- Pres. McCain@3AM: Toles nails it again.
- Thanks for the memories: Tiger Stadium in Detroit may not survive the month.
- God’s way of telling you that you have too much time on your hands: You are this guy putting lyrics to well-known movie themes. Or maybe you’re just the guy watching the videos.
- One guy’s an optimist and the other guy is an expert on the economy: In this Daily Show video, Bush and Bernanke appear — simultaneously but in different parts of DC — to say completely opposite things about the economy.
- Douchebag for Liberty: Bob Novak says McCain cannot win running a positive campaign. And this just in — Columbus has discovered America!
- We don’t even show the coffins arriving at the airbase: The entire nation of Israel shuts down as she mourns her war dead.
- McCain better rev up the nastygrams: Obama down by only three in North Carolina.
- Gore issues a challenge: Produce every kilowatt of electricity through wind, sun, etc by 2018. And T. Boone Pickens’ TV ads are running on TV, too, in Baton Rouge. Pretty soon, it’ll be a movement! UPDATE: Texas OKs a massive wind power project.
- Obama pwnage: Dem nominee sucker-punches the Wall Street Journal and others who reported a puny $30 million take in June — real number: $52 million. Ouch.
E Pluribus Unum
We're all in this thing together.
1. How about a little Ambien humor? At his age, it is a much better fit.
2. We build it, we use it, then we tear it down. It is who we are.
3. Total waste of his time. If that is a talent then he should re-channel it.
4. Don’t polish Bernanke up too much, we’re not out of this yet.
5. McCain isn’t going to win regardless of the campaign he runs.
6. The MSM bows down to the gov’t. Color me shocked.
7. See 5.
8. When Gore advocates waving every bit of gov’t bureaucracy that would drag that out until 2040 and tells the Kennedy family to f off let me know. Until then, it is media whoredom.
9. Impressive number indeed. It’s his to lose.
When Gore advocates waiving every bit of gov’t bureaucracy that would drag that out until 2040
Note that I also mentioned T. Boone Pickens in the same bullet point as Gore. This should be a signal to the reader that those two represent (so far, on this important matter) the best and the worst of the American system — and neither gentleman is 100% of one or 100% of the other.
What that means is this: the “project” is going to take a partnership of government and business at all levels. And neither entity has a lock on efficiency of purpose or execution.
“When Gore advocates waving every bit of gov’t bureaucracy that would drag that out until 2040…”
You’ve been brainwashed. It isn’t government bureaucracy that’s been dragging out our move away from fossil fuels, it’s the unholy alliance between corporations – particularly oil and car makers – and their cronies in government (see Ronald Reagan). The enemy is corporatism in government not “bureaucracy”.
I finally clicked all the way through to the text of Gore’s speech. I was far too kind to him. He remains the single biggest obstacle to the energy sources of the future.
How so?
P.S. I have to tell you that if I were going to ask the question, “What is the single biggest obstacle to the energy sources of the future?” Al Gore’s name wouldn’t even be on the list, to say the least.
From the beginning, Gore has framed the debate as an all or nothing, have to agree with him all the way, good people v. bad people issue, like just about every politician. If you want to alienate people, you do what Gore did. If you want to convince people who may be skeptical of your position on an issue like this give them something they can agree with.
“Alternative” energy is markets, its the jobs that allow America a new leg up in a globalized world where new populations now do just as well (or approximating parity) the jobs that some in our country think Americans are entitled to perform, forever. It’s the next great step forward in American ingenuity. That is an argument that people who disagree with Gore (on AGW) could have embraced years ago.
Gore didn’t win any argument, the price of a gallon of gasoline did. Republicans would have long ago gotten behind the idea if Gore had appealed to capitalism as well as altruism.
What, you never heard of “aspirational goal horizons?”
Face it, anyone who challenges the cult of authoritarian personality that rationalizes the right wing’s use of power to screw their fellow man for the sake of a buck will be demonized, messenger attacked along with the message since the message is incontrovertible.
“Alternative” energy is markets
With all due respect, I call bullshit.
I was in the alternate energy business for nearly 10 years — before, during and after the last great oil shock of the mid to late 70s. And we did fine — until the government yanked the tax credits and the oil markets were de-regulated.
Had the government stayed the course, we’d probably already be out of the mess we find ourselves in yet again.
How many more times do we have to go round the wheel before we get it right?
Mark,
Don’t look to me to defend the moron-in-chief. If I’d give Gore credit for anything related to this it would be that he never claimed to be a uniter before he was a divider.
Ara,
That may be true, but Gore still contributed to that environment by making this a wedge issue rather than one that caused a ground swell of support and crossed ideological lines and forced Washington to change its idiotic ways. To change the way an entire culture fuels its vehicles and powers its homes and various electronics you need more than tax credits, you need someone who finds a way to get everyone on board.
I’m sure you could site examples where Gore voted against ending those subsidies. I have no doubt he did. However, when you want to make the change that Gore has advocated, and if you believe it the way Gore does AGW, it is absolutely necessary to draw the largest coalition possible. Gore has failed miserably in that. His argument has always lacked the second part that I mentioned earlier.
you need more than tax credits, you need someone who finds a way to get everyone on board…Gore has failed miserably in that.
And that makes him “the single biggest obstacle to the energy sources of the future?”
By that standard, the Rockefeller (oil) and Ford (internal combustion engine) families should be indicted for mass murder, no?
Now that’s a jump. How do you get from a to b?
I was just going to ask you the same thing.
Your reasoning seems to be this: Al Gore COULD HAVE brought us together but he failed therefore he is the chief obstacle to the energy sources of the future.
When did he get that kind of a monopoly? When did he get that kind of power?
The answer is, he never did.
Failing to succeed is not the same thing as blocking all efforts at future success. If it were, Standard Oil and Ford Motor Co. would have a lot to answer for because they are far more responsible (than Gore at least) for the kinds of energy choices we have today.
P.S. Which is not to say they are to blame…
P.S. …and which is not to say that Gore has failed.
If Gore has identified the real-life falling sky of chicken little, as a steward of national policy I’d say his culpability in not bringing us together is much larger than a for profit business selling their products. Government is much more indictable for not doing the right thing than business.
Government is much more indictable for not doing the right thing than business.
Well, it is certainly true that government should be by the people, of the people and for the people. Just as business should be by the shareholders, of the shareholders and for the shareholders. Each has its place and purpose.
But to suggest that government (and Al Gore as its representative) is solely to blame for not doing something about climate change is to suggest that business is out of control somehow. “Stop me,” say the titans of industry, “before I hurt someone!”
That doesn’t wash.
The kind of government you allude to might have existed under Stalinist Russia, but that was then & there, and this is here & now.
Neither government nor business has (or should have) total autonomy and authority. That said, neither has total responsibility either.
Government does have a role to play in relation to business, mostly in keeping an eye on them and making sure they don’t abuse the trust of the people. And an independent press has the job of keeping an eye on government. But that’s a discussion for another time.