Chapter 8: This Is Our Due Summary and Analysis

Along with the IT and globalization merger, the climate crisis and our energy consumption has intersected with our country's growing deficit. America has failed to meet the challenge that is represented by this reality and has dithered and delayed on developing viable and plausible policies to combat this emergency. Part of the problem is that segments of the community and even some politicians deny that these issues even exist. Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill tried to warn Vice President Dick Cheney that the tax cuts the administration planned would pose a threat to the economy. Cheney cut him off saying that they had just won the mid-term elections and, "This is our due." (156) Senator Inhofe of Oklahoma refers to global warming as a hoax. When the Bush administration pushed through tax cuts...