The Capital Climate Action protest went on today in Washington DC with a march on the coal fired power plant. Amazingly, NASA’s Dr. James Hansen actually showed up and took the stage at the protest to complete his transformation from scientist to political activist. But, we”ll leave the issue of his appearance there for another discussion.
Here are some scenes from the live web feed today.
Dr. Jim Hansen gets ready to deliver his message at the protest
Here’s a chronological order of the protest in a series of screencaps from the video feed.
Arrival at the power plant.
So THAT’s what those stimulus checks are for.
The camera operator put the camera down on it’s side for about five minutes, giving us this picture. Must have needed to get a smoke.
Interesting things you can do with a scarf and coat hanger wire.
The Native Americans arrive to protest Black Mesa power plant.
The hemp hat trio sings for the crowd.
Bewildered or zoned? I can’t tell.
“Justicia Climatica”? I was confused as to the meaning of this, at first, but then I discovered it was Chilean
The camera operator has issues again…
Coal is dirty. Ok, but have you guys smelled yourselves lately?
Not only can we save the planet, we can show you how to make illegal copies of DVD’s!
Jimbo is warming up in the bullpen.
Closer.
Closer….
And Dr. Jim Hansen is on the air! He’s making a succinct point.
I’ll bet Jim had no idea he was being sponsored by Obama’s stimulus package….oh, wait.
After Dr. Hansen left the stage, a hip-hop group sang his praises. Time for the mute button.
A few observations:
- The snow didn’t seem to interfere with the determined masses walking through it.
- Rage boy wasn’t present, but maybe he missed his flight due to snow delays.
- Most of the speakers recycled everything we’ve already heard before, it was pretty boring.
- Lucia watched this simultaneously, she has some thoughts
- The one highlight was Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. saying that Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship “should be in jail… for all of eternity“. Oddly, Kennedy’s message seemed even a bit too extreme for some left leaning news outlets, such as AlterNet which didn’t mention it in this story on the protest though there were other quotes from Kennedy.
- The advertisements that kept popping up on the video certainly didn’t help the credibility.
- One of the chants was “No coal, no gas, no nukes, no kidding”. There was also “Nuclear Hell No”, “Biofuels hell no”. Apparently wind power and solar are the only options they endorse. Iwonder if Jim Hansen has figured this out yet, since he has advocated nuclear power.
- At no time did the simultaneous viewers counter ever reach 1000, the highest I saw was 970. Likewise the number of total viewers that were counted never exceeded 10,000, and the final I saw just before they went off air for the first live feed (with Hansen et al) was 9978. It appears that many people clicked to check it out, but few stayed for the long haul.
- There was lots of singing, chanting, and dancing. Drumsbeats and other percussive instruments filled the air. The native indians used to have rain dances to control the weather, these dances and chants seemed to be aimed at controlling the climate. How far we’ve come.
- They claimed victory and went home, nobody was arrested. Unfortunately I don’t think they realize that simply blocking the gates for a couple of hours is not quite the same as shutting down the boiler.
When it was all over this line from a famous sci-fi series came to mind. I think I’ll send it to Jimbo to hang on his wall:
“Thinking about what you can’t control only wastes energy, and creates its own enemy.“
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James Hansen truly is Lord of the Flies. Pass the conch piggy…
This crowd reminded me of the movie “The Day After”.
I must say that Hansen blends in perfectly.
I think the poster here must understand two important facts about this protest.
1. Although only a small group of protesters showed up at the event, 12000 people have been in a meeting with top Obama staff.
These 12000 people will be trained in organizing protests.
What we see here is the creation of a tool that enables Obama to enforce his political objectives by a controlled use of “public protest”.
This is potentially a very dangerous development which undermines the democratic system of the USA
Mao, Lenin, Stalin and Hitler knew the power of this tool which is currently used in Russia, Venezuela, Cuba and North Korea, in short, it is a well tested tool used by Communists, Socialists and dictators.
You can read all about the meeting here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/ethicalman/2009/03/obama_crowd_power.html
2. This is positive: There has been a counter protest.
The came with only thirty people but they were there and they drew media coverage.
from Myron Ebell in Washington:
“I was out there at our counter-protest today and it was cold. There were 6 or 7 hundred anti-coal protesters and about thirty of us. We spent a couple hundred bucks, they spent a few hundred thousand, and we got a significant fraction of the media.
“I’d like to do a cost benefit comparison of them and us using carbon dioxide emissions as the unit of value.
“A highlight was the Greenpeace truck and trailer with a big solar panel on top. It was covered with snow, so they had to use their generator for the sound system.”
from http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2009/03/02/morano-mocks-deadly-storm/
“Last night, Sen. Jim Inhofe’s office responded to forecasts of a dangerous storm with mockery.
“A winter storm sweeping up the East Coast with rain, snow, and ice has caused 350 car crashes in New Jersey, a 15-mile-long traffic jam in North Carolina, and four deaths from car accidents in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Long Island. Hundreds of thousands of households lost power from Georgia to Maine.
“Marc Morano, Sen. Inhofe’s environmental communications director, mocked the threat of the storm by pointing out it would take place at the same time as a protest of fossil-fueled global warming in Washington D.C.”
# Comment from: Dennis Webb March 3rd, 2009 at 9:56 am
I looked on the CCA site yesterday and it had a few “facts” about coal.
one of them struck me as odd (seeing as im starting up a CFB right now):
It said, coal plants are the “least job intensive” industry in the US. Now i have a couple problems with this statement. 1) its completely wrong. (each coal plant in the US employs roughly 2-300 people including shifts, management, labor, contractors varying on size) 2) a wind farm may employ alot of people to design it and build it but once its up and running, it only needs skeleton shifts to make sure they dont fly apart in high winds (see earlier post on wind turbines on WUWT) not to mention all the men and women who are employed to work in the coal mines to fuel this nation. its a good thing coal cant be outsourced. I suggest taking a look at their “facts” and letting them know exactly how rediculous they actually are.
Wow a few hundred turned up in a country with a population of a few hundred million. Meanwile over in Scotland “Plane stupid” are at it again:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/north_east/7920294.stm
If only Penn and Teller covered this…
Let us not be too quick to rush to judgment; Dr. Hansen may be on to something here. If the Washington DC coal powered electric generator is closed down and Washington DC is taken off the power grid, the ability of the looters to giveaway trillions of our dollars to their political cronies will be seriously impaired.
To save the Republic, let’s make Earth Hour a 24 hour, 7 day a week, 365 day a year event in Washington DC. Will the last person to leave the Whitehouse please blow out the candles.
Mike
D. King (01:39:54) :
It’s good to see Panama Jim
lol. Nice.
Surprised they aren’t marketing a “Panama Jim” action figure in toy stores. They could make one of Gore as well, and call them the “Climate Justice Brothers.”
As long as they weren’t “scratch n’ sniff,” I might actually buy one.
I would like everyone to remember this day and these images the next time Hansen makes one of his “jousting with jesters” comments…
Power Engineer (04:19:53) :
“I looked on the CCA site yesterday and it had a few “facts” about coal.
one of them struck me as odd (seeing as im starting up a CFB right now):
It said, coal plants are the “least job intensive” industry in the US. Now i have a couple problems with this statement. 1) its completely wrong. (each coal plant in the US employs roughly 2-300 people including shifts, management, labor, contractors varying on size) 2) a wind farm may employ alot of people to design it and build it but once its up and running, it only needs skeleton shifts to make sure they dont fly apart in high winds (see earlier post on wind turbines on WUWT) not to mention all the men and women who are employed to work in the coal mines to fuel this nation. its a good thing coal cant be outsourced. I suggest taking a look at their “facts” and letting them know exactly how rediculous they actually are”.
Power Engineer,
You can not compare coal and wind energy in terms of performance and continuity.
The output of a windmill is determined by the availability of wind.
No wind, no energy.
We need at least 1.000 windmills to deliver the energy provided by a menium sized coal plant.
The price for this energy is the price of the windmills + the costs of a back-up energy plant for periods without wind.
As a consequence the energy bill for consumers will double and if the back up plant is taxed for CO2 emission taxes the bill will triple.
Because this back-up plant must be able to start up and shut down quickly, this will be a gas power plant.
At this moment in the coal and gas are the cheapest solutions.
Both are available in abundance, sufficient to secure the US energy needs for at least the next 500 years.
The entire concept of so called “green energy”, wind, solar and bio fuels is a hoax
This was the “mother” of all demonstrations! (Gulf War I).
Back to the “stoned” age.
It’s interesting that their web site resembles some of the communist publications of the 60’s in color and tone.
Even more interesting that there does not appear to be any way to enter a “comment” anywhere on the site. Seems like a way to “silence their critics”
and/or “silence dissent” to me.
Windmills Energy Revolution?
The first horizontal axle windmill, according Wikipedia, was applied in Wales in the year 1291 AC.
The windmill was used for sawing, grinding and pumping water.
In the Netherlands wind wills were used to dry lakes, gain land from the sea and to regulate the water level.
The windmill was replaced by the steam engine which started the industrial revolution.
The steam engine was more reliable than the windmill and came with higher capacity.
Today some geniuses have decided that a windmill propelling a turbine is able to replace our coal based energy infrastructure.
A windmill ladies and gentleman is LOW TECH, LOW CAPACITY AND UNRELIABLE and can never replace coal power plants.
Therefore the so called Energy Revolution is a HOAX
I thought Vietnam was over…..
They claim 2500 attended, but really it’s about a fifth of that.
They claim the climate sensitivity to a doubling of co2 is 3C or more…….
Following that link, we see:
That tells us where this administration’s priorities are.
/Mr Lynn
Looking at the crowd, I now realize what a service the Grateful Dead had provided all those years. It gave these people something to do.
Ah yes, the magical moment of Dionysian tribal togetherness. Not quite a Woodstock-era event, but it still captures the spirit. And then let’s toss in a touch of civilization with an appearance of a moment of rationality in the person of Dr. Hansen.
Anthony,
“The day the Earth stood chilled”
Mr Watts this is the coffee police! Place the cup on the table and step back. No one will be hurt!
Put the keyboard down too! You don’t really want to hurt someone else with bad puns!
Mike 😉
These are the same folks that will sign any petition, even against dihydrogen monoxide.
They are joiners, not thinkers. The phrase “useful idiots” describes them perfectly.
They would be deserving of our pity were it not for the fact that idiocy reigns supreme in our schools, and in our government, and gets trumpeted by the MSM as science. The lunatics have indeed overtaken the asylum.
Sorry, this snide post and comments is irrelevant and self-indulgent. Why are you trying so hard to belittle some run-of-the-mill protest?
By the way its quite a stretch to suggest that the generic pop-up ads you saw have anything to do with the video stream. They’re as likely to be related to your own browsing patterns…
You know what they say in advertising: referring to a competitor’s marketing is a failure of your own.
REPLY: The advertising seems out of place given their fight against capitalism and profits. Other commenters below have addressed your other issues – Anthony
Is it just me being a silly woman, or are other women freaked out by the trenchcoat buttoned to his nose hairs and a hat pulled down to his bellybutton?
Seriously, I’ve never seen a person working at any wind farm I’ve seen. I haven’t really seen many turbines working either, for that matter. Wind farms aren’t even job intensive for machines.
Why are you trying so hard to belittle some run-of-the-mill protest?
1. I don’t think you have to try very hard.
2. It wasn’t billed as a run-of-the-mill protest. And Bobby Kennedy, James Hansen and members of Congress don’t typically bother with run-of-the-mill protests.
I guess Jim didn’t read the request:
I’m not impressed.
looks like jim hansen is trying to bring back the good old days of woodstock, flower power and free love…lmfao!!!…the National Aeronautical and Space Administration should be proud one of their top scientist’s spent the day on taxpayer dollars hanging out with a bunch of groupies freezing their asparagus’ off protesting hotair…you just cannot make this stuff up…priceless!!!