AMAC Exclusive – By Seamus Brennan
Though many conservatives have understandably grown tired of the left’s perpetually apocalyptic language surrounding climate change and environmental concerns, few would have guessed that President Joe Biden—who has repeatedly claimed that “there is no greater challenge facing our country and our world”—would fall into this category. Yet this is quite literally what appeared to happen during last week’s United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow, as Biden fell asleep mere minutes into the event. Could there be a more perfect portrayal of Americans’ growing exhaustion with the far left’s climate obsession?
As expected, Biden’s post-nap remarks at COP26 adopted much of the bleak vocabulary that has come to permeate Democrats’ environmental policies in recent years. “We only have a brief window left before us to raise our ambitions and to raise—to meet the task that’s rapidly narrowing,” he grimly warned. “There’s no more time to hang back or sit on the fence or argue amongst ourselves. This is the challenge of our collective lifetimes. The existential threat to human existence as we know it.”
Biden, much like others in his party, now exclusively refers to climate change as a “crisis.” To give this supposed crisis added drama, Biden and Congressional Democrats have now also begun insisting that addressing climate change is necessary to combat “systemic racism.” The term “environmental justice” is quickly gaining popularity among progressives, with the implication being that if you don’t completely embrace the far left’s narrative on climate change, you must be racist. It’s unsurprising, then, that this doubly-urgent crisis now justifies the use of ever-more-forceful language from Joe Biden: “This is our last chance,” the President threatened in October.
If that threat sounds familiar, there’s good reason for it. Despite the radical left’s contention that right now is the world’s last chance to take dramatic action on climate change, the fact remains that progressives, the media, and the expert class have been forecasting impending environmental catastrophe for more than half a century. In 1970, The Boston Globe reported that “scientists predict a new ice age” by the start of the 21st century. In 1978, The New York Times cautioned that there was no end in sight to the then-30-year global cooling trend. Americans were told by various supposedly authoritative sources that oceans would be dead by 1980, rising sea levels would “obliterate” and “wipe nations off [the] face of the earth” by 2000, New York City would be underwater by 2015, the Maldives would be completely submerged by 2018, children soon wouldn’t know what snow is, and Britain would become Siberia by 2024. The list goes on. As the Competitive Enterprise Institute aptly put it, “None of the apocalyptic predictions with due dates as of today have come true.”
Perhaps the most recognizable example of the left’s climate fearmongering in recent years is former Vice President Al Gore’s 2006 book-turned-documentary An Inconvenient Truth, in which he decried global warming as “a true planetary emergency” and infamously insisted that, absent “drastic measures” to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, “the world will reach a point of no return” by 2016. Needless to say, come 2016, we were all still standing.
In his 2017 follow-up documentary An Inconvenient Sequel, notwithstanding the obvious shortcomings of his predictions a decade prior, Gore doubled down on his doomsday predictions, alleging that if we failed to act immediately, future generations would inherit “stronger storms, worsening floods, deeper droughts, mega-fires, tropical diseases spreading through vulnerable populations in all parts of the earth, melting ice caps flooding coastal cities, unsurvivable heat extremes, and hundreds of millions of climate refugees.” Americans can likely expect a third installment of the Inconvenient Truth series whenever Gore’s latest batch of predictions inevitably prove false.
The left’s endless pattern of dire predictions for the future of the planet makes clearer than ever that their political strategy has been rooted in either fabricating or deeply exaggerating environmental concerns as justification for imposing a progressive vision for American society—a ploy most noticeably seen with behemoth far-left bills like the Green New Deal—that the American people would otherwise never even entertain without a looming planetary disaster as pretext. Though Americans of every political persuasion are right to support policies that will protect the environment and stave off legitimate environmental devastation, both the left’s pattern of hyperbolic opportunism and an honest review of the facts demonstrate that, despite Joe Biden’s overwrought doomsday rhetoric, Americans have no reason to panic—and they most certainly have no reason to sign on to a massive and unprecedented transformation of American life for the sake of averting an apocalypse that the left has been promising since the 1960s.
As former President Donald Trump said in a statement referencing Biden’s dozing off at COP26, “Nobody that has true enthusiasm and belief in a subject will ever fall asleep.” If not even the most progressive president in American history who campaigned on the notion that climate change is an “existential threat” can bear to stay awake to hear the latest iteration of climate hysteria, the American people certainly won’t either.
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The more that citizens of the world deny the Universe is of an intelligent design and that nature is the controlling factor for the planet Earth, the more those citizens become god-like in their believing “they” can control natural factors of the Earth. Not only do these misguided citizens disregard nature’s power to protect the Earth, they believe “they” do have such power.
We are a mere, small part of nature, but we are governed by nature. To disregard nature’s ability to maintain control over planet Earth, including periodic climate changes, is the height of undeserved arrogance.
If we focus on working with nature rather than thinking we can control nature, we will quickly realize that a warmer Earth will be beneficial for most life on Earth, flora and fauna. With fresh water being the mainstay of life, a warmer Earth will put more fresh water to beneficial use by releasing fresh water from the polar ice sheets. It’s not like the polar ice just melts into the oceans, raising the sea levels. While sea levels will increase, just as they have in the past warmer periods, most of the polar ice will evaporate and sublimate into the atmosphere, where fresh water will be carried by clouds over land masses. Those water laden clouds will dump fresh water onto land masses, filling aquafers, lakes and streams which will allow for vegetation to grow in currently arid land areas. More fresh water and more vegetation means more sustenance for all animals, including mankind.
No matter what subject, the progressives make racism a contributing factor to the current crisis the progressives are crying about. Wow, I didn’t know that there was so much racism affecting everything (not).
Over the 73 years I’ve lived on this planet there has been very little change in the overall climate. We have warm years and cold years controlled by the jet stream in North America. We can no better control climate than we can control when it’s going to rain, snow or a hurricane rises up from the Atlantic or Pacific. The US is one of the lowest producers of carbon gases yet we are being told we need to cut our omissions further. We can control air and water quality but only ” Mother Nature” can control climate.
So right.
I did a college paper for Economics and Sociology on the looming ice age and its impact on worldwide economies and food supply and its impact on social structure and the day to day lives of the average person. That was is in 1973 or so. The data distortions at the time were the same as now leaving the actual climate changes subjective if measurable. We were having the same “settled science” argument as now. My sociology professor (typical assumptive elitist) was not at all amused when I mentioned that if settled science were a valid concept, we would be sailing off the edge of the earth as the sun rotated around us. Then as now the solution was essentially societal devolution to dark ages societal misery and shortages with of course the solution being the shared misery of socialism. The only denialists out there are those who reject historical climatic changes as having any research value unless it conforms to the mob mentality. The models used to justify the climate hysteria are so valueless that when actual climate historical date is entered the numbers can’t be reproduced. The climate is changing, of course it is, or we’d be really screwed. We are contributing to that change but not in the measurable amount to produce the catastrophes predicted by the left. Having lost the scientific urgency argument, (to actual data) the left now seeks to make it a race issue. Oh Puhleeeeeze!
I am from Germany and I am fascinated about US and the great people living there! You have such a beautiful country and are such a rich nation. You have freedom and can choose to build bridges and embrace change! Many countries do not have such freedom at all. Germany does too, though. Certainly you are very blessed and fortunate. I definitely thank you for all the values you hold and share. US has done it´s part time over time. I wish you can feel proud and grateful for what you have achieved. I wish you continue to love your history, your nation and your achievements and how fortunate you are. May we in Germany and Europe do our part and together with Asia and yourselves join in developing the future of a world getting smaller day by day!
Nothing like thinking delusion will just make globally rising temperatures will just disappear.
There is a great video on u tube by mark mills prager university unobtanium. It’s all about any thing that produces energy. Very intelligent.
I think the Dems should put a little more effort to look into climate change. There may be some climate change, but, it is normal and happens. Remember the “ice age” 10,000 years ago.
Listen to the scientists. They are all agreeing that there is no danger of the world ending in 12 yrs. and that the oceans have not risen. Use your head Dems and stop spending $$$$$ for something that is not happening. The weather has not changed either. Remember the snow storm in 1947 and the many bad storms we have had. No changes at all. Tell China to clean up their act.
“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary.”
H.L. Mencken
It used to be fringe religions that predicted the end of the world, not because of climate but because of different biblical prophesies. When the date and hour of prediction passed, they just moved it up a few days, weeks.
That is how we know that “Climate Change” is a religion.
I’m 56 years old and constantly tell young people they have no idea how many times over the years I’ve been told by climate scientist, climatologist and “political climate scientists” we were just a a handful of years away from the earths complete destruction
It’s been constant from my childhood through today, always a different crisis, of course man made, which was the end of us all
Now they have incorporated every possible weather event into their scare. Apparently higher temperatures will bring heavy snowfalls-at the same time making sure no child ever sees snow again- Plus long droughts AND torrential floods
We were all going to freeze to death according to all of the “settled science“, now all the sudden we are in danger of the earth spontaneously combusting due to the extreme heat
Most people don’t know carbon dioxide in our atmosphere makes up less than 1/2 of 1/10 of a percent—.04% of the entire atmosphere… Yet this controls all of the climate and weather
They’ve hidden most of the articles now, but if you search you can still find scientific journals which talk about how the earths CO2 levels were hundreds of times higher millions of years ago, long before any fossil fuels were being used. We all know the earth went in and out of multiple ice ages with up to 15/20° changes, long before the first SUV
It’s all ridiculous. One day soon this incredible warm up we are in the middle of(1° increase over the last century) Will level off and there will be a different “crisis”
I did a college paper on the looming ice age and its impact on world hunger…… that was 1973.
The last poll I saw showed only 40% of voters considered GW as the top concern. Rising prices are much more the problem now.
It’s been 15 years since Al Gore’s disaster movie, “An Inconvenient Truth.” But the only truth that’s been revealed is that Al Gore has gotten extremely wealthy pumping the man-made climate change meme.
During the Covid lockdown when many people weren’t working & most were staying at home & not driving very much, CO2 levels increased. That indicates that man (at least people in locked-down economies) wasn’t the problem. The only country whose economy expanded during the Covid pandemic was China.
Let’s ask a basic question. Who says today’s climate is optimal? Historical records show vineyards in Roman Britain. Today’s climate is too cold to allow vineyards there. The Roman Warm Period was an estimated 2° C warmer than it is now, which was a good thing for humanity, not the disaster global warming alarmists are always predicting from warmer temperatures. Why should we impoverish ourselves for a suboptimal global temperature?
Leif Ericson says man-made global warming is a myth. During the Medieval Warm Period (MWP), 950-1250 CE, fields in Greenland were cultivated. During the Little Ice Age (LIA), 1300-1850 CE, these fields became permafrost and still are. That says the Medieval Warm Period was warmer than it is right now, although not as warm as the Roman Warm Period. Fossil fuels weren’t a factor in MWP or LIA.
Look up the Wikipedia entry for Paleoclimatology. The graphs shows the earth has had both no ice and been an ice ball. In neither case did man exist as a species yet. The extremes in the paleoclimate record show that natural variation dominates any alleged man-made climate change. Before we spend tens of trillions of dollars, shouldn’t we try to understand the natural forces that change climate over geologic time?
It is statistical folly to use about 100 years of data to extrapolate climate cycles that last hundreds or thousands of years. Only the gullible or math challenged believe in the statistical validity of models built on 100 years’ worth of data, that have failed to predict future temperature patterns.
We are currently in an Ice Age retreat. The moderate temperature increases in the last 100 years have been a boon to the fauna & flora of planet earth. Yet, far too many are looking a gift horse in the mouth & threatening to send it (i.e., the American economy) to the slaughter house.
Thank you!
The leftists and socialists have to make everything an emergency or crisis or “existential threat” in order to circumvent our representative republic system of government. If everything is an emergency, the president can simply sign Executive Orders to push their leftist or even right-wing ideologies. Congress is weak and has given much of its power to the Presidency over the last twenty years. Why worry about how your constituents want you to represent them? You can just hide in Washington DC pretending to stand up for your voters and when the President signs an unpopular Executive Order, you just throw your hands up and act like there is nothing you can do.
Climate change has become a big power grab by politicians, whose only interest is in retaining their power by taking money out of hard working people’s pockets. They will have us living hand-to-mouth trying to make our way on public transportation while they are allowed to travel freely on private jets preaching to us about how we need to sacrifice to avoid some theoretical cataclysmic event.
The simple fact is that we may very well have passed a climate tipping point from which there is no possibility of return. What is important is not the absolute value of CO2 and other greenhouse gases at this moment. What is important is the rate at which that value is changing. Those of us who have read of earth’s geologic history know major disruptions to the carbon cycle of the kind we are presently causing have accompanied major extinction events. And we are disrupting that cycle even more rapidly than the disruptions that caused those extinctions. It is worth noting that large, multicellular species such as ourselves do not typically fare well in mass extinctions.
So ‘saving the planet’ is not the issue, is it?
Water vapor is the most important, abundant, impactful greenhouse gas. It varies and can be as high as 4% of the atmosphere. CO2 at .04% is a minor player. Water vapor and clouds (clouds warm and cool the earth) make up 90 to 95% of the greenhouse effect, according to Dr. Will Happer, a Princeton physicist. What about water vapor?
And if you buy all of the manmade global warming what is the answer. If you say wind and solar, what will provide electricity when they don’t which is 70% of the time. And what about the Chinese and Indians that are building hundreds of coal plants and opening hundreds of coal mines. They understand that coal is a inexpensive, reliable abundant form of energy.
As John Kerry admits, even if we went to no carbon output in the US it wouldn’t solve the problem. So why spend trillions and triple our electric rates if it won’t work anyway?
I know nothing about climate change science. I am a retired engineer, having worked on a score of nukes and two score carbon fueled power plants. Thus I am certain of this engineering judgment.
If climate change is real, mankind will cease to exist. We face a termination event, similar to the dinosaurs. Carbon is the sole ubiquitous, cheap source of energy on earth and without fire, the combustion of carbon, energy, humans can not survive. Uranium can help, in advanced societies, if several barriers are removed.
Live with it. For now.
If we follow ALL of the science, today’s CO2 concentrations are very near historic LOWs. Only once in the past 550 million years has CO2 been this low. Nature thrives with high CO2 levels and a warming planet if far better for humans and nature than a cooling planet. Read the Book, Popular Deceptions to learn the facts the media, the ‘Greens’, and our politicians are hiding.
I think the greatest threat to mankind is the Democrat party.
Why do old folk buy into the hate of fascism and Republicanism, the nasty policies which has kept the rich richer and the rest of us poorer?
Democrats gave us Medicare, Social Security and whatever help you get.
Republicans gave us endless Republican Wars.
HAHAHA, still buying those tired old party-line stereotypes pushed by the corporate media? Joe Biden just sold $650 Billion of weapons to Saudi Arabia to keep pumping profits into the war machine of the military/industrial complex. Wake up and realize both parties are in the business of keeping the rich richer, including themselves! Oh and if we’re being honest, Trump did not start any wars, he actually brokered the the agreement with the Taliban to get us out Afghanistan, then Old Joe pushed the date back and royally F’d it up!
Medicare and Social Security are going broke and threaten to place a large burden on future generations. Required personal retirement account with government assist for the poor would have been a much better solution. Better financial education would help. We are largely a nation of financial dummies. Of late Democrats are helping the ultra rich, not so much the middle class, because that’s where the money is.
Advances in technology will solve global warming. The only question is whether those advances will occur quick enough to avert 200 million human deaths. The odds are they won’t.
My entire household and two electric cars are powered by the PV system on our roof. No electricity costs, no gasoline costs, no oil changes, no emissions checks, no tune-ups, no engine maintenance at all. We do not go out to “gas up”, it is done at night.
Do you live in Death Valley? Southern Arizona? Certainly not Western Montana or anywhere in Alaska.
That’s nice if you live where there is enough solar insulation, but millions of U.S. residents do not. Also rooftop solar will do nothing to run our industries. By the way you are welcome for my subsidies.
Increased CO2 in the air has led to greening of the planet as confirmed by satellite. Record crop harvests are saving millions from starvation. A warmer, somewhat wetter earth, has so far proved beneficial. Meanwhile, we need increased prosperity, not poverty, to be able to adapt to climate changes