Posted on 08/07/2017 11:24:46 AM PDT by Kaslin
RUSH: I went out to Los Angeles for the weekend. I had to go out there to play golf. Everybody I play golf with is gone, out of town here in Palm Beach. So I went out and, you know, it was a fabulous time. I played Bel-Air yesterday, and Jack Wagner was in the foursome, the famous actor. The guy is a scratch golfer, maybe plus one, knocks the ball 325 yards. Just the nicest guy, and he plays so well it’s intimidating. But I had a fine last three holes and our team pulled even and broke even. It was fun.
Saturday I played out at Calabasas with some friends. And that one, I gotta tell you this, all three of the guys in the foursome are listeners, and they are fans, quote, unquote, and they are one of us. So we’re sitting there, we’re having an adult beverage after the round, and, as always, the subject of current events and Trump and politics and a couple of issues came up.
And then the issue of climate change came up. And one of the guys said, “Look, Rush, I know, I know, I know, but I’ll tell you, I don’t know what’s wrong with it. Why don’t we pursue it? Why don’t we take ’em at their word, look at the economic benefits that would accrue if we began to –” My mouth fell open in shock and dismay and we got into a discussion. And this was good for me, because this is somebody on our side who has fallen prey to the very seductive language and so forth put forth by the global warming or climate change advocates.
So I had to use some unique techniques here in discussing this, rather than the scientific data or the usual left versus right lingo. I asked him a question. I said, “I want you to pretend, let’s hypothetically pretend that there is no man-made climate change, none, nobody’s alleging any, there isn’t any at all. Now, further, I want you to assume that you are the secretary of commerce or the secretary of science and whatever. You’re in the Trump administration. You have a cabinet-level position that grants you oversight over such things as climate change and whatever other scientific things that would impact the administration.
“I want you to imagine that Trump calls you into a private meeting in the Oval Office and says, ‘Albert, I’m cold. I don’t like being cold, and I want to warm it up, and I’ve heard from scientists that this can be done. So I want you to put together a policy initiative that would succeed in raising the overall world temperature one degree Celsius in 25 years. I want to hear from you in two weeks, Albert.'”
So I asked that situation, if that happens. “What would you do? What would you do, Albert? You believe it. You think they’re telling you the truth. What would you do?” And of course there was no answer. Albert is a fake name. I’m making up a name. The guy’s name is not Albert. Don’t worry about. I would not betray people’s identities here.
See, it works the same way in reverse. How do we stop it? How do we stop it if we can’t figure out a way how we would do it? I said, “Come on, Albert, tell me we all have to start driving SUVs. Tell me we all have to start paying higher taxes. Give me every cause that the left is telling us that you would have to advocate. We all have to drive SUVs. We have to stop burning coal, whatever it is. And there was nothing forthcoming. I think what it illustrates is that this issue goes way beyond specifics. Specifics don’t have anything to do with it. It has to do with emotional and other things.
I learned something. I thought I knew everything about the climate change argument until I read a piece in the New Republic. The New Republic is a traditional long-standing Journal of Opinion on the left. Back in its heyday it was along the same lines only on the left of National Review, but National Review has left the New Republic in its wake.
Oh, by the way, Gore’s movie came in 15th at the box office, and all of Gore’s buddies are accusing the studio of sabotaging the movie. It came in 15th, and supporters of Gore are livid, claiming that Paramount, I think it is, didn’t do nearly enough to support the movie and is sabotaging it. No. Nobody cares. Nobody wanted to go see a redo because Gore hasn’t been right about anything yet.
Oh. And here’s another thing, and it leads into this New Republic business. During the discussion post-round, I happened to mention, “What do you think of Algore? It’s been learned, it’s been discovered that Algore personally has a carbon footprint 34 times as large as the average American.” And I was looked at by another member of the group, he wagged his finger at me, said, “Not a worthwhile argument. It doesn’t matter.”
I said, “Really? So you’re confirming a point, that hypocrisy of liberals doesn’t count. They can get away with it, they’re not gonna be held –”
“No. It’s just not gonna matter to anybody.”
“Maybe it won’t, but that doesn’t mean it’s invalid. The fact that it doesn’t persuade anybody is interesting in and of itself.” But here, let me get to this brief excerpt here from — it’s actually quite lengthy piece written by Emily Atkin.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Here in the New Republic, Emily Atkin: “The claim that Gore and his ilk are hypocrites is a classic conservative attack strategy of redirection (because it ignores the core issue of climate change).
“This is much easier, and perhaps more rhetorically effective –” to claim Gore and others are hypocrites “– than debunking climate science itself. So the theory is, we can’t debunk climate change, people like me — except of course I can and do daily. But her theory is since we can’t debunk it, we have to go after these leftist phonies as hypocrites.
And she says: “That’s why you only see groups like the National Center for Public Policy Research releasing ‘studies’ on Gore’s energy use. NCPPR, which has been funded by oil interests, advocates against policies to fight global warming because it denies that global warming exists.”
“But the hypocrisy charge…” This is where it gets interesting. “But the hypocrisy charge simply doesn’t hold up to scrutiny. An anti-abortion advocate who believes abortion is immoral and should be illegal, but gets one herself, is a hypocrite. But climate change advocates who don’t live a carbon-neutral lifestyle aren’t hypocrites because…” Ready for this? This is what I didn’t know. It’s “because, for the most part, they’re not asking you to live a carbon-neutral lifestyle.” They aren’t? Ladies and gentlemen, let me ask you a question.
When you hear Gore, when you see Leonardo DiCaprio or any of these advocates on TV and you hear them talk about what’s necessary to fix this, have you ever gotten the impression that they don’t think you need to change your lifestyle? I don’t believe this! I mean, that’s the bread and butter of climate change is to convince you to change your lifestyle because it is your lifestyle that has created the problem. In their world, American progress — advancing the standard of living, advancing the quality of life — is where the problem exists.
In their warped view, climate change results from progress. They don’t use those words, but if you take a look at what they believe, that’s exactly how it would be defined. So here comes this babe Emily Atkin saying (paraphrased), “No, no, no, no. You can’t go after Gore because Gore is not telling you that you have to the change your lifestyle.” Well, then who is being told that they have to change their lifestyle? Well, I have the answer here, according to Ms. Atkin.
She says, climate advocates are “asking governments, utilities, energy companies, and large corporations to increase their use of renewable energy so that you can continue to live your life as you please, without contributing to global warming.” How many of you think that? That’s what I didn’t know, and I don’t believe it. So, in other words — according to this latest expert — you can go ahead and buy whatever car you want with no shame.
You can burn charcoal briquettes, you can grill hamburgers and steaks, and you could eat all the beef in the world you want, and they’re not gonna say a word to you about it. Because you don’t have any impact on climate change. No, no, no, no! What they’re gonna do is go after governments and large corporations and other businesses and utility companies and so forth. Now, stop and think. I think that statement right there cooks their goose! It explains exactly what they want: bigger government with more controls.
And if you don’t think that bigger government’s gonna eventually get around to controlling you, then you have another think coming. But I don’t think this is accurate anyway. The whole point of the climate change advocate alarmism is shame, to get you to stop behaving in ways they say are destroying the planet. That’s how they’ve succeeded in it. They running around; they blame everybody else. They blame you for your contribution, but then they give you an out. They give you a chance for redemption. Vote Democrat, raise taxes, buy some silly little electric car.
Do something that mitigates the damage you have made by living your life. That’s the central theme of it. But now we’re told, “No, no, no, no. Climate advocates are not telling you to change your lifestyle. They’re telling governments and they’re telling utility companies and energy companies and large corporations to change so that you can live however you want without contributing to global warming. “Last month, [Gore] said the three best ways are to talk about climate change … look for environmentally responsible choices when making large purchases … and support climate-friendly political candidates…”
Sounds like personal action. Sounds like things individuals have to do to ward off climate change. And then there’s this little paragraph: “As David Roberts pointed out in Vox last year, the reason climate advocates don’t intensely advocate for personal behavioral changes is that they’re ‘insignificant to the big picture on climate.’ That’s true even for huge energy users. DiCaprio’s emissions ‘are a fart in the wind when it comes to climate change’ Roberts wrote.
“‘If [DiCaprio] vanished tomorrow, and all his emissions with him, the effect on global temperature, even on US emissions, even on film-industry emissions, would be lost in the noise.’ And it wouldn’t be hypocrisy, since DiCaprio isn’t asking you to stop flying.” He isn’t? What are his speeches at the Academy Awards all about? So they’re taking a new turn here, trying to say that… I wonder how many of you have gotten this impression up to now.
As I say, I didn’t know. I had not heard this angle. I thought I knew everything. But they’re now saying that they never, ever have done that. The climate change advocates have never been speaking to you. No. They’re talking to large institutional polluters to get their acts in gear so that you can continue to pollute and live your life as you wish. I have not heard this before. This is their way around the whole hypocrisy charge.
Jack Wagner an actor so famous I have never heard of him.................
What I find interesting is that the “anti-frackers” in my neighborhood all use wood burning stoves and fireplaces.
Of course, there is no fracking going on in Connecticut but I guess it makes them feel like they belong to something.
Gore’s line was “We all have to change”, not “big business has to change so that we don’t”.
Night time soaps guy. Your wife has no doubt heard of him.
they don’t care about people changing because its really just about the rich countries sending money to the poor countries.
Saw a trailer for it, in front of Dunkirk. As soon as his ugly mug showed up onscreen, the entire audience let out a collective groan.
:-) People are sick of being lectured.
Or as they say, “When I want to get preached to, I go to church.”
I doubt it. She doesn’t watch much soaps................
A better argument is to inform them that for 500 years during the Roman Era the Earth’s temperature was 2 degrees warming than it is today, and during that 500 year period life in Europe was great, crops grew everywhere, hell grapes grew in Ireland. There was no world-wide droughts are flooding.
And to top it off the hope of the Paris accord was to cool the Earth’s temperature by 0.5 % degrees in 80 years. Great idea, let’s destroy the economies of 1st world countries to lower the temp by 0.5 degrees.
Near as I could tell from the trailer, the movie consists of AlGore lecturing, with B-Roll of natural disasters (Which you and I know NEVER happened until Al started noticing them) in between.
What kind of self-hating masochist would pay for something like that? Someone who is determined to virtue-signal, I suppose?
Of course it will be required to be shown in every public school.
Actually, it IS the whole point, that Algore has 34 times the carbon footprint of the rest of us. It goes beyond hypocrisy; if Gore really believed this was a dire matter of life and death, he wouldn't live as he does.
Ergo, his conduct proves he does not believe what he says, and therefore it is a scam.
During the Roman Warm Period, civilization flourished in areas where it had never been known, such as Gaul (France) and Britain. At the end of the Roman Warm period, a colder climate in the Asian steppes forced the nomadic horsemen westward, where they pushed the Germanic tribes to overrun the Western Empire.
The Roman Warm Period ended as the Empire fell. Do you remember what the cold period following was known as?
“The Dark Ages.” Yes, the nadir of Western Civilization. Thanks to the Byzantines, some of that civilization was preserved. And then, as the climate cycle repeated, we had the “Medieval Warm Period.” Also known as “The High Middle Ages,” where civilization flourished, universities were founded, cathedrals and cloth halls were built. Where Vikings raised cattle in Greenland (which isn’t done today because its too cold).
And then the cycle continued, when the climate turned colder, reduced crop yields could not support the expanded population that relied upon a warmer climate for food production, and in a colder climate, malnourished people lost their resistance to disease...
...and we had “The Black Death.”
Climate cycles are not new, and the formulae remain the same:
Warm = civilization = good
Cold = “Dark Ages” = bad
Now tell me again why we want it to be cold?
Give that NONE of Al Gore's apocalyptic pronouncements have come true, why should anyone with sense want to waste another 2 hours of their life listening to him?
But Progressives have no sense, so that explains it.
Baraq Hussein Ubama said that we can’t just set our thermostats at whatever temp we want. We can’t just drive our SUVs anyplace we want to go.
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