I was roaming around The Huffington Post, reading up on the various news stories of the day. Eventually I came upon a wonderful little article where Rick Santorum was claiming Global Warming to be a “hoax”. My question becomes, “why does it even matter?” Why is there a fight against Global Warming in the first place? Why do Republicans and these so-called religious conservatives fight against the idea? Really, there’s only one answer to that question.
People like Rick Santorum don’t care about the environment, Americans, or their god’s creation. Santorum and those like him are paid by Big Oil to keep their mouth shut about the benefits of green energy and attack any of those that speak positively of green energy. If Santorum was truly a religious man, and cared an ounce about what his god created, he’d work hard to make sure we kept this environment safe, clean, and beautiful for future generations. The reluctance of politicians, on any side, to stand up for green energy only shows they are purchased entirely by Big Oil.
What’s the downside to renewable energy? For the people, there isn’t one. (Though there are morons that complain wind farms are an “eyesore”. I’m of the mindset they should just get over it and stop crying like spoiled brats.) However, for those in the fossil fuel industry, there’s much to lose. For corporations, everything is about profits. Green energy is nothing but a threat to these large corporations. Instead of trying to help better our society and environment, they pay politicians to work against the health and safety of the planet and the American people (as well as the people across the world).
Really, it’s not about Global Warming. Global Warming shouldn’t even matter. There’s no downside to using renewable energy. We could be using it within the next 10 years if our politicians would start working for the better of the American people, and not for the better of their own wallet. Our homes could be powered by a mixture of solar and wind energy. We could use this to power all electric cars. Removing ourselves entirely from oil (both foreign and local), coal, and nuclear energy.
Would this be cheap at first for the taxpayer? Not at all. Neither was getting the ball rolling on the oil industry, however. For those of you that don’t know, the government spends 4 billion (though some estimate more) a year of taxpayer money on oil subsidies. In 2011, Big Oil made 38 billion dollars in profits in their second quarter. Do they really need $4B in taxpayer money to help them make a gigantic profit? Hardly.
The attack against green energy because Global Warming is a “hoax” is just utter nonsense. Even if Global Warming is a hoax (in which case, I’m assuming you think yourself smarter than these guys), why does it even matter? Why are you defending the oil companies and their ridiculous profits? Part of the reason our economy is tanking is because people aren’t out buying things. Part of the reason people aren’t buying things is because they are spending so much of their money on gas, they can’t afford non-necessities anymore. Could gas prices be cheaper? After a $38B profit dollars in a single quarter? I’d say they could.
So at the end of the day, Global Warming is something that politicians claim isn’t provable, and sucker the American people into a false sense of what green energy would really do for them. Imagine how different our country would be if we didn’t depend on a finite source of energy. If we stop letting our politicians lie on behalf of Big Oil and start working for green energy today, there’s a strong chance we could be off of finite energy sources within the next decade. No more reliance on foreign oil, which means no more Middle-Eastern organizations using American taxpayer money to purchase weapons to attack our people. No more reliance on Big Oil, no more need to be in the Middle-East in the first place. Less war and cheaper energy, that’s the benefit of renewable energy that no politician wants you to know.
spatterpattern
tardisdoctor
Toni Goodman
writinginmy
Good point. I don’t know how anyone could reasonably argue with that, although I am certain that someone will (not reasonably).
Thank you for reading and commenting. It’s hard for me to think of how anyone could bring a reasonable argument against green energy to the table. I have never heard one. Any argument I ever hear is usually “Global Warming isn’t real”. I doubt we’ll ever hear a reasonable, intelligent argument against green energy. Which, honestly, is a good thing.
You finally got the blog up. Nice work.
Priscilla
While I do wholeheartedly agree that full transition to green energy would ultimately benefit us in a myriad of ways in the long term. I also am extremely wary of the “faux urgency” employed by the left as an instrumemt to twist our collective national arm into signing off on a global agreement that would prove potentially disasterous to an already fragile economy. Up until at least this point in history our nation’s strength has been generally beneficial to freedom around the globe. If we allow ourselves to be weakened to a point where we become irrelevant in that role is there anyone else poised to honorably fill the void? If not, then we are remiss to make hasty economic decisions that potentially jeapordize freedom across the globe. One must ask regarding green manipulation of our nation’s energy consumption (steered according to guidelines set by a global conglomerate of nations who may or may not have our nation’s best economic interests at heart, those emissions reductions then being counter-weighted by the output of other nations who scoff at obeying such guidlines themselves) would we truly impact, beyond a miniscule degree, any global trend toward man-made warming whether real or imagined? While this is no reason to resist the independent pursuit and development of green energy sources, it is very good reason to guard against allowing bad decisions to be irrevocably foisted upon us in the name of good intentions and possible dire consequenses that may be beyond the reach of our short term control and that are certainly beyond any realistically enforceable reach of our sovereign borders. Not against green energy (we should move in that direction)… just against allowing outside interests to set our policy.
I appreciate your input. I agree there is no haste at the moment. Even many arguers for the truth of man-made Global Warming say the damage is already done. It will be a slow process, but I do believe it should eventually be done.
I do agree with you in this… and though I am not an expert at solar cycles I do think that if we are moving into another solar maximum, as I believe is the case, then temperatures are gonna be trending upward again in addition to any other factors that may already be moving us in that direction. Potentially not pretty…
No haste? All the damage is not done. It is true that the excess CO2 we have added will remain in the atmosphere for thousands of years, but every day we add more, and at an increasing rate. Changing such a fundamental system as our energy supply cannot be done quickly, but by delaying action, we insure that either the damage will be much greater, or our rate of change will have to be more drastic.
This sums up a lot of my problems with this article. As much of a tool as Rick Santorum is, the fact that he claims global warming is a “hoax” doesn’t prove he’s in bed with big oil. In reality, all it means is he’s trying to articulate a delicate issue of “IF Global_Warming=True then Use_Mass_Fear_to_Institute_Statist_Control” concerns into a 2 second soundbite for news channels and the average moronic voter. I too wonder if global warming is a hoax because the people who shout most loudly about their “concerns” on the issue all seem to have one thing in common: they’e statists, and would love the idea of using a global catastophy to centralize authority. But whether global warming is a hoax or not doesn’t even matter, because environmentally-conscious actions are still important otherwise.
Thank you for commenting. I’d like to point out that you essentially agreed with me, nevertheless. I have my qualms with Rick Santorum, as it’s been clear that he’s an easily bought candidate. In fact, he is quoted as saying that he wasn’t against abortion until he ran for office. One of his biggest donors became anti-abortion groups.
@ToniGoodman Toni the premise of the piece was why are people against global warming and why do republicans and religious conservatives fight against the idea. You had an interesting point about green power but that and the other issues are not correct statements. Steve, who replied to your blog online, made several points that I had in mind. That said, the common “left” lie that republicans are against clean water, air, ground, etc is utter BS. Just because it keeps getting repeated doesn’t make it true. Saying santorum doesn’t care about the environment, Americans, or their gods creation is wrong in so many levels. You have no idea what is in santorums head, but i know he is more level headed than most of the left nut jobs. (And by your statement on “thier gods”, i see that you believe in something else besides god.) That goes for religious conservatives. Why might they fight against warming? Maybe, along with most people that can think instead of using emotional thinking, can see through the lies and all the rigged results that have been proven wrong. There is nothing wrong promoting alternative energy, as a matter a fact I support it every day. (the word green is funny to me since there is no such thing) Yes you got off topic with your rant. That is the problem most of the time. Keep to the facts. Don’t put down oil. It is a way of life. Do we need to wean off of it, sure. But technology isn’t there. Nuclear energy would of got us off coal but the environmental wackos have seen to stop this. So we use more coal. EPA has now set out to screw us over on coal. We will see rolling blackouts sooner than later. That is why people fight against things. It all gets rolled up and crammed down our throats as global warming. And that does not hold water.
“…the people who shout most loudly about their “concerns” on the issue all seem to have one thing in common: they’e statists, and would love the idea of using a global catastophy to centralize authority.” Allen, I see no evidence that this is true. There are indeed some “alarmists” distorting the data, but the sources I use, the ones that merely present the latest findings rationally, would seem to have no interest in one world government, or some such nonsense. Global warming is not a hoax—that idea is absurd. Global warming is what is happening, according to the best data we have available, and we do have lots of good data.
Dave, religious conservatives are not “fighting against warming”, they are fighting the scientific data and models that show that global warming is happening and that humans are causing it. Environmental “wackos” have not stopped progress on nuclear energy—the nuclear industry did that to themselves, with the help of short-sighted politicians. Nuclear accidents are rare, but when they happen are devastating, as we have seen. Nonetheless, it would be a viable source of energy, if the huge problem of safe disposal of nuclear waste is addressed. EPA’s intention, I’m sure, is not to “screw us over”, but to protect us from careless business practices. There is plenty of money going into promoting “clean coal”, but no plans on how to make that economically feasible. What is being “crammed down our throats” is the business-as-usual plan of the fossil fuel companies and their bought off politicians.