False prophets of doom - Environmentalists would prefer that we forget these predictions

charlotte.com ^ | 5-10-08 | WALTER WILLIAMS

[kingattax]

In 1968, Paul Ehrlich, Vice President Gore's hero and mentor, predicted there would be a major food shortage in the U.S. and "in the 1970s ... hundreds of millions of people are going to starve to death."

algore's insane hero and mentor. figures

[Mr Ramsbotham]

If we don’t get rid of liberals, the world as we know it will cease to exist by 2050.

[DuncanWaring]

Prophet-of-Doom ping.

[agere_contra]

If I were a gambler, I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000.

Ok, lucky guess.        :0)

[Former MSM Viewer]

I submit that the real idiots in this discussion are the millions of Americans that fall for this crap

[11th Commandment]

Williams forgot all about the 1980/1990 ozone hole scare. Remember the predictions of “even if we act now, it is too late”. $650 billion later all the Western world has new A/C’s while China and the developing nation produce more CFC’s than ever. And guess what... NO OZONE HOLE>

[kingattax]

I submit that the real idiots in this discussion are the millions of Americans that fall for this crap

thats a GREAT point

[Reily]

Somewhere I read that Dr Paul Ehrlich's actual field of expertise is entomology, specifically butterfly population dynamics. His predictions are probably perfectly reasonable if humans responded to environmental stress like insects.

If what I read was true it is another example of expertise in one field rendering one a total fool in another !

[Captain Beyond]

bump

[CHEE]

Why hasn’t Drudge picked this up. It is information that should be exposed to the masses.

[Joe 6-pack]

"I submit that the real idiots in this discussion are the millions of Americans that fall for this crap"

GK Chesterton once said:

“A dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it.” G. K. Chesterton

Fortunately, there will always be a few who are willing to challenge the orthodoxy regardless of how deeply ingrained it has become. From Columbus, ("The earth is flat!") to Washington, ("The British Army is invincible!") America has had a way of inspiring greatness that arises from challenging convention (or "concensus") and rising above it.

[Red6]

Say it isn't so!

The politics of fear applies to environmentalism? But aren't those many of the same people who believe there is no threat from radical Islam, Iran, Libya, and that the GWOT is just fear mongering by Bush?

The liberal sees the world upside down.

[zerosix]

One thing is almost a certainty: the U.S.A. won't exist as we now know it (check out the "scary" movie "Soylent Green.)

These hoaxers, and they are either hoaxers or total nuts, whichever, prey on the ignorant and young.

About time to defeat them everywhere (anyone know how to send this to the RNC, GOP and John McCain?)

[Dilbert San Diego]

Heck none of the past predictions matter. We’re supposed to forget all that and focus on what Al Gore and his henchmen are saying NOW. Al Gore says the debate is over. He’s put his weight behind the global warming movement. So we’re supposed to all fall in line with this.

[Ikemeister]

“I submit that the real idiots in this discussion are the millions of Americans that fall for this crap”

---

Yes, but the scary thing is that one of these idiots is running for President...on the GOP ticket.

[pennboricua]

With his full brain tied behind his back!

[Bon mots]

I submit that the real idiots in this discussion are the millions of Americans that fall for this crap

I submit that the real idiots in this discussion are the millions of Americans Democrats that fall for this crap

[idkfa]

• “…civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind,” biologist George Wald, Harvard University, April 19, 1970.

• By 1995, “…somewhere between 75 and 85 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct.” Sen. Gaylord Nelson, quoting Dr. S. Dillon Ripley, Look magazine, April 1970.

• Because of increased dust, cloud cover and water vapor “…the planet will cool, the water vapor will fall and freeze, and a new Ice Age will be born,” Newsweek magazine, January 26, 1970.

• The world will be “…eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age,” Kenneth Watt, speaking at Swarthmore University, April 19, 1970.

• “We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation,” biologist Barry Commoner, University of Washington, writing in the journal Environment, April 1970.

• “Man must stop pollution and conserve his resources, not merely to enhance existence but to save the race from the intolerable deteriorations and possible extinction,” The New York Times editorial, April 20, 1970.

• “By 1985, air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half…” Life magazine, January 1970.

• “Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make,” Paul Ehrlich, interview in Mademoiselle magazine, April 1970.

• “…air pollution…is certainly going to take hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone,” Paul Ehrlich, interview in Mademoiselle magazine, April 1970.

• Ehrlich also predicted that in 1973, 200,000 Americans would die from air pollution, and that by 1980 the life expectancy of Americans would be 42 years.

• “It is already too late to avoid mass starvation,” Earth Day organizer Denis Hayes, The Living Wilderness, Spring 1970.

• “By the year 2000…the entire world, with the exception of Western Europe, North America and Australia, will be in famine,” Peter Gunter, North Texas State University, The Living Wilderness, Spring 1970.

[Spouting Horn]

McCain has “fallen for that crap”...He is a Republican.

[hiredhand]

I think everybody is going to be very surprised at how we "boil down" in the end. For example, there's been a noted national instance of lower income wage earners pawning belongings for gas and grocery money. They might not be smart enough to realize that this pattern isn't sustainable, but for people to be doing this tells me "something". They're either poor budget managers (like DUH!), or they've simply exhausted their spendable income after paying bills and such. My "guess" is that they're not forfeiting certain "comforts" so that they can buy gas and groceries, but I can't say this for certain.

Anyway...if this cross section of our society is already approaching the "end of their rope", what happens when they actually ARRIVE there? Will they wander around looking for day labor? Will they go to the various state and federal welfare agencies? Will they turn to crime? I don't know.

But let's assume that we "bump it up a notch". Let's assume that the price of gas goes up and over that which can be afforded by the next tier of income earners. This would be "Middle America". According to financial consultants (such as Dave Ramsey), Middle America is on an average $20,000 in consumer debt per household, has two car payments, and a house payment. What are they going to do IF the price of fuel goes over what they can afford? Something has to "give". What will "give" though?

I didn't mean to pick on the prospect of unaffordable fuel. It was just an illustration. Our nation is "fragile". We've become fragile due to decades of leftist panty-waists and their followers who have beaten down the intestinal fortitude which our founders and forefathers had. We've become a nation of cowards...a nation which murders it's unborn...a nation who sends its children off to government schools for training by the NEA...a nation who won't stand up to the homosexual movement... a nation who believes that black, semi-automatic, magazine rifles take on a life of their own and go out at night and hunt down and kill people.

Nah...it won't be the "environment" that kills us. It will be the same thing that's been killing us since that all to familiar story which took place in the Bible back in Genesis 3. That's what will be our undoing...and it will be slow enough for certain of us to watch it in progress, and deceitful enough to convince everybody else that it isn't really happening....sort of like the coming elections! :-)