Text 1540, 116 rader
Skriven 2006-06-03 16:50:00 av Robert E Starr JR (1986.babylon5)
Ärende: Re: Atheists: America's m
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On Sat, 3 Jun 2006 04:31:40 +0000 (UTC), "Carl" <cengman7@hotmail.com>
wrote:

>
>"Josh Hill" <usereplyto@gmail.com> wrote in message 
>news:8hu182d0bimmlmsobm4nash894derebrf8@4ax.com...
>> On Thu, 1 Jun 2006 21:04:29 +0000 (UTC), Rob Perkins
>> <rperkins@usa.net> wrote:
>>
>>
>> There really isn't much you can do at the micro level. Because even if
>> you adopt an entirely green lifestyle -- and at this point, you'd have
>> to convert your car to running off French fry grease to do that -- it
>> would be the proverbial drop in the bucket.
>
>My understanding is that McDonalds sells it's used grease to cosmetic 
>companies.

Yuck!

I've actually read some articles about people who run their cars off
waste oil from restaurants. Seem the exhaust smells like French fries!
Apparently, diesels run very nicely off vegetable oil -- in fact, it
seems that Diesel invented them to do just that.

>> This requires government action. It's something we have to do as a
>> group, as a nation -- more than that, something that the entire world
>> has to do. But they aren't going to do it until we do.
>
>Why won't they?

Look at what happened to Kyoto -- conservatives argued (correctly, I
think) that it wasn't fair to the US, and so we didn't ratify it. And
because we didn't ratify it, we had an excuse to do nothing for the
next six years, which is what we proceeded to do.

So I think a sense of fairness is important. People just don't like to
think they're getting the worse end of a deal.

I can understand too why businessmen and politicians would be
reluctant to assume costs that their competitors don't have. If the
cost of a European product is only slightly more expensive than a
comparable American one, customers will choose the latter.

And finally, there's the matter of example. This country, for better
or worse, is enormously influential, and trends that start here have a
way of spreading around the world.

>> But when we do -- the Europeans will play along, because they've been
>> way ahead of us on this issue and they'll be freed of the worry that
>> we'll gain an economic advantage over them if we save a few pennies on
>> fuel.
>
>But they already have significantly higher fuel costs.  Why would a few more 
>pennies
>dissuade them if they're already way ahead of us?

Wouldn't that make them even /more/ reluctant to spend more on fuel?

>> China and India will go along if we and the Europeans make it clear
>> that they have to if they want to keep trading with us. And they very
>> much want to do that.
>
>Threats work on the Chinese?  Did I miss that memo?

Well, they ended the Korean War, and have presumably kept them from
invading Taiwan. When, apart from those examples, have we seriously
threatened them?

They have, though, responded reluctantly to noise about unfair trade
in Congress and elsewhere, typically by making the smallest moves that
they think will diffuse the issue. I gather that their response to
such things is very Machiavelian -- or, really, Sun Tzu-ish, which
means that they will likely make an accurate assessment of our resolve
and then act in the way that best serves their interests. And American
tariffs wouldn't serve their interests. They'd cost them more than the
pollution remedies would.

>> Then too, if we reduce demand for oil (and the US uses /25% of it/),
>> we'll drive its price down, meaning that they'll be spending less on
>> energy and fertilizer.
>
>I don't think  the price will go down.  The Chinese are reported to have 
>been
>buying up oil contracts wherever it can...including rights from Cuba to 
>drill
>offshore.  Anythiing we save they'll use.

Not 25% of the world supply, I think. For a few years, anyway. In
fact, I'm more concerned that we'd end up subsidizing them by driving
down the price of oil below the price of alternative fuels, which are
currently cheaper than oil but wouldn't be if oil returned to $20 a
barrel. And both the oil companies and OPEC countries would be
determined to out-compete alternative fuels as well -- oil company
executives have said on at least one occasion that they would drive
the price of oil down if ethanol became competitive, and the Saudis
have long had a policy of keeping oil prices low enough to discourage
competition.


-- 
Josh

"I'm not going to play like I've been a person who's spent hours involved with
foreign policy.
I am who I am." - George W. Bush
                                                                               
                      
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