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ORIGINAL: slaveboyforyou

You're wrong about there "ALWAYS being alternatives."  Saudia Arabia is a major player in the Middle East and in OPEC.  We have to deal with them.  Our entire economic stability depends on steady oil supplies from that part of the world.  Besides it isn't our place to force our morality on other nations.  We don't have any room to talk considering our own culture's treatment of women.  The rate of violent crime towards women in this country is much higher than any Islamic nation.  It's that reason that Muslim cultures feel justified with following strict interpretations of the Islamic law.  In fact, you'll find survey after survey where Muslim women defend their culture. 

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ORIGINAL: popeye1250

Vanessa, the job of the U.S. govt. is to run our country not to go around taking on the problems of foreign countries.
And as a U.S. Citizen I really don't much care what they do in foreign countries.
I'm not willing to pay more for "special coffee" because some people in the U.S. think "Juan Valdez" isn't making enough money for his coffee beans.
People would be better off and our country would be better served if we put all that energy into making the U.S. a better country.

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Umm, wind, solar, renewable, tidal, bio, green, alterations in our lifestyle, dependence on cars as we know them, mass transit, more people working from homes, using our own resources, just a few little things like that. :)

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And of course Muslim women defend their culture. They will be beheaded if they don't.  Sheesh. 

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ORIGINAL: slaveboyforyou

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Umm, wind, solar, renewable, tidal, bio, green, alterations in our lifestyle, dependence on cars as we know them, mass transit, more people working from homes, using our own resources, just a few little things like that. :)

The technology is not avaliable yet for wind and solar energy to be efficient enough to replace petroleum.  Despite what the green squad tell you, it's simply not good enough yet.  The technology for tidal turbines is not advanced enough to be reliable yet.  "Bio" and "green" is a pretty broad reaching buzz word.  You'll have to narrow that down. 

What alterations in our lifestlye do you propose?  I think the majority of us do everything we can to cut down on energy costs; we have to.  It's rich limousine liberal assholes like Al Gore that say shit like that, but they don't actually apply it to themselves.  Mass transit is great for dense metropolitan areas; not all of us live in those areas.  Even when mass transit systems are put into cities with a lot of car usage, people don't use it.  Working is home is fine for people that are able to.  But again, a lot of folks can't do that.  People can't do construction, unload trucks, run farms, install electrical systems, etc. from the comfort of their home office. 

We do use our own resources.  We used to supply most of the world's oil.  Standard Oil had the largest "navy" in the world at one time.  But we hit peak oil 40 years ago.  We'd like to drill for oil where it most likely is off-shore and in certain areas of Alaska.  But now that Mr. Obama is in office, don't hold your breath waiting for that to happen. 

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And of course Muslim women defend their culture. They will be beheaded if they don't.  Sheesh. 

No they don't. 

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who came to their job in private planes and whose cars were shipped on Semi's. That sounds "green" to me.

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The technology IS there, but no one is supporting it. Not unlike most things in our Military-Industrial complex society, money has to come from the Gov. sector before things can be perfected and implemented and passed on to the private sector.

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And yes, Mulim women are caned, raped and beheaded for anything their "owners" decide they should be. They have no voice, are not recognized by the courts equally. I mean Good Lord man, Google some photos and info about this. It's everywhere. 

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ORIGINAL: VanessaChaland

Our government is you and me. We the people and all that. But on a more important note, we the people, as in the people of the world have a humanitarian duty to protect those that are unable to protect themselves. We can't sit by the sidelines and watch another Nazi Germany develop, nor while Africa slaughters itself, nor while millions of women are "owned", kept illiterate in some cases, raped, and have thier clits cut off. I mean what the hell does that make us that we have the power to stop some of this and don't?  :)

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ORIGINAL: slaveboyforyou

They aren't the ones telling average folks to go "green."  I don't watch auto racing of any kind, but I don't deride people that do.  I don't long for a "green" society where we all wear hemp clothing, birkenstocks, and hold hands on Earth Day as we sing We are the World.   

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ORIGINAL: VanessaChaland

Any person, male, female, child, old, young, any race or culture anywhere, that is a slave, deprived of life, liberty and justice, raped, beaten, murdered is everyones concern everywhere. Surely I don't need to refer an educated person like your self to:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came...

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We don't chose our place of birth, our skin color, or language or culture. We DO chose what actions we take to help those that are born in more unfortunate circumstances than ours. We can either choose to speak out and try to help, or we can choose to do nothing and let them suffer. I choose the former.

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ORIGINAL: VanessaChaland

Sure I do. And every time I buy some new Tupperware I say to myself "Fuck those Saudi women and all like them that live a horrible life of beatings, despair, torture, no options and death at the hands of the insane patriarchial SOBs that "own" them. As long as I get cheap gasoline, plastics and other products why should I give a fuck about others"?

You really disappoint me slave boy. That type of generalized statement belongs on Fox News or an after school special for kids. Seriously, we all know how important petroleum is in our day to day lives, still must we support the worst of the worst to get it? There are alternatives. There has ALWAYS been alternatives. I would happily pay $10 a gallon for gas if it meant that other women around the world would be free from the jackasses that currently "own" them and have power due to the money they have, which we gave them, to buy oil, so Bush Co. could make more millions. :(

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ORIGINAL: slaveboyforyou

I guess you don't use petroleum in any way, shape, or form.  

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ORIGINAL: VanessaChaland

Umm, wind, solar, renewable, tidal, bio, green, alterations in our lifestyle, dependence on cars as we know them, mass transit, more people working from homes, using our own resources, just a few little things like that. :)

And of course Muslim women defend their culture. They will be beheaded if they don't.  Sheesh.

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ORIGINAL: slaveboyforyou

You're wrong about there "ALWAYS being alternatives."  Saudia Arabia is a major player in the Middle East and in OPEC.  We have to deal with them.  Our entire economic stability depends on steady oil supplies from that part of the world.  Besides it isn't our place to force our morality on other nations.  We don't have any room to talk considering our own culture's treatment of women.  The rate of violent crime towards women in this country is much higher than any Islamic nation.  It's that reason that Muslim cultures feel justified with following strict interpretations of the Islamic law.  In fact, you'll find survey after survey where Muslim women defend their culture. 

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There ARE alternatives out there.

There is no energy crisis.

There's only a crisis of lack of vision and determination.

But you know, it helps when you have a President who ISN'T the puppet ruler of the oil company interests behind the fucking desk in the oval.

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Oh, suuuuuure they would.

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Thanks to independant funding of solar cell research, amorphous cell structure silicon has dropped the cost and difficulty of manufacture on solar cells to the point where you can now power your home for about the same cost as a new BMW. With federal tax breaks for installation, you could drop that to the cost of a new Ford. The cells would also come with a lifespan close to 25 years (which is better than the car would) Currently, they are designing a form of roofing panels which would do the same job as your shingles, and cut your dependance on the grid by 80%. Probably more as they are improved over the years, thanks to increased demand.

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Wind power is exploding. You may not think much of it SB4U, but American Industry sure as hell does. The midwest wind corridor is sprouting turbines like mushrooms in a dark cave. And those intrests are making some pretty good money off the deal. Sorry you feel you need to blind yourself to that reality. The center of the US could get as much as 25% of it's electrical needs met by wind power within the next decade, IF the federal government continues to offer incentives to build and improve them.

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Again, just to set the record straight... I was talking about helium 3 mining... not helium. It's fairly common throughout the solar system... but not so much here on Earth. It's okay, I know a lot of people who haven't bothered to research it. Yes, it WAS Bush's idea to distract the nation from his lies about the war by promising to take us back to the moon. Doing something right for all the wrong reasons is still doing something right, I suppose. Somehow, I'd think if "Curious George" Bush had science in mind when he made that decision, he also wouldn't have maimed stem cell research for almost two fucking decades. No, Bush decided to take us back to the moon (without any increase in NASA's budget, BTW) for purely political reasons... to distract people from the fact he lied about yellowcake from Nigeria, and was responsible for trashing the Constitution.

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The "science fiction" solutions I cited were to give some examples of some of the more interesting systems that might be available within the next 25 years. Naturally, you poo-pooed the notions. After all, what from science fiction has ever come true in real life? LOL! Trips to the moon? Ha! Home computers? Nonsense! Advances in medical research? Bah!

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You know, it's funny how all those things have come to pass even though (and perhaps in spite of) people like yourself, SB4U, automatically naysaying them. Again, I hear the painful bleating of a dinosaur being slowly sucked down into a tar pit... Or maybe it's the grumbling of a luddite, proven ineffective against a machine that can do his job 50 times better and faster.

My point is, there are alternatives, and they need to be researched and developed. Otherwise, the only alternative you propose is "more of the same"... at least until the lights go out and the cold begins to creep in  

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ORIGINAL: VanessaChaland

Any person, male, female, child, old, young, any race or culture anywhere, that is a slave, deprived of life, liberty and justice, raped, beaten, murdered is everyones concern everywhere. Surely I don't need to refer an educated person like your self to:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came...

We don't chose our place of birth, our skin color, or language or culture. We DO chose what actions we take to help those that are born in more unfortunate circumstances than ours. We can either choose to speak out and try to help, or we can choose to do nothing and let them suffer. I choose the former.