we're toast....

February 3, 2005

A three-day scientific conference on global warming in Exeter, U.K.,

that wrapped up today vividly illustrates the frustrating current

state of the climate-change debate. There was a palpable sense of

urgency among the scientists in attendance, as various studies

predicted that global warming will yield rising sea levels, outbreaks

of infectious disease, droughts, floods, famine, and up to 150

million " environmental refugees " fleeing arid or submerged land.

Poor countries in South Asia and Africa are expected to be hardest

hit, but aside from some areas of Canada and Russia that may become

newly habitable, virtually every part of the world could see ill

effects. Looming in the background was the poorly understood but

widely acknowledged possibility of abrupt, catastrophic, irreversible

climate change of the sort that was recently overdramatized in the

movie " The Day After Tomorrow. " But just when all the gloomy

predictions will come to pass is unknown. Scientists are still

unable to answer the question U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair put at

the center of the conference: " What level of greenhouse gases in the

atmosphere is self-evidently too much? "

straight to the source: New Scientist, Jenny Hogan, 01 Feb 2005

straight to the source: Terra Daily, Agence France-Presse, 02 Feb 2005

straight to the source: News, Agence France-Presse, 02 Feb 2005

straight to the source: The Guardian, Paul Brown, 03 Feb 2005

What you see is what you get

You've made your bed, you better lie in it

You choose your leaders and place your trust

As their lies wash you down and their promises rust

You'll see kidney machines replaced by rockets and guns

And the public wants what the public gets

But I don't get what this society wants

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