Endurance

When most people read news like this, they assume that someone else in their community will take care of the problem. Law enforcement, human rights groups, churches, some government agency. Were it only so. History teaches us law enforcement responds when there's a corpse, moral authorities when there's malicious harassment. Sometimes human rights groups once there are death threats or physical assaults. Last time the hate campaign organizer noted in this article ran amok, it took a cross-burning and death threats against public officials and candidates to mobilize civil society to organize themselves and act. Let's hope it doesn't take that much to get them mobilized this time.

As noted in The Tyee article on the brief history of mechanical energy produced from ethanol, bio-energy is extremely inefficient. Apart from the fact biofuels offer little or no benefit in reducing greenhouse gases, the soil erosion, nitrate run-off and high food prices resulting from biofuel production make it questionable as a replacement for fossil fuels. While ethanol got the lead out of gasoline, the energy returns for biofuels are dismal.