Well, I guess we will have to decide whether anecdotes or facts are to be accepted:

The influence of European pollution on ozone in the Near East and northern Afric

Massive Pollution Documented Over Indian Ocean

Let us of course, not leave out our Chinese friends who are basically raping the world:

Environment of China - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

China's pollution nightmare is now everyone's pollution nightmare | csmonitor.com

http://www.inhabitat.com/2008/06/24/transportation-tuesday-chinas-olympic-dream-faces-pollution-woes/

Now if your going to compare the US with some remote African or South American tribe, that really isn't fair.

And all of this consumerism I think is a bit overblown. Sure, there are a few idiots out there who buy a 50'' plasma flat screen and throw it out a week later, but I think if you took a real sample of the average joe/janet in this country you would find that the waste is not as bad as the media makes it out to be.

America's waste is WORSE than our media makes it out to be. The majority of us shop at Wal-Mart to get the best price, where NOTHING is manufactured/sold with a presumed life of more than 3-5 years- not a shirt, not a camera, not a tire, not a dresser, not a TV.

Somewhere along the way prosperity ruined America. It's no longer acceptable to be poor. Coming up poor was once a virtue that built character and created backbone and strong work-etchic... America's BEST citizens were products of poor households. But today poverty is something we all speak of eliminating- as if its some dispicable, shameful disease.

What's more is, our American Dream was once a very modest "chicken in every pot, a car in every garage". NOW it's a styro-box of nuggets, a biggy fries w/ ketchup and a large soda in every pot, a SUV in every bay of our 4-stall garage and a computer, Sony PSP and MP3-Player in every kid's bedroom at the main house- and just a simple desk-top PC for community-use at the weekend place.

In Europe, South Africa, & Japan stores don't bag your purchased goods- it's presumed that shoppers will provide their own re-usable canvas totes- no Wal-Mart style plastic bags littering the country-side in Sweden, Germany or Switzerland.

America stands for BUY, BUY, BUY. And sooner or later every bit of this low-life CRAP we BUY goes to the land-fill, cause ain't NONE of it quality enough to last our life-time to pass-on to those we leave behind, anymore. Can you just imagine what a PBS broadcast of "Antiques Roadshow" will look like in the year 2108? WHAT in America that is produced today will still be around then to be called an antique? Nothing will, when goods are manufactured to survive only slightly longer than a very green banana!

The wool can't be pulled over my eyes- I live it and see it everyday. I've lived abroad, plus worked in the last pristine locale that North America has to offer. I know what clean is. I know what a horizon with no pollution looks like. And here in Illinois where I am now? There ain't NO SUCH THING. Not anymore, there ain't- one can drive for days and never find it.

I can post links to "researched, factual writings by fair & impartial unbiased sources" too, Jafo...

In fact, in ten minutes I had skimmed and cut/paste a dozen links to offer here to support my various points... but I realized it was just too easy- for both you AND I to play this titt-for-tatt game of seeing who could come up with the most pieces to sustain their point.

I will offer a link to only ONE piece, and diplomatically, it agrees partly with BOTH you AND I. Here's the link:
Poverty is the worst polluter - Helium

The article above states these very interesting facts:

1.) None of the world's top ten worst polluted cities are in the U.S.

2.) Sixteen of the world's top twenty heaviest polluted cities are in China.

3.) Only TWO of the world's THIRTY-FIVE heaviest polluted cities are in the U.S. and they are Hanford, CT. and New Orleans, LA.

The article proves much of what you claim to be correct, Jafo- so where does that leave me and my views?

Well, that all depends on your view of personal responsibility. Do YOU feel you have gone to great lengths to reduce any negative impact you make? I don't feel I personally have done nearly enough.

Do YOU feel it's not your responsibility to do more, go to greater lengths and make much bigger effort at going green and in stewarding our environment both locally and nationally? I definitely feel it's MY responsibility.

Do you feel your descendents 50, 100, 200, 500 years down the road will look back and not have a single sad, shameful or embarrassing thought about the habits you personally exhibited and the practices you personally took part in to leave them a safer, cleaner, more pristine environment?

Are you likely going to leave this country better & cleaner than you found it? Is this even a concern on any level?

Only YOU can answer these questions, Jafo. I've answered them for myself and I'm not at all content with the outcome of my own reality- but I still have time to make a better impact, and I intend to.

I see American individuals as far behind those of other nations. I've seen with my own eyes 200 European kids AFFECT 200 American kids to significant CHANGE and IMPROVED habits and behavior.

I worked on Alaska's northermost coast along the Beaufort Sea smack-dab in the middle of the Prudhoe Bay oil fields and I marvelled at the stewardship the companies up there practice. I am 110% FOR drilling in ANWR simply BECAUSE I have seen first hand how it is and can continue to be done safely, responsibly, cleanly. The tree-huggers make my skin crawl when they picket and protest and get all stupid and make the claims they falsely make. But I feel this way ONLY because I have witnessed the HARD WORK and TREMENDOUS EFFORT made by industry up north. And I won't stand still and listen to anybody say that their efforts haven't made an incredible difference. That would be an insulting thumb in the eye to all those who make the effort every 16-hour day they put in up there.

We've covered much ground just since I was a young boy in the 60's and 70's, and have made many changes but it would be dangerous to say we've come as far as we need to and that all efforts should slow down or stop.

If any American feels it's not their problem- not their fault- not their duty to play a part in creating change, that's something I won't take the time to argue with because it takes too much effort in a world that requires so much from us already, for far more deserving causes.

One final thought: In America (and rarely anywhere else) environmental conscientiousness tends to be a partisan issue. If one looks out across the land, they can practically SEE folks wearing RED t-shirts caring in one manner, and folks wearing BLUE t-shirts caring in a very different manner. I don't wish to argue this point and all the politics that it might entail- but my question is simply: Why do you think this is? Or do you disagree? In my view one only need listen to talk radio to determine that the extreme far-right pundits play a role, and exhibit an attitude that screams "There ain't no problem, we ain't got nothing to fix, and this country-side's fine just the way it is". And if you disagree just give a quick 15-minute listen to Rush L., Glen B., Sean H., Michael R., Bill O., G. Gordon L. or ANY of them. They think anyone who picks their discarded cigar-butt up off the street is a NUT-JOB! Well, not me, Jafo. Not me.

You guys can argue this all day, but I'm not getting into the middle of what is, at base, an emotional argument.

However, I do have to make one correction. Chubby, I growed up dirt poor. And it's no virtue, thank you very much.

Has it made me a better person as an adult? I'll leave that determination to others. But, when you're scrambling every minute just to survivie, there's no time left to worry about bigger issues.

Like art, big-picture concerns require free time. And that's something poor people don't have.

Points respectfully well-taken, Brook...

But my larger point was poverty is no sin. And it's probably been the single largest contributor to success ever. I'd venture to say there are those whose greatest early asset was having nothing. Had they something, they may never have amounted to anything at all.