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Road to Copenhagen: Money-Changers in Democracy’s Temple
There is a scene in the New Testament where Jesus throws the money-changers out of the temple. We could use some of that in the halls of Congress.
While the U.S. Capitol is not the National Cathedral, members of Congress are the custodians of a sacred trust: to protect the vitality and integrity of the extraordinary experiment the founders began.
For example, the debate about climate change isn’t just about polar bears and energy prices. It’s about whether a free people will be a responsible people, a capitalist economy will be a caring economy and a democracy will protect the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for everyone, even those not yet born.
Some of this sacred trust is codified in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Some is unwritten and implied. And although the Constitution dictates that we keep government and religion separate, there are places in public policy where secular values and moral values overlap. Stewardship of nature and its resources — called “creation care” in religious circles — is one of those places.
Government’s stewardship responsibility is recognized in the body of laws past Congresses developed once we realized that burning rivers, poisoned water, dangerous air, carcinogenic fish and toxic wastes were not in the national interest. In the landmark National Environmental Policy Act, for example, Congress declared:
It is the continuing responsibility of the federal government to use all practicable means, consistent with other essential considerations of national policy, to improve and coordinate federal plans, functions, programs and resources to the end that the nation may ... fulfill the responsibilities of each generation as trustee of the environment for succeeding generations.
Some legal experts believe public officials have a fiduciary duty to protect the commons — the air, soil, water and forests on which we all depend.
Professor Mary Wood at the University of Oregon law school champions the idea of an “atmospheric trust doctrine” under which government officials are held legally responsible for failing to reduce carbon emissions. According to research commissioned by the Presidential Climate Action Project and conducted by the University of Colorado Law School, that type of legal accountability doesn’t exist in federal statutes today. But Wood argues that the common law trust principle underlies the statutes, and the courts should enforce it:
Such litigation rests on the premise that all governments hold natural resources in trust for their citizens and bear the fiduciary obligation to protect such resources for future generations. The courts have the ability to enforce this fiduciary obligation to reduce carbon at all levels of government.
Two-thirds of the greenhouse gas pollution being emitted by the United States is in compliance with government-issued permits, Wood says. That means government is not fulfilling either its fiduciary or its moral responsibility in regard to climate change and its profoundly destructive impacts.
Yet in past court cases, Wood says, we can find the seeds of an atmospheric trust doctrine. For example, in a 1982 case involving a railroad and the State of Illinois, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled:
The state can no more abdicate its trust over property in which the whole people are interested … than it can abdicate its police powers in the administration of government and the preservation of peace.
The Philippines Supreme Court, whose opinions might be less important to other countries if the court weren’t discussing a global issue and basic morality, said it even better in a ruling about logging in an ancient forest:
These basic rights need not even be written the Constitution for they are assumed to exist from the inception of humankind … (or else) the day would not be too far when all else would be lost not only for the present generation, but also for those to come — generations which stand to inherit nothing but parched earth incapable of sustaining life.
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David Sassoon - naive and paranoid?
David (Sassoon), so you think that I’m QUOTE: naive and paranoid UNQUOTE eh. Your comments have no substance, just like the UN’s propaganda about The (significant human-made global climate change) Hypothesis.
As I said previously QUOTE: in support of two major objectives which it has had since its inception UNQUOTE. Anyone who has read the Commission on Global Governance’s 1995 report “Our Global Neighborhood” understands what is planned (Note 1). I suspect that you have read this but prefer not to draw attention to it.
I haven’t checked out the credentials of the commissioners (Note 2) who put together this report but am aware of one particular individual who name keeps popping up in relation to climate change and population control, Maurice Strong.
In a 2007paper challenging the validity of ice core reconstruction of ancient CO2 concentrations Zbigniew Jaworowski said (Note 3) QUOTE: The concern at the top about “climate change” is not genuine and there are hidden motives behind the global warming hysteria. .. Maurice Strong, who dropped out of school at age 14, established an esoteric global headquarters for the New Age movement in San Luis Valley, Colorado, and helped produce the 1987 Brundtland Report, which ignited today’s Green movement. He later become senior advisor to Kofi Annan, UN Secretary-General, and chaired the gigantic (40,000 participants) “UN Conference on Environment and Development” in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. Strong, who was responsible for putting together then Kyoto Protocol with thousands of bureaucrats, diplomats, and politicians, stated: “We may get to the point where the only way of saving the world will be for industrial civilization to collapse.” Strong elaborated on the idea of sustainable development, which, he said, can be implemented by deliberate "quest of poverty . . . reduced resource consumption. . . and set levels of mortality control”. .. UNQUOTE
On the subject of The Hypothesis, what a reaction there has been to the alleged disclosure of E-mails and other data! This information has been flying around the Internet since 19th and if genuine it potentially blows the lid off the all of the propaganda that has been promulgated about The Hypothesis. Despite this there apparently has not been a word from any political party member or broadcaster about it and I see no mention of it on your blog either (4). I’ll copy this there also. Why no news coverage or political reaction? Never mind, nothing much escapes the Internet.
In an article on this subject in the UK’s Daily Telegraph (Note 5) mention is made of John Daly. It says QUOTE: One of the alleged emails has a gentle gloat over the death in 2004 of John L Daly (one of the first climate change sceptics, founder of the Still Waiting For Greenhouse site), commenting: “In an odd way this is cheering news.” UNQUOTE. This alleged E-mail is presented more fully elsewhere (Note 6).
It is important to remain sceptical about the validity of this “leak” of information and await the results of a thorough investigation. (Is anyone in the news media doing something along these lines?). Despite this, there is a saying “there’s no smoke without fire”. It is interesting to see that there appeared to be an exchange of E-mails between John Daly and Phil Jones back in 2001 (Note 7). This item starts with QUOTE: After several requests by visitors to this website for details of the two emails which were sent by Phil Jones of CRU, demanding withdrawal of the articles about recent errors in CRU hemispheric temperatures, the following exchange of emails was made via a very large CC (110 addressees), with both of Jones' emails signed in his official capacity as professor at CRU. UNQUOTE. It is followed by an apparent exchange of E-mails between John Daly and Phil Jones.
I leave you to read them and draw your own conclusions. While you’re at it, have a read of the comments at Wattsupwiththat (Note 6). There are some interesting comments about that site favoured by supporters of The (significant human-made global climate change) Hypothesis, Realclimate (Note 8). It leads off with an article spinning the motivations behind what appears in the E-mails followed by some uncharacteristic defensive responses to readers’ comments by Gavin Schmidt.
Another interesting commentary on this is at ClimateAudit (Note 9).
NOTES:
1) see http://www.sovereignty.net/p/gov/gganalysis.htm
2) see http://cumbey.blogspot.com/2005/10/our-global-neighborhood-circa-1995.html
3) see http://www.warwickhughes.com/icecore/zjmar07.pdf
4) see http://solveclimate.com/blog/david-sassoon
5) see http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100017393/climategate-...
6) see http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/19/breaking-news-story-hadley-cru-has...
7) see http://www.john-daly.com/cru/emails.htm
8) see http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/11/the-cru-hack/comme...
9) see http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=7810
Pete Ridley, human-made global climate change agnos(cep)tic
Mr Ridley A naive and paranoid
Mr. Ridley
Your comment below provides a naive and paranoid readings of the texts. You are entitled to your opinion.
I suggest you compare it to the text of the Montreal Protocol, for example, which has enabled 198 nations to cooperate and halt the use of almost 100 ozone destroying substances over its successful 22 year history. The US signed the treaty thanks to Ronald Reagan.
There is nothing unusual about the language of the UN climate treaty, which is needed as an instrument negotiated between national governments to solve a common problem.
UN's Ulterior Motives
Many of us regard the UN’s support of The (significant human-made global climate change) Hypothesis as pure propaganda in support of two major objectives which it has had since its inception, having nothing to do with trying to control global climates. These objectives are :
- redistribution of wealth from developed to developing or underdeveloped economies,
- establishment of a framework for future global government.
These objectives are clearly illustrated in the latest draft UN treaty on Climate Change (Note 1), which I find extremely worrying. One of my major concerns is that it invokes (rather than restates) text about redistribution of wealth from developed to developing economies, which is one of the main reasons for this UN propaganda in support of The (significant human-made global climate change) Hypothesis. What the latest draft says is QUOTE: Financial flows for mitigation will be sourced and governed in a transparent and balanced manner in line with [chapter 4][paragraphs 173 and 174] (of FCCC/AWGLCA/2009/INF.1) [text][agreement].] UNQUOTE. That’s just over one line of text, easy to skip over. Para. 173 from FCCC/AWGLCA/2009/INF.1 22 June 2009 is not just a line of text but covers pages 156 – 160 so must not be overlooked. This would be very easy to do, since it does not even appear as “small print” in the latest draft. I suspect that this was done quite deliberately, but then I am a sceptic.
Page 85 Para. 64 says QUOTE: An Executive Body on Finance and Technology for Mitigation (EBFTM), accountable to the COP, shall be established. UNQUOTE. This is the part of the UN’s future global government that will collect and distribute funds collected from global taxpayers.
It is claimed on Page 86 Para. 68 c) that QUOTE: Have an equitable and geographically balanced representation of all Parties within a transparent and efficient system of governance UNQUOTE. It goes on to say on Page 137 Para. 22 QUOTE: The COP shall appoint a board which shall function under the authority and guidance of and be accountable to the COP, to manage the financial mechanism and the related facilitative mechanism, funds and bodies, which shall have an equitable and balanced representation of all Parties within a transparent system of governance, to address all aspects of the means of implementation for developing countries, for both adaptation and mitigation. UNQUOTE. I don’t recognise this as “western style” democracy but more akin to some of the dictatorships which are already receiving from the developed nations vast sums which never reach the deprived people for whom it is intended.
This draft agreement goes on and on in this manner, with horrendous consequences for developed economies if it is approved by our representatives, yet how good an understanding do they (or ourselves) have of its implications. There are several paragraphs that typify the politically correct nonsense coming out of the UN, e.:-. Page 6 PP15 QUOTE: Further acknowledging that developed countries have a historical responsibility for their disproportionate contribution to the causes and consequences of climate change, reflecting their disproportionate historical use of a shared global carbon space since 1850 as well as their proposed continuing disproportionate use of the remaining global carbon space. UNQUOTE. Page 7 Para. 4 QUOTE: 4. [Developing countries face not only the additional challenge of adaptation but also the need to put their economies on a sustainable path. All Parties agree that developing countries face serious adverse effects of climate change as well as threats to their future economic potential due to insufficient access to shared global atmospheric resources.] UNQUOTE. Page 7 Para. 6 QUOTE: These adverse effects [also] [further] [undermine the equitable development needs of present andfuture generations] [demand a more equitable utilization of the global atmospheric resource to reflect the needs of present and future generations], and have a range of direct and indirect implications for the full and effective enjoyment of human rights including the right to self determination, statehood, life, food and health and the right of a people not to be deprived if its own means of subsistence, particularly in developing countries. UNQUOTE.
And so it goes on for page after page after page. They even bring “sex” and “gender” into the debate. Para 56 QUOTE: and recognizing gender equity as an integral part of effective implementation of adaptation UNQUOTE and Page 55 Para 63 QUOTE: utilizing scientific as well as sex-disaggregated socioeconomic data UNQUOTE ???!!!!!
What a farce – but what is worse, our elected representatives pretend to be swallowing it all.
NOTES: 1) see http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/2009/awglca7/eng/inf02.pdf
Best regards, Pete Ridley, Human-made global climate change agnostic.
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