The big brained types who either believe global warming is a real threat—or who used a warming trend as a means of grabbing power, promoting careers, scoring grants, internationalizing governance, or a combination of the above—want to impose wrenching and economy-wounding policies on the people of the world. Europeans already accept that kind of hyper control, but Americans are still resistant. So, global warming hysteria was born, which has for years screamed ONLY TEN MORE YEARS TO SAVE THE PLANET!, or THE POLAR BEARS ARE ALL GOING TO DIE, or FLOODS, FAMINES, EARTHQUAKES, MELTED HIMILAYAN GLACIERS IN 20 YEARS! People with reasonable doubts were compared to Holocaust Deniers, accused of being shills for the oil companies, and denigrated as anti science believers in a flat earth. Humans were declared THE ENEMIES OF THE PLANET, and a near religion was born with a quasi-Christian narrative of original sin (prospering via the use of fossil fuels), repentance (making Al Gore rich and dismantling economies and redistributing wealth), and redemption (a new world made green by renewable energies and depopulating to under 1 billion). Hallelujah!
It worked for a time. But then, when the climate models began to fizzle and alternative media was able to penetrate reasonable counter arguments to the hysteria meme. Some called the whole thing a “hoax,” which overstates the matter in my view. But more moderate voices allowed for the warming trend, said that some of it appeared to be natural, but some caused by human activity. They argued that draconian actions were not warranted and urged further study or suggested that our money was better spent preparing for potential changes rather than tilt at windmills by somehow trying to change the weather of the entire planet.
Well, in the last year the hysterics’ tactics blew up in their faces, with the IPCC report discredited and shown to be politicized, as Climategate revealed the nasty tactics employed by the scientific in crowd tried to keep the out crowd from having a voice at the table. Meanwhile, a cold winter—described by warming proponents as mere weather at first, and then as proof of global warming—interfered with the fear mongering about constantly rising temperatures, which, it turned out, had not risen in a “statistically significant” amount in 15 years.
The American people seem to have noticed. The most recent Gallup Poll reflects that the hysteria fever has certainly cooled considerably. For example, 48% think global warming is “generally exaggerated,” up from 31% only five years ago. A whopping 67% don’t think it will pose a “serious threat” in their lifetimes, up 9% in only two years. But that’s the problem with false hysteria. Generating it is relatively easy, particularly when it is supported by the Establishment and the MSM. But maintaining the fear long enough to really change society, that’s a lot harder. And once the balloon springs a leak, it is really hard to reinflate.
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