The Green New Deal is a War on the Poor, With NO Climate Benefit

   

   Why are some Democrats, including Sen. Joe Manchin, calling on Pres. Biden to open up the Keystone XL pipeline? Because shutting it has contributed to the current spike in energy prices is the politically obvious answer. However, there is a larger, more pertinent question to ask. Why do Democrats use climate change as an excuse to destroy the national economy? Pres. Biden's action against Keystone XL was just one aspect of the larger policy, driven by the far left wing of his party. He parrots their claim that there is a "global climate crisis" that demands we stop using all fossil fuels, without heed to the cost, or if there is a viable alternative.

   Pres. Biden has rejoined the Paris Accords, which Pres. Trump wisely withdrew from. Nothing in the agreement will have any effect on the climate, and the US is one of the only nations that has been reducing greenhouse gas emissions on its own, both before joining the accords, and after withdrawing from them. Liquid natural gas has lower emissions than coal or diesel fuel, as well as oil and gasoline. The shale fracking revolution in the US has brought emissions down significantly, but it is being treated as just another fossil fuel to be abolished. Why is that? Well, it seems to be more part of a new economic agenda than anything to do with climate change.

   For decades, there has been a strain of the left wing that was anti capitalist, and preferred that government should control and dictate every aspect of the US economy. They're called Socialists, and they are more popular than ever, especially with today's youth. Time and again, since the Great Depression, they have used perceived "national crises" to give the government more control over the free private economy. This is the latest example of that. They want to use government to supplant the existing energy industries with a "green" one, through regulations based on a "crisis" that they can't even have any effect on. The true goal is to consolidate government power, and control over the people.

   Here's the proof of that, in it's simplest form: If reducing carbon emissions is the goal, it would be simple enough to put a tax on carbon emissions, and make people pay for that policy. The government could subsidize the costs for the poor and lower middle class people, and then let the private sector sort out how to adjust to it. However, there is no support for a carbon tax, except for the farthest left Democrats. Instead, they promote things like electric cars, which wouldn't fare well with a carbon tax on their electric fuel. Even without that, and generous government subsidies, electric cars are neither affordable nor feasible for most Americans.

   This is where we're at now. The far left has dragged even the "moderate" Democrats to a place that they don't want to be: waging war on not on the rich, but on everyone from the poorest all the way through to the middle class. For decades, the Dems have claimed to be the party of the poor and middle class, and they've spent trillions of tax dollars to prove it. Well, the era of fighting for the less well off has ended, in order to save the planet. The Green New Deal is based on the premise that America, as a "rich" country, can afford to be destroyed economically, in the name of "global climate change." There seems to be no concern for the poor and lower income people who depend on a thriving national economy to make their living, and often depend on benefits that our economy provides. All of this, in the name of a false promise of saving the future.

   It turns out that many of the policies that the Green New Deal proposes actually use more carbon than what the free market was doing. Killing pipelines means more carbon emitting trucks delivering fuel that is still needed, because the alternatives aren't ready to carry the demand. Batteries for electric cars do an amazing amount of environmental damage, as well as being carbon intensive, and create hazardous, unrecyclable waste. The same with the materials used to build wind farms, and they have the added dangers to birds, and the dangerous effects of their turbines on humans. Even if we could implement enough of these alternative energy sources to power our economy, they would cause new environmental damages and risks. We have had decades of experience at improving fossil fuel efficiency, and LNG is an obvious next step in transitioning to cleaner renewable energy sources. Why don't these facts matter to the green far left? Because their goal is not to save the environment, but to destroy the free market US economy.

   On a global scale, the Green agenda also harms the poorest nations. The Paris accords, the COP 26 Climate Change Conference, and all of these other schemes by the "global community" have no place for the poorest nations to develop their own natural energy resources. They all call for "payments" from the developed nations to keep them from using the most economically feasible fuels. Can they burn the dollars and euros that are sent to them? These are nations that truly are starting from scratch, and while pledges from developed nations sound nice, China is sending people into these countries to build things, mostly coal plants. They have no large scale power transmission capability, either. China is doing this to have authoritarian political influence on often weak governments, while the Western developed nations look away. The US used to oppose Communists taking footholds in "nonaligned" and "undeveloped" nations around the globe, and with good reason. The Green Democrats are now following the global crowd, instead of leading the charge in defense of freedom for the poorest nations. US politics don't stop at the border anymore, because the left doesn't believe in borders.

   Finally, if they were serious, nuclear power is still the best potential energy source of the future. While it seems politically radioactive, pun intended, that is only in the US. Even Japan, after the Fukishima disaster, has continued their nuclear power operations, with new safeguards and regulation. Meanwhile, in NYS, Gov. Cuomo shut down the perfectly capable Indian Point reactors, as well as vetoing every natural gas pipeline that would supply the energy to replace it. When NYC and its suburbs start having rolling blackouts like California, the rich will simply go somewhere else, while the middle class and poor will probably be banned from using personal generators by local Green pols and bureaucrats. All of this in service to a phony Green agenda that won't even allow the one fuel that has the lowest carbon footprint, and is less vulnerable to price fluctuations than any other. Again, one must ask, why?

   In summation, most people that support some form of the "Green" agenda have good motives. They are just uninformed. Republicans, Conservatives, and right wingers breathe the same air, drink the same water, and live on the same planet as everyone else. I don't know any of them who put profits before polluting our environment. That's not to say there aren't any, but they actually come from all political stripes, including the Democrats, Progressives, and left wingers. When one side refuses to engage in honest debate about the best policies and practices for both human economic growth, and the environment, I have a problem with them. Being called a "climate science denier" is just a way to shut down having that debate. Once the US can get past this political blockage, it will actually clear the way for a better future for the global environment, and allow each nation to develop their own energy policy, free from international pressure to "save the Planet."