THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume IV, Issue # 159, December 13, 2002
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
POLITICAL ENVIRONMENTALISM: THE NEW LAST REFUGE OF SCOUNDRELS
By Alan Caruba
"Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel," said Samuel Johnson on April 7, 1775. If the great man of British letters were alive today, he might amend that to say that, in America, "environmentalism is the new last refuge of scoundrels." I surely would.
I was reminded of Johnson's quote by two other quotes. They were by aspiring candi- dates for the Democrat Party's nomination to be elected President in the 2004 election. The trigger was news that the Environmental Protection Agency had decided to revise the rules concerning how much "pollution" could be released by utilities upon which we depend for electricity.
Actually, what the former rules did was make it impossible to make any changes to curb "pollution" through various upgrades of the facilities. Until the revision, a utility would not be able to make incremental changes at a reasonable cost. Instead, it would have to undertake wholesale upgrades costing a huge amount of money. Naturally, the utilities opted to make only those mandated upgrades they could afford.
Since coal is burned to produce forty percent of all electricity generated for consumer use in America, the Greens have sought to make the production of energy as costly a process as possible for both the utilities and their consumers. Huge natural reserves of high-grade coal in Utah were put off limits to any use--an action taken by the Clinton- Gore administration.
But I digress. Within hours of the December 22 EPA announcement, two leading Demo- crat contenders for the presidential nomination immediately issued statements. By 3:19 PM, North Carolina's Senator John Edwards said that Americans would suffer "more smog, more soot, and more premature deaths." By 3:21 PM, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry said "To safeguard the environment, we don't just need a new EPA administrator, we need a new president."
If you want to know what Al Gore thinks, just read his insane screed, Earth in the Balance. We are waiting to find out if he will run again, but if you are as crazy as Gore, the odds are he is already gearing up for another run. He will run hard on the many bogus issues of environmentalism. In the 2002 midterm elections, Americans correctly perceived that Democrats have no idea how to provide for the security of this nation, insure sufficient energy resources, or promote the general welfare of the people.
The Democrat candidates will, for the next two years, beat the drums of environmental- ism to remind everyone that George Bush and all Republicans actually want to kill everyone with "pollution." They have made these claims in the past and they will do so again, and again, and again.
The problem with that is, like everything else the Greens say, it's a lie. There is no global warming. The air in America is clean. The water you drink from the tap is clean. Americans are living longer, healthier lives than ever before.
In the voluminous body of quotations and literature that has been spoken and penned by environmentalists, we are confronted by the spectacle of the chronic scold, the person for whom enough is never enough. This is particularly true of government laws and regula- tions to "protect" the environment.
Earth and nature are never to blame for the ills they perceive. It is always mankind. It is always industry. It is always technology, chemistry. or some other branch of science. It is always innovation in agriculture, ranching, or forestry. It is always capitalism. It is al- ways prosperity. Mostly, though, it is always freedom.
What this great, prosperous nation needs are more facilities to generate the energy we require to keep our extraordinary economy growing, to provide heat and electricity to the homes and apartments of our growing population, to be less dependent on oil from nations that hate us, and to extract the natural resources this nation possesses in abundance.
More on Policy Issues Relating to
Energy, Environment, & Natural Resources
Alan Caruba is a veteran business and science writer, a Public Relations Counselor, Communications Director of the American Policy Center, and Founder of the National Anxiety Center. Caruba writes a weekly column, "Warning Signs," posted on the Inter- net website of the National Anxiety Center (www.anxietycenter.com). He is the author of A POCKET GUIDE TO MILITANT ISLAM, available from the National Anxiety Center, 9 Brookside Road, Maplewood, New Jersey, 07040.
Copyeight 2002 Alan Caruba
Reprinted with Permission of Alan Caruba
Reprinted from ACaruba@AOL.Com
December 11, 2002
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