Green stories that will (hopefully) shock and amaze you!

One of the biggest fallacies Utah Mormon culture could ever do is lump the green movement and environmentalists into two categories - weak, pansy hippies (who are most likely high) and extremist nut cases (who are also probably high). It's also really ironic that Utah Mormon culture has rejected environmentalism because it is so very Mormon. However, the environmentalists can not be easily defined with just two erroneous categories, as anyone who participates in environmentalism in any way knows it's really a slice of humanity - you've got your working mothers and stay at home moms, the business man, the idealistic college students, the guy who lives out in mountains with his shotgun, the cyclist and hiker, the Baptist preacher, duck hunters, farmers, and yes, even the nut cases and annoying, vain, preening wanna-bes and hypocrites (every group has their fair share of those). It's a very human thing. Very few who care about the environment are frothing-at-the-mouth raving lunatics. Many of them you'd get along with very well, and a lot of them are (contrary to popular conservative Republican/Mormon belief) very patriotic and really care about this country.

So here's a smörgåsbord of stories to put a sane, "compassionate conservative," human face on why people are passionate about the environment and helping out those who try and do their part. The first, a story of bravery from a cyclist. The second, Al Gore's 10 year challenge. The third, a column about why Gore's 10 year challenge for sustainable energy is patriotic and economically sound, and the fourth is sunny globalization optimist Thomas Friedman on the real source behind the oil problem in America.

Cycle Commuter Catches Hit-and-Run Corvette-Driving Bob Novak


"In 2001, syndicated columnist Bob Novak almost hit a jaywalker, called him some names and was quoted as saying : 'He was crossing on the red light. I really hate jaywalkers. I despise them. Since I don't run the country, all I can do is yell at 'em. The other option is to run 'em over, but as a compassionate conservative, I would never do that.'


"Today he took option two, except the 66 year old man splattered over the windshield Novak's Corvette had the green light. Novak then took off, and might have got away with it.


"Except cycle commuter David Bono of Harkins Cunningham thought what every good lawyer should think: 'This car is speeding away. What’s going through my mind is, you just can’t hit a pedestrian and drive away.'"

Al Gore's 10 Year Challenge



"Of course the greatest obstacle to meeting the challenge of 100 percent renewable electricity in 10 years may be the deep dysfunction of our politics and our self-governing system as it exists today. In recent years, our politics has tended toward incremental proposals made up of small policies designed to avoid offending special interests, alternating with occasional baby steps in the right direction. Our democracy has become sclerotic at a time when these crises require boldness.


"...Many Americans have begun to wonder whether or not we've simply lost our appetite for bold policy solutions. And folks who claim to know how our system works these days have told us we might as well forget about our political system doing anything bold, especially if it is contrary to the wishes of special interests. And I've got to admit, that sure seems to be the way things have been going. But I've begun to hear different voices in this country from people who are not only tired of baby steps and special interest politics, but are hungry for a new, different and bold approach."

My Challenge to America: Don't Ignore Gore's Speech


"I am reminded of those that decry government regulation as detrimental to "the free market," except of course when the regulation benefits them. No, what it really comes down to is this: while energy companies can own and exploit oil fields and coal mines, no one owns the sun. As a result, in the coming renewable energy age, there will not be a handful of multinationals owning all the energy production. Instead, we will see a diversified, competitive, innovation-driven, job-creating energy economy (sounds like the free-market at its best, no?). And that is extremely threatening to vested interests."

Thomas Friedman - 9/11 and 4/11


"What doesn’t the Bush crowd get? It’s this: We don’t have a “gasoline price problem.” We have an addiction problem. We are addicted to dirty fossil fuels, and this addiction is driving a whole set of toxic trends that are harming our nation and world in many different ways. It is intensifying global warming, creating runaway global demand for oil and gas, weakening our currency by shifting huge amounts of dollars abroad to pay for oil imports, widening 'energy poverty' across Africa, destroying plants and animals at record rates and fostering ever-stronger petro-dictatorships in Iran, Russia and Venezuela.


"When a person is addicted to crack cocaine, his problem is not that the price of crack is going up. His problem is what that crack addiction is doing to his whole body. The cure is not cheaper crack, which would only perpetuate the addiction and all the problems it is creating. The cure is to break the addiction.


"Ditto for us. Our cure is not cheaper gasoline, but a clean energy system. And the key to building that is to keep the price of gasoline and coal — our crack — higher, not lower, so consumers are moved to break their addiction to these dirty fuels and inventors are moved to create clean alternatives."

Bonus points for reading this article which has some good points on why off-shore drilling is not the most effective idea:


How Obama Can Regain the Initiative on Energy


"A perfect place to start is with Think Progress' excellent myth-busting piece on the supposed benefits of offshore drilling. As the Bush administration's own Energy Information Administration (EIA) has said, access to new coastal regions would not have a measurable impact on domestic crude oil production or prices before 2030, at the earliest. Even after 2030, the EIA states that "any impact on average wellhead prices is expected to be insignificant" over the long-term.


"...According to research done by the Union of Concerned Scientists, increasing our federal standards to over 40 mpg by 2015 and 55 mpg by 2025 would save 3 times more oil by 2025 than could be recovered by drilling in ANWR. Even something as simple as having drivers check the air pressure on their tires regularly could save thousands of barrels of oil a day."