Posted by tealady on February 10, 2006, at 17:08:50
In reply to Re: please rephrase that » Dr. Bob, posted by alexandra_k on February 4, 2006, at 17:20:20
> yep. sorry about that...
>
> er...
>
> the us has been a major contributor to pollution / global warming etc. the effects of that are not limited to the present (and future) citizens of the us either; they are felt worse on other points on the globe:
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> the us is a major contributer (see for eg)
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pollution
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> and on the global nature of the effects:
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> Sinking islands and deltas
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> A 1-metre rise in sea level could make 200 million people homeless.
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> At particular risk are islands. Many of the people of Polynesia face a real threat of rising oceans because they are island nations with many low-lying coasts already ravaged by tropical cyclones. Global warming is likely to both raise the oceans and increase the severity of storms. "Almost all the 1,196 islands of the Maldives are less than 3 meters high, and most people there live less than 2 meters above the waves. Six other coral atoll countries - the Cocos Islands, Tuvalu, Tokelau, Kiribati, the Marshall Islands and the Line Islands - face a similar crisis. In all, 300 Pacific atolls are expected to disappear, but will become uninhabitable long before as storms wash over them more frequently and freshwater supplies become salt: (Lean 93).Good posts :-)
Re Above.. it's Ok..It's a long way away from the US;-)
Reminds me of the reactions I observed on the Bali bombings.. the first ones..
Sept 11th had a huge impact, Bali?? on another forum most US folk didn't know where it was.. so really not something to be given much concern, someone in the south, probably South America?,..until someone had the idea it was an island.. maybe it was in the Caribbean,..now that is getting close to the US, so that might be something to be concerned about..it might even have meant to be an attack on the US ..concern ..
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> [and these islands are in the southern hemisphere]
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> Many more people are at risk from the flooding of deltas and other low-lying coastal areas. Some areas are already subsiding, making them doubly vulnerable to the rising sea. "Four fifths of Bangladesh is made up of the delta of the Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna rivers: half is less than 4.5 meters above sea level. The land is already sinking, partly because some 120,000 wells have been drilled to extract drinking water. Studies suggest that up to 18 per cent of Bangladesh could be under water by the year 2050: by 2100 this could rise to 34 per cent and affect 35 per cent of the population.
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> more people outside the us suffer...but it doesn't really impact the US a lot, even economically.
But then I can can tell you don't need it spelt out.
Re Oz, I wish our govt would be more like NZ too.
I guess the proximity of our country with Asia,and large coastline, weighs on the wisdom of maintaining neutrality.. I think it's even more of a motive.WWII must still have some weight in political thinking I guess. It's like we thought England would come to our rescue in WWII based on WWI and previous history? Just seems to be a repeat of similar thought, and shortsightedness to me.
Also, good to see someone who tries to view the story from all sides:-)
Did you ever find any translation.
I don't follow politics at all really. I used to until about 2001. Tried to chat with people from the areas usually on all sides of a conflict and in areas where refugees ran etc, as well as read stories published in various countreis.. to try to get a picture.
One girl in Balkans during the war even had a website(no longer there), to try to explain the history of the region..I was lost :-)
Anyway I've dropped out of following politics, economics etc since then.. except vaguely..and everything expected keeps happening, I find it upsetting and depressing, and I feel so ineffectual I just try not to think about it.
poster:tealady
thread:605246
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/poli/20060204/msgs/608423.html