Archive for December, 2009

The climate conference in Copenhagen gets underway today. There is a great story in the London Telegraph, which has the following nuggets (emphasis added):

…total number of limos in Copenhagen next week has already broken the 1,200 barrier. The French alone rang up on Thursday and ordered another 42. “We haven’t got enough limos in the country to fulfill the demand,” she says. “We’re having to drive them in hundreds of miles from Germany and Sweden.”

And the total number of electric cars or hybrids among that number?

“Five,” says Ms Jorgensen. “The government has some alternative fuel cars but the rest will be petrol or diesel. We don’t have any hybrids in Denmark, unfortunately, due to the extreme taxes on those cars. It makes no sense at all, but it’s very Danish.”

The airport says it is expecting up to 140 extra private jets during the peak period alone, so far over its capacity that the planes will have to fly off to regional airports – or to Sweden – to park, returning to Copenhagen to pick up their VIP passengers.

…In the city’s famous anarchist commune of Christiania this morning, among the hash dealers and heavily-graffitied walls, they started their two-week “Climate Bottom Meeting,” complete with a “storytelling yurt” and a “funeral of the day” for various corrupt, “heatist” concepts such as “economic growth”.

…And this being Scandinavia, even the prostitutes are doing their bit for the planet. Outraged by a council postcard urging delegates to “be sustainable, don’t buy sex,” the local sex workers’ union – they have unions here – has announced that all its 1,400 members will give free intercourse to anyone with a climate conference delegate’s pass. The term “carbon dating” just took on an entirely new meaning.

At least the sex will be C02-neutral. According to the organizers, the eleven-day conference, including the participants’ travel, will create a total of 41,000 tons of “carbon dioxide equivalent”, equal to the amount produced over the same period by a city the size of Middlesbrough.

…The temptation, then, is to dismiss the whole thing as a ridiculous circus.

Many of the participants do not really need to be here. And far from “saving the world,” the world’s leaders have already agreed that this conference will not produce any kind of binding deal, merely an interim statement of intent.

Instead of swift and modest reductions in carbon – say, two per cent a year, starting next year – for which they could possibly be held accountable, the politicians will bandy around grandiose targets of 80-per-cent-plus by 2050, by which time few of the leaders at Copenhagen will even be alive, let alone still in office.

…And as the delegates meet, they do so under a shadow. For the first time, not just the methods but the entire purpose of the climate change agenda is being questioned. Leaked emails showing key scientists conspiring to fix data that undermined their case have boosted the sceptic lobby. Australia has voted down climate change laws. Last week’s unusually strident attack by the Energy Secretary, Ed Miliband, on climate change “saboteurs” reflected real fear in government that momentum is slipping away from the cause.

In Copenhagen there was a humbler note among some delegates. “If we fail, one reason could be our overconfidence,” said Simron Jit Singh, of the Institute of Social Ecology. “Because we are here, talking in a group of people who probably agree with each other, we can be blinded to the challenges of the other side. We feel that we are the good guys, the selfless saviors, and they are the bad guys.”

1200 limos, 140 private jets, free prostitutes, calling economic growth a “heatist” concept… yeah, you could say it’s just a big ridiculous circus.

68 years ago today, the Japanese attacked the United States by bombing Pearl Harbor and leading to one of the deadliest days in our history. Nearly 1,200 sailors on the USS Arizona lost their lives that day.

The Arizona’s anchor is now a monument in Wesley Bolin Plaza at the Arizona capital grounds. Each year some of the survivors (there are now only 21) of the USS Arizona gather to remember the sacrifices that were made that fateful day.

On this day, let us not forget those brave sailors that gave their lives in protecting our freedom.

As I was going through airport security recently at Reagan National Airport in D.C. (actually it’s in Virginia, right on the edge of the Potomac River) I had an epiphany of sorts. I’m a electronic gadget carrying case.

First, my Blackberry came off my belt and into the bin, followed by my iPhone, then my Kindle. I also happened to have my iPod in my pocket, and it went into the bin. In a separate bin was my MacBookPro.

Think about that. Five electronic devices. More than 570 GB’s of space for data, documents, songs, pictures, movies, TV shows, you name it.

What is a bit absurd about all this is that I can’t really imagine life without any one of those devices. Each has just enough unique application to my life that they seem indispensible. Of course they aren’t…. other than my blackberry… or MacBookPro… or, well, this is not very convincing.

I just have to face it. I’m not addicted to these things, I’m DEPENDENT on them. I think that’s worse than addiction.

One cool thing. When I’m on the flight from DCA to PHX (those are the airport codes for Reagan National and Sky Harbor – if that wasn’t obvious – and it’s not always obvious. For example, how is Dulles – in suburban Northern VA – IAD?) I have well over 5 hours of battery in my MacBookPro, about 10 hours in my Kindle, literally days in my iPhone and Blackberry, and 4 hours in my iPod. I’m just one powered dude.

What was that thing about being a geek?