since I just finished reading (deep irony time)The Prince by Machiavelli, here is a piece of sage advice from the Italian Renaissance:
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Mercenaries and auxiliaries are useless and dangerous. If a prince bases the defense of his state on mercenaries he will never achieve stability or security. For mercenaries are disunited, thirsty for power, undisciplined, and disloyal; they are brave among their friends and cowards before the enemy; they have no fear of God, they do not keep faith with their fellow men; they avoid defeat just so long as they avoid battle; in peacetime you are despoiled by them, and in wartime by the enemy. The reason for all this is that there is no loyalty or inducement to keep them on the field apart from the little they are paid; and this is not enough to make them want to die for you. They are only too ready to serve in your army when you are not at war; but when war comes they either desert or disperse.

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Mercenary commanders are either skilled in warfare or they are not: if they are, you cannot trust them, because they are anxious to advance their own greatness, either by coercing you, their employer, or by coercing others against your own wishes. If, however the commender is lacking in prowess,in the normal way he brings about your ruin. If anyone argues that this is true of any other armed force, mercenary or not, I reply that armed forces must be under the control of either a prince or a republic: a prince should assume personal command and captain his troops himself; a republic must appoint its own citizens, and when a commander so appointed turns out incompetent, should change him, and if he is competent, it should limit his authority by statute. Experience has shown that only princes and armed republics achieve solid success, and that mercenaries bring nothing but loss; and a republic which has its own citizen army is far less likely to be subjugated by one of its own citizens than a republic whose forces are not its own.

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Mercenary armies bring only slow, belated, and feeble conquests, but sudden, startling defeat.

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from across the centuries, advice that has not been heeded... and they keep saying that Karl Rove was influenced by Machiavelli... KR apparently didn't read the whole book, just a few quotes...

Up until now, we have been spoiled by having access to many out-of-season foods, which are shipped long distances. Also, the artificially low cost of fuel has made it economical. What increasing fuel costs mean to our diet is this:

1. The cost of foreign-grown out-of-season fruit and vegetables will go through the roof; result: forget eating Chilean grapes in the middle of winter. You will have to cope with cold-storage apples, canned fruit or dried fruit. This is how I grew up; we canned our own applesauce and ate it through the winter.

2. Fresh fruit and vegetables will have to come from local sources, to be reasonable in cost. If folks have half a brain, the local farmers will plant for their own markets, and not for shipping or "export". There will be more use of Farmers Markets and other direct produce sales. For those of us in California, it will mean little change, but elsewhere, people will need to make adjustments in their diet.

3. Corporate agriculture will become increasingly expensive, as shipping costs absorb some of their profit. Prices on food will go up, as a result, especially processed foods.

In essence, we will return to the eating patterns of previous years, before 1960 or so, when most foods were relatively locally grown.

(this may seem obtuse, but I feel we are circling around the problem and not addressing it head-on, so I add to the circle..)

Having read the comments above, I suggest we look at the climate issue through the framework Jared Diamond uses in his book.

Factors leading to collapses of civilizations:

1. (inadvertent) environmental damage

2. climate change (man-made/natural)

3. hostile neighbors

4. decreased support by friendly neighbors

5. society's response to its environmental problems

On a global scale, we are now dealing with numbers 1 and 2. So far, there hasn't been much of a response (#5), which is one of the indicators of possible failure. Numbers 3 & 4 come into play as resources become scarce. So far no one has mentioned the possibility of resource wars which will have a negative effect on #5. Iraq can be viewed as the "opening salvo" in the global resource wars. If leaders are stupid/greedy (which they are), and do not deal with issue #5, we are indeed heading in the wrong direction.

We shall see. The manure may hit the ventilator. I would like to be optimistic, but so far, there has been much talk and little action.

Diamond identifies the problem:"...failures of group decision-making on the part of whole societies or other groups. That problem is of course related to the problem of failures of individual decision-making."(p.420)

He then identifies a "road map" of factors leading to such failures:

1. they failed to anticipate a problem before it arrived
-no prior experience
-reasoning by false analogy
2. perceiving or failing to perceive a problem has actually arrived
-origins are imperceptible
-distant managers
-slow trend concealed by wide up-and-down fluctuations ("creeping normalcy or landscape amnesia)
3. societies often fail even to attempt to solve a problem once it has been perceived
-clashes of interests, selfishness("rational behavior") especially "...when the interests of the decision-making elite in power clash with the interests of the rest of society." (p.430)
-"core values" (religious beliefs, etc.) that are incompatible with survival ("irrational behavior")
4. finally, the problem may be beyond the present capacities to solve, a solution may exist but be prohibitively expensive, or the efforts may be too little and too late

have at!

(Note to readers: I consider myself a Buddhist, but have a strong background in Medieval history, which also covers the history of the Early Church. I also play for Sunday services at a very liberal United Methodist church.)

1.There is no mention of homosexuality in Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke). None. Therefore, Jesus did not say anything about it. (Paul, who had his own issues, does mention it, but that is Paul, not Jesus.) Now Jesus does have quite a lot to say about divorce, which none of the Protestant churches seem to notice... (the Bible Belt has the highest divorce rate of the nation...!)

2.The approach should be through Jesus' teachings: to see those who purport to be the leaders of the church as false prophets or "scribes and Pharisees" who would lead their congregations into error.

3.Or... perhaps use the "hypocrite" teachings. If you are a Biblical literalist, then to cherry pick your quotations about morals is to be a hypocrite. And Jesus, in the Synoptic Gospels, has lots to say about hypocrites.

4.The real teachings of Jesus are essentially liberal. If people would actually read the Gospels for themselves (like Luther suggested!), especially the Sermon on the Mount and the Beatitudes, there is no other conclusion they should reach. (Jesus keeps mentioning the 'if you have eyes and ears' bit, duhh.)

5.Churches and preachers have tried to twist the readings to benefit their own power, but they have become the modern Pharisees; twisting the Word to benefit their personal egos and pocketbooks. As Christians, only by following the real teachings of Jesus, found right there in the Synoptic Gospels, can they truly hope to attain the Kingdom of God.

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...See, I actually have read the Gospels... won't hurt anyone, and you don't even have to "believe"! And all I have is the King James Version, which is jolly, because I can read Elizabethan English in context.

There is nothing in the essence of Jesus' practical teachings which contradict the Buddhist teachings (surprise, surprise). The historical and cultural contexts are different, and after winnowing those out, one gets to the core of their meaning:
-be good, do good
-wealth and greed are a hindrance to spiritual development
-to care for the least of those among us enriches the world
-it is good to care for the environment (creation)- it keeps us alive.

just some ideas from this heathen...
kb