Download | Play 
Download | Play (h/t Heather)
Host Bill Maher speaks to Jeffrey Sachs, author of Common Wealth, about the very critical need that we must acknowledge to find alternative fuel resources and focus on sustainable energy. That need is made more critical because with the priorities for funding placed by the Bush/Cheney White House, we’re now eight years behind in terms of research.
Let me tell you, you know, if we put a little bit of thought to it, a small part of the Mohave Desert could provide more than half of the electricity needs of the United States without emitting any carbon dioxide, just using the solar power that’s available. Africa could be powering itself with the tremendous amount of solar power. But how much are we investing in this, Bill? We’re investing basically an hour or two of what we spend on the Pentagon for the whole year of our federal research budget right now. The total research budget of the Bush administration on sustainable energy resources has been between 2 and 3 billion dollars, which is 1 and 1 ½ days of what we spend on the Pentagon. So it’s been all war, no sustainability. And look where we are right now, right back into a corner and that’s the problem.
No Trackbacks To “Real Time with Bill Maher: On Sustainabilty“
How many companies in the field of sustainable energy have made large and continuing contributions to the GOP or the Bush campaigns? Yup, now contrast that with the moneys given to those two recipients by the oil companies and the military providers. One might notice an imbalance there which, if one thinks hard about it, might give a clue as to why our treasury is spent on the latter but not on the former.
Even more important, in this time of campaigning for the next President, how much allegiance do the various candidates for that office already owe big oil and big weapons manufacturers? Before replying, based upon your own unique allegiance of course, your candidate being the good one while the other two are not, its a trick question. All three are up to their elbows in money from all those sources. Thus the future looks bleak as far as a change of direction in both areas is concerned.
A trillion dollars here, a trillion dollars there, and soon you’re talking real money. But when it comes to reporting on what the Bush war legacy has cost American taxpayers, the media has been shockingly indifferent to the highest run-up in military spending since World War II.
Eight wasted years…
Jeffrey Sachs says it all.
May I just add…. AAARRRGGGHH!!!!!
Eight years behind? Try 30. Carter had the right idea about pursuing alternatives following the oil shocks of the 70s, but Reagan made sure that fossil fuels were our only priority. Unfortunately Bill Clinton did little to reverse this. The political right and the oil men are depending on keeping us addicted by tapping the largely unused reserves in Iraq. As a bonus, drilling in politically unstable parts of the world will keep the military-industrial complex well funded. Meanwhile the rest of the world will be passing us by.
The essence of the problem, is that people are stupid.
They make a good point on Beef being enviormentally hazardous. Any meat production on the industrial scale it is now can only lead to disaster. If only veggie-mongers would take this talking point instead of the sanctimonious “Meat is murder/we’re better than you” angle, which actually is more effective in generating donations from gullible/emotional people who don’t realize they’re being scammed.
But I digress…
Industrialization needs to scale back. Locally produced foods have to come back…personal gardens have to become the norm. And, most importantly, exotic foods must remain in exotic locations..not shipped anywhere in the world!
You want seafood? Go to the shore! You want Prairie Oysters? Go to the Prairies!
You want Veggies? Grow them!
You want Mangoes? Sail to “Mangoland”!
North America’s love affair with the automobile has become a codependent relationship…it’s time to start dating other modes of transport, folks. We will soon have no choice but to travel by train or bus…I love trains, so it’s win/win for me! I especially love the subways in NYC. Never a dull moment, always something (or someone) to see…
But the best thing that can happen to us is for our present way of life to grind to a halt…it’s the only way “stupid people” will wake up. Sure, there will be massive losses of life, but the only way we adapt to change is to be affected by change.
This problem will solve itself later on but not without billions of people suffering tremendously and a few people profiting tremendously. There are steps that could be taken to tilt the scale towards less suffering and less profit but that’s like asking politicians to lay off the hookers and closet gay sex - it’s just their nature and its not gonna stop just because you ask them to.
bill mahr is really starting to annoy me… what a smug know it all… he may be clever and playing for my team, but i get the feeling he´s drunk the kool aid, and will end up the way of dennis the douche comedian (i forget his name)on fox… he would stab anyone in the back just to save his gig… it is a good illustration of how far to the right things have gone when we revere this eliteist windbag…
good informative guest though…
It’s not the energy sources, it’s who controls the energy sources. The corporate fascists will only move on to other sources if they can control them. Remember Enron.
I would never mistake Bill Maher’s Frustration and contempt for “stupid people” for “Eliteism”.
When you see a roomful of people banging themselves bloody with hammers even though you repeatedly warned, in depth, that such a practice is self-destructive, eventually you come across sounding eleitist when you shake your head in disgust and call these hammers-to-the-heads “stupid”.
Don’t kiss Jeff Sachs’ ring. His ideas ruined the Global South. Everything he touches turns to shit.
the want is impeachment
the need is change
the time is NOW!!!
“cheney and bush” must go NOW!!!
Global mismanagement; war crimes, torture; put this bush bastard in jail; and you can derail the whole bush family so we never have to sit through a mess like this again. Its not acceptable to waste 8 years and Trillions of dollars and millions of human lives. What kind of system do we have; where one little ignorant prick can do so much damage for so long???
Verdillac @ 10:
Your absolutely right on that note. The Moron Factor in America is not diminishing, it’s growing. I am starting to think it hovering around 48% right now and we can thank the religious right and the “home-schoolers” a lot for that.
DNC ad hammers McSame http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....98816.html
Jeffrrey Sachs mentions the Pentagon and the war. As Nick Turse points out in his very relevant book The Complex, subtitled How The Military Invades Our Everyday Lives, the military sucks up enormous of fuel in Iraq and Afghanistan. According to Fuel Line, a newsletter connected to the Pentagon, the Defense Energy Support Center [DESC] supplied 1,897,272,714 gallons of jet fuel for the operations directed in Afghanistan alone. In just a year and a half, from March 19, 2003 to Aug. 9, 2004, the DESC sent 1,109,795,046 gallons of jet fuel for military operations in Iraq. In 2005, the Department of Defense’s Defense Logistics Agency stated that the military’s aircraft, ships, and ground vehicles were consuming an astonishing 11 million barrels of fuel each month in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other places around the globe. The Pentagon has written that it consumes an amazing 365,000 barrels of oil every day, which is the equivalent of what the nation of Sweden consumes on a daily basis.
These numbers demonstrate how the Pentagon is addicted to big oil. Before the Global War on Terror began, the U.S. military was already taking in 4.62 billion gallons of oil per year. It has now been increased even more, with the Pentagon revealing that it consumes 5.46 billion gallons a year.
There is more bad news. The military model Humvee gets four miles per gallon in city driving while the Abrams tank, which is being used in Iraq, cannot even achieve a mile per gallon. B-52 bombers suck up 47,000 gallons each time it flies a mission over Afghanistan. An F-16 fighter goes through $300 worth of fuel a minute.
All of this proves the symbiotic relationship between Big Oil and the U.S. military. As retired Lt. Gen. Lawrence P. Farrell Jr., the president of the National Defense Industrial Association has observed, the Pentagon is “the single largest consumer of petroleum fuels in the United States” while defense technology analyst Noah Scachtman stated in 2007 that the Pentagon is the world’s largest energy consumer.
It would appear that the way to drastically cut fuel costs and save on energy consumption is to stop the United States from constantly going to war and draining precious fuel that could be much better used at home.
Bill and Jeffrey touch on each of these issues; the want, need, and time! in order for immediate change, we must come together for immediate action! who’s country is this? why must we wait till the situation gets worse? why can’t we put our energy into reusability, sustainability, and utilize our own American ingenuity to survive the oncoming train wreck from the havoc we placed on our resources. NOT a shut down but a change of direction. Europe has faced this many times, asian countries are decades ahead in technology and infrastructure. when are we going to be strong again?
never stop questioning authority! a true American hero…
This was maher’s last show of the season. He had a powerful lineup and his panel was one that i really was looking forward to hearing from. I have to say though that i feel that he missed this great opportunity to really probe his guests for their thoughts on the great issues confronting our country. Phil Donahue, Ariana Huffington and Gary Shandling.
Where i feel maher missed the boat was perhaps in inviting the bafoon Shandling on the show. he made me indeed uncomfortable every time he opened his mouth. he monopolized the panel and really didn’t have anything to say. maher should have known better than to place him on this powerful panel. i’ve seen him before on the show and he wasn’t bad. he just did not fit in with this panel. He should not have been on. Both Phil and Ariana fared well in spite of the distraction. I did enjoy the interview with Sachs, excellent. we need to hear more from him and his colleagues
Please tell us something we don’t know. Billions per mo. on a war for oil that we don’t need and that we will never see.
I love seeing the oil co. adds about them seeking alternative energy sources and how they want to help the enviorment, which is all so much krap I wanna puke. “Oh aren’t the oil companies wonderful for thinking about all this stuff?” Yea right, they only make 40 billion a year and they’re throwing a whole 1% at looking for alternatives? Give me a frickin’ break!!!!!
$5 a gallon comin’ up, but we really care about you…….and that tax rebate you can use on something like, like? gas maybe? Just another way for my tax dollars to go to the criminals!!!!! Bitter? Yea I’m bitter.
McCain the Liar @ 3:
8 years wasted implies nothing happened and we were left with Clinton legacy of peace and prosperity 8 years later. I wish it was simply 8 years wasted instead it was 8 years of running America into the ground for big oil, the defense contractors, the super rich, Halliburton, Bush cronies and corporate elitists at the expense of the middle class.
Impeachment should be the LEAST BushCo should be faced with. BushCo and his reich wing activist courts would inforce capital punishment laws on the average American who killed a convenience store clerk in attempting to steal a 100 bucks in an armed robbery. Yet BushCo in trying to steal Iraq’s oil is responsible for the deaths of over a hundred thousand innocent people and 4000 American soldiers but they will get off scot free without so much as an impeachment trial. The poor and middle class must face justice, the super rich and well connected get by with murder…literally and figuratively. There are not only two Americas, there are two justice systems.
the fact is, the big oil companys own, all the energy sources in this country, coal gas solar, they gotcha by the cods and they aint going to let go, if they give you the right to buy a hydrogen car or one driven by solar power your going to pay up the ass for the privelege of owning one! but as long as thiers a drop of oil in the ground they wont allow you to use anything else,
no longer a proud american @ 18:
I think Gary Shandling pissed everyone off. He didn’t have the mentality for this kind of discussion, he tried to make jokes out of something that is not joke-worthy. But what pissed me off the most was how he kept taking center-stage and jibbering.
I like many of those ideas that Sachs mentioned. They are at least plausible. The problem isn’t that there aren’t enough workable, good ideas floating around. The problem is that many Americans simply do not listen to them or ignore the problem entirely. If they do listen they do not want things to change that will directly impact them. I mean lets face it. Most Americans have become accustomed to having what they want, when they want it. If someone goes to the grocery they can pretty much expect that the bread will always be there. If they go to a gas station they can pretty much rest assured that the gasoline will always be there. If it isn’t or if it costs to much for a good they whine about it. To get some of those ideas off the ground it may require an entire cultural shift. No politician(s) can do that. What it may take to get some of those ideas off the ground unfortunately, is a lot of pain.
mahers is at best an uninformed twitt, he loves to try and seem that hes smarter then you! at best hes just an insult commedian no better then jay leno ,the only difference between the two is mahers is allowed to tell you how big his pecker is on tv!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What we need to dump it the idea that nothing can be done unles somebody is making a profit from it. All sorts of crackpot schemes are being hatched (like the one in the post I link to) to make money from recycling waste and from harnessing sustainable energy but we are losing sight of the fact it was unrestrained capitalism that got us into this mess.
Sun, Wind and water belong to everybody. It is not practical for us all to have a windmill or solar panel on top of our houses but we can embrace the idea of co-operation
For those of you who may remember in the 70s’ during a long term energy crisis we were asked to do many things to save on energy such as: turn off lights when leaving a room, turning the thermostat down to 68f.
Of all the change in habits that Americans made, the one that I remember most was cutting back on Christmas lights.
Cities all over this country discontinued their contest for the most opulent displays of illumination because they realized that the city was promoting the waste of energy through their traditional contest. Many Americans cut back on their Christmas displays.
Fast forward 30 years and the contest and elaborate displays are back in vogue.
The lights that you buy now are more “energy efficient” than the old lights, and LEDs are becoming more popular, but one look up and down the streets of most American cities reveals far more illumination than ever before. The equivalent of such displays would be the guy who decides that he wants to lose weight by drinking light beer, then downs an entire 12 pack and wonders why he has not lost weight.
The solution is what do WE want and by what means do WE serve our own special interest.
With all due respect, the US military’s use of fuel is not what makes our country the greedy hog of oil that it is. The USA, with 4.6% of the world population, uses 25% of all oil pumped in the world and 40% of all gasoline in the world. That’s 22 million barrels (each with 42 gallons) of oil per day.
As such, the military uses about 1.7% of the total oil used in the US. I agree about the tie-ins between the MIC and Big Oil and the general American exceptionalism/ignorance/greed/etc that pervades. Nevertheless, more of the blame to our oil consumption rests with big ol’ V-8 powered SUVs/pickups and a society that is based upn cheap transportation and blatant consumerism.
Back to Sachs, he is quite correct about our miniscule (relative to our economy & federal budget) funding of alternative energy and improved means of conservation.
It’s a problem for the unwashed masses. It isn’t a problem for the oilmen in the White House.
“Let them eat petroleum jelly. Heh, heh, heh. Look, Lynne, our portfolio just rose ten thousand percent in value.”
Not one little “non-war mongering” premptive thought in the empty skulls of Bush, Cheney and the entire GOP. Not surprising. Just a few month’s ago Bush was still singing the praises of this great “republican” economy.
“As long as me and my cronies are making a killing, things must be great,” even if they really suck. Isn’t that what conservatism is all about? “Got mine, fuck everybody else.” Or taking the macro approach to conservatism, “got mine, fuck the entire planet!”
so fitting
Listen to Hillary get booed for saying “Senator Obama complained about the “hard” questions in the ABC debate” http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200...../democrats At the 1:40 minute mark
I ran a day-long outdoor music festival on a solar panel, back in the ’90s… it was a trailer-mounted panel that was mobile and could be hooked up for multiple uses (designed to pump water in rice fields for demos for Heifer Project Int’l) — it ran a 2,000 watt PA like a dream, no sweat, no mess, no noise or pollution. Much better than a gas-driven generator.
Popularizing solar power through readily accessible promotions such as outdoor concerts would be an easy way for the public to see and experience the possibilities of solar energy. The space station uses solar panels, so why can’t the average American city?
Habitat-Vic @ 27:
There seems to be a huge disconnect here. My point at comment #16 is that the United States is certainly not helping by wasting huge amounts of energy and fuel by engaging in needless wars and occupying countries that were never a threat to anyone in these United States. All of that fuel that was consumed by all those weapons of mass destruction could have been put to much better use if it was used by businesses and people here in the United States. I am simply at a loss how you or anyone else could possibly assert otherwise.
Verdillac, the problem is not the “veggie-mongers”. The problem is people, including environmentalists, who KNOW that meat is a huge cause of global warming and yet refuse to change their diet. Don’t blame the messenger.
Habitat-Vic @ 27 Says,
“As such, the military uses about 1.7% of the total oil used in the US.”
Yes but consider that of the 300 million people in this country, the military has 1.4 million active duty and 1.4 reserve duty personnel. So theres a huge disparity in the per person consumption rate. And look at what they use it for. The impact of MILITARY conservation of resources would be significant both economically and enviromentally.
Also that does not factor in the use by the military defense contractors and other private military related business.
Just like stem-cells, it still gets done… it’s just a lot slow.
======
34 j Says: Verdillac, the problem is not the “veggie-mongers”. The problem is people, including environmentalists, who KNOW that meat is a huge cause of global warming and yet refuse to change their diet. Don’t blame the messenger.
======
There’s so much else we could do that if we did it, we wouldn’t have to force people to overhaul their lives.
Grab new bulbs, force industries to comply with tight restrictions, regurgitate solar/wind/nuclear all over America to replace coal. It’s that simple.
he says 8 years wasted i say 35 years wasted…i remember my dad talking about these same issues in 1974!!!
Verdillac @ 10:
Banging the heads of cow and pigs bloody with sledge hammers for meat consumption, I call that animal cruelty.
There can be no sustainability without population control. If we can’t find a way to stop population growth NOW then we may as well let the Earth go into the toilet sooner rather than later. Better that than watch every species and every resource be consumed so that whatever comes later will have something to use besides our garbage.
Dr Sachs encapsulates it so well. Sustainability is THE issue of our times, and solar energy, which the US has great tracks of uninhabited, sun rich southwestern deserts to take advantage of, has the added major advantage of a minimal environmental footprint.
Per a recent cover story in Scientic American: “A massive switch from coal, oil, natural gas and nuclear power plants to solar power plants could supply 69 percent of the U.S.’s electricity and 35 percent of its total energy by 2050″.
http://www.sciam.com/article.c.....grand-plan
@31 Ruthless People take your Obamazoid propoganda to another thread!
mojave not mohave
Anybody who thinks there is any hope for this planet I just have to give you one word of advice: ‘HA!’