{"id":573,"date":"2007-03-16T17:04:48","date_gmt":"2007-03-17T00:04:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/?p=573"},"modified":"2007-03-16T17:18:10","modified_gmt":"2007-03-17T00:18:10","slug":"curse-of-the-black-gold-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/2007\/03\/16\/curse-of-the-black-gold-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Curse of the Black Gold"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Yeah, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/?p=315\">Al Gore<\/a> wants you to turn off your air-conditioning, go carbon neutral, use those awful fluorescent bulbs, drive a Prius, etc. etc. amen. Yeah. We get that, thanks, Al. We get that the whole global warming thing means maybe we should not burn through a whole lot of fuel to get across the planet or across town. We think <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ngo.grida.no\/wwfap\/polarbears\/risk\/index.html\">polar bear cubs<\/a> are cute and we totally dig snow sports. We get it.<\/p>\n<p>But there&#8217;s something else to think about when it comes to giving up oil: the effect oil production has on societies at the source. <a href=\"http:\/\/www7.nationalgeographic.com\/ngm\/0702\/sights_n_sounds\/index2.html\">National Geographic<\/a> is running a multimedia presentation about the impact of oil companies on the lives of the inhabitants of the Niger Delta. Who&#8217;s reaping the benefits of the wells? Not the people of the Niger Delta. If Al Gore doesn&#8217;t make you go on an oil diet, you might consider doing it for the people of the Niger Delta. From the <a href=\"http:\/\/www7.nationalgeographic.com\/ngm\/0702\/feature3\/index.html\">full story<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><span class=\"featureMainCopy\" \/><span class=\"featureMainCopy\">Beyond the city, within the labyrinth of creeks, rivers, and pipeline channels that vein the delta\u00e2\u20ac\u201done of the world&#8217;s largest wetlands\u00e2\u20ac\u201dexists a netherworld. Villages and towns cling to the banks, little more than heaps of mud-walled huts and rusty shacks. Groups of hungry, half-naked children and sullen, idle adults wander dirt paths. There is no electricity, no clean water, no medicine, no schools. Fishing nets hang dry; dugout canoes sit unused on muddy banks. Decades of oil spills, acid rain from gas flares, and the stripping away of mangroves for pipelines have killed off fish. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>In my treehugging lefty world, this totally underscores my desire for an <a href=\"http:\/\/www.electricvehiclesnw.com\/main\/reasons.htm\">eBike<\/a>. Who says green products won&#8217;t get you greenbacks? I&#8217;m ready to hand over some Benjamins for a sweet electric ride.<br \/>\nVia the <a href=\"http:\/\/thetravelphotographer.blogspot.com\/\">Travel Photographer<\/a>, my favorite new discovery on the web. Bookmark and learn, comrades, bookmark and learn.<\/p>\n<p>[tags]oil, National Geographic, global warming[\/tags]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Yeah, Al Gore wants you to turn off your air-conditioning, go carbon neutral, use those awful fluorescent bulbs, drive a Prius, etc. etc. amen. Yeah. We get that, thanks, Al. We get that the whole global warming thing means maybe we should not burn through a whole lot of fuel to get across the planet &#8230; <\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more-container\"><a title=\"Curse of the Black Gold\" class=\"read-more button\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/2007\/03\/16\/curse-of-the-black-gold-2\/#more-573\" aria-label=\"Read more about Curse of the Black Gold\"><br \/>&#8230;read more.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-573","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-seattle","masonry-post","generate-columns","tablet-grid-50","mobile-grid-100","grid-parent","grid-50"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=573"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=573"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=573"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nerdseyeview.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=573"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}