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Anyway, the Dems' eagerness to bail out the U.S. automakers and the UAW tells me other issues are shoved to the side of the road. We don't want fewer vehicles on the highway, we want more -- even more hogs -- just as long as they're made by Detroit and union labor.

Hey, selling cars is fine by me.* Doug

Oh come on Doug! The new owners [ The government] of the big three will come out with thrilling new marketing names for it's amazing environmental friendly products......Such as......." The Lenin Wiz" ,,,," The Stalin Tightwad" ......." The Marx Brothers SUV" ......" The Fredick Engles Van" ....." The Peoples Car" Oops........forgot that the socialist workers party of Germany gave that name to Hilter and Voxwagen..........and finally........" The Green Machine" ......that rolls on forever........

Don't you just love the new Paradise of fail Capitalism and Socialism together......

Of course giving away 100 times as much money without conditions to financial institutions directly responsible for our economic woes is fine...

The auto industry as whole has seen about a 40% drop in sales over the last year. That's not just a Big 3 problem. Honda and Toyota are in deep trouble, and Formula 1 racing is in danger of collapsing. This is a whole industry in crisis As many mistakes as they've made over the years, it's a bit ridiculous to scapegoat these companies. They and the UAW made a lot more concessions than any of the financial institutions have even considered. Too bad those Ivy League employees at AIG don't belong to union we can demonize so we could make them reform their business.

The environment is a fine thing for financially comfortable folks to fret about, which is why they pay the extra few bucks for the reusable cloth bags at Harris Teeter. Of course, no one really cares enough about the environment to seriously hamper their lifestyle. Al Gore has a heated swimming pool, doesn't he?

Hopefully, this recession will be over soon enough so that we can return to fretting about the environment. In the meantime, we can only hope that the cognitive dissonance will not become so great as to cause the explosion of liberal brains (such as they are).

Your comments are a bit ironic, Brian, since climate change will cause huge drops in global GDP, so we'll all have to "hamper our lifestyle." The environment is an economic concern. The fact that we pretend the things the environment gives us are infinitely abundant, and thus treated as if they have no cost, does not make it so.

And lots of people do change their lifestyle. I'm cutting way down on my meat consumption, for example, (raising animals for meat is as big source of greenhouse gases as cars and the main reason for rising food prices and the grain shortages that occurred earlier this year). Criticize Al Gore all you like. Your criticism of his character is just to deflect from his argument, about which he's completely right.

Having said all that, for the time being saving the auto industry in this country in the short term is necessary. We're already shedding half a million jobs a month, so 3 million more will be a big problem. Detroit will have to adapt and offer cleaner products, and we should put a high price on carbon to force them to do so. If we address the root problem, that fossil fuels have been kept artificially cheap because we refuse to acknowledge the costs of the emissions, the market will push us in the right direction.

Ah
The horrible liberals and unions.
They have caused all the problems.
Marxist principles

No doubt about it.

Andrew,

I can accept that Al is 100 percent right about everything, but it seems he's left out some important information.

He's famously said the planet has a fever, but he hasn't disclosed what its 98.6 is. How much cooler should the climate be? How much cooler can we reasonably expect to make it? And, what are the costs of a cooler climate compared to the costs of a warmer climate?

Aren't there some benefits of warmer weather in some places and some detriments to colder weather?

If Al says warmer is worse, OK, we just have to take his word for it. But does that mean colder is always better?

Doug, I think your post is on target. Another point is that we are going to be "investing" many more dollars in infrastructure-- roads and bridges-- as an economic stimulus. We are doing more things to accomodate motor vehicles and all the problems they cause.

Al Gore argued we must rebuild NO.
Al Gore argues, NO will be under water in a few years. Which is it?
When my children was in college its was we freezing the planet.
Dodge may just want to sell the large trucks they have. Saw one today, at 25,900, on sale for 14,950.

as an economic stimulus. We are doing more things to accomodate motor vehicles and all the problems they cause* Joe

The greatest economic stimulus given to a country in the past 80 years to accomodate autobiles was under Hilter with national socialism as the tool for building his Autobahns.[ first modern interstate road system after the vast Roman empire interstate or province system which still stands to this day] It should be noted that Hilter use this system to rapidly move his Armies to all fronts of his wars.....The Roman system was designed for the very same reason. In the middle 1950's, President Eisenhower started the very same vast road system for military {interstates} system to move troops around should the USA ever be attacked from the Soviets during the cold war........

Nothing changes in war or make work politics for the military industrial complexs of the world.....in past [ ancient] or modern history

Another kind of scary thing, is I went and filled up my car yesterday for 19 bucks which is like the lowest in 5 yrs.. What happened? I know somebody will come out with mumbo jumbo etc. but come on. All of a sudden there was an oil glut?
You have to think that somebody's pulling strings here and we're all just dancing in the puppett show. Somebody went to the oil machine and said; look the whole bloody thing's comming down at $4 bucks a gallon. Gas prices and Detroit's short sightedness are what killed Detroit.

Dad, the "fever" quote is a metaphor. There's no exact temperature it should be. Efforts are to slow or stop the warming. The idea is to get the atmosphere closer to natural composition and then nature should take care of itself.

The costs of warming will clearly outweigh the benefits. If some areas now too cold get nicer climates, expect them to be inundated with refugees as other places become uninhabitable. The Pentagon considers climate change a serious security risk. This isn't just something liberals worry about anymore.