They were last seen blocking the relocation of Cal's football stadium from its current location directly over a major fault line because its replacement would be located where some old trees stand. In their wacky scale the lives of tens of thousands of people on balance are less important than a few trees in the middle of one of the nation's most populous cities.Anyway, this dude's saying future caps on pollution emissions and peak oil will kill most sports as travel costs become prohibitive. Oh and do away with night games while we're at it.
I reckon, in the next few years, as a result of caps on emissions and peak oil being reached, that we can say goodbye to international sports and most national sports. The idea that you could fly people and teams all over America, all over the globe, all the time, just to play sport, is so late twentieth century. Fifty years ago it was still something of a novelty to see people flying to play sport. Now it is taken for granted.There's more than a touch of sarcasm in the article but the way the world's going it's actually something that could sadly happen if the enviro-nuts have their way (hello, Kyoto!).
But not for long. Get ready to say goodbye to international tennis, golf, motor racing, Olympic Games. Won't be viable much longer. Nor will it be viable to send baseball, football, basketball, ice hockey teams criss-crossing the US every day.
What does this have to do with college football? Well, for all the clamoring about the need for more intersectional games such a cap on travel would be rather counterproductive. The SEC would certainly love the change as it could go on its merry way scheduling nearby conference foes and regional nobodies. But the end of USC/Notre Dame or Ohio State/Texas type games would be highly annoying.
So uh, fight the hippies. Just look for the folks smelling their own smug.
(H/T: Sports Filter)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
4-14-2007 @ 12:40AM
ray said...
so anybody who cares about the environment is a hippie nut job? i didnt realize i was one of those
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4-14-2007 @ 1:49AM
Ricky said...
GREAT ARTICLE! Pretty soon the hippies will have us all walking and worshiping them. I tell ya, the world is not a fun place to live anymore. Not with hippies like the ones in Berkeley ruining the lives of everyone. All they care about is trying to get in the newspaper. I gurantee all of us are friendlier to the environment than them. The other day I saw a hippie dumping OIL at the Oak Grove. Later I saw one dumping several flasks of mercury! They are bad man, very bad!
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4-14-2007 @ 10:30AM
apop55 said...
Yeah! What a bunch of freaks, trying to prevent us from wasting all of our resources! I hate that!! And caring about old trees? How stupid; forests are for pansy hippies. We should make the entire country look like air force bases in North Dakota!
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4-14-2007 @ 11:41AM
Adam said...
Madness, pure madness. I love the environment, but these people are beyond rational thought. Somebody please take the weed away from them.
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4-14-2007 @ 11:06AM
Brad M. said...
Don't these enviromentalist nutjobs have better things to do? Shouldn't they all be in Brazil, demanding that the Brazilian people stop building suburbs? Every time a tree gets chopped down in the Amazon, Al Gore dies a little. It's a beautiful thing.
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4-14-2007 @ 1:16PM
The U will be BACK! said...
Definitely not a hippie here:
But I am not willing to throw them all into the ocean. Although I may not always agree on the solutions proposed, I cannot help but to applaud environmetalists who are concerned about the world my kids will live in.
There are extremes. Some of them may be a bit extreme, but if you want to be fair, Talk about the other extreme of people who senselessly do things with no regard to how they affect the world we have to share.
By the way, Poster #4 is the perfect example of why people in this country refuse to consider the environment. Somehow political ideology has turned the debate over environment into yet another politically polarizing topic. Some people HATE environmentalists because they are reminded of Al Gore, or because the hate "liberal hippies". It shouldn't matter who the hell brings this issue to the forefront. When the shit hits the fan whether you are conservative or liberal, you won't be able to run from it.
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4-14-2007 @ 6:05PM
Jeff from LA said...
I love the environment and I hate Cal, but even so, these hippies are just going too far. It seems as if they are not happy with their own jobless lives smoking pot, but they wish for the rest of us to live just as they do. Perhaps this is evidence that marijuana really does kill brain cells.
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4-14-2007 @ 8:39PM
sports bettor said...
50 years ago most people didn't fly for work, now a lot of people do. Flying is need in today's business world just as today's sports world, and it will not go away.
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4-15-2007 @ 1:03AM
Evanel L. said...
Peak Oil is already here. And unlike past oil shocks, oil prices will continue trending up - and stay permanently up.
The world's 3 largest oil fields (which account for +10% of ALL global production) are all in decline. These 3 fields are declining at current rates of 8%, 14%, 25%... all above the 3% average that was "expected". No major new fields for conventional oil have been discovered in the past couple years, which is why all oil producers/companies recently are investing in technology & adding rigs to old fields, instead of exploring for new ones (because most have already been discovered). We use 30 billion barrels/year, but only find less than 4 billion. (The 30 is climbing, while the 4 is shrinking.) 54 of the top 65 oil producing countries are past peak production, and in decline. OPEC reserves are overstated by at least 50%, and there is no spare capacity. Global demand continues to go up, while supply is plateauing, and will probably begin declining globally as reserves dry up. This means higher prices. And unfortunately, since oil is finite, that means permanent higher prices.
Apparently, there are still many Americans (like quite a few of the posters above) who are not worried about anything - because they don't have any facts.
Most major industries depend on oil: transportation, agriculture, health care, high-tech, textile, plastics, chemicals, etc... once oil becomes scarce, costs will skyrocket, consumer demand will drop, unemployment will rise, and recession will occur (just like previous oil shocks). But this time, the recession will be long-term.
It's not just me, the US GAO (Government Accounting Office) finally said the same thing 2 months ago. They said the consequences of peak oil can only be "mitigated", and not avoided. Which means a recession-depression is coming, and it's only a matter of time. Google it.
Alternative energy comprises less than 1% of all US energy uses. There is no political (or consumer) will to mandate investment in technology & infrastructure, & consumption cuts. Waiting for oil prices & the market to lower demand, our alternatives will still not be ready. This is one of the great flaws of capitalism: nobody is motivated to do the right thing until it becomes too expensive to do the wrong thing.
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4-15-2007 @ 1:15PM
Brian said...
"This is one of the great flaws of capitalism: nobody is motivated to do the right thing until it becomes too expensive to do the wrong thing"
And one of the great benefits of capitalism is that when there is a need, a demand, the market will mobilize to meet it.
A recession may occur but eventually a solution will be found. Naturally while there is still a reliable supply of oil, expenditures towards that next means of energy are low as they are inefficient. But once a economically viable demand for other forms exist, watch the great things the market can do to compensate.
There was a segment on 60 minutes this week about nuclear energy. It doesn't replace oil in all industries (or our vehicles) but it's clean and relatively cheap (now that we know the technology) energy to do a lot of things.
But people are freaked out about nuclear still so we haven't built any new plants in 30 or so years. That WILL change soon enough. That's one move in a better direction. Others will follow.
The U.S. and other capitalist nations can recover from any slumps, its the non-capitalist or weak capitalist nations/state economies who have a great deal to worry about. Quatar is an example of such a nation "getting it", using their dwindling oil revenues to finance a tourist paradise and economic powerhouse. They're preparing for life after oil.
Also, part of the reason we're not discovering oil is because various lobbies have successfully blocked access to off-shore rigs, ANWR etc., things that could help mitigate such a blow.
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