29 October 2008

Tim O'Reilly's Greatest Post

I don't always agree with Tim O'Reilly's views, but it seems clear to me that this is his best, and potentially most important post even though - or maybe because - it's about politics, rather than technology:

for those concerned about climate change, the most urgent case for the election of Barack Obama was made by John McCain. Despite being an early and thoughtful advocate on the threat of global warming, he lost all credibility with his selection of Governor Palin as his running mate. We can not afford to take the risk of a Vice-President (especially for a candidate as old as McCain) who is scornful of science, denies human involvement in creating climate change, and is completely unprepared to tackle this most urgent of problems.

Let's hope America is listening to him and all the others saying much the same. If they don't, this planet is in very serious trouble indeed.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

The biggest problems with Obama to date have been his past associations with many shady characters (many of whom are in jail), and his lack of personal transparency. He's managed to lock up his academic, professional, and state legislative records to date. Obama also voted for FISA, a surveillance act that gives the government unlimited power to spy on anyone in the US.

Any criticism of him is consistently brushed off as racism, and thus ignored in the American media.

Having spent north of $620mn to date in his campaign, next week's election should be a bloodbath for the Republican party.

Glyn Moody said...

I have no...er, few... illusions about Obama. In particular, I don't think he's going to be as friendly to Europe as many think.

That said, he's clearly better than an ageing candidate whose running-mate not only denies the climate change is mostly anthropogenic, but is ignorant enough to mock the entire field of drosophila genomics as self-evidently a waste of time....

Anonymous said...

The climate( weather) has always been changing.. Any free fly spray? p

Glyn Moody said...

Certainly; but not consistently *up* as it is now. The chances of this being just a random variation are becoming vanishingly small...