Kakki, As usual you've covered everything completely and eloquently. Let's see what the next two years bring. If the rep. don't do the job they can be voted out. Kasey
Hi Anne, > Sigh. It seems the biggest loser in yesterday's > election was the state of Alaska. There'll be tons o' > drilling there for sure. Everything I've read says the majority in Alaska want the oil business to provide jobs and improve their economy. Was there this kind of opposition when the Alaska pipeline was built back in the 60s-70s? Everything I've read says there will be little ecological impact - and that there was little ecological impact from the previous drilling there. I know, I know, we all read different takes on it. > It's all about oil. Iraq. Alaska. You put an oil man in > the White House and that's what you get. This makes me want to scream every time I read it. Was it all about oil when Clinton bombed Iraq during the 90s? Are the longstanding UN sanctions on Iraq all about oil? What about the fact that the US can get oil from a number of other sources than Iraq and has done so for years now? What about the fact that Europe and Asia are the biggest consumers of oil from Iraq? What about the fact that the largest oil companies in the world area British and Dutch? If, for some reason we "took over" Iraq just to get the oil, the truth is we would have far better access to the reserves there and could bring in a much higher technology to process it, thereby raising competition which would LOWER the price of oil to the entire world and LOWER the profits the oil companies make from it? I am not at all enthusiastic about a war in Iraq, but this "it's all about oil" thing drives me crazy. It defies the facts as I know them, is way too pat, and seems to be just a mantra for singling out that "big bad Bush oil family." > A personal aside. When I spent a few years lobbying for > funding to clean up a local pond, the Republican city > councilor was the biggest and most active supporter of > the effort. So, I guess you can't generalize. (although > it seems that overall the Republican party is not as > environmentally friendly as the Democratic party.) I have been involved with three environmental land conservation foundations. In all three it was "evil rich Republicans" who gave tens of millions to sustain the organizations and to buy the land up for preservation. > When will people figure out that it's worse to wake up > in the morning and say "Sh*t, I have no planet" than to > say "Sh*t, I have no job."? Preserving land is a good thing within reason. Far more important is controlling and working toward eliminating pollution of our air and water. If you have X amount of money for the environment, where would you have it go - to new technology that will help eliminate it or to using government money to buy up any open space just because the neighbors want their property values to increase, as is often the case here in California. They held up a much needed freeway here for years, wasting millions, based on saving part of some bird's habitat. What is worse - the bird losing some habitat or people in their cars idling on clogged highways and freeways for hours every day adding grossly to the air pollution? KakkiGet more from the Web. FREE MSN Explorer download : http://explorer.msn.com
