Ted Rall for November 22, 2021

Discomfort is RELATIVE. If you are used to being mobile over miles in minutes, and your culture is used to it, then OF COURSE cutting back on that is hard. You don’t know how to dress, what you need to bring, when the buses run (and which ones to use). And walking a few blocks to and from the bus stop: NOT something you’re prepared for. How do you carry your groceries? Will the ice cream even still be frozen when you get home? etc.

But there is in fact a reasonably straight forward solution: If it COSTS TOO MUCH MONEY to maintain your habits, you’ll soon find another way. Bitching and moaning the whole way, no doubt… and voting against whoever did this to you.

It’s neither too hard nor impossible.

Cities have said that it was “too hard” and “impossible” to enact Styrofoam bans, too. But guess what? It can be done. It has been done. It should be done everywhere!

Good work, Ted. This is your wheelhouse.

Animals don’t do any of those things, because their instinct is to survive & preserve their species. Humans often do what they think is best for their immediate survival, but dismiss survival of the species.

It’s not that no one can ever drive a vehicle, it’s that we need to transform cities to be less car dependent & transition necessary vehicles to renewable energy. The nations that figure out how to do this, will be the leaders of the next century. We can do this.

Just out! For all you “gas guzzler’s”! The Hummer Mark 20. Guzzles 10 gallons of gas per foot!!

The animal examples have one thing in common: if the animal takes the easy way, it dies. The human example: his easy way kills the rest of us.

^ ^ ^ (I might reluctantly actually agree with Kyrie on this one.)

All countries can enact measures which can go much farther than anything that was proposed at COP 26 or in the Paris Accord. The problem is that the 1%ers in all counties simply do not want to change as it will cost them coin. Greed is killing this planet. Here in the US both major parties are not doing a whole lot though at least the Democrats have a few people who understand what is at stake and embrace the ideology of a much needed Green New Deal but unfortunately the establishment in the DNC and many powerful democrats (not just coal fired Joe Manchin) are bought out by Big Oil and other conglomerates just like their Repubba Brethren. The time for change was decades ago but we still need to try despite the resistance of the ignorant and the greedy. Great strip today Ted!

basically

When they come out with the electric Jeep Wrangler, I may think about it.

Does carbon even burn?

Who knows what “evolution” has in store for us? Does it go beyond natural selection, the scientific construct we currently believe in? Or is there a built-in mechanism of which we aren’t aware to maintain life, once developed, from the destructive interference of “higher” forms? Are human beings a danger to Life on Earth? Have we through misguided intelligence and over-population tripped a hidden switch that will eliminate us?

Before anyone here jumps on me about Darwin and such, let me say that this is an idea that relies on no discernible facts. But isn’t there a human tendency to take a “leap of unfaith” above scientific reasoning through story-telling to suggest that other factors control us all? And are they far wrong?

I am thinking of one example, the novelette “The Locusts” that appeared in the June 1979 issue of “Analog.” It was by Larry Niven and Steven Barnes, and later included in the Niven collection of short stories, “Limits.” Using the pattern of locust swarms, it speculates that a critical point increase in human numbers might cause a devolution back to Pithecanthropus (Java Man) in consequent human offspring.

Is it a virus, or a deeply hidden safeguard in genetics? The problem is appears in a human colony on Tau Ceti IV when babies are born strange. Is some factor in the alien environment the cause? Later it is found that all babies on Earth are being born that way — with a loss of sentience beyond that of early hominids, and resulting inability for complex culture and manipulation of environment.

Is this a cautionary tale or wild, entertaining speculation? Seeing the way the world is going, I wonder. Total destruction by humans or devolution — which is preferable?

The watchword of natural selection: adapt or die.

Not hard.. impossible. Our “civilization” can’t survive without it (burning carbon). Hiding the smokestacks won’t work. Alternate energy is a mere pittance.

The problem is not the burning of carbon as much as the number of people burning it.

Yes, build solar and wind but we also need base load plants, greenest solution is modern nuclear plants, which China is moving ahead on.

No one changes until they have to. The only question that remains is whether physics allows us enough time to adapt to our folly.

Republicans and oil companies will destroy us all.

That’s right, Theodore. Forty years ago Reagan abandoned sound environmental policies telling us it was too hard.

No, Ted. Our first priority is to overturn this for-profit system. Fixing the climate problem (or any other problem) is simply not profitable.

Unlike our buddy in the fourth panel, I am trying to do my part. I am driving an EV and though I still have an ICE truck, it seldom gets used. (Incidentally, EV’s are a lot less costly to run than ICE’s.) I still use natural gas for heating, but I only heat the south side of the house and may even only heat two rooms when temps dip below 60. Whereas, I still have single pane windows, I use insulating panels outside and insulating drapes inside to cut back on heat transfer. With my forest land, I had wanted to cut back all the pines from the central section. But, I backed off from that plan as the pines do the best job of absorbing and holding in CO2 from the air.

If we each do our part, we can at least slow the climate change effect.

At least the frog in the slowly heating up water had an excuse.

Slightly OT: the “shaman” just got 41 months in quod. It could hardly have happened to a more deserving nitwit.

Um…you don’t burn carbon.

Since the trolley companies were all bought up early in the 20th century, and simply dismantled, Automobile manufacturers gained ground. Henry Ford gave our grandparents a car almost everyone could afford. Flivvers and Packards crowded the horses off the roads. After WWII, Ike sponsored the International Highway system, which everyone wanted. The Suburbs grew as veterans could afford a house. We designed our large country with the individual automobile in mind. Yes, I drive a Nissan Sentra, but if I could afford a Honda Pirius, I would by it. If a trolley line passed through Ipswich, north through Newburyport, I would gladly leave the Sentra home and ride the rail to & from my job! Their WAS a trolley line that went up the very roads I take five days a week from the 1890’s until 1915! But, it was “purchased”, and closed down to make way for the automobile. The Repubs want to reverse this country to the 1880’s. A return to extensive affordable public transportation is one avenue I would reccommend.

I usually look askance at many Rall strips. He is like the old socialists always ready to split their party because they don’t think most members are pure enough or have sold out. But this strip really makes a valid point in a humorous manner. Although it does sort of imply that the solution to battling climate change is to make personal changes like not driving a fossil fueled car rather than regulating governments and corporations. But I guess those too ultimately come down to people making choices. For those who think we can’t afford to move to carbon free energy or have plenty of time to do so. Think again. Good job Ted.

Greed is killing the Amazon rain forest which probably removes 1/5 of the world’s atmospheric carbon.