An unincorporated division of the Anonymous Anything Society - Sept 25, 2013
Government Shut Down Versus Global Warming
How annoying! Why all of the kerfuffle over the threat by Ted Cruz to stop the government from governing if our legislators do not defund (or is it unfund) the Affordable Care Act? Any such bill has as much chance of succeeding as persuading anyone in Washington to do anything about Global Warming - one thing our straight-jacketed president and gridlocked legislative delegation has yet to address with anything beyond lip-service. They are simply fearful that the fossil fuel folks would throw a fit...and unfund them.
The green-house effect is not some liberal scare tactic - as the right-wing commentators have decried for at least 20 years. Absolutely not.
We and all other countries are 'way too late accelerating toward a crucial, massive switch to alternative power sources. By the end of the oncoming decade, the ice will melt even faster and faster and only when their summer cottages on the Atlantic and Pacific seaboards all begin to sink under seawater, will our Washington delegation think twice before approving another huge pipeline to sluice more crude oil south from the fracking fields and Canadian oil sands.
By then, the noxious fumes from the giant coal, gas or oil burning turbines at most of our present power plants....and from petroleum powered vehicles, will have denuded what's left of the forests on the fruited plain. The greatly increased temperature, rising tides and a worldwide deluge will bring the sort of disaster lately visited upon us now sporadically - but soon, year round.
The warning signs are upon us. There has been serious quickening in the slope toward certain planetary suicide of every living thing.
It will soon get worse, much worse. Many of the issues seemingly politically important today, such as the cost of Obama Care and immigration and a financial melt down of mammoth proportions that could be triggered by a frown between two world leaders, does not amount to much in comparison to an acceleration in the slide toward imminent extinction. The price for health care will be of picayune importance when food will no longer be able to be grown; when domestic animals begin to disappear.
In comparison to this impending disaster, just how important is a government shut down? Does this mean that China will panic and foreclose on all of the notes for the billions they've loaned us? I don't think so. The last thing an investor would want to seize in bankruptcy court for example, is AMTRAK, the subsidized public railway service. Only the inhabitants of an insane asylum would want our Department of Defense even at "Going Out of Business Sale" prices. Shall I go on?
Could we "sequester" (such a poor choice of words - look it up) our Senators and Representatives - not pay them for staying at home? C'mon, a good joke never hurt anyone!
Will we not issue passports and close the border stations...lock all of the post-offices...furlough the FBI? Will we lock the gates at our National Parks? Worse yet, not be able to visit the Pandas at the Washington Zoo?
In the meantime, will anything prevent us from threatening to attack some other country somewhere, for at least a few weeks? Is that asking for too much?
Does the latest cheap thrill from Washington mean we may have seen the last of Sarah Palin and Hillary Clinton or the likes of that little snippet from North Carolina, John What's-His-Name? That's too much to hope for.
Don't you get it? The Cruz talkfest is just a publicity stunt. This guy wants to be President and he is in a hurry to get there. Tell you what Senator Cruz: be blamed for a delay of one second in the issuance of our "Rocking Chair" money and I can see it now. From the Lincoln Memorial, a field of of Q-tips will have been marshaled overnight by AARP - enough to push the Senate Office building right off of its foundations.
-Phil Richardson, Observer and Storyteller.
*Grover Cleveland, 22nd and 24 President - only one to achieve such a thing. Born March 18.
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