problem with adaptation -- natural systems adapt and evolve at a very slow pace. For example, I've posted elsewhere about the mostly ignored crisis of rapid ocean acidification. It's not that the levels are higher than any time previous in history....the problem, like the rate of atmospheric carbon increase, is that it is happening in such a rapid timescale that nature does not have time to adapt to the changes. During the final age of Dinosaurs - the Cretaceous, most of that period had a high carbon level in the atmosphere, and no ice at the poles. There was tropical vegetation in the Arctic, including a species of alligators in the Arctic Ocean that had developed specific adaptations to living in a world with six month-long days and nights. But, the changes occurred very gradually...not in the space of a couple of centuries! Same with sudden recognition of coral bleaching and dieoff of coral species. During the Cretaceous, reef-builders, plankton and other fish, had time to adapt to changing ph levels and move away from hotter equatorial waters; whereas today, marine biologists are telling us that, not only do the reef builders not have time to adapt, even the plankton species (which move very slowly) don't have the time to move to more suitable waters and adjust to lower ph levels in the water. And if nature can't adapt, I don't think we will either, regardless of the level of hubris. We depend on nature to supply us our food, clean water and air to breath. Humans are only adaptable in the sense of developing technologies that allow us to exploit nature to greater degrees. Unless we spend time in the woods roughing it, and trying to get clean water and gather something to eat, we are as helpless as babies today! The humans of the Pleistocene were far more resourceful and adaptable than we are today. They pretty much had no choice about it because of the rapid swings and weather and changes in climate. And even then, the human race had at least a couple of close calls when our ancestors almost dwindled down to the point of extinction. Next time, may not be so lucky!

Morality and ethics can't be derived from the biological principles of natural selection because the evolutionary process is devoid of such values. The only value is survival and furthering of the species, and survival odds may be improved through developing altruism, but that would be a co-adaptation, since there is nothing altruistic in the evolutionary process itself. Evolutionary principles do not guide us in how we should treat strangers. All we have to do is check the historical record for how many times murder, genocide, rape, theft etc. are justified as a holy cause against the enemies of God. Working towards a universal moral sense takes a leap beyond human nature and our evolutionary principles....that may be why it still isn't happening other than through rhetoric today. Where I believe this becomes a problem is when some humanists try to insist they have, or like Sam Harris, could develop an objective moral system through scientific means. Our modern day moral judgments are no more universal or eternal than those that are sourced in religious texts. I would say that the closest we can come to universal or objective morality is still what can be agreed upon through general consensus. If most people are in agreement

I think there is clear evidence that we are hardwired to favour kin over strangers -- so it's been a struggle for centuries for governments and religions to try to maintain that notion of being nice to complete strangers. That part doesn't come naturally to us, even today....so right now, at this point in history, when the world has become a very small place where setting global standards and rules would save us from extinction, it still isn't sinking in to most people that what goes on half way around the world still affects us here. I'll accept any group or any method that's working towards a universal morality, regardless of what approach they have taken to start the journey.

Yes, but that's because building pyramids is done through the use of sustainable resources....as far as I know, we're not going to run out of limestone. As for our survival...or more correctly, the survival of future generations, their survival depends on how the planet's biosphere adjusts and reacts to what we have done so far to terraform the world to our liking. And that makes it crapshoot at best!

It may only happen once a year, but on rare occasion The National Post actually has something useful. I've been wanting to post this for a couple of days now: Graphic: Stopping the Dead – a statistical look back at the Walking Dead series so far The graphics, which are too long to post, and have spoilers, depending on how up to date you are with the series, tell us how many zombies are killed, who kills them, how they're dispatched.....everything you need to know on one page.

I've been reading over the last year or so, some of the stories coming from Walmart suppliers and former suppliers who paint a clear picture of a company solely focused on the bottom line -- getting products as cheap as possible, including forcing suppliers to outsource and facilitate the moves of their manufacturing operations to China, Vietnam and Bangladesh....wherever the job can be done cheapest. And the company has been willing to help suppliers with all of the logistics necessary for closing down and exporting manufacturing jobs abroad. But, this story that has come out of the ashes of the fire in Dhaka is even more damning: Wal-Mart Nixed Paying Bangladesh Suppliers to Fight Fire At a meeting convened in 2011 to boost safety at Bangladesh garment factories, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) made a call: paying suppliers more to help them upgrade their manufacturing facilities was too costly. The comments from a Wal-Mart sourcing director appear in minutes of the meeting, which was attended by more than a dozen retailers including Gap Inc. (GPS), Target Corp. and JC Penney Co. Details of the meeting have emerged after a fire at a Bangladesh factory that made clothes for Wal-Mart and Sears Holdings Corp. killed more than 100 people last month. The blaze has renewed pressure on companies to improve working conditions in Bangladesh, where more than 700 garment workers have died since 2005, according to the International Labor Rights Forum, a Washington-based advocacy group. At the April 2011 meeting in Dhaka, the Bangladesh capital, retailers discussed a contractually enforceable memorandum that would require them to pay Bangladesh factories prices high enough to cover costs of safety improvements. Sridevi Kalavakolanu, a Wal-Mart director of ethical sourcing, told attendees the company wouldn’t share the cost, according to Ineke Zeldenrust, international coordinator for the Clean Clothes Campaign, who attended the gathering. Kalavakolanu and her counterpart at Gap reiterated their position in a report folded into the meeting minutes, obtained by Bloomberg News. “Specifically to the issue of any corrections on electrical and fire safety, we are talking about 4,500 factories, and in most cases very extensive and costly modifications would need to be undertaken to some factories,” they said in the document. “It is not financially feasible for the brands to make such investments.” http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-12-05/wal-mart-nixed-paying-bangladesh-suppliers-to-fight-fire.html So much for "tough on suppliers!" They are only tough on suppliers in the sense of expecting products at the lowest cost, and there is a strong case to make that Walmart and all of the secondary major clothing retailers, choose to use these supplier companies as a form of plausible deniability when things go wrong....like this fire.

Your source doesn't acknowledge the impact that the rise in population has had in Bangladesh....they don't deny it, they just don't mention it either! How do they expect "challenges" such as malnourishment to be addressed? All they mention is economic growth. Nevermind that new money coming in through foreign investment is not being evenly distributed; what would happen if Bangladesh was able to follow the same path to double digit GDP growth that India and China has taken in recent decades? Well, for one thing, when we talk about growing carbon emissions increases, we would be including Bangladesh whenever India and China are mentioned, just because of the sheer size alone of their growing population. A more honest, broader examination of the problem would look like this: Population Increase Threatens Bangladesh It is entirely possible that the perilous situation that awaits Bangladesh with its population growth isn’t getting the kind of consideration that it so deserves. Or it may be that people are very indifferent about the whole matter. But ignoring or avoiding the problem itself would not somehow make it go away, and would only make the situation worse for this poverty stricken country, and the world. Bangladesh is the 7th largest country in the world in population where 150 million people are virtually elbowing each other in a land that is 134,000 sq km in area with a population density of more than 1100 people per sq km. Overpopulated! Well, there are only a few city-like states - like Singapore - that would top this kind of population density. Excluding those states, Bangladesh would make it to the top of the list in population density. What makes the situation even more horrifying for Bangladesh is that the country is poised to lose a good part of its territory to the rise in sea levels associated with global warming, while its very population increases at an unsustainable rate. During independence in 1971, the population of Bangladesh was about 75 million. After 37 years, its population is believed to have more than doubled. The current estimate of population growth in the country varies from 1.5 per cent to 2 per cent a year depending on whose assessment one pays attention to. For good measure, if one takes a middle ground and considers a growth rate of say 1.75 per cent a year, it would mean that Bangladesh population will double in the next 40 years, while at the lowest rate the doubling time would be 47 years. How serious a problem would the country face when its population doubles? To get an idea, one might imagine the current U.S. population of 300 million living within the confines of the state of Wisconsin, which is close to the size of Bangladesh. In spite of such an ominous scenario, idealists may be quick to point out that Bangladesh is making improvements in education and healthcare, and most importantly has achieved a respectable economic growth rate of about 5 per cent a year in recent decades. Though true, such progress has had a very little effect on the overall poverty level in the country. Studies reveal that in real terms the poverty level in Bangladesh has not come down but gone up. What would then account for such an anomaly? In addition to the massive corruption in the country, which benefited the few and also slowed potential economic growth, the main reason for this incongruity might be the rapid growth of the country’s underprivileged population, whose unemployment rate remains as one might expect extremely high. http://www.afroartic...ngladesh/164725 The reason I felt compelled to mention the down sides of modern medicine, is because it took a few generations in the west before people started realizing that children had greater odds of survival, and it was no longer necessary to have 6 or more children to leave a legacy. The added problem is dealing with societies that restrict access to birth control. With population too high to be supported by traditional farming, this has made their dependence on new textile industry jobs even more desperate. And rather than attempting to raise the living standards of the poor in these countries (as free trade propagandists promised us 35 years ago), Walmart and their corporate brethren, maintain the misery by insisting that their suppliers keep driving costs downward, or threaten to drop them for suppliers who can beat their prices.

I've been reading and writing more than I care to about Israel and Palestine over the last few days, so I think I'm going to bail here before I waste any more time on the M E. I think I've already said everything I can think of saying on the subject already....time to move on.

You're talking about possible causes for an end to civilization, and yet you fail to notice the hard limit that WILL cause the crash or the unwinding of our present civilization: resource scarcities and environmental degradation. This tells me that you either are not serious, or you spend too much time in the abstract world of economic theory and political science, and not enough examining how nature is revolting against our civilization.

And, supporting a neutral policy on this forum is assumed to be taking sides with the Palies. My support for the Palestinians only goes as far as they are the ones who've been forced off their land, are impoverished and facing U.S.- financed military power in the region. Palestinians could have made deals early on too....at least with some of the Labor Governments....with the exception of Golda Meir....who would not even recognize the Palestinians right to exist as a people...let alone as an independent state! She was yet another example of how the few women who rise to the top in male-dominated societies, go overboard in their displays of aggression and vitriol, and try to act more manly than any man available for the job....but, that's another subject. And, speaking of Golda, and the good old days -- the Israelis who were starting to try to pave the way for permanent annexation of the West Bank and Gaza after the 67 War, started immediately doing that talk about how Jordan is really Palestine...the bullshit story that started that latest video posted here. These countries and their boundaries are a permanent legacy of how Britain and France carved up and divided the Ottoman Empire after WWI. Jordan is mostly desert, and mostly already has a Palestinian majority population, thanks to the forced migrations after the wars with Israel. And they are ruled by a Hashemite member of the same royal family that runs Saudi Arabia. Somehow forcing Arabs out of their homes and across the Jordan River, started being considered by the hardline Israelis as the New Palestinian state that they would be willing to recognize....and that excuses taking all the land on the west side of the Jordan River for Israel.

My sense of nationalism has never matched people like you, who just go berserk if someone criticizes their country's policies. And, in case you have noticed over many posts, I used to consider our Government - whether under Liberal or P.C. administrations, to be on the right side of most foreign policy issues....but, I sure as hell can't say that any more! And it's not just our Government that's giving Canada a black name in the world these days. It's even further off topic, but take a look at what Canadian mining companies are doing in Latin America these days. Their actions are worse than many of the U.S.-based companies.

Speaking of Harper, and his constant genuflecting to U.S. policy interests, I wonder if this story has been mentioned in anyone of the umpteen number of Israel/Palestine threads so far: Nearly half of Canadians polled would prefer the federal government be neutral when it comes to Israel and the Palestinian Territories, a new poll suggests. According to the CBC/Nanos survey, 48 per cent of people asked how the government should handle Middle East foreign policy said they want the government to favour neither the Israelis nor the Palestinians. Another 27 per cent said they are unsure. Of those who had a preference, 19 per cent said they want the government to favour the Israelis, with six per cent wanting the government to favour the Palestinians — a three-to-one ratio. Nik Nanos, president of Nanos Research, says Canadians likely prefer a Middle East foreign policy that "treads the middle path." "For those that do have a preference, they're more likely to favour the Israelis over the Palestinians, but it's still a minority at only 19 per cent," Nanos said. http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2012/12/06/pol-nanos-foreign-policy.html If we were going by all of the sqawkboxes here and saturating the rest of online media, you would think that the Bibi-followers were the majority, or at least common opinion. Now, we know that at least half of Canadians want our government to remain neutral and these Zionists...whatever their motivating causes, are a clear minority in Canada! Maybe Harper thinks we have churches full of Christian Zionists, like in the U.S.. But I doubt that's the case outside of Alberta!

Yes, I am aware of this -- in a nutshell, it all began a deal was struck many decades ago between the white South Africans of British extraction, and the Afrikaanders, whom they fought a bloody war of aggression (The Boer War), and took over their territories. The deal looked in many ways, a lot like Lincoln's deal with the South after the Civil War, where even after the Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln ordered a hands-off policy after a brief reconstruction, and left the South to informally chip away and dismantle that emancipation. In South Africa, the Brits rehabilitated the Afrikaanders use of their own Dutch dialect as official language, and for most of the remaining white-ruled years, they dominated the governments, while the Brits controlled the money and business. And yes, the U.S. could use the excuse of anti-communism....same excuse for supporting despots in Latin America, Asia, Africa and the Middle East.....but, eventually the noise against apartheid got a little too loud to deal with. You're really reaching back in ancient history, to blame Canada for sending regiments to fight on behalf of England during the Boer War! Why not the most modern example -- Brian Mulroney letting Reagan know that their special friendship that greased the slide into free trade deals, did not include taking their side in trying to prop up the apartheid government. And, as I've said a number of times before....what the hell has happened to the Conservative Party between Mulroney and Harper? Nobody can imagine Harper veering even slightly off of official U.S. foreign policy protocols these days.

yeah we're cooked....or more correctly - almost certainly cooked! And it's mostly because there are too many people like you - who think they're smart, think they're educated, but can't see past the end of their noses! I'm relatively new at examining environmental issues like climate change....I've only really studied this issue in detail in the last five years. But, what is most important, aside from reading a few books that go into a little detail and cover paleoclimate, atmospherics and how biospheres function. And there are two important points that I have learned: 1. Our growth-dependent economic system, which requires constant expansion and increases in energy and resource extraction, is 100% incompatible with long-term survival of the human race....and most other species for that matter. 2. Most humans seem to be incapable of deferring short-term, immediate gratification, in favour of long term benefit...even if that benefit almost certainly means the survival of their children and grandchildren.....it's easier to just live in denial, and pretend that you just don't know any better! And what that means is that, as the costs and requirements for doing more than cosmetic fixes for environment have become apparent, there has been less and less resolve to do anything about it! If the problem was easy and cheap....or even moderately costly, like banning freon and other cloroflurocarbon gases, in the efforts to stop the decline in the Earth's ozone layer, the oil lobby and their propaganda would not have been enough to stop the Kyoto Protocol, and put and end to serious efforts to tax carbon -- and at least slow down the rates of carbon increase. 3. The gravity of the climate situation has been underemphasized...not exaggerated, as some denial clowns maintain! Here's some bad news - specifically about the twin sister of a hotter world - Ocean Acidification - and this report published earlier this year, has been left in the science ghetto of science publications like Science Digest, Scientific American or the best written article - here at Physics.Org. This report informs us with almost absolute certainty - that the world's oceans are becoming rapidly acidic, and at an increasing rate; and the dieoff of ocean life, beginning with the most common forms of plankton, which supply almost half the world's total oxygen supply, has already begun, and likely won't be stopped, because of the lack of action to reduce atmospheric carbon levels. Now, where won't you find this story? Any mainstream media source...whether it calls itself liberal, conservative, "balanced" etc. - none of the MSM picked up this story over the last six months....at least in North America....I'm not sure about European, especially non-English media. And you wonder why I'm in a foul mood! So, I find myself more and more in agreement with the peak oil and peak resource theorists, who say the only realistic hope now for longterm human survival is that too many resources will become too expensive to maintain our plundering way of life. And that finally brings me back to where I feel these economic and environmental issues bump up against secularism, the freethought movements, and the notion that a lot of my atheist friends have that they are a rational, objective minority, swimming in a sea of idiocy. This is a fairly recent realization on my part, that naturalistic thinking does not = taking a rational approach to economics and the environment. And freethinkers have their own reason to put up barriers to conflicting information, since a modern humanist mythology began over 100 years ago, that claimed credit for The Enlightenment, the unequivocal acceptance of new technological advances, and modern capitalism in its liberal or conservative forms, because most freethinkers are stuck with a notion of continual, unending progress, that will lead to a better world through human advancements, rather than divine intervention. The mere notion that...maybe the Enlightenment, especially the unqualified embrace of technology wasn't such a good idea after all....is just too horrible for most atheists to contemplate! Almost the equivalent of a religious-minded believer daring to contemplate that there are no gods.

There's nothing in the video that wasn't common knowledge accepted by all sides 20 or 30 years ago....and that's the saddest commentary about the present state of media and information these days! Menachem Begin, and his Likud supporters were warned years ago, when they started the settlement policy in the West Bank that it would it would make a permanent peace deal with Jordan, Syria and local Palestinians almost impossible....but he pushed ahead anyway. And now, from the latest numbers I looked at, there are more than half a million Israeli settlers in the West Bank - including East Jerusalem. So, now that they have essentially annexed the West Bank....except for a collection of Palestinian enclaves separated by Israeli checkpoints, how can anyone take talk of a "Two State" solution seriously these days! It wasn't that many years ago that South Africa tried to create a bunch of little "homelands" for the black population. At the time, South Africa's only allies...surprise surprise, were England (Thatcher England by this time), the United States and Israel....who could at least be excused for not having a great deal of choice in the world in choosing friends! But, because of overwhelming global opposition to Apartheid South Africa, England, the U.S., and by extension - Israel, were forced into conceding their opposition to sanctions and diplomatic isolation of the South African Government. And South Africa was forced to end apartheid and become a unified nation again. Although, for what it's worth, if you follow some of the stories that pop up in the news over the years - like the recent massacre of striking miners - the ANC made an obvious under-the-table deal with the wealthy English and Afrikaander ruling class - that would leave them in charge of the economic levers of power. So, not to get distracted too far, let's not kid ourselves about South Africa! Most of the democracy and changes since apartheid ended have been superficial and cosmetic! The people who controlled most of the land, banking and business during apartheid, still are in control today. And, I mention this, because if Israel/Palestine ever does actually graduate to a permanent peace solution today, it will have to be a One-State solution, not a Two State agreement. If there is no plausible means to create a functioning, independent Palestinian state today, talk about a two-state solution...which for some reason was considered too radical until very recent times....is out of the question. But, a future one-state solution would likely look much like the South African arrangement: there would be permanent and distinct Jewish and Palestinian regions, and it's possible with the presently higher Arab birth rates that they could end up being the voting majority in a nation that doesn't disenfranchise anyone. But, they will never get equivalent economic power as their Jewish neighbours.

I wonder lately if Israeli peace groups that I used to hear about some decades back, like Peace Now, even still exist in Israel. You wouldn't know there was a Jewish voice for peace going by who they are voting for and what's said in the media! Maybe the problem is that most of the 'Jewish voices for peace' have packed their bags and left Israel over the years, and been replaced by waves of crackpot Ultra-Orthodox Jews who don't know the meanings of words like 'peace' or 'compromise.' Although it's essential to mention that the majority of them (The Haredi) are a bunch of worthless bums who get to dodge the draft so they can spend their lives studying their Torahs and living off welfare and breeding like rabbits. Eventually, when there are not enough Israelis to fill the IDF, they will have to hire mercenaries to fight for their cause!

Well, pardon me if I don't attempt to sugarcoat the message! Until someone shows me evidence to the contrary, my underlying assumption about the human condition is that we are racing towards our own destruction as a species. Bits and pieces of these issues appear separately as separate issues, dealt with as environmental, resource and economic problems under different categories. It's because of idiotic compartmentalization of economics and environment that Obama can get away with a stupid statement after his re-election about being concerned about the environment, but having to give reviving the the economy the utmost priority. Sure, there have been times in the past when the end seemed imminent. I would guess that most of the religious hysteria you seem to be referring to, were an unconscious realization of difficult times in the past, when wars, disease, massacres and forced emigrations made end time thinking plausible. Most pro-growth clowns still keep yacking today about the Club of Rome meeting in 1968, and their final report which predicted an End To Growth. They were extrapolating from present trends of their day; but today, with the state of the environment, resource decline, there is much less wiggle room for pro-growth capitalists to breathe new life again into Neoliberal economic theory. So, like it or not, we have two choices life: either this present system ends or the human race dumps so much carbon into the atmosphere that our species, and possibly even most others on Earth now, are also doomed to extinction.

First, I have to ask if you are one of the minions sent out by Walmartcorp to scour the internet and try to do damage control? Otherwise your following points are mostly meaningless distractions designed to shift the blame from the source of evil that has leveraged governments around the world to do business this way....it didn't all just happen by accident! Second, have you ever considered that the sudden arrival of vaccinations and antibiotics in the last 40 years...which get most of the credit for raising life expectancy in third world countries should also be credited for the sudden spike in population in places like Bangladesh, Africa and the Middle East, where women have had almost no access to family planning? And the population explosion in Bangladesh has been a major factor in forcing people off the land, and having to move to overcrowded cities and accept these sweatshop labour jobs in the first place! This would be bad enough if this new, free trade, globalized capitalist system that you are in love with was sustainable....but, it's not! It is crumbling and falling apart right here and now, as the costs of environmental degradation and declining energy & related resource costs keep rising. We have not improved the lives of Bangladeshis and all of the other Third World people living on subsistence agriculture on a long term basis. Why don't you try reading what former suppliers of Megamart have to say when their factories shut down and they could no longer compete with other foreign suppliers driving prices down: One way to think of Wal-Mart is as a vast pipeline that gives non-U.S. companies direct access to the American market. "One of the things that limits or slows the growth of imports is the cost of establishing connections and networks," says Paul Krugman, the Princeton University economist. "Wal-Mart is so big and so centralized that it can all at once hook Chinese and other suppliers into its digital system. So--wham!--you have a large switch to overseas sourcing in a period quicker than under the old rules of retailing." Steve Dobbins has been bearing the brunt of that switch. He's president and CEO of Carolina Mills, a 75-year-old North Carolina company that supplies thread, yarn, and textile finishing to apparel makers--half of which supply Wal-Mart. Carolina Mills grew steadily until 2000. But in the past three years, as its customers have gone either overseas or out of business, it has shrunk from 17 factories to 7, and from 2,600 employees to 1,200. Dobbins's customers have begun to face imported clothing sold so cheaply to Wal-Mart that they could not compete even if they paid their workers nothing. "People ask, 'How can it be bad for things to come into the U.S. cheaply? How can it be bad to have a bargain at Wal-Mart?' Sure, it's held inflation down, and it's great to have bargains," says Dobbins. "But you can't buy anything if you're not employed. We are shopping ourselves out of jobs." http://www.fastcompany.com/47593/wal-mart-you-dont-know And that's how we end up with clothing coming in to the country from foreign sweatshops with no access to collective bargaining for better wages and working conditions. It's a neverending race to the bottom! And, did you look at the numbers listed in the OP? Walmart has forced suppliers to move their manufacturing operations abroad to cheaper locations, and continually forces suppliers - both U.S. based companies and foreign ones like Tasreen to keep cutting costs or they will drop them: Sure you do! . These "good old days" are a blip in human history....let alone the history of this planet. Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, we are now consuming 800X the natural resources of people living prior and world trade is 100X greater than before this revolution. The Revolution is no more than a feeding frenzy that has ended up with an economic system that can only only move forward, faster and faster...consuming more energy, more resources, producing more and more products. Attempts to control capitalism have been thrown off in the last 30 years, and unrestrained capitalism will keep trying to consume more until the whole system collapses....which could be as soon as 10 years, or as long as 50 years. I don't see attempts to substitute and innovate, taking us beyond the next half century. If there is still a human race living on this planet at the end of this century, they will be trying to live a pre-industrial life in a badly degraded world that has become hotter than any time in the last 55 million years. So much for the Star Trek future...but that's another topic.

Harper's team early on had a number of advisory sessions with top Republican strategists like Frank Luntz. The shift from the traditional PC issues to the appeal to rightwing social concerns like nationalism, fear of crime, opposition to a gun registry, appointing a crackpot young earth creationist to run the science and technology portfolio, placing the oil...I mean tar sands industry as priority one, and the similarities to Republicans are obvious. The only difference is that, aside from Alberta and a few other places out west, Harper and Hudak's brand of conservatism doesn't have the fundagelical army of supporters to draw upon to work on behalf of the executive class, so he has to tone down any exuberant Conservative fundies who start yacking about abortion too much. At least LCBO employees can make a decent living. How many other retail employees get payed more than minimum wage these days?

Bullshit! I'm looking at the full resolution map of the West Bank from 2006, and it's almost completely separated the north from the south without having to travel through Israeli checkpoints. Not to mention that the map shows the degree to which Israel has become an apartheid state, just like South Africa. Since the 1967 War, Israel hasn't made a decision between remaining a democratic state, or a Jewish state that subjugates half of the population....so like South Africa, they pretend to be both Jewish and democratic, and create a bunch of little Bantustans to pen the local Palestinian populations into, until they can all be coerced or intimidated to leave, and never have the right to return....just like East Jerusalem!

We interrupt the regular nonsense for this important bulletin: Pat Robertson Declares Earth Older Than 6000 Years And Calls For Evangelists To Stop “Covering Up” Science I just heard about this blog post written by Johnathan Turley a few days ago. I guess I missed this because my rss feed from the Evangelical Outpost and Religion News Blog links somehow missed the story! Pat Robertson remains something of an enigma. Just when you dismiss him as a religious wing nut who says that God gives him tips of who will win elections; atheists want people to be miserable; and causes earthquakes to punish Haitians as Devil worshippers. Then Robertson turns around and calls for the legalization of marijuana and now called for evangelists to stop suggesting that the Earth is only 6000 years old when every scientific fact points to the contrary. I wish he would just pick one side of the sanity/insanity line and stick with it because this is getting confusing. Robertson finally uttered the truth about a ludicrous calculation made in 1650 by the Archbishop of Ireland James Ussher when he estimated that the Earth was created on Oct. 23, 4004 B.C. Yet, forty six percent of pastors insist the Earth is 6000 years old. American politicians like Sarah Palin and others (here) also still proclaim faith in the young age of the Earth as biblically correct even if it is scientifically nonsensical. Robertson’s surprising comments came on the Christian Broadcasting Network’s “700 Club.” A viewer wrote into the show to express her “biggest fear is to not have my children and husband next to me in God’s Kingdom because they question why the Bible could not explain the existence of dinosaurs.” In response, Robertson said: "Look, I know that people will probably try to lynch me when I say this, but Bishop [James] Ussher wasn’t inspired by the Lord when he said that it all took 6,000 years. It just didn’t. You go back in time, you’ve got radiocarbon dating. You got all these things and you’ve got the carcasses of dinosaurs frozen in time out in the Dakotas. They’re out there. So, there was a time when these giant reptiles were on the Earth and it was before the time of the Bible. So, don’t try and cover it up and make like everything was 6,000 years. That’s not the Bible. . . . If you fight science, you’re going to lose your children, and I believe in telling it the way it was.” So, how much clout does old Pat still have in the political rightwing evangelical movement? So far, it seems like the other leading fat old white men are just trying to ignore him for now. If Pat's advice gets any wider media attention, other than Turley, they may have to take a stand.

Yep! That's the one I was referring to. It's similar to the alternate universe choices that the latest Republican-controlled House of Representatives has put in charge of key Congressional panels. The last thing they want is someone who actually knows something and doesn't take orders directly (along with kickbacks) from their local oil and bank funded lobbyists.