Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

China is the elephant in the room here fellas. Lots of people live there.

No doubt. They've been more short-sighted than most and it's a major problem for all of us. At the same time, emphasizing that part and getting bogged down in who owes what and "I'll never pay unless you pay your full share, at the exact same time, now go" puts us in a prisoner's dilemma situation where every actor/state, from the perspective of being ledger conscious, is best served by (using P.D. vernacular here) the inaction/betrayal choice rather than cooperation/acquiescence option.

That isn't the same thing as naively saying that stewardship should be disconnected from economics. We have to care about the bottom line if only because ignoring it is clearly inconsistent with human nature. Instead, I'm just saying that the economic costs of poor stewardship are intense enough that we should make the investments no matter what. In modest ways, we already are. But our leaders still fight about doing more (or anything at all). Yet doing more is both the best option morally *and*, if you consider the next few generations' of economic costs for inaction now, fully worth the investment in dollars and cents.

It may not be possible to overstate the downsides, e.g., of desertification on world hunger or the impact of rising seas on the world's largest populations. There's probably no cost that could be paid from a budget now that is greater in magnitude. 

Have not seen any robins yet in my area this spring.  Usually see the first by the second week of March.  Wherever they overwinter I'm guessing they likely expired from excessive heat.

we're doomed

You? Almost certainly not. But if you have kids who'll have kids and so on, then there's a good chance. Anyway, for anyone who has ever camped and found the principle of "Leave No Trace" worth teaching and following, the story is here is barely different.

Even if CO2 emissions are too controversial a topic for us to connect and we have to move the goalposts to discuss smog, oil spills, deforestation, or Texas-sized Pacific islands of plastic, there's no denying that we are leaving a trace and that trace is metaphorical garbage.

All of this falls under the umbrella of stewardship.

Think about SUVs.  When I had kids, I had two minivans.  Yes, they weren't cool, but they got better mpgs than any SUV of similar capacity, and had sliding doors to boot.  But, people want "cool", something that is a quasi-truck cool, but really is a poor excuse for a minivan.  Unless you tow, a minivan is far better than an SUV, and cheaper to boot.

Europe is more practical in part because they are less wealthy in the main, so you see almost no SUVs and pickup trucks.  They have smaller minivans and work vans, usually with Diesel engines and manual gear boxes.

I work really hard to not have to go to Walmart*. I don't like what it's become and I don't like the vibe. The shopping cart example is just one of many things that drives me nuts about that place.


* I DO go there once a year, to pick up the supplies I need for my boat. Head treatment, potable water treatment, antifreeze, stabile, etc. I go at 7AM before the masses show up in droves.

Mine is always the first shopping cart in the corral. Maybe the last too, but I'll never know.

Think about SUVs.  When I had kids, I had two minivans.  Yes, they weren't cool, but they got better mpgs than any SUV of similar capacity, and had sliding doors to boot.  But, people want "cool", something that is a quasi-truck cool, but really is a poor excuse for a minivan.  Unless you tow, a minivan is far better than an SUV, and cheaper to boot.

Europe is more practical in part because they are less wealthy in the main, so you see almost no SUVs and pickup trucks.  They have smaller minivans and work vans, usually with Diesel engines and manual gear boxes.

Well, the SUV craze isn't what it used to be. These days, people buy "crossovers", which are basically minivans without the sliding doors and "soccer mom" vibe. Most/many are on car chassis instead of truck chassis, FWD, and at least not horrible for gas mileage. 

I also think that Europe have smaller vehicles because EVERYTHING is much more compact. Walking around Rome/Florence/Paris over the last few weeks, I can't imagine driving my Ford Flex around there. Even worse to try to find a parking spot anywhere. 

I would say that I was already aware that manual transmissions were the norm in Europe, but I was surprised how far it extended. In Rome they only have Uber Black (no UberX) so we once got picked up by a luxury Mercedes van, and of course it had a manual. Pretty much everything I saw there was a manual.

Europe is practical for a lot of reasons. They walk a lot and the train system is fantastic. I saw a lot of cars by familiar makers that I've never seen here. Yes, they were smaller.

Not a whole lot of bottled water over there either, except for American tourists, in my observation. I did notice a lot of people had their own bottles that they could fill and carry. I did find Italy to be very dry, so wherever we went to eat or get a caffeine boost, we always asked for water.

I wonder how it is outside the cities, though? I mean, in downtown Chicago/New York people also walk a lot and use public transit, but once you get outside the metro area it becomes MUCH harder to do so because population density falls off quickly. 

I would agree about all the makes and models of cars, though. It was funny actually trying to get an Uber and it tells me the car coming to pick me up is a Seat, or a Renault, or a Peugeot. I had no idea what the heck I was even looking for!

Agreed on the water, except that I actually saw quite a lot of bottled water at the restaurants. It seemed normal there to buy a bottle of water for the table (even still water, not the sparkling). 

Water must be precious in Italy, in fact, because it seems impossible to get more than 3 oz of coffee at a time! 

I once rented a "minivan" in France back when.  It was a Puegot 805 I think, we had five people, but it was smaller than our minivans and we had to get another vehicle for luggage etc.  The van had a manual transmission, which was fine with me.  I once got a car with a dual clutch transmission that was HORRIBLE.  I presume they are better now.