Rio+20 - Rio '92 Revisited - Global (guilt trip) Agenda

"We are at an historic turning point, communism has collapsed, the entire world conceives of itself as a global civilization, and the community of nations can now envision the possibility of a global agenda. But the only organizing principle for this global agenda is the effort to save the earth's environment. This must be the new central principle giving coherence to our efforts to work together. And the Earth's Summit is the designated time and place for this new agreement to congeal. This is a turning point we must break through to a new way of thinking about our relationship to the earth. We are not entitled to exploit it with impunity with no concern for the integrity of the ecological system. Its just unforgivable if we allow the selfish impulses of the short term considerations of this moment to win out over the wisdom and the mandate of history to act."

That is a direct quote from the then former American Senator Al Gore as he was interviewed on the CBC Radio Show Quirks and Quarks in 1992 before the Rio Earth Summit twenty years ago this past week (you may hear the quote if you listen to the podcast here).

Its pretty clear to me what he was thinking, here was a chance for governments around the world to join together and defeat the newest boogie-man. Now that the cold-war was over and the evil empire was defeated, it was time to turn to the real enemy, and it was us, you and me. What better way to defeat "us" than by forming a supra-governmental organization under the auspices of the United Nations, that benevolent protector of all that is right and good with the world?

The Rio Earth Summit was an historic attempt to grab power, without a shot being fired anywhere. The governments and citizens of earth were about to have a massive guilt trip dumped onto them by the self-appointed protectors of the planet. The global organizing agenda, as Gore put it, is clear: "We are not entitled to exploit it (Earth) with impunity with no concern for the integrity of the ecological system." How dare we lowly humans aspire to live in comfort at the expense of any planetary resources? What could we be thinking? Woe to us for disturbing the habitat of the three-spined stickleback, the Northern Spotted Owl or the Frankston spider orchid, in a selfish attempt to provide food and shelter to mere humans. "Its just unforgivable if we allow the selfish impulses of the short term considerations," like harvesting logs for building or eating perhaps. How dare we?

The Rio Summit in 1992 promoted sustainable developement. I have nothing against that concept in general, it's eminently sensible. Owners who would destroy their very means of earning a living are just plain stupid. So, overfishing or over harvesting a renewable resource, just makes no sense. Notice the key word "owners," when ownership is not assigned or left to the commons, thats when the trouble begins. Today my interpretation of "sustainable" in the current enviro-babble includes ideas like, stagnant, no-growth, heavily regulated, uncompetitive, subsidized and top down. Nothing to do with ownership and more to do with the favourite new buzzword "stewardship," which comes complete with the guilt trip and none of the benefits of ownership. 

Rio's successors have morphed into conferences against climate change, as if we humans controlled climate, more powerful than the Sun are we. A succession of meetings and treaties over the years backed by questionable data, produced by self-serving researchers, under the direction of the IPCC has made everyone guilty of tromping their filthy carbon footprints on everything. We are guilty of using fire for heat, light and to drive our machines. We are guilty of contravening the questionable hypothesis of anthropogenic global warming (AGW). By merely breathing, we, you and I, add to the carbon burden of the planet's atmosphere, adding, by the way the one essential gas of photosynthesis, carbon dioxide, from which all earthly organic food originates. Do you aspire to a low ecological footprint? Then the poverty of Sierra Leone is for you (see the graph above), or if you want to be in the green zone of sustainability and human welfare, then the wealth and freedom of Cuba beckons.

Rio+20 convenes this week, committed to continue the fraud of sustainable development. While all the major leaders of the world were in Rio twenty years ago, none are coming to Rio+20, things have changed. Much to the chagrin of enviro-statists like George Monbiot who warns that its "make-or-break" time. So deluded are he and his colleagues, that they fail to grasp that the no-growth scenario is coming fast, as nation states crumble under massive debt-loads and unfundable liabilities, and depressed economies become the norm. Be careful what you wish for George.

The only good news is that people are slightly more skeptical about AGW, and the ability of governments to solve anything. One can only hope.            

Changing the culture: Plastic bags are bad, repeat.

It was the proverbial good news/bad news story out of Toronto City council on June 6th, 2012.

GOOD NEWS: The 44 council members voted to remove the silly 5 cent per plastic bag fee that the previous administration had foisted on retail stores and citizens. The original purpose of the fee was to socially engineer the behavior of Torontonians, away from using so-called "single use" plastic bags toward multiple use bags. It worked, B.F. Skinner would have been proud. But the bag tax, as it came to be known, was a sore point for many. Toronto's Mayor made removal of the bag tax an issue, that he championed, and city council granted his wish. The fee will be removed July 1st, 2012. 

BAD NEWS: But shortly after that win, a motion from a councillor to ban all plastic bags from retail stores passed in a close vote. The ban takes effect on Jan. 1st, 2013, though some believe it will be challenged in court. I hope so.

Arguments for and mostly against the bag ban have raged ever since in the local and even national media. But of course most of the arguments revolved around the environmental issue, unnecessary solid waste, evil plastic, people will get accustomed to the using recyclable bags, blah, blah, blah. Why plastic bags? Why subject this extremely useful item to this type of ridicule? Surely there are far worse environmental menaces lurking in people's garbage? Maybe the household waste of citizens should be searched too? Think of the new jobs created, garbage police, waste watchers. 

Such a search would be an invasion of privacy you say? Of course it would. So why is it that elected officials are concerned with the way people carry home their groceries? Isn't that really a private matter too, between the buyer and seller? That's the real issue, why is a municipal government involved in this? Obviously the City councillors have too much time on their hands, sitting around dreaming up new rules to justify their own existence.

The bags of course have many uses, both visible and invisible. First, they are a courtesy afforded by the retailer silently saying to the customer, "Thanks for coming to my store, please use these bags to convenience your trip home and by the way help give our store some cheap advertising." That is the invisible positive message implied by every buy-sell transaction where a bag is given freely. Perhaps Toronto council likes chasing away business to the surrounding towns? Perhaps Toronto council hopes those surrounding towns will also foolishly adopt this stupid rule too? It boggles the mind.

The visible uses of plastic bags are so numerous, I won't attempt to enumerate them. Suffice to say that everyone I know, has a bag of plastic bags in a closet somewhere in their home. As cheap and flimsy as these bags seem to be, they have multiple lives and everyone knows it. Plastic garbage bags will still be used, and more will need to be purchased if this ban succeeds, and dog owners will need to buy special bags. And of course there is the uniquely Canadian penchant to bagged milk, will that be banned too? Let's all go back to reusable glass, can't wait. 

As I have already suggested, the bags are not really at issue here. What is at issue is a prevailing attitude that people can be controlled to serve the collective good; a "good" that is determined by the wisdom a few through the coercive power of government. What is the proper function of government? That is the issue. Is government there to modify human behaviour - change the culture - or to allow humans to interact freely in a non-coercive environment? I vote for the latter.

Los Angeles also banned bags, displaying the power of mindless celebrity do-gooders. Here is how ReasonTV treated that story. 

Dots on the sun and a Cosmic collision

On Tuesday June 5, just after 6 pm in the Eastern Time zone of North American, the planet Venus will track across the face of the sun, its called a transit. For most people, its not a big deal really. A tiny dot, Venus, will be seen (**if you wear protective eye coverings**) moving from left to right across the face of the sun. Astronomers have made a big deal about this for a long time. Back in the days of HMS Endeavour and James Cook, astronomers knew that such a transit could help them determine the size of our solar system, so James Cook was sent to gather the data. Today, transits are used to find new worlds around distant stars. The transit of Venus happens about every 120 years in pairs, eight years apart. This one is our last chance, the next one is in Dec., 2117, lets hope there are clear skies. Such are the vagaries of astronomy, a puff of condensed water vapour could obscure a once-in-a-lifetime event. Its happens a lot.
While I'm on the subject of missing big events, you're going to miss this one for sure. I heard about this first, decades ago, but astronomers are now convinced that its going to happen, a collision of galaxies. Its already happening, go out late at night, on crystal clear nights, and look between the great square of Pegasus and the W of Cassiopeia. If you have a sharp eye or a pair of binoculars, you can detect a fuzzy patch of light. That is M31, the Andromeda galaxy, and we in the Milky Way are heading straight for it fast, or its heading for us....both actually. The collision will be astronomical ;-), in 4 billion years.  

Quantum Leaps and Bafflegab

In any given day there are hundreds (maybe thousands) of stories where governments and politicians attempt to exert their influence on individuals. Sometimes it's overwhelming. Where to focus first, whats the greatest danger, who should be held accountable?

I missed this story reported in Cato @ Liberty more than two months ago. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon speaks about the energy poverty he experienced as a child in South Korea. South Korea has made huge advances since then. Now the Secretary apparently wants to bring energy poverty back, this time to everyone. Listen to his talk here. But as Chris Edwards points out in his CATO blog, Secretary Moon's writers are experts in that famous schoolyard phrase I used to hear: "bullshit baffles brains" - yes it does.

So I have cut and pasted the relevant phrases that Mr. Edwards used in his CATO entry, for your enlightenment below. Orwell would be proud.

By the way, I saw that cartoon on my Facebook page from a friend, and it fits so well don't you think? There is one more frame that is missing, but if you go to the original site here, and click the red button, bottom left, all will be revealed.

I have a high-level group of eminent experts and visionary thinkers…

Our challenge is to join forces and overcome the barriers to bring our efforts to scale. We will need to scale-up successful examples of clean energy and energy efficient technologies… We must make a quantum leap…

My Sustainable Energy for All initiative will bring together key stakeholders in an effort to create transformative change in the world’s energy systems. By leveraging the global convening power of the United Nations, it will introduce new public-private partnerships by fostering the necessary enabling conditions, including to mitigate risk and to promote large-scale investment. And by engaging a broad range of stakeholders, the initiative will mobilize innovative solutions and bold commitments…

Next week in London, the clean energy ministerial meeting will receive our action agenda on 11 areas—very concrete areas for how we can end this poverty. We must rally behind these priorities. I am very excited we are joining hands with the clean energy ministerial to promote game-changing initiatives such as the global lighting and energy access partnerships

…renewed political commitment to sustainable energy…

…concrete deliverables…

…produce a powerful outcome document…