|   Calif. imports 75% of its lumber - How do greens address this | Dances With Hornets
Dec 14, 2003 5:07 PM | | As I've previously stated:
I am first to admit that no one has the mind of God and is all knowing. The problem is that just like the Democratic Party, the environmental movement is being radicalized.
One of their main weaknesses is they are not economists and they ignore economic issues and the effect of markets. California imports 75 percent of its wood from outside the state (data from the L.A. Times).
While a part of our imported lumber could be reduced by not building single family houses over 1,500 square feet in size, I doubt over half of the houses being built are over this square foot limit. This is due to land costs in California. There has been an increase in condo contruction in many areas due to this factor.
Let's say we make it illegal to build a house over 1,000 square feet, unless you're a celebrity like Barbara Striesand, who owns a house in L.A. that's 10,000 square feet, and probably a few more around the country or world. She needs these houses to comfort her from the busy task of telling us how to live.
Let's say that reduces our needs by 25 percent. How many other uses do we have for timber, such as newsprint and other paper products? We can recycle, but recycling needs power and water to operate, we already are short of water and luckily our power situation has improved. So let's say we reduce it anther 25 percent by recycling.
That leaves us with havesting 25 percent of our lumber from outside sources and that's if we can reach these marks I've previously stated (I think I'm being over - optimistic, but if Barbara Striesand and her other Hollywood friends chipped in it would help).
I wonder how big Senator Boxer's house(s) is/are or the houses of the leaders of the major environmental organizations? We'll leave those questions for another day.
We would still need to supply 25 percent of our lumber, and if not harvest this 25 percent from California Forests, take another 25 percent from forests outside California.
Can we reduce our lumber needs by 75 percent and only harvest 25 percent from California Forests?
The current goal of the environmental movement is to stop us from harvesting, from our forests in California, the remaining 25 percent of lumber we don't import from other forests outside California.
If environmentalists really cared about the environment around the world why haven't they considered the effect (on forests outside the state) their policy of stopping all logging in California would have?
Have you read any article in the news lately or in the electronic media about how the environmentalists are advocating sustainably harvesting our forest's, recycling efficiently and finding other materials such as hemp for paper (a little rough for toilet tissue maybe.)?
Or are the articles on them trying to stop timber harvesting? Do they support us taking any timber from our forests, and if so, how much and from where?
Could we ever survive without harvesting any lumber? And if we are unwilling to harvest what we need, we must get it from other forests outside of California.
Should we be advocating conserving our forests and sustainably harvesting our forests for our needs? Should the environmental movement continue to stop all logging in California or look for ways to sustainably harvest our forest for our needs - thus not affecting the forests, some in 3rd world countries - outside California?
Can we stop all population growth in California, keep our current needs from rising and reduce the 75 percent of lumber we are harvesting from other countries (affecting their forests) - and stop logging the 25 percent we are currently harvesting from our forests - thus reducing our need for timber to 0?
The cost of land is limiting the affordability of housing. Market forces are creating a trend towards condos and much smaller houses. ESA and other lawsuits against development have added increasing costs to building, and along with lands costs, have increase the price of a home in California.
Areas such as Southern California, Northern California, and around the San Francisco area are also experiencing this trend. In parts of Silicon Valley prices are depressed due to the Tec Stock Market bubble collapse under President Clinton.
I have told my friends who rent in Laguna Beach that within 15 years they will no longer be able to afford living there on their salaries. They would have to move inland and even there housing prices will be high.
It is not hard to beleive that if you own a median priced home in Orange County, around $300,000 +-, you'll be a millionaire in less than 15 years.
If the current trend in stopping all development in California continues, Manufacturing will not be economical in California, and due to rising property values, California will be the domain of the elite.
But the environmental movement's anti-capitalism, anti-private property rights and socialist policies could be adopted to address these social inequities. The private wealth in California could be redistributed to the masses and the existing housing become property of the state. The masses would then be equal.
What a wonderful world it would be, would it not? |
| 99% of what Dances with Hornets post is unrelated to this forum | (nm)
Dec 17, 2003 9:32 PM | | |
| Uh oh... now you've done it... | The Preacher
Dec 18, 2003 11:45 AM | | Now he will rain down countless 50,000-word essays telling you how his posts are, in fact, *directly* related to this forum. Another crazy person in recent history called these essays "manifestos." |
| Preacher, do you give any thought before you post? | Dances With Hornets
Dec 18, 2003 6:33 PM | | Preacher,
I've found most people do not operate on reason, or understand how a policy that seemingly is not related to their "issue" is.
So I'll forgive you for your obvious ignorance and explain how "stopping logging" through policies such as the wilderness designation, not only affects forests outside California but our access.
I'm going to explain this very slowly, like I explain concepts to 11 and 12 year olds that I tutor in math, hopefully you'll understand the concept:
Environmentalists want to stop any resource recovery such as tree harvesting (logging), so they attempt to get as many areas as possible designated as wilderness to stop resource recovery.
The wilderness designation ban's mountain biking.
Do you understand how these two issues are related, or do I need to put it in easier terms for you and NM, which I think is short for "No Mentality", to understand.
Do you understand the concept of A+B=2?
Prime numbers can only be divided by one and the number itself?
Do you understand reason and logic and the relationship of actions?
I find some of the people on this board attempt to discredit a point by using rhetoric - not facts, logic or reason.
They usually respond by either discrediting what you say by calling you, right wing, destroyers, writers of manifestos, etc.
The recent post by Dave54 on the attempts to discredit Bjorn Lomborg and his book "The Skeptical Enviromentalist" are an example of this.
I understand it's hard to believe the environmental movement's policy of stopping all logging in California, which is not actually stopping logging, only impacting forests outside of California for our needs, may be causing you cognitive dissonance. You want to believe there are no losers in this policy. But there are losers.
So while the environmental movement attempts to gain the high moral ground by "stopping logging" in California, it does the opposite, it shows them to be elites with a morally bankrupt policy that provides no solutions, only transfers the impact to other forests for our benefit.
I leave enough "holes" in my arguments for those opposing my statements to fall into. Let's see if you fall into the holes I left here.
Merry Christmas Preacher and I hope you get the gift of logic and reason for Christmas; it's obvious from your post you are lacking in same. |
| Remember one thing about me... | Dances With Hornets
Dec 18, 2003 10:49 PM | | Preacher,
In all issues and the subsequent arguments/data I use to address them, I attempt to understand and gauge the net effect and ultimate result of these arguments/data.
I understand the environmental movement. Only a fool does not contemplate every action taken to address an issue many moves out - and I consider every action taken but one move on a chess board in a long lasting game.
I do not feel the environmental movement understands how they may win the game, but lose the battle. Stopping something without understanding the ramifications of doing so does not necessary translate into a solution.
Like I've tried to point out, actions taken that seem morally superior do not necessarily have moral results.
I want real solutions that provide us with sound stewardship policies that not only advance the conservation of our forests, but the conservation of our freedom of access.
We must address many of the issues advocated by the environmental movement. Where I disagree with the environmental movement is on the ideology and policies used to address them.
I do not treat the issues I am involved with lightly.
There is a reason why I post on this board, and why I call the environmental movement to task. Consider it a certain strategy not yet revealed.
As I've pointedly stated to Preacher, do not think these posts are in any way irrelevant to mountain bike access - and more importantly, sound forest management policies.
Dances With Hornets. |
| Enough bullshlt from Dances! | Fergie
Dec 19, 2003 9:05 AM | | Preacher- I would like to hear a little from you about the situation in CA. I'm on the other coast, and things seem somewhat different here. (OK, VERY different!) What got so out of hand there? From where you see things, how do the majority of riders out there feel about things? |
| about the situation in CA | The Preacher
Dec 19, 2003 10:55 AM | | Hi Fergie,
I could not begin to know all the access situations in California, because it's a big state, with many different situations. I can tell you about the places I have lived, which are L.A., Ventura and Marin counties, and also Santa Barbara, where I do a good amount of riding.
L.A. access is good, with problematic areas. Something like 7% of trails in the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area are open to bikes. We're working to improve this. Some other areas are beginning to be threatened by reckless, high-speed, "one way" (I don't want to use the official term here, for fear of alienating some) riders who are cutting trails and in some cases shouting obscenities at other trail users. We're working to educate these folks as well. But in general, there is unlimited, great riding to be had in L.A. County.
Ventura County access is very good. In fact, the area I live in -- Thousand Oaks/Newbury Park -- the local open space organizations embrace MTBers as preservation allies. Just aboout every trail around here actually begins it's life as multi-use... what a concept!
Marin is as bad as things can get. Very little legal singletrack open to bikes. That which is open is very smooth, albeit very beautiful. Marin also has some of the most beautiful fire roads I have ever ridden, but if you're looking for technical riding, you will be disappointed here. The area is also VERY politically-charged. No matter what you do... whether it's on a bike, on foot, in the city, in the country... there is SOMEBODY who does not want you to do it, and they will employ whatever political powers they can to try to stop you. I get the feeling that Orange County (home of DWH and WS) is also this way. But, since I am not from that area, nor do I have any desire to go there, I cannot speak with any knowledge of the place and I have absolutley no incentive to get involved in their problems.
Santa Barbara has been an MTB paradise for years, until recently. The backcountry of SB still has basically unlimited riding, though we are examining Sen. Boxer's Wilderness bills which could affect certain trails in this area. The technical front country trails have come under recent (last several years) threat of closure, mostly due to the "one way" types of behavior described above. As I also witnessed in Marin, this has prompted malicious booby-trapping of the trails in some extreme cases.
As for the environmental side of things, I am not educated enough to speak in great detail. I can tell you that (like myself) the vast majority of MTBers that I have met in my lifetime consider themselves conservationists... more like "hikers on wheels" than "motocrossers without a motor."
As for the wilderness argument, I have to say I am of the the school that supports an alternative designation to new wilderness... one that allows non-motorized travel. I also agree that bikes could be a solution to congestion and pollution in National Parks. While I would not ask for new access for bikes in current wilderness areas of the National Parks, I do think it would be appropriate for bikes to be allowed on some trails there. |
| Thanks! Good information. | Fergie
Dec 19, 2003 1:21 PM | | Thanks Preacher! I learned more in your page long post then in months of reading through the other drivel. I know it is impossible to sum up a whole state in such a short space, but thanks for the information.
I tried to write up a brief summery of access in my area (southern NY) but there are so many different factors; governments, hiking groups, mountain bike clubs, development, illegal trail builders, etc. It is almost as if every park has a different situation. I'm going to write it all up, and I'll post it here when I'm done. I would just say that in this area there is a strong history of land stewardship among the hiking groups such as the AMC, and especially the NY-NJ Trail Conference. This brought the area literally back from the ashes, and prevented near total devastation. Since before the creation of the Appalachian Trail in the 1920's these groups have been protecting many parks and natural areas, and preventing exploitation. The amount of trail work and activism they have done boggles the mind. I feel that our best course for more access is simply to show that we are in it for the long haul, and that we are committed to the lands first and foremost. Once we demonstrate that we are responsible users, the access will follow. Access gained through respect has power and will endure. It may take years, and there will be frustrating times, but I like trail work, I've got a handful of trails to ride, and hiking ain't so bad (especially in the winter), so what do I have to loose?
Any other folks out there care to write up their access situations? It would be a good way to start the year, and I would like to hear how other people are facing their specific access challenges.
"Long term commitment to trail management is necessary to sustain public trails as a recreational opportunity" - NYNJTC on mountain biking.
http://www.nynjtc.com/issues/trailuse.html |
| My pleasure, Fergie. | The Preacher
Dec 19, 2003 5:58 PM | | Good luck with your local efforts. I believe that strong, local advocacy is where it's at. That and keeping an eye on the obvious, national situations which may have impact... both negative and positive.
Yeah, I hike too. I actually hike more often than I ride, 5-6 times per week. Sure it's only a mile "hike" that is actually taking my dog for a walk, but I only get out on my bike on average about twice per week. |
| Thanks! Good information. | ferday
Dec 21, 2003 7:48 PM | | up here (alberta/east BC) the access has been threatened by a small group of hardcore shuttle riders, but the community (thanks Pinkbike!) stepped in quickly enough to get cmba/imba involved as well as the government. the talks have been proceeding rather well, and we are getting alot of support from private landowners.
as well, the incident seemed to have taught many a lesson, and (hopefully permanently) have stopped being idiots. of course, there is not much riding in the national parks areas, which cover a lot of good terrain.
p.s. "one way" riders are not necessarily a problem, many of these riders (myself included) spend a great deal of time maintaning trails/conservation efforts. |
| "one way" riders | The Preacher
Dec 22, 2003 10:34 AM | | Hi Ferday,
Sorry. Again, I'm not trying to point the finger or alienate any user group here. I agree that ALL types of MTBers are potential allies, and that many "one way" riders do contribute to local advocacy efforts. I'm sure this is even more true in your neck of the woods.
At the same time -- with my previous post -- I am simply trying to "call a spade a spade", as many of the newer conflicts did not arise until people started shuttle bombing places that had been ridden and shared with other user groups peacefully for decades.
Also, being locally active in MTB access and open space organizations, I can tell you -- first hand -- that the vast majority of MTBers that do get involved in advocacy down here are NOT one way riders. Again, I am sure this situation is different where you live, and I would never suppose to speak with any knowledge of any area with which I am not familiar.
Glad to hear that things are going well for you up there. Maybe I'll have the opportunity to get up there someday. Looks like a bitchin' place to ride! |
| about the situation in CA | gc
Dec 21, 2003 9:08 PM | | I can only speak for OC but our situation here is very positive. For the most part, local land managers have embraced our representation and work and see us as a valuable asset to their management areas. Trails aren't being closed, and some are even being opened. Just about all singletracks are open to bikes and technical trails aren't sanitized in the parks/forest. Our relationships with equestrians is on solid ground as well.
There is a very vocal group trying to take away riding areas through the Wilderness designation but they are few in numbers and mostly complain instead of finding solutions (of which there aren't problems). This casts their voice in a dark light with land managers and really just makes it empty hyperbol.
All in all, good stuff going on behind the Orange curtian. |
| See? What did I tell you? | The Preacher
Dec 19, 2003 10:27 AM | | He's very predictable. I do wonder if -- like other manifesto-wielding zealots -- he is also unemployed (?). One would almost have to be to have enough time to type all that crap. |
| I submit it is you who are very predictable... | Dances With Hornets
Dec 19, 2003 11:06 AM | | Do not debate the points, respond by rhetoric
"like other manifesto-wielding zealots"
"he is also unemployed"
"One would almost have to be to have enough time to type all that crap."
I love your intelligent responses to the points I've made.
You are indeed very predictable.
Dances With Hornets |
| I submit it is you who are very predictable... | Dances With Hornets
Dec 19, 2003 11:07 AM | | Preacher,
Who is "very predictable?"
You do not debate the issues or points I've made, you respond by rhetoric:
"like other manifesto-wielding zealots"
"he is also unemployed"
"One would almost have to be to have enough time to type all that crap."
I love your intelligent responses to the points I've made.
You are indeed very predictable.
Dances With Hornets |
| more on the continuing 'Skeptical Environmentalist' saga... | dave54
Dec 18, 2003 4:18 PM | | http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1071251634079 |
| Background on Bjorn Lomborg & The Skeptical Enviromentalist | Dances With Hornets
Dec 18, 2003 5:24 PM | | GREEN SCARE
January 23, 2003
Smearing a Skeptic
Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
BY BJORN LOMBORG
COPENHAGEN--I'm the author of "The Skeptical Environmentalist," a work that grapples hard with our pessimistic view of the environment. It's a serious book on a serious subject. But it has now been denounced by the Danish Committee for Scientific Dishonesty--yes, such a body exists!--in a manner reminiscent of medieval book-burnings. And many environmentalists have cheered from the side, world-wide.
How did this happen and what are the consequences?
I am Danish, liberal, vegetarian, a former member of Greenpeace; and I used to believe in the litany of our ever-deteriorating environment. You know, the doomsday message repeated by the media, as when Time magazine tells us that "everyone knows the planet is in bad shape." We're defiling our Earth, we're told. Our resources are running out. Our air and water are more and more polluted. The planet's species are becoming extinct, we're paving over nature, decimating the biosphere.
The problem is that this litany doesn't seem to be backed up by facts. When I set out to check it against the data from reliable sources--the U.N., the World Bank, the OECD, etc.--a different picture emerged. We're not running out of energy or natural resources. There is ever more food, and fewer people are starving. In 1900, the average life expectancy was 30 years; today it is 67. We have reduced poverty more in the past 50 years than we did in the preceding 500. Air pollution in the industrialized world has declined--in London the air has never been cleaner since medieval times.
This information needs to reach a broader audience, because it concerns our basic priorities. If we fall prey to minor scares and spend a disproportionate share of our resources there, we will have fewer resources left for other areas. Nevertheless, presenting these uncontroversial data has proved to be curiously controversial. In the 16 months since its publication, many have reviewed the book favorably, but others, such as reviews in Nature, and the Scientific American, have been strongly dismissive. The debate continues--passionately.
Apparently unable to counter the main arguments of the book, some, regrettably, have also tried to pressure the publisher, Cambridge University Press, to stop its publication. Others drew the Danish Committee for Scientific Dishonesty (a national review body, with considerable authority) into the debate, asking it to judge the book against a complaint of deliberate and conscious distortion of the data in order to fit preconceived conclusions.
While not agreeing that the data were deliberately and consciously distorted, the Danish Committee decided that the book is "contrary to the standards of good scientific practice." The raw nerve that my book has struck often makes rational judgment more difficult. I fear that the committee may also have been caught up in the emotion of the debate and have deliberated my case with less than full impartiality. (Its decision and my comments are at www.lomborg.com.)
The committee asserts that the book presents a "systematically biased representation." Yet its only examples stem from a faithful résumé of the four very negative reviews from Scientific American, to which the committee devotes more than a third of its 14 pages, and which it accepts unconditionally. I wrote a 34-page rebuttal, which the committee mentions in just one line.
And the irony, sad to say, goes deeper than that. My book was also viewed as flawed because it was not initially subject to a peer review. (This is untrue: Cambridge did have the book peer-reviewed.) Yet, although many scholarly journals have weighed in on the matter, the only published material that the committee referred to in its report come from two popular (i.e. non-peer-reviewed) publications, the above-mentioned Scientific American article and--believe it or not--a half-page article in Time. ("Danish Darts. Reviled for sticking it to the ecological dogma. Bjorn Lomborg laughs all the way to the bank.")
The committee's report also speculates on my motives for writing this book. It states that "The Skeptical Environmentalist" wouldn't have been noticed but for the "overwhelmingly positive write ups in leading American newspapers and the Economist. The USA is the society with the highest energy consumption in the world, and there are powerful interests in the USA bound up with increasing energy consumption and with the belief in the free market forces. The USA is also responsible for a substantial part of the research in this and other areas dealt with by Lomborg." Some might interpret this as the committee seeming to say that I'm in the pocket of "Big Bad America."
Yet I have no desire to support one interest group over another. My focus is on providing information that allows people to make better choices. This is most obvious in the discussion over global warming. My point has been that, despite our intuition to "do something" about it, economic analyses show that it will be far more expensive to cut carbon dioxide emissions radically than to pay the costs of adaptation to the increased temperatures. Moreover, all current models show that the Kyoto Protocols would have little impact on climate--at a cost of $150 billion to $350 billion annually. With global warming disproportionately affecting Third World countries, we have to ask if Kyoto is the best way to help them. For the amount Kyoto would cost the U.S. per year, we could provide everyone in the world with access to basic health, education, water and sanitation. Isn't this a better way of serving the world?
It seems to me that we need to be able to point out such questions without being censured. If the critics want to take each point of the book, dissect it soberly and judge it, that's their prerogative. So far, however, a fog of hysteria has descended over the debate. The baseless denunciation by the Danish committee--which some have called Orwellian--has led to an academic outcry. In Denmark alone, 280 professors have signed a petition rejecting the decision. Now, more than ever, we need to ensure an open and impartial debate.
Mr. Lomborg, a professor of statistics at the University of Aarhus, Denmark, is the author of "The Skeptical Environmentalist: Measuring the Real State of the World" (Cambridge University Press, 2001). |
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