Bumppoman

I am a conservative in all ways. Instead of explaining why fully in this post, I will instead focus on a single issue: why environmental protection is unimportant to me and most likely should be to you too.

I did not vote for Barack Obama. I'm sure many would term this racial bias or ignorance or "resistance to change." This is not so. I would have been open to true change. But Mr. Obama simply brings classic American liberalism back into the West Wing after a nice eight-year respite. What do I mean by "American liberalism?" Try to make every single thing in the world better, usually through taxation. Mr. Obama's predecessor may have been guilty of overstepping his bounds to ameliorate a bad situation in Iraq, but just five months into Mr. Obama's term, he has already:

• given trillions of dollars of government money to private industries in order to attempt to fix a naturally occurring economic cycle
• reneged on many of his campaign promises to "fix" things, namely homosexual service in the Armed Forces and a plan for socialized healthcare
• (most importantly for this post) introduced a climate change bill that will cost the average taxpayer nearly seven thousand (!) dollars a year by 2035

The response to this plan is mixed from what I can gather. However, some of those supporting it incensed me enough to write this. "Get used to the fact you're gonna have to buy a smaller car, keep your heat down in the winter and your A/C up in the summer," an anonymous online commenter writes. "It ain't all about you anymore." So who is it about? Future generations? It is likely too late to "save" the environment from its eventual destruction from humans. In that case, all this bill does is make Americans suffer in the present, suffer AND pay ever-increasing climate protection taxes in the future. I don't want to be cold in the winter and hot in the summer just so there are two smog-free days for my great-great grandchildren to go outside in 2138 instead of just one. I don't want to vacation to Scranton, PA instead of Oregon because someone tells me I need to care about the planet.

The ugly truth is that I don't care about the planet, and neither do most Americans. I'm sorry for being selfish, but I'm not the only one. When gasoline is $10 a gallon, I'm sure more people will be as vocal as myself in decrying the push for "greener" America. Let individuals decide what to do about reducing their "carbon footprints." I recycle already. Nobody knows if there will even be humans who need the environment in twenty-five years. Count me among those who want to live freely now, instead of being crippled by restrictions concerning the future.

Welcome. Hopefully, you're beginning to read what will be the first in a long and fruitful series of blog ramblings by me. It is highly likely that you already know me, but nonetheless, Google crawls my site on occasion so perhaps I should quickly introduce myself for anyone who isn't familiar with me.

My name is Brendon Stanton, and I am a college student currently enrolled at the University at Buffalo. I consider myself an interesting guy; eccentric would possibly be the best way to describe me. As you'll quickly find out by continuing to follow my blog, I'm very opinionated and never afraid to express my thoughts. However, I am not disrespectful to those with whom I disagree. I love nothing more than to have a good argument about anything, but at the end I won't think any less of you. One of my best friends is the ideological opposite of me, yet we've been friends for the better part of the last decade.

Take everything that I say with a grain of salt. When I begin ranting on a subject, I quickly become carried away. My friends seem to like this; it provides entertainment. I'm not as angry of a person as I often appear. Hopefully you the reader will find similar enjoyment. Nonetheless the commenting feature exists for a reason and if you have some feedback, I'll gladly read it and respond.

You may be asking why I have chosen to begin writing a blog when it has become a bit passé to do so. The truth is that I don't entirely know myself. I am an amateur programmer, and I created the software that runs this blog, but I had no real use for it. This seems to be my biggest flaw in website creation: I enjoy making things but not using them. Hopefully that will change with this blog.

What else can I say? I am a huge baseball fan of an extremely random team: the Florida Marlins. Undoubtedly I will be writing about their season at various junctures in time. (Currently the Marlins are leading the Yankees 6-3 in the eighth.)

I hope this will suffice as an introduction, and will form a bond of readership between us. If not, thanks for visiting once. The Internet is a tricky business: more than ninety percent of visitors to websites never come back. I would appreciate a second chance. Let's eschew that trend together!