They Finally Did It!!

[Zuruck]

Cops, I'd post something again, but it's lost on the white trash on this board. They just don't get that sometimes it's not about what makes your life easier. I swear that if President Bush came out tomorrow and said that everyone should wear Nazi armbands that these guys would have them before day's end. Will, your point isn't common sense, it's far right Cheney / Ken Lay task force p.o.v...

[Skyalmian]

Now, where did I put it...
Oh, here.

[DCrazy]

http://www.anwr.org/features/distort.htm (Pro drilling)

Sky, I found a different graphic with a slightly larger development area: http://www.unc.edu/~money/geography/anwr1.html

That page also brings up an interesting concept I hadn't thought about before: ice roads. I figured they would have to build a railway or asphalt highway to get the oil and equipment from place to place, but the concept of a road made of ice is intriguing. The problem is it would have to be repaved every year.

But this page brings up an interesting point: apparently the proposed development areas only cover equipment that touches the ground, not the pipelines, which are suspended above.

[Pebkac]

But this page brings up an interesting point: apparently the proposed development areas only cover equipment that touches the ground, not the pipelines, which are suspended above.

Their is already ample proof that the pipelines do not hurt the indigenous critters running around Alaska. A case could be made that the pipeline has been beneficial in that regard.

[Gooberman]

Fine drill in ANWR, but just realize that all it is is a band-aid.

My 04' Honda Civic only beats my friends 68' mustang by a factor of 2-3 in gas miliage. That is ridiculous. A 68â?? computer couldnâ??t run pacman, yet all the advancement we could do on fuel economy is 2-3?

This is something the left and the right need to compromise on and no more Bush shoving his agenda down the other sides throat. Go ahead and Drill in ANWR, but attach to that bill strict fuel economy guidelines for all cars. No modern car/suv/truck should be allowed that canâ??t get 25mpg city. The ford escape hybred (SUV) can get 36mpg highway, if forced, all suvs and trucks will do this, but only if forced.

The car companies are too in bed with the oil companies to agressively research and force these things themselves. Its only due to high gas prices that the car companies have recently put forth a little more effort. The government needs to get involved....that is assuming that they arn't as in bed with the oil companies as the car companies are.

You don't get your gas hogs, we don't get our wild-life reserve. Come to the table. Don't just take.

We will run out of Band-Aids, we need to address the bleeding.

[woodchip]

As to the pipelines, I trust you can all see that any pipline will simply tie in to the existing one which is a releatively short distance away.

[Zuruck]

http://www.audubon.org/campaign/arctic_ ... lling.html


the low impact drilling in the Kenai National Refuge...in a far less sensitive area...how does tundra grow back? Oh right, it doesn't....

[Will Robinson]

Zuruck, if my position isn't common sense then you should be able to own me by answering the simple question I asked and refuting the two points I made. Instead you claim I'm being partisan. What's the matter can't you answer the question or challenge the two points I made?

By the way, there are deformed frogs found everywhere you can find frogs, not just in areas close to industry. You can find them in protected lands that have never been "poisoned". I think the general consensus is that frogs mutate for reasons unknown.

Regardless, if you can show me the enviroment will be better off letting ossama's nephews drill instead of americans then I'll admit I'm wrong.

I could take you to a place in mexico where Union Carbide dumped waste from it's battery factories where whole villages of people were poisoned. People not frogs!!
Why did they manufacture there instead of under U.S. regulations? Because third world countries don't have the EPA etc.

The fact is, oil will be pumped, the reality is you don't seem to want to face that fact! Do you really think stopping drilling in ANWR is going to result in a cleaner earth if the oil that could have been produced in ANWR instead comes from Saudi Arabia, Iran, Mexico, etc. etc.? Or is it you don't care about the earth you only care about the ground within our borders?

So, show me where third world countries do a better job of protecting the enviroment and I'll consider your position. As it stands you are dodging my point and trying to use alarmist rhetoric to discredit me without ever offering a rebuttal.

[Hahnenkam]

By the way, there are deformed frogs found everywhere you can find frogs, not just in areas close to industry.

I think those frog mutations are related to the ozone layer depletion and associated uv radiation damaging their dna when they are eggs.

sorry for the off-topic interjection. carry on

[Will Robinson]

By the way, there are deformed frogs found everywhere you can find frogs, not just in areas close to industry.

I think those frog mutations are related to the ozone layer depletion and associated uv radiation damaging their dna when they are eggs.

sorry for the off-topic interjection. carry on

If that's the case then it does nothing to argue against oil drilling in any particular place.

[Iceman]

Fine drill in ANWR, but just realize that all it is is a band-aid.

...

The car companies are too in bed with the oil companies to agressively research and force these things themselves. Its only due to high gas prices that the car companies have recently put forth a little more effort. The government needs to get involved....that is assuming that they arn't as in bed with the oil companies as the car companies are.

You don't get your gas hogs, we don't get our wild-life reserve. Come to the table. Don't just take.

We will run out of Band-Aids, we need to address the bleeding.

You hit the nail on the head Goob.

[Hahnenkam]

If that's the case then it does nothing to argue against oil drilling in any particular place.

Exactly. It means frog eggs need spf40 sunblock.

[Tankie2]

I think the environmental short sightedness of our current leaders is a natural result of having Christian Fundamentalist running the country. No amount of logic or scientific evdidence is going to sway thier faith based decision making. There is no way science, logic or even the evidence of thier own eyes can sway them from The Truth. The fundamentalist political and finacial elite running this country think preserving resources for the future is rediculous, since obviously the first Battle of Armeggedon is already underway. If they don't exploit it now for thier own ends it's all going to waste. There is no guarantee of a next generation, let alone many generations. After all, God gave them dominion over the Earth and it's thier Duty to have complete dominion before the Big Boss shows up to see how they've done.

[Duper]

I think the environmental short sightedness of our current leaders is a natural result of having Christian Fundamentalist running the country. No amount of logic or scientific evdidence is going to sway thier faith based decision making. There is no way science, logic or even the evidence of thier own eyes can sway them from The Truth. The fundamentalist political and finacial elite running this country think preserving resources for the future is rediculous, since obviously the first Battle of Armeggedon is already underway. If they don't exploit it now for thier own ends it's all going to waste. There is no guarantee of a next generation, let alone many generations. After all, God gave them dominion over the Earth and it's thier Duty to have complete dominion before the Big Boss shows up to see how they've done.

Oh come on Tankie. I know you are capable of making a better argument than that gush. I think if you looked a bit more closely at the situation and corporate America, I doubt that you would find many Christians involved.

As a Christian myself, I've always been very concerned about environmental issues. While I wouldn't chain myself to a bulldozer, I certainly DO NOT want all our virgin timber here in the NW to be logged off. The lumber companies would do it too, if they thought they could get away with it. That grade of wood these days gets a pretty penny. I think that in many cases though, that balance is needed. Both sides are WAY outta kilter... so I guess they manage to keep each other in check. Much like the "gun control" issue.


We have the ability and tech to drill with low impact. Money is the real issue... but not that anyone doesn't know that. Money is always the issue where companies are concerned.

I know you have something stuck in your craw where Christianity is conserned, but use those smarts you are touting in your previous statement when posting like that.

[Tankie2]

1. I think if you looked a bit more closely at the situation and corporate America, I doubt that you would find many Christians involved.

-----------------------------------------------------

2. I know you have something stuck in your craw where Christianity is conserned, but use those smarts you are touting in your previous statement when posting like that. [/quote]


Wrong on point 1. The closer I look the more evident is is that there a more Christians in key policy making positions who are influenced, lobbied and supported by multinational corporations. Her are a couple of exerpts:

We are not talking about a handful of fringe lawmakers who hold or are beholden to these beliefs. The 231 legislators (all but five of them Republicans) who received an average 80 percent approval rating or higher from the leading religious-right organizations make up more than 40 percent of the U.S. Congress. (The only Democrat to score 100 percent with the Christian Coalition was Sen. Zell Miller of Georgia, who earlier this year quoted from the Book of Amos on the Senate floor: "The days will come, sayeth the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land. Not a famine of bread or of thirst for water, but of hearing the word of the Lord!") These politicians include some of the most powerful figures in the U.S. government, as well as key environmental decision makers: Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), Senate Majority Whip Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Senate Republican Conference Chair Rick Santorum (R-Penn.), Senate Republican Policy Chair Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), House Majority Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft, and quite possibly President Bush. (Earlier this month, a cover story by Ron Suskind in The New York Times Magazine described how Bush's faith-based governance has led to, among other things, a disastrous "crusade" in the Middle East and has laid the groundwork for "a battle between modernists and fundamentalists, pragmatists and true believers, reason and religion.")


Ever since the dawn of Christianity, groups of believers have searched the scriptures for signs of the End Time and the Second Coming. Today, most of the roughly 50 million right-wing fundamentalist Christians in the United States believe in some form of End-Time theology.
Those 50 million believers make up only a subset of the estimated 100 million born-again evangelicals in the United States, who are by no means uniformly right-wing anti-environmentalists. In fact, the political stances of evangelicals on the environment and other issues range widely; the Evangelical Environmental Network, for example, has melded its biblical interpretation with good environmental science to justify and promote stewardship of the earth. But the political and cultural impact of the extreme Christian right is difficult to overestimate.

"Christian politics has as its primary intent the conquest of the land -- of men, families, institutions, bureaucracies, courts, and governments for the Kingdom of Christ," writes reconstructionist George Grant. Christian dominion will be achieved by ending the separation of church and state, replacing U.S. democracy with a theocracy ruled by Old Testament law, and cutting all government social programs, instead turning that work over to Christian churches.

People under the spell of such potent prophecies cannot be expected to worry about the environment. Why care about the earth when the droughts, floods, and pestilence brought by ecological collapse are signs of the Apocalypse foretold in the Bible? Why care about global climate change when you and yours will be rescued in the Rapture? And why care about converting from oil to solar when the same God who performed the miracle of the loaves and fishes can whip up a few billion barrels of light crude with a Word?

Here is the source, check out the full article for youself.

http://www.grist.org/news/maindish/2004 ... christian/

As for Point 2. You are absolutely right. Unlike the Vice President of the United States, who has stated on National Television that he believes in the Freedom of Religeon and not Freedom From Religeon.I say religeon should be practiced in your private lives, in private churches and private homes and private schools. it should not be forced on the public or legislated through law and it certainly should be separate from the State, the legislature, the executive office and the civil courts. The environmental policy should be left to realist and scientist. "Christian Science" is an oxy-moron. and "Christian Politics' is just plain dangerous. If I had to chose between a Nobel prize scientist and the Pope, who both said they could save the world. I'll chose the scientist every time.

[Tricord]

I find it kind of funny how Will keeps saying over and over again that the entire middle east is one big terrorist training camp. Are we a little biased here? Every time you say that, you thrash your credibility IMHO.

As far as I'm concerned, we need to invest in nuclear energy, not tone it down. Mohammed El Baradei (with a name like that, he must be an islamikazi, eh Will?), the head of the atomic agency, thinks the same way. It has become normal and even "cool" to turn against nuclear energy as a politician, but it is our only way out of this. Windmills and solar panels are unreliable and small-scale solutions.

We should continue to power ourselves with nuclear plants that use fission, while we research nuclear fusion. When we can successfully harness that power, we will have limitless energy supplies with zero ill effects for the environment. Sure, it's a little more complicated to achieve than building a windmill, but the perspective should seduce the environmentalists. Oh wait, the environmentalists usually have no clue what they're talking about anyway...

We are a lot more concerned by fuel efficiency in Europe than you US guys because fuel is at least three times more expensive at the pump than it is over there. You will pay the same price as we do in the long run. Be it through government deficit spending or at the pump.

One thing we can say about the current US administration is that it's not very open-minded. It is conservative. It will go through great lengths to keep it's own interests up. Sometimes, usually, at the expense of something else.

[Top Gun]

I fully agree with building more nuclear power plants. Nuclear energy has a very good safety record in the United States; yes, Three Mile Island occurred, but the problem was quickly resolved with little danger to the public. I know there's always the problem of waste, but with the right procedures, it can be handled, whether it's stored at Yucca Mountain or on-site. Irrational fear of nuclear energy isn't doing our planet any good.

[Iceman]

The Atomic Energy Commission heralds the outcome of Three Mile Incident as encouraging. They claim that every thing that could go wrong went wrong went wrong and they were still able to prevent a Chernobyl magnitude disaster. That makes sense because the US AEC requires three layers of redundancy in all of the critical systems in a nuclear power plant ... hence the incredible expense for building one. Unfortunately, people are just too wigged out about turning green that I doubt they will ever accept it. Now waste ... that is the real problem. What the hell do you do with it? If we could launch it into space and direct it to the sun the problem would be solved but unfortunately we dont have a cheap, heavy lift capability to do so.

[Will Robinson]

I find it kind of funny how Will keeps saying over and over again that the entire middle east is one big terrorist training camp. Are we a little biased here? Every time you say that, you thrash your credibility IMHO.

I never said that, quit projecting your stereotypical perceptions on me.
I have, and still do, assert that money spent on oil from the middle east goes into the pockets of islamikazi's. For example the Saudi's pay bin Ladden protection money...oil money no doubt...Libya-oil money....Iran-oil money..etc.
Those places are home base to islamikazis.
Every dollar we spend on american oil drilled and refined here will be a dollar that is payed to someone who won't invest in suicide vests and al Queda protection money.
Now, there is a real difference between saying that and what you are trying to ascribe to me and it's your credibility that suffers for it.

As far as I'm concerned, we need to invest in nuclear energy, not tone it down. Mohammed El Baradei (with a name like that, he must be an islamikazi, eh Will?), the head of the atomic agency, thinks the same way. It has become normal and even "cool" to turn against nuclear energy as a politician, but it is our only way out of this. Windmills and solar panels are unreliable and small-scale solutions....

I totally agree and think that we should never have stopped building nuclear energy plants, and if you would check you would see that it's the lefty's in my country who are against it.
In fact one of my favorite bumper stickers was one that had the symbol for nuclear power with a thumbs up sign and the words:
"I hope the tree hugging enviromentalist freeze to death in the dark!"

You need to troll for a different kind of redneck, or learn a little more about me.

[dissent]

... and quite possibly President Bush. (Earlier this month, a cover story by Ron Suskind in The New York Times Magazine described how Bush's faith-based governance has led to, among other things, a disastrous "crusade" in the Middle East and has laid the groundwork for "a battle between modernists and fundamentalists, pragmatists and true believers, reason and religion.")
...

and you were, like, expecting something else from the New York Times (!!)

People under the spell of such potent prophecies cannot be expected to worry about the environment. Why care about the earth when the droughts, floods, and pestilence brought by ecological collapse are signs of the Apocalypse foretold in the Bible? Why care about global climate change when you and yours will be rescued in the Rapture? And why care about converting from oil to solar when the same God who performed the miracle of the loaves and fishes can whip up a few billion barrels of light crude with a Word?
...

and people have been ridiculed and ridden out of town on a rail for just as long when their (so called) prophecies failed to pan out and their ideas were justifiably discredited. your argument here seems a bit, oh, overwrought. I doubt fundamentalists could foist this on the general population. Think they're fundamentalist nutcases? Vote 'em out in the next election!

I say religeon should be practiced in your private lives, in private churches and private homes and private schools. it should not be forced on the public or legislated through law and it certainly should be separate from the State, the legislature, the executive office and the civil courts. The environmental policy should be left to realist and scientist. "Christian Science" is an oxy-moron. and "Christian Politics' is just plain dangerous. If I had to chose between a Nobel prize scientist and the Pope, who both said they could save the world. I'll chose the scientist every time.

I think the amendment reads something like 'prohibit the establishment of religion, and shall make no law to prevent the free exercise thereof'. The "wall of separation" was Jefferson's metaphor. Yes, you can legislate morality; that's what most basic laws do. You really expect people to park their beliefs at the door when they walk into the legislature? This is a republic; everybody who wants to can weigh in, and then people can vote on their decisions, representatives, etc. Censoring debate and decision to only the 'realists' is no panacea for good judgements.

[Duper]

"Christian politics has as its primary intent the conquest of the land -- of men, families, institutions, bureaucracies, courts, and governments for the Kingdom of Christ," writes reconstructionist George Grant.

This is unnecessary as many biblical precepts are already wrought into the Constitution. Nor is this, I believe, God's will.

"Christian Science" is an oxy-moron. and "Christian Politics' is just plain dangerous. If I had to chose between a Nobel prize scientist and the Pope, who both said they could save the world. I'll chose the scientist every time

So, you are saying that if an unbelieving scientist with years of experiance in the lab and field and well noted among his piers Becomes a believer in Jesus Christ that he is no long an intellegent individual? That he no longer can be effective in the field of Scientific study and research? Many of the most recognized scientists were Christians. Oddly, the pride of knowledge ALWAYS exaults itself above God. It happens even to believers.

I read through the article posted. I found nothing convincing there. I DID find a lot of bad theology taken from dusty corners of the most exteme sects. The author is an alarmist that did a very good job of painting a very bleek picture. Much of what was written, I've seen in various forms elsewhere.

This statement is just sad.

Many years ago, a friend of mine introduced me to his "religious grandparents," who, whenever they were asked about the future, proclaimed, "Armageddon's comin'!" And they believed it. Christ was due back any day, so they never bothered to paint or shingle their house. What was the point? Over the years, I drove by their place and watched the protective layers of paint peel, the bare clapboards weather, the sills and roof rot. Eventually, the house fell into ruin and had to be torn down, leaving my friend's grandparents destitute.

Let's ridicule an elderly couple that have a conviction. Did anyone offer to paint thier house? Did they actually believe, and/or, Say that there was no use in painting thier house? Does it really matter? Why didn't thier deadbeat grandson offer to do it? None of these things are stated as being conclusive. It's left open to assumtion. And there is of course the glaring implication that (as a conclusion to his thesis) an elderly couple that believe in Armageddon will bring about the destruction of the environment; or rather they are proof positive that all Christians are like this and it REALLY IS the end of the world as we know it, but only because Christians don't care enough and we're taking over the government and nation.

This article is a bit over the top.

As on excellent example of intellegence in Christianity, check out Ligonier Ministries

R.C. Sproul is an apologist. One of the best imo.