CNN founder rebukes US military spending, says global warming could spark cannibalism RAW STORY

Published: Thursday April 3, 2008



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Print This Email This CNN founder Ted Turner, who bills himself as the largest private landowner in the country, has a message on global warming. "We'll be eight degrees hotter in 30 or 40 years and basically none of the crops will grow," Turner said, speaking in a little-noticed interview on PBS' Charlie Rose Thursday. "Most of the people will have died and the rest of us will be cannibals... Civilization will have broken down. The few people left will be living in a failed state  like Somalia or Sudan  and living conditions will be intolerable." The comments were picked up by Thursday's Atlanta Journal Constitution. "We're too many people; that's why we have global warming," he added. "Too many people are using too much stuff." He said that individuals should pledge not to have more than one or two children. He also criticized his onetime network, saying it has veered too far away from serious news -- specifically singling out Lou Dobbs' show. Concurrently, he said the military needs to be cut "way back." "Right now, the U.S. is spending $500 billion a year on the military, which is more than all 190 countries in the world put together," he remarked. "The two countries that the military industrial complex and some of our politicians would like to demonize and make enemies are Russia and China," Turner said. "China just wants to sell us shoes. They're not building landing craft to attack the United States, and Russia wants to be our friends, too."



He said that despite the United States' huge military budget, "we can't win in Iraq."



"We're being beaten by insurgents who don't even have any tanks, they don't have a headquarters, they don't have a Pentagon, we don't even know if they have any generals," Turner told Rose.



Turner called the Iraqi insurgents "patriots" who "don't like us because we invaded their country and occupied it. Nobody likes to be invaded."

