President Trump announced on Thursday, June 1, 2017 that the United States would withdraw from the Paris Climate Change Accord, unilaterally and without reservations. As stated by President Trump:
It is time to exit the Paris accord and time to pursue a new deal that protects the environment, our companies, our citizens and our country … It is time to put Youngstown, Ohio, Detroit, Michigan, and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, along with many, many other locations within our great country, before Paris, France.
In so doing, President Trump kept his campaign promise to cancel the Paris Climate Agreement, but the fight for withdrawal was a difficult one. President Trump faced enormous pressure from international leaders, multi-national corporations, the political establishment, and even among his own advisors.
Trump’s speech was powerful, to the point, and effective. He invited Democrats to participate, but warned that nothing will change with or without their support. Should the agreement be renegotiated, it would be as a treaty, with the consent of 2/3rds of the Senate. Even so, this nation would continue to have the clean air and water, but without the bureaucratic and financial burdens imposed by other nations. Not mentioned by Trump was this favorable outcome, with increased oil and natural gas production, we can maintain Europe in the event Russia tries to strangle their supplies from the East.
The mitigation efforts specified by the agreement would reduce global warming by less than 0.2 degrees C by 2100, while funneling hundreds of billions of US dollars into the private bank accounts of third world dictators. If allowed to remain in effect, our economy would be held at less than 2% growth, whereas we need 4% to sustain full employment and our social obligations to our own citizens.
It will be hard for Democrats to run for office on the promise that the US will be strangled for a “good cause”, yet California Governor Jerry Brown says that his and 13 other Blue states will continue to abide by the Paris Accord. Undoubtedly, the residents of these Blue states will experience “blue feelings” not of their own making, as taxpayer money is spent to pay for the “warm feelings” of Gov. Jerry Brown and other Blue state governors. If “clean” energy is so good, much less sufficient 24/7, why not let it stand or fall on its own merits?
Paris Accord as a Ploy to Impose Socialism
Apologists for the Paris Accord maintain that any effort is better than none; however, the only effects in the US — using the Paris Accord as justification — are the draconian and expensive measures proposed by Obama
Former President Barack Obama blasted Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris global warming accords (one of Obama’s signature schemes to impose socialism in America) which he characterized as America vacating its leadership role on the world state. Obama had “agreed” to do things which would cripple this nation’s economy and make us much less competitive on the world market. On the other hand, China, which also complied with the agreement, agreed to nothing. Meanwhile, China is in the process of building 350 coal fired power plants, one every two weeks under the current plan. In central China coal plants spew unfiltered smoke into the air. On a bad day in Beijing, visibility is about 200 feet.
Completely omitted from bluster from the Left is the money Obama committed the US to pay into a “world account” to benefit third world countries. Paradoxically, China is among the benefactors, even though its economy will surpass the US in the next year or two.
According to the Left, the US stands in opposition to the rest of the world, but this nation was a rogue nation to begin with. Only half a dozen countries declined the Paris Agreement. This is hardly surprising. The wealthiest nations, other than the US, opted to give much less financial support for what is essentially a “feel-good” agreement. When you rob Peter to pay Paul, you can expect the complete support of Paul in your endeavors.
United Nation’s IPCC Panel Reports Misleading with Exaggerated and Inaccurate Global Warming Claims
In the wake of President Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord, came the predictable howl of protest from the eco-theocracy and those who use environmental concerns as pretexts for the imposition of fascist or socialist government controls on human activity. Democrat billionaire climate activist Tom Steyer called Trump’s Paris exit a “traitorous act of war.” Tom Steyer, along with General Electric, is heavily invested in wind power, which receives substantial subsidies from federal and state governments (as long as it’s not in the proponent’s back yard).
Democrats, speaking on behalf of the “vast majority of scientists”, were quick to form a chorus of protest and proceeded to read from the same sheet of talking points. While key figures like Kerry and Pelosi are free to improvise their own “facts”, anyone daring to dispute the key talking points will be shunned and be subject to an attempt made to primary them out of their positions in Congress. Rep. Nancy Pelosi claimed that President Trump was “dishonoring” God and questioned whether his grandchildren will even be able to breathe air after his announcement a day earlier that he would withdraw from the Paris climate accord.
Nations of the world, with Al Gore leading the unsubstantiated claims in this nation, have long been assured to believe that reports produced by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change(IPCC) are authoritative because they rely entirely on peer-reviewed, scientific literature. They support the hypothesis that global warming is real and manmade, while rejecting The Heartland Institute’s reports produced by the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC) who have come together to present a comprehensive, authoritative, and realistic assessment of the science and economics of global warming.
The IPCC scientists largely come from academia, which is so politicized to the left that any dissent is considered disloyalty to the organization. As a result, violators are subject to verbal and physical attacks and risk losing their jobs. Supporters, on the other hand, highly vocal with many of them depending on government grants to support their work on climate issues, know that a negative report would end their funding. In addition, very few of the IPCC scientists have actually published scientific papers in support of their position.
Out of about 13,000 peer-reviewed scientific publications in 2016, only about a dozen were not in support of climate change, and none provided proof that human activity was to blame, rather that change was occurring.
How about coastlines in danger? For starters, it is exceedingly difficult to establish what the sea level actually is. It is measured mainly on its relationship to coastlines and traditionally consists of the mean level half-way between high and low tide, averaged over 19 years. Depending on other factors, like salinity, temperature, air pressure and weather, it can vary as much as 5 meters in many locations. The largest effect is weather, particularly storm surges, where the sea level bulges under low pressure areas like hurricanes. While the sea level is one factor, the shorelines themselves are not constant. Nor is the earth’s gravity constant throughout. For simplicity the “surface” of the earth is described in a handful of “geoids of reference” to describe effective sea level. Only recently have measurements from satellites added a higher degree of consistency, subject to variations due to the factors described above.
Are islands in the Pacific sinking? Absolutely. A clear example is the state of the Hawaiian Islands, which extends 1800 miles northwest of the 8 large islands constituting the State of Hawaii. Most of this archipelago are very low to the sea, and remnants are under water, due to erosion. They were formed from volcanic activity over a relatively fixed plume of magma in the mantle as the continental plate moved to the northwest at a rate of about 32 miles/mm years. Midway Island falls near the terminus, and consists of a coral atoll, which formed around a volcanic island now eroded until is forms the floor of the lagoon in the atoll. The erosion of islands is illustrated dramatically by the Hawaiian archipelago, but applies to similar islands throughout the world.
Southern California is subsiding, in part by tectonic movements of the Pacific plate, but mostly because of the depletion of water and petroleum in the last century. Another self-proclaimed “victim” of climate change is Miami Beach, which was built on a barrier island of sand, augmented by landfill. While large buildings are anchored in bedrock, streets and small buildings are built on sand. The consequences are somewhat biblical in nature. Washington DC is built on a swamp, only inches above sea level even in Washington’s time. That sort of gives credence to Trump’s pledge to “clear the swamp.”
CO2 a Pollutant Only Because EPA Decided It Was
The thrust of the Paris Accord is the reduction in emission of carbon dioxide, a colorless and mostly odorless gas. It is “pollution” only in the sense that the EPA has decided it can be regulated as such. It does not contribute to “dirty air” nor “dirty water,” for which regulation will continue unabated. Medically speaking, asthma is caused by allergies, not pollution, although pollution can make it harder for people, including asthmatics, to breath.
MIT atmospheric science professor Richard Lindzen suggests that many claims regarding climate change are exaggerated and unnecessarily alarmist and that the belief that CO2 controls the climate “is pretty close to believing in magic.
The Paris Accord actually does little to mitigate climate change nor carbon dioxide emissions. The standards are non-existent and compliance is strictly voluntary. What is spelled out in more detail are payments extracted from developed countries to undeveloped countries. Domestically, President Obama used the Paris Accord to impose new taxes and regulations by fiat, without Congressional approval. It has been used as a lawful treaty without the necessary approval of 2/3rds of the Senate.
Global Warming Alarmists as Worshipers of Mother Earth
As Dr. James Hansen, NASA’s former lead global warming scientist, said of the UN Paris Pact:
The Paris agreement is a fraud really, a fake. It’s just bullshit for them to say: We’ll have a 2C warming target and then try to do a little better every five years. It’s just worthless words. There is no action, just promises. As long as fossil fuels appear to be the cheapest fuels out there, they will be continued to be burned.
Mark Morano, founder of Climate Deport, spoke of global warming as akin to a religious issue to many global warming alarmists, in that they worship “Mother Earth.” On the Tipping Point with Liz Wheeler of One America News Network Morano remarked:
What Trump did today was a blow to superstition. No longer in Washington DC do we have to pretend that a UN climate treaty can save the planet or actually control temperature or impact storminess. This truly is a day that science has won out in DC and that is a rare day when it comes to climate change.
One could ask, if compliance is voluntary, what does it matter if the US is in or out? The most plausible answer is that it affects the “legacy” of President Obama, hence the legitimacy of his administration and that of Democrats for the last 8 years. $1.6 trillion dollars and a crippled economy is a big price to pay for a few egos.
Nancy J. Thorner is a writer, cellist, and Tea Party activist based in suburban Chicago.
