How many is too many?

I do not normally watch television on Saturday AM. (May 16) However, a late morning snack put me at the breakfast table while KQED was broadcasting To The Contrary with Bonnie Erbe. You many know that all of the commentary on this show comes from women.

The second half of this episode was the first of a three part series entitled POPULATION AND THE ENVIRONMENT. This promises to be "a historical look at the connection between population tabilization and the environmental movement."

I think that most who consider themselves to be progressives will have a difficult time aligning their ideas of social justice to those of ecological sustainability. To ignore one at the expense of the other will only ensure that we solve neither set of issues.


California does not have enough water for it's current population in drought years. With Climate Change happening as rapidly as it is, we may not ever catch up. According to the San Diego News Network report of a major scientific meeting held this month in San Diego...

“Water demand is projected to rise at a faster pace than that of the world’s population growth, the latter of which is expected to increase by 50 percent by 2050.”

This is a global problem to which we have not begun to supply the answers.

The panelists issued a declaration summarizing their research in four sections: the problem, progress, conclusion and the future. The declaration will be presented at the Science and Technology in Society 2009 forum in Kyoto.

“Human society and the global environment will be able to exist together, but this will only be achieved on a region by region basis as we saw at this workshop,” states the declaration. “A major failure in any one region will have serious global consequences.”

In California, the Democratic Party is so involved in building it's power base in the Hispanic / Latino community that they will ignore the ramifications of population growth. It will be a forbidden subject. Greens, on the other hand, have always worked for local and regional solutions and this issue is one where we hill have an advantage if we really stand up and tell the truth. Immigration reform requires that you learn to treat every individual as contributing to society and find a way to make that happen.

Community Based Economics is a foundation of Green Values and that is where we must integrate the concerns for immigration and for the environment. It won't be easy.