Food prices continue to rise, and the shortage in staple foods is having far-reaching consequences.
Now, the United Nations is getting in on the act, urging nations across the world to increase food production as food riots threaten to destabilize many already unsteady third-world nations.
Why are we having these problems? Today's food shortages are a direct result of the growing demand for ethanol for use as fuel for cars. Ethanol made from corn is in high demand, and the more farmers sell their crops to make biofuels, the less staple foods there are for the rest of the world.
These shortages are even effecting the US, the so-called "Breadbasket of the World." Unfortunately, it will likely take more than a few miffed shoppers to make the people of America wake up and smell the wheat...or lack of wheat.
On top of all of that, the shortage in food staples has driven many manufacturers of processed foods to turn to genetically engineered or altered grains in the name of saving money. With the worries around the world as to the potential side-effects of these engineered foods, this brings up even more concerns as to the true practicality of turning to corn-based ethanol for fuel.
The simple truth of it is that using corn-based ethanol was and is an ill-conceived idea, and has far-reaching side effects that will eventually cause a major backlash. No one can fault farmers for turning to crops that will make them the most money, but we can blame the green movement and the leaders in our government for encouraging the burning up of our food supply.
The United States used to literally be the Breadbasket of the World. Nations the world over depended on the United States' grain exports to feed their citizens. Now the US is burning that food in the name of energy independence and is importing grain to feed its citizens. Widespread use of corn-based ethanol is a mistake, but it's not too soon to correct that error. We can stabilize the world's food supply by turning away from this foolishness and eating our food, rather than burning it.
After all, who will benefit from cleaner air if we all starve to death?
Showing posts with label global warming. Show all posts
Showing posts with label global warming. Show all posts
Monday, April 21, 2008
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Global Warming Movement Screws the Little Guy
The "green" movement has gotten bigger and bigger in US politics, with public schools brainwashing our children and politicians grubbing for more and more power, all in the name of "saving the planet."
Now we're starting to see the real fruits of their labor.
The push toward biofuels has driven up food prices across the globe, the green movement is having a negative effect in third world nations the world over. With heightened awareness of ethanol, farmers have been growing more and more corn, with the crops going toward ethanol production instead of food. The shortage is driving up food prices and is creating social unrest in Haiti, the Phillipines, and many African nations whose nations depend on staples such as corn and wheat for their survival.
The American Left often accuses the US of arrogance, but now again we see that true arrogance resides on the Left. They have used the green movement to justify their continued push toward socialism, and now, in their blind push toward "saving the planet," they are driving up food prices for people who already had a hard time affording enough food to survive.
By utilizing corn-based ethanol, the green movement is advocating the literal burning of our food supply, to the detriment of millions of Americans, as well as millions more across the world who depend on American food production and low food prices.
Liberals say that the world hates us because we pissed off a bunch of Islamic radicals (who were pissed off anyway) when we invaded Iraq and liberated millions of oppressed people there. Now they're poised to give the world a real reason to hate America, when the Left makes food unaffordable in the name of clean air.
We should take care of our environment, but we cannot afford to sell our souls in order to decrease pollution. We need to approach environmentalism logically, not emotionally. We need to look at all sides of the issue before handing more and more power to the government in the name of environmentalism. We need to look at how our actions will effect others, as well as how they will effect our children. Will cleaner air truly help our children if they can't afford to eat?
Now we're starting to see the real fruits of their labor.
The push toward biofuels has driven up food prices across the globe, the green movement is having a negative effect in third world nations the world over. With heightened awareness of ethanol, farmers have been growing more and more corn, with the crops going toward ethanol production instead of food. The shortage is driving up food prices and is creating social unrest in Haiti, the Phillipines, and many African nations whose nations depend on staples such as corn and wheat for their survival.
The American Left often accuses the US of arrogance, but now again we see that true arrogance resides on the Left. They have used the green movement to justify their continued push toward socialism, and now, in their blind push toward "saving the planet," they are driving up food prices for people who already had a hard time affording enough food to survive.
By utilizing corn-based ethanol, the green movement is advocating the literal burning of our food supply, to the detriment of millions of Americans, as well as millions more across the world who depend on American food production and low food prices.
Liberals say that the world hates us because we pissed off a bunch of Islamic radicals (who were pissed off anyway) when we invaded Iraq and liberated millions of oppressed people there. Now they're poised to give the world a real reason to hate America, when the Left makes food unaffordable in the name of clean air.
We should take care of our environment, but we cannot afford to sell our souls in order to decrease pollution. We need to approach environmentalism logically, not emotionally. We need to look at all sides of the issue before handing more and more power to the government in the name of environmentalism. We need to look at how our actions will effect others, as well as how they will effect our children. Will cleaner air truly help our children if they can't afford to eat?
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Another Reason Politics Doesn't Make Sense
Politicians have been pointing at higher gas prices for several years now, placing the blame with the Bush administration and the war in Iraq, and pointing to rising gas prices as yet another reason that America needs "change."
Well, Michigan Congressman John Dingell (D) wants to do something about it - he wants to raise the price of gas even further. During a time when consumers are already feeling the pain of higher gas prices, Rep. Dingell has proposed a 50-cent per-gallon hike in gas taxes...in order to discourage consumers from buying gas in an effort to prevent global warming.
The problem: for millions of Americans, gasoline is a necessity, not an option. Raising gas taxes will do little more than hurt average Americans who need to buy gas for their vehicles in order to get to work every day. Hiking up the gas tax may sound like a good idea for a Congressman who spends most of his time in Washington, where the public transportation infrastructure has had to grow in order to meet the needs of millions of people, but that just doesn't work across most of the rest of the nation. I can think of no better way to hurt the US economy and the average American than to raise gas taxes...which makes it the perfect kind of policy for a Democrat to propose.
Well, Michigan Congressman John Dingell (D) wants to do something about it - he wants to raise the price of gas even further. During a time when consumers are already feeling the pain of higher gas prices, Rep. Dingell has proposed a 50-cent per-gallon hike in gas taxes...in order to discourage consumers from buying gas in an effort to prevent global warming.
The problem: for millions of Americans, gasoline is a necessity, not an option. Raising gas taxes will do little more than hurt average Americans who need to buy gas for their vehicles in order to get to work every day. Hiking up the gas tax may sound like a good idea for a Congressman who spends most of his time in Washington, where the public transportation infrastructure has had to grow in order to meet the needs of millions of people, but that just doesn't work across most of the rest of the nation. I can think of no better way to hurt the US economy and the average American than to raise gas taxes...which makes it the perfect kind of policy for a Democrat to propose.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Reid Blames Fires on Global Warming...And He's Right!
After his record in the recently-resolved Limbaugh smear letter fiasco, you'd think Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid would keep his mouth shut & stay under the radar for a little while...but no such luck.
Today, Reid told reporters that "one of the reasons we have the fires in California is global warming." When pressed on the matter, he kind of backed down from his assertion, essentially saying that global warming was one of many causes.
I have to say that I would agree with Harry Reid if only he added one word to his statement: "one of the reasons we have the fires in California is global warming hysteria."
The truth: global warming did not start this fire. The fire was started by an arsonist, possibly more than one. It has been labeled by many news organizations as a "super fire." The reason the fire is so wild and uncontrollable is because environmental lobbyist groups blocked the Healthy Forest Initiative, which was designed expressly for the purpose of reducing the severity of forest fires. Under the Healthy Forest Initiative, underbrush would be regularly cleared out of forests just like the one burning in souther California, giving any forest fires less fuel to feed on and making it easier for firefighters to contain any fires. Environmentalist lobbying groups blocked the initiative's implementation in California, claiming that clearing out any plants would contribute to global warming.
Global warming alarmism didn't start this fire, but it has been a major contributor to the tragedy that the fire has become. Global warming alarmists prevented the Forest Service from properly managing the forests, and this "super fire" is the direct result of their alarmist actions.
My question for the global warming alarmists is this: how much more pollution has been caused by this wildfire due to your meddling than has supposedly been prevented by allowing the forests to grow unchecked?
When it comes to the environment, modern science knows a lot...but many things are still unknown. When it comes to global warming, we only know one thing: the earth is getting warmer. The truth is that we don't really know why, and now we have concrete evidence that rabid environmentalism doesn't help anything, and is in fact a very bad thing.
Today, Reid told reporters that "one of the reasons we have the fires in California is global warming." When pressed on the matter, he kind of backed down from his assertion, essentially saying that global warming was one of many causes.
I have to say that I would agree with Harry Reid if only he added one word to his statement: "one of the reasons we have the fires in California is global warming hysteria."
The truth: global warming did not start this fire. The fire was started by an arsonist, possibly more than one. It has been labeled by many news organizations as a "super fire." The reason the fire is so wild and uncontrollable is because environmental lobbyist groups blocked the Healthy Forest Initiative, which was designed expressly for the purpose of reducing the severity of forest fires. Under the Healthy Forest Initiative, underbrush would be regularly cleared out of forests just like the one burning in souther California, giving any forest fires less fuel to feed on and making it easier for firefighters to contain any fires. Environmentalist lobbying groups blocked the initiative's implementation in California, claiming that clearing out any plants would contribute to global warming.
Global warming alarmism didn't start this fire, but it has been a major contributor to the tragedy that the fire has become. Global warming alarmists prevented the Forest Service from properly managing the forests, and this "super fire" is the direct result of their alarmist actions.
My question for the global warming alarmists is this: how much more pollution has been caused by this wildfire due to your meddling than has supposedly been prevented by allowing the forests to grow unchecked?
When it comes to the environment, modern science knows a lot...but many things are still unknown. When it comes to global warming, we only know one thing: the earth is getting warmer. The truth is that we don't really know why, and now we have concrete evidence that rabid environmentalism doesn't help anything, and is in fact a very bad thing.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Absolutely Disgusting
As I was logging on to Blogger today, something caught my eye: the latest Blogger Buzz (aka "something I usually ignore altogether but caught my eye for some reason).
They are calling it the "Environmental Blog Roundup," and normally I would just ignore it as yet more global warming propaganda, but one particularly disgusting blog jumped out at me: the Rachel Carson Centennial Blog.
I have major problems with Rachel Carson. For anyone who doesn't know, Rachel Carson was a marine biologist/environmentalist who is given credit for helping to start the modern enviro-wacko movement.
Carson's defining work is a book called Silent Spring. In this book, she argues that pesticide use will inevitably lead to the deaths of animals, birds in particular, through a process called "bioaccumulation." DDT was in widespread use across the United States in an attempt to wipe out malaria. One of the side-effects of DDT was the weakening of the shells of birds' eggs. Carson argued that through bioaccumulation, birds would build up DDT in their systems, leaving their eggs constantly vulnerable to breakage, which would lead to the extinction of birds (hence the spring is silent).
The problem with Carson's premise: studies have showed that DDT does not accumulate in birds' systems. Use of DDT does temporarily weaken the shells of birds' eggs, but the problem does not persist over the long-term. In response to Carson's book, however (before these studies were completed), DDT was banned. When it comes to Rachel Carson, the most important question is this: how many people have died from malaria needlessly due to Rachel Carson's book?
Because of the ban on DDT in the US, the manufacture of DDT came to a screeching halt. US policy has worldwide effects, and the US's perception of DDT (and refusal to donate money for DDT use for malaria control in African nations...though the US would give money for other, less effective measures) has prevented effective malaria control in third-world nations across the globe. Since the publishing of Silent Spring, millions of people have died needlessly from mosquito-borne malaria.
Yes, we need to be responsible stewards of our environment...but what the enviro-wackos don't seem to understand (and haven't since Carson's day) is that overreacting based on false evidence (aka lies) helps no one.
For more information on this, I recommend the book The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science.
They are calling it the "Environmental Blog Roundup," and normally I would just ignore it as yet more global warming propaganda, but one particularly disgusting blog jumped out at me: the Rachel Carson Centennial Blog.
I have major problems with Rachel Carson. For anyone who doesn't know, Rachel Carson was a marine biologist/environmentalist who is given credit for helping to start the modern enviro-wacko movement.
Carson's defining work is a book called Silent Spring. In this book, she argues that pesticide use will inevitably lead to the deaths of animals, birds in particular, through a process called "bioaccumulation." DDT was in widespread use across the United States in an attempt to wipe out malaria. One of the side-effects of DDT was the weakening of the shells of birds' eggs. Carson argued that through bioaccumulation, birds would build up DDT in their systems, leaving their eggs constantly vulnerable to breakage, which would lead to the extinction of birds (hence the spring is silent).
The problem with Carson's premise: studies have showed that DDT does not accumulate in birds' systems. Use of DDT does temporarily weaken the shells of birds' eggs, but the problem does not persist over the long-term. In response to Carson's book, however (before these studies were completed), DDT was banned. When it comes to Rachel Carson, the most important question is this: how many people have died from malaria needlessly due to Rachel Carson's book?
Because of the ban on DDT in the US, the manufacture of DDT came to a screeching halt. US policy has worldwide effects, and the US's perception of DDT (and refusal to donate money for DDT use for malaria control in African nations...though the US would give money for other, less effective measures) has prevented effective malaria control in third-world nations across the globe. Since the publishing of Silent Spring, millions of people have died needlessly from mosquito-borne malaria.
Yes, we need to be responsible stewards of our environment...but what the enviro-wackos don't seem to understand (and haven't since Carson's day) is that overreacting based on false evidence (aka lies) helps no one.
For more information on this, I recommend the book The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science.
Friday, October 12, 2007
Al Gore wins Peace Prize
Al Gore has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his work to raise awareness on the issue of climate change. The argument from conservatives, including Rush Limbaugh, is that with this move, the Nobel committee has lost all credibility. I would agree with Rush, except for one thing: the Nobel committee lost its credibility long ago: between Yasir Arafat and Jimmy Carter, the Nobel Peace Prize has been a joke for years now. In fact, Al Gore is receiving the Nobel Peace Prize for the same reason he was given an Oscar: he's a liberal who is unafraid to bloviate endlessly about global warming.
The primary flaw behind Al Gore's awards are that his film was a sham, full of misrepresentations, half-truths, and outright lies about the nature of global warming. The news that Gore was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize is not as important as the news that an English court recently ruled that teachers showing Gore's movie to school children must give a disclaimer, explaining that the film contains inacuracies and partisan political views.
True conservatives can only hope that this English court's decision will introduce some logic into the global warming debate (which Gore refuses to engage in, citing "scientific consensus"), though that seems unlikely, as the mainstream TV and print media largely ignored the story coming out of England, yet have been praising Gore almost constantly since the Nobel Peace Prize announcement.
The primary flaw behind Al Gore's awards are that his film was a sham, full of misrepresentations, half-truths, and outright lies about the nature of global warming. The news that Gore was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize is not as important as the news that an English court recently ruled that teachers showing Gore's movie to school children must give a disclaimer, explaining that the film contains inacuracies and partisan political views.
True conservatives can only hope that this English court's decision will introduce some logic into the global warming debate (which Gore refuses to engage in, citing "scientific consensus"), though that seems unlikely, as the mainstream TV and print media largely ignored the story coming out of England, yet have been praising Gore almost constantly since the Nobel Peace Prize announcement.
Monday, April 02, 2007
SC jumps on the global warming bandwaggon...
The US Supreme Court ruled today that the EPA must regulate greenhouse gases, saying that they fall under the Clean Air Act's definition of "air pollutant." According to Justice Stevens: "The harms associated with climate change are serious and well recognized."
The Supreme Court was right in one thing: global warming is a very serious problem. It's not a serious problem for the reasons the Court cited, though. Global warming is a serious problem because it is a vehicle for government regulation and socialism. Liberals have been trying to over-regulate businesses for years now; it looks more and more like global warming will be the vehicle whereby they will finally get their wish - and with laws like the Kyoto Protocol, this is not just a movement toward socialism within the US - it is a move toward global socialism, regulated and run by the United Nations.
The other bothersome aspect of global warming is that it is inherently anti-progress. You'd think the self-labeled "progressives" would see how foolish they look, advocating for a position that essentially seeks to eradicate every technological advance in the 20th and 21st Centuries (electricity is evil, cars are evil, incandescent light bulbs are evil, plastic shopping bags are evil, and on and on). And organizations like PETA are even advocating veganism in the name of saving the environment...because cow flatulence is apparently destroying the planet. If cow farts are so hazardous to the environment, we should re-write history, praising the men who nearly eliminated the world's population of buffalo as America expanded westward - after all, if cow farts are so deadly, I'm shocked that the buffalo didn't kill us all a thousand or two years ago.
The truth of it is that global warming is a theory driven by emotionalism, shoddy science, and a lust for greater government control. The lust for government control has existed for some time, but finally, the socialist Left has found a way to get its wish: the regulation of every aspect of people's lives in the interests of "saving" the planet.
The Supreme Court was right in one thing: global warming is a very serious problem. It's not a serious problem for the reasons the Court cited, though. Global warming is a serious problem because it is a vehicle for government regulation and socialism. Liberals have been trying to over-regulate businesses for years now; it looks more and more like global warming will be the vehicle whereby they will finally get their wish - and with laws like the Kyoto Protocol, this is not just a movement toward socialism within the US - it is a move toward global socialism, regulated and run by the United Nations.
The other bothersome aspect of global warming is that it is inherently anti-progress. You'd think the self-labeled "progressives" would see how foolish they look, advocating for a position that essentially seeks to eradicate every technological advance in the 20th and 21st Centuries (electricity is evil, cars are evil, incandescent light bulbs are evil, plastic shopping bags are evil, and on and on). And organizations like PETA are even advocating veganism in the name of saving the environment...because cow flatulence is apparently destroying the planet. If cow farts are so hazardous to the environment, we should re-write history, praising the men who nearly eliminated the world's population of buffalo as America expanded westward - after all, if cow farts are so deadly, I'm shocked that the buffalo didn't kill us all a thousand or two years ago.
The truth of it is that global warming is a theory driven by emotionalism, shoddy science, and a lust for greater government control. The lust for government control has existed for some time, but finally, the socialist Left has found a way to get its wish: the regulation of every aspect of people's lives in the interests of "saving" the planet.
Monday, March 19, 2007
Gore to get grilled over inconvenient inaccuracies
Global warming activist and former vice-president Al Gore is set to testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and then the Senate Environmental and Public Works committee in the afternoon. The topic: rampant inaccuracies in Gore's recent film An Inconvenient Truth...and Gore is set to get some tough questions.
The inconvenient truth for Gore is that the "scientific consensus" upon which so much of his activism depends simply does not exist. There are many scientists in the United States and across the world who do not buy into the man-made global warming hysteria, and many more who keep their opinions to themselves due to global warming activists' hysterical denunciations of dissenters.
I have yet to hear anything from the mainstream media about Gore's testimony, but it will hopefully be in the news tomorrow. I am eager to hear how this propagandist responds to tough questioning about his out-and-out lies.
The inconvenient truth for Gore is that the "scientific consensus" upon which so much of his activism depends simply does not exist. There are many scientists in the United States and across the world who do not buy into the man-made global warming hysteria, and many more who keep their opinions to themselves due to global warming activists' hysterical denunciations of dissenters.
I have yet to hear anything from the mainstream media about Gore's testimony, but it will hopefully be in the news tomorrow. I am eager to hear how this propagandist responds to tough questioning about his out-and-out lies.
Sunday, February 04, 2007
Al Gore & Rush Limbaugh
This week, Al Gore and Rush Limbaugh were both nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize - Al Gore for his global warming propaganda film "An Inconvenient Truth," and Rush for "fighting for conservative principles in America," and because of his "tireless efforts to promote liberty, equality and opportunity for all humankind, regardless of race, creed, economic stratum or national origin."
Since the inception of his program, Rush has been decried as a Nazi, homophobe, and many other divisive names. As one responder to "The Lede" blog on the New York Times website put it, Rush is "a crack-addicted neo-nazi bigot who rants at every opportunity against Jews, Blacks, homosexuals, Muslims and non-European visitors to the United States." Personally, I don't know how so many people got it into their heads that Rush is evil; I listen to his radio program almost every day, and the most evil thing he tends to do is to use logic to defend conservatism and argue against liberalism. Of course, to too many liberals and members of the Democrat party, logical argument is the very definition of evil, so I guess that works. The "crack-addicted" remark makes me laugh, though - Rush Limbaugh was addicted to prescription painkillers after he received back surgery - something that could happen to anyone, and has, in fact, happened to many people. Rush was not using crack, heroine, meth, or any other illegal drug; he became addicted to medicine that had been prescribed to him by a doctor. The sad truth of it is that many liberals are willing to give more compassion to real crack addicts whose own choices lead them into their addiction than they are willing to give to someone who becomes addicted because he is trying to deal with unbearable pain.
There apparently are some questions surrounding the validity of Rush's nomination, but regardless of the hair-splitting when it comes to the nomination rules, I believe (obviously) that Rush's nomination is the more valid of the two. Here's why:
Al Gore was nominated because, as one of his nominators stated,
The only "inconvenient truth" when it comes to global warming is that the science behind the theory, at this point, is inconclusive. According to liberals, failure to accept each and every tenet of man-made global warming is tantamount to heresy, and as time goes on, liberals come closer and closer to stoning those they deem heretics. The best defense that liberals have come up with for man-made global warming is that there is a "scientific consensus," and as I addressed in my last post, scientific consensus is itself a farce. Science does not operate by consensus, it operates by process; this process is known as the scientific method (note that "form a consensus" does not appear as part of that method). As Rush Limbaugh and others have pointed out, if consensus dictated science, we would still believe that the world was flat!
Rush Limbaugh, on the other hand, has spent the last 20+ years enhancing the democratic process in America by defending conservatism and advocating for conservative values. He has created a media empire in a nation whose media has, for decades, been overwhelmingly liberal. He is rightly the father of talk radio, one of the most popular and profitable forms of media in the 21st Century. He has approached issues with logic, humor, and sarcasm, but rarely, if ever, with divisiveness. He is hated by many liberals, but this is only because he proves, again and again, to be right on almost every issue.
The simple truth of the matter is that, when it comes to Rush Limbaugh, liberals hate him because he presents the conservative side of the debate clearly, articulately, and with humor, and for all of the liberals' lip-service to debate, they would much rather shut the conservative side down. But Rush is here to stay, and I pray that he wins the Nobel Peace Prize, because if he does win, it is not just a victory for Rush Limbaugh, it is a victory for conservatism in America.
Since the inception of his program, Rush has been decried as a Nazi, homophobe, and many other divisive names. As one responder to "The Lede" blog on the New York Times website put it, Rush is "a crack-addicted neo-nazi bigot who rants at every opportunity against Jews, Blacks, homosexuals, Muslims and non-European visitors to the United States." Personally, I don't know how so many people got it into their heads that Rush is evil; I listen to his radio program almost every day, and the most evil thing he tends to do is to use logic to defend conservatism and argue against liberalism. Of course, to too many liberals and members of the Democrat party, logical argument is the very definition of evil, so I guess that works. The "crack-addicted" remark makes me laugh, though - Rush Limbaugh was addicted to prescription painkillers after he received back surgery - something that could happen to anyone, and has, in fact, happened to many people. Rush was not using crack, heroine, meth, or any other illegal drug; he became addicted to medicine that had been prescribed to him by a doctor. The sad truth of it is that many liberals are willing to give more compassion to real crack addicts whose own choices lead them into their addiction than they are willing to give to someone who becomes addicted because he is trying to deal with unbearable pain.
There apparently are some questions surrounding the validity of Rush's nomination, but regardless of the hair-splitting when it comes to the nomination rules, I believe (obviously) that Rush's nomination is the more valid of the two. Here's why:
Al Gore was nominated because, as one of his nominators stated,
(Note: "Sheila" refers to Sheila Watt-Cloutier, a Canadian Inuit activist.)A prerequisite for winning the Nobel Peace Prize is making a difference, and Al Gore has made a difference. …
Al Gore, like no other, has put climate change on the agenda. Gore uses his position to get politicians to understand, while Sheila works from the ground up.
The only "inconvenient truth" when it comes to global warming is that the science behind the theory, at this point, is inconclusive. According to liberals, failure to accept each and every tenet of man-made global warming is tantamount to heresy, and as time goes on, liberals come closer and closer to stoning those they deem heretics. The best defense that liberals have come up with for man-made global warming is that there is a "scientific consensus," and as I addressed in my last post, scientific consensus is itself a farce. Science does not operate by consensus, it operates by process; this process is known as the scientific method (note that "form a consensus" does not appear as part of that method). As Rush Limbaugh and others have pointed out, if consensus dictated science, we would still believe that the world was flat!
Rush Limbaugh, on the other hand, has spent the last 20+ years enhancing the democratic process in America by defending conservatism and advocating for conservative values. He has created a media empire in a nation whose media has, for decades, been overwhelmingly liberal. He is rightly the father of talk radio, one of the most popular and profitable forms of media in the 21st Century. He has approached issues with logic, humor, and sarcasm, but rarely, if ever, with divisiveness. He is hated by many liberals, but this is only because he proves, again and again, to be right on almost every issue.
The simple truth of the matter is that, when it comes to Rush Limbaugh, liberals hate him because he presents the conservative side of the debate clearly, articulately, and with humor, and for all of the liberals' lip-service to debate, they would much rather shut the conservative side down. But Rush is here to stay, and I pray that he wins the Nobel Peace Prize, because if he does win, it is not just a victory for Rush Limbaugh, it is a victory for conservatism in America.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Consensus doesn't make it right...
I'd like to cover two things today:
The first is global warming. Recently, a gal from The Weather Channel decided to make some bloviations about global warming. One of the things that she said was that she believed that any weather broadcaster who did not believe in global warming should have their AMS (American Meterological Society) membership revoked.
This, I believe, is a prime indicator that the global warming debate is nothing but an absurd cacophony of opinion and politics.
One of the main defenses of global warming given by its proponents is that there is a supposed consensus among scientists that man-made global warming exists, and that it is a very real, very dangerous problem.
The problem with this line of thinking is that consensus does not make science.
Does global warming exist? Yes, the evidence bears this out. The average global temperature has risen somewhere in the neighborhood of one degree Farenheit in the past 100 years. Is this something we should be worried about? I don't know. The global warming activists would have us believe that global temperature will continue to rise until the planet becomes uninhabitable. Some add on "unless we do something about it," others believe it's already too late.
My problem with the global warming debate is that there are other scientists out there who believe that these temperature changes are cyclical - that they are natural phenomena, not created by man. As yet, the issue is unresolved, due to simple lack of information: temperature records do not go back far enough to make a decisive judgment.
But the truth is that the "debate" about the existence of global warming is largely one-sided: the proponents of global warming control the money and power in the scientific community, and thus have gained control of the debate. This debate is very similar to the debate over evolution and intelligent design: scientists who question the existence of man-made global warming are shunned in the scientific community. Their articles are not published, and their research grants are revoked or denied.
This is the problem with science today: it is too tied to money and to the government. Instead of looking at all of the evidence inclusively, and, at the least, saying, "Well, we don't know for sure, but we should probably take some measures just in case," science has become political. He with the most money and power determines which theory is right. Governmental agencies dealing with scientific matters are stacked with scientists who adhere to the politically accepted beliefs of the time. Grant money is granted or withheld based on a candidate's beliefs rather than their experience or the merits of their research.
Science should be about investigation. Any and all hypotheses and theories should be subject to question and investigation. But instead, science and politics are tied too closely together, and this has tainted the advancement of science to a horrible degree. Science is no longer a pure search for knowledge, it is a political endeavor.
The greatest evidence for the fallacy of consensus science lies in the history of science: which scientists are remembered? Which are looked at as foolish? Today, Galileo is lauded because he was willing to stand up against the consensus of his time to say that the world was round. Even Darwin is remembered because he stood against the consensus of Biblical creationism. The scientists who stood up in the face of "scientific consensus" are the ones whose names are written down in the history books, proving to anyone not blinded by politics that science is not a democracy: when the votes are cast and the ballots are counted, the majority may very well be entirely wrong.
When it comes to global warming, I am a skeptic. I just don't know whether global warming is man-made or cyclical. I have seen evidence for both arguments. Both have merits, and both have questions that remain unanswered. But given the political factors surrounding the debate and the historical background of "consensus science," I must say that I tend to lean more to the other side of the debate.
The second thing I'd like to talk about is President Bush's latest poll numbers. The poll numbers released shortly before the President's latest State of the Union speech were abysmal, to say the least - somewhere around 28%. Much of the media has tried to cast this disapproval of the President as a swell of support for the Democrats, but I believe that this is not true (and from what I have heard, the poll numbers bear that out - the Democrats' poll numbers were not much better than the President's).
Personally, I believe that the reason the President's poll numbers are now so low is because of the question being asked: "Do you approve of the job the president is doing?" Now, many on the left do not approve because of the war in Iraq. Many on the right do not approve because the President has not done enough to secure the border, or to try and fix the illegal immigration problem. President Bush's problem is not that the nation is leaning toward the Democrats, President Bush's problem is that he has been trying so hard to be a moderate - and when politicians are moderate, instead of getting both sides' approval, they tend to get both sides' disdain. President Bush ran for president as a Republican, and that should carry with it an ideology much more conservative than the one the President has espoused. In his drive to moderation the President, and many Congressmen, have driven many away from the Republican Party, whose roles are made up of more conservatives than moderates - this is evidenced in the Republican's losses in November's election. By denying the people of his party the strong voice for conservatism that they crave, the President has driven his approval numbers down.
I believe very strongly that if the Republican party wants to win the next presidential election, they must run a candidate who will stand up strongly for conservatism, both in values and in government. Conservatives in America are tired of seeing wishy-washy RINOs in power such as Lincoln Chafee or Arlen Specter. If the Republican party wants to win elections once again, it must, once again, truly become the party of conservatism.
The first is global warming. Recently, a gal from The Weather Channel decided to make some bloviations about global warming. One of the things that she said was that she believed that any weather broadcaster who did not believe in global warming should have their AMS (American Meterological Society) membership revoked.
This, I believe, is a prime indicator that the global warming debate is nothing but an absurd cacophony of opinion and politics.
One of the main defenses of global warming given by its proponents is that there is a supposed consensus among scientists that man-made global warming exists, and that it is a very real, very dangerous problem.
The problem with this line of thinking is that consensus does not make science.
Does global warming exist? Yes, the evidence bears this out. The average global temperature has risen somewhere in the neighborhood of one degree Farenheit in the past 100 years. Is this something we should be worried about? I don't know. The global warming activists would have us believe that global temperature will continue to rise until the planet becomes uninhabitable. Some add on "unless we do something about it," others believe it's already too late.
My problem with the global warming debate is that there are other scientists out there who believe that these temperature changes are cyclical - that they are natural phenomena, not created by man. As yet, the issue is unresolved, due to simple lack of information: temperature records do not go back far enough to make a decisive judgment.
But the truth is that the "debate" about the existence of global warming is largely one-sided: the proponents of global warming control the money and power in the scientific community, and thus have gained control of the debate. This debate is very similar to the debate over evolution and intelligent design: scientists who question the existence of man-made global warming are shunned in the scientific community. Their articles are not published, and their research grants are revoked or denied.
This is the problem with science today: it is too tied to money and to the government. Instead of looking at all of the evidence inclusively, and, at the least, saying, "Well, we don't know for sure, but we should probably take some measures just in case," science has become political. He with the most money and power determines which theory is right. Governmental agencies dealing with scientific matters are stacked with scientists who adhere to the politically accepted beliefs of the time. Grant money is granted or withheld based on a candidate's beliefs rather than their experience or the merits of their research.
Science should be about investigation. Any and all hypotheses and theories should be subject to question and investigation. But instead, science and politics are tied too closely together, and this has tainted the advancement of science to a horrible degree. Science is no longer a pure search for knowledge, it is a political endeavor.
The greatest evidence for the fallacy of consensus science lies in the history of science: which scientists are remembered? Which are looked at as foolish? Today, Galileo is lauded because he was willing to stand up against the consensus of his time to say that the world was round. Even Darwin is remembered because he stood against the consensus of Biblical creationism. The scientists who stood up in the face of "scientific consensus" are the ones whose names are written down in the history books, proving to anyone not blinded by politics that science is not a democracy: when the votes are cast and the ballots are counted, the majority may very well be entirely wrong.
When it comes to global warming, I am a skeptic. I just don't know whether global warming is man-made or cyclical. I have seen evidence for both arguments. Both have merits, and both have questions that remain unanswered. But given the political factors surrounding the debate and the historical background of "consensus science," I must say that I tend to lean more to the other side of the debate.
The second thing I'd like to talk about is President Bush's latest poll numbers. The poll numbers released shortly before the President's latest State of the Union speech were abysmal, to say the least - somewhere around 28%. Much of the media has tried to cast this disapproval of the President as a swell of support for the Democrats, but I believe that this is not true (and from what I have heard, the poll numbers bear that out - the Democrats' poll numbers were not much better than the President's).
Personally, I believe that the reason the President's poll numbers are now so low is because of the question being asked: "Do you approve of the job the president is doing?" Now, many on the left do not approve because of the war in Iraq. Many on the right do not approve because the President has not done enough to secure the border, or to try and fix the illegal immigration problem. President Bush's problem is not that the nation is leaning toward the Democrats, President Bush's problem is that he has been trying so hard to be a moderate - and when politicians are moderate, instead of getting both sides' approval, they tend to get both sides' disdain. President Bush ran for president as a Republican, and that should carry with it an ideology much more conservative than the one the President has espoused. In his drive to moderation the President, and many Congressmen, have driven many away from the Republican Party, whose roles are made up of more conservatives than moderates - this is evidenced in the Republican's losses in November's election. By denying the people of his party the strong voice for conservatism that they crave, the President has driven his approval numbers down.
I believe very strongly that if the Republican party wants to win the next presidential election, they must run a candidate who will stand up strongly for conservatism, both in values and in government. Conservatives in America are tired of seeing wishy-washy RINOs in power such as Lincoln Chafee or Arlen Specter. If the Republican party wants to win elections once again, it must, once again, truly become the party of conservatism.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)