First World Fiddling

Fossil fuel and land use behind CO2 rise --

The first volume of the fourth assessment report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has been almost three years in the writing and brings together the work of 600 writers from 40 countries. More than 620 experts have reviewed the findings, and representatives of 113 governments have read and revised the key points.
The report assesses our current knowledge of climate change and the reasons behind it, looks at how the climate has already changed and how a range of different scenarios may have an impact in the future.

Read the rest of the story.

Scientists offered cash to dispute climate study.

From Green Left Weekly --

Gore focuses on individual actions, makes few serious demands on big business and endorses the largely voluntary market-based measures, such as emissions trading, that are contained in Kyoto. He, like most mainstream environmental groups and the major Green parties, place the onus of solving global warming onto individuals, while relying on the capitalist market, nudged along by so-called “green” taxes and legislative regulations.

Such views reflect a well-meaning but utopian belief that if enough of us decide to drastically reduce our demand on the world’s resources, big business and governments will respond to “market signals” and adapt to a slow-growth or no-growth economy.

It is a good thing to organise our lives to live more ecologically. But that alone will not be enough to halt the crisis. It certainly cannot be the main strategy as it will let the real culprits off the hook and divert precious activist energy away from challenging the underlying systemic dynamic driving ecological degradation.

What is required is the rapid, far-reaching reorganisation of industry, energy, transport and mass consumption patterns, and the massive transfer of clean technology to the Third World. This is simply not possible under capitalism.

And a Happy Ground Hog Day to You, Too!