[Sosfbay-discuss] MT Times Column

[Wes Rolley]

The following has been submitted as a column in the MH Times.   Should 
run next week. 
__
Almost every newspaper you pick up, every television new program you see 
has at least one story that focuses on the current economic problems in 
the United States and the steps being taking by our government to try an 
get us out of it.

Most of the governmental pronouncements seem to be designed to re-build 
our confidence in the economy the government's ability to actually do 
something constructive. They expect us, as confident citizens, to go out 
and spend more money. After all, it is our function, as consuming 
citizens, to keep the economy growing.

The largest corporation in the US is no longer a manufacturer but retail 
giant Wal-Mart Stores. There are only three ways that this company can 
grow in the US: open new stores in areas not yet served, have the 
population grow, or for us to just consume more.

There are many who fight Wal-Mart on the first issue. I am not one of 
those hawks. There are times and places where Wal-Mart makes sense. 
There are other times and places where it does not. It should be up to 
each local area to decide.

There is little that we can do about the population question. This as a 
moral issue over where the government has no business directing behavior 
and I agree. Most would not want to have lived in a country that limits 
families to two children as China has done.

However, I am greatly concerned about the pressure on everyone to 
consume more, to buy more, to have an economy where hedonistic 
consumption becomes a goal of government. When I think back over my 
life, the things that have made me the happiest, the things that I value 
most highly, there is not a single thing that I have purchased which is 
on that list.

After 9/11, as the economy turned downward, we were told that they way 
to show the terrorists that the United States could not be beaten was to 
go buy more, travel more, live it up. To some extent, we did. I don't 
think that this has gained us any new friends around the world.

One of the hidden costs of all of this consumption comes from the energy 
that is needed to manufacture, package, distribute, sell and then 
dispose of all of that consumption. Energy costs and it is becoming an 
increasing cost of all that we do. The cost of jet fuel has nearly 
doubled in the last year ($1.85 / gal to $3.48.) It is now the largest 
expense for major airlines. As fuel costs go up, so will travel costs 
for all of us, but more importantly, it will push the costs higher for 
all of those things we buy.

There is a second level of cost inherent in being a consumer driven 
society. All of the energy that we are using to keep our consumer 
economy growing is also fueling the growth of greenhouse gases in our 
atmosphere. The way out of our biggest economic disaster since the Great 
Depression is to do those very things that fuel the biggest ecological 
disaster we have ever faced.

I have no doubts about the effects of Global Warming. Every new 
announcement increases my certainty.. The most recent report from the 
World Glacier Monitoring Service, Univ. of Zurich, indicates that the 
rate of glacier melting is accelerating. They monitor thirty reference 
glaciers in nine mountain ranges. The average thinning of the glacier in 
2006 was the equivalent of 1.4 meters of water.

Deniers of global warming, like comedian Ben Stein, remind us that 
climate models are not reality, but rather only someone's idea of how 
reality functions. Reality is far more complex than any model. Most 
climate models include the effects of large scale, fast feedback (years 
to decade) mechanisms, such as the fact that warmer temperatures will 
hold more water vapor in the atmosphere, increasing the greenhouse 
effect. As a result, most models have been conservative in estimating 
the amount of warming. It is more difficult to consider slower acting 
(decades or centuries) feedbacks, but when these are added, the models 
come closer to observed results.

Here is our quandary. We can solve our economic problems by a massive 
surge of consumption. But if we do, we run the danger of causing 
permanent damage to our planet. There are other choices. We can target 
our consumption not toward heavily advertised immediate gratification 
products but rather to those things which will make permanent, long 
lasting changes for the better. We can buy more local food products. We 
can rediscover the joy of gardening. When the government sends our 
stimulus check, we can spend that money making our homes more energy 
efficient.

The choice is ours. We really can have a good economy and a good 
environment, but we have to spend wisely.

-- 
"Anytime you have an opportunity to make things better and you don't, then you are wasting your time on this Earth" Roberto Clemente

Wes Rolley
17211 Quail Court, Morgan Hill, CA 95037
http://www.refpub.com/ -- Tel: 408.778.3024