Another Passing Phase

Today's The Washington Times includes an editorial by Steve Milloy (JunkScience.com) who provides guidance for candidates in "2012 GOP guide to the climate debate."  Milloy’s article reminded me that this is the third watermelon (green on the outside – red on the inside) or liberal inspired hoax in my lifetime. 

The first environmental inspired huckster I became aware of was Paul Ehrlich who wrote the ridiculous book “The Population Bomb.”  It warned of mass starvations that were imminent in which hundreds of millions would die.  He is still out there hanging around Stanford where some still consider him to be a serious scientist.  How is it that liberals get it so very, very wrong? 

The “population bomb” is a case study in how liberals look at a problem.  They see the potential of a shortage in anything – gasoline, money, food, tigers, polar bears, corn, or housing – and they freak out.  Instead of getting out of the way so the market can produce more of these things they insist on controlling them.  They can’t see the potential that a capitalist sees.  To a liberal the glass is always half empty. 

In our world as a desired product or resource becomes scarce, the price goes up and some happy capitalist will find or make more.  Ironically that will also have the ultimate effect of driving those prices down.  Ehrlich didn’t understand that and neither does the current temporary occupant of the White House. 

Of course government can artificially make something scarce and drive up prices and drive down availability.  We see that in the oil industry as government restricts exploration and drilling.  Even the most well-meaning program can have entirely negative effects like “Cash for Clunkers” which clobbered the used car marketplace. 

It was also governments who were causing the majority of symptoms that Ehrlich misidentified as an impending food shortage.  If you look at where people are starving it isn’t free market capitalists or farmers that are to blame – it’s governments.  North Korea, Cuba, Nigeria, Egypt, and Sudan come to mind.  If you really want to starve people put a liberal in charge of production – the USSR, Cambodia, Turkmenistan, and China are splendid examples.

Paul Ehrlich is probably a smart guy just as President Obama is probably a smart guy.  What is lacking is an understanding of what makes the world go around and a deep abiding confidence in government.  The liberal filter that they run anecdotal evidence through confirms their prejudices and they make the wrong decision each and every time.  What makes it worse is when they sensationalize the potential but unlikely problem (like Al Gore).  Ehrlich wasn’t wrong because his facts were wrong (though there is some of that at work) but rather he inexpertly assembled them into a false narrative that fit his liberal ideology.  This is of course true with modern climate alarmists. 

Liberals know that in general you won’t act against your own best interest so they have to scare you.  Thus it wasn’t a “Discussion on the availability of food in the Third World” – rather it was the “Population Bomb.”  Much like Roman mothers whispering in their children’s ears about Hannibal, liberal women whisper about “Global Climate Change.”  It’s the same principle at work.  You have to be convinced that hundreds of millions are imminently about to die (as Ehrlich asserted) in order for women to surrender control of their wombs and everyone else to surrender their freedom to governments to counter the problem. 

Similarly no one would pay more for bad gas produced by diverting food from the grocery into our gas tanks.  The very thought is ludicrous and self defeating.  People must be cowed into doing something so ridiculous when they live in a land with enough oil reserves to power our vehicles well into the next century. 

                                                                                  

As the underpinnings of “Global Warming” or “Global Climate Change” come unraveled, there are already people waiting in the wings to restart the “Population Bomb” hysteria.  The second green hoax in my lifetime was “Global Cooling” that fueled hysteria as the population hysteria died down.  I actually watched a special recently on the Discovery channel on “Global Warming” and it was immediately followed by a special on “Global Cooling.”  All of the people were very earnest about their beliefs in the reality of man-made climate change – but they were of course also very wrong.  There are faint rustlings of both population and cooling hucksters warming up in the wings now.  Liberals never stop.  Liberals never give up.  Liberals are always wrong.