Model Train Journal

The first time I read that I thought it was about recycling us old farts into Soylent Green.

Nope, the thrust of The Green New Deal is to eliminate all fossil fuels in the next 10 years.

An insurgent movement is pushing Democrats to back an ambitious climate change solution.
As we will see, the exact details of the GND remain to be worked out, but the broad thrust is fairly simple. It refers, in the loosest sense, to a massive program of investments in clean-energy jobs and infrastructure, meant to transform not just the energy sector, but the entire economy. It is meant both to decarbonize the economy and to make it fairer and more just.

Ocasio-Cortez, the young bartender who ran against incumbent centrist Democrat was already committed to putting climate change at the top of her agenda, eagerly embraced the green mobilization plan and began using the GND branding.

Now comes the best part, How to pay for it. Her plan is to tax the rich at 70%. Wow I like that. It will be fun watching all those Hollywood elite liberals squirm on that one. Just think, if this were to become law the Hollywoodies would have a legitimate excuse to move to Canada.

As much as they hate cars they aren't going to get rid of gasoline powered cars for a long long long time.

v8vega wrote:As much as they hate cars they aren't going to get rid of gasoline powered cars for a long long long time.

Good.

HONDO74 wrote:The first time I read that I thought it was about recycling us old farts into Soylent Green.

Nope, the thrust of The Green New Deal is to eliminate all fossil fuels in the next 10 years.

Take away that word fuels, and add an "s" to fossil, and there are several of us on this board in trouble!

HONDO74 wrote:An insurgent movement is pushing Democrats to back an ambitious climate change solution.

As we will see, the exact details of the GND remain to be worked out, but the broad thrust is fairly simple. It refers, in the loosest sense, to a massive program of investments in clean-energy jobs and infrastructure, meant to transform not just the energy sector, but the entire economy. It is meant both to decarbonize the economy and to make it fairer and more just.

A lot more liely that it will de-dollarize a bunch of our wallets.

HONDO74 wrote:Ocasio-Cortez, the young bartender who ran against incumbent centrist Democrat was already committed to putting climate change at the top of her agenda, eagerly embraced the green mobilization plan and began using the GND branding.

Probably a good thing as we well might need a stiff drink after all that.

HONDO74 wrote:Now comes the best part, How to pay for it. Her plan is to tax the rich at 70%. Wow I like that. It will be fun watching all those Hollywood elite liberals squirm on that one. Just think, if this were to become law the Hollywoodies would have a legitimate excuse to move to Canada.

I think I detect an error in strategy.

I always figured the next American revolution would be the very poor against the very rich, because there wouldn't be a middle class. I think we are working on that.

On the idea of RICH, I've always wondered what the amount of wealth was, that once you surpassed that dollar point, additional wealth was irrelevant......as in it (the excess wealth, that is) did that person no benefit to have it, other than maybe for pissing contests.

I don't think I've quite gotten there yet.

v8vega wrote:As much as they hate cars they aren't going to get rid of gasoline powered cars for a long long long time.

You hang on to that thought as long as you can because your new environmentalist governor has other plans for you and the state of California. He is going to fix all of California' ill's within the next 8 years, yes 8 years because he will be the governor for 8 years and he has a super majority of democrats to pass any legislation he wants.

Californians had the chance at the election to repeal the added gas tax and they turned it down Apparently Californians are willing to pay a lot more for gas. He can add a lot more tax to help pay for the green new deal. Al gore's idea many years ago was to increase the price of fuel to eliminate the internal combustion engine.

I have no strong partisan leanings in the political area. I hate the proposed methods of the left, and the way they suggest their proposals should be accomplished by penalizing success. On the other hand, I have no love for the head-in-the-sand attitude the right takes towards the environment.

NJPiney wrote: On the other hand, I have no love for the head-in-the-sand attitude the right takes towards the environment.

Millions of people's jobs in this country. either directly or indirectly are dependent upon fossil fuels. If many of the people you represent are dependent on that you don't want to have them lose their jobs.

We will see what happens as California leads the way...

And fossil fuels put untold numbers of blacksmiths, livery stable workers and others dependent on livestock out of work. How many boiler makers had to switch trades when diesels replaced steam engines? How was the southern agricultural economy going to survive without slavery? Times and technology changes and life goes on.

In any case, I'm not an advocate of the drastic and total measures pushed by the extreme left, but rather a more gradual, voluntary approach. Look how many homes now have solar panels on their roofs (along with the jobs created selling and installing them) without fossil fuels being banned for generating. Same for hybrid cars. Nobody ever banned horses when the internal combustion engine took over. After a while they just made less practical sense.

NJPiney wrote:And fossil fuels put untold numbers of blacksmiths, livery stable workers and others dependent on livestock out of work. How many boiler makers had to switch trades when diesels replaced steam engines? How was the southern agricultural economy going to survive without slavery? Times and technology changes and life goes on.

In any case, I'm not an advocate of the drastic and total measures pushed by the extreme left, but rather a more gradual, voluntary approach. Look how many homes now have solar panels on their roofs (along with the jobs created selling and installing them) without fossil fuels being banned for generating. Same for hybrid cars. Nobody ever banned horses when the internal combustion engine took over. After a while they just made less practical sense.

Yes --> Times and technology changes and life goes on. People need to look forward and get ahead of the curve on employment instead of clinging forever to a dead end. Change happens and if people really want jobs and to work, they need to adapt and take advantage of opportunities, or get left behind.

One note though, horses really were banned in many cities after it became clear that their future in the main roads was ending, that they were now becoming a physical hazard, and also that they were becoming a health hazard.

Rufus T. Firefly wrote:One note though, horses really were banned in many cities after it became clear that their future in the main roads was ending, that they were now becoming a physical hazard, and also that they were becoming a health hazard.

I wasn't aware of that, but even still, it occurred well after cars and trucks took over, rather than being the factor that forced the change. It does kinda remind me of the laws banning steam engines in cities such as NYC. Even in the early 20th century those PIA environmentalists were causing problems!

NJPiney wrote:

Rufus T. Firefly wrote:One note though, horses really were banned in many cities after it became clear that their future in the main roads was ending, that they were now becoming a physical hazard, and also that they were becoming a health hazard.

I wasn't aware of that, but even still, it occurred well after cars and trucks took over, rather than being the factor that forced the change. It does kinda remind me of the laws banning steam engines in cities such as NYC. Even in the early 20th century those PIA environmentalists were causing problems!

Yes, it was later and it just goes to agreeing that your statement of change happens - it takes time and things evolve. The alleyways behind the homes were serviced by horse drawn milk deliveries into my youth, just not on the main streets. Not environmentalists at all - the steam engines scared the crap out of the horses and a run away horse or one out of control is the physical hazard I was noting. Cleaning up the crap is the health hazard.

NJPiney wrote:And fossil fuels put untold numbers of blacksmiths, livery stable workers and others dependent on livestock out of work.

It also put the whaling industry out of business. Whale oil was no longer needed for oil lamps or lubricants for machinery. And it was a lot cheaper than whale oil.

This country would not be where it is today without the use of fossil fuels. We would still be back in the horse and buggy days. And horses produce a lot of methane gas. There are people that want everyone to stop eating beef to save the environment because cattle also produce a lot of methane.

A lot of changes are going to have to take place to eliminate fossil fuels.

Will they be able to change aircraft over to electric.

According to the climate change scientist we have 10 years to stop using fossil fuels before we reach the point of no return and we are headed for the apocalypse

HONDO74 wrote:

NJPiney wrote:And fossil fuels put untold numbers of blacksmiths, livery stable workers and others dependent on livestock out of work.

It also put the whaling industry out of business. Whale oil was no longer needed for oil lamps or lubricants for machinery. And it was a lot cheaper than whale oil.

This country would not be where it is today without the use of fossil fuels. We would still be back in the horse and buggy days. And horses produce a lot of methane gas. There are people that want everyone to stop eating beef to save the environment because cattle also produce a lot of methane.

A lot of changes are going to have to take place to eliminate fossil fuels.

Very true. But it probably won't be 100% since some uses will require some petroleum - much of the synthetics and chemistry will require this as feed stock. An example of possible transition is evidenced in Brazil where they pushed a significant percentage of automobile fuel to alcohol and bio-energy in the 70's to reduce their dependence on foreign oil.

Methane from livestock concerns are silly. Humans make plenty of methane - next time you get stuck in an elevator you'll experience it 1st-hand. The only folks that I hear wanting us to stop eating beef are PETA and Vegans that have to take B12 pills to survive. And if stop eating them, they aren;t going to go away........

Will they be able to change aircraft over to electric.

Seems unlike or air travel will no be what we know today. Maybe recreation of a real rail network would address some of that - air travel today is mess, and at full capacity. Something has to give there eventually.

According to the climate change scientist we have 10 years to stop using fossil fuels before we reach the point of no return and we are headed for the apocalypse

And then we have the folks that totally deny everything......... Somewhere in between is probably where we really need to be, but isn't that true of most things? We're probably doomed,

Rufus T. Firefly wrote:
Seems unlike or air travel will no be what we know today. Maybe recreation of a real rail network would address some of that

The rail network is feasible. Eliminate all the diesel electric and convert to all electric. Don't know if they could run these off of batteries but they could put up catenary across the country. Going to need a lot of electric power. Need more wind turbines and solar panel farms.