This forum is going to get ugly fast.

[theoceansnerves]

As someone who ranks the environment as the #1 issue I base my votes on, the next four years absolutely terrify me. As it is, this forum is 90% bad news already. We now have an even bigger gap in the Senate in which a horrific energy bill will be pushed through. We had enough votes to stop it before but now with Daschle gone it will pass with the MTBE provision intact. Republicans control a majority of governorships, including here in California and in the environmental "battleground" state of Utah. Bush now has a mandate to open the entire west to oil and gas drilling. I saw a Republican spokesperson say on TV last night that included in Bush's winning mandate will be the opening of Alaskan wilderness for oil drilling. Murkowski has been elected Senator. Special interests and former company men control positions of power critical to safeguarding the environment (EPA, Interior, etc.) Who knows what will happen when he gets his "conservative" majority in the Supreme Court. I'd really rather not even think about that right now...

[gulfcoastliberal]

1. The SCOTUS packing is really horrifying

We are so fucked.

[phantom power]

2. And don't forget coal. I wonder if there will be any

mountain-tops left in Appalachia, in 2008.

[doubleplusgood]

25. don't you mean "clean coal" ?

</sarcasm off>

[seasat]

3. I'm an scientist and research will be slashed.

We've seen basic research cut under Shrub but we'll see it cut even more, especially environmental research. I'm wondering if I'll have a job this time next year. Our department is already talking about the cuts in grants for next year that we already know about. It's a crying shame when China, Russia, and other countries are pursuing a more progressive environmental policy than us.

[hatrack]

4. Well, it's never really been sweetness and light over here anyway . . .

But I agree. How the hell am I going to keep up?

[blindpig]

8. don't know how you do it now

Your prodigious output may well be an indicator of masochism but I prefer to think that you are tougher than hobo shit. Thanks for all.

For myself, I shall upgrade my appreciation for irony(if possible) and do some grad work in black humor. And re-read old Ed Abbey.

[Frangible]

5. I'm scared

It's now another 4 years of fundamentalist whack jobs who think the environment is something God gave them to rape for profit.

[mainegreen]

6. Our only hope now

if for those of us in blue states to get our attorney generals to SUE SUE SUE!!!!

[Dogmudgeon]

7. Almost

It's not the forum that's going to get ugly ... it's the news.

Y'know, it's been getting pretty ugly for several years now.

Roe v. Wade? With an impending climate catastrophe, it will be more like Row v. Ski.

--bkl

[Delphinus]

9. Kill me now

What * is going to do is beyond most of our comprehensions. How he was elected still is boggling my mind. I'm still in shock.

[midnight armadillo]

10. ANWR is toast

End of story. ANWR will be start to be developed in the next four years - I expect that bill to pass in the next year.

Much, much worse is that the nuclear plants will be quickly re-certified to run for decades past their design lifetimes. The NRC is already amongst the most ineffectual of gov. agencies, and will become even more so. The potential for a nuclear accident in the coming years will become very real as the 'bathtub curve' failure rate takes hold.

The much greater threat to the environment comes from global climate change. Further industrialization of the wilderness will only make it worse with fragmented habitat, etc. There is zero chance of any change in US policy for the better here. ZERO.

Science in general will again be severely undermined in the US, with possible funding cuts to try to close the budget gaps. If it's kept up long enough the US will certainly start to see a brain drain, with Chinese and Indians returning to their countries and Canada and Europe beckoning...

[RegexReader]

12. If global warming is to be believed

then this will literally be true.

RegexReader
$USA =~ s/Republican/Democrat/ig;

[indigobusiness]

17. Take heart. The warming tundra is hell on roads

and I see a graveyard of oil-field vehicles strewn along the way. They are going to have a hell of a time if the rate of arctic warming continues.
It might be a joke on them.

[AzureWaves]

11. *sigh*

It has been #1 for me as well, it is so depressing to think of what will happen....my #1 reason (out of a nearly infinate number) for wanting bush out was for the environment. I feel kind of helpless, but know nothing will get done if I don't get involved somehow. Even the smallest efforts can make a difference, we have to remember that. :)

[baby_bear]

13. May I ask for a special note of sympathy?

...for me and my fellow career scientists at EPA, who are in total despair, having assumed that we were going to be rid of the toxic administration.

Oh dear. When I think what four more years will wreak on this planet...

s_m

[Buzz Clik]

14. You certainly have my sympathies.

I have close friends at the Cincy lab and in DC, and they are all in pain. Some are taking mandatory 15% cuts in pay, many others are having their jobs redefined from above in ways that make no sense.

As a university researcher who has interfaced with EPA for decades, this is particularly disturbing. We have seen enforcement money slashed, research programs cut to zero, and funding for critical centers of excellence recalled.

I made the decision nearly 30 years ago to build a career in environmental research, and I did just that. Now, I'm an environmental activist, but only as a hobby. My funding for students is coming from elsewhere.

[planetwarming]

15. It's Called Consumerism

Not Republicanism. If they didn't get it here, they would get it somewhere else in the world, spoiling some other place. It sure would have been nice if Kerry got the chance to raise the CAFE standards though.

[baby_bear]

16. Thanks, Buzz Clik

You no doubt have seen federal research dollars more narrowly available the past few years. If you happen to be in the "right" field, your dollars may have gone up.

At the applied science level at EPA, our dollars have been drying up for doing the things that can make a difference in people's lives on a relatively short-term basis. But that requires money from the polluters, so we don't see much of that. And the Superfund tax is gone, so the petroleum companies have really pulled out a coup.

I'm sure you know the drill. Hard to stick in there and keep working, but I work with such committed scientists that I can't bail out on them, or the environment. I'll stay until Bush outsources my job.

s_m

[Alan Smithee]

18. Even my conservative friend is spooked.

Five years ago he was trying to convince me global warming didn't exist.

Now I hold the ultimate trump card for all our arguments. Small comfort, but I'll take what I can get.

[SoCalDem]

19. I posted this in January.. and now it's even worse for me ..

:cry:

SoCalDem (1000+ posts) Wed Jan-21-04 02:50 AM
Original message


I can barely bring myself to browse this forum


and it's not for the reasons that I deliberately avoid some of the others at DU..

It is just so DAMNED heartbreaking to read the subject lines.. I actually fear what might be inside the link.. It's an irrational thing, but most of the things that are reported about the environment/energy/science areas are NOT good..

I do what I can, but these sorrowful articles make me think that somewhere "out there" a horrible thing is going on, and there is nothing anyone can do except tell other people.

I have almost decided to take the "Ignorance is bliss" approach.

When I think back to when I learned about the exotic animals of faraway places, or of the natural wonders or the world, it never occurred to me that in my lifetime, we might see the last orangutan, or the last rhinoceros, or the last unpolluted river/stream/lake.

I swam in unpolluted water, drank directly from mountain streams, walked barefoot in mossy mountain meadows. I have held golden tree frogs in my hands, and have seen flocks of wild toucans & parrots, so many in a flock that it created a shadow, much like clouds do.. To think that greedy humans are willing to live without these things, is excrutiatingly painful.. I almost do not want to know about it..

[KeepHopeAlive]

20. It is seriously depressing

I was so frustrated that the environment was barely, if ever, mentioned during the campaign. I don't remember one environmental question during the debates.

It will be almost impossible to fight the lie of a "mandate" federally. I'm equally disheartened locally. Voters in my town gave thumbs up to the building of a sprawling shopping center right at the gateway of the community that will most likely house Walmart. The debates regarding this issue were almost entirely economical in nature and rarely environmental.

[Dogmudgeon]

21. The next four years will be insignificant

The mechanism behind global climate change is now self-perpetuating and won't stop until one of the planet's temperature-regulating mechanisms kicks in. The smart money is on the thermohaline circulation in the Atlantic to be impaired, causing a little ice age or starting the next major glaciation early. The ocean would then become a more efficient heat and carbon sink.

Pollution is a short-term problem. But the problem of a die-off of life is real -- and we're in the middle of it. Some scientists have found evidence that the die-off is actually a couple of million years on by now, but human ingenuity has dramatically increased the rate.

The brakes on the problem will be applied by moving past the peak of oil production. The economy will be wrecked for dedcades, maybe centuries, and it's probable that the human population of the Earth will return to about 500 million within the span of a generation (25-40 years).

Enjoy what you've got while you've got it. The future is not bright at all.

--bkl

[ramapo]

24. I agree

We missed the boat about 30 years ago. America bought "Morning in America" over reality. Reality is now playing out even while the delusion that everything will be ok forever is firmly in place.

Anyone of us could wake up tomorrow and decide to be a "good" envionmental citizen. This cannot take place with our society. Even if it did we now are faced with the copycat cultures. Look at the Chinese. They have learned nothing from our environmental mistakes.

It is so frustrating to see that Bush has not been held accountable for his environmental policies. But I honestly think that events are now out of our control.

Don't worry though. Mother Nature will eventually make things right.

[kohodog]

22. We need a valium dispenser at the door to this forum.

It will be hard to read for those of us who have been paying attention. However, if we can use this forum as a call to action it may help.

[BlueHandDuo]

23. That would be environmentally irresponsible...

...because the valium you excrete in your urine isn't removed by standard wastewater treatment methods, so it builds up in the water, where it can adversely affect wildlife. Prozac, too.

We're humped.

[hatrack]

26. Quite so! Been following the news from DC & Colorado myself.

Now, if I could only rest assured that all the coffee I piss on a daily basis weren't harming local fish . . . :hi:

[Tree Hugger]

27. Hopefully only 4 years

I decided about a year ago that I would be going to law school next fall, becoming an Environmental Lawyer. Hopefully by the time I graduate, things will be different, and there will be a job for me.

As it is now, I'm an Environmental Engineer. And the only person at my company who talks about trees as opposed to money when we're planning a development. It's frustrating.

How do you convince people that the Environment is in trouble, when they don't see it on an up-close, daily basis?

I have so much respect for anyone at the EPA, especially now, and I hope to end up there someday, if it's not dismantled by then.