(I have to say, I hadn't noticed the sudden silence in the last few months.)

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/13/opinion/letters/hasidic-schools-yeshivas.html

The West burns under a heat dome as Pakistan drowns, Arctic permafrost melts and the great rivers of Europe go dry.

Where have all the climate-crisis deniers gone, and why are they being allowed to hide?

Stephen Cooper
Los Angeles

In article <e6c7413b-5e1d-48a0-b860-4c4abe633b2bn@googlegroups.com>,
Lenona <lenona321@yahoo.com> wrote:
>(I have to say, I hadn't noticed the sudden silence in the last few months.)
>
>https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/13/opinion/letters/hasidic-schools-yeshivas.html
>
>The West burns under a heat dome as Pakistan drowns, Arctic permafrost melts and
>the great rivers of Europe go dry.
>
>Where have all the climate-crisis deniers gone, and why are they being allowed to hide?

You could say that they have achieved their goal, so they no longer need to
scream and shout.

Climate denial has given way to climate doom.

--
That's the Trump playbook. Every action by Trump or his supporters can
be categorized as one (or more) of:

outrageous, incompetent, or mentally ill.

On Thursday, September 15, 2022 at 9:38:01 AM UTC-4, Kenny McCormack wrote:
> In article <e6c7413b-5e1d-48a0...@googlegroups.com>,

> You could say that they have achieved their goal, so they no longer need to
> scream and shout.
>
> Climate denial has given way to climate doom.
>
I take it you mean they've pushed enough consumers down the wrong path to where we're talking about "the point of no return" for the environment. (It reminds me of how someone once said that the materialism and hedonism of the 1950s were due heavily to living in the shadow of the Bomb - many people were thinking "eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow...")

However, it just might be a good idea for environmentalists not to say, rudely, "I told you so." That way, the deniers can stop sulking after a while and have enough time to scrape their dignity together and - maybe - remake themselves as fighters of climate change, if not quite in the way their enemies were hoping for.

At any rate, I think the two of the biggest reasons liberals are having trouble with fighting climate change are:

1. Their unwillingness to say, loudly and frequently, that in a First World nation, no, it should NOT be acceptable to have more than one child - if that, no matter how married or rich you are. Any modern environmentalist will tell you that, if asked. (Older ones, like Al Gore and Dr. David Suzuki somehow never thought of that, even in the 1970s - when each of them had children!) One reason it's different in Third World nations is that people there don't consume nearly as many resources. Another is that having children is often the only form of Social Security, and each couple has to anticipate that at least one child will die in childhood. But even "only" 8 billion people may not be able to eat three meals a day if disasters keep happening, so any economic problems we will have by shrinking the birth rate even further will just have to be dealt with - likely through teaching extreme personal frugality.

2. Their unwillingness to say that frugality should NOT be just for adults. Why does anyone expect future generations to sacrifice their First World lifestyles (and the environmental harm that comes from consuming) when parents act as though it's OK for kids to demand almost anything, on a whim, without so much as telling the KIDS to pay for it? Yes, they'll be crushed, but they'll get used to WORKING for what they want or even not wanting it any more - and the parents won't have to make any depressing lectures about the environment - or the family's lack of money. (IMO, the only time parents should say "we can't afford it" as opposed to "it's not good for you" or "earn it" is when they're talking about things like the basics of food, clothing or shelter. Of course, any homeless kid already knows the parents are poor.)

In article <7dd42849-15f3-4a59-97f6-58cd641f5ea4n@googlegroups.com>,
Lenona <lenona321@yahoo.com> wrote:
>On Thursday, September 15, 2022 at 9:38:01 AM UTC-4, Kenny McCormack wrote:
>> In article <e6c7413b-5e1d-48a0...@googlegroups.com>,
>
>> You could say that they have achieved their goal, so they no longer need to
>> scream and shout.
>>
>> Climate denial has given way to climate doom.
>>
>
>I take it you mean they've pushed enough consumers down the wrong path to where
>we're talking about "the point of no return" for the environment. (It reminds me
>of how someone once said that the materialism and hedonism of the 1950s were due
>heavily to living in the shadow of the Bomb - many people were thinking "eat,
>drink, and be merry, for tomorrow...")

Yes.

I personally think we are (way) past the point of no-return.

Also, I tend to think of the people as part of the landscape. I.e., even
if we could fix climate technologically, we simply can't do it with half
the US population being crazy in love with a madman.

Liberals tend to think "Oh yeah, we'll just build a bunch of wind and solar
and electric cars and we'll be good". But that can only happen if we
someone get a Platonic benevolent philosopher king in place (See how this
is connected to that other thread - about the Queen dying?) It can't
happen with the system(s) we currently have in place.

>However, it just might be a good idea for environmentalists not to say, rudely,
>"I told you so." That way, the deniers can stop sulking after a while and have
>enough time to scrape their dignity together and - maybe - remake themselves as
>fighters of climate change, if not quite in the way their enemies were hoping
>for.

Not sure about the second part of that, but you're certainly right that the
main problem is that these people are so entrenched in their way of
thinking that they can't change w/o losing face.

>At any rate, I think the two of the biggest reasons liberals are having trouble
>with fighting climate change are:
>
>1. Their unwillingness to say, loudly and frequently, that in a First World
>nation, no, it should NOT be acceptable to have more than one child - if that, no
>matter how married or rich you are. Any modern environmentalist will tell you
>that, if asked. (Older ones, like Al Gore and Dr. David Suzuki somehow never
>thought of that, even in the 1970s - when each of them had children!) One reason
>it's different in Third World nations is that people there don't consume nearly
>as many resources. Another is that having children is often the only form of
>Social Security, and each couple has to anticipate that at least one child will
>die in childhood. But even "only" 8 billion people may not be able to eat three
>meals a day if disasters keep happening, so any economic problems we will have by
>shrinking the birth rate even further will just have to be dealt with - likely
>through teaching extreme personal frugality.

My take simply to say that, yes, the only real solution to the resource
crunch is to reduce the population - by a lot. And nobody wants that.
(And, no, I'm not talking about any kind of mass extermination - just
attrition. And the fact is that, we either do it voluntarily, in a
planned, controlled fashion, or it just happens on its own...)

Incidentally, one of the nifties stats I've heard recently is that in order
to support the kind of world lifestyle that we currently have, it would
take 1.5 Earths (And, surprise, surprise, we've only got 1.0 - and no way
to synthesize more). The only way we continue to lurch along is by
"borrowing from the future" - aka, kicking the can down the road -
something we've gotten real good at.

But, and this is the real take-away, in order to support a world in which
all or most of the population lives like Americans (which is the ultimate
goal of capitalism, isn't it?), it would take, get this, 5 Earths.

And yet we've still only got 1.

--
If Jeb is Charlie Brown kicking a football-pulled-away, Mitt is a '50s
housewife with a black eye who insists to her friends the roast wasn't
dry.

And, to quote a caller to a public radio show, some weeks ago, even if the object you bought recently is something you love and will use every day, it will STILL become part of a landfill someday.

Just one reason why we shouldn't be so worried about young people's "feelings" - and learn to say "no" to them more often, if not in words, necessarily.

(As I may have mentioned, even Greta Thunberg doesn't have the guts to criticize her peers the way she criticizes politicians. Or maybe she's waiting to play her cards right?)

In the previous article, Lenona <lenona321@yahoo.com> wrote:
> 1. Their unwillingness to say, loudly and frequently, that in a
> First World nation, no, it should NOT be acceptable to have more
> than one child - if that, no matter how married or rich you are. Any
> modern environmentalist will tell you that, if asked.

"Any modern environmentalist" will tell you all sorts of laughably
absurd things, if asked.
--
_+_ From the catapult of |If anyone objects to any statement I make, I am
_|70|___:)=}- J.D. Baldwin |quite prepared not only to retract it, but also
\ / baldwin@panix.com|to deny under oath that I ever made it.-T. Lehrer
***~~~~----------------------------------------------------------------------

On Thursday, September 15, 2022 at 1:52:55 PM UTC-4, J.D. Baldwin wrote:
> "Any modern environmentalist" will tell you all sorts of laughably
> absurd things, if asked.

I was talking about the inconvenient things they'd LIKE to say, but they don't - unless asked. Because "compassion fatigue" is real, with most people in the upper half of society.

Anyway, even if you have detailed proof that the average American doesn't consume far more than his/her share of resources, or that it's reasonable to expect Third World residents to be happy without clean water, accessible health care, etc., I don't see what's wrong with the old saying "better be safe than sorry."

(At least until 2030, when, according to the United Nations, we should only be at 8.5 billion, despite our only taking 11 years to get from 7 billion to 8 billion. We're probably more likely to be at 8.8 billion by then.)

I don't remember your saying exactly WHY there's little reason to worry. Unless you don't expect to live past 2030 yourself.

In the previous article, Lenona <lenona321@yahoo.com> wrote:
> I was talking about the inconvenient things they'd LIKE to say, but
> they don't - unless asked. Because "compassion fatigue" is real,
> with most people in the upper half of society.

OK, I wasn't going to engage in a detailed way on this, I just wanted
to throw out a snarky quip. But, hey, what the hell. The graf above
sums it up: "Only we are compassionate. Anyone who doesn't accept
all of our assumptions and wild-ass guesses about everything simply
lacks basic humanity." I reject this notion (in case that wasn't
clear).

> Anyway, even if you have detailed proof that the average American
> doesn't consume far more than his/her share of resources,

Of course, the average American *produces* far more than his/her share
of goods and services. The two are often tied together, and
rightfully so.

> or that it's reasonable to expect Third World residents to be happy
> without clean water, accessible health care, etc.,

How many trillions has the West dumped on such countries, to little or
no effect? I've personally participated in a public-health fellowship
in east Africa, and I can tell you that the public health problems
they have are entirely due to a combination of corruption and Marxism.

> I don't see what's wrong with the old saying "better be safe than
> sorry."

Harold Egbert Camping was an evangelical preacher. Like many of his
intellectual ancestors, he "calculated" a precise date for the return
of Jesus, and convinced his many followers he was correct. He
announced a date in 1994, which came and went, so he picked another
date later that year. His prediction failed to happen. He announced
that he had made a simple error in his calculations, and the real date
would be in 2011. That didn't happen. He revised his "calculations"
once again and announced another date. Guess what happened with that
one.

Through all of this, he *kept* thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of
followers who believed, in their hearts, that he was right. His
complete lack of any track record didn't even dent their fervor.

Starting to see a parallel here? I've been hearing these predictions
of doom from "environmentalists" for going on 50 years, and the
predated my awareness by a few decades. We were supposed to run out
of oil in 1980. Critical minerals by 1995. New York City was
supposed to be underwater by 2011. "Four or five Katrinas per year"
was going to become "the new norm." The polar ice cap was supposed to
be gone in summer by 2015 or so. Snow in the populated areas of North
America would become a remarkable rarity by 2018. And on and on and
on and on. And yet there is a steady supply of gullible idiots who
keep feeding on this stuff.

Here's a tip: when the predictions fail over and over and over and
over again, you're being lied to.

"Better safe than sorry"? You're asking us to annihilate our entire
economy on the barest, thinnest justification. Really, on the
*opposite* of justification. Unless ... just maybe ... it's not
really about the climate, but about a) money and power for politicians
and bureaucrats and b) increased control over the daily lives of
regular citizens. Hmmmmm.

> I don't remember your saying exactly WHY there's little reason to
> worry. Unless you don't expect to live past 2030 yourself.

Hey, what the hell did posterity ever do for me?

More seriously, there is just no actual reason to believe any of the
doomsday predictions. None. They have no model, no real science,
behind them. Actual real-world events contradict the predictions.
Yes, yes, I know there are still extreme weather events. Just like
there have been for the 40,000 years of human history, and for the
four billion years prior to that. That's not even interesting.
--
_+_ From the catapult of |If anyone objects to any statement I make, I am
_|70|___:)=}- J.D. Baldwin |quite prepared not only to retract it, but also
\ / baldwin@panix.com|to deny under oath that I ever made it.-T. Lehrer
***~~~~----------------------------------------------------------------------

In <tg1sf8$qtq$1@reader2.panix.com> INVALID_SEE_SIG@example.com.invalid (J.D. Baldwin) writes:

[snip]

>Harold Egbert Camping was an evangelical preacher. Like many of his
>intellectual ancestors, he "calculated" a precise date for the return
>of Jesus, and convinced his many followers he was correct. He
>announced a date in 1994, which came and went, so he picked another
>date later that year. His prediction failed to happen. He announced
>that he had made a simple error in his calculations, and the real date
>would be in 2011. That didn't happen. He revised his "calculations"
>once again and announced another date. Guess what happened with that
>one.

>Through all of this, he *kept* thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of
>followers who believed, in their hearts, that he was right. His
>complete lack of any track record didn't even dent their fervor.

Sorry, JD, but Camping was *almost* right.

What he, and the others have gotten wrong, is that The Rapture
isn't a single event visible to everyone. It's a gradual elevation
of those people who were worthy.

So yes, in 1994, a group of Righteous Souls were brought
on board, and the rest were LEFT BEHIND.

I'm afraid that includes, well, you...

Ditto on 2011. And a whole bunch of other times.

Have no fear. First, there will be more coming up,

and...

second: I'm one of the caretakers, guides, and gatekeepers,
and I'll put in a good word for you.

(and I'm open to bribery...)

--
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dannyb@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]

On Fri, 16 Sep 2022 13:07:52 -0000 (UTC),
INVALID_SEE_SIG@example.com.invalid (J.D. Baldwin) wrote:

>Starting to see a parallel here? I've been hearing these predictions
>of doom from "environmentalists" for going on 50 years, and the
>predated my awareness by a few decades. We were supposed to run out
>of oil in 1980. Critical minerals by 1995. New York City was
>supposed to be underwater by 2011. "Four or five Katrinas per year"
>was going to become "the new norm." The polar ice cap was supposed to
>be gone in summer by 2015 or so. Snow in the populated areas of North
>America would become a remarkable rarity by 2018. And on and on and
>on and on. And yet there is a steady supply of gullible idiots who
>keep feeding on this stuff.

Al Gore warned in 2007 that polar bears were going extinct.
Supposedly, the melting ice caps were going to do them in. The US
Geological Survey warned in the same year that their population would
decline by 2/3 by the mid-2000s if the ice caps kept melting. Instead,
their population has grown by 20 percent since then, because it turns
out, polar bears, just like people, do better when there isn't so much
ice everywhere. As Rick Perry once said, "Oops."

Is there "climate change"? Sure, there has to be. The Earth is a
living, dynamic planet that's going to go through periods and cycles
and events. Is mankind causing it? Let's be really honest: there would
be climate change with or without mankind. Again ... living, dynamic
planet. Are humans influencing the climate change? Well, if all of
humanity were wiped out, that would probably affect the climate in
some ways, so sure. Are humans influencing it in a negative way?
That's where it starts to get really complicated. If we're the ones
melting the ice caps, is that a negative thing? The polar bears don't
think so. Don't define negative as "changing the status quo." If
temperatures rise, some regions will suffer, while others will thrive.
The Earth will be just fine, and in the long run, humanity will deal
with it and come out on top. That's humanity's most defining
characteristic as a species. We muddle through. We adapt. But here's
the real question, the most important question: do the people who
express the most concern for climate change, who have the most
invested in it, who make their livelihoods fretting over it, have the
slightest clue what we ought to DO about it? No. No, they do not. As
you (J.D.) point out, they have repeatedly demonstrated that they have
zero prescience. They don't have a clue what's going to happen if we
do X versus if we don't do X or if we do Y. We shouldn't listen to
them. Moreover, we should mock and ridicule them for being so wrong so
often. Maybe we need to do *something*, but we're better off asking a
Magic 8-Ball what, because the answers will be of the same quality,
but the Magic 8-Ball isn't becoming wealthy and powerful off of it.

David Carson

On Friday, September 16, 2022 at 9:07:55 AM UTC-4, J.D. Baldwin wrote:
> In the previous article, Lenona wrote:

> Of course, the average American *produces* far more than his/her share
> of goods and services. The two are often tied together, and
> rightfully so.

But do average Americans give more than they take?

It's well-known that it's traditional for Americans (and people in most First World nations?) to shop more or less daily for stuff they don't need much, don't even WANT that much and will use very little, if at all - often just to keep up with the Joneses.

> > or that it's reasonable to expect Third World residents to be happy
> > without clean water, accessible health care, etc.,

> How many trillions has the West dumped on such countries, to little or
> no effect? I've personally participated in a public-health fellowship
> in east Africa, and I can tell you that the public health problems
> they have are entirely due to a combination of corruption and Marxism.

Maybe I should have referred, instead, to their wanting to BUY all the trappings of modern life - such as light bulbs. One can't blame people who HAVE money for wanting to spend it on the things they want most and don't have.

> > I don't see what's wrong with the old saying "better be safe than
> > sorry."

> Harold Egbert Camping was an evangelical preacher.

Yes, I remember - there was even a billboard of his a quarter mile from my dwelling.

> Starting to see a parallel here? I've been hearing these predictions
> of doom from "environmentalists" for going on 50 years,

I admit it's foolish to predict - or panic over - what's going to happen centuries from now. (Conservative columnist Betsy Hart once wrung her hands over someone's prediction that Japan, with its low birth rate, would be completely empty in 2500 - something like that). It's also a bit reckless to predict what will happen even 30 years from now. In the mid-1960s, someone predicted the global population would reach 7 billion in 1995. Of course, that didn't happen till 2011 - but that could easily have been partly because people didn't really know, back then, how popular small families would become, since the Pill had just been invented.

But at the same time, it would be foolhardy to wait to predict where, when, or how often tsunamis are likely to strike until you can see them coming with the naked eye. Or where and how often famines are likely to occur. As Aesop wrote: "it is too late to whet the sword when the trumpet sounds."
> Here's a tip: when the predictions fail over and over and over and
> over again, you're being lied to.

I don't believe it's lying, most of the time. After all, just because Hippocrates and Galen and many of their successors were seriously wrong about a great deal of medicine doesn't mean they were lying - or wrong about everything. (There's a reason we still remember their names, after all.) What's more, it took until the late 19th century for doctors even to take the importance of soap and water seriously, despite the microscope's having been invented in 1590! That's a gap of roughly three centuries.

Whereas ecology didn't really exist till the 20th century, so of course such scientists made a lot of mistakes and are still struggling to improve and not to be laughingstocks. But they certainly weren't wrong about pollution being a growing threat to everyone's health - or about how even children can and should be making better choices, such as avoiding anything with excess packaging, such as fast food.

> "Better safe than sorry"? You're asking us to annihilate our entire
> economy on the barest, thinnest justification.

No, I'm saying that personal frugality was the basis of economies for thousands of years (that's a lot of practice!), so we can do that again - and in a much better way, since at least slavery is no longer legal, even though it still exists all over the world. (I heard that one of the worst such countries, today, is India.) Better to have a frugal nation than a nation with an economy that's based heavily on buying things we don't need.

And, as I mentioned in another thread, author Martin Ford pointed out that you can't blame the elderly for being frugal, even though that meant, in 2014, that "demand for products and services...decline(d), and that mean(t) fewer jobs (for the young)." So, having fewer children just might be better for the employment rate - especially when automation isn't going away. See the short thread here:

https://groups.google.com/g/alt.obituaries/c/6UdLgNHvLCA/m/bb2LzVGRAgAJ

Really, on the
> *opposite* of justification. Unless ... just maybe ... it's not
> really about the climate, but about a) money and power for politicians
> and bureaucrats and b) increased control over the daily lives of
> regular citizens. Hmmmmm.

And banning abortion ISN'T about controlling regular citizens?

Heaven forbid everyone should be well-fed, well-educated, and politically active. Where are the cannon fodder and the wage slaves to come from?

Frugality and birth control alike give a LOT more money and freedom to individuals than if they didn't practice/have those things.

> Yes, yes, I know there are still extreme weather events. Just like
> there have been for the 40,000 years of human history, and for the
> four billion years prior to that. That's not even interesting.

That reminds me of someone - just ONE person, mind you - who claimed that ALL the planets are getting warmer.

But he isn't a scientist - and if the folks at Fox News believe that, they don't make that claim often. If at all.

> No, I'm saying that personal frugality was the basis of economies for thousands of years (that's a lot of practice!), so we can do that again - and in a much better way, since at least slavery is no longer legal, even though it still exists all over the world. (I heard that one of the worst such countries, today, is India.) Better to have a frugal nation than a nation with an economy that's based heavily on buying things we don't need.
>
> And, as I mentioned in another thread, author Martin Ford pointed out that you can't blame the elderly for being frugal, even though that meant, in 2014, that "demand for products and services...decline(d), and that mean(t) fewer jobs (for the young)." So, having fewer children just might be better for the employment rate - especially when automation isn't going away. See the short thread here:
>
> https://groups.google.com/g/alt.obituaries/c/6UdLgNHvLCA/m/bb2LzVGRAgAJ

>
> Frugality and birth control alike give a LOT more money and freedom to individuals than if they didn't practice/have those things.

To clarify, I meant that since retirees - and people forced into "retirement" - will inevitably spend less, and, according to Pew Research: "in September (2020), 40% of Boomers were retired, up from 39% in February," young people may well have no choice but to be frugal as well. See the thread above. (Also, boomers make up about 25% of the U.S. population.)

Of course, young people who struggle with money would be foolish to take on any big responsibilities - even when it's just a dog.

On Friday, September 16, 2022 at 1:04:16 PM UTC-4, Lenona wrote:
> No, I'm saying that personal frugality was the basis of economies for thousands of years (that's a lot of practice!), so we can do that again -

More on that, from another old thread:

Author/historian David M. Tucker wrote the 1990 book "The Decline of Thrift in America." He said that up until the 20th century, when Henry Ford came along with his slogan "don't try to save money and be a miser," individual thrift was, in fact, pretty much the basis for the American economy and society. (Not to mention that, in other countries, it was the rule for everyone, except for kings and robber barons, for thousands of years.) Tucker wrote that a popular plot in Victorian novels was for a spendthrift housewife to see the error of her ways, and all would live happily ever after.
From issue 53 of "The Tightwad Gazette" in Oct. 1994 - not sure if this is included in Amy Dacyczyn's book "The Complete Tightwad Gazette" or not:

"Tucker has observed that trends in personal thrift and government thrift go hand in hand...and sure enough, a big 'problem' in the 1890s was thinking up ways to deal with the federal government's enormous surplus of money. (It was finally decided to buy 94 tons of silver from western mines each month for the period from 1890 to 1893.)

"But holes began to appear in the thrift ethic during World War I. Tucker says the damage was done mostly by two forces that had been around in a primitive form for years, but that suddenly became sophisticated and widespread: advertising and credit."

(The idea of thrift pretty much disappeared from American media and schools in the 1970s. Dacyczyn said that Tucker said that one small ray of hope for the future lies in the Keynesian economists dying off.)
________________________________________________

And, if anyone's interested, there seems to be quite a few different theories as to when we're going to reach 8 billion.
The U.S. Census Bureau implies that it won't happen for another 11 months.
Worldometers, by my calculations, indicates that it will be on Jan. 6th, 2023 or so.
The United Nations has stated it will be about nine weeks earlier, on November 15th, 2022.
But this -

https://www.theworldcounts.com/challenges/planet-earth/state-of-the-planet/world-population-clock-live

- suggests it will happen....on Sept 20th or 21st!

I doubt that the people behind any of those sources is "lying." They're just calculating as best they can.

> > Here's a tip: when the predictions fail over and over and over and
> > over again, you're being lied to.

> I don't believe it's lying, most of the time. After all, just because Hippocrates and Galen and many of their successors were seriously wrong about a great deal of medicine doesn't mean they were lying - or wrong about everything. (There's a reason we still remember their names, after all.) What's more, it took until the late 19th century for doctors even to take the importance of soap and water seriously, despite the microscope's having been invented in 1590! That's a gap of roughly three centuries.

Besides, would you accuse meteorologists of lying just because THEY so often get their forecasts wrong? (Note: I think viewers just don't bother to notice all the times they get it right. You know it's NOT going to rain when the forecast says there's a zero percent chance of it.)

Besides, even if the United Nations is correct in its prediction that we'll have a sudden slowdown and not reach 9 billion until 2038 or 10 billion until 2055, chances are it really ISN'T remotely safe to increase by even a quarter-billion, EVER.

"Nothing except diamonds is above the law of scarcity value."

Yes, if we managed to stop at 8 billion, we would have to scramble to figure out how to support ourselves in our old age without too much help from the young - but that was going to happen anyway.

And just because parents and most people tend to understand the importance of child welfare in an age of dropping birthrates, that's not an excuse to spoil kids and risk their becoming ne'er-do-wells, which too many parents of small families tend to do. (Whereas at least one semi-famous family with seven children, in the 19th century, didn't even bother to celebrate their children's birthdays - it "was pleasant enough to be alive." Apparently, the kids didn't really mind.)

Newsgroups: alt.obituaries
From: INVALID_SEE_SIG@example.com.invalid (J.D. Baldwin)
Reply-To: news@baldwin.users.panix.com
Subject: Re: OT: Letter to the editor - on climate-change deniers
References: <e6c7413b-5e1d-48a0-b860-4c4abe633b2bn@googlegroups.com> <72db8fab-ba37-45b2-bced-4705d819bb5en@googlegroups.com> <tg1sf8$qtq$1@reader2.panix.com> <012f58c8-a294-476f-aa4f-4e5abe715719n@googlegroups.com>
Organization: Revealed on a need-to-know basis
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
X-PGP-Key-Info: Key number 869CC8A5, finger me for full key

In the previous article, Lenona <lenona321@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > Of course, the average American *produces* far more than his/her
> > share=20 of goods and services. The two are often tied together,
> > and=20 rightfully so.
>
> But do average Americans give more than they take?

On average, it's self-evident that they do: even when our politicians
drive our economy into the toilet, it's still incredibly productive.
And we have a *lot* of non-productive citizens and non-citizens riding
along on the backs of the rest of us; and still we are the most
productive economy in the world.

> It's well-known that it's traditional for Americans (and people in
> most First World nations?) to shop more or less daily for stuff they
> don't need much, don't even WANT that much and will use very little,
> if at all - often just to keep up with the Joneses.

I don't much like consumerism but I like contrived rationing or good
and services doled out by venal, corrupt politicians and bureaucrats
way, way less.

> Maybe I should have referred, instead, to their wanting to BUY all
> the trappings of modern life - such as light bulbs. One can't blame
> people who HAVE money for wanting to spend it on the things they
> want most and don't have

No, and so what? If you're earning your keep, spend your money on
what you like. If there are serious, demonstrated externalities to
some goods, tax and regulate them. But first you ought to have to
make the case for the specifics of the externalities and their
magnitude.

> But at the same time, it would be foolhardy to wait to predict
> where, when, or how often tsunamis are likely to strike until you
> can see them coming with the naked eye. Or where and how often
> famines are likely to occur. As Aesop wrote: "it is too late to whet
> the sword when the trumpet sounds."

We can respond to bad events. We can't prevent them. There's no good
reason to think beef consumption and gas-powered cars are causing
tsunamis, hurricanes, blizzards, heat waves or anything else.

Think about it: what an ASTONISHING coincidence it is that it's
suddenly super-critical that we ban all the things the Left has hated
for decades, or else we'll all die. And not like all those previous
times when they said everyone was going to die and no one did, but FOR
REAL THIS TIME NO KIDDING BECAUSE SCIENCE!!!!!1!

Forgive me if I maintain my skepticism.

(See also David Carson's excellent summary of the silliness.)

> > Here's a tip: when the predictions fail over and over and over and=
> > over again, you're being lied to.
>
> I don't believe it's lying, most of the time.

It's absolutely lying. Not by every single advocate of gas-rationing
and eating bugs and all the rest of the craziness. Greta Thunberg,
for example, is plainly mentally deficient and manipulable (by her
parents and parties unknown) enough that she probably sincerely
believes her own silliness. (For a laugh -- a bitter one, but a laugh
nevertheless -- look up her response to why nuclear power is not the
answer to emissions-generating power plants.)

But a whole lot of these people are very smart and they are acting in
ways that directly indicate they don't believe their own bullshit. Al
Gore heating six mansions (with pools) year-round. Barack Obama and
Joe Biden traveling in 25-SUV motorcades and private jets with
helicopter escorts. All of them buying oceanfront property. Just how
gullible do they think we are? (Well, obviously, we are collectively
pretty damn gullible.)

> Frugality and birth control alike give a LOT more money and freedom
> to individuals than if they didn't practice/have those things.

And if individuals don't practice that path to freedom, why, we'll
just force them to abort pregnancies after the first child. Freedom
is slavery, after all.

> That reminds me of someone - just ONE person, mind you - who claimed
> that ALL the planets are getting warmer.

Mars warmed about one degree F in the last couple of decades of the
20th century. That's not really controversial. Its polar ice caps
have diminished. Mars is almost certainly the only planet besides
earth that would significantly warm or cool in response to a tiny
change in the sun's output. (I'm not saying we know that the sun's
output is responsible for recent warming trends, but I will say that
it can't be ruled out.)
--
_+_ From the catapult of |If anyone objects to any statement I make, I am
_|70|___:)=}- J.D. Baldwin |quite prepared not only to retract it, but also
\ / baldwin@panix.com|to deny under oath that I ever made it.-T. Lehrer
***~~~~----------------------------------------------------------------------