The planet’s already on the brink of resource exhaustion and climate catastrophe. We’re not talking about the United States in 1900—a country of only 76 million people pigheadedly despoiling its way into the 20th century. It’s 2009, the planet’s already on the brink of resource exhaustion and climate catastrophe, and China is 17 times more populous than America was during our industrial era.
If we just sit back and listen to those who pooh-pooh the complaints and celebrate supposed “miracles”; if governments refuse to strengthen international environmental policies; if the world merely hopes for the best as 1.3 billion Chinese pursue old-school smokestack industrialization, then there’s not going to be much of a world left.
