Global warming is just another variation on the theme, as Al Gore and his film An Inconvenient Truth readily prove.
The real Inconvenient Truth is; politicians lie, and Al Gore is just another politician. As Thomas Sowell points out in his latest column over at The Atlasphere, “Studies Show” is a phrase you should immediately discount:
More recently, the National Academy of Sciences came out with a study that supposedly proved beyond a doubt that human activities were responsible for ”global warming”. A chorus of voices in the media, in politics and in academia proclaimed that this was no longer an issue but a scientific fact, proven with hard data.
The NAS report not only had statistics, it had an impressive list of scientists, which supposedly put the icing on the cake.
The only problem was that the scientists had not written the report and in fact had not even seen it before it was published, even though they had some affiliation with the National Academy of Sciences.
At least one of those scientists, meteorologist Richard S. Lindzen of M.I.T., publicly opposed the conclusion and has continued to do so. But that fact was largely lost in the midst of the media hoopla.
Besides, what is a mere meteorologist at M.I.T. compared to Al Gore and his movie. The environment is the Democrat’s terror war; and it has even less substance. The answer to the problem of the environment is to get the gov’t out of other peoples business…
[In other words, allow individuals to pursue polluters instead of placing the EPA in the way of progress on the issue. Which is what the EPA’s purpose is. Don’t beleive me? Explain superfund sites, then. Government forgiveness for polluting businesses. Taxpayer funded cleanup of corporate pollution.]
…And let the concerned private citizens handle the issues. As the world’s biggest polluter, the US gov’t doesn’t have any business pretending to care about the environment.
I have eaten a Big Bowl of Crow since publishing this and other thoughts on many subjects. This is from my last post on climate change;
I was slow to buy in to the idea that climate change was a thing because of this, and for a brief time was in the same camp as several of my friends (and the late author Michael Crichton as another example) that climate change was some kind of conspiracy. It wasn’t until I ran across this argument presented on 350.org that I realized just how demonstrable AGW was
The EPA is necessary. In fact, the EPA isn’t powerful enough which is its major flaw. Superfund? That is a bought congress weakening the EPA from outside. The corrupting effect of money on the government. What we need is a global authority on the environment. I just hope we’re smart enough to craft an organization that will do the job it needs to do without becoming a totalitarian regime all by its lonesome. Able to protect natural resources without crushing human ability to use them. That task will redefine the phrase balancing act.
The only problem was that the scientists had not written the report
That is false. Lindzen has never claimed that he wasn’t one of the 11 scientists who prepared the report.
publicly opposed the conclusion
Again – false. He opposed the executive summary, not the report. Besides, an assertion like that should be linked to the comment source (a WSJ commentary), not to the document being disputed.
Lindzen WSJ commentary
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As usual, far too much public attention was paid to the hastily prepared summary rather than to the body of the report.
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He was one of the 11 scientists on the panel. None of them ‘prepared’ the report. Some clerical person on staff did that (gimme a break) the point of Sowell’s column was that the reports are crafted to favor whatever the report funders would like promoted; in this case, the environmentalist agenda of human caused global warming.
…Which is precisely what Lindzen IS saying. That he would like to skew the betting odds in his favor shows his risk aversion. A point in his favor, IMO, considering the subject matter.
The fearmongering surrounding the reporting on global warming is just another instance of the Socialist Left grasping at any straw that will keep them in power, or gain them more power. It’s no different than the breathless reports of the latest ‘terrorist threat’ just another attempt to manipulate public opinion.
…And a pretty transparent one, at that.