Tag: climate politics

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Accountability responsibility

Algal Mess

Florida, Algae, pollution, responsibility

Florida’s inland waters are clogging up with algae. You can now see the “algae bloom” from space.

What’s the big deal? Well, it stinks. “The blue-​green algae, also known as cyanobacteria, contain toxins that are highly dangerous to humans,” explains Harry Sayer at the Orlando Weekly. “Ingestion may cause nausea, vomiting, and liver failure.” No wonder, then, that the State of Florida is in alarm mode, preparing to spend millions of dollars to fight it.

The problem is: fighting water plants is not easy.

Easy or no, it’s a crisis. Animals are “in distress, some are dying,” says a resident of a beach town to which the algal mess has spread. Tourism? Gone. Who wants to smell that mass of green gunk? Gov. Rick Scott has declared a state of emergency. Understandable.

Over at ClimateProgress, Samantha Page has found something else to attack:  “Climate Denier Marco Rubio Tries To Tackle Toxic Florida Algae, Is Baffled By Cause.” Now, Florida Senator Marco Rubio ® is not a “climate denier” — a term of art that should make everyone, including environmentalists, cringe. He doesn’t deny the existence of climates. Or climate change. Page quotes him as being skeptical of the effectiveness of proposals to turn the direction of climate change around, back to its previous conditions, to which we have comfortably adapted.

Well, that’s his job.

Still, it is almost certain that increased CO2 in the atmosphere has aided algae growth here and elsewhere. It’s nature’s response. Algae converts the gas to biomass and oxygen.

But Page is also right: the state should look into industrial and agribiz pollution, too, as causes. That is, after all, a basic function of law and government.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Florida, Algae, pollution, responsibility

 

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Common Sense crime and punishment First Amendment rights folly ideological culture meme Popular

Scientists for Censorship

Climate Crime, Paul Jacob, Common Sense, censorship, global warming

“You have signed the death warrant for science,” scientist Peter Webster wrote to a colleague, recently.

The recipient of this charge had signed onto an entreaty to President Barack Obama, U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch, and White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director John Holdren — along with 19 fellow climate scientists. They asked for an investigation into companies and organizations that publicly express doubt about predictions of impending catastrophic man-​made global warming. Specifically, they urge the administration to pursue this line of assault using the oft-​abused RICO statute, the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act.

Yes, the scientists are calling for harassment of dissenters and straight-​out censorship.

Ronald Bailey, over at Reason, calls this a “new low in politicizing science.” Climatologist Judith Curry, who quoted Webster’s above judgment as an epigraph to her post on the subject, colorfully characterized her reaction: “When I first spotted this, I rolled my eyes — another day, more insane U.S. climate politics.”

The 20 alarmists, for their part, draw a parallel to the tobacco RICO investigations that were so influential a few decades ago. But that original case was badly decided. Moreover, RICO laws are themselves an affront.

The anthropogenic global warming catastrophists have previously undermined their case — lies, conspiracies to hide data, misleading use of computer models, and a relentless campaign to turn scientific inquiry into “settled science” will do that. But now, the grotesque spectacle of scientists demanding that the full weight and force of coercive government come down on their “opponents” completely destroys any remaining shred of credibility.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Climate Crime, Paul Jacob, Common Sense, censorship, global warming