To hear Barack Obama and Al Gore talk, the earth has been saved – thanks to self-conscious, narcissistic and force-wielding politicians (such as themselves).
The reason the earth has been saved, they claim, is the recently concluded Paris agreement on fossil fuels.
Says Gore: “This universal and ambitious agreement sends a clear signal to governments, businesses, and investors everywhere: the transformation of our global economy from one fuelled by dirty energy to one fuelled by sustainable economic growth is now firmly and inevitably under way.”
Yet as Steve Milloy of junkscience.com pointed out: “Yes, that’s why China and India are building 2,400 coal plants … which is perfectly okay under Paris treaty.”
Let’s think about this.
IF stopping the use of fossil fuels were really the goal of environmentalists, isn’t it reasonable to assume they’d want everyone to stop – not just America?
Logically speaking, there has to be another motive. Obama and Gore would not be celebrating an agreement which allows other nations to expand their use of fossil fuels. They would be disappointed and angry, if this was really their goal.
Another hypothesis explains the contradiction. Gore, Obama and other environmentalists are less interested in reducing fossil fuels than they are in reducing the economic growth of America.
According to their “progressive” paradigm, America is a shameful, racist and arrogant place. It’s time to give other nations and cultures a chance to “catch up.” This would explain the rush to limit (and ultimately outlaw) fossil fuels in the United States, while failing to curb their development elsewhere.
What else could explain the discrepancy?
Everybody knows that civilization and economic growth will come to a halt without the continued, active use of fossil fuels. Because of the comforts and life-sustaining benefits brought about by automobiles, trains, heat, electricity, jet travel – just to name a few – millions would, in fact, perish without the continued development of fossil fuels. Those who survive would lead a wretched life, compared to what even the poorest in industrialized nations know today.
Logically and morally, you cannot evade the benefits of fossil fuels while only focusing on their disadvantages, real or theoretical.
Advocates of “climate change” sanctimoniously condemn anyone who questions their intellectual dishonesty by labeling them “deniers,” haters and – let’s not forget that old standby – “racist.”
Yet you cannot claim to hold a sound scientific position when you evade the bulk of the evidence which plainly shows how advantageous to human life and survival fossil fuels are. [See Alex Epstein’s brilliant work on the subject. Also see Mark Steyn’s excellent review of global warming research, “A Disgrace to the Profession.”]
Consider an example from earlier this year, reported in The New York Times about famed automobile manufacturer, Volkswagen.
As one commentator eloquently puts it,
The automaker says it cheated on federal emissions tests because company engineers considered it “impossible” to pass them.
…A major-league automaker, with an entire engineering staff at its disposal, found it impossible to comply with the federal government’s emissions fatwas. It would have required unacceptable (to VW’s customers) functional compromises – or unacceptable costs.
So, VW elected to shrug.
Screw the tests. Screw Uncle. We are in the business of building cars that must be appealing to our customers, such that they are willing to part with hard-earned money in exchange for them. If that means the cars are not “compliant” with the government’s endless laundry list of demands … well, so be it.
How long before others do something similar?
It’s so easy to morally condemn successful, profit-making companies for daring to go against the government’s will. Yet these very same successful, profit-making companies got that way because they’re meeting the demands of customers.
Customers—that’s you or I, potentially. Why do we consider government our ally when it’s actually the successful, competent and capable people in the private sector making our lives so much better?
We are asked to give all of this civilization and life-saving comfort up, all for the sake of … a dubious, politically motivated weather forecast.
Imagine.
Even the most skilled weather professionals with the best technology available cannot usually give us a fully accurate weather forecast 5 or 6 days (sometimes even 1 or 2 days) into the future. Yet we’re supposed to take the environmentalists’ word for it that the sky will literally start falling in about 25, 50 or 100 years. And any dissenting scientific opinion will be condemned, defunded, and even outlawed (as some are starting to suggest).
The next time an environmentalist tells you the earth can only be rescued by the elimination of fossil fuels, point to the Paris “agreement.” Ask them why America must submit while the rest of the world can go on doing its thing.
Are fossil fuels the enemy? Or is America?
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