Subject: Re: The Gax Tax (Again!)
From: James Michael
Date: 8 Oct 1996 05:09:43 GMT
This posting was incorrectly attributed to me; I'm responsible for none
of it. Thank you.
Jim Michael
jmichael@cts.com
mwgoodman@igc.apc.org (Mark W. Goodman) wrote:
>In article <535smt$pc9@Mars.mcs.com>, synergy@MCS.COM (synergy) wrote:
>
>> James Michael writes:
>>
>> >jim blair wrote:
>> >>The Gas Tax Again!
>> >[stuff deleted]
>>
>> >>The current gas tax collects approximately one billion dollars per year,
>> >>for
>> >>each penny per gallon of tax. That means that rather than discussing a
>> >>CUT
>> >>of 4.3 cents, we should be discussing a 20 cent per gallon INCREASE just
>> >>to pay for road repair. And it adds evidence to my claim that the US
>> >>provides a massive subsidy to cars and trucks. See the web page for
>> >>details.
>>
>> Wrong! The correct thing to do is to stop subsidizing all mass transit
>> scams and use the money saved to pay for road construction and maintenance.
>> Then, once the transit scams have been eliminated or privatized, the gas
>> tax should be eliminated and replaced with a user fee system that measures
>> each motor vehicles' use of roads in a given area and then factors
>> in each vehicles weight to arrive at a fair usage fee. We have the
>> technology to do this on a very cost effective basis right now, but
>> the LOOT-scum train-brains would fight such a fair proposal tooth and
>> nail, because they know that transit can't compete with roads if
>> neither are subsidized.
>>
>Wrong yourself. I assume that you are failing to take into account the
>"external costs" of driving versus public transit. These are costs like
>health costs of air pollution and economic costs of climate change, which
>driving imposes on the rest of society rather than on the person doing the
>driving. These costs are much higher for cars on roads than for mass
>transit. This is what makes mass transit subsidies and punitive gas taxes
>economically rational, and makes the simple-minded libertarian argument
>fall apart, once again.
>>
>> --
>>
>> Annoy a Fascist: Just Say NO! to gun control.
>>
>> "Much is made of the 'haves' and 'have-nots'; little is said of the
>> 'dos' and 'do-nots.'"
>> -- Thomas Sowell.
>>
>> "Government doesn't work."
>> -- Harry Browne, Libertarian Presidential Candidate
>>
>
>--
>Mark W. Goodman
>mwgoodman@igc.apc.prg
Subject: Headwaters Ancient Forest Logging to Begin 10/8
From: whs@uclink4.berkeley.edu (Will Satterthwaite)
Date: Mon, 07 Oct 1996 22:39:41 -0700
Forwarding the following from EPIC
-will (NOT an EPIC spokesperson)
EMERGENCY ACTION ALERT € EMERGENCY ACTION ALERT
EPIC € The Environmental Protection Information Center
PO Box 397, Garberville CA 95542
(707) 923-2931 € fax (707) 923-4210 €
http://www.humnat.org/epic/ € epic@igc.apc.org
October 7, 1996
LOGGING IN HEADWATERS' ANCIENT GROVES STARTS TUESDAY
The Pacific Lumber Company notified the California Department of
Forestry (CDF) today that they intend to begin salvage logging operations
in the ancient groves of Headwaters Forest beginning Tuesday, October 8.
Despite the agreement announced September 28, four of Headwaters' six
ancient groves remain vulnerable to salvage logging.
Under an exemption to the California Forest Practice Rules, timber
companies can "salvage" trees without submitting their plans to the usual
level of agency and public review. Restrictions imposed by a federal judge
on salvage logging in Headwaters specify that only downed trees may be
removed from the ancient groves. However, standing trees may be cut
provided that Pacific Lumber consults with the agencies on a tree-by-tree
basis. In either case, salvage operations will dramatically alter the
ancient forest ecosystem. These four pristine groves will suffer damage
from downed logs being dragged by cables across the forest floor, trashing
the sensitive understory and possibly damaging standing trees.
The California Board of Forestry meets Tuesday in Mt. Shasta to reconsider
emergency rules which would prohibit exemption logging in coastal ancient
forests, including Headwaters. Also, government officials such as
California Resources Secretary Doug Wheeler, Deputy Secretary of the
Interior John Garamendi and Senator Dianne Feinstein have it in their
power to institute a moratorium on logging in endangered species habitat
while the Habitat Conservation Plan mandated by the September 28
agreement is developed. All of these public officials need to know that
salvage logging in Headwaters Forest cannot go on, and that the public will
hold them accountable for their inaction!
PLEASE MAKE THE FOLLOWING CALLS TODAY! Tell these officials to take
IMMEDIATE action to protect the ancient groves of Headwaters Forest from
salvage logging!
Board of Forestry: (916) 653-8007 fax (916) 653-0989
Pete Wilson: (916) 658-2793 fax (916) 445-4633
Doug Wheeler: (916) 653-5656 fax (916) 653-8102
Dianne Feinstein: (202) 224-3841 fax (202) 228-3954
John Garamendi: (202) 208-6291 fax (202) 208-3048
Subject: Re: Major problem with climate predictions
From: af329@james.freenet.hamilton.on.ca (Scott Nudds)
Date: 8 Oct 1996 00:59:56 -0400
(phil. Felton) wrote:
: Not so, there was indeed concern in the 70's about the observed cooling since
: the 40's. I suggest you read H.H Lamb, "Climatic History and the Future",
: Ist Ed. 1977, second Ed. 1984.
Inded there was, and these were the seed for the unscientific news
reports that followed. The scientific community was not warning of
an impending ice age, and they were not warning that steps must be taken
to thwart it. The time sales under consideration were considerably
longer than the decades or century time scale that are being used today.
Try as they might, denialists will not succeed in portreying the
cooling trend casually reported in the 70's with the warnings being
issued today. Such comparisons have no scientific basis, and are in
fact based on ignorance or deceit.
I am still waiting for a reference to scientific literature from the
period that warns of an impending ice age.
---
"It was a Rembrant of science and art." American Conservative Bo Gritz
referring to the Oklahoma City bombing that killed 160 Americans, many
children.
--
<---->
Subject: Re: time sensative request
From: af329@james.freenet.hamilton.on.ca (Scott Nudds)
Date: 8 Oct 1996 01:00:18 -0400
In <530ub9$3hq@omnifest.uwm.edu>, csmith@omnifest.uwm.edu (Carol Smith) wrote:
: Dr. Michael Sanera, director of
: Environmental Education Research (assoc? org?)
: who speaks about
: "Environmental Myths Taught in the Classroom"
: at right wing educational events.
: Any interesting connections with other orgs?
: please e mail me directly.
: csmith@omnifest.uwm.edu
No listing on Sanera or the group as named. However the following group
name comes close...
THE FUTURE OF ENVIRONMENTALISM AND ITS IMPACT ON THE
ENVIRONMENTAL PROFESSIONAL - April 96
----------------------------------------------------
- Jay H. Lehr, Ph.D. - Senior Scientist -
ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION ENTERPRISES - Columbus, Ohio
The world has just witnessed an environmental backlash that lasted less
than two years. It all started in the United States when a newly elected
Republican congress was thought to be set on dismantling abusive
environmental regulations. Some were sure they would succeed. Others,
who maintained a lower profile, were not. They knew that the
environmental movement, for better or worse, had done too thorough a job
brainwashing the world's population. A change of heart by the population
of any country, least of all the United States, was simply not in the
cards.
Environmentalism, absent from the human psyche just three decades ago
will likely take its place among Maslow's table of strongest human
needs, as we close out man's most productive century. Politicians
everywhere now realize that tangling with environmental issues with an
eye to economizing is taboo. In fact, all efforts of the Republican
Congress to dismantle the nation's current environmental protection
program have ceased.
IS THE BATTLE IS OVER?
Yes, the battle is over. This nation and the rest of the world will not
soon again be challenged to modify its environmental activism, no matter
how neurotic it may be at times. One can only be in awe of the
leadership of the environmental movement for laying so strong a
foundation that even logic, common sense, good science and economics
could not knock the building from its moorings. Thus we can now all
live with it, and the comforting knowledge that environmental
professionals everywhere will continue to be a highly valued segment of
society.
Membership of the big environmental groups is on the rise again.
Unfortunately, these are the same groups who value kangaroo rats and
spotted owls over homo sapiens..
OUR STOLEN FUTURE
As environmental activists tout the new environmental tract "Our Stolen
Future", further support for my predictions will develop.
"OUR STOLEN FUTURE" documents declining sperm counts in man and some of
his friends in the animal kingdom. It lays the blame at the feet of
industrial chemicals. Some have described the book as "innuendo heaped
upon hypothesis piled upon theory", but fact or fiction, it will have a
major impact on society.
Remember that the 1960's pop environmental book, Rachel Carson's "Silent
Spring" is responsible for millions dying of malaria each year. The
book lead to the outlawing of DDT, the chemical that had virtually
eliminated the disease before it was labeled a carcinogen by
environmental activists. Despite the fact that DDT's carcinogenicity
was never proven, it remains virtually unavailable throughout the world.
It is likely that with no greater evidence "OUR STOLEN FUTURE" will
force the elimination of a few more industrial chemicals. Our
professional future will then be enhanced as we are hired to eliminate
residuals of some newly convicted chemical in our environment.
A MATURE INDUSTRY
The view from within the environmental science community is not yet a
rosy one. We have experienced a significant downsizing and jobs are not
plentiful. We are still reducing the previous overpopulation of
environmental professionals. Ten years ago there were 5 jobs for every
individual who had reasonable credentials supporting a claim to the
title of environmental scientist or engineer. Today each of us must
fight for a single position and many are still disappearing into other
vocations. We are, however, on our way to being a stable, healthy
scientific community with no real threat of extinction.
AN ENVIRONMENTAL ECONOMY
Our current economy is now founded on environmental protection. Although
the public in general may still suffer economic harm from unnecessary
regulations, Fortune 500 companies have painted themselves GREEN.
Industries have sprung up to combat radon and asbestos, to manufacture
freon substitutes, to scrub air and filter water, and to make chemicals
biodegrade to name just a few. I suspect that a homicide committed in
defense of the earth's flora or fauna would receive a certain degree of
clemency in recognition of such high minded intent.
PREFERRED IGNORANCE
Today we are an environmental activist society - so you may as well lean
back and enjoy it. Continue to speak the truth, advise reason, logic
and good science, but don't be disappointed when such wisdom is
ignored. With psychic hotlines a 300 million dollar industry today,
what can we expect? Persevere anyway: teach good science wherever you
can.
Keep in mind when you do this that there is a certain entertainment
value in bad science. With the complexity of the technical systems that
run our society increasing exponentially, people are turning off their
efforts to understand how things really work. Examples include the
awesome capabilities of the Internet/World Wide Web, or our ability to
see more and newer galaxies outside our solar system, or sub atomic
quarks within molecules, or unravel billions of genes in our DNA. We
are now working on a need to know basis, and face it, the public does
not believe they need to know.
All of this has created a subtle intellectual backlash that has driven
people to take comfort in absurd, silly concepts that require only faith
and no intelligence: inane tv talk shows, psychic hotlines, aliens,
creationist beliefs, even a plethora of sci=fi related TV shows
presented as unsolved mysteries with potentially strange truths to be
discovered. We did not see it coming, but perhaps we should have.
Nearly 20 years ago I joined an organization called the Committee for
the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP). Its
magazine the SKEPTICAL INQUIRER ran articles debunking silly science.
For a while they were making headway with the scientifically illiterate
media. No longer; they are now being swamped by the forces of what I
call Preferred Ignorance. I look forward to the day when people will
again become interested in reason rather than ritual. In the mean time
we can only bear with them. The frustration is real for us all.
ONE TRUE THREAT
There is one area of ignorance we can not take as lightly as my
prescription above. This is the misinformation being spread among our
elementary school students. My own granddaughter insists that I recycle
my popsicle sticks. Her scientific reasoning powers are being stunted by
propaganda before they are ever developed.
The environmental education modules being accepted by our grade schools
as factual information on the environment are often scandalously
inaccurate. They create fear where none should exist. They frequently
turn child on parent where parents are not abiding by some environmental
mantra taught in the schools. (The Nazis used this technique effectively
prior to World War II in Germany.) We must make every effort to thwart
these on going efforts today. The simplest way for all environmental
professionals to help is to offer our services to teach a lesson at our
kid's schools. Its fun, its doable and it can create the healthy
skepticism lacking in their present curriculums. We can't do a thing
about adult TV viewers buying into scientific silliness, but we must
make an effort to avoid our kids becoming mindless environmental
zealots.
THE LEGISLATIVE VIEW
Much of our environmental legislation continues to do a good job. Much
of it is outdated and ineffective, some of it is onerous and
inappropriate. Do not expect very much change to the current
legislative landscape. When the current backlash to the perceived
gutting of legislation by Republicans dies down, we can expect some
rough edges to be filed down on a few environmental acts. Modest
improvements will benefit everyone.
CONTINUING OUR OWN EDUCATION
In the midst of prevailing scientific ignorance in society, we as
scientists and engineers have an even greater responsibility to keep
abreast of information that will allow us to do what is best for the
environment. We can't afford to stand pat with what we learned in
academia or even on the job. We must, to the extent possible, insure
access to continuing education throughout our careers. Happily, high
level education is available. Now that the public in general has
abdicated its application of reasoned intelligence, it is even more
vital that we scientists fulfill our obligation to guide society in
environmental matters.
Jay H. Lehr, Ph.D. Senoir Scientist Environmental Education Enterprises
2764 Sawbury Blvd Columbus, Ohio 43235-4580
Comments: Phone: 800-792-0005 Fax: 614-792-0006 E-Mail:
e3jklucky@aol.com
--
<---->
Subject: Re: More on Tragedy of the Commons
From: af329@james.freenet.hamilton.on.ca (Scott Nudds)
Date: 8 Oct 1996 01:00:19 -0400
jim blair wrote:
: RE: TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS
: The essay deals mostly with population growth and the idea that there are
: problems which cannot be solved by technology alone. The title refers to
: the "common" land which English villages held, to belong to no one but to
: be used by all. Enclosure of commons began in the 12th century but was
: not complete until the end of the 19th. During this entire time there
: was an ongoing conflict between those who wanted land to be owned by
: specific people and those who maintained that it must belong to all.
: The "tragedy" is that common ownership is an unstable situation.
: Each person has a short term interest in overusing the common land.
: Since it belongs to no one, no one has in interest in its long term
: preservation, only in its short term exploitation.
: Seen in this light, the essay is really about how socialism (or at least
: this EVERYTHING BELONGS TO EVERYONE version of socialism) cannot
: work. In England, when the commons were (finally) divided up into plots
: and sold to individual farmers, the problem described in the essay
: ceased.
I am sorry, but your interpretation of Hardin's essay (your last
paragraph) is simply wrong. Hardin makes no such claims and in fact he
has refuted such interpretations of his work.
I note that the interpretation of Hardin offered y Stavros N.
Karageorgis (UCLA - Sociology) precisely matches the following short
clarification from Hardin himself.
A Commons Error
---------------
- Garrett Hardin - May 1994 -
...
When, in 1968, i described "the tragedy of the commons," I used the word
"commons" as it had been used by my only predecessor, William Forster
Lloyd in 1833. He and I meant any resource that was shared on a "help
yourself" basis, that is, an commons. Although neither
Lloyd nor I originally used that adjective, it is implicit in both of
our essays.
In the early stages of the exploitation of a natural resource, when
there is no real shortage, an unmanaged commons is the most economical
mode of distribution. But human demands increase faster than resources,
so there comes a time when a help-yourself policy becomes contrary to
the interests of all. TWO ALTERNATIVES ARE THEN AVAILABLE: PRIVATISM,
IN WHICH A RESOURCE BECOMES PRIVATE PROPERTY AND IS MANAGED BY ITS
OWNER, OR SOCIALISM, IN WHICH A MANAGER (OR BUREAUCRAT) IS INJECTED INTO
THE SYSTEM. BOTH PRIVATISM AND SOCIALISM MAY FAIL OR SUCCEED, DEPENDING
ON MANY FACTORS. But commonism - living the Marxist ideal of an
unmanaged commons - cannot possible succeed in a world of shortages.
When the needs asserted by individuals are given priority over
preserving the carrying capacity of the environment, tragedy is the
inescapable result.
The survival of the commons among the Turkana people does not contradict
what I have described because (in Monbiot's words) every significant
resource in their environment "is controlled by a committee of elders,
who decide who should be allowed to use them and for how long." The
Turkana elders refused to make individual need paramount in the ethics
of distribution. Group survival came first.
...
Garrett Hardin
Department of Biological Sciences
University of California, Santa Barbara
--
<---->
Subject: Re: Residential woodsmoke
From: af329@james.freenet.hamilton.on.ca (Scott Nudds)
Date: 8 Oct 1996 01:00:25 -0400
(charliew) wrote:
: Use your head! There are no effects from residential wood
: smoke.
The 4000 who died in the england 45 years ago would undoubtedly
disagree with you.
London fog killed 4,000
-----------------------
-David Kendall-
Never again, say air quality experts in Britain, never again will
4,000 citizens die from a London fog.
That figure is the conservative estimate - some say 8,000 - of how
many Londoners coughed, choaded, turned blue with Cyanosis, and breathed
their last breath 40 years ago, in December 1952.
Starting Dec. 4, a thick atmospheric fog rolled over London and the
Thames valley, then stopped dead.
It was below freezing, dead calm. The damp chill seeped into every
crevice, under doors and through ill-fitted windows. People began
emptying their coal scuttles into thousands of fireplaces.
Dark sulphurous smoke poured into the fog, staining it a putrid
mustard hue, brewing up a deadly gas that invaded the lungs of the
elderly, the bronchial, the asthmatic, and the weak hearted.
Air as thick as pea soup
The pea-soupe thickened daily, held motionless by a lid of warm air
passing above - a thermal inversion.
A dark oily film coated china appliances and linen.
Ambulances inched through the streets with a guide on foot ahead
holding a blazing torch aloft. Milk delivery stopped and infants went
hungry.
Idling vehicles caught in traffic jams puffed more poison into the
soupy air.
People lined up at hospitals. Then, they began lining up at
undertakers.
Prime Minister Winston Churchill assured the populace by radio that
the filthy air didn't contain radioactive particles from atomic
experiments.
Visiting Canadian prime minister Louis St. Laurent escaped by driving
slowly to stay with Churchill outside London.
After four days, a westerly wind ended the paralyzing dim-out, but the
damage had been done and the dying continued for weeks.
Thousands died later
Thousands more apparently recovered only to have their death later
attributed to the killer fog.
"That sort of smog couldn't happen again," Steve Bland of the air
quality division in England's department of the environent said last
week. "It was domestic coal burning in open fires and cooking ranges,
making sulphur dioxide."
It won't hapen again, said Bland, because those cheery, blazing
hearths were outlawed after the great yueltide disaster of 52.
"The 4,000 deaths kicked government into action," Bland said.
But it took four years before the Clean Air Act was made law, and even
more years while it was implemented.
"We couldn't do it overnight." Bland said. Today 98% of London smoke
is controlled.
--
<---->
Subject: Re: time sensative request
From: af329@james.freenet.hamilton.on.ca (Scott Nudds)
Date: 8 Oct 1996 01:00:27 -0400
In <530ub9$3hq@omnifest.uwm.edu>, csmith@omnifest.uwm.edu (Carol Smith) wrote:
: I need info on
: Dr. Michael Sanera, director of
: Environmental Education Research (assoc? org?)
Letter to the Editor
--------------------
The following is the reply of Paul Rowland to Michael Sanera's letter
to the Republic:
Michael Sanera's response to Linda Valdez's column in which Sanera
attacks her for not spending time listening to him for two to three
hours like other reporters did is as predictable as it is self
serving. Likewise, his deifying of a few scientists who produce
documents that support his point of view, despite the fact that the
scientific community in several forums this past year have repudiated
that view, continues to confuse issues of what constitutes scientific
knowledge. Sanera's claim that the "most damning criticism of EE comes
from the environmental community itself" is based on a poorly
researched article based on a few poorly produced materials.
His use of selected text and selected issues has served as a basis for
his attacks on the Arizona Environmental Education Guidelines. Having
defined balanced materials as those including his favorite studies and
his point of view, he shouldn't be surprised that few such materials
exist. He should look at college-level environmental sciences
textbooks that are written by eminent scientists in the field -- even
they would not pass Sanera's criteria for "objective and unbiased."
Interestingly, the materials Mr. Sanera prepared for the Arizona
Environmental Education Curriculum Review Committee (AEECRC) were
biased in the way they presented views with which he disagrees. He has
yet to solicit assistance in writing those viewpoints from
environmental educators in the state.
Environmental educators recognize that balance comes from the educated
use of materials by trained teachers who have access to many different
sources of materials. For example, at the environmental education
resource centers in the state, one can find biased materials from the
Arizona Beef Council, National Wildlife Association, Air and Waste
Management Association, Keep America Beautiful, The Steel Recycling
Association, The Plastics Council, and a variety of state and federal
agencies. I would hate to see us eliminate any of these materials. Our
goal is to train teachers in using all materials so students learn
both fundamental principles but also skills for recognizing bias in
presentations. Mr. Sanera would like to prevent the free flow of
information into classrooms because he fears that his point of view
will not make it there. In effect, he wants the state government,
through the AEECRC, to do the job that the rest of us assume is our
own job; to develop and promote our best understanding of the
environment and our role in it.
Paul Rowland
Associate Professor
Center for Excellence in Education
Northern Arizona University
Flagstaff, AZ
Environmental Education Curriculum Review Committee
One way in which the governor can influence future decisions about the
environment is by appointing individuals, who will carry out his
agenda to Boards and Commissions. Dr. Michael Sanera was recently
appointed to the Advisory Council on Environmental Education . Mr.
Sanera's views, which were presented to the Environmental Education
Curriculum Review Committee, are not supported by documentation and
out of sync with most of the educational establishment.
: Any interesting connections with other orgs?
July 1994
William Perry Pendly has just released his book "It Takes A Hero; The
Grassroots Battle Against Environmental Oppression", a project of the
Mountain States Legal Foundation. With introductions by Senator Larry
Craig and Congressman Billy Tauzin, the book "documents ordinary
people against the the multi-billion-dollar environmental movement."
Familiar names like Kathleen Marquardt, Clark Collins, Cheryl Johnson
and Chuck Cushman are profiled in the book, which also contains a
directory of 1,000 "grassroots fighters against environmental
oppression: The Hero Network." CLEAR has copies of It Takes A Hero.
Please give us a call if you would like to borrow one