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As it turns out, part of the problem is us.
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Speak for yourself, White Man.
Yeah, obese people are everywhere in the US today, mostly due to the plastic shite the corporations provide for them to eat. I haven't owned a motor vehicle since 1991 and, guess what? I'm slim & trim from walking and biking.
That's just skirting around the problem, though. In the last couple of decades I've observed a steady trend towards A) larger gas-guzzling vehicles and B) single person occupancy. Americans hold it to be their right (and it is) to drive alone 5 blocks to the supermarket in their huge goddam vehicles. However, if they simply understood the implications of their actions on the environment I feel we'd see far less of it. But instead, the TeeVee has them pissing their britches watching out for murderers, rapists and now terrorists so they will never, ever EVER stop to give someone a ride, even on the hottest or coldest days of the year. On the flip-side, one would be far more inclined to walk to their destination if there were a good chance they'd be offered a ride, as was the case a mere 30 years ago (I remember).
One more thing: I detest BP (and other mega corps) as much as anyone, but blaming them for the destruction of aquatic and wetland habitats and countless rare and valuable species is logically and morally equivalent to blaming Mexico for the US drug problem. The market will work, bringing the supply to where there is the demand, no matter how much imbecile legislation is passed. The problem is the ignorance of the average US citizen. Find some way to fix that and a lot of huge problems simply disappear. I was hopeful that the switch to digital TV would so frustrate a large number of viewers that they would simply give up the tube. That would have had a chance to break the increasingly sophisticated mind control the mega corps have over a vast majority of the US population. Alas, I was wrong and now I and to some degree every inhabitant of this planet are paying the price.
