Sustainable Development Called Security Imperative (Powell)

Environmental News Service ^ | 08/06/2002

[toenail]

Did you see this thread? Same old tune.

[toddst]

What keeps poor countries poor is not access to unapproved technology but rather the lack of liberty, and the absence of clear legal protection for private initiatives.

Stated more clearly, prosperity requires that individuals have liberty to act in their own interest, and honest courts to protect them as they do so.

It is not an accident that poor countries almost without exception have state controlled economies, normally run by an elite for the benefit of that elite.

You are exactly correct IMHO. These points are being glossed over by the very socalist governments (and their liberal media supporters) that do hold their own people down while attacking our free-market system as "not sustainable."

Poverty would disappear rapidly if socialist and/or repressive governments would get out of the way of their own people.

[Captainpaintball]

He ran out of straws four or five months ago. The only reason Bowel is in his curent position is because he is a recipient of Republican-style affirmatve action. He is little more than a disgrace.

[meenie]

The Colon man is not sustainable, thank God!

[sauropod]

Thx.

[Tailgunner Joe]

Colon Bowel Alert!

[DoughtyOne]

Sustainable development? I'll give sustainable development some consideration when we quit allowing millions of foreigners to come here each year. If we have room for them, then sustainable development IS NOT AN ISSUE, IS IT?

[E.G.C.]

BTTT!!!!!

[AAABEST]

He is little more than a disgrace.

"Poverty, environmental degradation and despair are destroyers of people, of societies, of nations.

Funny how Colon-boy doesn't mention spreading democratic ideals.

[cogitator]

Funny how Colon-boy doesn't mention spreading democratic ideals.

You may have a poor opinion of Powell as evidence by the picture, but he did say this, in the next paragraph (I even Bolded the text of the statement).

[AAABEST]

...but he did say this, in the next paragraph

I did read your bold. I should have bolded "spreading" to make my point. That's the solution as opposed to trying to solve the worlds environmental and economic problems.

What I was trying to say is that by having democratic ideals these problems tend to take care of themselves, as opposed to the world trying to solve the "problems" that come with a free-society as put forth in the China/Oil example.

I realize I don't make myself clear sometimes. Nevermind.

[onedoug]

Replies too thoughtful to fully digest at work bump!

[dinasour]

Thanx for the ping.

[Free_at_last_-2001]

Sustainable developement is a hoax. - Agreed and I hate to admit I have worked with "Sustainable" types in the past - and I have to say they were idiots - but dangerous!

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

We have heard of late how we are at a disadvantage in the war that has just begun, because in the West we cling to life and comfort at the expense of honor. Our enemies tell us that, and in the telling they barely conceal their enjoyment. Do they really believe this? Because if they do, I have a message for them: The sense of honor in the West may be slow to awaken, but it exists in measures and quantities, when it does awaken, enough to fill the world, as it shall, as it must. How do they think we have come to where we are? How do they think we survived the battles that led to the great revisions in this civilization, its unprecedented turnings, redirections, and rededications -- of which, being entirely unself-critical and subjective, they have not yet had the courage to make even one? They say we have no history. Did we spring from a leaf? How do they think we have come through our five thousand years? Honor. From long familiarity, we know what honor is.

It is what enables the individual to do right in the face of complacency and cowardice. It is what enables the soldier to die alone, the political prisoner to resist, the singer to sing her song, hardly appreciated, on a side street. It is God's valuation and resplendent touch, His gift of strength to those who need it most, when they need it most.

I ask you to defend and protect what is great and good, to choose your battles, but to stand your ground. For little things cascade into big things, and even should the larger battle not go well, hold your position. Even if, in the end, you do not prevail -- though you must -- you will have done right, and the ghosts of those who came before you over many thousands of years, of those who fell unknown and unremembered while doing right, of those who upheld against all pressures and in the face of wounding opposition, will be justly honored, as you will be justly honored, by those who come after you.

Congratulations, and God bless.

Defend Civilization Itself, Mark Helprin.

---

Antedote to Barbra Streisand. (^:

[Demidog]

"Sustainable development" is an oxymoron. My goal is just to get this farm such that I never have to go to the store. That in itself would be quite a feat.

Consumerism is definately a problem. I doubt seriously that any government will solve the problems listed in this article.

[hedgetrimmer]

The UN, and international NGOs have defined sustainable. It merely means that if you are a sustainable society, you are a socialist society and all private property belongs to NGOs or the government. See, folks who believe in sustainability don't believe that you common people can take care of land or property in the "correct" way. Therefore the government or some annointed land conservancy must take it away and do it for you.

"Sustainable Development is nothing but pure Socialism in a Green cloak. Too many Conservatives throughout the nation are either falling for the deception or ignoring it. This is the current crisis of the Conservative movement. "
--Tom DeWeese

[hedgetrimmer]

See post #37

[SteamshipTime]

What a load of malarkey. The argument is that without government to shepherd the judicious use of resources, free-market economies will strip-mine, clear-cut, and toxic-dump themselves into oblivion. In fact, the opposite is the case. The socialist centrally-planned economies of the Eastern Bloc, the Soviet Union, China, et al. are plagued with pollution, shortages, and crop failures. The free market West, by contrast, enjoys an abundance of greenspace and first order goods.

When individuals are given rights in air, land, and water, tort liability protects and balances those rights. When air, land, and water are considered "public" resources (i.e., owned by noone and everyone), waste and spoilage is the inevitable result.In a society which honors and protects rights in property, mutually antagonistic and/or cooperative exercise of those rights strikes a balance of (guess what?) "sustainable development."

Doubtless, people occupy space, consume resources, and generate pollution. Thus, one threat to "sustainable development" in the United States is the government's importation of large numbers of people (literally millions) and its coercion of non-discrimination and association towards immigrants by native property owners.

[cogitator]

See, folks who believe in sustainability don't believe that you common people can take care of land or property in the "correct" way.

Do you think that slash-and-burn agricultural practices in rain forests constitute taking care of property the "correct" way?

Here's an example of what such practices look like near Rio Branco, Brazil, which is near the border with northeastern Bolivia.