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Environment Das/Turns ***Beaches*** Beaches are key to the economy-offshore drilling destroys them
Sierra Club ’09 (Sierra Club, America's largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, 8-09, “Don’t Rig Our Coastal Economy,” www.sierraclub.org/habitat/downloads/2009-08-coasts.pdf)
Our coasts are now facing more threats than they have in almost three decades. The vast¶ majority of America’s coastline, once protected, is now actively being pursued for¶ development by the oil and gas industry. New offshore drilling would jeopardize our¶ beaches, coastal environments, and booming tourism economy.¶ While only a handful of big oil companies stand to profit from drilling our coasts, all¶ Americans stand to profit from keeping our beaches clean, healthy and pristine. ¶ Tourism is a vital part of our nation’s economy, and beaches are an essential piece.¶ According to the World Tourism & Travel Council, in 2009 alone the United States¶ travel and tourism economy is expected to directly and indirectly produce 13.8 million¶ jobs and generate $1.35 trillion.¶ 1¶ That makes America’s coastal recreation and tourism¶ industry the second largest employer in the nation, workers who serve the 180 million¶ Americans who make over 2 billion trips to our coasts every year. Tourism in America is¶ a trillion-dollar industry with coastal communities contributing over $700 billion¶ annually to our economy¶ 2¶ . ¶ These valuable beaches and coastlines will be forever changed if industry is given a green¶ light to drill. Oil and gas rigs would deter tourists from visiting coastal communities,¶ would stress wildlife, and would threaten to contaminate the waters where American¶ families swim, boat, and fish. The risk to our coastal economy from offshore drilling is¶ just too great. ¶ But our coasts are not solely about jobs. Millions of Americans share fond childhood¶ memories of building sandcastles, learning to ride a wave, fishing, or watching seabirds,¶ dolphins and whales at the beach. Each year, families from all over the world flock to our¶ beaches to continue this tradition. This summer,¶ given the state of the economy, we can expect¶ even more families to keep their vacations local¶ and head for the beach.¶ Our coasts and marine waters provide the¶ economic lifeblood for thousands of tourism¶ and fishing communities, generating billions of¶ dollars and sustaining millions of jobs. In¶ addition to being a favorite American vacation¶ destination, beaches provide a sanctuary for fish¶ and wildlife and are a critical part of America’s¶ natural heritage—from sea to shining sea. But¶ these coasts are in jeopardy.¶ Big Oil, which continues to experience record profits, has teamed up with industry¶ lobbyists and allies in Congress to push their agenda and sacrifice our coasts for their¶ financial gain.¶ If we want to see what our coasts will look like if the oil industry has its way, we have to¶ look no further than Alabama, Louisiana, Texas, and Mississippi. For years, coastlines in¶ these states did not enjoy the same protections from drilling as beaches in the rest of the¶ country. As a result, the oil industry was able to leave its ugly mark. Years of wear and¶ tear from oil operations have destroyed many coastal wetlands of the Louisiana Bayou.¶ Thanks in large part to drilling, Louisiana is losing 25 square miles of coastal wetlands¶ each year. These wetlands once provided a natural barrier from storms like Hurricane¶ Katrina.
Extinction
Austin 9 (Michael, Resident Scholar – American Enterprise Institute, and Desmond Lachman – Resident Fellow – American Enterprise Institute, “The Global Economy Unravels”, Forbes, 3-6, http://www.aei.org/article/100187)
What do these trends mean in the short and medium term? The Great Depression showed how social and global chaos followed hard on economic collapse. The mere fact that parliaments across the globe, from America to Japan, are unable to make responsible, economically sound recovery plans suggests that they do not know what to do and are simply hoping for the least disruption. Equally worrisome is the adoption of more statist economic programs around the globe, and the concurrent decline of trust in free-market systems. The threat of instability is a pressing concern. China, until last year the world's fastest growing economy, just reported that 20 million migrant laborers lost their jobs. Even in the flush times of recent years, China faced upward of 70,000 labor uprisings a year. A sustained downturn poses grave and possibly immediate threats to Chinese internal stability. The regime in Beijing may be faced with a choice of repressing its own people or diverting their energies outward, leading to conflict with China's neighbors. Russia, an oil state completely dependent on energy sales, has had to put down riots in its Far East as well as in downtown Moscow. Vladimir Putin's rule has been predicated on squeezing civil liberties while providing economic largesse. If that devil's bargain falls apart, then wide-scale repression inside Russia, along with a continuing threatening posture toward Russia's neighbors, is likely. Even apparently stable societies face increasing risk and the threat of internal or possibly external conflict. As Japan's exports have plummeted by nearly 50%, one-third of the country's prefectures have passed emergency economic stabilization plans. Hundreds of thousands of temporary employees hired during the first part of this decade are being laid off. Spain's unemployment rate is expected to climb to nearly 20% by the end of 2010; Spanish unions are already protesting the lack of jobs, and the specter of violence, as occurred in the 1980s, is haunting the country. Meanwhile, in Greece, workers have already taken to the streets. Europe as a whole will face dangerously increasing tensions between native citizens and immigrants, largely from poorer Muslim nations, who have increased the labor pool in the past several decades. Spain has absorbed five million immigrants since 1999, while nearly 9% of Germany's residents have foreign citizenship, including almost 2 million Turks. The xenophobic labor strikes in the U.K. do not bode well for the rest of Europe. A prolonged global downturn, let alone a collapse, would dramatically raise tensions inside these countries. Couple that with possible protectionist legislation in the United States, unresolved ethnic and territorial disputes in all regions of the globe and a loss of confidence that world leaders actually know what they are doing. The result may be a series of small explosions that coalesce into a big bang.
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