Category: Green Hell

Al Gore 1984

The latest from CEI:

Can Big Brother be green? Absolutely. If carbon dioxide were the planetary poison that global warming alarmists claim, then every aspect of our lives would be fair game for government control: the homes we build, the cars we drive, the light bulbs we use. Even the number of children we have—because lets face it; any reduction in CO2 that we achieve will be more than offset by the households our kids will create when they grow up.

There are already proposals in Congress and federal agencies to vastly increase taxes and regulations in order to address the so-called global warming crisis. But as a growing number of scientists are openly declaring, there is no crisis.

To take action, and to learn more, see http://cei.org/1984

South Park fans—this clip has a special treat for you.

Irony aficionados—In its original 1984 ad, Apple Computer warned of a totalitarian threat in computing. Today Al Gore sits on Apples Board of Directors. The company that warned of 1984 25 years ago now has, as one of its directors, the man most likely to lead us into a new 1984.

History students—Apple Computer ran its ad, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYecfV…, only once, during the 1984 Super Bowl, to introduce its new Macintosh computer. In 2006, during the primary battles, a pro-Obama YouTube take-off of the Apple ad was created by an independent solo video artist,.casting Hillary Clinton in the role of Big Brother. The ad was titled Vote Different—apparently parodying Apples Think Different slogan. It can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6h3G-l…

Western Climate Initiative: Costly and Ineffective

From the Western Business Roundtable:

A new study says that a climate action plan promoted by several Western governors could prolong the economic recession, weaken already overburdened Western power grids and will deliver a temperature “benefit” of only one ten-thousandth of a degree Celsius even after a century of operation.

Most popular: Green Hell on GlennBeck.com

Glenn Beck’s radio interview with Green Hell author Steve Milloy is at the top of GlennBeck.com’s “Most Popular” item list.

Click here to check out the interview about Chinese workers being poisoned with mercury while making compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs).

Subsidymagination: GE CEO advises Obama to just ‘give me the money’?

It has paid General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt very well to snuggle up to President Obama and his plan to socialize America and to do away with free markets and free enterprise.

General Electric will receive $40 million in federal stimulus money and another $15 million in New York State grant money to build a $100 million locomotive-battery plant near Albany, NY, according to the Wall Street Journal. The plant will eventually employ 350 people and could generate as much as $500 million per year in revenue by 2015, according to GE.

A few points to ponder:

  • The feds and NY state will be spending a total of $55 million to create 350 factory jobs. That works out to government spending of about $157,000 per factory job created. The median household income in Albany County for 2007 was about $70,000 per year. The factory jobs would not commence until mid-2011.
  • If it only takes a $100 million capital investment to build a plant that will be generating $500 million in revenue in six years and $1 billion within ten years, shouldn’t GE — a company with almost $180 billion in annual revenue, $19 billion in cash flow and $18 billion in operating profits — be able to afford the plant without nursing off taxpayers?
  • Since taxpayers will front 55 percent of the plant’s construction costs, what exactly will taxpayers receive in return? Will GE repay taxpayers with profits from the factory?
  • Hybrid locomotives are not some slam-dunk technology. A recent effort to market a hybrid locomotive designed for limited railyard use just failed.
  • Keeping in mind that GE’s hybrid locomotive has yet to be commercialized, it’s featured benefit is only a 10 percent fuel savings at best, plus the attendant reduction in air emissions — hardly something to get excited about.
  • Is GE getting this sweetheart stimulus deal because CEO Jeff Immelt sits on President Obama’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board? Exactly what advice does Immelt provide to Obama — ‘give me the money’? Isn’t this a conflict-of-interest?
  • Immelt is also a big supporter of Obama’s plans for greenhouse gas regulation (called “Ecomagination”) and nationalizing health care (called “Healthymagination”) since GE would benefit immensely from such legislation.
  • GE has already received a $140 billion bailout from taxpayers.

Ask Gary Sheffer, GE’s Director of Communications and Public Affairs, whether GE should just collapse its rent-seeking efforts under the single rubric of Subsidymagination. E-mail him at gary.sheffer@ge.com or phone him at 203-373-3476. Feel free to share his response with the rest of us.

White House looks to re-brand ‘cap-and-trade’; JunkScience.com announces naming contest

What’s in a name? Apparently, nothing conducive to green oppression if it’s “cap-and-trade.”

The White House is looking to replace the term “cap-and-trade” with something more exciting to the public, according to a report in the Los Angeles Times. According to the Times,

Today, aides in Obama’s Council on Environmental Quality will meet with a research and marketing group that is promoting an alternative to the phrase “global warming,” which some pollsters say fails to capture the idea of greenhouse gases threatening the environment.

“There is value in trying to get the messaging right,” said a senior White House environmental aide, who was not authorized to speak on the record. “Because at the end of the day this is tricky policy. . . . We want to make sure we’re talking in a way that people understand.”

Let’s save the taxpayers some money.

E-mail your suggested alternative to “cap-and-trade” to junkman@junkscience.com

The best entry received by Monday, May 18, 2009 wins an autographed copy of Steve Milloy’s new book, Green Hell: How Environmentalists Plan to Control Your Life and What You Can Do to Stop Them.

So put your thinking caps on — no recycling “cap-and-tax” or “cap-and-charade” — it won’t be easy to buff the cap-and-trade turd into a popsicle!

Eco-industrial complex writes climate bill

The Washington Times reports,

Democratic lawmakers who spent much of the Bush administration blasting officials for letting energy lobbyists write national policy have turned to a coalition of business and environmental groups to help draft their own sweeping climate bill…

At the kickoff to hearings last week on the massive climate bill, Myron Ebell, climate and energy policy director for the Competitive Enterprise Institute, told lawmakers, “The authors of the draft bill have invited the beneficiaries of what could turn out to be the biggest transfer of wealth from consumers to special interests in American history to write the rules for this legalized plunder.”

Although the pain of the climate bill will hit consumers and taxpayers first, it will eventually hit the businesses (a.k.a. useful idiots) who are helping the greens. The USCAP companies are just too short-sighted to see their eventual demise.

Stupid Banker of the Day: HSBC’s Kevin Bourne

European bank HSBC’s dalliance in the U.S. subprime bubble cost its shareholders more than $15 billion in losses. So you might think the bank would be wary of wandering into the next financial bubble — that is the green one. But once again, you would be wrong to apply common sense to today’s financial industry.

Reuters reports today that a large U.S. pension fund is interested in investing in companies in HSBC’s Climate Change Market Index. HSBC equities chief Kevin Bourne told Reuters,

“It doesn’t matter if investors believe in climate change or not, they know it’s a good investment category.”

Apparently, investing in companies that provide tangible value to society is so old-school. It seems to have  been replaced by getting in while the getting is good and getting out before the bubble bursts. But few, including HSBC, seem to have a good track record in that regard.

Bourne added,

“But investors are global and if they can’t find your company, they can’t lend their money to you. The tough question is how to let investors know that you’re involved in climate change.”

HSBC seems not to view its challenge as asking whether investing in dubious climate change schemes is appropriate so much as it is jumping over that due diligence question and onto figuring out how to find the next sucker.

Moving past HSBC’s investment bubble recidivism, there is the question of the unnamed pension fund willing to gamble its assets on climate change scams.

While Bourne would not name the pension fund, he did indicate to Reuters that it was among the four largest: either the California State Teachers’ Retirement System, California Public Employees Retirement System, State of New York Employees’ Retirement System, or the Florida Retirement System.

So the money going into HSBC ‘s green bubble is not that of some private, cowboy investment group; it’s the taxpayer money intended for California, New York or Florida public sector retirees.

Aside from the direct risk of investing in bubbles, there’s the innocent bystander effect. The ongoing subprime bubble-caused financial crisis has already cost state pension funds an estimated $1.3 trillion.The two California public employee retirement systems have so far lost a combined $110 billion — even though the two were never heavily invested in them in the first place. New York and Florida public employee funds have taken similar losses.

The problematic intersection of state pensions funds and global warming has been preliminarily explored in the report, “Pensions in Peril.”

Switching metaphors, maybe Kevin Bourne, HSBC and the rest of the fast-talking, but slow-witted Wall Street crowd ought to step back from, and reconsider pressing the handle that will cause the green vortex that will flush hard-earned taxayer and investor money down the toilet again.

When the green bubble bursts, will there be any money left to pay state retirees?

Cap-And-Trade: Al Gore’s Cash Cow

Today’s lead editorial in Investor’s Business Daily about Al Gore’s profiteering at consumer/taxpayer expense mentions Steve Milloy’s new book, Green Hell: How Environmentalists Plan to Control Your Life and What You Can Do to Stop Them.

As IBD points out:

Gore’s altruism claim [during last week’s congressional hearing] is phony. According to a March 6 Bloomberg report, Gore invested $35 million of his own money not in green nonprofits, but with the very profitable Capricorn Investment Group LLC, a Palo Alto, Calif., firm that directs clients to green investments and invests in makers of environmentally friendly products.

Utility execs fret Obama climate policies

Reuters reports,

Less than half of utility executives support the Obama Administration’s plan to make the United States a leader on climate change and are concerned about the impact related policies will have on industry profits, according to a survey released on Monday.

Maybe one day these cowards will stop stop fretting and start fighting back?