Climate alarmism’s failures have seriously damaged our country

July 11, 2023

News headlines in the days following the July 4th holiday said the following things:
* The planet saw its hottest day on record this week. - CNN
* Heat Records Broken Across Earth - The New York Times
* How we know the Earth is now the hottest in thousands of years - The Washington Post
* World's hottest day? Earth set another heat record Thursday - USA Today

These headlines fit comfortably with predictions of climate catastrophe that we have been treated to over a period of many years, such as these, published by The Western Journal in 2018:
* 1970: “Most species on the Earth will perish by 1995” 
* 1970s: “Global cooling is the real problem”
* 1989: “If global warming isn’t reversed by the year 2000, it will be too late to avert catastrophe”
* 2000: “Great Britain will be almost snow-less thanks to global warming”
* 2001: “Snow is going to be a thing of the past in other places, too”
* 2008: “We’ll be living in Antarctica pretty soon”
* 2008: “Prince Charles says we only have 96 months to save the world”
* 2009: “We only have 50 days to save the world from global warming”
* 2016: “Pretty much everything in ‘An Inconvenient Truth’”

And, there was one more, but the end date of this predicted catastrophe has not yet arrived: 1988: “The Earth will warm by 3 to 9 degrees Fahrenheit by 2025-2050.”

These were serious predictions made by, or based upon theories promoted by, scientists and/or organizations focused on climate issues. 

The reference to “An Inconvenient Truth” addresses the documentary produced by former Vice President Al Gore, who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 for it.

In the 2006 global warming documentary, Gore predicted that the global sea level could rise as much as 20 feet "in the near future."

It didn’t happen.

Two years later during a speech at the Copenhagen Climate Conference he said that there was "a 75 percent chance that the entire north polar ice cap, during some of the summer months, could be completely ice-free within the next five to seven years."

It didn’t happen.

Dire predictions like those of Gore and the preceding list that did not come true tend to create doubt about other similar predictions. Even those that someday may come true, if any of them ever will.

This is even more likely when people like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the former bartender and current member of the House of Representatives, warn of impending doom.

“The world is gonna end in 12 years if we don’t address climate change,” she reportedly said, “and your biggest issue is how are we gonna pay for it?”

This comment found the support of two-thirds of Democrats in a Rasmussen poll, and a total of 48 percent of all those polled. Later, Ocasio-Cortez labeled her comment as “dry humor” and “sarcasm.”

One of the many great things about this country is the ability of everyone to say pretty much anything they want to say, with a few exceptions for dangerous material. This is still largely true, despite some recent efforts to control some opinions. These previous faulty predictions were allowed, and even encouraged.

We don’t really know what prompted the “predictors” to say what they said. Perhaps they truly believed what they were saying. Or, perhaps they had some nefarious purpose behind their predictions.

What we do know is that the predictions were grossly wrong, since the time for them to have occurred has passed, and Earth is still here and hardly the worse for wear.

And yet there are still those that predict climate catastrophe, and a broad range of folks who believe them.

In a video on Facebook, a guy was interviewing another guy and asked him what to do about climate change. The interviewee said, “Farming has to stop. That’s the single biggest driver of climate change.” An interesting perspective.

The interviewer then said, “Alright. Without farming you would be hungry, naked and sober.” Perhaps the interviewee had not thought beyond his initial idea.

Even some of those who reject the cataclysmic predictions agree that people and their habits are having an effect on Earth’s climate. But they understand that anything that the United States does will have minimal effect on the global atmosphere. 

Yet, the U.S. under the Biden administration’s edicts, tries to kill fossil fuels, push “green energy” on us, despite its inability to meet the demand, force electric vehicles on the populace, and do away with gas ovens and other things. All this as China, India and other nations continue to increase their reliance on coal-burning energy and other uses of fossil fuels.

We need to think smartly about this situation and not try to force on people things that will occur naturally as the clean forms of energy that they think will save the world evolve.

The situation simply does not require the U.S. and other nations inclined to fight climate change to force expensive and often painful situations on their people, while other nations happily ignore the situation, counteracting whatever smidgen of good these harsh methods accomplish with their selfish tendencies.