The old Californians were invaded by all of the fruits and nuts from all of the other states. WE are all huddling in the center of the state trying to overcome THEIR invasion.
Posted on 07/29/2007 5:22:43 PM PDT by DogByte6RER
Residents are 'green' hypocrites, poll finds
Californians want immediate governmental action, but are unwilling to make personal sacrifices
By Steve Geissinger
MEDIANEWS SACRAMENTO BUREAU
Contra Costa Times
SACRAMENTO -- Many Californians' alarmed talk about global warming amounts to a lot of hot air. Experts say residents are growing more opinionated on the issue -- and hypocritical.
A survey by the Public Policy Institute of California shows most residents think dirty air from cars is helping foster disasters such as drought and hurting their health through ailments such as asthma.
They want immediate action from government officials and presidential candidates with strong environmental protection stands. They support current attempts to lower greenhouse-gas emissions from autos.
"For the first time, a majority of Californians say global warming poses a very serious threat to the state's future economy and quality of life," said institute President Mark Baldassare.
The 54 percent who hold that view mark a 5-point increase since last July and a 15-point increase since July 2005.
"More Californians are associating global warming with a greater variety of environmental threats. It's not just air pollution. It's concern over increased droughts and flooding," Baldassare said.
But the poll released last week also found two-thirds of workers put up with pain at the gasoline pump so they can drive solo to jobs -- a fourth in SUVs.
Just 13 percent carpool and 7 percent use public transit.
"You have to wonder about the gap between behavior and opinions," said Jack Pitney, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College.
The survey also indicated 70 percent of Californians are ready to buy more fuel-efficient cars, despite the extra cost.
But analysts say, in another case of saying one thing and doing another, it may be that few of them will ever actually pay to back up their comments.
"It's easy to tell a pollster you're willing to sacrifice for a cleaner environment," Pitney said. "But it's harder to do it."
Some of the building concern can be attributed to politicians' rhetoric, said David McCuan, a political science professor at Sonoma State University.
"But in reality, Californians' real challenges are local -- housing, education, roads and a fair wage from a steady job," McCuan said.
Experts also say people voice opinions contrary to their actions in hopes that the collective momentum will force the hard choices on them that they can't make by themselves.
"We buy gas guzzlers but vote for gas sipping," says columnist James Surowiecki in the current New Yorker magazine. "Our desires as individuals to protect ourselves in large cars and to outclass our neighbors encourage us to buy bigger and bigger vehicles with more and more horsepower."
"In calling for laws requiring better gas mileage in our cars, voters are really saying that they're unhappy with the collective result of the choices they make as buyers," he says. "Sometimes, they know, we need to save ourselves from ourselves."
Residents truly embracing the fight against global warming "need to connect the environmental dots," Pitney said.
"Over the long run, high gasoline prices are the most efficient way to encourage conservation," he said. "Yet I've never seen any Californians cheering when the pump price goes up."
Anyways...for the record I am NOT one of those hypocrites.
I own a Hummer H2 and I don't beleive any of the gloom and doom by tree hugging gurus like Al Gore. Al Gore and his minions merely use "global warming" fears to grab more government power.
World climate is in a constant state of flux. Temperatures rise and dip on cycles. After all, wasn't it "global warming" that thawed out the planet some 10,000 years ago to end the Ice Age? I don't think there were any SUV drivers back then.
So this poll finds that many Californian are hypocrites. Not much new here. They must have focused their poll sampling in Hollywood and San Francisco...
Of course they are. They're liberals.
"You have to wonder about the gap between behavior and opinions," said Jack Pitney, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College.
Carpooling would be wonerful, if I had someone to car pool with. Public transit would be wonderful if we had some that was reliable. I have several times been called upon to bail out friends when the bus doesn't come. Turns out the union has a clause that drivers who are sick do not need to call in and tell anyone, so of course no bus runs if they take a day off.
My favorite both sides of the argument covered expression.
The old Californians were invaded by all of the fruits and nuts from all of the other states. WE are all huddling in the center of the state trying to overcome THEIR invasion.
And we are supposed to be surprised by the study??
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Or sometimes, they're just idiots.
The carpool statistics include children who are dropped off at school. I am not kidding you. In California they include driving your kids to school to inflate the carpool numbers.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
ahem...
but are you married?
LOL!!
/j/k
Aw come on now. There’s lots of untapped tax sources. Hunters, fishermen, fast food, carbonated soft drinks, energy taxes, snack chips, coffee, walmart, marijuana(legalized), bullets, guns, carbon taxes, gas guzzler taxes...and I’m not even trying.
Kalifornia liberals hypocrites??
Surely you jest.
This is why I’m in favor of Schwarzenegger’s plan to stop global warming. Let the Californians have what they want, and make them wish they had not.
That’s hilarious. I bet none of the Hollywood divas nor the Berkeley sandal-wearers want to ride the bus. They only want us to ride the bus.
This is not limited to Kalif. Here in Utah I once unscientifically polled a bunch of people I know and found out that not one liberal rides in a car pool. I could only find three people besides myself who car pool or van pool. None were liberals.
I vanpool to work M-F.
It’s about an hour commute to San Diego, so we rotate drivers and I get in some sleep time.
Even though I own a gus guzzling SUV, I typically use it on weekends.
My fellow vanpoolers seem to be pretty fond of the Michael Savage Show in the afternoon...
Green Hypocrites = Ecosexuals
Read:
“Green Dating – Are You An Ecosexual?”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1865766/posts
No surprises here! Remember uncle Teddy and the windmill farm?
I’m a 3rd generation Cali...and we’ve been po’d at ‘em since before my mamma and daddy taught me to talk (That’s a few generations ago!).
Hey Walt, check out what the “ commissioned type” study (polls) found out!
My husband and I don’t say that cars are the cause of global warming, but we actually do drive a Prius.
We also recycle, and use flourescent lights.
My husband would prefer to not use the A/C, but I have severe allergies and just get too stopped up with fans and windows open.
Liberals never live by their own rules.
Liberals don’t want for THEMSELVES to get out of those gas guzzlers. They want YOU to get out of those gas guzzlers so YOU can ease freeway congestion and reduce smog, etc. Liberals think they are the elites and DESERVE to live large. It is YOU, the great unwashed, that needs to sacrifice.
And, while you are sacrificing, keep voting in more liberals so they can find more ways to make YOU (not them) sacrifice.
Californians get the government they deserve. Morons.
Gotcha there! It's a shame, isn't it? There are some of us here huddling on the coast, too.
I love California. I love the Valley (San Joaquin), I love the coast, and I love L.A. (an acquired taste) from the bottom of my heart. I am so blessed to be here and have been grateful for the treat from as far back as I can remember. I don't love the fact that too many people here who have no business voting, vote for idiots. I'm glad there are still folks with connections to the Original California, settled by people with guts and very adventurous spirits. And you know ... they're still coming here. That's a good thing. As long as they're legal, of course! ;^)
GW Ping!
E-POLL
Should the government do more to tackle climate change?
Yes - (36%)
No - (64%)
liberals truly want to sacrefice.
Only thing is they want to sacriface THEIR neighbors necessities for their luxuries.
Just ask Al Gore and his friend, Laurie David
I read 40 years ago about a huge feel-good crowd of hundreds assembled in a rural area near Los Angeles to bury the evil automobile. Not symbolic, literally. Lots of feel-good press coverage. Lots of chests swelling with pride and accomplishment.
Hundreds of private automobiles parked every which way along the country road, in the fields, everywhere. It took a call to the sheriffs department and deputies hours to get it all sorted out and the do-gooders on their way home to celebrate how "we care and you don't."
It's what they do.
Never has really been a "conservative" state, and has been filled with hippie-critical NIMBYs since at least the 1950s.
Green Hypocrites is redundant.
Some of Gov. Schwarzennegger's "global warming" measures put severe resitrictions on concrete -- it's the first I heard of this but apparently concrete produces gobs of CO2. One Internet source says, "Concrete is thought to be responsible for around 10% of global CO2 emissions."
(Robert Kennedy is known to be a key adivsor for Mr. and Mrs. Schwarzenkennedy.)
Fine. But at the same time Gov. Schwarzennegger and California have put in place ambitious plans for the construction of all kinds of stuff that require concrete.
It's what they do.
bttt
Really? I am shocked! Most liberals are their slogan should read do as I say not as I do because I know more than you.
I see how this works; stupid people who are incapable of making decisions for themselves empower greedy jerks in government to tell them what to do for their own good. Capable and self reliant citizens who might make different decisions in their lives are then forced to follow the same rules as the idiots.
I call BS. I don't know anyone who carpools, and even so no way it's twice as many who use public transportation. Unless you live and work downtown somewhere it just is not practical. Park&rides are popular, but you have to DRIVE to them first.
I find this story shocking. \grin
So, are YOU gonna be the one to tell Jim Robinson that? What are you doing on California-born-and-raised Free Republic? I love having people from New Jersey telling us third, fourth, and fifth-generation native Californians what we're about. When my husband and I were in your neck of the woods during a Florida-to-Boston road trip, we didn't dare drive across your tiny little communist-MAFIA state for fear of being stopped by cops who would confiscate our legal firearms.
You deserve a kick square in the ass, pal.
Global warming in a nutshell - it's oxymoronic.
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