synthesis

My right-wing views on reproduction and my left-wing views on environmental issues meet at this point.  We probably can't have a planet on which virtually everyone enjoys a Western middle-class standard of living and still have seven billion people living on it.

marketplace money

Here's a link to the 'Marketplace Money' website.  Look for the October 5th show about poverty.

http://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-money

There are many segments, but the thing that struck me about so many of them was that these people had many more children than they could support.  One has to wonder how many of these people would still be under the poverty line if they had just stopped having children at two (or one for single mothers).  There was one Somali woman who had six out-of-wedlock children.  What the hell could she expect?

People shouldn't have children they can't support.  That means that people on welfare shouldn't have children.  The welfare system should provide serious-- and successful-- disincentives to having additional children.  Certainly there should be no increase in benefits.  In fact, among other things, maybe there should be a monthly bonus for NOT getting pregnant, and if the woman became pregnant anyway she would lose the bonus.

irresponsible reproduction

This is one issue where I've become very right-wing.  I listened to a 'Marketplace Money' show on NPR last Saturday that made my blood boil.  I'll give the link and expand on this in a couple days when I have more time.  The subject was poverty and how people deal with it.  Yet all of these people had at least two children, and one had six, all out of wedlock!  I wonder how many of these people would fall below the poverty line if they had only two children per couple or one child per single mother.  These people are reproducing us into being a third-world nations!  More later.

the earth system

THE EARTH SYSTEM

It seems to me that we might have a better chance of seriously addressing environmental problems-- especially climate change-- if we started thinking of this planet as a congeries of interlocking systems-- the climate system, the food system, the energy system, etc.

This would be a different approach than the 'Gaia Hypothesis,' which is a kind of romantic biological metaphor of 

planet Earth as a living organism. Given that our species seems to have this technological bent, thinking of it as a kind of ubersystem might have more appeal.

We know that human activity takes place on such a scale now that it can have significant effect on these different systems. We affect the climate system by throwing all these greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere; we affect the food system by driving some fisheries-- cod, tuna-- to the brink of extinction; etc.

If we got into the habit of thinking all these related systems as part of an 'earth system,' then we could use systems analysis to 'tweak' it toward better 'performance.' This would become a habit of mind that would then drive public policy.

bumper sticker

There is only one 'Job Creator':  DEMAND.

we built that

The new New Orleans levees, with $15 billion in federal money.

denial central

"President Obama promised to begin to slow the rise of the oceans . . ."
[Laughter]

". . . and to heal the planet."
[Laughter]

"My promise is to help you and your family.”

As far as I can tell, this is the only reference-- and a rather oblique one at that-- to climate change in the entire 2012 Republican convention and platform.

This denial of reality continues apace. One can only hope that the subject somehow raises its ugly head during the debates.