Friday, June 01, 2007

Bush gives a speech.

So the newspapers and TV are all going on about GWB uttering a few green platitudes, nobody seems to be looking at the rest of the speech. Read it for yourself on the Whitehouse site. Let's start with the fact he's addressing the U.S. Global Leadership Campaign, what is that? According to their site they're

Americas voice for security, prosperity, & humanitarian values [& the correct use of apostrophes]
So is that America's security, America's prosperity & America's humanitarian values? Nope they look to increase the International Affairs Budget
These programs build markets for U.S. exports, provide for U.S. embassy personnel and security, and promote good governance practices that strengthen democracies. They also facilitate the formation of international coalitions, fund essential nonproliferation and anti-terrorism efforts, respond to global challenges such as hunger and illiteracy, and help people build a future of hope and opportunity.
So all good stuff, but why "Global Leadership"? I'll let George answer that
"It's rallying businesses and non-governmental organizations and faith-based and community and civic organizations across our country to advance a noble cause, ensuring that the United States leads the world in spreading hope and opportunity."
I'll play nice and assume the "noble cause" is spreading hope and opportunity and not that it should be the United States leading the world in doing so.
"When Americans see suffering and know that our country can help stop it, they expect our government to respond."
<cough>New Orleans, Bosnia.
"When America helps lift societies out of poverty we create new markets for goods and services, and new jobs for American workers. Prosperity abroad can be translated to jobs here at home. It's in our interest that we help improve the economies of nations around the world."
Yeah the thought that these societies might produce their own goods and services that they could sell to the US doesn't seem to get a mention. No wait
"Bringing progress and prosperity to struggling nations requires opening new opportunities for trade. Trade is the best way to help poor countries develop their economies and improve the lives of their people"
Uh-huh so encouraging them to produce goods to support their own populace first, to build-up their economies to a point where they can trade their surplus and use that money to feed back into the country - that's not the way to do it? Nope
"free trade is the best way to lift people out of poverty"
Ignore the fact that the Western world already has everything in place for trading, ignore the fact that they subsidise the hell out of everything to keep it cheap and not allow developing nations to do the same - free trade is the answer to the world's problems. Get these countries to grow high-value crops to sell to the West then use that money to buy the West's surplus of food that the developing country isn't growing themselves - money goes in, money comes back out.
"So the administration, my administration worked with G8 nations to ease the debt burden. We're not the first administration to figure this out. My predecessor did the same thing, because it's the right policy for the United States of America."
Was that an indirect compliment to Clinton?
"Since I took office, we have more than doubled U.S. development spending across the world -- from about $10 billion in 2000, to $23 billion in 2006"
Uh-huh subtract the contracts to Haliburton et al for Iraq and then give me a figure.
"The first four years of my administration, we doubled our assistance to Africa."
Yep from $1 to $2. Okay I jest, but no figures are mentioned.

President Bush mentions three goals - promoting democracy, promoting education (particularly for girls), and fighting disease. All good goals, no doubt they're pushing Saudi Arabia really hard on the first two and encouraging the big pharmaceutical companies to lower their prices for the latter.
"At the G8 summit, I'm going to urge our partners to join us in this unprecedented effort to fight these dreaded diseases. America is proud to take the lead. We expect others to join us, as well."
Excuse me? Taking the lead; join you? No don't think about that on to the green bits. You see in order to build up these free-trade economies it's going to take energy and so far that production of energy has been deemed to be um a bit messy.
"The United States will work with other nations to establish a new framework on greenhouse gas emissions for when the Kyoto Protocol [that we didn't ratify] expires in 2012 [long after I've left office]."
Perhaps I spoke to soon
"By the end of next year, America and other nations will set a long-term global goal for reducing greenhouse gases."
Oh wait "long-term" that's still 'after I've left office'. As a sop the midterm goals will reflect each countries own mix of energy sources and future needs. So a country that burns a lot of coal and needs a lot of energy will um probably still exactly the same amount of coal, but will be a lower proportion of their overall energy use. Technology to the rescue.
"The world is on the verge of great breakthroughs that will help us become better stewards of the environment. Over the past six years, my administration has spent, along with the Congress, more than $12 billion in research on clean energy technology."
Wow that's nice, while you're at it can you give me tomorrow's winning lottery numbers too? Just because a lot of money has been spent doesn't mean you're getting any results.
"Last week, the Department of Energy announced that in 2006, our carbon emissions decreased by 1.3 percent while our economy grew by 3.3 percent."
Perfectly correct and quotable if you've read only the second page of the EIA document check page 8, milder winter, cooler summer = less A/C. Page 9 notes the switch to using natural gas over petroleum for energy generation. Also that 3.3% increase in the GDP is only true if you're chaining the GDP to 2000 dollars (which isn't mentioned), if you use the current dollar value the increase is 0.003%.

That's the percentage differences between each year's carbon emissions and between each year's GDP pegged to the current dollar. Not that bad a match, though even I'll admit that's a better GDP increase then I'd expect from the trend.

Okay enough stats
"If you are truly committed to helping the environment, nations need to get rid of their tariffs, need to get rid of those barriers that prevent new technologies from coming into their countries."
or should that be 'taking over their countries'. Just what tariffs are in place that prevent countries from using new technology? Nope don't give any concrete examples just assume they exist.
"We'll help the world's poorest nations reduce emissions by giving them government-developed technologies at low cost, or in some case, no cost at all."
No sarcy comments here, that's a fine sentiment and I'll stop with that note.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

No-one should beleive anything this man and his cronies are saying.They are only interested in making certain parties happy and making money for themselves.

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/bbc_wtc7_videos.html

WOW clairvoyant BBC reporters...

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/wtc7.html

Another of the newly re-insured buildings collapses due to a fire...

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/9-11secretservice.html

Strange the country is under attack and he sits there..

Following all related to 9/11

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/9-11_wtc_videos.html

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/thermite.html

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/wtc_charges.html

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/anthraxsuspect.html

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/WMDlies.html

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/fakealqaeda.html

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/osama_dead.html

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/osamatape.html

Most scarey is this link for us in the Uk

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/london_exercise_video.html

Anonymous said...

Check out these series of videos from youtube.Quite chilling still when u get to part 5

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Odp1FO0Vmuw&mode=related&search=

FlipC said...

A lot to digest there. So forgive me if I talk in generalities. Conspiracies? Yeah they exist, but I also know about cock-ups, coincidence, ass-covering, and people who are happy to take advantage of any situation for their own benefit.

I know that these things happen all the time, but that we only notice them when they impact on something important.

I also know that secrecy is inversely proportional to membership; so anyone who proposes a conspiracy that requires the compliance of the entire government and media infrastructure has a big obstacle to overcome.

That's not to say that such things cannot be orchestrated by a small cabal, pushing the right people, 'losing' the right information and sure both the American and Pentagon have their own little groups as does the UK.

So 9/11. The FBI didn't talk to the CIA and vice-versa; that's the way it always was and it never got commented on before.

Bush sitting like a lemon when the towers fell, that's a fustercluck. The country's under attack, the President's in a known public location and needs to be moved to the designated safe area. But that location is too far to drive and the skies aren't safe for aircraft. The brain goes numb - can't drive, can't fly; only thing to do is stay put. The justifications put out later are ass-covering.

The towers falling - well they were a unique construction, so applying the behaviour of other buildings is out of the question and computer simulation remains just that - simulation. WTC7 was close to the towers and suffered shock and impact damage from the other collapse and that could cause its own collapse.

You could say NIST screwed-up by not checking for thermite traces, but it could just as well be argued that if they had the demolition theorists would have have presented that as 'evidence' in its own right and accused them of covering up if the tests came back negative. So one hand they could be accused of pandering to 'nuts' and spending unnecessary money on tests, while on the other hand they'll simply be accuses of lying. As that's liable to happen anyway forget doing the tests.

The UK July bombing report is damn scary in that it really does explain some inconsistencies in what happened.

Anonymous said...

Wtc building 5 and 6 were even closer than building 7 suffered MORE extensive damage and yet didnt fall down like building 7 did.What about the BBC reporting on a building that had fallen down,yet was behind the woman reporting on the story ? Doesnt that seem a little screwy to you to say the least..

I strongly suggest you check out the 10 videos on you tube starting with the link above.The things that happened that day and followed are mind-numbing.As for Bush wanting to build a "missile defence" system its all bullshit tbh.This is so that the defence manufacturers can make even more money by forcing a new cold war with the Russians.