First, I sweat Google imperialism. I pretty much live for Gmail, Google Maps, and texting questions to Google from my phone. They’re good at everything–I can’t complain. Google Maps is a lifesaver, given my abysmal sense of direction, so imagine my delight when I heard that they’re launching a walking directions feature! Apparently it’s still far from perfect, but I like where their heads are at.
*Would you forgive me if the pun was borderline intentional?
After yesterday’s What Is It To Be American kick, this op-ed got me going again. It touches on two of my favorite topics: American values and environmentalism.
What I love about the environmental movement is that it’s based on looking beyond ourselves, and right now, solutions to the problem usually involve making a sacrifice or at least a change. While it may be fun to burn lots of gas or spray pesticides everywhere, damaging the planet and using our resources in unsustainable ways hurts everyone who lives here and the consequences will only be worse for future generations. I like how people who are really into being green recognize our interconnectedness and are willing to make sacrifices for the sake of the planet. And frankly, I think they’ve succeeded in making it pretty fashionable. I’m embarrassed to be caught with a plastic bag.
The environmental movement also has its problems though, like why is this a political issue? Why don’t we (and our government in particular) consistently push for the best long-term solutions? I thought we were all about innovation and trail blazing around here. Last week, Al Gore challenged the US to turn to entirely carbon-free energy in the next ten years. In the op-ed, Bob Herbert fears that “the naysayers will tell you that once again Al Gore is dreaming, that the costs of his visionary energy challenge are too high, the technological obstacles too tough, the timeline too short and the political lift much too heavy.”
He goes on to cite times when the country has pulled through in a crunch:
When exactly was it that the U.S. became a can’t-do society? It wasn’t at the very beginning when 13 ragamuffin colonies went to war against the world’s mightiest empire. It wasn’t during World War II when Japan and Nazi Germany had to be fought simultaneously. It wasn’t in the postwar period that gave us the Marshall Plan and a robust G.I. Bill and the interstate highway system and the space program and the civil rights movement and the women’s movement and the greatest society the world had ever known.
Some would say you have to know where you’ve been to know where you’re going.
Thomas Friedman, sometimes I find you a little bit obnoxious, but I really dig this analogy for our fossil fuel consumption:
When a person is addicted to crack cocaine, his problem is not that the price of crack is going up. His problem is what that crack addiction is doing to his whole body. The cure is not cheaper crack, which would only perpetuate the addiction and all the problems it is creating. The cure is to break the addiction.
A friend recently posted a link to this little column about how America needs GM to maintain the Hummer brand for its “symbolic fortitude.” Matthew DeBord seems sincerely concerned (I’m trying to see the irony in the piece, but I don’t think it’s there) that the end of Hummer would somehow represent the end of the American way of life:
For American life to work, the illusion of endless abundance must be maintained. Sure, we must adapt to a future of less-abundant natural resources. Our vehicles will need to become radically more efficient. But we require vestiges of the old dream to sustain our national optimism, which in turn nourishes our national character.
It’s something that I’ve been wondering about America–is this really a country based on having more than everyone else? More food, more gas, more money, more moral authority? Is anyone worried that implicit in this view is the fact that everyone else will have to make do with less? Even as he says it, DeBord seems in denial of the fact that we will one day be forced to cut back; forget the idea that we should. I hope the nourishment of our national character doesn’t require that we be blind to reality.
And they said no one would go downtown.
For the fourth of July, we went to watch the fireworks at the newly opened Erie Canal Harbor. The commercial slip features excavated remnants of the Erie Canal and a new building for the Naval Park. Really, it was too crowded to fully appreciate that night, but it seemed like it would be a nice place to spend an afternoon, and the fireworks display wasn’t bad.
I mention this because I think it represents a lot in a city sometimes pessimistic about its own redevelopment. And maybe this was ten years in the making, but it’s good to see a new attraction downtown. Change takes time, after all.
