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In Reply to: RE: Since when has life become clean? posted by Postal Grunt on May 05, 2008 at 19:50:51

Postal, I am sorry that I have failed, apparently, to live up to your standards.

We are not all made for politics. Frankly, I think I would have made a successful politician, had I entered that particular field. But there's a lot more to being a successful politician and making a difference in this world than having a facility for articulating positions. We are not all made to fit for the demands of running for public office, for aggregating money and talent and influence around us, for compromising ourselves -- both philosophically and personally.

I don't hold people like Huffington and Limbaugh, or even Bagala or Matthews, in low esteem. We NEED people to focus our political attention, to articulate the things we feel in our bones. Opinion leaders are every bit as important as political leaders and military leaders. Harriet Beecher Stow and Rachel Carson and William F. Buckely all come to mind.

I admire your dedication to your fellow workers and your willingness to devote your own time to improve the lots of your peers. I am not cut out for it. I have become personally engaged in public issues on more than one occasion -- once fighting the local government on behalf of homeowners (myself included) who purchased homes constructed on the site of what was once a hazardous waste dump. Yes, I've been there. We were ALL defrauded by local government officials who saw an opportunity to turn worthless land into a windfall. The presiding judge, whose own political campaign was financed by the very same interests who profited from the land sale, and who misrepresenting the history of the site to prospective buyers, threw out our fraud claim. I had to ask myself a fundamental question then: do I want to keep fighting, or do I want to get back to my life, as a father, a husband, a professional. The deck is always stacked against the private citizen, isn't it? You can't fight city hall, they say ... unless ...

Unless you change people's minds, unless you open their eyes, unless you speak out. I believe in speaking out. I believe in the free market of ideas. I believe in intelligent dialogue and persuation. I believe in the voting booth.

I have been a janitor, a salesman, a postal worker, a grounds-keeper, a loading dock worker, a teacher, a writer and an advertising consultant. I have been a responsible citizen and a good husband and father -- or at least I have tried. I have been a little league coach, the member of a co-op negotiating committee and co-op board, a small-time community advocate and organizer. What else would you have me do?

And what about those whose lives have been ravaged by the coal industry? Or the military? Or those who work in the chemical industry? Or the dentists who have contracted lukemia?

We've come a long way in recognizing the responsiblity of corporations, and the rights of workers. Unions, for all the criticisms one could make of them, have played a vital role in securing these advances.

But some work is dangerous. Working on skyscrapers is dangerous. Being a cop or a fireman is dangerous. Even working behind a computer has its occupational hazards -- obesity, heart disease, diabetes and hypertension are all linked to stress and a sedentary lifestyle.

The world is not a perfect place. It never will be. If we abolished all the noxious industry and commercialization that the utopians decry, we'd all soon be at eachother's throats with pointy sticks fighting over acreage to grow our own crops and raise livestock. We'd be dieing of dyptheria and cholera and ecoli and polio.

To get back to coal, it is important to remember that the USA is the Saudi Arabia of coal. It is important to realize that we can utilize coal responsibly, both to our environments and the people who mine it. It is important to remember that the consequences of drifting along without a major initiative to generate energy at home will have much more noxiuos consequences than a couple of decades more of greenhouse gase emmissions.

Green energy techologies will emerge. It cannot be stopped. Exon can't stop it. BHP can't stop it. OPEC can't stop it. Because they CAN'T buy up all the patents, they can't stop GE and Seimans and the Matsushita and NEC and American Engenuity and Japanese Innovation and German Technical Wizardry (no slight intended her for the French, the English, and all the other techological powerhouses of Europe and Asia).

The reason we don't have this energy today is because WE CAN'T!!!! But we will soon. Perhaps in 10 years, or 20 years, or 30 years. But we still want to have a viable, thriving country when we finally do.

Then we can worry about the industrial pollution that DOESN'T come from energy!

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