Radical Environmentalism or Human Progress. Pick Only One

Why only one? Because the two are fundamentally inapposite. They are matter and anti-matter. Polar opposites. Black and white. False and True.



O.K., O.K., I realize that was too provocative without an explanation. Let me explain.

Environmentalists argue that using of energy is polluting the planet, causing toxins that cause immediate harm, and greenhouse gases that cause global warming. From there, their solution is to use less. Many go so far as to argue that humans must be forced to use less, even if it means lowering our standard of living. That's where the real problems begin. Because in the rush to reach for the simple-sounding solution that feel good, no one calculates the harm that using as much energy as humans do avoids. That's right, our "energy intensive" lifestyle saves more lives than it harms.

Want proof? Think of all the life-saving progress that the world has seen in the last 100 years.

Take Norman Borlaug. Borlaug revolutionized modern agriculture, in the process he saved somewhere around one billion lives, and counting. Couple Borlaug's agricultural revolution with fertilizers, machinery, and all manner of modern energy intensive conveniences and you're looking at savings billions of lives.

Sitting in our comfy chairs in front of our televisions, it's easy to agree with using less energy, so we pass some taxes on coal, or nuclear, or gas or oil. But in agreeing to make energy more expensive, we're not only making our lives less "comfortable" we're inadvertently making it harder for the Borlaug's of the world to buy the energy he needs to research his revolutionary wheat strains. We're making it harder to make inexpensive computers and to ship them, so that poor farmers in India can google a better way to learn about Borlaug's advances. And when we've made energy more expensive, and that computer doesn't get made and the farmer never learns about the advances, and hundreds or thousands of his countrymen die, because they don't have enough to eat, no one is going to blame a "green" tax.

Don't buy it. Humans have an incredible capacity to solve problems. If you set them free, rather than shackle them.

Tea Parties

For classical liberals and legal conservatives, the very fact of the protest speaks to the degree of its seriousness.

Absolutely right. Your garden-variety Leftist has been raised to protest anything and everything. I remember endless protests at the University of Oregon, on subjects ranging from "Take Back the Night" to Graduate Teaching Assistants salaries, to Spotted Owls to starch levels in dorm food. The one thing I specifically remember is that there was NEVER a protest that could even be considered anything less than coming from some variant of the radical fringe left.

Conservatives just don't get out in the street and protest.

So, when they do, and they're respectful in the process, and they do so on short notice, with no central organization, you know it means something. What does it mean? It's too early to know, exactly. But the more the Drive-by-Media tries to ridicule the protestors ala CNN, or tries ad hominem smears ala Pelosi (who likened the protestors to Nazis) the more emboldened these folks it will get. Nobody thought Californians had the gumption to pass massive, landscape-changing property tax reform in the late 70's. But they did. And it changed the political landscape for the better for more than 20 years.

For the Children...of course

The Oregon legislature has just decided to kill off one of the State's single most successful industries - microbreweries. Why? To "help" the children. By raising taxes on beer a whopping 1900%. Yep, you read that right. One thousand nine hundred percent. From around $2.50/barrel to over $50.00/barrel. Because, we all know, when times get tough, the best thing a politician can do is tax the be-jabbers out of one of your state's biggest and most prominent industries.

I don't even know what to say. Other than to invite all those fabulous Oregon microbrews to relocate to Virginia. We could use some good McMenamin's Terminator Stout fresh from the tap.

No, seriously. The lesson to take from this is that no one is safe from do-gooder politicians and their seriously deranged fantasies and life-long leeching off the public goodwill. No politician should ever be allowed to wield the power to kill businesses and industries, no matter what.