Rio+20 - Rio '92 Revisited - Global (guilt trip) Agenda

"We are at an historic turning point, communism has collapsed, the entire world conceives of itself as a global civilization, and the community of nations can now envision the possibility of a global agenda. But the only organizing principle for this global agenda is the effort to save the earth's environment. This must be the new central principle giving coherence to our efforts to work together. And the Earth's Summit is the designated time and place for this new agreement to congeal. This is a turning point we must break through to a new way of thinking about our relationship to the earth. We are not entitled to exploit it with impunity with no concern for the integrity of the ecological system. Its just unforgivable if we allow the selfish impulses of the short term considerations of this moment to win out over the wisdom and the mandate of history to act."

That is a direct quote from the then former American Senator Al Gore as he was interviewed on the CBC Radio Show Quirks and Quarks in 1992 before the Rio Earth Summit twenty years ago this past week (you may hear the quote if you listen to the podcast here).

Its pretty clear to me what he was thinking, here was a chance for governments around the world to join together and defeat the newest boogie-man. Now that the cold-war was over and the evil empire was defeated, it was time to turn to the real enemy, and it was us, you and me. What better way to defeat "us" than by forming a supra-governmental organization under the auspices of the United Nations, that benevolent protector of all that is right and good with the world?

The Rio Earth Summit was an historic attempt to grab power, without a shot being fired anywhere. The governments and citizens of earth were about to have a massive guilt trip dumped onto them by the self-appointed protectors of the planet. The global organizing agenda, as Gore put it, is clear: "We are not entitled to exploit it (Earth) with impunity with no concern for the integrity of the ecological system." How dare we lowly humans aspire to live in comfort at the expense of any planetary resources? What could we be thinking? Woe to us for disturbing the habitat of the three-spined stickleback, the Northern Spotted Owl or the Frankston spider orchid, in a selfish attempt to provide food and shelter to mere humans. "Its just unforgivable if we allow the selfish impulses of the short term considerations," like harvesting logs for building or eating perhaps. How dare we?

The Rio Summit in 1992 promoted sustainable developement. I have nothing against that concept in general, it's eminently sensible. Owners who would destroy their very means of earning a living are just plain stupid. So, overfishing or over harvesting a renewable resource, just makes no sense. Notice the key word "owners," when ownership is not assigned or left to the commons, thats when the trouble begins. Today my interpretation of "sustainable" in the current enviro-babble includes ideas like, stagnant, no-growth, heavily regulated, uncompetitive, subsidized and top down. Nothing to do with ownership and more to do with the favourite new buzzword "stewardship," which comes complete with the guilt trip and none of the benefits of ownership. 

Rio's successors have morphed into conferences against climate change, as if we humans controlled climate, more powerful than the Sun are we. A succession of meetings and treaties over the years backed by questionable data, produced by self-serving researchers, under the direction of the IPCC has made everyone guilty of tromping their filthy carbon footprints on everything. We are guilty of using fire for heat, light and to drive our machines. We are guilty of contravening the questionable hypothesis of anthropogenic global warming (AGW). By merely breathing, we, you and I, add to the carbon burden of the planet's atmosphere, adding, by the way the one essential gas of photosynthesis, carbon dioxide, from which all earthly organic food originates. Do you aspire to a low ecological footprint? Then the poverty of Sierra Leone is for you (see the graph above), or if you want to be in the green zone of sustainability and human welfare, then the wealth and freedom of Cuba beckons.

Rio+20 convenes this week, committed to continue the fraud of sustainable development. While all the major leaders of the world were in Rio twenty years ago, none are coming to Rio+20, things have changed. Much to the chagrin of enviro-statists like George Monbiot who warns that its "make-or-break" time. So deluded are he and his colleagues, that they fail to grasp that the no-growth scenario is coming fast, as nation states crumble under massive debt-loads and unfundable liabilities, and depressed economies become the norm. Be careful what you wish for George.

The only good news is that people are slightly more skeptical about AGW, and the ability of governments to solve anything. One can only hope.            

Changing the culture: Plastic bags are bad, repeat.

It was the proverbial good news/bad news story out of Toronto City council on June 6th, 2012.

GOOD NEWS: The 44 council members voted to remove the silly 5 cent per plastic bag fee that the previous administration had foisted on retail stores and citizens. The original purpose of the fee was to socially engineer the behavior of Torontonians, away from using so-called "single use" plastic bags toward multiple use bags. It worked, B.F. Skinner would have been proud. But the bag tax, as it came to be known, was a sore point for many. Toronto's Mayor made removal of the bag tax an issue, that he championed, and city council granted his wish. The fee will be removed July 1st, 2012. 

BAD NEWS: But shortly after that win, a motion from a councillor to ban all plastic bags from retail stores passed in a close vote. The ban takes effect on Jan. 1st, 2013, though some believe it will be challenged in court. I hope so.

Arguments for and mostly against the bag ban have raged ever since in the local and even national media. But of course most of the arguments revolved around the environmental issue, unnecessary solid waste, evil plastic, people will get accustomed to the using recyclable bags, blah, blah, blah. Why plastic bags? Why subject this extremely useful item to this type of ridicule? Surely there are far worse environmental menaces lurking in people's garbage? Maybe the household waste of citizens should be searched too? Think of the new jobs created, garbage police, waste watchers. 

Such a search would be an invasion of privacy you say? Of course it would. So why is it that elected officials are concerned with the way people carry home their groceries? Isn't that really a private matter too, between the buyer and seller? That's the real issue, why is a municipal government involved in this? Obviously the City councillors have too much time on their hands, sitting around dreaming up new rules to justify their own existence.

The bags of course have many uses, both visible and invisible. First, they are a courtesy afforded by the retailer silently saying to the customer, "Thanks for coming to my store, please use these bags to convenience your trip home and by the way help give our store some cheap advertising." That is the invisible positive message implied by every buy-sell transaction where a bag is given freely. Perhaps Toronto council likes chasing away business to the surrounding towns? Perhaps Toronto council hopes those surrounding towns will also foolishly adopt this stupid rule too? It boggles the mind.

The visible uses of plastic bags are so numerous, I won't attempt to enumerate them. Suffice to say that everyone I know, has a bag of plastic bags in a closet somewhere in their home. As cheap and flimsy as these bags seem to be, they have multiple lives and everyone knows it. Plastic garbage bags will still be used, and more will need to be purchased if this ban succeeds, and dog owners will need to buy special bags. And of course there is the uniquely Canadian penchant to bagged milk, will that be banned too? Let's all go back to reusable glass, can't wait. 

As I have already suggested, the bags are not really at issue here. What is at issue is a prevailing attitude that people can be controlled to serve the collective good; a "good" that is determined by the wisdom a few through the coercive power of government. What is the proper function of government? That is the issue. Is government there to modify human behaviour - change the culture - or to allow humans to interact freely in a non-coercive environment? I vote for the latter.

Los Angeles also banned bags, displaying the power of mindless celebrity do-gooders. Here is how ReasonTV treated that story. 

Dots on the sun and a Cosmic collision

On Tuesday June 5, just after 6 pm in the Eastern Time zone of North American, the planet Venus will track across the face of the sun, its called a transit. For most people, its not a big deal really. A tiny dot, Venus, will be seen (**if you wear protective eye coverings**) moving from left to right across the face of the sun. Astronomers have made a big deal about this for a long time. Back in the days of HMS Endeavour and James Cook, astronomers knew that such a transit could help them determine the size of our solar system, so James Cook was sent to gather the data. Today, transits are used to find new worlds around distant stars. The transit of Venus happens about every 120 years in pairs, eight years apart. This one is our last chance, the next one is in Dec., 2117, lets hope there are clear skies. Such are the vagaries of astronomy, a puff of condensed water vapour could obscure a once-in-a-lifetime event. Its happens a lot.
While I'm on the subject of missing big events, you're going to miss this one for sure. I heard about this first, decades ago, but astronomers are now convinced that its going to happen, a collision of galaxies. Its already happening, go out late at night, on crystal clear nights, and look between the great square of Pegasus and the W of Cassiopeia. If you have a sharp eye or a pair of binoculars, you can detect a fuzzy patch of light. That is M31, the Andromeda galaxy, and we in the Milky Way are heading straight for it fast, or its heading for us....both actually. The collision will be astronomical ;-), in 4 billion years.  

Quantum Leaps and Bafflegab

In any given day there are hundreds (maybe thousands) of stories where governments and politicians attempt to exert their influence on individuals. Sometimes it's overwhelming. Where to focus first, whats the greatest danger, who should be held accountable?

I missed this story reported in Cato @ Liberty more than two months ago. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon speaks about the energy poverty he experienced as a child in South Korea. South Korea has made huge advances since then. Now the Secretary apparently wants to bring energy poverty back, this time to everyone. Listen to his talk here. But as Chris Edwards points out in his CATO blog, Secretary Moon's writers are experts in that famous schoolyard phrase I used to hear: "bullshit baffles brains" - yes it does.

So I have cut and pasted the relevant phrases that Mr. Edwards used in his CATO entry, for your enlightenment below. Orwell would be proud.

By the way, I saw that cartoon on my Facebook page from a friend, and it fits so well don't you think? There is one more frame that is missing, but if you go to the original site here, and click the red button, bottom left, all will be revealed.

I have a high-level group of eminent experts and visionary thinkers…

Our challenge is to join forces and overcome the barriers to bring our efforts to scale. We will need to scale-up successful examples of clean energy and energy efficient technologies… We must make a quantum leap…

My Sustainable Energy for All initiative will bring together key stakeholders in an effort to create transformative change in the world’s energy systems. By leveraging the global convening power of the United Nations, it will introduce new public-private partnerships by fostering the necessary enabling conditions, including to mitigate risk and to promote large-scale investment. And by engaging a broad range of stakeholders, the initiative will mobilize innovative solutions and bold commitments…

Next week in London, the clean energy ministerial meeting will receive our action agenda on 11 areas—very concrete areas for how we can end this poverty. We must rally behind these priorities. I am very excited we are joining hands with the clean energy ministerial to promote game-changing initiatives such as the global lighting and energy access partnerships

…renewed political commitment to sustainable energy…

…concrete deliverables…

…produce a powerful outcome document…

Red Patch Syndrome - *CDC ALERT*

This is an advisory of a virulent new communicable disease: Red Patch Syndrome - "RPS"

This is believed to be a HOST - PARASITE relationship.

CLINICAL FINDINGS & PATHOLOGY: After a lengthy incubation period of up to 12 years, affected individuals seem to have the pathological need to associate in large groups and march along broad thoroughfares in cities making repetitive chants and noises with a variety of implements, pots, pans, etc. 

The diagnostic indicator of the syndrome is the red patch that appears on the attire of affected individual's.

Affected individuals assert that they have collective rights which supersede individual rights, and that individual property is an artificial construct, so they are entitled to property by virtue of their existence.  

Additionally some affected individuals choose to cover their faces, no doubt due to the shame of their condition, and many of these take part in violent outbursts destroying property (its theirs anyway, right?) and causing general mayhem. Manifestation of symptoms seems to be worse at night and in good weather.

INFECTION: Its believed this is a vector born organism that enters the ears and/or eyes of human hosts with absolutely minimal involvement of their brain. It primarily affects students of college age (18 to 25) particularly those of Francophone descent, but RPS is easily spread to Anglophones and Allophones often by cell phones or texting devices (wireless transmission! its airborne, run!!). More commonly infection is by close contact and aggravated by exposure to the toxins produced by the large number of Marxist professors in Quebec Colleges.

A common characteristic presented by those affected (usually young adults) is confusion between positive and negative rights and an inability to grasp concepts like personal responsibility and property rights likely due to the long incubation period (12 years) in government run schools and repeated exposure to the toxins produced by the unionized staff in those schools. Those afflicted with RPS ignore that the positive right to a cheap (or free) education demands that someone is obliged to provide it. Clearly this demonstrates the parasitic nature of this ailment.

MORPHOLOGY & ETIOLOGY: Unknown morphology, a causative organism has yet to be identified.
Etiology is difficult to pin point, but outbreaks of RPS-like syndromes have been known throughout history as owner-slave/parasite-host relationships. This culminated in central Europe (Moscow) in 1917 with an aggressive form of RPS that ravaged the region for more than 70 years with localized outbreaks in South East Asia and as far afield as Cuba in the Caribbean Sea.


EPIDEMIOLOGY: A strain of a less virulent form of RPS is believed to have been endemic in Quebec for over 50 years. Epidemiological research has shown that this more virulent RPS outbreak originated in South Eastern Quebec in Canada along the St. Lawrence River Valley and on the Île de Montréal several months ago. The index case may have been in the National Assembly of Quebec (Quebec City) during a budget attempt at an austerity measure for post secondary funding.
Similar outbreaks have occurred earlier in the year in Britain and other parts of Europe, but the characteristic red patch was absent.

This more virulent strain of RPS has been observed as far south as New York City during a recent Saturday Night Live broadcast with Mick Jagger and the Canadian group Arcade Fire, who apparently brought it across the US border despite the precautions of Homeland Security (nice job, eh?). Recently small pockets of RPS have been spotted to the West in Toronto, and officials there are anticipating an outbreak over the summer. Be advised, it may even spread further.       

TREATMENT & CONTROL: Local officials in Quebec have been unable to contain the outbreak despite a variety of measures to subdue and quarantine especially the violent affected individuals. Official use of a remedy agent called B(ill) - 78 has had little or no effect and may have aggravated the condition. B - 78 it also poses the risk of an assortment of nasty side effects from its hasty application.

PREVENTION: RPS-like syndromes can be prevented by repeated application of large doses of Austrian Economic Theory over several years, but such prophylactic measures are difficult because strains of RPS have become endemic in large parts of the world causing flare-ups to occur regularly.  

RELATED DISEASES: Greek Disease: This is a widespread phenomenon, closely related to RPS, that seems to be coming to a head in the Mediterranean country of Greece. Forms of Greek Disease are found throughout the Eurozone and even in North America. Its just a matter of time before the most severe symptoms are manifested.

Dutch Disease: Recently in Canada Thomas Mulcair, who is a known infected carrier of RPS-like syndrome, claims to have discovered an ailment where Canadian oil manufacturers in the West, have created a situation that results in high currency values that depress Canadian manufacturing and export abilities. This is unrelated to RPS, except that Mulcair has a distorted view of economics and should expose himself to the healing effect of Austrian Economic Theory as soon as possible.

Occupy Movement Syndrome - OWS: Definitely related.

- 30 -

Anti-humanists and other Merchants of Despair

Who is more dangerous the person who says: "the sky is falling, protect yourself" or the one who says: "live your life?"

Who is more dangerous the person who says: "restrict the size of your family" or the one who says: "have the family you are able to support?"

Who is more dangerous the person who says: "we don't have the right to manipulate genes to grow more food" or the one who says: "let the market decide how food is grown and distributed?"

Who is more dangerous the person who says: "restrict the use of fossil fuels, and ration the use of fire" or the one who says: "drill baby drill and let the free market and individual rights mitigate pollution?"

Who is more dangerous the person who says: "we must limit the growth of industry to save the planet" or the one who says: "we will never run out of resources?"

Who is more dangerous the person who says: "humans are vermin and are destroying the planet" or the one who says: "look how humanity has prospered and still coexists with nature?"

Robert Zubrin says we can make the pie big enough for all.

Success without winning - the Ron Paul Evolution

I've run in three election campaigns in recent years, but I'm really new to politics. What I've learned about politics is that it's a lot like high school in some ways.

In high school students quickly sort themselves into groups by a number of factors, almost all of them superficial.

First you sort by age and grade, then by gender within the first sorting. Then you may sort by ethnic origin, skin colour, and religion. Those are all fairly superficial factors that really don't say much about the individual, except that s/he can be sorted along those lines.

It's not until you start sorting by personality, interests, abilities, and intellect, that people are given their due, and those are often overlooked because of the superficial factors. It's the superficial factors that usually lead to a hierarchical structure within a student population.

Take a look at Mitt Romney or Barak Obama, forget the skin colour and the money. Both of these men sort out well, superficially by their appearance, and because of their personalities, and abilities, I'll bet they were very popular in high school and in the upper parts of their hierarchy. They didn't have to be deep thinkers, or super intelligent, in fact that may have hurt them because they would become marginalized. That is the unfortunate truth in politics and high school, the thinkers and those that think differently become marginalized.

In fact thinking itself often becomes marginalized in politics. The truth of that statement becomes apparent whenever a politician, with perfectly good intentions, makes an economic decision based on those good intentions. Every economic decision is at the very least two sided. A decision that favours one side, always has a negative effect on the other even if its just tiny.


In high school, the popular students had little impact on the entire school body, but they ran the show, or at least the part they were permitted to run. They were admired and followed, but only controlled things like dances and some events.


It's not always the popular students that become the politicians and power-brokers, the problem is that the electorate acts as though they were back in high school. They admire and follow the politicians and the powerful based on the same set of superficial criteria they used in high school. They aren't looking for deep thinkers or the super intelligent, they're looking for the superficial person that has been properly sorted to make decisions for them based on good intentions, you know, for the common good. It's a lot like high school except its life, and not just a dance.


Dr. Ron Paul may or may not be a deep thinker, I don't know, but he does think differently. Because of that he has been marginalized since his first efforts to change government in 1988. Yet here he is near the end of his political life, and according to Brian Doherty, Dr. Paul is succeeding without winning.     

        

The Biology of Trust - a biological basis for free market economics

Ever wonder why some people are trusting and generous, others not so much? It may have to do with a molecule that is normally released in people during sex or breast feeding. The molecule is oxytocin, and it might help explain trust in an economic sense.
Paul Zak is a neuroeconomist, interested in finding the biological foundations for human behaviour. Since human behaviour (Mises called it human action - praxeology) is essential in economics, well, you can see why this is interesting work.

Zak says his work builds on work done by Vernon Smith, also an interesting guy. Check out this interview of Smith on ReasonTV last year. That Smith has based much of his work on another Smith, Adam Smith.
Here is Paul Zak explaining his very interesting experiment, and how it might help understanding economics.

For Mother's Day....End the War on drugs.

Repeal the laws for non-violent drug offences. The war on drugs here in Canada, in the US and around the world has failed. It should not have started in the first place, but the evidence is clearer than ever for those who can see.

Would you use heroin if it were legal?

That is just one of the questions that Ron Paul is famous for. Ron Paul is making a serious run for the GOP nomination. He might even control 30 - 40% of delegates by the time of the GOP Convention in August. Here is very good interactive Google Delegate map that shows how things are going now.

Will Ron Paul be able to have another go in 2015-16? He has been doing this for 24 years now, a generation. If not, the question I have is who will take up the fight after this election campaign is over?

Here is a short piece from ReasonTV on Dr. Paul's popularity amongst the young.

John Stossel shops his new book....

Always interesting to hear a top notch libertarian communicator, enjoy.

May Day! Mayday! M'aidez!

The annual May Day shenanigans took place last week. Traditionally May Day was the beginning of summer in the northern hemisphere. It has since morphed into International Workers' Day (kind of a spring time Labour Day) for a variety of reasons.

Mayday is also the traditional distress call used by sailors and airman which comes from the original French: "m'aidez," literally "help me."

The idea of "help me" links the distress call, to the current economic malaise and to the indebted employed and unemployed worldwide, through International Workers Day (IWD). Whether one is lost at sea or deep in debt, assistance is needed.

May Day has offered the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement the opportunity to restate their case this spring. What is their case? That seems to depend where you're looking.

In the United States the OWS May Day protests are complicated. America seems to be in perpetual state of war and has been in an economic depression since the last days of Bush 2. This video link to ReasonTV is indicative of how complicated their protests are.

Many of my libertarian friends see OWS as a grassroots movement, one that we need to embrace and get in front of to help our cause. I don't think so. I think this story is like the early days of the Tea Party in the US.

American libertarians jumped on the Tea Party bandwagon, until it was clear that it was just a neo-conservative revival, and not libertarian at all. The Tea Party has blended into the GOP wallpaper.

I believe that will happen to OWS (they will blend somewhere), but calling OWS neo-collectivist may be a bit of a stretch. Collectivism is already the dominant political force in most Western democracies. The only thing that is "neo" about OWS, is that it seems to be led by the young. Their "new ideas" linked to International Workers Day last week, still clings to the Marxist idea that workers of the world are oppressed somehow by capitalists, and that the workers can break their chains and demand their rightful position as rulers of themselves (and the capitalists). OWS claims that they are the majority (99%), and by virtue of that fact, deserve a bigger share of the wealth owned (they say) by the 1%. It's an old idea.

So far in Canada, Occupy protests are relatively peaceful, though some of the protests have become more violent in the States where the economy is worse.

The Soviet era May Day Parade picture I've included, shows that Marxism was never benignly peaceful, and OWS by extension is not either. The occupation of someone else's property is a violent act, even if it is "public" property. No one should be under any illusions that somehow OWS is benign, or that they are on the side of liberty. They are still a confused rabble, but I believe they will be brought to heel at some point, and show themselves as the collectivists they are, despite the confused press they are getting.

The three month old "student strike" (oxymoron anyone?) in Quebec is a demonstration of the neo-collectivism in action. Post secondary students in Quebec have the lowest tuitions in the country. They have been given a cheap ride for many years. A Quebec budget proposal of small incremental increases in tuition prompted violent demonstrations in recent weeks. For the students in Quebec the cheap ride was not enough, they have demanded the keys and the entire car too. So it is with collectivism, once the moral argument is accepted that we are all responsible for the "wants" of one another, then property is irrelevant and what's yours is also mine. M'aidez is no longer a request for assistance, but a demand.

Big time tax avoidance

In Canada your taxes are due today, or else be prepared to suffer penalties if you happen to owe money.

Avoiding tax is one of the most popular games on the planet. The more tax you are required to pay, the more incentivized you are to avoid taxation. That is true for individuals as well as corporations, and what is also true is that wealthy individuals and corporations generally find ways to pay the least amount of tax.

Apple Corporation is one of the largest (if not the largest) companies by market capitalization in the world. But Apple has found ways to avoid billions of dollars in US corporate tax legally. More ammunition to support the Laffer Curve.

A Lesson for taxpayers and government

Its tax time in Canada, again. 
The fact is there is a constant stream of tax revenue that flows into the Canadian Federal government pot each and every minute of everyday. The flow of revenue increases during the waking hours as daylight marches across the country, but it reaches a torrent towards the end of April every year.


Aside from my feelings about taxation, like, its legalized theft, its immoral, I don't support this or that, but I'm forced to pay for it anyway, why can't I at least pick and choose where I want to spend my money - aside from all that, it's a pain in the ass to do.


I've talked about a flat tax form before, here and here. Yes, I know its still a tax, still coerced, but think of the hours saved and the stress avoided? One piece of paper, how much did you make? Pay 15%, or whatever, end of story.

But a flat tax would create huge distortions in the tax industry and economy in general. My Turbotax software would be unnecessary, all those people toiling to minimize the pain would need to find other employment. Thousands of accountants, lawyers, and other tax preparers have become huge businesses that depend on the stacks of arcane rules that exempt this or that, and whose primary purpose is to avoid payment. Entire lifelong careers have been created for so many. Think of the government lobbyists these guys must have? You may be assured, flat taxes are not on their agenda.

I'm not going to ignore our law makers, who sit in various legislature buildings in every provincial capital and Ottawa, dreaming up new ways to tax and of course spend. "Spend" is the real issue, isn't it? It was the spending during World War I, that created the need for a "temporary" income tax in 1917. Yes, temporary; but once the precedent was set, well, here we are 95 years later, some "temporary." You can thank Robert Borden, he's the guy on the $100 bill, the new plastic bill.

Its true, our democratic governments have never had a problem collecting money. Governments have learned to use brute force in such subtle ways that some people actually don't think they are taxed enough. But those people should be asking why not spend less? How refreshing is that? Here is an interesting spin on revenue and spending.

           

Earth Day "Fail"

Today is Earth Day 2012, a manufactured event allegedly celebrating nature. Nothing wrong with celebrating nature, I try to do that every day.

But Earth Day was started by well intentioned people that thought somehow Planet Earth was being exploited by humankind. The truth is, the difference between exploitation and survival is in the eye of the beholder.

If you are impoverished, cold, starving and exposed to the elements, is capturing and killing a deer for food, exploitation? Who would argue that? Some might, but they would be arguing from comfort.

I believe the person that kills for food or uses Earth's natural resources has an agenda, to survive. I also believe Earth's resources should be used responsibly, not wastefully. If used responsibly then it is justifiable, not matter what is being used or how much.

I also believe that many of the people who mindlessly support Earth Day and oppose exploitation of Earth's resources also have an agenda. Their agenda is not noble and not justifiable. It is in fact anti-human.

Scroll down this page to a logo I keep on the right hand side: "EXPLOIT THE EARTH OR DIE, It's not a threat it's a fact." I believe that is true, I believe nature is only benevolent, if it is made so by human action.

So as a tribute to justifiable exploitation of Earth's resources, watch this short video. I'm not American, but this is not an American problem, it's a global problem, it's a matter of survival. May all your days be Earth days.