Journal: News & Comment

Get it through your head

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Ryan takes the brainless Vancouver Province newspaper to task for its editorial dissing the Kyoto Protocol. The Province editors write:

Obviously, greenhouse gas emissions must be reduced, but this doesn't have to happen at the expense of economic development or our standard of living.

Ryan responds:

Um, actually it does have to.

And he's right. What surprises me is that no one seems to be touting a particular set of benefits Kyoto (or something, at least) can bring: a ratified treaty would finally prod us all in the butt enough to try actually using the energy-saving technologies that have existed for decades. I mean solar cells on the roof, electric or hybrid cars, proper mass transit, fuel cells, and so on.

Climate change shows us that energy costs us more than we're paying. The deficit isn't monetary, yet, but we'll have to stop using fossil fuels the way we do now, eventually. May as well get started.

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