The National Resources Defense Council is reporting on a study that looked at ten eastern US cities are found they are going to see more red alert days during the summer for air quality. They found that rising temperatures due to global warming will lead to a decrease in the number of good air days (as defined by the EPA). Two of the cities I have lived in were included in the study: Columbus, Ohio and Greenville, South Carolina. Another city included was Asheville, NC where Donna and I have spent several anniversaries. Greenville and Asheville are both very beautiful cities, so it’s really a shame to see that things will be going downhill. The same will be true everywhere, of course. By the middle of the century, the study reports, 50 eastern US cities will see:
A doubling of the number of unhealthy ‘red alert’ days
A 68 percent (5.5 day) increase in the average number of days exceeding the current 8-hour ozone standard established by the EPA
A 15 percent drop in the number of summer days with “good” air quality based on EPA criteria because of global warming
Well, I didn’t get a chance to listen to Edwards last night on MSNBC, since I apparently can’t work a TV anymore. I thought I was watching MSNBC, it was actually NBC and then after Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island made the Democratic response and there was no John Edwards, I realized my mistake. Thanks to the wonders of the giant tubes that make up the interwebs, I was able to watch his speech:
I was pretty happy about the speech, though it came off as disappointingly weak at the end. He made a convincing, fairly non-aggressive case against prolonging the war, arguing from simple practicality. It seems this approach could possibly be better at persuading conservatives and fence-sitters than saying that Bush and the military are terrorists (ala Rosie O’Donnell). And yes I know she didn’t actually say that. What was weak in Edwards’ speech was the whole “timeline” business. It annoys me whenever I hear it. It’s so open-ended. If by timeline, he means in three weeks, then I can live with that.
Another problem here is that while Edwards has come out on the side of peace, he still voted for the war: a serious failure in judgment. And I don’t even listen to Obama (aka Obomba) when he chastises other candidates for voting for the war. Based on his long history of voting to prolong W’s endless war, I have little doubt that Obama would have been right there with his “aye” raised high when called upon to vote to overthrow a sovereign nation whose leadership we installed.
It returns to the fact that there is only one choice: Dennis Kucinich. Electability is a term invented by the corporate-sponsored media. Real electability is what happens when you actually go out and vote with your mind and heart instead of voting because of what some plastic face on a TV screen tells you to do. Dennis Kucinich is the only one who has opposed this war at every turn, the only one who has a real plan to bring our troops home. Edwards was right when he said the only way to force a political solution between Shiites and Sunnis is for us to get out of there. Kucinich has been saying that all along. We should hold all of these democrats accountable and vote for the only one with the clarity of mind and morals to do what was right from the very beginning and elect Kucinich.
