In a message dated 97-12-16 21:45:51 EST, [log in to unmask] writes:

> You are correct.
>
>  However, the fault lies with badly designed laws that encourage people
>  to do stupid things when developing land.
So, we should learn to change the laws?   In Poland they are making new laws
from a clean slate.

>  Americans and American communities do not universally make bad choices.
I am possibly biased from living near a high density population. I see am only
asked to look at bad buildings... therefore it is hard for me to imagine good
buildings.

>  And since it is apparent to me that the majority of communities do
>  in fact provide their residents with reasonably clean air and water,
>  reasonably good education for children, reasonably good roads and so
>  forth, I must disagree with your pessimism in Poland.

OK, but I was not trying to be pessimistic and did not think that I was being
pessimistic under the circumstances. Bear in mind, 70% of Sczcecin was leveled
by Allied (read American) bombing. What may be considered pessimism in one
place can be simple respect in another. I could have stood there and made
everyone feel bad by telling them we drive bigger cars on better roads and
don't give a damn how much gas we burn or how many cities we have bombed. As
it was, I was happy to be given a selection of breads and fruits to munch on
in the hospital. It reminded me that simple pleasures are often what we really
need.

>  We are blind men looking at the elephant.  We cannot prevent ourselves
>  from understanding the elephant from the parts we have touched.  We have
>  done some very stupid things in our country.  We have also done some
>  miraculous things.
We have also done some stupid things in other countries. I don't expect to
ever figure out the elephant and am tired of only looking at it. Beside that,
when I tried to carve my initials into it's hide with my penknife, I suddenly
found out the damn thing can talk. I think it is pretty miraculous and intend
to get on with the conversation any which way I can.

>I like to turn to our own mythology now and then.  I
>  suspect that the hope for our environment comes from how the western
>  movies (real old ones) tell us about the kind of villany it takes to
>  poisen a water hole.  I think many of us are concluding that there's not
>  much difference between the character of the guy who would poisen a
>  water hole and the guys who build unnecessary strip malls, belch crap
>  into the air or water, etc.
I think some of us can appreciate this myth. Unfortunately, and possibly again
because of my experience of NYC and proximity, I don't think very many
capitalists share the view. Despite the DISCOVERY channel, the environmental
discussion appears to be going on outside of the popular media. I believe many
people are sincerely concerned, but they are not the ones programming the
media. Have you ever yet seen a news program talk about the positive aspects
of using the internet? All you ever hear is about how it will damage our
children by exposing them to sexual perverts. The reality of our discourse on
BP is not represented honestly be the media... with TV we are being
conditioned by the choices of a few media programmers, not by ourselves making
free choices. The discourse on BP is repeated all over the internet where
people are sharing their concerns and developing relationships. It is a
distortion, an attack on our individual freedom of expression, for anyone to
say that we are all perverts and to encourage paranoia against the media. When
have you ever seen a progam on public television that REALLY shows how
historic preservationists do real restoration... and I don't mean the This Old
House bastardization, but something like the restoration of Monticello,
without it being turned into an infomercial?

>  Okay, the 4-runner looks like its some kind of macho statement, but look
>  who's driving it!  Its my 4'-11" wife!  (they must have based that
>  commercial about how awkward it is for a woman in a tight skirt to get
>  out of one of those things on her...not the tight skirt...at least in
>  this decade...but on the distance from grade to running board!)  Why?
>  Cause no matter what else goes wrong, if that school bus can get those
>  kids home, I want her there with them.
OK, go to Morristown, NJ and sit in the parking lot at Peck School (private,
wealthy) and count the Land Rovers and Jeep Cherokees... we are not talking
safari land here - you have to really go somewhere to find a gravel road. I
love to drive a big fat car, just it sometimes bothers me not that I have to
pay for the gas, but possibly my son, or grandchildren, will not have the
luxery of mindlessly using up a finite resource.

>  I'm not comfortable with the
>  sprawl of minimals throughout my township...when the township itself has
>  no commercial, social or political focal point.  That's bad design.  Bad
>  design is very expensive.
I'm confused here. You would prefer sprawl with social and political focus? Or
do you simply regret the lack of social and political focus? Or is it the lack
of social and political focus that creates sprawl? (My favorite.) Or does
sprawl create a lack of social and political focus?

>  I do agree with most of what you said.
Good enough. Now I will see what I can do to disagree with myself.

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