Guest post by Thomas Fuller
(Okay. Based on the assumption that overly cryptic titles of blog posts need to be explained early: Old Testament prophets predicting doom gave rise to the term ‘Jeremiahs’ after one prominent example, and their doom-laden screeds even got the term ‘jeremiads.’ Michael Tobis is lamenting the failure of climate activism of late and predicting horrible things will happen–very much like the Jeremiahs of old.
Tobis is a Research Scientist Associate (in practice, mostly a software engineer) who very rarely writes about climate science, preferring to pronounce on the sins and errors of journalists, bloggers and politicians. Instead of writing about what he knows, he writes about what angers him. He may well be an expert on climate science. He is not at all an expert on media criticism.
However, Tobis mostly sits crouched on the lilypad of his own weblog, and his posts are frequently written as if they were being croaked into the night, waiting vainly for a response.
So Three Dog Night was very wise when they wrote that Jeremiah Was a Bullfrog.)
Cap and Trade is dead. So says Joe Romm, so says the NY Times, so says the Atlantic.
Okay, what is next?
The wrong answer is C) Nothing. But thanks for playing our game. What will happen is that we will reframe the problem in a way that may be more acceptable to more people. That’s because restating the problem is much easier than readjusting the solutions so many have been working on. So we will start talking more about adaptation than mitigation, about regional resilience than global mean temperatures, about heat in the oceans rather than CO2 in the atmosphere. (All of which are fine with me.)
The world is not going to walk away from global warming quickly–even if many would like to run. Defeat doesn’t work like that in diplomacy. Cancun will still take place, options will still be floated, proposals bruited, etc.
But the surest sign that the air has gone out of the balloon is the decision to retain Rajendra Pachauri, as some gloomy Banquo’s ghost. If the IPCC had anything that was both new and real to offer, they’d have got a new guy in there.
So the diplomats will not acknowledge the failure of diplomacy. The mainstream media, having spilled more ink than an army of squids promoting the need to change our climate, will have to wait a respectable length of time before dropping the hot potato in favor of Lady Gaga or watching paint dry, whichever is more entertaining.
Domestic politicians won’t let go of their clubs until after the November elections in the USA, although the UK may be moving a bit more quickly. But being on the right side of the climate change issue now means no more than being on the wrong side. Next up–immigration reform?
We diehards on the blogs will still talk about it–we have a lot invested in the subject. I’ve noticed the range of subjects on climate blogs is widening a bit, with Keith Kloor reintroducing anthropology and archaeology, and Michael Tobis getting more local than global.
But despite this all giving discussions the air of a post-game show, it isn’t over. Not the actual changes to the climate, not the politics, not the blame game, and eventually not the policies to deal with it.
We still have climate and it will still change. We may be a bit less arrogant about our ability to predict those changes and assign the causes, but change there still will be.
Those who don’t like the changes will still blame human activities, although if they’re smart they might start reading Roger Pielke Sr. and attributing changes to more than just CO2.
People are still re-fighting the Vietnam War. Heck, there are people still re-fighting the Civil War. We’re not going to let this go any time soon.
Especially because of the twin peaks of Energy As An Issue and The Developing Countries As An Issue. Because we are the way we are, we will think we have to solve both. And because we are the way we are, we will think we have to solve both at the same time with the same tools, even though actions to make progress on one of them will make things more difficult for the other. Conserve energy, make the developing countries suffer. Help the developing countries, make the energy crisis worse.
And when we get frustrated, maybe we’ll pine for the easy days of fighting over climate change.
There are things we can do to protect against further climate change, improve energy security and smooth the path for developing countries. The conservative American Enterprise Institute and The Brookings Institute have teamed up with the Breakthrough Institute to propose a post-partisan solution (PDF), mostly based on research. It’d probably work, too. But the problem with post-partisan proposals is that they would put partisans out of a job, so of course left and right are ganging up on these people.
Their proposals are important, but it probably looks as though their timing stinks. This would have seemed really useful six months ago. But now it seems like they’re showing up with their party gifts just as everybody’s cleaning up and getting ready to go home.
But that’s an illusion. The climate / energy wars will last another generation. This is just a pause of exhaustion. We will change names, politicians, bloggers and the nuances of our positions and get ready for Round Three. This is, after all, the title fight to end all title fights.
But more on that another time. Meanwhile, Joy to the World!
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BTW, I’ll bet most readers didn’t know this:
“Joy to the World” is a song written by Hoyt Axton, and made famous by the band Three Dog Night. – Anthony
Climate change ? Are the glaciers coming back to Yosemite ?
Must agree with Philip Thomas and Mike M.? Why must there be ANY action on climate change? Adaption, mitigation, or otherwise? It’s not like humanity has faced a climate crisis in the past. And, IMO, there is no impending climate crisis on the horizon.
“Global Climate Disruption”, or whatever the name is this week, is a fabricated problem. It doesn’t exist. Recall, global cooling was the boogie-man in the 1970s, which turned into global warming in the 80s, which morphed into the meaningless, catch-all ‘climate change’ in 90s. If there was a true climate crisis, it wouldn’t have to undergo re-branding every decade.
Money, research, and resources should be funneled into real environmental problems, and, dare I say, real cutting edge science, like sending Man back to the moon. The resources p!ssed away on AGW these past 20 years is criminal.
I think Raving is right about the AGW bubble.
The war that will last a generation is the one between the developed world and the developing world, in which developed-world NGO’s are the main antagonists against the world’s poor. Our ‘aid’ agencies’ belief that countries can rise from poverty by becoming dependent on handouts from developed nations has been failing for generations, but nobody seems to have noticed.
Copenhagen exposed the Climate game as just another means to keep the poverty-stricken impoverished and dependent on the developed world. That war will go on until (a) we wake up and do something that would actually be helpful (e.g. pass the stalled-in-congress free trade agreement with Colombia, and encourage -those- kinds of initiatives instead of just offering crumbs off our table) or else (b) the third world wakes up on its own and shakes off its dependency on European and N.American handouts, as many countries are already doing.
Curiousgeorge, at October 16, 2010 at 3:04 pm
re conflict, competition, and cooperation.
Cooperation is The defining human characteristic. Intentional Communities foster standards and gather energy: resolving storage needs with a barn-raising; addressing Hussein in Kuwait and Hitler in Europe; setting football rules and establishing teams are several examples. IPCC efforts to claim the heights and to set the agenda from ´on high´ have shown us how to neither define nor address any problem.
This conflict between oligarchs and workers was unnecessary and not the last battle. As noted above, by several commenters, the self-anointed will always be with us. The price of liberty is constant vigilance.
I think you do miss the one key point, this entire scare was somewhat successful and despite all the hope you portray, I think this battle will just shift venues somewhat and all the idiot scientists will start studying similar fields such as “sustainable”.
Global warming may be dead, but the underlying theme of “too many stinky people” is still alive and kicking. This was the basic assumption that got us into this mess and until that is thoughly choked to death and science restored from its use of feel-good equations and bad models, we will still be in this mess for a long time.
The gravy train has a long way to go until its wrecked as well. The NSF is giving out record numbers of grants for global warming research (under stimulus dollars) and Obama expanded NASA’s budget…to study climate in more detail. Until those actions are corrected, in the case of NASA I think the correct direction is de-funding climate studies and going for space exploration, but I digress. Until those things are done, we will be arguing about global warming in the states for awhile, and in places where they already established CO2 controls….well that might be a hassle and quite a mess for a very long time.
The fat lady still has not sung yet, as too many believers in climate catastrophe are still kicking it up. Expect at least another 2 years of this nonsense….until the fat lady sings for global warming, and then we can ask ourselves the question that people always come to:
“what now?” We still have a long way to go for that.
An old Italian proverb, “The mothers of idiots are perpetually pregnant”, persuades me to believe that the AGW racket, presently hitting rock bottom, is far from over.
There’s too much easily pocketed taxpayer money involved, too many pseudo-scientific jobs at the stake.
And let’s not forget that an army of MSM hacks play Jeremiah the bullfrog for a living.
This description of the political situation is accurate, as is the broad point of the AGW hysteria fading away. The hysteria peaked somewhere in the middle of last year and for a number of factors, crashed dramatically but this piece ignores what I think will be the coda to the movement – ecoterrorism.
This will not be people buzzing whaling ships or barricading power stations. This will be green zealots killing people. Think about the sort of people who saw nothing wrong with the 10:10 movie and indeed, still don’t. They’ve had nearly a generation of conditioning and when the bubble bursts, you can expect them to move to more extreme ways to save the planet.
Pointman
bait and switch
…….thanks Tom, but not falling for this either
So the diplomats will not acknowledge the failure of diplomacy.
What failure? The diplomats have achieved exactly what the vast bulk of them set out to do. Nothing.
Their success is that they managed to con the green NGOs into believing that they were actively trying to do something. Magnificent really.
No conference as long as Copenhagen or Cancun will ever get agreement on a problem that size. You would need 6 months, minimum. And that’s what the WHO does in its rounds. If the governments (and so the diplomats) were serious about carbon reduction the talks would be on-going. And no body without power would be invited (all those NGOs) because they add nothing – having no power – and only generate emotion rather than solutions. Do the Red Cross get a seat in peace negotiations?
What?! Jeremiah’s predictions did come true.
Between the AGW folks, the goldbugs, the Fed, the banking cartel, the Austerians, and the war lovers the world seems determined to bring on the End. It seems a strange time to mock an authentic Prophet.
Go ahead and strike this comment, moderator, for being religious. I’ll laugh.
BTW, Jeremiah is a good read. 🙂
Hey evanjones. I still remember you and the gang. I had fun with you guys. Congratulations on the success of this site.
The people I really feel sorry for are those guys like Anthony Watts who have worked so hard to dispel the global warming myth and who are destined to be the experts in a subject which most of the public couldn’t care less about.
Forget any idea of being paraded in a victory parade, they’ll be lucky if anyone remembers who they were in a few years time. How ironic! That success comes when Joe public wonders why anyone sceptic and alarmist alike, could ever got so heated about such an unimportant subject.
Yes Minister, La mamma dei cretini e sempre incinta. Truer words were never spoken in any language.
“But that’s an illusion. The climate / energy wars will last another generation. This is just a pause of exhaustion. We will change names, politicians, bloggers and the nuances of our positions and get ready for Round Three. This is, after all, the title fight to end all title fights.”
I doubt this. When a fad is over in the West, it is OVAH! Other things will now absorb our attention, like…jobs and careers!
@ur momisugly John R T says:
October 16, 2010 at 4:34 pm
Curiousgeorge, at October 16, 2010 at 3:04 pm
re conflict, competition, and cooperation.
Cooperation is The defining human characteristic. …………………..
I disagree, but you are entitled to your opinion of course. Cooperation exists only for as long as it furthers the interests of all the parties. And even then there is competition for leadership/supremacy. This is true not only in a biological sense, but also in social/cultural structures. Were it not so, we would still be living in the trees and running from lions. Conflict is what got us to where we are – the top of the food chain. Conflict is what puts one culture/tribe/nation/business, etc. in a superior position to another. Conflict determines who survives and prospers (passes on their “genes”), and who doesn’t.
Alan S. Blue says:
October 16, 2010 at 3:14 pm
No doubt we will have to fend off repeated attacks from hostile beaurocracies, like the EPA, with sticks, pitchforks and torches, if we want an America worth living in.
A fight it will be, for such agencies have a one-size-fits-all solution for problems: Shut everything down.
Mike Haseler says:
October 16, 2010 at 5:04 pm
Look on the bright side: We may get a reprise of Leanord Nimoy’s In Search of the Coming Ice Age.
The public will be automatically skeptical for the next 20 years.
It’s the projected, or “modelled” crisis. i.e. there will be a crisis of some kind at some future date and that is the crisis we can avert now if we do X. In this instance, X involves giving me, personally, £1. Thanks very much!
Mr. Fuller,
I find your comment that the climate / energy wars will last another generation to be overly pessimistic. In part I believe this may be because you are still holding onto the idea that CAGW is a real problem. From the climate realist side things are looking more optimistic.
You have indicated that those involved in the scam will try and slink slowly away from their false claims and I believe this will be so. They will try, but it will not work. We now live in the age of the Internet and the old political techniques will not work. All the past behavior of the politicians, NGO’s, “progressive” journalists and scientists involved is recorded forever. The internet will allow the evidence of their mendacity and malfeasance to be refreshed in the public eye with the click of a mouse.
Those involved in the scam will be smacked down whenever they try to regain influence over our society. Only those who make a clear public admission of error are likely to survive. Those that try the old fashioned slinking away are doomed in the face of the new media. With the collapse of the CAGW scam, a generation of politicians, environmentalists and journalists have written themselves out of the political equation. There will be no foot soldiers to man the trenches on the left of field for the bio-crisis scam or the peak energy scam. The only players on the field will be an army of sceptics talking about abiotic oil and thorium power.
No carbon debt, no bio debt, no energy debt and no framework of socialist global governance to redistribute the ill gotten gains. We can look forward to a few decades of hope and aspiration.
Joy to the World!
More Joy. by Harry Nilsson:
“The other day, I met a girl named Joy
She said, “Come here, I’m going to make you my Joy Boy”
Well, things went good, things went bad
Now every time I think of Joy it makes me sad
It makes me . . . sad
The other day, I met a girl named Joy
She said, “Roy, I’m going to make you my Joy Boy”
Well, she took me for a ride, sort of a joy ride
Now every time I think of Joy, I get all weird inside
Sung:
Joy to the world was a beautiful girl
But to me Joy meant only sorrow”
vasthead.com/Songs/joy_nilsson.html
Wrong, wrong, wrong, Mike Haseler! Anthony Watts is a true hero (not that most people even know what that is these days). Anyone who understands the enormity of the global warming scam and the damage it has done to society, will be forever in Anthony Watts’ debt.
Ralph Phalen:
I’m expecting “dead” Cap and Trade legislation to be presented and passed during the lame duck session. Congress will have nothing to lose.
I’m hoping the remaining incumbents will not want to commit suicide like their recently ousted associates did.
Ya know – regardless of whether the earth is warming or not, humans will adapt. That’s our forte. We will require more energy as we bring the entire globe to a higher standard of living – there is no doubt about this. As I contend with my warmist friends, efficiency and free markets will drive this adaptation – not scare tactics and not economy throttling government intervention.
Humans adapt, not mitigate
‘mike sphar says:
October 16, 2010 at 4:10 pm
Climate change ? Are the glaciers coming back to Yosemite ?’
They will. It’s matter of time.
Minor typo nitpick –
“There are things we can do to protect against further climate change, improve energy security and smooth the path for developing countries. The conservative American Enterprise Institute and The Brookings Institute …”
You left out the comma after “energy security,” and the last sentence should be “The conservative American Enterprise Institute and The liberal Brookings Institute …”
It’s easy to miss such things. I notice that it happens all the time.