Patrick Moore lays into Greenpeace

I have spent most of a week looking at a story about the government agencies corrupting the historical record of temperatures in a most fraudulent way. I intend to write that story up today or tomorrow. What could cause such wide-spread, anti-science behavior? I think the same sort of thing that could corrupt an organization that I supported a long time ago. I ran across a story by Delingpole on Patrick Moore and, for now, thought I would share it here.

The following is from a story by James Delingpole:

Patrick Moore, a Canadian environmentalist who helped found Greenpeace in the Seventies but subsequently left in protest at its increasingly extreme, anti-scientific, anti-capitalist stance, argues that the green position on climate change fails the most basic principles of the scientific method.

“The certainty among many scientists that humans are the main cause of climate change, including global warming, is not based on the replication of observable events. It is based on just two things, the theoretical effect of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions, predominantly carbon dioxide, and the predictions of computer models using those theoretical calculations. There is no scientific “proof” at all.”

Moore goes on to list some key facts about “climate change” which are ignored by true believers.

1. The concentration of CO2 in the global atmosphere is lower today, even including human emissions, than it has been during most of the existence of life on Earth.

2. The global climate has been much warmer than it is today during most of the existence of life on Earth. Today we are in an interglacial period of the Pleistocene Ice Age that began 2.5 million years ago and has not ended.

3. There was an Ice Age 450 million years ago when CO2 was about 10 times higher than it is today.

4. Humans evolved in the tropics near the equator. We are a tropical species and can only survive in colder climates due to fire, clothing and shelter.

5. CO2 is the most important food for all life on earth. All green plants use CO2 to produce the sugars that provide energy for their growth and our growth. Without CO2 in the atmosphere carbon-based life could never have evolved.

6. The optimum CO2 level for most plants is about 1600 parts per million, four times higher than the level today. This is why greenhouse growers purposely inject the CO2-rich exhaust from their gas and wood-fired heaters into the greenhouse, resulting in a 40-80 per cent increase in growth.

7. If human emissions of CO2 do end up causing significant warming (which is not certain) it may be possible to grow food crops in northern Canada and Russia, vast areas that are now too cold for agriculture.

8. Whether increased CO2 levels cause significant warming or not, the increased CO2 levels themselves will result in considerable increases in the growth rate of plants, including our food crops and forests.

9. There has been no further global warming for nearly 18 years during which time about 25 per cent of all the CO2 ever emitted by humans has been added to the atmosphere. How long will it remain flat and will it next go up or back down? Now we are out of the realm of facts and back into the game of predictions.

Moore makes his remarks in the foreword to a new book by bestselling Australian geologist Dr Ian Plimer called Not For Greens. The book describes the various, complex industrial processes which go into the making of just a single teaspoon, starting with the mining of various metals.

If Greenpeace’s membership remained true to their principles they would have to eat with their bare hands because, as Moore notes, they are opposed to mining in all its forms.

“If you ask them for the name of any mine that is operating in an environmentally acceptable standard you will draw a blank. They have become so cornered by their own extremism that they must deny their daily use of cell phones, computers, bicycles, rapid transit, and yes, the simple teaspoon.”

Tax consumers and the brutality of the state

As the U.S. becomes more and more a police state, the population needs to realize that the government is not “us”. The government is the enemy that divides us into various groups in a divide and conquer strategy. It views the mundane citizen as a milk cow to produce the things that enables the government’s own agenda.

The risible idea that public servants share the burden of government when public servants are the burden of government is yet another ideological scale that the libertarian must remove from the eyes of the masses so that they can see the truth. The truth as classic libertarian class analysis demonstrates is that the State divides the people into two classes: tax payers and tax consumers. Tax payers are those who produce and exchange in the market. Tax consumers are those who live off of the production of those who exchange in the market. And without a clear delineation between who is a tax payer and who is a tax consumer, the tax payers will never see that they are the exploited class. They will never realize that the tax consumers live off of their production and that the tax consumers composing the ruling class uses tax payers own resources to crush their freedoms. Instead the tax payers will continue to think that their rulers are actually on equal standing with them. — Brutus

The tax consumers are legion. It is not just the “welfare queens” or the local bureaucrats that everyone loves to malign. The tax consumers are all those people who do not “produce and exchange in the market“. In other words, the tax consumers are those people who do not live by voluntary, mutual exchange but rather they live be coercion and threat — the state is their weapon. Everyone from the president down to the guy who runs the local street sweeping machine for the city are tax consumers and live by the force and brutality that is the state. This tax consuming class amounts to more than half of the country at the present time, so the battle for freedom and liberty is going to be a long row to hoe. America was founded on the ideas of the classical liberals but in these modern times we have rejected their policies as a people.

As the president claims that he can take the country to a new war in the middle east without any vote by congress authorizing the action we see some big government conservatives complain about “presidential over-reach”. But these same people who are worried about the constitutionality of the president’s claim are happy to see the vast amount of new private prisons being built to cage people for ingesting or smoking a weed without the expressed permission of the state. This is, obviously, unconstitutional to anyone capable of reading and understanding the document but our conservative friends love big and intrusive government as long as it is making people do what these conservatives think they should do.

But let us not just blame the neo-con war-mongers who are so beloved by the mainstream media these days. Anyone who believes in democracy or the collective will is responsible for the actions of the state that they support. Every instance of police brutality, deaths in no-knock drug raids by SWAT teams, massive “collateral damage” in our continuing brutal occupations in foreign countries, or any of the other countless wrongs committed by the state is a crime that all state supporters share in. It is like all members of a criminal gang share in the culpability of the crimes the gang commits. And so supporters of the state share in the responsibility for all the crimes of the state — yes even down to the public school teacher. There is no such thing as the ‘collective will.’ Democracy is merely tool used by the majority to trample on the rights of the minority; and those in control will ultimately use the state to trample on the rights of almost everyone. All states become ever more a police state.

The only real answer to our many problems is to stop asking the government to “fix things” in the first place. Don’t ask government to “create jobs” or to “fix” the situation in Iraq. Peace, prosperity and a state of well being can only be created by individuals agreeing to exchange their labor and capital by mutual, voluntary consent. The use of force cannot create freedom, either here or anywhere else in the world.

“It is important to remember that government interference always means either violent action or the threat of such action. ……The essential feature of government is the enforcement of its decrees by beating, killing, and imprisoning. Those who are asking for more government interference are asking ultimately for more compulsion and less freedom.” ~Ludwig Von Mises

The brutal killer Mao of China once told us that all government flows from the barrel of a gun. We must educate the population that it is the very entity, the state, that they ask to “fix things” that is the problem in the first place.

One reason the police are your enemy

I was reading my normal sources when I came upon several instances of inexplicably bad behavior by police offerers which made little sense other than, perhaps, they just plain enjoyed bullying people and that is why they joined the force. For example, consider the episode Mass. state trooper treats man like criminal for failing to show “respect” reported by The Bay State Examiner in which a cop treats a motorist like a criminal because he wanted to know why he had been pulled over.

On June 10, Anthony Destefano was pulled over in Revere and treated like a criminal by a Massachusetts state trooper who apparently wanted to punish him because he felt disrespected.

A pair of YouTube of the traffic stop show that Destefano repeatedly asked why he was pulled over. The police officer, who identified himself as Trooper Taylor Robidoux, refused to tell him until he handed over his license and car registration. After Destefano produced the documents, the officer told him he was pulled over for having tinted windows.

This example is only a small one, and the motorist was not hurt this time, but it is just one more example out of millions that go on in this country every year. Another report I read just today was about two police officers who crashed a family cookout to harass a man who was not wanted or suspected of any crimes, then shot the man’s elderly father and allegedly planted a gun on him, according to numerous witnesses. And these criminal cops face no punishment for their actions!

Those of us who are paying even a small amount of attention to the news realize that the police are out of control. The reports of police brutality have skyrocketed in recent times and we all have our theories as to why that has come to pass. We know that the police were handed overwhelming and unconstitutional powers in the “war on drugs” and that the police has been “militarized” over the last decades, but understanding how we got to this present state of affairs can be difficult at times.

I was reading Simple Justice: a Criminal Defense Blog by New York defense attorney Scott H. Greenfield the other day when I happened upon a post on one of the main reasons why the police act as they do.

After watching a number of youtube videos sent to me, each of which involved a person subject to commands by police who were, upon failure to comply, harmed, it occurred to me that both the victims of the harm, and those who commented about it, failed to appreciate what was happening.

The harm was in response to what we refer to as “contempt of cop,” the failure to do as told, whether completely or quickly enough.  The reaction tended to focus on the propriety of the command. Sit down. Stand up. Stay in the car. Get out of the car. Stop the video. Move away.  The reaction by the target of the command was that they don’t have to, the command was unlawful or that the order was ridiculous.

The orders may be arbitrary. The police officer didn’t particularly care whether the person was standing or sitting, in the car or out.  What the cop cared about, and cared deeply, is that the person complied with his order, no matter what his order was. Command presence.

A core concept in modern police training is that command presence protects the officer.  It’s the cop’s way of showing the person with whom he’s interacting that the cop is in control, that he is not weak and is the predator rather than the prey.  The corollary is that the person who complies with the officer’s commands is not a threat to the officer’s safety.  The person who refuses to comply, who challenges the officer’s command, is a potential threat. Due to the First Rule of Policing, threats must be stopped.

Ironically, the notion behind command presence was not to strike fear into people, but rather respect.  If an officer appears confident and in control, he will obtain compliance not through the threat of harm, but through the trust and respect he engenders.

This demand for total obedience as part of police training explains why the people who call the cops are often beaten or killed themselves. It explains why the deaf or people with other disabilities often enrage the cops and end up beaten or killed. The orders issued may be arbitrary and of little real meaning other than enforce total obedience by the victims citizens to the “command presence” of the cop.

The entirety of this training focuses exclusively on the officer. That they will “inflict pain” isn’t perceived as a negative, but as mandatory.  The cavalier mention of punishing the perp isn’t viewed as conduct unbecoming, but conduct they are expected, trained, to use to prevent “unacceptable behavior.”  Unacceptable behavior, of course, is noncompliance.

Whatever the stated reasons for the demand to total obedience to the “command presence” of the police officer, the real reason is that the police are the enforcers of the criminal gang writ large: The State. The state demands that you obey their laws, edicts, demands, rules and so forth. The police to the state as the edge is to the knife. The police are the state and don’t you forget it.

There can be no real freedom and liberty as long as the sheep allow the criminal gang and their enforcers to continually commit aggression against the population. The very idea that there are any police officers who are “good guys” is a fallacy and a dangerous one at that. The police are trained to be your enemy and the training was well learned in the vast majority of cases. This is all on top of the fact that many sociopaths and psychopaths join the police force for the raw pleasure they get from inflicting pain on the innocent.

The state is your enemy. The police are the state. Connect the dots.

Some signs of the growing police state

It is always good to know your enemy, and our enemy the state is being very open about its intention to enslave you. If we don’t find some way to push back against the menace of our aggressive, invasive, militarized government we stand little chance of stopping the ever increasing dystopian nightmare of the America police state.

One of the most obvious elements of the rise of the modern U.S. police state has been highlighted in the news recently, and that is that the National Security Agency has been systematically collecting information on all telephone calls and electronic communications placed in the United States by its own citizens. Edward Snowden‘s revelations have surprised many people. But those people who knew that such outlandish and illegal government spying has been going on domestically since the 1970s and before saw the Snowden revelations as just the natural evolution of the evil that the NSA, the CIA and FBI have been committing since the end of WWII. I have read that the government has gone so far as to intercept laptop computers ordered online in order to install spyware on them. It has always been the case that a police state considered spying on its own citizens as a critical component of maintaining control of the populous.

The government has been very open about its program of recycling military war gear to the nation’s local police departments. The local police are stocking up on tanks, weapons, and all manner of military-grade hardware meant for the battlefield. And the local police are using this gear under the all-too-human rational that if you have it you should use it. And this fits in with the new wave of the police shooting unarmed citizens. We are being bombarded with news reports of the police using a take no prisoners approach to dealing with all civilians. Even more telling to me is the new and universal tactic of always shooting the family pets first. This is a telling sign of the police attitude and mindset of feeling they are enforcers in a military occupation.

The police have now instituted strip searches and other invasions of bodily integrity. The police have made a joke of the 4th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution which says that citizens are not to be subjected to unreasonable searches and seizures by government agents. Why do the U.S. Government courts of law permit these violations of the Constitution? Why? It is because all of the State’s minions are working together to build a police state. Worship of state power is at an all time high. We have been left powerless against the police who are now empowered to forcefully draw our blood, strip search us, and probe us intimately.

The news is full of reports of the growing use of remote control drones.  Government agencies are preparing for the drone dominated society of the near future. Some experts say that there will be over 30,000 drones inside the U.S. by 2020. Unmanned aerial vehicles come in sizes from the size of a flea to massive warplanes that can destroy entire towns. Privacy? Forget about that. Safety? Only is you are a compliant slave of the state.

How bad can it get? Well look at how we are making criminals out of little children like the ten year old Pennsylvania boy suspended for shooting an imaginary “arrow” at a fellow classmate. By using nothing more than his hands and his imagination the child ran afoul of the U.S. police state. In Miami a few years ago the police tasered a six year old for being “unruly”. And there is no place left to hide. The government can tell you what you can and cannot do within the privacy of your home. People have been arrested for growing organic vegetables in their own yard. God help you if you light up a cigarette. Government agents can invade your home, break down your doors, kill your dog, damage your furnishings and terrorize your family. Your home is definitely not your castle.

The dystopian nightmare has begun.

 

 

How to advance the cause of liberty

“Better to die fighting for freedom then be a prisoner all the days of your life.”
― Bob Marley

We are coming up on another election cycle. This one will be the first one in a while that does not have Ron Paul somehow involved in a race someplace. Ron Paul had an ideology and message the last time he ran for the nomination for president that many young people found very attractive. Ron Paul seemed to tap into some sort of energy source when he ran, but he is now out of the running and I don’t see anyone on the horizon that comes close to supporting the ideas of the Classical Liberals as Dr. Paul did.

As I write this, millions of people throughout the world are in opposition to the dehumanizing, oppressive, violent, and destructive essence of the governmental systems we see around the world. The fascist corporate-state systems that are exploiting human beings for ends that serve the overlords are causing an awakening among the downtrodden — especially the young. Peace and liberty is the natural state of affairs that mankind aspires to. Private property ownership and respect for the inviolability of the individual are qualities that people around the world are coming to demand out of their existence.

Those of us who are drawn to the ideas of libertarianism or anarchism are in agreement that we don’t know exactly how things would work in a free world. We have some ideas and can make some educated guesses, but free men and women will remake the world in ways that I can hardly image. When someone asks “who will build the roads” I always like to answer that I don’t know exactly but at least the State will not be killing you or other innocent people and that seems far more important to me.

As we move forward from this point in time, we have an opportunity to show others that the state does not work for the masses but rather against the masses. The news reports from all over the world show us governments brutalizing, impoverishing and enslaving their own populations. At the same time, we see alternative schools, private roads, private security firms, and other examples of the market providing non-state solutions that are far better than the coersive brutality of the state.

I think that the best way to promote liberty is by your own personal behavior. Be the free man your philosophy calls for and let that encourage others to live the libertarian philosophy. Now I realize that the state keeps us enslaved, but I am referring to living as close to the non-aggression principle as current conditions allow. Always look to individuals for solutions and not the state. Don’t think that we will ever be able to free mankind from politics by using politics — you just can’t use evil means to accomplish good ends.

There are all kinds of approaches people might take to further liberty.  We can use peaceful demonstrations against the brutality of the state. We could run for public office like Ron Paul did and use that campaign as a platform to spread the ideas of peace and liberty. Some will try writing op-eds or blog posts. Others might write books. Whatever people try, we should support those efforts that are consistent with furthering the cause of liberty. I feel that as long as efforts are consistent with the N.A.P. then we should be supportive rather than critical. I am of the view that running for political office is counter-productive but I did applaud Ron Paul in his runs for president due to the message he was spreading via his campaign. He succeeded in raising the conscious awareness of millions of people so that they began to see the state for the vicious racket that it is and that was well worth the whole effort. But even so, I warn those who think electoral politics can aid us to not be fooled by the many candidates that will talk “libertarian” to get your vote. Ronald Reagan talked “get the government off your back” a lot, but in the end he built up the power and brutality of the government with every move he made.

As we think about advancing libertarian principles, let us remember that the statists are easy targets since the statists must defend the horrific track record of the states around the world. We have generations of evidence that statist programs grounded in socialistic central planning lead to poverty, brutality, misery, and are utter failures from the perspective of the common man. Even regulatory systems can now be understood to be nothing more than a cover for industry-desired cartelism and corporate welfare. The failure of keeping the state from controlling the economy has led to bankruptcy of entire civilizations. The state is the civilization killer while the free individual working with others in mutual, voluntary cooperation is the civilization builder.

The state leads to a deeper bankruptcy than just in material terms. The state leads to moral bankruptcy as well. Those who use the power of the state to aggress against innocent people are damned by their actions and can not possibly be moral human beings. All the minions of the state are party to the wars, brutal police-state practices, torture, spying, and all the rest. The state is an institutional order that has no moral foundations at all — it is built upon raw aggression. The state will always treat its human subjects as mere assets to be exploited on behalf of the purposes of the state itself.

We must do what we can do to further liberty and freedom, and we must encourage others who are doing likewise. As another election cycle approaches remember that voting for “a good candidate” is not the answer. The problem of politics will not be cured via politics.