. . . but perhaps won’t. I swear it seems as if someone has a concession at Tea Party functions selling self-lobotomy kits, and they’re selling like $10 iPhones.
File this in the “Whom the gods destroy, they first make mad” department, with loss of sense of humor as a key symptom.
You may have seen this ad during the Super Bowl, and though you may have cringed a bit at the way it tweaks people who show concerns about the environment and who urge cleaning up pollution, you probably found it pretty humorous.
But over at the Club the Constitution Constitution Club site, they appear to think it’s an ad from the Obama administration’s Department of Homeland Security.
So some hoaxster with the apt handle The Rat at Club the Constitution Constitution Club dug up a dull, run-of-the-mill document out of the Department of Homeland Security that talks about DHS policies on working to implement the government’s environmental justice policies. “Environmental justice” is shorthand for “don’t dump garbage or toxic pollution in or close to the homes of poor people just because they are unlikely to have lawyers at the moment.”
Then The Rat flew off the handle, a truly head-exploding, insane Gish-Gallop rant about Homeland Security:
In its just-released Environmental Justice Strategy document, the DHS says the idea is to “include environmental justice practices in our larger mission efforts involving federal law enforcement and emergency response activities” and to incorporate environmental justice in “securing the homeland.” Roll that around in your head for awhile:
“Federal law enforcement” agents conducting “emergency response activities” in the name of “environmental justice” for the purpose of “securing the homeland.” The Green Police. Oh. My. God.
You couldn’t make up craziness like this guy, The Rat, could you? He clearly has no clue about the history of environmental justice (and is Google-challenged on top of that) — or he’s venally working to make people believe falsehoods. What’s the harm in including “environmental justice practices in our larger mission?”
Does this Rat, who appears to be a complete idiot, fail to understand that “emergency response activities” are commonplace, and occur whenever an 18-wheeler carrying a load of chemicals turns over on the freeway? Does The Rat fail to understand that spills need to be cleaned up? (Real rats are very clean creatures, actually. While they live in filthy, they do not prefer it, and they keep their dens very clean. This is one way a real rat, say Rattus Norvegicus, or Rattus rattus, is superior to this faux rat.)
Here’s the description of the Audi advertisement from Auto123.com, showing none of the insanity the right wingers try to insert:
As reported by Audi
HERNDON, Va.,– Green Police, the Audi Super Bowl ad, provides an uncommon avenue for green advocates, anteaters, Styrofoam, the legendary rock band Cheap Trick and the 2010 Green Car of the Year to find their inner connectivity.How all of these rather disparate elements come together hasn’t been revealed yet by Audi. But in the end they will provide an entertaining look at how we all face a dizzying array of choices that can impact the environment. Some of these choices are easier than others. But, the Green Police ad will show, one of the best choices is driving the Audi A3 TDI, which won the prestigious 2010 Green Car of the Year award presented by Green Car Journal at the Los Angeles Auto Show in December.
The Audi Green Police ad will air Super Bowl Sunday in the fourth quarter of the largest television event of the year. But Super Bowl ad followers, Audi aficionados and others can get sneak peeks at what’s coming.
Audi released a teaser edit of the Green Police Super Bowl ad today, which highlights the crucial role anteaters can play in keeping the planet green. Think Styrofoam. One Super Bowl reviewer online is already betting the Audi Green Police ad will win top honors for “Best Use of an Unusual Animal in a Super Bowl Ad.” Audi disclaimer: No anteaters were harmed in the filming of the Green Police Super Bowl ad. To find that teaser video, go to www.facebook.com/audi.
Another preview of the Audi Green Police ad is the available download of the theme song of the spot. The legendary rock group Cheap Trick returned to the recording studio to remake their smash hit “Dream Police” into “Green Police.” Fans also can find that download by going to the Audi Facebook page.
For Audi, the Super Bowl has been a premium platform for promoting the performance and prestige of its cars the past three years. But underlying the fun of this year’s Green Police Super Bowl ad is a serious message: If 30% of Americans drove clean diesel cars like the Audi A3 TDI, the nation could reduce oil consumption by 1.5 million barrels a day. What’s more, clean diesel engines reduce CO2 emissions by 30%.
“Those are real-world benefits that the A3 TDI offers for today’s concerns about fuel consumption and greenhouse gas,” said Scott Keogh, Audi of America Chief Marketing Officer. “Super Bowl ads are all about fun, but the best ads point consumers to products that enrich their lives. That’s what we’ve done with the Green Police.”
Got that? It’s a straight up, funny-as-anything Super Bowl ad pushing Audi’s TDI Diesel engined cars.
Have the right-wingers genuinely lost their humor senses? Are they so shallow in their reading they didn’t catch the humor? Can’t they tell a joke from reality?
In contrast, environmental justice is, by now, a rather well-established movement to marry civil rights laws and anti-pollution laws to prevent poor neighborhoods from being unfairly burdened by pollution, in a drive to clean up pollution for the benefit of all. It’s an old enough concept that it goes by its initials, EJ. See Wikipedia’s quick and concise entry:
The United States Environmental Protection Agency defines EJ as follows:
Environmental Justice is the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies. EPA has this goal for all communities and persons across this Nation [sic]. It will be achieved when everyone enjoys the same degree of protection from environmental and health hazards and equal access to the decision-making process to have a healthy environment in which to live, learn, and work.[5]
The United States Department of Transportation defines three fundamental EJ principles for the Federal Highway Administration and the Federal Transit Administration as follows:
- To avoid, minimize, or mitigate disproportionately high and adverse human health and environmental effects, including social and economic effects, on minority populations and low-income populations.
- To ensure the full and fair participation by all potentially affected communities in the transportation decision-making process.
- To prevent the denial of, reduction in, or significant delay in the receipt of benefits by minority and low-income populations.[6]
Could a serious-minded American citizen disagree with anything in those two definitions? That’s right out of the Boy Scout Manual, it’s Leave No Trace writ large — it’s been the policy of the U.S. government since the early 1970s, proposed by Republicans as a means to conserve our nation’s lands, waters, and other resources.
There is nothing in the DHS environmental justice policy statement to suggest the agency will do anything more than worry about whether the agency itself is environmentally friendly, and fair to minority populations in the dumping of its wastes. Actually, there is nothing in the document opposed to pollution — only statements outlining that every group in the agency is responsible for following policy. The document says, in too many words, that no one can use the excuse, “It was the custodian’s job to see the used fluorescent light tubes were disposed properly.”
That crazy right wing! They just get more and more distanced from reality the closer the election looms!
Links to the post at Club the Constitution Constitution Club, with the implied allegation that Obama will be sending cops out to fine you and your local gendarmerie for using Styrofoam cups, make up a new Anti-Green Wall of Shame, made by unthinking people spouting off about what they do not know:
- Obama’s Department of Homeland Security Forms Green Police
- The Big Picture » Here Come the Green Police! DHS Launches ‘Environmental Justice’ Units « The Constitution Club
- Who’s Up For The Green Police? » Pirate’s Cove
- Who’s Up For The Green Police? | Right Wing News
- April 24, 2012 | Another Slow News Day
- The Church of the Global Warming Fascists (AGW) revising their theology, another fall – Christian Forums
- Hold onto jaw before reading « Pull My Chain
- Where Is He Wrong? | SelfAdoration.com
- THE GREEN POLICE ARE REAL! DHS LAUNCHES ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE STRATEGY | iBC_FN | iBankCoin Financial News
- Forget Homeland Security, Now It’s About “Environmental Justice” – Tea Party Nation « Gds44’s Blog
- Forget Homeland Security, Now It’s About “Environmental Justice” The Federal Observe
- Here Come the Green Police! theflyingcameldotorg
- The Mind, It Boggles, Short Little Rebel (Who complains at the next blog, “This was a strategy that Hitler bragged about it.” Hitler worried about dumping pollution on poor people? Bullfeathers; the woman knows nothing about the topic.)
- The Mind, It Boggles, Western Rifle Shooters Association (Do you sense an astonishing echo chamber effect here, with no thought at all to what words are actually echoed?) (Note the discussion of shooting federal agents in comments; they must think no one is watching, or cares.) (Ooh. Also see this astonishing claim by Mike, in comments: “Marx and Engels discussed using environmentalism to destroy the capitalist west.” Pretty good, since environmentalism didn’t exist before either Marx or Engels died; nor did they talk abut “destroying” the west, especially since “the west” didn’t become parlance for capitalism until after 1946; Marx died in 1883, Engels in 1895.)
- InfoWars gets the Audi joke, but completely misreads the policy document (there is no new unit of DHS; there is no group of uniformed cops to enforce environmental rules)
- Steven Hayward at Powerline, who probably knows better, gets all panicky and whiny and says you should be fearful
- Intelhub fell for the hoax, and added to it
- (Updated May 3) Alan Caruba never hesitates to pile on if he thinks it’s nasty enough, and he does it again here at the aptly-named Absurd report, not pausing to understand the inaccuracy of the original report, nor giving a thought to the irony of posting such absurdities; Caruba gets suckered again
- Presstitution got suckered
- Caruba has his own echo chamber –– and like an echo, there’s no brain working in the process (Ruthfully Yours)
- gds44 got suckered (again) — more echoing Caruba (doesn’t anyone on the right ever think for themself?)
More than a dozen blogs, operated by at least a dozen bloggers — all of whom conserved a great deal of energy by failing to use any of their gray matter neurons before parroting a hoax. Oy. (My experience is that most of those blogs are terrified that someone will leave an opposing opinion in comments — if you successfully post a comment at any of those blogs, will you let us know in comments? The Ghost of Stalin stalks heavily among the blogs of the unthinking right.)
How many people will be suckered by this hoax? More than a dozen so far, and counting.
P.S.: The Audi advertisement was for the 2010 Super Bowl; that’s some digging.
Update, May 3: A few wags at the original site now claim it’s parody, that they know it’s not so. Alas, they don’t post that, and as you can see by the update above, other anti-American Clean Air types continue to pile on, not hesitating to attack our national government for fun.
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 
To quote:
The story is in a pdf document, put out by the government. No mistake — the document exists and it says what the source says it says.
Uhhuh..and the black helicopters are about to take off and the UN is going to take over the world!
Do you know how absolutely stupid and crazy you jokers sound with all your conspiracy nonsense and bulldrek about the “Scary Black Man in the White House”?
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The Self-Adoration site said:
I dare you to quote from the document any clause that involves setting up a “green police” force to hassle Americans, as is alleged.
You’re right that the document exists. You’re wrong to claim it says what Club the Constitution claims. I think it’s unethical for your site to promote false claims as true. If you’re not a conservative nut doing that for political points, you’re a duped tool of the Imams of the Right.
Your post is Q.E.D. in showing how embarrassment did not follow after the error, though any sane American would have blushed and confessed the error.
(Weird that the trackback from that post comes two weeks after the post.)
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[…] started this morning with a link to this post. In it, I see that my post, “Where Is He Wrong?” is linked. Why? According to the title, […]
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Well, on second thought, Mr. Klein could share in Morgan’s usual reason for taking the positions he does.
That being an irrational and visceral hatred of the “Scary Black Man in the White House”
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Well its offensive to polluters who want to dump pollution near poor people’s homes, I imagine. After all..such a policy would cost them money.
Now..why Mr. Klein is defending them when he claims he’s not in favor of dumping pollution near poor people I have no idea.
Frankly, I’m pretty sure at this point Mr. Klein also has no idea why he’s taking the position he has.
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Earlier, at Mr. Klein’s site, I asked: “Can you identify any ‘environmental policy’ that is offensive to anyone, in the memo you complain about?”
Mr. Klein said:
Actually, I didn’t say it does nothing. I said it sets a policy. The policies are, without too much oversimplification, “Pollution is bad, and it’s doubly bad if instead of cleaning it up, we arrange for it to be dumped near the homes of poor people, simply because they are generally not listened to and unable to generate political action to their defense. In other words, we believe in justice for all, and pollution for none is part of justice for all.”
So my question is still valid: Can you identify any environmental policy offensive to anyone in that memo? Please don’t write to us about what you imagine it does or doesn’t do, or what you imagine I might have meant other than what I wrote, or what the authors may have meant other than what they wrote.
Is there a policy there you find offensive? What is it? Why do you find it offensive?
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Well you know, JS, those who believe in the free market fairy dust are just being some rich jagoff’s like Mittens…….well..I’ll refrain from saying the word.
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The part I laughed at, JS, is how he thinks he’s being insulting.
Oh no, Mr. Klein, you weren’t being insulting. Trust me, I know insulting…I’m downright one of the sharpest tongued people here when I feel like it. You aren’t even close. But please, continue..give me a reason to return the favor.
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He calls us infants…
…because we don’t believe in free market fairy dust or the magical Libertarians road and bridge trolls.
Too funny…
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Oh I just love people who make an argument that boils down to “People would stop killing each other if we just got rid of those laws making murder illegal.”
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To quote:
The atrocities you note–and yes they are atrocities–happen because centuries ago, rulers like the ones you defend came up with an imagination that maybe we could pretend that something other than people are doing these things.
Voila…shielded liability, which reduces to nobody being responsible for anything.
The rulers I defend, Klein, would go after the people that perpetrated those atrocities. Are those rulers perfect at doing so? No, they’re not. But they’re still far better then what you would have. Under your system the rich and the powerful or the simply depraved would be able to rape and pillage at will and absolutely noone would the power and the authority to stop them.
Is government perfect? Hell no…but it’s far better then the alternative proposed by the neocons and the libertarians. Their alternative is simply nothing more then glorified economic piracy and economic anarchy.
Show me a person arguing that government should do nothing..should get out of the way of the “free market” and I’ll show you either someone about to be fleeced…or someone about to do the fleecing. Or if you want an example..the difference between a sheep and a wolf.
To quote:
Voila…shielded liability, which reduces to nobody being responsible for anything.
*falls over laughing* Oh boy. That more or less describes the mindset of the right wing. That they’re never responsible for anything. The BP Oil spill? Why they weren’t responsible. BP wasn’t responsible for the spill and the Republicans weren’t responsible for so weakning government oversight that it was laughable. The Bank bailouts? Oh that was somehow Obama’s doing despite the fact he wasn’t yet the President. Bush and the Republicans had nothing to do with it. The deficit? All Obama’s fault even though the wars and Bush’s tax cuts to the rich make up a vast majority of said deficit. Just like Bill Clinton was somehow responsible for 9-11 and not the Republican President and the Republican Congress that held all branches of government at that time.
The coddling of far right wing domestic terrorists like JT Ready? Oh..that’s not the Republican’s responsibility either. It’s not their fault that they’ve allowed massive nut jobs to have power. It’s not their fault they’ve so defanged the FBI and the police from being able to deal with people who like weapons a little too much. It’s not their fault that somehow Mr. Ready was able to procure military grade weapons.
Just like somehow Captain Ahab Walker isn’t responsible for the financial hole he sunk Wisconsin into..it’s somehow those damn teachers unions that did it..they made him give out tax cuts to his rich cronies that turned Wisconsin’s budget surplus into a budget deficit.
The rich not creating all those jobs and prosperity that the Republicans promised after the last round of tax cuts to the rich? Nope that’s not the Republican’s fault either….why the rich just need $4 trillion dollars in more tax cuts and everyone in the country will have jobs and prosperity coming out of their ears…and the middle class and the poor should give up medicare, social security and all the rest of the safety net so the rich, the ultimate victims, can have it all. After all..surely the rich, after they have it all, will surely act out of the beneficence of their hearts and spread their hoards, and I use that word for a reason, around to everyone. Just like Smaug did with the Dwarfs in Tolkien’s The Hobbit. Those Dwarves should have been happy that the Dragon stole their home and their wealth..hell they should have praised him, served him and treated him as a hero and “job creator” that was only interested in their best interests.
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Complete fiction. Monsanto was not protected by a policy of the government, nor was BP, nor Vitro (in Salt Lake City) nor PG&E, nor U.S. Steel (fluorides and sulfur oxides and nitrogen oxides) . . .
Environmental injustices occurred perhaps because government turned a blind eye, but not for government excusing the behaviors. “Rulers like the ones [I] defend” are not to blame for anything other than not regulating as perhaps they should.
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Mr. Darrell, you have a remarkable talent for expressing your imaginations without ever touching reality. “To the extent, to the extent…” Reality doesn’t occur “to the extent;” it’s just a set of instances. To the extent(!) I can discern anything about reality in your comments, I’ll address them at my place. It may not be until next week, but I’ll be sure and let you know. For now, I just see nothing here except you writing about irrelevancies and making absurd charges, one after the other after the other. Newt Gingrich…really now.
Meanwhile, for the two infants who are whining about corporations, I’ve got a surprise for you. You are making my point, not yours. The atrocities you note–and yes they are atrocities–happen because centuries ago, rulers like the ones you defend came up with an imagination that maybe we could pretend that something other than people are doing these things.
Voila…shielded liability, which reduces to nobody being responsible for anything. This is the world you are arguing for, so I’m not sure why you’re whining so loudly about what results when it’s, ahem, instantiated. To use the form of argumentation so popular around here, I guess you must be in favor of these things happening, which is why you defend the principles that cause them to occur.
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To quote:
Nick, didn’t your parents ever teach you about free market fairy dust?
No, not even my dad, a lifelong Republican, believes in the free market fairy dust that the neocons/libertarians spout.
Now if I can just get him to stop voting Republican until the Republican party gets its head out of the orifice it stuck it in…
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Nick (James) says, “if you try arguing that the coal powered plant 20 miles from me, for example, has my best interests at heart and surely won’t pollute more then they absolutely have to even if the EPA didn’t exist then you are, in the immortal words of Bugs Bunny, a world class maroon…”
What? Nick, say it ain’t so! Don’t tell me you believe a company like — oh, say Monsanto for instance — didn’t have the very best interests of the people of Anniston, Alabama at heart!?!?
Surely, BP/Clark, Potash Corp/PCS Nitrogen and General Dynamics are all primarily committed — before profit — to protecting the people of Lima and Ottawa, Ohio from things like brain cancer, birth defects and tainted fish in the Ottawa River!
Nick, didn’t your parents ever teach you about free market fairy dust?
Corporations, megafarms and the owners of industrial sites will ALL rally to outdo one another when it comes to public health, public and worker safety and a clean environment just the very instant that big gub’mint gets out of their way. The fairy dust can’t be sprinkled all over us unless we stop monitoring these folks. Once we stop, they’ll be so competetive with one another in the “court of public opinion” that they will strenuously enforce their own safety protocols…often more stringent than what government now has in place. And on top of that, Nick…
Oh, damn the luck. I thought I could make it all the way through without breaking character.
The cognitive dissonance of anarchy disguised as conservatism is just too much to handle. But it’s fun to try.
Jim
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Mr. Klein, to the extent you endorse the hoax against Homeland Security, you’re a tool. To the extent you endorse the implied criticism of President Obama, you’re a prevaricating tool.
To the extent you claim Homeland Security is an evil agency, you’re a dupe of the anarchists, the communists, al Quaeda, and Newt Gingrich (difficult to tell the difference between them, I know, but there you have it).
To the extent you think you’re making sense, you’re a living, walking, breathing, typing exemplar of that old Greek aphorism, “The empty vessel makes the most noise.”
The world doesn’t hang in the balance. But for the record, I hope you continue your pettifoggery. You’ll distract the forces of evil and other campaigners against Obama from their appointed rounds, and in the end that’s a good thing, an action of virtue, even if unintended virtue.
Carry on.
P.S.: TSA is a part of Homeland Security, probably the most famous part and least loved part. It’s also the major butt of the hoax of Constitution Club. Still not sure if you were writing about the hoax or the memorandum upon which the hoax is based, but either way it’s anti-Obama, and if you missed that, go back and read it again until you figure it out.
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It seems odd to me that you’re going so out of your way to endorse my original comments on this in my post at selfadoration.com
An empty mind is nothing to show off.
Doubly odd that in your post title, you mention embarrassment. I can’t imagine what could more embarrassing than your distracting gurgling now. But okay, since I’m a sport, I will attempt to address every point briefly, even though every single one of them is repetitive. If you deny this, then point out one you believe isn’t, and I’ll re-cite where I already covered it.
On the Constitution Club, I don’t care about his imaginations.
Why the CC was cited—it was because that was the source for the paper to which I was referring.
As to my position on the paper, I think it’s evil—either as being an utter waste and sucking of production, which is what you’re saying it is, or as an affirmative directive to action, that action being evil.
AFAIK, you were the first between us to bring up the TSA, at 11:31AM today. If that’s wrong, then just tell me the earlier cite where I brought it up, and I’ll address it.
My stand on misrepresenting anything, is that it’s wrong. I did not misrepresent the policy of the TSA, which I believe is a department of Homeland Security.
Now I believe that covers everything you brought up in your most recent comment, so hopefully we’re done with distractions. The only thing I care about, being far more importantly hierarchically than any of this, is what I wrote in my comment at 8:57AM today:
————————————
You say me having “Jim Klein” as THE dog in this fight, is evil.
I say it’s ALL the good is, and that every single person on Earth is likewise situated.
One of us is right and one of us is wrong, and the world hangs in the balance. Now you go ahead—be accurate.
————————————–
So address that, if you can. If you don’t understand it, just say so and I can clarify. I won’t believe you, but I’ll clarify anyway.
I believe I’ve addressed every single point you’ve raised, my lack of interest in the CC notwithstanding. YOU opened this up about my supposedly falling for some hoax, and YOU say that “embarrassment should follow.” I’ve explained in great detail that the relevant paper I was citing was NOT a hoax, and I’ve defended everything I’ve said.
Meanwhile, you still haven’t retracted your falsehood about me saying something about Obama, or my supposedly defending the dumping of toxic materials in poor neighborhoods. Those were both entirely derived of your imagination and you have failed to address either one yet, just as you have failed to address the singular philosophical disagreement between us, at least in principle.
If “accuracy” means “distracting” and “bringing up red herrings” and “pretending not to understand” to you, then so be it. Carry on as you have, and I’ll continue to point it out as I have.
But if you’d like to get to the crux of the matter, then do. One way the world has already changed is that anyone who’s read “Man Alive!” (available free at selfadoration.com ) knows exactly what you’re doing. And more—they know why it’s wrong.
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Jim Klein wrote:
Then, later, he wrote:
Minor difference. “Jim Klein” is both “a” and “not a” I suppose. I can look to see what you said, but I don’t think what you said is relevant to anything at all, and if it is, it’s beyond my current understanding.
I don’t know what your position is. You offered up the hoax at Constitution Club, as I understood it then as an indication that Obama’s policies at Homeland Security are in error. That’s not what you meant? What did you mean?
Can you clarify? Is it worth bothering to try to figure out what you meant? Constitution Club was wrong, or if trying parody, awfully inept. I’m not sure what you meant in your reference to them — either you liked it, or didn’t, but it’s almost impossible to say now that you claim I was wrong in saying you referred to them at all.
I don’t know what your position is. Every time I come close to stating what I think it is, you claim I err.
Maybe you’re as confused about your position as I am. You can clarify it here, or more accurately, you may clarify it here. Whether you can clarify, I’m beginning to wonder.
I said nothing at any point about TSA’s methods of carrying out their security work at airports. That’s not an issue here. For what it’s worth, I have found no evidence of TSA “groping children’s genitals.” TSA is charged with producing the results of a good police frisk, without being able to do the frisk. I find the entire process of TSA searches wearying, and it makes me glad not to be flying 100,000 miles a year anymore.
But even were they to touch somebody’s genitals in the course of their searching, that does not justify the hoax Constitution Club created. As you protest so loudly, intentional misrepresentation of the facts, of a person’s or agency’s policies, is not cricket.
I still don’t know where you stand on misrepresenting Homeland Security’s policies. You’ve wandered off on rabbit trails that even most philosophers would find confusing. I regret you won’t stand up for accuracy, I think, since I can’t tell that you are, if you are. If you are standing up for accuracy, I regret you’re not more clear about it.
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“I didn’t say ‘Jim Klein’ is evil.”
Here’s a backhanded compliment for you, Ed. I’m disinclined to think you’re this poor a reader. Unfortunately, that renders you a bullshitter. I didn’t say you said Jim Klein is evil. You can look and see what I did say…
“You say me having “Jim Klein” as THE dog in this fight, is evil.”
I even contrasted it with what I say…
“I say it’s ALL the good is, and that every single person on Earth is likewise situated.”
Now do you believe this is an inaccurate representation of our respective positions, or not? If it’s accurate, then let’s figure out who’s right and who’s wrong. If it’s not accurate, then tell me why not. Tell me why you think it IS the good that a person considers himself “THE dog in this fight.”
Everything else is irrelevant detail. I already addressed your questions about why the CC was cited—I used the source from where I got the cite, rather than a link to the paper itself. Further, I already conceded that this was likely an unwise choice.
On the TSA, at least you’re explicitly admitting that you’re offering “imagination;” personally I consider that a step forward on your part. If we were talking about that, I’d ask you to defend the TSA engaging in about the most reprehensible act imaginable among civilized people, which is the involuntary groping of children’s genitals, as well as adults. But frankly, I’m not really interested in your wordy defense of that—it’s quite enough to know that you and Mr. Kessler are in favor of it, no doubt in pursuit of some “higher cause.”
If that’s wrong, then one of you should stand forth and call for the arrest of those individuals who engage in such atrocious acts. I’ll be sure and look for that in upcoming comments to see if I’m wrong.
James, on the question of pollution, I’ve already stated my personal position twice—“I don’t think it’s fine to pour toxics anywhere that other people might get injured.”
That’s not what we’re discussing, to the degree we’re discussing anything at all. I’m sure that you too don’t think it’s fine to pour toxiics anywhere that other people might get injured.
We’re discussing why you believe the proper means for humans to solve problems is for some of those humans to forcefully impose on the rest of the humans, even before those other humans caused any damage.
Like Ed, you give the same defense—it’s because of what you imagine. And of course, I have the same answer—what you imagine has nothing to do with reality necessarily, and in any event, it’s NEVER some claim to impose slavery on some of the people by other people. Really now…how tough is that and why do you think you can change the reality of it, with a series of words?
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Klein, if you try arguing that the coal powered plant 20 miles from me, for example, has my best interests at heart and surely won’t pollute more then they absolutely have to even if the EPA didn’t exist then you are, in the immortal words of Bugs Bunny, a world class maroon.
Companies exist to make a profit. They exist to make as much profit as possible. If given the choice of doing something the cheap way and doing something the right way even if it is more expensive then they will choose the cheap way every single time. Why? Because doing it the right way, as its more expensive, cuts down on their profits. And considering, just to use them as an example, the Koch Brothers can buy that aforementioned coal power plant and never step foot in the area at any time why would they care about the health of anyone living near it?
Expecting a company to act ethically and morally by choice is very much like expecting the Mafia to not kill anyone. Companies are by definitional amoral things. Some of them are downright morally depraved. But there’s very few ones that act ethically and morally by choice.
So again..some things the “free market” simply can’t be trusted with. Pollution is one.
Health care is another.
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To quote:
Only at best…insofar as they accompish anything decent, hugely more inefficiently than productiive people choosing the best way to do something. Why, does someone here deny this?
Ok lets pretend the EPA didn’t exist. Company A along the Mississippi River in Minnesota decides to dump 40 tons of mercury waste in the river.
Said waste ends up flowing down the river into Iowa, Missouri and every other state that has the river flow through it. Exactly how is Iowa’s authorities to deal with someone polluting the river in Minnesota? Because it’s not like Iowa has any authority in Minnesota. Neither does Missouri or any of the other states. The reason the EPA exists, blowhard, is simply that pollution doesn’t stop at state borders.
And it’s not like the “free market” is going to punish said company because the “free market” has all the policing authority of a 5 year old.
You can live in this fantasy world where the federal government or any government is simply not needed. But that is not the real world. It never has been the real world. it is nothing but a far right wing/libertarian pipe dream conjured up by some illicit drug that says “government is not needed.” In a country where it’s supposed to be “of the people, by the people, for the people” the government..wait for it…speaks for the people. Or do you honestly think you know more then Abraham Lincoln?
Oh and by the way..newsflash for you. The people have chosen the best way to do something…that’s why they got the government involved. That’s why the EPA exists. To give the people the power and authority to, in this case, stop and deal with pollution.
What? You only trust the people to make the “right choice” when their decision matches up with your political philosophy? My my my..arrogance and ignorance all in one package. How very efficient of you.
But please, if you want to think the EPA shouldn’t exist I’d like your address because I can go find quite a lot of pollution that I’d like to dump on top of your head. After all, I live in Minnesota farm country. And there is a whole lot of cow dung that needs to be dealt with…. Surely you don’t mind if I pay off your neighbors so I can dump it right along your property line?
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You should be happy to have TSA worry about their own effluents instead of new ways to probe your orifices, then, I would imagine. But the hoaxsters (Parodists? Really? Where is there any hint of parody?) assume something quite different. They see the agency shifting its focus to all pollution instead. Maybe you could talk sense to them.
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I mention the harms of pollution because the indictments of EPA, yours and others, and the indictments of concern about environmental justice, suggest that you endorse the opposite view, that pollution should be dumped mostly on poor people (since they have the toughest time fighting it).
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Please explain the process by which a non-EPA world could convince utilities like New Mexico Public Service and Southern California Edison to install air pollution controls, scrubbers and filters, to stop pollution. In a non-EPA world, how are farmers convinced to stop using DDT that kills the songbirds?
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I didn’t say “Jim Klein” is evil. No philosophy required, but some accuracy would be good.
I did say I don’t know what your original post is about that it cited the inaccurate hoax from Constitution Club. Whether there is a dog named Jim Klein in any fight really doesn’t affect that, either.
I’m still confused about why you cited the article, to what effect, and why you don’t just say “it’s inaccurate” and disavow it.
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“Yeah, in other words, his dog in this fight is that he doesn’t really have a dog in this fight.”
Oh, I gotta dog in this fight—his name is Jim Klein.
Here’s some philosophy for you Ed; let’s see if you strive to be accurate about this.
You say me having “Jim Klein” as THE dog in this fight, is evil.
I say it’s ALL the good is, and that every single person on Earth is likewise situated.
One of us is right and one of us is wrong, and the world hangs in the balance. Now you go ahead—be accurate.
jk
http://selfadoration.com/ManAllive
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Sorry, James, now I can’t even get past this…
“Right..because the EPA is wholly wasteful. Along with the FBI, CIA, NSA, NASA, CDC, NIH, FEC, FCC, FDIC, etc….”
Only at best…insofar as they accompish anything decent, hugely more inefficiently than productiive people choosing the best way to do something. Why, does someone here deny this?
I would think that under dispute is the real truth of the matter. More commonly, and must worse, is when they do actually do something. It’s often the very worst of human action, being the forceful imposition of some people on others.
While it’s interesting to come across people who defend that as you do, knowingly or not, I’m not the guy who will call anything but what it is. So it’s probably in both our interests that I skip the rest of your comment for now.
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More good news, Ed…we see you’re capable of SOME insight, since you caught the “party” thing. We’ve now proven that you have a mind; at least that’s settled.
Why are you talking about the Constitution Club in response to a comment that said…
“Also, in an effort to admit myself wrong about something–forgive me, but that’s somewhat foreign territory for me–I concede that it would’ve been wiser for me to link the actual paper in my original post, rather than where I picked it up. I hope by now it’s very clear that it’s the existence of the paper that I believe is evil, as opposed to someone’s imagination of its implications.
“As you might’ve noticed, I don’t find imaginations particularly interesting…not his and not yours.”
Why are you talking about people hurt by pollution when your whole point here is the intent of the paper was NOT to do anything about anything, but only express some “worry” about it?
You write, “The harms of pollution and environmental injustice are real. We don’t need fake claims to fight against cleaning up places where people live and healing injuries.”
Then why are you defending something that you state quite forwardly is NOT meant to do anything real? Not only did you put it in bold in the original post, you seem to maintain that there’s no intent to have any agents of the government do anything real in order to stop it. If I misunderstand you, then please tell me who do you expect to do what?
Lastly, thanks for clarifying the state of your honor with regard to the charge that I said something about Obama and especially that I “take issue with preventing pollution in poor neighborhood.”
Interestingly, it was rather more forthright than most of the stuff you do write.
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Hey, james…I just got online and the very first thing I read here is “I have a question for you, Mr. Klein,” which naturally draws my attention, It starts, “You have the same objection to your party…”
I don’t know WTF that’s supposed to mean and associating me with any “party,” in whatever sense you mean except maybe a bunch of people having fun, is an obvious misuse of “your.” I’ll read Ed’s now, since he’s probably trying to say something.and check later to see if the rest of your comment is intelligible, unlike this.
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When the TSA takes every opportunity to violate me in an airport, I have to cast a wary eye at stuff like this and wonder about the truth to absurdity ratio. I mean, who knew 20 years ago that we’d be where we are right now just for committing the “crime” of flying from point A to point B.
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I’m not sure Mr. Klein has a party.
(Yeah, in other words, his dog in this fight is that he doesn’t really have a dog in this fight. Go instantiate that.)
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“Intantiated?”
Okay. The post at Constitution Club instantiates telling falsehoods about federal policy, falsehoods about the Department of Homeland Security, and falsehoods about Barack Obama, for starters. It starts out false, it stays false.
There are hundreds of thousands of Americans who have been injured and sickened by pollution dumped on their doorsteps, or in their homes. Their weight should be greater, in policy making, than the weight of all “instantiates” of green police, simply by number. If we measure by harm, their weight is greater still.
By all counts, the post at Constitution Club fails to measure up to accuracy or advocacy of wise policy.
The harms of pollution and environmental injustice are real. We don’t need fake claims to fight against cleaning up places where people live and healing injuries.
If instantiation is your measure, you of course cannot stand with the Constitution Club.
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I have a question for you, Mr. Klein.
You have the same objection to your party trying to force probes up women’s vaginas right?
To quote:
Government policies are either wholly wasteful–as you insist is the case here–or they are instantiated
Right..because the EPA is wholly wasteful. Along with the FBI, CIA, NSA, NASA, CDC, NIH, FEC, FCC, FDIC, etc….
No what’s wasteful, Mr. Klein, is this belief that no matter what the government does it’s automatically bad. What’s also wasteful is this stupid Ayn Rand inspired pseudolibertarian social darwinist nonsense that your party is hewing to.
Frankly I am sick and tired of your party stupidly making up crap in order to attack the President with. And sorry, that is rather what you’re doing. If you can’t honestly criticize..if you and your party have to make up crap and imagine crap and then pretend that the President is somehow comparable to Stalin, Hitler or both at the same time then it’s time that your party take a bow and walk off the stage.
Is Obama the best president we’ve had? No. But he sure as **** isn’t as much of a ****-up as the last president we had.
So really its far past time your party start returning to reality and dealing with said reality.
But I do have to thank you for teaching me a new word. I never knew the word “instantiated” existed before.
Though you seem to have an obsession with using it over more common words.
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Let’s start with the good stuff. First, I think it’s great that you offer out the mic, without censorship apparently, and I commend you for that. Also, in an effort to admit myself wrong about something–forgive me, but that’s somewhat foreign territory for me–I concede that it would’ve been wiser for me to link the actual paper in my original post, rather than where I picked it up. I hope by now it’s very clear that it’s the existence of the paper that I believe is evil, as opposed to someone’s imagination of its implications.
As you might’ve noticed, I don’t find imaginations particularly interesting…not his and not yours. Though here, his are more sensible than yours, and here’s why. Government policies are either wholly wasteful–as you insist is the case here–or they are instantiated. If instantiated, they can only be instantiated through brute force. After all, that is the only means at the avail of the government. Instantiated policies do indeed look like the “green police” ad, in principle if not in detail. In fact, generally they look worse, with the thugs (the purveyors of the force) often wearing black hoods to hide their identities and frequently engaging in horrid acts, from killing pets to killing innocent bystanders. This happens regularly and if you’d like some cites put up here, I’ll do the work and get it done.
So that’s the harm of instantiated policies like this. In this case, on the assumption that you’re correct that there’s no intent to ever instantiate it, then it amounts to nothing but utter waste. What else would you call an uninstantiated policy? So that means that whatever resources went into this—its development and its propogation and whatever else is involved–was for no purpose at all.
Well, those resources came from somewhere, some production that some people engaged or will engage. So that production was forcefully taken from what would have been the benefit of someone, and dissipated into the ether for no value at all. Indeed, we could talk about the disvalue of a producer having to live in such an environment, but I don’t really need that for this. The removal of the production and its subsequent waste, is harm. So we’ve established harm in any event, on either the instantiation of the paper or its utter uselessness.
Moving forward, I see you engage once again this terrible habit of yours. You write,
“While you’re at it, since you take issue with preventing pollution in poor neighborhoods, please make your case for why the poor should disproportionately be poisoned by pollution.”
And when will you stop torturing cats? See, anything goes when one just makes up stuff. So far, the only comment I’ve made on toxicity is, “I don’t think it’s fine to pour toxics anywhere that other people might get injured.”
Yet here you are, saying that I “take issue with preventing pollution in poor neighborhood,” AS IF I ever said that, or AS IF a policy paper that supposedly does nothing, somehow prevents pollution in poor neighborhoods.
I see you’re honorable about allowing responses. Let’s see how honorable you are about a charge like this.
As to why anyone would want to emulate me, why would I want that? What a boring world it would be. I’d hope they’d emulate my principles, and my success at achieving them. What this is all about, is what’s addressed in the book, “Man Alive!” You see, they’re not MY principles; they are FACTS that are in accordance with being human. If one wants a happy life for oneself, then it would behoove one to understand what his self IS, don’t you think?
http://selfadoration.com/ManAlive
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Ed can I go dump 40 tons of mercury in that person’s neighborhood so we can see exactly how fast that person protests?
Oh I just love NIMBY people. They don’t mind if something bad happens in someone elses area but God forbid it happening to them.
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To quote:
irony is beyond this crowd.
Well you would know about irony being beyond someone. After all you’re such an expert on it.
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By all means, show us the language in whatever memorandum you refer to which calls for the creation of a team of agents to police environmental violations. Please. Quote it for us, and show us why it’s harmful.
No vapor philosophy from you, we expect. Nor vapid, either. Right?
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Most people who claim to be writing philosophy write so densely that not even they can decipher it once they’ve got the worlds pasted to a page.
So, who were you writing about? Why the link to the hoax at Constitution Club on “green police” and the diatribe against Homeland Security?
What sort of “thinking” were you using then, and why would anyone else want to emulate it?
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Irony isn’t beyond most of the people who stop by here — I’d be willing to be persuaded otherwise, Short Little Rebel.
And while you’re here, can you explain why it is that you ban dissenting voices at your blog? While we’re discussing irony, explain why you think your readers should be deprived of it, or explain how it’s not ironic that you adopt Soviet-style blocking of dissent as your MO, can you?
You thought the Constitution Club post was parody? Have you any indication of that, prior to your being called for spreading the hoax? Or since?
Please explain your own statement: “This was a strategy that Hitler bragged about it.”
Thanks for dropping by. As you can see, no censorship here. You should try it sometime.
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Okay, you’ve got the mic — what’s the harm? Specify what the harm is, and quantify it.
In any case, it is not as your colleagues-in-hoax allege and imply, that anyone plans “green police” to do anything bothersome or harmful.
While you’re at it, since you take issue with preventing pollution in poor neighborhoods, please make your case for why the poor should disproportionately be poisoned by pollution. If you’re going to defend it, defend it all the way, and tell us why that’s a good idea instead of a crime.
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irony is beyond this crowd.
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Actually, you did just as I charged. You even put it in bold…”There is nothing in the DHS environmental justice policy statement to suggest the agency will do anything more than worry about whether the agency itself is environmentally friendly, and fair to minority populations in the dumping of its wastes.”
I won’t try to decipher “fair to minority populations in the dumping of its wastes,” but I know what “nothing…more than worry about whether the agency itself is environmentally friendly” means. It means “do nothing but worry,” and it’s your defense of why the paper is okay. That’s why you put it in bold.
“But surely the paper does no harm.” How could a complete waste of time, money and resouces–to which you’ve already admitted–not be harm? It’s not cuz you’re gettin’ and not givin’, is it?
Meanwhile, I haven’t said a word about Obama, not one. Yet here you are…”none of what you claim can be found among his faults.” Well, duh…if I didn’t claim any, how could they be there?
And then throw in a little hypocrisy…”and it’s dishonest to claim they are,” You mean it WOULD be dishonest, if the world really went along with your imagination. That’s all this has been about from the beginning…your wild imagination about “right wingers,” good deeds that are accomplished by doing no action, and papers that don’t exist but do.
“…and it’s particularly unpatriotic to tell others to gird up and get ready to tilt windmills, and imaginary windmills at that.”
Really, Ed, you’re a funny guy. Not much of a thinker, but funny. The paper to which I referred that does exist is “imaginary” according to you, but your wild charges about hoaxes that don’t exist is somehow “accuracy.”
When you catch me writing something false, there’ll be a fast retraction. Let’s see if we get any from you concerning hoaxes I fell for, policies that make sense because they do nothing or charges I’ve made about Obama when I’ve made none at all.
Do your readers know you make all this stuff up, or did I just stumble onto a fantasy blog?
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Actually, I didn’t defend the Homeland Security paper at all. I think it’s loaded with bloated bureaucratese, and it strives hard to achieve length in the hope that length will give it a heft that it lacks in coherency, clarity, or call to action.
What I did was point out that the hoo-haw over the paper was invented dudgeon, the boy calling wolf and calling for an air strike and holy war to get rid of the non-existent wolf.
But surely the paper does no harm. I notice at your blog you go one at length about whether “he” is wrong, and I’m not sure who you’re referring to. Was Obama wrong to call for an end to sweeping pollution into poor neighborhoods instead of cleaning it up? No. Was The Rat wrong to invent a dudgeon and claim Obama to be evil when his agency wrote a bloated memo, not for writing the bloated memo, but for imagined tyrannies that do not obtain? Yes, The Rat was wrong.
Now that you call my attention to it, I suspect that much of the rest of your angst is misplaced, too. Obama has his faults; none of what you claim can be found among his faults, and it’s dishonest to claim they are, and it’s particularly unpatriotic to tell others to gird up and get ready to tilt windmills, and imaginary windmills at that.
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There is no shaming the shameless, you know?
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“The best way to expose high-faluting wankery is by exposure.”
Hey, we agree about something!
So now that you’ve defended the government paper BECAUSE it does nothing, did you have anything else to say?
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Apparently Dave subscribes to the “Any publicity, even publicity that shows the person/people in question to be raging idiots is good publicity.” mentality.
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You’re welcome. In Scouting young men learn that sunlight kills germs. That’s also the purpose of “sunshine laws,” and it’s what we mean when we say, colloquially, “let some sunshine in.” The best way to expose high-faluting wankery is by exposure. See Elf Eye’s comment, for example.
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At your site, Mr. Klein, I responded:
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Always happy to have a link, but I’ve no idea what you’re on about.
Oops, check that…really I do. Here’s my response:
http://selfadoration.com/an-empty-mind-is-that-what-you-want/776
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Judging from the comments at the Rat’s blog entry, his readers really don’t get that the ad is a parody. Actually, I’m not even sure they get that it is an ad–they react as if it’s a documentary. Excuse me while I pick up my jaw from the floor.
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Thank you for the free publicity.
-Dave
site administrator
constitutionclub.org
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