Miles Jackson <cqmv at pdx.edu>
>They increase their energy use at every opportunity - and why shouldn't
>they? People want to improve their
>lives, and make use of whatever resources are available to do so.
>There was a time when those on the left were supportive of working class
>aspirations for greater resources.
Consumption of energy does not equate with greater productive resouces.
Here is the logical breakdown in your whole argument, which is where you continue to demostrate why the vox populi is neither brainwashed by capitalism nor uncomprehending of their policy realities.
I am no "limits of growth" leftist nor "small is beautiful" environmentalists. I actually like chain bookstores and support more housing over slow growth politics. But I want more productivity in use of resources, not more raw production of fossil fuels. Productive consumption, not gross consumption, is the measure of social advancement.
If policy requires that cars double the miles that people can drive on a gallon of has, that is not a denial of resources to the working class-- it means that they use half the energy for the same amount of travel. That is a social gain, which average voters understand even if ex-marxists posing as populists do not.
Calling people irrational while extolling populism is just elitist gamesmanship pioneered by the New Right. It's an unattractive game played by anyone, from left or right.
I happen to think peoples individual use of SUVs and public policy views seeking to rein them in are both intelligent and self-consistent views. People know from experience that the car industry has the ability to deliver fuel efficient cars but only do so, at prices and volumes that average folks can afford, when the whole industry is forced to ratchet up fuel efficiency.
People want more stuff cheaper and made with less use of destructive environmental fossil fuels. You say you want to fulfill peoples aspirations but you assume all they desire is made material gain. You scoff at their view that they can have it all, including a clean environment.
Me, I want bread and roses.
Nathan Newman