Montgomery County, MD Green Party Blog

Isreal has closed off all access to the Gaza strip, preventing food from being shipped in. A humanitarian crisis is close at hand. Will this one make the media?

A report by the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) warns of a lack of basic food supplies due to the frequent closures of the Karni crossing that are preventing goods from reaching Gaza from Egypt. The report also said there has been a significant increase in the number of hungry people since financial aid has been halted.

Now that they have withdrawn from Gaza, the Israeli authorities seem intent on starving out the Palestinian population that is left there.

“We certainly aren’t going to stop that 18-wheeler that’s rolling down the hill. In the short-term, I’m not sure that anyone can stop it,” said John Walsh, director of the Center for Global Change and Arctic System Research at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks.

There are limits to how much individuals can do to prevent it. The big disasters are believed to be just decades away. Nearly two dozen computer models now agree that by 2100, the average yearly global temperature will be 3 to 6 degrees Fahrenheit higher than now, according to Gerald Meehl, a senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research. A British conference on “avoiding dangerous climate change” last year concluded that a rise of just 3 degrees would likely lead to some catastrophic events, especially the melting of the Greenland’s polar ice. A study in the journal Science last month said the melting, which is happening faster than originally thought, could trigger a 1- to 3-foot rise in global ocean levels.

The Green challange (”Green” meaning something beyond just environmentalist) seems more and more how to survive coming catastrophes or near catastrophes and still maintain some sort of egalitarian community structure. It is a problem that will take serious thought, and will probably involve more community action than political action–even though the political is still an indispenable way to get your message out.

People just have to live beyond their means…

High gasoline prices have had only a modest impact on the driving habits of American motorists, who have done relatively little to moderate their gasoline consumption. Ever since oil prices soared in September after Hurricane Katrina, gasoline consumption has been within 1.5 percent of the previous year — some months lower, some months higher, according to figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Gasoline deliveries in January, barely lower than a year earlier, ran 13.3 percent higher than January 1999, when crude oil prices were a fraction of current levels.

“People are wealthier, they’ve been enticed into buying homes further from work, and the auto industry has been enticing them into buying very inefficient vehicles,” said Philip K. Verleger, an oil consultant. He estimates that it takes a 20 percent increase in price to trim consumption by 1 percent today while a 10 percent price increase in the 1970s would have an identical effect.

Nonetheless, angry motorists are already sending e-mails to AAA complaining about the higher prices. One accused local gasoline stations of “price gouging” and claimed prices go up twice a day at some places.

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Associates Say Reelection Fears, Not Criminal Probe, Led to Republican’s Decision

Huzzah! Couldn’t have happenned to a nicer guy…

The decision came three days after Tony C. Rudy, his former deputy chief of staff, pleaded guilty to conspiracy and corruption charges, telling federal prosecutors of a criminal enterprise being run out of DeLay’s leadership offices. Rudy’s plea agreement did not implicate DeLay in any illegal activities, but by placing the influence-buying efforts of disgraced Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff directly in DeLay’s operation, the former aide may have made an already difficult reelection bid all but out of reach.

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