Cheap Blogging Crutch 12.28

The Big Zero
Economic killjoy Paul Krugman, fresh of prognosticating an economic contraction for next year, rehashes all the ways in which the US shat itself over the past decade. Near zero job creation, private sector employment declines (a first!), lower median household income, no gains for homeowners, 25% of people owing more on their house than it is worth, zero gains on stocks, it was revealed that Santa and the Easter Bunny never existed, and we all found out that everyone we ever thought loved or cared for us... didn't. On the bright side, we're not all slaves to some intergalactic overlord. Otherwise, you were better off a decade ago. Happy new year!

New groups join climate lobby fray
If the inherent laziness and incompetence of the Senate wasn't enough to buckle your knees over the prospects for climate legislation, then the Politico wants to smash a five iron right into your kneecap. That's right: a rundown of all the various lobbying interests that are gearing up to make sure you die sunburned and waist deep in melted ice cap. But it's not all bad, while one half of the lobbyists won't admit that global warming exists, there a whole other side of lobbyists who will admit that climate change is real... just that nothing should be done about it now. It's that kind of debate that makes this country great.

Green Giant: Beijing’s crash program for clean energy
As our elected betters can't figure out a decent way to address either the climate problems, energy independence, or the development of new energy technologies our soon to be global overlords in China have been aggressively funding science endeavors through the 863 Program and have, in recent years, drastically expanded their energy technology programs. What aggressive scientific funding measure is the US taking? Uh, $50 million for abstinence only education in the health reform bill counts as science funding, right? Hopefully they'll give us access to all their work once we've defaulted on all the money we owe them and they take over. Maybe they'll give us extra money for abstinence education too.

7 Tipping Points That Could Transform Earth
Just in case you didn't have enough global calamities to worry about, Wired Science came through with 7 examples of conditions whereupon an irreversible tipping point could be reached and the world could spiral inexorably towards apocalyptic calamity. Strangely not on the list: dithering world leaders and governments that recognize a problem but don't actually want to do anything about it. That's probably because we've already hit that tipping point. Ah well, personally I hope we're hit with the Gulf Stream catastrophe. That's what happened in The Day After Tomorrow and I'll be damned if it was two and a half hours of white knuckle excitement.