SocraticGadfly: It's another Earth Day with the earth continuing to be lost

April 22, 2019

It's another Earth Day with the earth continuing to be lost



The biggest lost is further delays in addressing the massive problem of climate change.

I've discussed AOC's aspirational Green New Deal, the one started by neoliberals who are the youth division of Gang Green environmentalist org Sierra Club, versus the Green Party's better but not perfect version, three times already, with a fourth in the hopper.  Part three, with links to one and two, is here.

My personal purple iris Earth Day gift.
Among problems with the Gang Green New Deal is, beyond it generally being aspirational and not concrete, it talks little about a carbon tax and nothing at all about a carbon tariff. A carbon tariff rightly addresses the political question of "why should we shoot ourselves in the foot?" and the moral issue of "we need to all be on the same page." It would not harm developing nations, as many, especially in subSaharan Africa, have not committed to a 20th-century style western grid or industrialization in the first place.

Second, to riff somewhat on other people, and without saying Ocasio-Cortez doesn't care about other environmental issues, climate change is only one issue.

Habitat degradation and species extinction beyond what's being caused by climate change are another. Potential Green Party presidential candidate Howie Hawkins discusses this and more.

With our Gen Z kids, device addiction and nature apathy is also big. Actually, it's big for their parents and even older adults as well.

If you're at an Earth Day event, whether one affiliated with the national Earth Day group or not, turn your phone OFF. Not just to "silent" but OFF.

If you don't, you're part of the problem. It's hard to care about nature if you can't occasionally focus on it.

That said, the planet WILL be around. And, the planet will recover — eventually — from most human degradation.

But, we may not. This is like an asteroid 66 million years ago, but we're aiming it at ourselves. Only the mega-rich of libertarian ilk could seriously tout the idea that we as a civilized, settled species could just pack up and relocate our entire civilization from its largely coastal and riverine current location.

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