TomDispatch - Xtreme weather meets Xtreme media bubble - and Dubya is Re-ejected from WH?
Tom engelhardt has written a story I wish I had the time to writeTomDispatch - Xtreme weather meets Xtreme media bubble.
Everyone I know takes pleasure in watching the gavel to gavel coverage of every hurricane by cable news networks. My one friend seriously findds this stuff entertaining, reporters getting bloown away by the wind/rain strapped onto rope, whatever. I can't think of anything more mindless. When we had hurricane Isabel, last year, this kind of coverage was not useful for many reasons, but one was as the people affected we had no power and therefore no television. So just from an information value added point of view, this was just useless. And so I always tink about the people affected and think, all this is really just a mockery or their misery. We are being entertained at their expense, while feigning national concern. So I refuse to watch hurricane coverage, and anyone who flocks to florida everytime there's a hurricane visitation, I secretly pray they drown or something. That's the level of my irritation.
But another more important point, which Tom raises is here is the silence on the connection between global warming/environmental degradation and this unprecedented number of hurricanes in a single season that have hit the Carribean and Florida --Oh nobody, remembers or cares about the impact on Carribean and Cuba: poor nations with little resources to mend from the damage.
There is a collective denial about the damage American consumerism is causing the world. Tom calls it global terrorism. Frankly, I have had it with the collective "we are the greatest country in the world" inspired ignorance. Last year, I read an article on the Sidney Morning Herald on research linking droughts in the Southern Hemisphere to high levels of polution in the Northern Hemisphere. That kinda of shit makes me angry.
But now, the chickens are coming home to roost. I have been watching this hurricane season thinking, "more please, more please." Because maybe, just maybe the Floridians at least will wake up to environmental degradation and how it is directly affecting their lives (that's the level of consciousness that is operational in ths country). And may be, just maybe they will realize just how atrocious the environmental policies of the Dubya White House have been. They would vote accordingly, and viola! a Dubya-free White House.
A girl can dream.
Everyone I know takes pleasure in watching the gavel to gavel coverage of every hurricane by cable news networks. My one friend seriously findds this stuff entertaining, reporters getting bloown away by the wind/rain strapped onto rope, whatever. I can't think of anything more mindless. When we had hurricane Isabel, last year, this kind of coverage was not useful for many reasons, but one was as the people affected we had no power and therefore no television. So just from an information value added point of view, this was just useless. And so I always tink about the people affected and think, all this is really just a mockery or their misery. We are being entertained at their expense, while feigning national concern. So I refuse to watch hurricane coverage, and anyone who flocks to florida everytime there's a hurricane visitation, I secretly pray they drown or something. That's the level of my irritation.
But another more important point, which Tom raises is here is the silence on the connection between global warming/environmental degradation and this unprecedented number of hurricanes in a single season that have hit the Carribean and Florida --Oh nobody, remembers or cares about the impact on Carribean and Cuba: poor nations with little resources to mend from the damage.
There is a collective denial about the damage American consumerism is causing the world. Tom calls it global terrorism. Frankly, I have had it with the collective "we are the greatest country in the world" inspired ignorance. Last year, I read an article on the Sidney Morning Herald on research linking droughts in the Southern Hemisphere to high levels of polution in the Northern Hemisphere. That kinda of shit makes me angry.
But now, the chickens are coming home to roost. I have been watching this hurricane season thinking, "more please, more please." Because maybe, just maybe the Floridians at least will wake up to environmental degradation and how it is directly affecting their lives (that's the level of consciousness that is operational in ths country). And may be, just maybe they will realize just how atrocious the environmental policies of the Dubya White House have been. They would vote accordingly, and viola! a Dubya-free White House.
A girl can dream.
posted by knikik at 11:28 PM
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