Not just useful for 9-11, Snopes.com is your one-stop urban legends destroyer. I should have used it for the divorce hoax.

Check out Salon’s review: Osama bin Laden is alive and well and living in Utah.

Time Magazine’s section looking back to 9-11 follows 11 lives transformed as it’s centerpiece. It ties together all of their coverage.

One of the better sites to make sense of 9-11 is the CSMonitor’s A Changed World.

It was widely viewed as a victory for the peace movement when the draft was abolished and military service became voluntary. Unfortunately this arrangement does not really serve the cause of peace but rather lowers the threshold of war by creating a decisive cleavage between the social classes that wield political power and those that supply the country its soldiers. Too many of our political leaders are now in a position to choose war with little fear that it will endanger their friends or loved ones. This is dangerous for the same reason it would be dangerous to entrust the power to determine tax policies to a class of citizens who have been granted blanket immunity from taxes. It breeds political irresponsibility.

Read this powerful piece in the Washington Post.

I normally discount pronouncements like that. But this one is from Camille Paglia:

The most radical task facing contemporary leftism is a purgation and reclamation of its own rhetoric.

Then again Meryl had this to say about Paglia recently (and made me smile at the thought…):

Paglia’s nuts, if you ask me. Actually, she’s such a type-A that I think if you ever got her and Ann Coulter on the same stage, they’d explode. Oooh….

Oh man, I just love that quote 🙂

Anyway, I have a lot of left and right leaning readers. Would be curious for your thoughts. Me? I just thought it was interesting to read.

Garret is having a great weblog conversation on just how *off* Lomborg’s The Environmentalists Are Wrong is.

it’s just that i’m surprised that so many are buying what this individual is selling, without using their baloney detection kit. or, at least spending a minute or two on google.

I posted my take to Garret’s discussion – Even if the Lomborg’s right with his facts (and like others I seriously doubt it – but who am I to argue? :))… He’s saying the monentary value of adjusting to the climate change is cheaper then preventing it in the first place. So his conclusion is that we should adjust instead of prevent. That’s bullshit. His whole argument is that we should take the route of least resistance. Just because something is easier doesn’t make it right. Just because something is cheaper doesn’t make it right.

I’d argue we need to do both. Help countries with fighting poverty *and* invest in technologies and practices to sustain and improve the environment. With America leading the way by actions and not words. Those actions can happen at a local level. At a personal level.

A great point Garret made,

“the market is driving a push to sustainability, because of pollution in urban areas – *not* the environmental movement. sustainability and development are local, regional issues too … not just linked to global warming.

Now read this Yahoo! news story on a report issued by the Natural Resources Defense Council, American Rivers, and Smart Growth America.

Suburban strip malls, office buildings and other paved areas have worsened the drought covering half the United States by blocking billions of gallons of rainwater from seeping through the soil to replenish ground water, environmental groups said on Wednesday.

Atlanta loses enough water to supply the average household needs of up to 3.6 million people a year, the report said.

The Boston area was next with between 44 billion and 103 billion gallons of water lost. Next came Philadelphia with 25 billion to 59 billion gallons of water unable to return to the soil, the report said.

“Sprawl development is literally sending billions of gallons of badly needed water down the drain each year — the storm drain,” said Betsy Otto, senior director for watershed programs at American Rivers.

“Sprawl hasn’t caused this year’s drought, but sprawl is making water supply problems worse in many cities,” she said..

Confirms Garret’s point doesn’t it?

Mike starts with attacking the sinner and not the sin, but ends up making some great points once past that. I wonder if our notion of poverty is cultural? If not then I have to disagree with this,

“Only when people are rich enough to feed themselves do they begin to think about the effect of their actions on the world around them and on future generations.” Yeah, Bjorn. We have seen that happen in Europe and North America. It is indeed as you say. What do you do all your life? Watch the fiords freeze over? Eat LSD with your cornflakes? That has to be the dumbest statement anyone arguing a point such as yours could put forward.

I come from a ‘disadvantaged’ background, and from my perspective, on this point, Bjorn is positively right. When you can’t feed yourself – all you think about is your next meal. I return to my point above. Fight poverty and lead by example on environmental issues. That’s IMHO.

Wanna see a perfect idea for protest on a very local level?. I love it!

Alwin nails why I have issues with IndyMedia,

I think that Portland Indymedia is doing an important job. I realize that Indymedia sites have an agenda, and it’s pretty plain what it is. I just think it would carry more weight if it was written with more attention to the facts.

I hear the outrage in the voice, can even empathize with it- but it’s place is in a more personal space (like a weblog) not in something purporting to be “Independent media.” Independent means not taking sides (emphasis added by Karl). Doesn’t it? Or have we changed the meaning of the word?

Alwin – I’ve been wondering who are the contributers to IndyMedia for a while. For such an ‘independent’ forum, they sure are biased in one particular direction. They are the leftist O’Reilly Report. Where are those that just want to report the truth and not their editorial opinion?

How many people have to be under direct supervision of law enforcement before you have a police state?

…it’s a bigger, though far less remarked-upon, injustice than any that are involved in the War on Terrorism.

And that’s a snippet of Glenn Reynolds’ take. Read the rest.

Go get the breakdown at TalkLeft: 1 of Every 32 Adults Now in Prison.

This quote stands out:

“The overall figures suggest that we’ve come to rely on the criminal justice system as a way of responding to social problems in a way that’s unprecedented”

But of course. The sad thing is… do you realize that the average guy on the street believes that’s the way it should be? A huge majority of people I know simply believe that if people break laws – they should go to jail. Little attention is spent on the reasons why people break laws in the first place anymore. Or if the laws broken are even valid… like how many drug users instead of drug dealers get jailed?

It is the Olympics of world politics.

For nearly two weeks, starting tomorrow, more than 100 nations and 65,000 delegates will convene in Johannesburg, South Africa.

The mission of the World Summit for Sustainable Development has been stated many ways, but those involved say it boils down to this: to save the planet from ecological devastation and rescue billions of people from wretched poverty.

Read the rest in this Philadelphia Inquirer article.

What happens when the rest of the world get’s together to make the world a better place? We don’t participate. Kinda like the popular kid that wants to be the center of attention and is pissed off that everyone else is putting something together – it’s up to the popular kid to swallow his ego and get involved.

Here goes a great weblog covering the summit. Thanks Shelley.