Well, I'm no expert and don't claim to be. I'm living my life the best I know how and to be honest, I really don't give a lot of thought to most of this debate. The main reason is I would be more likely to listen to someone like Ed Begley Jr. who walks the talk, rather than Al Gore, who while generating a lot of economic momentum does so in a destructive and in my opinion, poor way.

Yes, humans in America do more damage than those in Somalia, so we are to be punished for our success? Of course we are, by instead of encouraging us to live responsibly (in the environmentalist opinion) we will be punished by taxing our 'carbon footprint' which I still think is BS, but I'm forming that opinion without full information.

At some point you have to let the experts debate it out, so I'm dropping out of this convo... I don't have time to study up on it and give you the higher intellectual debate you want to achieve... but my thoughts focus on what I've been taught by a geologist I used to have as an instructor as well as my current level of understanding of the earth being a closed ecosystem, there isn't anything built or destroyed, just changed... I hear data being thrown around both ways, some say we are cooling, some say we are warming, there are facts both ways...

So who is right? Who knows, maybe my kid will. I for one don't think the facts add up, but again, I'm no pro at this stuff and don't have the time to become one... some smart scientists will eventually be able to prove something definate one way or another, probably after we all have cancer or something... I'm out, I shouldn't have even started as I don't have the time to follow up on it all.