God Bless Climate Change

Image: Pickpockets work so smoothly that you'll rarely feel them reach inside your pockets.


God Bless Climate Change

"You've Got to Pick a Pocket or Two, Boys"

To all naysayers: "Shut up and drink your gin!" [YouTube]

By all appearances, Climate Change has its own media conglomerate now. Employing one of them, MIT tried to chew up and spit out one of its own for daring to suggest that "climate science" may well be a crock.

InsideClimateNews:
Climate Contrarian Gets Fact-Checked by MIT Colleagues in Open Letter to Trump

• This is not a view shared by us': After MIT professor emeritus Richard Lindzen writes letter urging Trump to withdraw from climate accord, faculty responds.
• "Since MIT's administration has made the climate issue a major focus for the Institute with the Program in Atmospheres, Oceans, and Climate (PAOC) playing a central role, it is not surprising that the department would object to any de-emphasis of this issue," Lindzen wrote.
• "For far too long, one body of men, establishment climate scientists, has been permitted to be judges and parties on what the 'risks to the Earth system associated with increasing levels of carbon dioxide' really are," he said ...

That headline is all wrong. Fact checking consists of producing verified contradictory scientific evidence. But, basically, MIT was defending its own reputation, and not necessarily its research in the field of climate science. We have the best and the brightest, they protest; there are large numbers of other "real" scientists who agree with us; ergo: climate change must be real, so there.

Richard Lindzen is not your typical young, eager climate scientist perpetually on the lookout for funding. If anybody would be familiar with the proclivities of MIT (and in fact of any university that relies on funding from, shall we say, interested parties), Prof. Lindzen certainly would.

So, it's worthwhile to check out his easy-reading paper:
Science in the Public Square: Global Climate Alarmism and Historical Precedents (PDF)

• For science to be politically useful, several features are involved:
• Powerful advocacy groups claiming to represent both science and the public in the name of morality and superior wisdom;
• Simplistic depictions of the underlying science so as to facilitate widespread “understanding”;
• “Events,” real or contrived, interpreted in such a manner as to promote a sense of urgency in the public at large;
• Scientists flattered by public attention (including financial support) and deferent to “political will” and popular assessment of virtue; and
• Significant numbers of scientists eager to produce the science demanded by the “public.”

Prof. Lindzen does not talk down to the reader. Chatelaine Magazine, on the other hand, has skills in politico-speak that rival those of Justin Trudeau himself:

ChatelaineMag: Everything You Need To Know About A Carbon Tax — And How It Would Work In Canada: We explain the policy — and what it means for Canadians.

• "Debate over a carbon tax will play a major role in the 2019 election."
• Unsurprisingly, what the Liberals have called a “vital step to grow our economy and protect our environment” and the Conservatives call a “tax on everything” is not just controversial, it’s also complicated. Here, we explain how — and if! — carbon taxes work.

​
There you go. Chatelaine is the self-appointed go-to advisor on the whole, crazy shebang.

Considering the condescending, teacher-tone of the article, one might wonder if Trudeau wrote it himself. Especially since he tossed the term "grow our economy" into the very last few seconds of his Thunder Bay speech, ensuring that was what remained uppermost in the minds of his audience.

The implication being that it's downright impossible to grow an economy if we have to deal with other stuff at the same time. I guess multi-tasking is not a requirement for the job of PM.

Supposedly, Chatelaine is merely reporting here, but it does a good job of making things sound dire by inserting, early on, a quote from the UN climate people: If we don't act now ... (blah, blah with danger music) ... worldwide disaster.

In an earlier post, 'Truth Telling Can Be a Lonely Business", I quoted from an article by a UK journalist and it seems important to repeat that quote here in full:

Internationalman:The Nature of a Career Politician

• Career politicians assume that the nature of leadership is to burden the populace with legislation and taxation [YYC: think "Security Certificate and carbon tax, for instance]. They truly don’t understand the concept of limited government.
• In a politician’s mind, the purpose of the existence of the populace is to fill the trough for the leaders. And, of course, the fuller, the better.
• Indeed, I’ve rarely been successful when appealing to any leader to drop a proposal because it might not be in the interest of the populace. I have, however, often been successful in getting a leader to drop a proposal when I’ve advised him that it may be used by the opposition to cost him votes in the next election.

Now, as you read the Chatelaine article, you might want to take note of the many modifying (weasel) words to create an impression that only large corporations will be penalized for carbon pollution. In fact, they will suffer nothing, because whatever they have to pay will be passed on to the consumer. This is a way to fill the government coffers with only a little inconvenience to the corporate sponsors of political parties and people calling themselves experts, and providing all sorts of latitude in government spending - for example a big donation to the crooked Clinton Foundation, while our Native peoples have no clean drinking water.

Again, watch for these words:

What is a carbon tax?
1. Generally
2. Usually
3. Households (after giving the impression it's corporations being taxed).

What’s the difference between a carbon tax and cap-and-trade?
1. Experts say
2.  if done well

How effective is carbon pricing at fighting climate change?
1. Scientists and economists agree
2. Nobel Prize-winning
3. people will see that ...

Oh, that last line is so revealing of scam. That word "people", incorporates two entirely separate contexts - one referring to heads of corporations, i.e.: "there’s a big profit to be made from figuring out ways to supply energy where they can do it without incurring the tax” and the other to sacrifices made by the general public, i.e.: "adopting everyday measures such as driving less and opting for more fuel-efficient cars".

I would bet that those last two words, "fuel-efficient cars", are the main motivation behind the present urgency. There certainly is "a big profit" to be made for the industry that is already producing the vehicles.

4. the numbers seem to agree

The first thought crossing my mind is a question: Numbers? How does one count the "numbers" of carbon emissions, and how does that determine the quality of carbon emissions? Then how does one compare those sets of numbers to sets of numbers from other sources?  And why say that the numbers "seem to agree"? Do they, or do they not agree? And if they do, how is the agreement arrived at?

NakedScientists: How Do You Measure Carbon Dioxide Emissions?

• We put this to Gregg Marland at the Environmental Sciences division, Oakridge National Laboratory in the US:
• Gregg - Actually, I think there's a misconception that CO2 emissions are measured.

Read the rest of the NakedScientists article (it's not long) and judge for yourself just how useful the Chatelaine statement is, especially considering the weasel word "seem".

Back to Chatelaine:
Where does Canada’s federal government stand on a carbon tax?
1 senior fellow
2. think tank
3. energy transition
4. politically palatable
5. start low

It doesn't stand at all on "carbon tax": as previously shown, our PM is much better at weasel words than Chatelaine. He's been calling it "carbon pricing" and there's a Nobel Laureate who disagrees with him, though both Justin and his sidekick Gerald were apparently so pleased with themselves it took some time before it dawned on them.

Their reasoning was that's it's always okay to put a price on something, but when you put a tax on something, almost everybody gets up in arms. If the tax is hidden in the price, it's more easily accepted. And that's another example of how politicians see the general public as mostly stupid.

If #5 above: "Start low" is not deliberate mind-messing, I don't know what is.  It's the principle on which the training of children and dogs is based. Ease them into it; let them get used to it bit by bit and eventually they will accept the whole shebang. (The same method is used in sexual exploitation of children. It's called "grooming". I'm just saying...)

I hope you feel sufficiently insulted by that. Politicians do think of us as lamebrains (at best) because they imagine that the people who turn out at conventions and campaign stops to fawn over them are representative of the entire population.

They aim to increase profits for corporations by increasing your fear levels. They probably need drugs to get themselves to sleep at night; if not, then they have psychopathic tendencies.

What does a carbon tax mean for Canadian consumers?
1. directly (passed on to the consumer)
2. higher prices (on everything)
3. gas (even if the cost of producing oil goes down, the consumer price goes up and has already gone up)

Read this to find out why oil/gas prices to the ordinary consumer can go sky high when actual production costs are low. You'll see that it's "the commodities market" and a "cartel" of oil producing countries (OPEC), that determine prices, not the actual oil producers themselves.

And now, in order to prevent "climate change" the cost of everything will increase, you will have no choice but to drive an expensive electric car, and they will still call this a democracy.

Check out the list of OPEC countries (the cartel), and then realize how many of them are now under the thumb of the United States, and how many others on the list are scheduled to become so -- which means that the "cartel" is really just more of the good old US of A.

And we're supposed to worry about Russia?

What provinces already have their own carbon tax?
1. relatively (as in "a relatively steady decline in emissions")
2. climate action tax credit with GST/HST returns. 

Relative to what? Premier Doug Ford's cancellation of "cap and trade" in the Province of Ontario? Or to Quebec's embracing of cap-and-trade?

TorStar: What is cap and Trade?

• Under a cap-and-trade system, a government sets a cap — a limit — on the amount of greenhouse gas emissions various industries can emit into the atmosphere. This limit is gradually reduced over time to decrease total pollution levels.

If you see some sense in the above paragraph, especially the last line, you're either a wicked, wicked person, or some kind of wonder child. (Obviously, I'm getting more and more disgusted as I go along here.)

How can you reduce a limit (or "cap") on pollution and decrease total pollution at the same time? I guess it's all that trading going on. (See the fishing licence scheme below.) Yeah, that's it.

When you consider the response of the Naked Scientists, the ability to accurately assess "pollution levels", under any circumstances, is seriously in question.

Before I forget:
The GST/HST is not necessarily fully reimbursed:

TurboTax: ... the government introduced the GST/HST tax credit to reimburse some or all of the federal portion of sales taxes to low-income households.

I'm no fan of Ontario Premier Doug Ford, but it doesn't bother me at all that, upon taking office, he quit the carbon program instituted by the former Liberal government. And, on the off-chance that you're even slightly as stupid as the government thinks you are, just remember that, in the above  Star article, an "associate professor"(those guys know everything) condescends to explain to us that cap-and-trade is like catching fish.

If you get a permit to catch so many fish, you can sell part (all?) of your allotment to someone else and ... oh, excuse me for the insult to your intelligence if you had already deduced the whole sneaky picture before the associate professor weighed in.

So how do political leaders who oppose the carbon tax plan to fight climate change?
1. Ecofiscal Commission
2. more politically palatable
3. Ontario Carbon Trust

Wow, there's an "Ecofiscal Commission" that claims to offer "Practical fiscal solutions for growing economic and environmental prosperity in Canada."

And there's that "growing the economy" theme again, which Trudeau, as a brief, but pointed incidental, mentioned in his T-Bay visit.  It's obviously a deliberate catch phrase.

Do you suppose people sit around a table competing with one another on who can come up with the most catchy slogans?  And who can disseminate them most quickly and efficiently to the public? Of course they do.

Anyway, the Ecofiscal Commission is composed of "economists", so they ought to know how to recognize and deal with climate change, eh?

One of their members is also big in the "Conference Board of Canada" (so many fingers in the pie!) and here's that august group's claim to fame: 

• "We empower and inspire leaders to build a stronger future for all Canadians through our trusted research and unparalleled connections."

What a large mouthful of buzz words: "Empower", "inspire", "trusted", "unparalleled".  No excess of modesty there at all.  I'm inclined to trust these folks already, aren't you?  And we don't even know who the heck they are when they're at home.

But they can reach right into your pocketbook.

They're all set to encourage an increase in prices and taxes and, to accomplish that, they want you to donate to their coffers.  Now that's moxy. No, moxy's too tame a word. Hutzpah, that's it: gall, nerve.

Moreover (hey, I don't think I've ever used that word before), since they claim to be already funded both "privately and publicly" (though they don't reveal their money sources, except that we already know that "publicly" means the tax payer) yet they expect us to believe they have only the public's best interests at heart.

And that's just one organization of many feeding off the histrionics of "climate change". Let's move on now to the "Ontario Carbon Trust":

TorontoCityNews:  The Progressive Conservative government’s plan, unveiled by Environment Minister Rod Phillips on Thursday, will see the province spend $400 million over four years on the taxpayer-funded Ontario Carbon Trust to partner with the private sector on green technologies.

I couldn't find a website for the Ontario Carbon Trust, not even in a search of Ontario.ca  - though "trust" is a very popular word there (16 incidents in the list of organizations) -  unless it's part of this massive, global outfit, one of whose offerings is"advice and insights", no doubt at a hefty price.

Did you see that above? "Taxpayer-funded"?

How will this play out in the 2019 federal election?
1. ... big emitters would decamp for countries with less environmental oversight

Oooh, threats of abandonment. Sort of like what's coming out of SNC-Lavalin right now, and I quote from its own website:

• A RA would lessen the tremendous uncertainty for SNC-Lavalin’s workforce and would ensure that its headquarters can remain and prosper in Canada. 

Heres' the thing though: Why are they so concerned about prosecution if the alleged crimes were the acts of people no longer associated with the company?

• SNC-Lavalin is an ethically, restructured company with a completely new leadership team and new board of directors.

Do you suppose there's still something we're not being told?  Do bears eat fish?

Have I said too often that corporations run the government?  And that the same game will continue if the Conservatives win the election?

Have I mentioned before that this is more like fascism than democracy? Attributed to Benito Mussolini: Fascism should more properly be called corporatism, since it is the merger of state and corporate power

You may have noticed that the corporations didn't rush into the street to protect Mussolini when the people strung him up. Neither does SNC-Lavalin care whether it's Trudeau or some other PM that can fit into their pocket while managing to rummage though the taxpayer's pocket at the same time.

Related on YYC:
Grey Skies Are Gonna Clear Up
Climate Change: Both Sides Now
It's Weather, Not Climate