Which is the most urgent issue facing us today?

[Triana]

Poll question: Which is the most urgent issue facing us today?

Of course we have poverty, homelessness, lack of healthcare and an economy barely limping along. All are big issues, but are not necessarily urgent issues. bu$h has a one-track mind: WAR. Meanwhile, our earth is collapsing underneath us and bu$h hardly takes notice - too busy masturbating to war tunes. The Amazon rainforest will be gone in a year, polar icecaps are melting, permafrost is melting, species are dying out faster than ever, and record temperatures are being recorded worldwide. What do you think his priorities *ought* to be - promoting more WAR or doing something about climate change? Or, is the answer not that simple? Which most threatens our survival?

[ixion]

1. climate change is a huge issue, however before anything productive

will happen, the Crusades Pt II must stop, IMO.

[Name removed]

3. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[ixion]

8. well, it's kind of a Scylla and Charybdis situation, then

because allowing the ME to descend into full scale war simply to satisfy Israeli bloodlust will lead to the exact same outcome.

Look, you will never, and I meand NEVER, get me to condone what Israel is doing right now. Nor, of course, do I condone what radical Islamic or Xian groups, do either.

[Minnesota Libra]

11. My question to anyone and everyone is...........

.....if they disagree with what Israel is doing now and thinks Israel should be held responsible, then where were they and why weren't they screaming their outcries when it was Israel's cities and citizens being bombed and terrorized?? Pretty much, that's what all my post concerning Israel boils down to. No one, but no one has ever bothered to address that issue and I won't be holding my breath waiting for anyone to address it in the future either. I'm asking for the same condemnation and demands be made of all Arabs/Muslims as is being made and have been made in the past of Israel.

[ixion]

12. I do not condone violence at all from ANY group

that's it.

Violence like this is bad because people who are not involved -- people who are just trying to live their lives, people who are just trying to survive -- are being killed because of one set of extremists or another.

It makes no difference what religion those extremists claim to be defending.

No one said anything when China marched into Tibet and:
- outlawed their language and religion
- burned the largest compilation of religious literature on the planet
- executed the monks and leaders

Nope, the US didn't do a darn thing about that.

I don't pick and choose, you see. Killing people, outlawing their culture, enslaving the populace is wrong, no matter what government claims to do it.

[Minnesota Libra]

15. THAT I totally and completely agree with.................

....violence on either side is WRONG. OMG, we actually totally agree on something.:thumbsup:

[ixion]

16. cool, glad to hear that

being a Libra myself, I'm always striving for equilibrium. :hi:

[Minnesota Libra]

20. That's my problem, I want fairness on BOTH sides. No wonder.............

....we agree on this - both libras??? :toast: Have a great day and here, have breakfast.:donut:

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

14. And Christians will always try to wipe out both.

So what's your fucking point?

[lostnfound]

26. Wars are a huge problem for climate change, anyway

Quite a lot of carbon emissions out of those fighter jets, bombers, black hawks
Not to mention the other poisons

[foreigncorrespondent]

2. I voted for #1...

...because if you really think about it, 1&2 are kinda connected. Wars create destruction and further damage to the earth and atmosphere.

[Rosemary2205]

4. Verifiable elections.

Without that we may as well write off everything else.

[Triana]

19. Damn good point too. I thought after posting this..

...that one big thing that threatens our very survival and is an extremely urgent issue is George W. bu$h - who was installed by fraudulent elections. TWO of them. And they just helped pull the same crap in Mexico too. The CIA is well-versed in election meddling both at home and abroad. Duhbya's daddy used to head the agency.

[Demeter]

5. Fascism

Remove the Fascism in this country, and it becomes possible to make solutions that work for all other problems, at home and abroad.

[lapfog_1]

6. Climate change and energy production

should be the highest priority of every government on this planet.

If we can produce energy that doesn't use fossil fuel and isn't dependant on mining or drilling in only a few places on this planet... the ME will sort itself out over time (we won't care about it, they won't have the money to continue the fight with anything other than light weapons, nor the time for it).

next, we need to visit fresh water

[Triana]

21. I think water will be the next oil....

...and the biggest most powerful nations will be fighting for control of it and weilding it over less influental, smaller, poorer nations.

[lapfog_1]

27. Nothing that can't be solved with

cheap, non-polluting (in all meanings) energy.

But even then, after we can cheaply make all the clean water we want and deliver to where we want it...

The last thing is population control. This planet can't support 7 or 8 billion humans on it. Maybe 1 or even 2 billion, but not
8 or 10 or 15. We just start running into larger and larger issues to engineer around, and give ourselves less and less time to solve them.

[Triana]

28. Population control is the key...

...it's the crux of almost every other (if not every other) problem we have. But to get the human race to do anything about it is a whole other ball 'O wax.

The Fundies will cry "it's immoral!" to use birth control or abortion or to encourage people to have fewer children or remain childless.

The problem with that argument is that it is immoral NOT to - because we're loading this planet down with more resource sucking humans than it can handle and driving the whole thing towards almost complete destruction.

NOT DOING ANYTHING TO STOP THAT is immoral - and on a much larger scale. However, I doubt they can see past their dogma to get that most important point.

[ThomWV]

7. Most Urgent Issue: The Removal Of George Bush From Office

He is a cancer on the planet. All the other strife you see around the world are just symptoms of the disease which is his Presidency.

[Triana]

22. Gotta fix the broken elections....

...that's how the cretin got installed.

[BOSSHOG]

9. THE SPREAD OF CHRISTIAN THEOCRACY IN AMERICA

If the radical christian clerics in America have their way, all the other issues won't matter at all.

[Ganja Ninja]

10. I had to go with #1.

The war in the ME is going to be just another round. It's not going to solve anything and in 10 years there'll be another round and then another until someone breaks out the nukes. Then you might see both sides make a serious attempt at peace.

[michaelpush]

13. OVERPOPULATION

is the most serious issue facing our World. Humankind is the cancer that will kill the planet! If all of humanity was to have the resources they need and want, there would be nothing left in a few decades. There are too many humans for the planet to support, there is an unbalance in nature and it cannot compensate for it, other species are suffering instead. The economies of the world need to constantly grow and consume, which eats up the planets resources at an incredible rate. A lot of the conflicts and Environmental problems, lack of fresh water, poverty, hunger,economic/social injustice, are related to this issue. Humans are part of nature, we have a natural instinct to survive, and, each one has its own personal concept of what that is. As the competition for the resources and comforts of the World increase due to population growth, the planet will be overrun by development and resources will dwindle, and, in the fight and struggle that ensues, billions of us could die of disease and starvation. Unless the balance in nature is restored, this is our fate. We will become an unlivable planet with high concentrations of Carbon Dioxide due to de-forestation and burning of fossil fuels.

[Triana]

17. bingo that one - overpopulation...

...any fantasy that we can continue to infinitely suck resources off a planet that has finite resources is just that - fantasy. But I don't think the human race has the fortitude or the intelligence to save itself. A human-made disaster will reduce the numbers arbitrarily first.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

18. Totally agree. Overpopulation is the #1 overlooked issue.

Ironically, it's also the one causing most, if not all, of the problems now facing the world. The world's population has tripled in just my lifetime. 62 years.

http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/worldpop.html

[bdamomma]

23. both of topics are of equal importance

[skipos]

24. GAY MARRIAGE and FLAG BURNING

Just kidding.

[Cerridwen]

25. It's not that simple.

There are so many things wrong with the world, with our nations, with our communities, that until We, the People have influence in those spheres which effect our lives, we'll not be able to even begin to address creating the changes we need to make.

We appear to have so little influence in what is happening in the world today. Civil rights and protections have been shattered in the name of national security and the threat of terrorism.

Workers rights, pay, benefits and jobs have been destroyed in the name of "doing business" and profit.

Lands and species are being destroyed for profit and "progress."

Most of our elected officials no longer represent We, the People but instead pander to corporations and the "ruling class."

The few elected officials who do represent our interests, have little or now power to make change due to the influence of other elected officials, corporations and the "ruling class."

We can no longer be sure that we are even getting the officials for whom we vote.

Communities are sold out to and destroyed by corporate developers, agri-business, big box corporations and foreign interests.

The corporate media is complicit in hiding information vital to our survival. I for one, no longer believe any talking head, "journalist," or "reporter" in the previously, mainstream media to report an issue without injecting their own political bias. If "knowledge is power," then we have no knowledge and therefor no power.

The rules by which I thought we all once operated are no longer in place. The Golden Rule has been perverted; do unto others before they do unto you; or replace by the Rule of Gold; he who has the gold, rules.

Compassion is ridiculed as "feminization" and therefor weak. Violence as a tool for conflict resolution is applauded as proving how "tough" "we" are; whomever the "we" is. Even the Democratic Party, which I once thought of as the party of and for peace, is recruiting and running military and former military to prove to the nation that Democrats have "balls," too; that we're "tough guys," too. For every poison pen they shoot at us, we shoot one right back at them; for if "we" don't, there's a hue and cry that Democrats are "pussies," or as Bill Mahr once lamented, we've become too "feminized."

Not that any of this is new. It's just that now it's accepted and acknowledged unapologetically as the right thing, the tough thing, the "manly" thing to do.

What we once thought of as "unalienable" rights, have been eroded to the fading shadows we now see disappearing from sight around us into darkness; a new Dark Ages. We are repeating the history from which we didn't learn.

The most urgent issue facing us today...ourselves. I've seen many great actions planned which have received only nominal support. Too many sit back and say "that's just the way it is," "you can't fight the system," "it'll never happen, you can't get people to do that," or my all time favorite "I'm only one person, what can I do?"

It's not popular to say, but have to "become the change we want to see." Perhaps while we "Practice Random Kindness and Senseless Acts of Beauty" we could also perform consistent acts of subversion; i.e., deny support to corporate conglomerates one dollar at a time, deny support of violence one compassionate act at a time, refuse to give energy to propaganda one lie at a time, deny support to corporate controlled officials one vote at a time, support and promote local business one dollar at a time, support and promote issues one vote and one dollar at a time, support and promote truth one word at a time, support and promote peaceful resolution one attack at a time, promote communication; start a whisper campaign for peace, compassion and understanding, make hatred and violence ugly, practice zero tolerance for violence and hatred in your home, your workplace, your next bar-b-que...

"Become the change you want to see." ~Ghandi


~Cerridwen