I assume you include population stabilization or reduction as a major factor that needs to be addressed.

I don't think democracy necessarily causes climate change.  In the U.S. it does, however, create a situation where the primary function of government is to foster and promote corporate capitalism.  This is a result of the constitutional interpretation of individaul liberty to mean rights for corporations.  On a more basic level it has to do with who/what has the power.  And it ain't the government!  Democracy, in theory at least, allows for public input into government and the rights of the "people" (plural, not an individual).  The people in our case being the middle class. In Marxist terms the middle class refers to the bourgeoise or the capitalists.  
I do like the prof's suggestion that the corporations and by association the government are the one's committing violence against the natural world.  Therefore they are the eco-terrorists!  As long as the government is run by and for the corporations and not by and for the (capital-P) People, the continuous cycle of ecological terrorism and destruction will continue on.  That being said, I don't think the idea of social/ecological democracy is irreconcilable with democratic theory.  

Emilywrote:
> What alternative do you suggest for governance?

Hi Emily!  Thanks for asking it so clearly!

The alternative governance I would suggest already exists.  It's called sociocracy.
And, from what I have already seen, I believe it's far better than democracy!
)jack(

What is sociocracy?  Is that a euphemism for communism?

Democratic government actions that result in immigration and tax policies that encourage rather than discourage population growth as the panacea for all economic problems is just one example of where government goes astray.  Does anyone really believe that population-driven economic growth is sustainable in the long run?

Interesting comment.  This brings up some important questions not only about long term sustainability of the planet and our species, but again an indictment of the current economic system.  A system which relies on constant growth.  A stop or even a slow-down could comprimise the whole system.  
I don't see the U.S. government taking real action on population control.  Elected officials are so dependent on thier own public image of being pro-family that to discourage procreation would mean certain political doom.  

I'm not a native english speaker.  So I will quote WP:
Sociocracy is a system of governance using consent-based decision making among equivalent individuals and an organizational structure based on cybernetic principles.

It's based on four principles (Decision Making by Consent, Circle Organization, Double-Linking, Elections by Consent) and is closely related to social change in NonViolent Communication.

What is consent-based decision making among equivalent individuals?  What is an equivalent individual?  How does this differ from representative democracy?

"I don't see the U.S. government taking real action on population control.  Elected officials are so dependent on thier own public image of being pro-family that to discourage procreation would mean certain political doom."

I like to think that if we put our minds to it we could stabilize our population and simultaneously bring our economy into a soft landing.  After all, there are countries in the world with negative population growth.

Perhaps education is the answer.  Can people be convinced that a stable population is in their own enlightened best interest.  If a few of our religious leaders had revelations that would permit them to announce that families at the replacement level is good and anything else is a sin, i.e. having more children than one can support, provide medical care for, and educate is bad.

Any attempt at population control through legislation in our Republic would result(and rightly) in chaos. We have a government oversteping its Constitutional authority already so adding reproductive control to it could be the tipping point. Only a totalitarian government could enforce such a thing. If it is to be done it must be voluntarily. Fat chance.

If you are interested in sociocracy, I would recommand the article in wikipedia which is concised and well done, imho.

As an example, imagine a team with 10 "workers" and the operational leader of the team.
They form a circle.
The circle determines how the day-to-day operational decisions will be made. The operational leader is then responsible for applying these policies in managing the functioning of the department or group.

When this circle makes a decision, these 11 individual are strictly equivalent.
No decision will be taken while any of these 11 individuals has an valid objection.
The operational leader does not decide for the rest of the team.
This is the consent-based decision making among equivalent individuals.

Also the whole team selects (by consent) a representative among its members.  It's usually a person different from the operational leader (unless everybody agrees).
Now, suppose we have 8 different teams, each with its operational leader and a representative.
When the higher circle meets together, they gather the 8 operational leaders, the 8 representative and the higher operational leader.
These 17 individual are equivalent (though some belong to level N, N+1 and N+2).
They make a decision only when no one objects.

This is a kind of representative democracy but it's much more interactive.

I'm not so sure that there isn't some significant infiltration of right wing groups going on.  It sure didn't take the FBI long to track down Tim McVeigh et al [sp].  I think the SPLC and others tend to use a very broad brush in identifying so-called extremist groups.  People have a right to have strong feelings about many issues facing our nation.  And that alone seems to be the criterion that the SPLC and others use to invoke the word "extremist".

"Ruby Ridge and Waco are examples of people being murdered by the government in the name of left wing principles."

Yes, but the key words are "in the name of."  In other words, those actions were only nominally left-wing, and in reality were actions in defense of statism or authoritarianism, which is diametrically at odds with left-wing values, when you get right down to it.  We need to be very careful (restating your point, I think) to separate left-wing values from leftie-washing, to look for substance before appearance.  There are those on the Right who are more liberal than they think;  there are those claiming to be on the Left who would see half of us here locked up as threats to neo-liberalism and free trade.  I'd make friends with the former before I would ever trust the latter.

Left wing values often includes what amounts to government ownership of the means of production and distribution.  Is communism left wing or right wing?

Kent State.  Same state, very different school.  :)

Negative population growth or at least a stable population should be a goal of all animal rights and environmental activists. 

Your post is right on point, Tim; and there are a sizeable number of us who believe there just may have been somethin' fishy goin' on when Dubya continued reading to the kids while the Towers (im)ploded. 

As for your beloved land, that's been going on for about as long as this land has been invaded and colonized, without end.  It should be a crime.  Why isn't it?

One word - GREED

Jerry,I like your photos, especially the pyramid. But, please check out this website - www.thestoryofstuff.com this should help you understand why we environmentally conscious folk should NOT shop at Walmart. Please google "locally grown" and the name of your town or go to http://www.localharvest.org/ to find folks in your area from whom you can purchase food, and other than that, shop at smaller local (if you have one) groceries or health food stores.Yes, it costs a bit more, but your body is paying for the "cheapness" of food with dis-ease.

Dean, it is not a "carbon tax." It is a way to make those who pollute the world be responsible for cleaning up the mess they have made. A fee for necessary services IS NOT A TAX. You do not pay a tax to the city to treat your sewerage, you pay a fee. The word "tax" is being misused politically in this case to scare people. To agree with this you do have to believe that the service is necessary - in this case, that global climate change is real, is happening, and that humans are largely responsible. It is my opinion that our economy will be STRONGER with a cap-and-trade policy on carbon emissions.

I would disagree that the enemy has simply been "redefined" by the government.  For one thing, this report was done under the Bush administration, not the Obama admin.  It was simply released now.

For another, the threats from the extremist groups mentioned in the report arise from actions undertaken by them -- not from the gov't simply looking around for a new scapegoat.  Christian reconstructionism, white supremecists who are now joining forces with mainstream political orgs, and anti-abortionists who shoot, bomb, and threaten doctors, nurses and women -- are all responsible for the political fallout.  They rightfully are being identified as threats to this nation's security.

The carbon tax may destroy one specific kind of economic model but that doesn't mean we can't invent others.  And we should.  We should not wait for the government or Big Bidness (as Molly used to say) to invent these things for us.  We'll be waiting a very long time.

The distinction between fees and taxes is not very clear.  What one jurisdiction calls a fee is tax-funded in another.  Maybe we should have more fees for service:  fees for taking cares of the welfare and indigent people in our neighborhoods; a fee for National Defense; a fee for border security;  a fee for E-verfy, etc.

At least then we would have a better idea where our money is going.  Using the tax code to finance welfare is an example of how its real cost is obscured from view.

The Obama administration's perpetuation of many of the invasions of privacy legalized and quasi-legalized under the Bush administration really is worrisome.  It doesn't really surprise me (Obama's a pretty middle-of-the-road guy on national security policies, if not somewhat on the small-c conservative side of center) but it worries me.

I don't see gun nuts being singled out, however, simply for owning a gun or two.  Do you, really?  Really? 

The spread of this idea is ultimately based, as far as I can tell, on racist revulsion over having a black president.  

Yep, it's no wonder there are more so-called extremists on the right.  Can one be extreme in the defense of the constitution?

Well, Frank, what about "moderate terrorists” whose American “lifestyle” (more specifically, misuse and exploitation of the environment) is radically and convulsively changing the entire planet's ecosystems to the detriment of billions of other humans and non-humans on the face of the planet? Can they possibly be “terrorists” to you because they are so much like you? Somehow, the typically human reaction is that it's always got to be the other guy. There's us, and then there are the “terrorists.” If you're not for me, then you are against me. But it has become even more subtle than that: if you speak up against the President if his name happens to be "Bush", then you are unpatriotic. But if you want our president to FAIL (and his name happens to be Obama), then you are patriotic. What part of the looming environmental holocaust is your responsibility? What are you doing about it?

Man is on the brink of causing more earthly suffering than Stalin, Hitler, Mao, and Pol-Pot COMBINED. In the end, the political stripes of the perpetrator matters not one whit to those who will suffer. Protecting the environment should not be a political issue - it should be common sense. It's no more complicated than toilet-training a baby: the baby first of all has to REALIZE THAT HIS DIAPPER IS WET, and then the baby has to realize that HE DID SOMETHING TO MAKE IT THAT WAY before the baby can ever learn how to become something other than everyone else's problem.
Pardon the ranting here, but the hour is late, and we are not moving nearly fast enough to save much of the beautiful planet that I love. 

There's a difference between socialism and command-economy communism.  Sweden is a socialist country, when you get right down to it;  that's what social democracy is, a form of socialism.  When was the last time we saw a major dictator from Sweden?  Or mass murders there?

I would love to know, more generally, how one defines "left-wing extremism."  I've seen people criticized harshly on the Left for taking part in the Seattle WTO protests!  What were they supposed to do, stay home and do nothing?  Additionally, if you think a new development is going to have catastrophic effects on the surrounding environment, what are you supposed to do, let it be built?  If you can minimize death and bodily damage while preventing its building, isn't that what you should do?  Susan B. Anthony went to jail for voting when voting was illegal.  If you believe in something, act like you believe in it.  If you don't believe in it, don't claim belief in it while criticizing those who actually follow through in their beliefs.  That's like a person who calls themselves a Christian only going to church once a year for Christmas services and then making fun of the other people in the church for praying daily and attending every Sunday.  Sheesh.

When *women's* voting was illegal, I meant to say.  Left that out, sorry.

Pretty interesting comparison -- the Suffragettes in England did burn things and break things from time to time, even.

The example of Sweden is especially interesting now that Islam has become an important power in the country and headed to a majority in the not too distant future along with other European countries, notably France, the UK, and Germany.  Already in Sweden, blond women are being raped on a regular basis and jews are being attacked in the streets if they wear an identifying yarmulke.  How long after the Muslims achieve majority will it be before Sharia law is imposed and the Ayatollahs are calling the shots?

The cause:  Sweden's liberal or social democracy!

Lawyers in general are known as bottom feeders.  Look at how many lawyers are in Congress.

This is very far from the topic at hand, and verges on plain old trolling for a fight.  
Please chill out.

Thank you for pointing out the actual content of the report so clearly, Terry.  

It's true: I usually do delete comments from this blog that are irrelevant to the post at hand.

Those leaders mentioned above were not socialists. Some were totalitarians and some were fascists, some were communists.  It's kind of funny to hear people parrot right-wing media's liberal (no pun intended) use of the word "socialist."

Hitler came to power in a Democratic Germany. They had a Constitution and everything. He began by persecuting all non-Christians but esp. Jews.  He used right-wing pundits to take over the state's media, which was primarily newpapers at that time. He persecuted homosexuals, liberals, and abortion proponents. He demonized immigrants and wanted them deported.

Sounds an awful lot like the GOP, rather than any contemporary Democrats or Liberals.

James, there have been bad leaders in every type of governmental model you can think of.  Bad tribal leaders, democratic republican leaders, monarchy leaders (we call 'em kings and queens), etc.  Why are socialist leaders who go bad singled out as examples of why that particular economic model should be shunned entirely?  Because there are good leaders of countries who adopt socialist elements to their economic systems.  Socialism, after all, is an economic model first and foremost.

And just because a political talking head calls something a certain label, doesn't mean he's doing anything but pandering.  Nazi Germany, for example, had some socialist elements to its economy but was first and foremost a fascist state--note the emphasis on racial purity and the Fatherland over nearly everything else.  Those are not socialist ideals.

Dana, socialism, by definition, ends up with all power in the hands of the government and power corrupts...always in time. Although in a republic like ours the people theoretically control through election, since the government, if fact, controls the elections they control the outcome. It takes a great deal of trust (and no small bit of gullibility) to allow lifetime politicians to control such a republic. Can you name a fascist state that was not eventually socialistic?

I was struck by the recent PBS series about Native Americans and how they felt about the increasing encroachment of the colonists.  The Indians asserted concerns about their national sovereignty, languages, culture, natural resources, etc.  When these same concerns are asserted by the Pro-America movement in the face of immigration's unarmed invasion with deadly consequences for our national interest, national sovereignty, culture, language, natural resources, the environment, the extinction of species the reaction most often revolves around the word "racism".  I guess that make Native Americans racists.

Who is defending eco-terrorists here? Who is defending massive debt? (I would contend that we were "spent into massive debt" long before this current administration was elected, by the way. It was indefensible.) Whose policies made the huge bailouts (arguably, I admit) necessary in the first place? And how about the people who have ALREADY HAVE BEEN KILLED, and tortured, etc., etc., due to recent political policy and the world's reaction to it? I think we can safely say that their dreams have been hurt, also. This is a comparison of political policy and its result, and a valid one. I would contend that the war in Iraq (and its long-term political ramifications) was far more damaging to America (financially, politically, and morally), and has killed far more people than all the "eco-terrorism" that has ever happened in America combined. I feel the same about the past administration's total denial of global climate change, the damage from which in the long run could easily overshadow ALL other financial, political, and moral considerations. I would say that this discussion is not so ridiculous, after all. 
The government can't solve all our problems. But some problems only the government can deal with effectively, like global climate change and other widespread environmental destruction, and national security. In a democracy, the people are the government, and we had an election, and Obama won. No one that I can see is calling you extreme. 
And the Unibomber, if that's who you were referring to, wasn't a "leftist," he was mentally ill.

Dana, nutrition is a science, and they are lots of nutritional studies that show, despite our ancestry, eating less meat seems to be better for humans than eating more meat. The same can be said for refined sugar, and a number of other foods that are a part of the "American" diet. If you are really interested, you can easily look this up on the Internet, and evaluate this information yourself.
You are completely missing a whole other point, however. It is the reason most "radical" vegans might get involved in property destruction, and that is the unbelievable cruelty to which our society subjects most of the animals that we use for food. Why would a vegan care if a meat-eater died from some completely avoidable disease by insisting on eating meat? 
Many people don't believe in needless cruelty. I will not pay money to perpetuate the kind of cruelty that goes on in almost all commercial meat production. I just won't do it. I wish you wouldn't, either, but there is not much I can do about that, except to insist that animals by law are treated more humanely, regardless of whether we eat them or not.
By the way, eating vegetarian or vegan is A LOT cheaper than eating meat. Despite your sarcasm, I have never had any outside financial support, and avoiding meat has not been a real problem, once I decided that it was the right thing to do.
And then there is global climate change. Eating meat is highly energy-consuming, and produces huge amounts of carbon dioxide compared to growing plants, which actually absorb carbon dioxide. And animals that graze expel large amounts of methane in their digestive process, which is 20 times more powerful a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.
Nobody here is telling you what to do. But as a fellow inhabitant of the only planet you and I will ever share, I sure hope that you make intelligent decisions about how you treat our common environment. 

Just a moderate popping up to comment.  Most people of whatever political persuasion believe we should not pollute our environment, because it always comes back to bite you, so stop finger pointing, because it puts folks on the defensive which is counterproductive to your supposed objectives.  You want common-sense solutions that most can agree and acted upon?  Then let's TRY to act like civilized adults and stop appealing to fear and pity, creating straw men, engaging in ad hominem attacks, using generalizations, and making assumptions and faulty appeals to authority (and all sorts of other logical fallacies).  Those that don't care about the environmental damage they do more quickly respond to concerted MARKET PRESSURE from WELL-INFORMED and upset soon-to-be-former-consumers.  This cannot be avoided or manipulated, unlike government rules and regulations, which to them are just another game.  The fact is you can't even legislate CORPORATE morality.

Observations/questions:
"And then there is global climate change."
Climate change on earth is the rule, not the exception, so trying to pin the blame on humans is pretty uninformed.  Just look at the geologic column, with its myriad fossils of creatures and plants no longer with us.  It happened pretty darn quickly because (for the sake of those who don't actually spend much time outside in nature) jellyfish, fish, and plants (not to mention larger creatures) rot RAPIDLY - they don't wait around to be fossilized.  Even large-scale deaths don't automatically result in fossils.  Buffalo Bill and his pals killed millions of methane-producing bison on the Great Plains (with much sturdier carcasses) in a short period of time, and nary a fossil from it all.

Wait a minute, does this mean we should be erecting a monument to him since he eliminated millions of "animals that graze expel large amounts of methane in their digestive process, which is 20 times more powerful a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide"?  Uh oh!  And don't forget that we produce more methane ourselves when WE eat vegetables compared to meat.  It seems we're "damned if we do, and damned if we don't."

Hold on! Logic struggle! ...if humans abruptly stop hunting and/or eating all grazers (deer, bison, cattle, horses, wildebeest, gazelle, elephants, etc) then their population will rebound. Yay!...I think...but then we have MORE methane-producing grazers...and there certainly aren't enough predators to control them (unless you want to breed and release wolves, puma and coyotes in your neighborhood to control the deer eating your backyard garden and dashing into your buildings and vehicles). BTW, if anyone would care to get out their copy of Silent Spring and read about what happened to the deer on the Kaibab Plateau in the Grand Canyon, I believe it would prove instructive.  So, as genetics proves we are of Earthly origin, we have as much right to meat as any other omnivore, however I observe that OUR killing methods are VASTLY more "humane" than that of the non-human creatures predators who obviously do not grapple with moral questions.  But I digress...

A large part of North American was covered by glaciers (a mere 10,00 years ago, according to scientists), and now they have melted back up to the North Pole, leaving many small and Great lakes - that was some climate change, eh?  And how about those Icelandic farmers in Western Greenland around 900 AD?  Within 200-300 years it became so cold that the "ground ice" (as they called it, but we say "permafrost") rose up, and the glaciers moved further down the mountains.  They became unable to grow food (their subsequent encounters with Inuit/eskimos moving southward to follow the seals as they had more livable, ice-covered range, didn't help) and they literally died out.  You can visit the archeological sites and see 6-foot deep graves with plant roots going down as far (both not possible in permafrost).  We are not yet back to that warm!

Open up Google Earth and look objectively at the terrain.  Everywhere.  See how there was water all over the place, especially many places that are now deserts.  Earth has been warming and drying up for some time.  History is replete with accounts of large numbers of animals living in places that (today) are so incapable of sustaining them that the ideas seem ludicrous (hippos in Britain, lions in the middle east, to name just two).  There are even some crocodiles in oases in the Sahara (http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/06/0617_020618_croc.html). How do you think they got there?  Prehistoric American exotic pet collectors who decided they were too ornery to transport any further?

Having said all this, we should care for what we have under current conditions, but understand that although we can do all kinds of damage with pollution, climate change predates our puny efforts by quite a long time.
 

Dean, just like the issue that started this discussion, this is a MORAL problem. That is the difference between you and all these other animals you are identifying yourself with - you are capable of making a decision based on moral considerations. The other animals you mentioned are not. If an animal is raised with care and kindness and killed in a way that causes no suffering, I personally see nothing wrong with eating meat. But in our society’s way of procuring meat, this virtually never happens. There is plenty of proof of this; you just have to want to know. As a matter of fact, the way we treat animals we raise for food is rife with horrible suffering on many, many levels. If that's OK with you, or if you don’t care, or if you don’t believe it, then go right ahead and eat all the meat you want.