John McCain and Climate Change Mitigation
Since everyone and his dog is talking about John McCain right now, it’s worth noting that, considering he was a conservative Republican, he did a fairly decent job in advancing the cause of climate change mitigation. He was making good progress, until his party moved so far to the right that denying science became de rigueur and the existence of snow became proof that global warming is a hoax perpetrated by liberals and other anti-Americans, at which point he gave up, but he gets partial credit, IMO.
Craig,
Senator John McCain, like so many other well meaning politicians world wide, got caught up in the fever of Global Warming/Climate Change (CC)activism that swept the political world between 2004 and 2014.
The momentum grew from the earlier “peak oil ” scare that saw massive price rises in the cost of oil imports. Vast investment in new energy technology, mostly underwritten by taxpayers, along with grand schemes for social and political restructure and disruption were advocated fueled by the new “information age” and the advent of social media.
GW/CC became the rallying cry for a weird sort of new political/religious/ ideological movement.
The environmental “green” movement grew quickly and massively, especially as the US 2008 banking financial crisis grew to global proportions. The GFC heightened a perception of failure in traditional institutions and structures. Governments and private corporations poured unprecedented billions into alternate energy to satisfy what they saw as public demand for action.
As many “grand” projects failed spectacularly, the general public began to realize much of the fever was generated by activists made up of a coalition of woolly headed, but well meaning politicians, , hypocritical intellectuals, crazy activists, the young and naive, dubious and exaggerated “science”,deluded and/or dishonest promoters, social revolutionaries, radical utopians etc, all guided by the old socialist left who had emerged as the principle organizing force, clad in green but still just as red underneath.
The general public realized they were being asked to fund, not science, but politicized science. Eventually, the general public lost interest with disruptive, coercive demands of a “social reform” movement that began to appear inherently dangerous and repressive.
The general public also lost faith in excessive claims, bitter conspiracy theories, and rabid alarmist demands.
As one after another of the grand projects collapsed or became only viable with massive injections of taxpayer or consumer funding, Joe Public became even more wary, especially when oil prices fell and the US became energy independent, largely as a result of oil companies developing and deploying new technology.
Once the fever subsided, and more moderate voices began to be heard, the question still remained of what exactly was climate change, exactly how harmful are the effects, and what effective measures can be taken without massive economic and social upheaval ?
There are those cynics who might say this is the sort of questions that should have been considered before all the shouting, but that’s not human nature ! We are creatures of enthusiasms and fevered fads.
Although the “green-left” movement is still active, albeit much reduced politically, with radical activists still proclaiming the end of the world, more rational and objective voices are bringing order to the chaos.
Environmental progress can’t be achieved by wild eyed “Crusaders ” fighting imagined “evil enemies”, this approach was never going to be accepted since it was always the equivalent of setting out to prune a tree by sawing off the limb you’re sitting on.
The only acceptable environmental policies to gain general support are those which incorporate a minimum of disruption for maximum benefit.
Carbon Taxes, Cap and Trade schemes, etc are all just ineffective artificial devices destined to fail. At the best they become like US corn ethanol, a well meaning disaster. At worst they become a source of corruption and economically disruptive.
After many years of negotiation and pressure, the IMO has finally moved to pass effective regulations to compel international shipping to use only low sulfur fuel by 2020.
Having been an advocate for the abolition of bunker oil for many years, this is very good news indeed, yet my enthusiasm is not without concern.
I’m very much aware of the problems created by passing regulations before the technology exists to easily implement compliance.
Dr Philip K. Verleger jnr, a renowned economist has just published a well researched paper, entitled:
” $200 Crude, the Economic Crisis of 2020 and Policies to Prevent Catastrophe”
His conclusions are certainly not to be taken lightly or easily dismissed, and should be considered.
Dr. Philip K. Verleger, Jr. is president of PKVerleger LLC and a Senior Advisor to The Brattle Group, a Cambridge, Massachusetts economics consulting firm, Dr. Verleger specializes in the study of energy commodity markets.
The author of over 100 articles and books on energy economics, Dr. Verleger has testified frequently as an expert witness for parties in private disputes and as an independent authority to the U.S. Congress. His testimony before Congress has addressed regulation, taxation, the behavior of markets, and most recently, mergers.
Dr. Verleger has held positions at the President’s Council of Economic Advisers, the U.S. Treasury, the Institute for International Economics, Yale University, the University of California, and various firms in the private sector. He is a member of the National Petroleum Council and the Council of Foreign Relations. Dr. Verleger received his Ph.D. in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1971.
His paper can be found at:
ttps://www.pkverlegerllc.com/assets/documents/180704200CrudePaper.pdf
Craig, the reason I include Dr Verleger’s paper is to illustrate solutions to environmental and climate change are exceedingly complex and relying on trite, twee, asinine little snippets from Facebook, for information isn’t helpful.
Yesterday, we sold our thirtieth large industrial purpose built Electric Mower including Solar installation etc. This is not bad, since much of Australia suffering the effects of drought.
In itself, this sale may seem only an insignificant contribution to reducing climate change emissions. But it does raise environmental awareness. The golf club’s 486 members, many of whom are community leaders, with each visit can experience the practical and economic benefits of environmental clean(er) technology in a positive social setting.
Subtle evolution is easier than preaching revolution or fighting absurd lawsuits.