Thursday, February 6, 2025

The economy is core, not climate change

What are most regular people concerned about whenever they are asked about the state of their lives? In other words, what would be typical answers to questions about their priorities? Many people are invariably focused on the economy, jobs, education for their children and health. You will be hard-pressed to find anyone who cites global warming as a priority for them.

Despite this reality, the global elite suffers from what can only be a case of global warming hubris. For example the first thing that President Biden did in his worshipping at the altar of global warming , was to gut the Keystone XL pipeline which was meant to supply the US with oil from Canada. Now Joe Biden is literally begging OPEC to pump more oil to stem rising gas prices in the US. As the global warmer – in chief, you would have expected him to advocate for the building of solar panels and wind mills. But hell no! He is not. Instead he is calling for the pumping of more of that pollutant called oil. The sad part of this whole charade is that these high gas prices hurt the low and middle income classes hard.

On the other hand, the rich global warming alarmists could not care less about rising gas prices. In a staggering example of speaking from both sides of one’s mouth, they have just flown four hundred private jets to the COP 26 summit while telling us that the earth faces an existential crisis. If the earth really faced a grave threat, you would have expected them to meet over Zoom or at the east fly commercial. But we get it! Commercial is for the great unwashed if you are an environmental icon. So we have a group of people who are not willing to do what they ask of us.

This is not about envy because I respect the rights of those who work hard for their money to spend in any manner they deem fit including flying business or first class. What I abhor is the audacity of the dopey alarmists to lecture and prescribe lifestyles which would condemn us to poverty in the name of the green agenda.

I also see that the German government is prepared to offer to give South Africa the sum of $ 800 million to help the latter shift to green energy. This is farcical on two fronts. Firstly, it is an implicit admission by the global warming forces including Germany that the switch to green energy is not viable without grants and concessional loans. If the transition was cheap and therefore commercially sound, there would be no need, in the first place, for Germany to seduce South Africa with financial largesse. Secondly, it sounds inconceivable that South Africa – a country facing an unemployment problem – would forego cheap energy that it generates via coal and thereby undermine its manufacturing sector just to shore up its green credentials. The risks of economic dislocation for such a relatively sophisticated economy are not worth the $800 million sweetener offered by Germany.

Mining behemoth, BHP, is also busy flaunting its green credentials. It is engaged in a process of disposing of its coal assets. It is interesting that the mining giant is not shutting down these coal mines but rather selling them and enjoying value because coal is selling at a premium currently. If the main issue was pollution, then BHP could have shut them down. .

I hate saying this but the leaders of China and Russia made the right decision by skipping COP 26. They must be smiling at the useful idiots from the West. China in particular will keep its coal fired power stations and enjoy cheap energy to build solar panels and wind turbines for the West. Last but not least, they will maintain their competitive edge as the West self-destructs under the weight of costly global warming mandates. It’s surreal.

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