EPA fiats threaten American lives, livelihoods, living standards and life spans
Guest essay by Paul Driessen
The United States will “do more,” before it’s “too late” to prevent “dangerous” global warming, President Obama told Berliners last week. If Congress won’t act, he will, by regulating carbon dioxide emissions from power plants, increasing subsidies and reduce environmental overview for wind and solar projects on federal lands, and issuing other rules that will adversely affect economic growth and job creation.
Indeed, his Environmental Protection Agency is already devising new rules that will sharply curtail carbon dioxide emissions, by regulating thousands of facilities that use hydrocarbon energy – and thus ultimately almost everything Americans make, grow, ship, eat and do.
However, the manmade global warming “disasters” exist only in computer models and assertions by scientists who are addicted to billions in government Climate Armageddon grants. Moreover, the “preventative measures” are far worse than the disasters EPA claims to be preventing.
Even the most diehard alarmists have finally recognized that average global temperatures have hardly budged since 1997, even as atmospheric levels of plant-fertilizing CO2 climbed steadily. For many areas, the past winter was among the coldest in decades; the USA and Britain just recorded one their coldest springs on record; and satellite data show that Earth has actually cooled slightly since 2002.
The frequency and severity of hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and droughts are no different from observed trends and cycles over the last century. 2012 set records for the fewest strong tornadoes since 1954 and the number of years with no category 3 or higher hurricane making US landfall. (The vicious tornadoes of recent weeks underscore how quickly the weather can swing back to normal patterns.) Arctic sea ice is within a few percentage points of “normal” levels for the past fifty years, and the rate of sea level rise is not accelerating.
These facts completely contradict computer model predictions and alarmist claims. Moreover, as Climategate and numerous studies have shown, the “science” behind EPA’s ruling that carbon dioxide “endangers” human health and welfare is conjectural, manufactured, manipulated and even fraudulent.
EPA is supposed to protect our environment, health and welfare. Instead, it “safeguards” us from exaggerated or illusory risks – by issuing mountains of costly, intrusive regulations that endanger our health, wellbeing and wildlife far more than any reasonably foreseeable effects from climate change.
This accumulation of anti-hydrocarbon restrictions and penalties is putting EPA in control of nearly every aspect of our lives. Fuel, compliance and business costs will soar. Companies will be forced to outsource work to other countries, reduce work forces, shift people to part-time status, or close their doors.
Poor and minority families will be unable to heat and cool their homes properly, pay their rent or mortgage, buy clothing and medicine, take vacations, pay their bills, give to charity, and save for college and retirement.
With twelve million Americans already out of work, and another eight million working multiple lower-paying, part-time jobs, EPA’s global warming and 1,920 other rules over the past four years translate into unprecedented sleep deprivation, lower economic and educational status, and soaring anxiety and stress. That will mean greater risk of strokes and heart attacks; higher incidences of depression, alcohol, drug, spousal and child abuse; more suicides; and declining overall life expectancy.
EPA’s new 54.5 mpg fuel efficiency standards will force more people into smaller, lighter, less safe cars – causing thousands of needless additional serious injuries and deaths every year – in the name of preventing illusory climate and oil and gas depletion crises.
Federal regulators use the same phony climate change and energy depletion arguments to justify letting wind turbine operators slaughter millions of birds and bats every year – including bald and golden eagles, hawks, condors and whooping cranes. They continue to promote and subsidize $50-per-gallon biofuels, to replace oil and natural gas that the world still has in abundance – thanks to new exploration, drilling and production technologies. This focus on biofuels also means more rainforests and other wildlife habitats are being cut down in the name of “renewable” energy.
EPA and President Obama never consider any of this, in calculating the supposed “benefits” of their onerous regulations. They refuse to recognize that their hysterical claims of climate cataclysms are increasingly indefensible. They ignore the damage that their heavy-handed rules impose on our health, welfare and environmental quality.
EPA finds, punishes and even targets anyone who violates any of its ten thousand commandments, even inadvertently. The agency’s climate change actions, however, are not inadvertent. They are deliberate, and their effects are harmful and far reaching. They will affect every American and 100% of our economy.
And yet, these increasingly powerful bureaucrats – who seek and acquire ever more control over our lives – remain faceless, nameless, unelected and unaccountable. They operate largely behind closed doors, issuing regulations and arranging sweetheart “sue and settle” legal actions with radical environmentalist groups, to advance ideological agendas, without regard for their impacts on our lives, livelihoods, living standards, health, welfare and environment.
They know that, for them, there is rarely any real transparency, accountability or consequences – even for gross stupidity, major screw-ups, flagrant abuses or deliberate harm.
We need to save our environment from environmentalists and EPA – and safeguard our liberties, living standards and lives against the arrogance of too-powerful politicians and bureaucrats. How we achieve this, while protecting our lives and environment from real risks, is one of the greatest challenges we face.
________________
Paul Driessen is senior policy advisor for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power – Black death.
© Paul Driessen * June 20, 2013
Published in the Washington Times, Monday, June 24, 2013
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/jun/24/climate-alarmisms-10000-commandments/
“reduce environmental overview for wind and solar projects on federal lands”
Interesting how protecting the envirnoment is so important that we must stop protecting the environment to acheive it.
even more interesting…..is when the real environmental and pollution/health issues are not even talked about any more
Environmentalists must be up in arms…………
Hotair did a post: Pro-Obama group to environmental activists: It’s probably best to just avoid economic arguments altogether. My comment:
“We must de-develop the United States.” -O’s Science Czar
You know why they are going to avoid economic arguments, because other than the bs pretense of fighting climate change, Obama and the radical greens real motivation is to sack the economy. Really. Obama’s “Science” Czar John Holdren said it as early as 1973, way before the agw scare; Holdren’s words: “A massive campaign must be launched to de-develop the United States… [we] must design a stable, low-consumption economy.”
De-develop the United States?
Anything that promotes the economy in any way would be anathema to someone that wants to “de-develop the United States.” And Holdren has not recanted his position, and Holdren has remained as Obama’s trusted advisor for 5 years.
And energy is the most important key to economic vitality. So economic arguments won’t work here. Because Obama is simply thrusting a dagger into our economic heart by critically weakening our energy sector. Energy will be less abundant, and potentially much more expensive, especially electricity. There’s no upside. Industry and families are going to hurt – badly. Look what’s happening in Europe, and especially England. We are headed down that scary path.
“We have wished, we ecofreaks, for a disaster… to bomb us into the stone age, where we might live like Indians, with our localism, our appropriate technology, our gardens, our homemade religion, guilt free at last.” -Stewart Brand, Whole Earth Catalogue
“We’ve got to ride the global warming issue. Even if the theory of global warming is wrong, we will be doing the right thing …” -leftist Senator Tim Wirth, 1993
“Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn’t it our responsibility to bring that about?” -Maurice Strong, ex UNEP Director
“We have to offer up scary scenarios… each of us has to decide the right balance between being effective [dishonest] and being honest [ineffective].” -Stephen Schneider, lead ipcc author, 1989
“The only way to get our society to truly change is to frighten people with the possibility of a catastrophe.” -Daniel Botkin, ex Chair of Environmental Studies, UCSB
“….by regulating thousands of facilities that use hydrocarbon energy – and thus ultimately almost everything Americans make, grow, ship, eat and do.”
That is the bottom line. Carbon is at the heart of the very definition of “orgainic”. Carbon is life.
Control carbon and you control everything that eats sleeps and breathes.
Science be damned, that is what the eco-fascits are interested in. Obama also wants a “controlling” interest.
There are around 100,000 excess cold deaths in the US per year now. I bet this will quadruple it. These regulations will not go into effect untill 2018 when Obama has left office so it will be the next president saying it was Obama’s fault.
To paraphrase another famous statement … it has become necessary to destroy the environment in order to save it … 🙁
MarkW says:
June 26, 2013 at 11:36 am
“reduce environmental overview for wind and solar projects on federal lands”
Interesting how protecting the envirnoment is so important that we must stop protecting the environment to acheive it.
*
You summed it up perfectly, Mark. Makes you wonder when people are going to:
a) notice
b) get up in arms about it
When will skeptics put away all euphemisms and directly position the science fraud to the Green political structure?
Very few technical skeptics denounce the AGW political movement directly. Mocking the irrational science claims only takes you so far.
It’s a good article but the criminal enterprise isn’t going to stop because of it.
Eric: ” Look what’s happening in Europe, and especially England. We are headed down that scary path.”
Nothing to do the price of energy , all about bailing out the banks. The UK upped about as much to bailed thier banks as the US did. Now look at the ratio of (non banking) GDP or population. Almost an order of magnitude smaller than US.
At the bankers’ casino it’s one rule : heads we win, tails you loose.
Don’t confuse that with anything else.
Well, if they are serious, there should be an immediate USA ban, on carbonated beverages, including sparkling wines, and a complete ban on the production and use of dry ice.
A study:
Anthropogenic aerosol forcing of Atlantic tropical storms
N. J. Dunstone, et al. Nature Geoscience (2013) doi:10.1038/ngeo1854
Received 04 December 2012 Accepted 15 May 2013 Published online 23 June 201
presented in one of your other posts:
Asia’s air pollution may be keeping tropical storm activity down
Posted on June 25, 2013 by Anthony Watts
demonstrates that the inclusion of pollution (aerosols) data into the climate model better predicted historical hurricane activity in the Atlantic, more so than using natural climatic events.
Increased level of aerosols were consistent with decreased levels of hurricane activity,more so than was found from natural cycles. Otherwise, increased levels of aerosols influenced the climatic conditions that determine whether or not tropical storms develop and intensify into hurricanes.
Then, explain to me why changes in the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere would not have an effect on climate and weather patterns over a period of time? Why would it not be prudent to adopt measures to mitigate the impact that human activity has on increasing levels of CO2 ?
More musings from the same dude who promisd to cut the deficit in half and close Gitmo.
Talk is cheap, but reading a telprompter makes you an expert,
george e. smith says:
June 26, 2013 at 11:59 am
Well, if they are serious, there should be an immediate USA ban, on carbonated beverages, including sparkling wines, and a complete ban on the production and use of dry ice.
And an immediate halt on exhaling.
🙂
Warmer, colder – who cares? As Jacques Chirac said when the Kyoto Protocol was signed, “It’s the first step toward global governance.”
JohnWho@June 26, 2013 at 12:14 pm
…at least until the population reduction goal is achieved.
the real crime is when the Federal Government begins taking over valuable family owned Farm Land throuth eminent domain laws in order to place Wind and Solar power generatiion facilities on this now “Federal Land”
Always 1 misspelling in everything we do, just to see if you’re paying attention
“A.D. Everard says:
June 26, 2013 at 11:55 am
Makes you wonder when people are going to:
a) notice
b) get up in arms about it”
People are too busy watching the Zimmerman trial now.
If you can’t get them up in arms over the NSA snooping or the IRS targeting people you won’t get them up in arms about carbon.
Too complicated a notion masked with a feel good wrapping.
Without the fortunate surge in shale gas and oil production, the US would be rooted already (by its govt). Without such oil and gas, the UK and Europe are rooted already.
daddyjames – Are we sure that the aerosols referred to are man-made? Is it possible that they are natural, eg. as in Svensmark’s theory? Just asking.
Let’s not forget all pets have to be forbidden. They have no useful purpose, consume precious resources, thus generating CO2 emissions, and transform oxygen into CO2 pollution.
Despite all the evidence contradicting the AGW theory, governments all over the world are still blindly riding the fight-against-climate-change bandwagon. Nothing seems to be able to stop the enormous inertia that faith in global warming has accumulated.
Utilities should cut the power to Government offices for about a week. Let them see what the future they desire holds.
BernardP @June 26, 2013 at 12:47 pm
Perhaps that is because, in their minds, global warming leads to global government. However, the governments which are leading the charge would not likely run the global government. That role will be demanded for the not-yet-developing countries, in the name of social justice.
“and reduce environmental overview for wind and solar projects on federal lands”
You know he’s nuts when he takes two terms in office to make any paperwork headway on federal lands management related to solar and wind. Labeling it with gigawatts of capacity on those paper shuffled lands amounts to laughing at the dolt public along the way. That is not even getting to the insanity of locating grid-competitive, solar cost leader projects in remote areas to serve far away cities. The transmission line costs are not free and the efficiency falls over those distances. They don’t even bother to understand what makes sense in their “don’t pick winners” misdirection plays. That should further demonstrate that this is all fund raiser fluff and puff and not even close to policy or real goal setting. We would be a real basket case nation if the interstate highway system had been sold and administered in this faked manner.
“Are we sure that the aerosols referred to are man-made?”
Or, are we sure that aerosols aren’t just another fudge factor to make the models fit reality?
I am not American but to have someone announce in a speech that they are going to usurp due process in order to pass laws sounds illegal to me.
Don’t understand all this about doing the damage through Executive Orders or whatever it is called. Obama needs money to do all this and if Congress simply refuse to include the money in their budget proposals what can Obama do? Congress can defund EPA in areas Obama wants them to pursue and deny The White House discretionary money and threaten other departments with defunding if they transfer money allocated for other uses. Sorry but I am living in UK and maybe do not understand US “machinations”
What’s wrong with smaller cars, especially for commuting? Regardless of the AGW scam we should be using energy as efficiently as possible. Single passenger vehicles weighing 6,000 lbs doesn’t make sense.
@Mike Jonas
I can only let the statements from the authors speak for themselves. I encourage you to read the paper, and draw your own conclusions. From the abstract:
“We show that anthropogenic aerosols lowered the frequency of tropical storms over the twentieth century. However, sharp declines in anthropogenic aerosol levels over the North Atlantic at the end of the twentieth century allowed the frequency of tropical storms to increase.”
@ThinkingScientist
I fail to grasp how introducing measured data that allows for modeling of the environmental conditions – such that it better matches the historical record of tropical storm/hurricane formation – is to be considered a “fudge factor”. What the paper shows is that inclusion of this data, along with the natural variations present in the atmosphere, is better able to replicate the historical activity of tropical storm/hurricane records than just using the natural data alone.
Poor and minority families will be unable to heat and cool their homes properly…
Sorry, I know this is O.T. but that sentence rankles me. It is clearly correct to state that the poor will suffer more than others – regardless of ethnicity. But minorities per se? There’s really no need to give minorities a special victim status; being poor is what counts here, not ethnicity.
EPA = Carbon Inquisitors.
Be afraid, be very afraid.
You fight fire with fire and you fight the EPA with the same words they would use. Save the starving children of the world by feeding the plants that supply the nutrition their starving bodies need by producing the life giving CO2. For the EPA to restrict CO2 production, is to sentence millions of children to a painful death by starvation. Since the duty of the EPA is to protect the environment it only makes sense that it protect the environment for plants as well as humans. This requires that it recognizes CO2 as essential to life on this planet and enact decrees that force CO2 emitters to increase their production of CO2.
Since CO2 is essential to life, it is also essential to the security of the USA, therefor it’s production must be increased.
daddyjames says:
June 26, 2013 at 12:01 pm
“Then, explain to me why changes in the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere would not have an effect on climate and weather patterns over a period of time?”
1] Because CO2 is not an aerosol. It’s really not even a “pollutant”.
2] Because the CO2 “drives” climate hypotheses have a 100% prediction failure rate.
@kent Blaker
No one is calling for complete elimination of CO2 from the atmosphere, and the exaggerated claims in your post certainly do not facilitate any reasonable discussion on the matter.
And, its not a matter of growing enough food – at least globally. A large component is the lack of access to food – because of insufficient infrastructure that allows for the storage and distribution of food in many areas of the world. I would encourage you to investigate how much food goes to waste prior to be consumed. We already grow enough food to sufficiently feed the world. If we could only get it to people before it rots.
EW3 says:
June 26, 2013 at 12:34 pm
People are too busy watching the Zimmerman trial now.
If you can’t get them up in arms over the NSA snooping or the IRS targeting people you won’t get them up in arms about carbon.
—
It’s not surprising that people who don’t pay income taxes (47% and rising) are not concerned regarding IRS abuses. Heck, one wag recently took a petition to a couple of CA colleges asking people to support the IRS in it’s crackdown on conservative groups.
He got quite a few signatures.
Fascism, it’s no longer creeping it’s way into the body politic, it’s now up to a slow jog.
Man Bearpig says:
June 26, 2013 at 1:09 pm
—
In CA they passed an citizens initiative a few years ago to put a new law on the books.
A group sued the state govt claiming that the law was unconstitutional.
The state govt agreed with the group and decided not to defend the law in court.
Unsurprisingly, the court ruled that the law was unconstittutional.
The group that led the initiative effort wasn’t pleased with the state conspiring to scuttle the law they worked to pass. So they stepped in and appealed.
The Supreme Court just ruled that citizens did not have standing to appeal the first decision.
Regardless of how you feel about the initiative in question, and it is very controversial, the method by which it was tossed out should scare anyone who cares about the rule of law.
We now have Supreme Court approved method by which the executive branch can repeal any law they don’t like, without having to get the legislative branch to act.
All they have to do is get somebody to sue, and then refuse to defend. The courts have ruled that if the executive does not defend a law in court, nobody else has standing to do so in it’s stead.
John Peter says:
June 26, 2013 at 1:15 pm
—
You understand how govt is supposed to work.
However, our current adminstration has decided that it doesn’t need congress to fund anything. They just shift money around however they please, and if they don’t have enough just get the Federal Reserve to pring more up.
Steve from Rockwood says:
June 26, 2013 at 1:16 pm
—
If a smaller car is what you want, feel free to buy one.
You are not free to force others to buy the kind of car you want them to drive.
daddyjames says:
June 26, 2013 at 1:24 pm
—
There’s the problem, it isn’t measured data. For most of the past century we have only the vaguest guesses as to how much aerosols were produced in the US. We have even less knowledge of how much was being produced by the rest of the world.
In actuality, the authors added the amount of aerosols needed to get the models to produce the results they were looking for.
This is just silly:
“EPA’s new 54.5 mpg fuel efficiency standards will force more people into smaller, lighter, less safe cars – causing thousands of needless additional serious injuries and deaths every year – in the name of preventing illusory climate and oil and gas depletion crises.”
I have a 7 seater MPV that can get over 50 MPG now, its safe, etc,etc. difference is I live in Europe.
Irrespective of climate change, fuel costs money, and the higher the MPG the better for the consumer. Why not have targets for fuel efficiency, and sell lots of cars to the world. Or does the USA want to give up that market to non American car/truck industry. Just call the co2 justification an unintended consequence, forcing manufactures to raise their technological game..
(full disclosure,I also have a V8 sportscar, but it only weighs 1040kg)
” Steve from Rockwood says:
What’s wrong with smaller cars, especially for commuting? Regardless of the AGW scam we should be using energy as efficiently as possible. Single passenger vehicles weighing 6,000 lbs doesn’t make sense.”
No, Steve, you’ve got it wrong.
It is MY choice as to which car I drive. If I want to drive a 6 litre gas-guzzling SUV or super-car, then pay for the inordinate amount of petrol it consumes, that is my RIGHT. As a free person I have a choice. It is up to me as to how I disburse my disposable income. No government nor other party has any say in the matter.
Please acquaint yourself with the concepts enshrined in your own Constitution called Liberty and Freedom.
We here in the Socialist UK envy your possession of that most wondrous document.
Thank god I left the “West” (USA, Europe, Australia) a long time ago. The Europeans are emigrating in droves to South America. Chile is recruiting workers in Spain. Very fortunately (in this case AGW), the Latins generally do not take things that seriously and AGW drivel will probably never really get a grip here. The only ones that did (Spain) are suffering from having done so.LOL
Barry Woods says:
June 26, 2013 at 2:09 pm
I only can agree with your words…
It is a general misconception that smaller, lighter cars are less safe. Mostly it is a matter of speed (quadratic) at the very moment of impact. And the total mass that needs to be stopped within less than one meter on impact. The impact of two tanks hitting each other is far more dangerous for the drivers and passengers than of two small cars at the same speed…
Of course it makes a difference if a light car hits a heavier car (but even the heavier car will not survive a hit by a 30-tons truck, neither be safer when hitting a wall or a tree). So one can opt for more lighter cars (with all the benefits of less fuel use) or buy only bigger and bigger just to be the lucky guy that is in the heaviest car at impact…
@MarkW
If you can provide that data demonstrating that this is what was done by the authors, I will be willing to discuss that with you – otherwise it is simply an unverifiable accusation.
@JPeden
Arguing that adding a gas to the atmosphere has no impact on the weather? If that were true, it would never rain and we would not be here discussing this.
EW3 says: @ June 26, 2013 at 12:34 pm
….. If you can’t get them up in arms over the NSA snooping or the IRS targeting people you won’t get them up in arms about carbon.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I fear you are correct. Also it does not matter what we try to do.
If we sit back and do nothing we have a pseudo-USA , Agenda 21/Smart Growth and find ourselves pack off to ‘transit cities’ and a nice cozy 14 ft X 14 ft cell in LA or Boston or New York where “the community has a right to put a price on the right to live in it … If people are fit to live, let them live under decent human conditions. If they are not fit to live, kill them in a decent human way.” ~ George Bernard Shaw, Prefaces (London: Constable and Co., 1934), p. 296. (Some see what is going on link but they sound like conspiracy nuts.)
Unfortunately herding us into micro-mini apartments is EXACTLY what is planned by the National Multi Housing Council and your local town or city who is on board through ICLEI. Here are some of the laws and bills floated over the last several years.
Global Governance and the destruction of western civilization has been a long term plan since the 1930’s according to Pascal Lamy Director-General of the World Trade Organization.
SO if you have been paying attention you have probably figured out the goal is to get rid of the USA as a sovereign independent autonomous country and to implement a world wide EU like ‘Global Governance’ run by a bunch of bureaucrats.
If we as a group of citizens protest too violently they are ready for that too. (Another old list I made)
Martial Law Executive Orders – This link compares Clinton’s with Obama’s and has links to the documents
Essentially, in a crisis the government takes over all resources including you and your property.
Newest: Executive order 13603 SEE: Forbes 4/29/2012 .
Published: Saturday, February 23, 2008 Canada and the U.S. have signed an agreement that paves the way for the militaries from either nation to send troops across each other’s borders during an emergency, Canada-U.S. pact allows cross-border military activity
http://www.northcom.mil/News/2008/021408.html
Sec. 1042 of the Act, “Use of the Armed Forces in Major Public Emergencies,” effectively overturns what is known as posse comitatus, a law, passed in 1878, that prohibits the use of the regular military within the U.S. Borders.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/bush-paves-the-way-for-martial-law/5150
In 2006, the Military Commissions Act was passed which, in addition to legalizing torture, allows the president and military courts to declare anyone an enemy combatant without basic civil rights like the writ of habeas corpus.
http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/rightsandfreedoms/a/habeuscorpus.htm
Kellogg Brown & Root—then a subsidiary of Halliburton—was handed a $385 million contract to establish “temporary detention and processing capabilities” http://news.pacificnews.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=eed74d9d44c30493706fe03f4c9b3a77
On April 18, 2008 Federal law enforcement agencies, sheriffs offices as well state and local police forces in three states coordinated a vast round up called “Operation Sudden Impact” that result in hundreds of citations for traffic violations. http://www.nationalterroralert.com/updates/2008/04/15/operation-sudden-impact-leads-to-several-arrests/
More recently we have had the NSA spying scandal and the IRS harassment scandal which allegedly extended to infiltration, snooping and using the IRS to harass Christian churches if they were identified as places where large numbers of anti-Obama citizens congregated for worship.
More alarming is the purchase of huge quantities of ammo by DHS, now under investigation and military equipment given to local police. Small police departments across America are collecting battlefield-grade arsenals thanks to a program that allows them to get their hands on military surplus equipment – amphibious tanks, night-vision goggles, and even barber chairs or underwear – at virtually no cost, except for shipment and maintenance.
Heck we are not even allowed to protest anymore without ‘Permission’
Goodbye, First Amendment: ‘Trespass Bill’ will make protest illegal: The House of Representatives approved a bill on Monday that outlaws protests in instances where some government officials are nearby, whether or not you even know it.
And forget about a Trial by Jury, that got revoked too; comment @ ChiefIO
So they have the unwashed masses pretty well boxed in especially since 80% of them are absolutely clueless.
…..
Interdependence from above essay by Pascal Lamy is a KEY Phrase. You see it again in this IMF Report: Convergence, Interdependence, and Divergence
Several years ago I saw the plans for what country would concentrate on which sort of good and services but I did not keep a copy. Al Gore was talking of it when he was VP – “While presenting a national award to a Colorado FFA member, Gore asked the student what his/her life plans were. Upon hearing that the FFA member wanted to continue on in production agriculture, Gore reportedly replied that the young person should develop other plans because our production agriculture is being shifted out of the U.S. to the Third World.” – Ag Journal, Billings, Montana. (My Ag extension agent heard this first hand and was royally P.O.)
Here is a paper on the pros and cons of Interdependence Dale C. Copeland, “Economic Interdependence and War: A Theory of Trade Expectations,” International Security, Vol. 20, no.4 (Spring 1996) and here is the Interdependence Movement at CUNY
Another important concept is ‘The Third Way’ crafted by Anthony Giddens of the London School of Economics and pushed by Bill Clinton and Tony Blair
EM Smith (an economist by training) has a good definition of the Third Way
………………
It occurred to me that the push for Agenda 21 and the
closed citiestransit cities that result is really all about collecting every last drop of ‘Taxes’ from the serfs. Closed city zoning will not allow small businesses for long and corporations take the taxes out of your wage before you ever get a chance to see the money. Making corporations into tax collectors is the only thing that has kept the ignorant masses from a major revolt in the past. That and the skillful hiding of taxes as inflation and passed on taxes…. 151 taxes or half the cost of a loaf of bread….Steve from Rockwood asked (at June 26, 2013 at 1:16 pm): What’s wrong with smaller cars, especially for commuting?
The government also requires crash worthiness, disallows small diesel engines and mandates other “safety” features that add to the weight. The real problem is physics, if you want a car that can make it above 60 on the highway (in a reasonable amount of time), that takes energy.
Understanding the absurd 55 mpg requirement requires understanding the electric car farce. They will allow car makers to sell electric and mixed cars with high equivalent mpg ratings simply don’t add up. If they did, I would be the first to buy one without a government rebate. The fuel cost savings do not come close to making up for the higher price of the car even assuming lots of ideal conditions like minimal heat and A/C, no battery wear, etc.
The government is pushing a charade just like everything else about CAGW. If they can do pretend science, they can do pretend engineering.
BernardP says:
June 26, 2013 at 12:47 pm
…………governments all over the world are still blindly riding the fight-against-climate-change bandwagon. Nothing seems to be able to stop the enormous inertia that faith in global warming has accumulated.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
You have it backwards.
The globalists are riding CAGW as hard as they can to push the world into the ‘new model’ of universal feudalism. They want to get everything in place before the ‘Great Unwashed’ wake up and discover they are being herded into a cage. Unfortunately for them the weather is not cooperating and herding a mass of people is worse than herding cats.
@ Barry Woods says:
June 26, 2013 at 2:09 pm
Barry do you live in the UK ? If so did you take acccount of the smaller American Gallon ? it’s only 80% of the size of an Imperial Gallon.
I feel sorry for the US, the Federal Executive is just running rings around the constitution and common sense,
GirlsGovernment gone wild. The Constitutional Fathers didn’t foresee the capability of modern bureaucracy. It must be curtailed.Gail Combs,
The leftists/socialists/communists invaded and took over the green movement in the 1980s, following the Brundtland report.
With the fall of the USSR, they were bereft of purpose and arguments; they seized upon the Brundtland report with a renewed fervor(u)r.
The current environmental (sic) movement is a red movement in green disguise; hence Watermelon.
Here’s a Wikipedia link, that must be taken with a suspicion of political bias, but it covers the facts:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brundtland_Commission
Why am I so aware of this? Because during the early to mid ’80s, I was still a socialist, and I saw my colleagues frothing at the mouth at this opportunity to snatch victory from defeat, to attack the evil Capitalist Western civilization; to provide an excuse for the dictatorship of the proletariat.
daddyjames, if you want to be able to preserve and distribute food to places far removed from the point of production, you need energy. Increasing its cost isn’t going to help.
daddyjames says:
June 26, 2013 at 1:43 pm
Barry Woods June 26, 2013 at 2:09 pm
The free market can decide how much extra it costs to buy a more fuel efficient car. Government mandates, which are generally not based upon the laws of physics, but politics, cannot do this. What said government mandates do do is produce a byzantian set of rules and croney capitalism.
As many have said many times before on WUWT, Human-Caused-Climate-Change has never, ultimately, been about climate, it is about CONTROL. Countries that already have Socialist governments, e.g., Argentina, Brazil, and China, have already reached the end of the Road to Serfdom (Friedrich Hayek). They HAVE a dictatorship of the elite. The Demonocrats are still working on it. They still need excuses to steal American’s liberty and private property.
In that, there is hope. Hang in there, all you freedom-loving people of the British Commonwealth, the U.S.A., and the rest of you in other lands — the main CAGW battle is over. It’s just mopping up time, now.
Reality is daily resoundingly refuting the Cult of Climatology. While there will be many more battles in the perennial War for Truth, the CO2 battle is DONE. That’s why the Climatology Cult’s high priests are screaming so shrilly, now. When you have no real ammunition, you make as much noise as you can. Well, LOL, it is becoming daily more and more obvious to EVERYONE (e.g., Carbon Credit Market Collapse, Dope essentially conceding the oil sands pipeline will be approved, Boris Johnson switching sides…) that CAGW is so over.
Okay, it’s not obvious to the Cult of Climatology general membership — ignore them. They are mere, unthinking, followers. Until someone wants help, it is NO USE TO TRY TO HELP THEM. When they sincerely seek truth, they will find it. After the first couple of questions or so, it is easy to see whether someone is a genuine truth seeker or only a troll seeking to justify his or her fallacies.
The Cult’s preposterous propaganda is now appealing only to their general membership. It is not winning any new converts. Their pitiful little “wierding” campaign will not succeed. The Fantasy Science Club is clearly now in its death throes, wildly thrashing about, firing off blitzes of unsupported conjecture and speculation, desperately trying to delay its inevitable demise.
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Re: Dope and his stupid speech this week, Congress still is. Don’t let that tinpot dictator frighten you with his “words, just words.” [Dope c. 2008] The House is doing GREAT things and, once we get the Senate back to sanity, WE CAN STILL GET OUR COUNTRY BACK ON TRACK. Sure, it will take years to fully recover, but, we can and WILL, even now, get off the Road to Serfdom.
FREEDOM LIVES!
Hey, Rocky Road (LOVE that flavor!) — EXCELLENT refutation of “daddy.” Don’t sweat the italics thing, it was clear where the nonsense left off and your fine reasoning began.
@RockyRoad
I just pointed out some easily verifiable facts that can be quickly found if you bother. And I fail to understand why my comments elicit such a hostile response.
“reduce environmental overview for wind and solar projects on federal lands”; isn’t that how Obama got the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
In Australia, according to this “expert” we have only 7 years before its too late.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-06-17/climate-commission-report-warns-emissions-need-to-start-falling/4757550
Thanks Rockyroad, Daddy complains about food waste but in the developing world not much food goes to waste,
The best way of getting food to starving children is to grow it locally, which is best done with increased levels of CO2. To go head to head with the EPA and your President you need to go to apple pie and motherhood issues. CO2 helps to feed the children and the grandchildren. Tie it in that way. Focus on the children.CO2 saves lives and it grows more apples.
@ kent baker
Could you provide any data to verify your claim that food waste in the developing world is not a problem?
I don’t see that as a complaint of mine, merely an observation.
And I agree, improving the infrastructure would cause an increase in CO2 emissions. No argument there,
The long-term geological pattern is the sequestration of CO2 in limestone, coal, etc. This is a death-spiral for plants (and everything else short of extremophiles). It is our duty and obligation to reverse the process.
I’ve had it! Will someone tell me what the meaning of “preventation” is?? The root of “preventative”?
In the prevention of a disaster we can take preventive measures. I simply don’t know how to take preventative measures.
Snow and light vehicles are not a good mix.
Fundamentally industry has failed itself- there was naturally going to be push back from pollution and side effects of industry so they left it up to government to regulate them which they influenced by lobbying which lead to this mess now- the distance of government people from industry means they know very little, assume a lot and apply their politics so much to regulation solution- even if you think carbon dioxide should be regulated- government fails dismally at that. They should have taken the bull by the horns and set up their own collective regulator for which government only set the general results to be achieved and has some general involvement in the framework and preferably follow a science/economics based process.
“Single passenger vehicles weighing 6,000 lbs doesn’t make sense.”
The Toyota Camry weighs 3190 pounds at curbside. Perhaps you can identify the models of “single passenger vehicle ” you are fantasizing about. Or not.
LOL, Hinckley Buzzard, a 3 TON car! That really “doesn’t make sense.” [re: Steve from Rockwood at 1:16PM 6/26/13]
Maybe a Humvee …. loaded for bear with groceries and kids and the dogs and… . #[:)]]
“The weight of a military Humvee is 5,200 lb., without cargo.”
[http://www.ehow.com/info_7897735_military-humvee-specifications.html]
Maybe all the coal power generating plants should have three or four day “accidental” failures at the same time – making sure, of course, that the grid covering Virgina and D.C. is the main part of the fail zone. It might help make the elected jerks realize what they are messing with.
Hi Janice Moore:
Actually, Steve from Rockwood is sort of correct. A Ford
F350 Super Duty pickup has got a curb weight of 6,622 pounds. I have seen
such vehicles being driven with no passengers a number of times.
Where Steve from Rockwood doesn’t get it is that
mandating what vehicles we drive is yet another instance of government
overstepping its Constitutional bounds. A small, efficient, limited
Federal government that doesn’t try to do too much was the intent–
notice the 9th amendment to the Constitution?–not the overreaching,
over-regulating behemoth we now have.
Thanks, Chris R., for the correction. And, yes, indeed, the key issue is free markets with the BUYER choosing the type of car they want to buy.
LOL, one of my dream cars has been for several years a 1964 Cadillac (with removable hard top), painted metallic cranberry with a white leather interior, and a personalized license plate that says: FREEDOM.
To Janice Moore:
That would indeed be one AWESOME car, especially the
license plate. I hope you can someday achieve this dream!
Thanks, Chris R.. If I EVER do, I’ll post something on WUWT and I’ll take you for a ride (if you appear able, I’ll even let you drive it!)
Lighter weight cars won’t make you less safe if everyone else starts driving them. And they won’t worsen your outcome from crashing with an 18-wheeler.
Even though global warming appears to me less of a problem than claimed, there are plenty of other reasons to make cars more fuel-efficient. The oil supply will last longer, less demand means lower prices, and less consumption means less air pollution and less fuel cost to car owners.
There are means available to improve fuel efficiency. For example, a better automatic transmission would be a manual one controlled by a robot. Batteries, tires and mats could probably be made lighter with some effort. Axles could be hollowed with very little loss of strength. Headrests could probably be made less dense with some effort. A lot of nickling-and-diming the weight down would allow a smaller engine and lighter weight transmission to be used. These ways to reduce fuel consumption won’t even weaken the car’s body.
Then, there is a hybrid technology, using a small engine to power a generator, which powers a battery and electric motor. The engine only has to supply the amount of horsepower needed on a sustained basis. This allows for regenerative braking, which greatly increases urban fuel efficiency. The battery does not have to be big in cars used where there are no mountains to drive up at high speed. The engine can be diesel, which alone would increase fuel efficiency. Electrodiesel technology has been in use for decades – that is how many trains are powered.
I remember when automakers had to be dragged kicking and screaming to introduce airbags. I am not confident they would implement something people would want without a government mandate.