NSR- Scary Report on sea Ice levels

No, it's not 100% our fault, but that ruling elite would not, more often than not, be in place if if wasn't for our involvement.

Look I'm not saying that the United states is evil for doing this, in order to gain our current place in the world we oooked after our own interests first. And often time that meant stepping on the hands of others.

My point is not that we should be giving anything up in order to help developing nations. But that we should be the one leading the charge to develop technologies which curb the effects of greenhouse gasses, and actually further our economy by selling those techs to the world. Look, we already give billions in dollars in aid to these countries (unadvisably, since most of that aid is wasted on corruption or on "abstinence only" birth control classes), why not substitute that aid with technologies which will be beneficial to the world community?

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Originally Posted by MassLiberal

No, it's not 100% our fault, but that ruling elite would not, more often than not, be in place if if wasn't for our involvement.

Look I'm not saying that the United states is evil for doing this, in order to gain our current place in the world we oooked after our own interests first. And often time that meant stepping on the hands of others.

My point is not that we should be giving anything up in order to help developing nations. But that we should be the one leading the charge to develop technologies which curb the effects of greenhouse gasses, and actually further our economy by selling those techs to the world. Look, we already give billions in dollars in aid to these countries (unadvisably, since most of that aid is wasted on corruption or on "abstinence only" birth control classes), why not substitute that aid with technologies which will be beneficial to the world community?

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At least as far as South America is concerned, the ruling elite there came about with the Spainish and Portugese empires, same with most of Latin America. Most of that was done before America rose to be a great power. The rich down there are all of european decent. We didnt have much to do with that. However, if it makes you feel better, in 20yrs we can blame the obesity down there on our Mcdonlds and walmarts.

You are right we should take the lead, just as europe is ahead of us. The more mature a society. the more progressive it becomes in the those areas. However, not giving the developing countries the same opportunity to do as we have done, only makes it harder for it to become progressive itself.

Telling those people how they harvest their natural resources,putting restrictions on them now that we in America can afford to, is only consitent with the general arrogance of the west that I hear so many in here remark about.

How we explain that to them, i do not know, and how we expect them to accept our aid in lieu of economic independence is outright ridiculous.

Face it we are all screwed. The only good news is technology in many indutries has become alot cleaner. i.e. mining.

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Originally Posted by Core Shot

Good Read.

Here's the relevant part for this thread:

China's development is one of humanity's worst environmental disasters.
Cheap coal and a doubling of car ownership every five years has made the country the second-biggest emitter of greenhouse gases.
According to the World Bank, 16 of the planet's 20 dirtiest cities are in China, and Chongqing is one of the worst.
Every year, the choking atmosphere is responsible for thousands of premature deaths and tens of thousands of cases of chronic bronchitis.
Last year, the air quality failed to reach level 2, the government health standard, one day in every four.
Today's haze is so thick that I still haven't seen the sun.

Chongqing is trying to clean up, but this is a low priority compared to economic growth. And it is hard to find a place for the ever-expanding waste. We head into the hills to see the biggest of the mega-city's rubbish mega-pits: the Changshengqiao landfill site. It is an awesome sight; a giant reservoir of garbage, more than 30 metres deep and stretching over 350,000 square metres.

The waste engineer, Wang Yukun, tells me the city produces 3,500 tonnes of junk every day. None of it is recycled. Some is burned. Here, it is layered like lasagne: six metres of rubbish, half a metre of earth, a chemical treatment and then a huge black sheet of high density polyethylene lining. The site opened in 2003 and it already contains more than a million tonnes of rubbish.

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What the rest of the world does about the enviroment (and pretty much anything else) becomes increasingly unimportant by the day.

China and to a lesser degree India's economic growth are going to be one of the biggest events in human history. The rest of the world isn't really going to be able to do anything about it other than hope they get some of their business.

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Originally Posted by Cono Este

At least as far as South America is concerned, the ruling elite there came about with the Spainish and Portugese empires, same with most of Latin America. Most of that was done before America rose to be a great power. The rich down there are all of european decent. We didnt have much to do with that. However, if it makes you feel better, in 20yrs we can b

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The ruling elite came about under the spanish empires, then rebelled against them in the late eighteenth century when it was painfully obvious that the spanish empire was declining, then the British coopted them for their industrial needs in the early 19th century (building rail networks), until the Americans claimed devine providence over the entire Western Hemisphere with the monroe doctrine and kicked the Brits out, securing our rise as an industrial powerhouse. Claiming that the South American elite were independent of foreign powers is laughable. They sold out their countries futures in order to gain wealth at the teets of the industrial powers at any given time.

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Telling those people how they harvest their natural resources,putting restrictions on them now that we in America can afford to, is only consitent with the general arrogance of the west that I hear so many in here remark about.

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Since when have those countries even controlled their own natural resources? The proxy wars of the Cold War (of which chile was involved) and IMF structural adjustment programs ensured that foreign investors controlled the resources in any given country, not the actual government. So it is a mistake to say that it is arrogant of the west to tell a nation how to control its natural resources because, chances are, Western companies control said resources.