Monday, June 23, 2008

Did you think those isms were dead?

We read in The Guardain - - -

James Hansen, one of the world's leading climate scientists, will today call for the chief executives of large fossil fuel companies to be put on trial for high crimes against humanity and nature, accusing them of actively spreading doubt about global warming in the same way that tobacco companies blurred the links between smoking and cancer.

Hansen will use the symbolically charged 20th anniversary of his groundbreaking speech (pdf) to the US Congress - in which he was among the first to sound the alarm over the reality of global warming - to argue that radical steps need to be taken immediately if the "perfect storm" of irreversible climate change is not to become inevitable.

Speaking before Congress again, he will accuse the chief executive officers of companies such as ExxonMobil and Peabody Energy of being fully aware of the disinformation about climate change they are spreading.

In an interview with the Guardian he said: "When you are in that kind of position, as the CEO of one the primary players who have been putting out misinformation even via organisations that affect what gets into school textbooks, then I think that's a crime." …

The rest of The Guardian report’s here.

Comments:

The Guardian doesn’t say whether Hansen would permit the oil executives' families to visit them while they await trial.

Nor does The Guardian say how Hansen wants jurors selected; or what punishment he recommends for jurors who fail to find the executives guilty of “high crimes against humanity.”

And there’s no word on what would be done with “school textbooks [Hansen thinks are] a crime.” Burning, perhaps?

Whatever the case, for anyone who thinks Nazism and Communism are dead, Hansen and those like him are reminders the core isms of those two monstrosities live on in the minds and hearts of many, including one who sat today before Congress.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Why should this guy be getting multiple invitations to speak before Congress? We all know the answer but I'm really sick of the global-warming-as-god schtick. We can never have productive discussions on the subject if one side won't budge even though REAL scientific studies don't necessarily support its viewpoint.

Love your blog, John. Keep up the good fight.

Anonymous said...

John -

Let's see - in 1971, James Hansen developed a computer program that forecast a coming ice age, and guess who the culprit was -the burning of fossil fuel (although not because of carbon dioxide - note, though, correlation of carbon dioxide and global warming is near zero).

For story on Hansen, see:
http://www.investors.com/editorial/
editorialcontent.asp?secid=1501&status
=article&id=275267681833290

Now, Hansen thinks there is global warming and burning fossil fuels is the culprit. Was he wrong then or he is wrong now, or has he been wrong both times? It seems that no matter what his conclusions about the weather, the answer is always fossil fuels. As Karl Popper would say, that's not science, it's religion. (An aside - listen carefully to some of the commercials - the mantra is no longer global warming, because there's been none since 1998 and possibly 1995; the new mantra is, Climate Change - When you say that, you can never be wrong because the climate is always changing.)

Of course Hansen has no humility. He is willing to conduct Stalin-like trials against energy companies, evidence be damned. (Of course, Congress is totally inconsistent on the issue of global warming and fossil fuels - they want to go after energy companies for the high-oil prices - they don't want drilling to lower prices; but the high-price cuts down on fossil fuel usage, but Congress wants low prices which increases usage, but they want to sell carbon credits to cut down on carbon usage - reminds me of the Abbot and Costello routine - Who is on first.)

John, I would like to draw your attention to this Newsweek article of 1975:
http://sweetness-light.com/archive/
newsweeks-1975-article-about-the-coming
-ice-age

in which the MSM was hyping the coming ice age. There is an interesting aside there about food - the fear was that the cold would reduce the food available. It didn't take the weather to reduce the food available. All it took was a subsidy to divert corn production away from food into to bio-fuels. A good reason for governments to bud out of the market. They just can judge the laws of unintended consequences.

Finally - for anonymous at 8:32 PM, I would suggest this excellent article on why the science of global warming is no longer science but religion:

http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/religion.htm

Jack in Silver Spring

Anonymous said...

John -

Two corrections to my comment. Where I said: "They just can judge the laws of unintended consequences" I meant to say: "They just can't judge the laws of unintended consequences."

Also, I said the Congress was inconsistent. After reading my comment this morning, I think a better term would be, incoherent.

Jack in Silver Spring