Cathy Young writes in the Gulf Today:
A few years ago, University of California at Los Angeles public policy professor Mark Kleiman, a self-identified liberal, acknowledged in a blog post that those who “dislike a social system based on high and growing consumption” and favour state regulation of markets and stronger international institutions have a powerful motive to embrace global warming as absolute truth.
While sympathetic to environmentalist causes, Kleiman noted that environmentalists often show “eagerness to believe the worst” as well an aversion to remedies that involve scientific and technological solutions – such as nuclear power – rather than drastic regulations and curbs on consumption. While Kleiman later stressed that he did not see both sides as equal offenders, his criticisms still stand.
“There’s no doubt that environmental scientists have been targets of unfair attacks from the right. So-called ClimateGate – the 2009 release of hacked emails from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia – was hardly the proof of malfeasance it was made it out to be. (While critics jumped on one scientist’s mention of a “trick” to “hide the decline” in temperatures in a particular period, the reference was not to hidden data-fudging, but to an openly used adjustment technique.)”
Still stuck on stupid!!!
Every environmentalist has an obligation to avoid drastic regulation and curbs whenever and wherever possible and then, only as a temporary measure with a designed sunset. Otherwise, they serve coercion first while standing a very good chance of ultimately being defeated with a rejection of their excuses for power. It would be wrong and, in the end, bad for “the environment” – even if they had a full understanding of it, our role in it, and how to manage it. They should not demand everything they want for something they don’t – and can’t – understand.