I understand that air pollution doesn't stay in those cities forever. In Denver's case, the wind has to blow in the right direction to clear out the bowl effect the mountains create. No I haven't been to China, but I read about China's pollution problems. And I know they, nor India, nor other rapidly developing countries did not sign on to the Kyoto Accords. Nor should we. If you think we should, you are assuredly consigning future grandchildren to a 3rd world existence.

Which, as I pointed out, has nothing to do with why we continue to burn petrol.

And hey, I know the conditions are bad and I hope their government will improve on that but the bottom line is governments love cash more than their people. Always have, always will; which is why ours was intended to be a small government, and thus more responsive to the governed.

Finally, I don't view a childs life as intrinsically more valuable than your own or a 92 year old.

Naturally -and as it should be- a parent views their child's life as more important than their own. But societally speaking, we kill a million future children a year, and we promote that around the world, and we support China in their population control programs(if not officially, tacitly, like the USG does illegal immigration stateside). Our government, as China's, only values our children when it suits their purposes, not ours. They'll clean up the pollution when it suits them, not before. Afterall, the love of money is the root of all evil.

My position(s) is there are far and away more specious arguments made for this or that program or effort, where the emotional appeal of 'it's Fer the Children' is used as a lever the argument could not begin to substantiate on it's own merits. My other point, is all the smart folks in charge do not wish to diverge from petrol.

Sometimes I wonder whether the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on or by imbeciles who really mean it. - Mark Twain