Time to relearn the lessons of Nineteen Eighty-Four. A new language is being surreptitiously created by climate alarmists to control the thinking patterns, and, ultimately the behaviour, of our society. Although it is in plain view every day, most people don’t notice and blithely accept the subliminal messages this new use of words and phrases imparts to our subconsciouses.
But it is anything but harmless. It is suppressing independent thought and free speech in a way author George Orwell warned about in his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four.
Consider for example, the word of the year selected last week by Dictionary.com. It is ‘existential.’ The on-line dictionary explains:
Searches for existential spiked throughout 2019, especially after politicians used the word to characterize the dangers and disruptions climate change is widely held to pose for human life and the environment as we know them.
David Suzuki, 16-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg and other activists used the word through 2019 in relation to the supposed climate crisis and Dictionary.com explained that this too played a significant role in propelling existential to its word of the year status. It is certainly a great word for alarmists to have commandeered. How could anyone not be concerned about a phenomenon that threatens humankind’s very existence?
Similarly, Oxford Dictionaries picked “climate emergency” as its ‘word’ of the year.
‘Existential’ and ‘climate emergency’ are merely the most recent of the words and phrases that have been hijacked by climate alarmists in the battle for the hearts and minds of our populations. ‘Climate denier,’ ‘carbon pollution,’ ‘Climate change is real,’ ‘97% of experts agree,’ and ‘green energy,’ are all either wrong or completely misleading yet they too have become effective weapons in the war of words in the climate debate. This is all right out of Orwell’s book. Let’s take a closer look at what Orwell warned about when his book was published over 70 years ago.
In Oceania, the dystopian society of Nineteen Eighty-Four, a new language was created by the government to control the thinking patterns of the populace. Officially labeled “Newspeak,” it was the first language that, when fully adopted, was meant to limit the range of human thought. Concepts such as freedom, skepticism, and debate were virtually unthinkable since no words existed to describe them, aside from the generic term “thoughtcrime.”
Perhaps most insidious was “duckspeak,” a form of speech consisting entirely of words and phrases approved by the party. Someone who had mastered duckspeak could fire off ideologically pure assertions like bullets from a machine gun without thinking at all. Their words merely emanated from the larynx like the quacking of a duck. Being called a duckspeaker was considered a sincere compliment since it indicated that you were well-versed in the official language and views of the state.
More than ever before, we are now in an era of climate change duckspeak. Rather than being merely ridiculous or social satire, the underlying purpose of climate duckspeak is ominous: to convince opinion leaders and the public to think about climate change only as the government and their activist allies want. To support alternative points of view is “climate change denial,” today’s version of Orwell’s thoughtcrime, punishable by excommunication from responsible citizenry, loss of employment and, at times even death threats.
Former President Barack Obama set the stage for climate change duckspeakers, reassuring Americans and the world that “the debate is settled. Climate change is a fact.”
But, as Carleton University Earth Sciences Professor Tim Patterson pointed out, “Climate is and always has been variable. The only constant about climate is change; it changes continually.” So, Obama’s claim, and that of others who say the same, was correct but trivial, like “sunrise is real.”
But it is much more than that. Intentionally or otherwise, the former president was using a strategy right out of Nineteen Eighty-Four. His statements imply that experts have concluded that unusual climatic events are happening and that government must save us.
Similarly, referring to greenhouse gases (GHG) as “carbon pollution,” as Obama’s White House did thirteen times on its climate change web page, was pure duckspeak. It conjured up subconscious images of dark and dangerous emissions of soot, which really is carbon.
What Obama and others are actually referring to is carbon dioxide (CO2). But were they to call it that, most people would be unconcerned, remembering from grade school that it is a trace gas essential for plant photosynthesis. So, climate campaigners mislabel it “carbon” to frighten the public and to discourage further thinking, closely following “Big Brother’s” strategy in Orwell’s classic.
Referring to low CO2-emitting energy sources as clean or ‘green’ is a mistake as well since the gas is in no way unclean. Indeed, a truly green energy source would be one that maximizes CO2 emissions since that would encourage greater plant growth. But the ‘green’ label now used by climate activists to promote an image of environmental wholesomeness hides the ineffective and damaging nature of many alternative energy sources (see my presentation in Madrid about this here).
Finally, the “97 percent of experts agree” phrase is, using Oceania’s vernacular, “doubleplusgood” duckspeak, designed to suppress debate and boost the party line. After all, who would dare contest so many experts about such a complicated issue?
But “appeal to authority” and “appeal to consensus” are logical fallacies that prove nothing about nature. Regardless, none of the surveys that are used to back up the consensus arguments are convincing. They either asked the wrong questions, asked the wrong people, or polled mostly those who would obviously agree with the government’s position (see my discussion about this here in Heartland’s 2018 event in Oakland while the Global Climate Action Summit was underway across the bay in San Francisco).
In reality, independent reports such as those of the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change show that the science is highly immature with wide-ranging opinions about future climate change. Climate researchers understand that climate science is in its infancy. We cannot meaningfully forecast climate in 50 years. The system is too complex and our understanding of the basic science too primitive. Professors Chris Essex (University of Western Ontario, Canada) and Ross McKitrick (University of Guelph, Canada) write in their book Taken by Storm, “Climate is one of the most challenging open problems in modern science. Some knowledgeable scientists believe that the climate problem can never be solved.”
The on-line tool enotes concludes, when summarizing Nineteen Eighty-Four:
Orwell uses Newspeak to demonstrate the extremes of thought control but it has an important message for people living under all types of government: that language is instrumental in defining our liberty and freedom and we must never allow those in power to manipulate it.
Sadly, we have allowed governments and activists to impose on society a politically-correct form of language that has suppressed and distorted what should be a rational science and public policy debate.
University of Florida linguist M.J. Hardman summed up the important role language plays in societal control when she wrote in her paper Language and War (2002): “Language is inseparable from humanity and follows us in all our works. Language is the instrument with which we form thought and feeling, mood, aspiration, will, and act[ion], the instrument by whose means we influence and are influenced.”
It’s high time sensible people took all this more seriously, objecting vociferously whenever climate alarmist memes are used by politicians, the press, educators and in every day discussions. And we should boost our own point of view through regularly promoting our own memes – climate realism to describe our stance and the climate delusion to describe the ridiculous, and indeed dangerous, ideas of people like Suzuki and Thunberg. Nothing less than the future of our world is at stake.
Tom Harris is so right. “Green” energy, like wind and solar, is not green, but environmentally damaging. Carbon soot is environmentally damaging, but carbon dioxide is not. “Existential” implies life threatening, a term used to scare people into believing Alarmist propaganda. Climate Alarmism is a meme meant to frighten people into supporting dangerous policies to save the planet from a non-problem, CO2, at the expense of neglecting real, solvable environmental issues. Climate Alarmism is now a popular delusion that will come to be known as “The Climate Delusion”, once skeptical scientists are allowed to debunk the fraud. Wasting trillions of taxpayer dollars to save the planet from an imaginary problem, while devastating the economy, sovereignty, and freedom thru energy suppression, may well be an existential threat.
Harley Moody asserts that skeptical scientists are not allowed to debunk the fraud of “Climate Alarmism.” Mr. Moody provides no evidence to support his assertion that scientists have been prevented from studying climate. Mr. Moody asserts that Tom Harris’ phrase “The Climate Delusion” will become well known in the future when these unnamed scientists are allowed to do their work. Mr. Moody’s unsupported assertion and speculation about the future make little sense.
Renewable energy like wind and solar energy is far less damaging to the environment than the extraction, transportation and burning of fossil fuels. (Source “Benefits of Renewable Energy Use” Dec 20, 2017, Union of Concerned Scientists)
“While rising carbon dioxide concentrations in the air can be beneficial for plants, it is also the chief culprit of climate change. The gas, which traps heat in Earth’s atmosphere, has been increasing since the industrial age due to the burning of oil, gas, coal and wood for energy and is continuing to reach concentrations not seen in at least 500,000 years. The impacts of climate change include global warming, rising sea levels, melting glaciers and sea ice as well as more severe weather events.” (Source “Carbon Dioxide Fertilization Greening Earth, Study Finds” April 26, 2016, NASA)
Sorry Mr. James, your list of impacts was accidentally truncated and fell short before it could include the most recent catastrophic event, Eric Swalwell’s wet gurgling flatulence release on Chris Matthews’ show “Hardball” and the consensus among scientists is as high for liberal flatulence as it is for severe weather events.
Don Hart, your crude and abusive language reflects badly on you not on the people who disagree with you about climate science.
If you let me know who reads my comments to you, I’ll be sure to have them
skip the words offensive to delicate snowflakes posting under 2 first names. .
Atmospheric CO2 is nearly 410 ppm, approximately 130 ppm higher than at the start of the Industrial Revolution and has become a phobia for wealth redistributing Progressives, AKA loopy elites though they are almost as concerned at the disparity of wealth among the starving, naked paupers and filthy rich rug merchants who use $100 dollar bills to light expensive cigars.
This is not an exact science but generally, CO1 or carbon monoxide when produced by man or anthropologically from the same sources, creates enough toxic gases, although invisible and odorless, to kill off a proportionate amount of the worlds’s population, were the anthropological theory even founded on the truth. Piscatorial breathing is excluded from this study but since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, total population of the world has increased from 700 million to over 7 billion, causing the distressing conclusion that it is not burning fossil fuels causing the unthinking Climate Alarmists to go bat shit crazy with wealth redistribution programs, It’s too many people breathing.
Culling the unnecessary breathers could be accomplished by assisted mass suicides of the hysterical alarmists after their Last Wills and Testaments are altered to leave their assets to the poor.
Mr. Don Hart is mistaken. Many elite people, common people, poor people, wealthy people, capitalists, socialists, progressives, traditionalists, liberals and conservatives accept the scientific evidence of human-caused climate change. Calling people who disagree with you “loopy elites” and “bat sh*t crazy” is not a sound argument.
In rational debate of climate science, if you assert the people who disagree with you should kill themselves, then you’ve lost the argument.
The way to counter bad ideas like those of the climate doomsayers is with better ideas. We need to restore a proper understanding of reason, science and the scientific method in schools and the population, including government. I studied the sciences and it did not take me long to see clearly the litany of errors of thinking that riddle the hypothesis for dangerous man-made global warming. Tom Harris is right – language itself is being used as propaganda to prevent people from thinking clearly about this subject. For example, the term “denier” is such an obvious smear that is used so badly out of context as to be slanderous.
Good work Tom, it is hard to convince people with the facts of climate alone, we also need to point out the fundamental.errors of reasoning, and language reflects people’s thinking processes.
Mr. Dave McGruer praises Mr. Tom Harris for his attempt to convince people “with the facts” but Mr. Harris’ opinion piece offers no facts. Mr. Harris promotes a false political conspiracy theory that “the government and their activist allies” are some how attempting “to control the thinking patterns, and, ultimately the behaviour, of our society” by using common English words and phrases like ‘existential,’ ‘carbon pollution,’ and ‘green energy.’
Mr. Dave McGruer, claims he “sees clearly the litany of errors” regarding the scientific evidence of human-caused climate change. But rather than identifying a single error, Mr. McGruer complains about the word “denier.” Asserting the word “denier” is a slanderous smear being used out of context. However, the only two people to use the word “denier” in this opinion piece and in comments are Tom Harris and Dave McGruer.
In rational debate, unsupported and unscientific assertion don’t carry much weight.
Hello Dave James. Thank you for caring enough to at least present some talking points from “The Union of Concerned Scientists”, a political organization. Listed in “The Oregon Petition” are 31,000 plus scientists who disagree with Climate Alarmism due to CO2, 9,000 with Ph.D.s. You will find hundreds of scientists, some Nobel Prize winners, who are Climate Skeptics or Climate Realists listed at Climate Depot who disagree with Climate Alarmism. However, science is not done by consensus, and even if the “97% Scientific Consensus” (a proven lie—see “Why Scientists Disagree…” at heartland.org) was true, it would not provide a sufficient basis for instituting policies that would destroy our economy, security, and freedom by spending trillions of taxpayer dollars on a popular delusion, The Climate Delusion.
Sea level is rising at 1-2 mm/year—perhaps 1.2 mm/year—in a linear trend for the past 150 years, and for the past 700 years by best estimates. That is the thickness of a dime/year without any acceleration in rate, independent of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. The coastal areas experiencing higher water levels in recent decades are endangered by subsidence, not by increasing sea level, and neither the temperature nor CO2 has anything to do with it. Dangerous sea level rise is an Alarmist talking point used to scare people. Other false narratives include an increase in the severity or frequency of weather events, species extinctions, ocean acidification, disease epidemics, tipping points, and over 600 other scary scenarios attributed to warming temperatures caused by increasing CO2 mainly from fossil fuel combustion.
I cannot list here many of the references that prove Climate Alarmism is a popular delusion, but you might start with the NIPCC reports (the Non-Governmental International Panel on Climate Change reports compiled by over thirty international scientists, and which is free to read online), the many skeptic websites listed at heartland.org or at SEPP (Science and Environmental Policy Project). “The Mad, Mad, Mad World of Climatism” by Steve Goreham, and “Human Caused Global Warming—the Biggest Deception in History” by Dr. Tim Ball provide the climate history and analysis exposing the origins and motives behind The Climate Delusion. For information on the facts regarding wind energy, see AWED (Alliance for Wise Energy Decisions), published and archived by John Droz, physicist and expert on wind energy. To hear hundreds of presentations by scientists and economists on energy, global warming, climate change, weather events, sea level rise, and more, visit heartland.org for the archived videos of the past thirteen International Conferences on ClimateChange sponsored by The Heartland Institute.
The Mainstream Media (MSM) and the Bedfellows (those who benefit from the Climate Alarmism meme) have prevented the Realist Community from presenting their views in the public sphere from a platform where they are not demonized by terms like “Deniers” or “Flat Earthers”, denied their free speech rights, threatened, blackballed, denied tenure, ostracized, and otherwise silenced by the elite political forces and ideologues pushing Alarmism as a tool to manipulate the pubic as a means to their ends. The Bedfellows include the Social Radicals, the Corrupt Politicians, the Environmental Extremists, the Special Interests, and the Complicit Scientists. Isn’t it about time we held debates and discussions in the public arena where the Alarmists can defend their positions, and the Realists can present the facts and evidence to dispel the myths one by one?
The truth is that there is no Climate Crisis, No Climate Emergency. So, let’s have a debate in the public sphere on the evidence, the facts, and the history using critical analysis with civility and a common goal of exposing the truth about the manmade global warming and climate change claims. Agreed?
Harley Moody, you dismiss the Union of Concerned Scientists as political but you don’t dispute content of my source or my argument that renewable energy is far less damaging to the environment than the extraction, transportation and burning of fossil fuels.
You assert that “the Realist Community” has be demonized by terms like “Deniers” or “Flat Earthers,” but I’ve not used those terms. In this opinion piece and in comments the only people to use the term “Denier” is Mr. Tom Harris, Mr. Dave McGruer and you. You provide no facts and no evidence to support your conspiracy theory about “Social Radicals, the Corrupt Politicians, the Environmental Extremists, the Special Interests, and the Complicit Scientists” deny the freedom of speech to “the Realist Community.”
You write the Heartland Institute is a good source of information regarding climate science. However, the Heartland Institute is not shy about their rejection of the scientific evidence of human-caused climate change or their pro-fossil fuel agenda. (Source Heartland Institute website)
Mr. Tom Harris and Dr. Tim Ball are Heartland associates. (Source Heartland bios for Tom Harris and Tim Ball, Heartland website) Mr. Harris & Dr. Ball asserted man-made global warming was a “hoax” and a “plot” initiate in a “single hearing before the Energy and Natural Resources Committee” in 1988. (Source “GLOBAL WARMING: FAKE NEWS FROM THE START” by Tom Harris & Timothy Ball, Dec 20, 2017, Heartland Institute website)
However, Dr. Ball and Mr. Harris can even keep their false conspiracy theories straight. Mr. Harris and Dr. Ball asserted “man-made carbon dioxide causing global warming” was a “myth” created by Maurice Strong. (Source “$312 Billion: Green Energy Makes Ontario the Most Debt-Ridden Province on Earth” by Dr. Tim Ball and Tom Harris, Jun 18, 2018, PJ Media)
Mr Moody, welcome to the world of “Dave ‘never-ask-me-if-that’s-my-actual-first-&-last-name’ James.” Dare to question his ‘sources’ of information or the general gist of what he implies, and he’ll sidestep that every which way possible, ranging basically from “I never said or implied that” to “you dispute an argument no one made.” He will imply the wildest things, from saying Tom Harris believes the scientific method is not a source of knowledge or that Harris believes enviro-activist are sub-human, but when you read Harris’ actual quotes on the topics, there’s no way an objective non biased reader will come to those same conclusions. This “Dave James” commenter is also inconsistent in his assertions. In recent times, he claims the funding of a person has no bearing on the person’s argument, but years back in reference to whatever Harris’ association with the Heartland Institute was, his implication against Harris was unmistakable: “He who pays the piper calls the tune.” Attempt to grill “Dave James” on why he fixates on this particular think tank association situation, and he can’t even bring himself to define exactly what he means by “association” or why it has any relevance to any given argument a skeptic of catastrophic man-caused global warming might make. If I dare to say it was a pleasure to meet you in person at last year’s D.C. climate conference courtesy of a generous donation which permitted me to afford the airfare, hotel, & conference registration, “Dave James” will launch into a clearly obvious insinuation that this is evidence that I have some kind of insider nefarious association with Heartland, while also spewing a standard repeated line about my alleged inability to offer nothing rational to the topic at hand. Or else he might veer off in a different tangent about Harris or other AGW critics failing to disclose that they have an association with Heartland. My other critics will accuse me of being paid fossil fuel industry-sourced money to spew lies for Heartland, but that’s a different story completely …..
“Dave James” is terribly predictable, it frustrates others enough that they reply to him using harsh words, whereupon he consistently pulls ‘the victim card’ by saying something like ‘insults / personal attacks are not a sign of well-reasoned post.’ Label me as eternal optimist, I hope one day to break through in my jousts with him, where he will finally comprehend the folly of his compulsion to hurl anti-intellectual false premise diatribes at Tom Harris as he stalks Harris around the internet in comment sections, and where I might also prompt him to finally understand the embarrassment of sidestepping critics the way he does instead of admitting how his initial comments’ rationale implodes, and how his misapplied defensive responses similarly fall apart. He would become a better man from that, and potentially become one of the most ardent AGW critics we’ve ever seen.
Mr. Russell Cook is a blogger and is a fellow Heartland associate of Mr. Harris. (Source archived bio of Russell Cook on the Heartland website) One of Mr. Cook’s roles is “get in and fight back” in comment sections with people who take issue with false and misleading op-eds by Heartland associates.(Source “Exploratory Journeys with Tom Harris” Episode – 17,November 27, 2019: Tom interviews Russell Cook)
Mr. Cook does not like it when I point on Mr. Don Hart’s insults and crude and abusive language because Mr. Cook often falls back on insults in his rambling posts. But instead of insulting me or call me names, Mr. Cook makes-up false accusations. For example: Mr. Cook asserts, “He will imply the wildest things, from saying… that Harris believes enviro-activist are sub-human…” But I have never said or implied Mr. Tom Harris believes enviro-activists are sub-human.
I have criticized Tom Harris for referring to people who disagree with him regarding climate science as “anti-human.” (Sources: 1)”Extreme Environmentalists Are Anti-Human” by Tom Harris and Tim Ball, Jan 9, 2019, PJ Media 2)“Climate Change Alarmism Is A Despicably Anti-Human Ideology” by Dr. Jay Lehr and Tom Harris, Dec 26, 2019 Humans are Free)
Mr. Harris asserts Greenpeace, the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Alberta, Canada (APEGA), American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE), Geological Society of America (GSA), The Royal Society, and “other science bodies” who accept the scientific evidence of human-caused climate change have an “anti-human, anti-environment agenda” and they “appear to suffer emotional and psychological problems which they seem to deal with by attempting to make others miserable.” (Source “Science’s Untold Scandal: The Lockstep March of Professional Societies to Promote the Climate Change Scare” by Tom Harris and Dr. Jay Lehr, May 24, 2019, PJ Media)
@Dave James: Sorry for the delayed response. Unlike you, I have a life, with other things to do. You stalk Tom Harris in comment sections, and/or other Heartland speakers at CFACT’s online comment sections. It’s what you do. At Brand X, they can save you X% or more on car insurance. It’s what they do.
Like I said in my direct reply to Mr Moody, you are predictable. You can’t define what “association” means to you; you didn’t dispute the other part of the wild thing I mentioned but came back with “I didn’t say that” about the other, without explaining what exactly it was that you were implying when you first brought it up. Additionally predictable of you is to totally mischaracterize whatever ‘role’ you thought I have, from listening to Tom’s interview of me. Tell us, do you believe I’m instructed to “get in and fight back in comment sections with people who take issue with false and misleading op-eds by Heartland associates”?? You couldn’t prove that if your reputation depended on it, and the literal proof is my own Disqus comment history, where a long slog clean back to the first one clearly displays that I’ve challenged global warming believers all across a massive variety of article / op-ed / letters-to-editors / blog posts to stand and deliver on their highly questionable assertions. Your implication that this is an assigned job implodes when examiners see my appearances at “op-eds by Heartland associates” is actually a minority of the places where I’ve posted comment challenges. Your role, self-assigned or otherwise, in your comment history is abundantly obvious, via simply the number of times the name “Harris” is displayed in a screen search of your entire Disqus account comment collection. Try it out sometime: using a keyboard while in your Disqus account 4100+ comments page, place a weight on your keyboard’s space bar, so that it makes the page continuously scroll down, then step away for 10 or so minutes until it reaches the first one you ever posted, and then count each comment in which you either directly replied to Harris or at his pieces (or more recently other Heartland / CFACT speakers), or were replying to a comment section pertaining directly to one of Harris’ pieces or ones authored by Heartland / CFACT speakers. At the end of the exercise, you and everyone else will find it easier to count the times when your comments addressed literally NOTHING pertaining to Harris or Heartland. You aren’t a casual commenter like I am with just a hobby interest of seeing if global warming believers can rise to simple challenges about their assertions. You are what you plainly are. The entertaining aspect of it is how you sidestep all around that problem like it’s something you aren’t actually proud of.
Russell Cook uses insults because he has nothing rational to offer. Mr. Cook post is unfocused and confused. For example: Mr. Cook asks for the definition of the common English word “association.”
Mr. Cook claims to be “casual commenter” but Mr. Cook is directly connected to the Heartland Institute. Mr. Cook acknowledges on his blog that he receives money from the Heartland Institute’s which enables him “…to continue devoting time to this subject.” (Source Gelbspan Files/About)
Mr. Cook also acknowledges that the Heartland Institute provides him the platform for his blog. “Heartland brings together the people who are on the skeptic science side of the issue, but Heartland has also provided me the basic platform of my gelbspanfiles blog…” (Source Comment by Russell Cook on “CPAC 2019: Tim Huelskamp’s Interview with The Daily Caller” written by Billy Aouste March 1, 2019, Heartland Freedom Pub)
@Dave James: Nossir. You can’t define what “association” means TO YOU. In all the times I’ve previously put this challenge to you, you sidestep it. Every. Single. Time. The common definition of the noun associate is “a partner or colleague in business or at work” or “joined or connected with an organization or business.” That’s the image you are so desperate to plant in everyone’s mind, that I work hand-in-glove with them in their business activities. I do not, in any form. In the past couple of years in other comment sections, I’ve pointed out how my ‘association’ with them was tenuous at best, only one increment less so than my associations with Breitbart, AmericanThinker, CFACT, etc. When I did that, you sidestepped what the absolute definition of “tenuous” is, and instead offered clearly unfocused and confused responses that either I’m distancing my self from them or vice versa, while attempting to pass off the receipt of donations as proof of a direct association. By your own implied definition, if you received a tote bag from the Sierra Club after sending them a $100 donation, YOU and the Sierra Club have a direct association with each other. Since AmericaOutLoud give you a platform to stalk Tom Harris, YOU have a direct association with AmericaOutLoud. Everyone else sees how ludicrous that sort of attempt is to justify claims about “direct associations.” No doubt you’d say you would do what you do without giving to or receiving anything from the Sierra Club. Guess what? I’d find a way to keep doing what I do if I received absolutely nothing from Heartland. Thus, whatever association you attempt to paint me into does not taint me in the least, but the continual effort to smear me with ‘guilt-by-association’ most certainly does taint your appearance.
Why do you fixate on connecting Heartland with anybody? Because its a dogwhistle name to all on your side that prompts them to ignore anything I detail at my blog. For any fence-sitters who’ve never heard of the place, it becomes a dogwhistle when they do simplistic internet searches for it that yield screeds by scores of AGW agenda-driven critics. Your side sits in mortal fear of what happens when ordinary citizens examine the global warming issue objectively. Nice of you to reference where I say “Heartland has also provided me the basic platform of my GelbspanFiles blog, …” but you very conveniently leave off the rest of the sentence: ” …where I’ve laid out every which way the ‘crooked skeptics’ accusation falls apart.” You hurl insults about my manner of writing because that’s all you’ve ever had, you’ve never disputed a detail seen within my blog regarding the smear of skeptic climate scientists. At other comment sections where Tom Harris has been accused of taking illicit money to lie, I’ve bopped in to torment the accusers about how baseless the accusation is overall, whereupon you’ve never disputed what I said in your replies to me, and instead only attempted to tie me into your version of nefarious “association” in a way that’s ludicrous.
I could say “keep being predictable” but that would not reflect my true feelings. What I wish for you to do is take a long time to seriously reflect about why you feel compelled to stalk Tom Harris around the internet and respond to comments like mine and so many others with weak, false premise, sidestepping arguments. One day you’ll thank me for suggesting this. Open your eyes, embrace critical, objective reasoning.
Russell Cook insists his association with the Heartland Institute is “tenuous at best.” Mr. Cook claims his relationship with Heartland is like his relationships with “Breitbart, AmericanThinker, CFACT.” However Mr. Cook does not disclose receiving any funding from Breitbart. The American Thinker does not provide Mr. Cook with the platform for his blog. Mr. Cook’s association with CFACT is very different form his association with the Heartland Institute because he does not take money from CFACT.
Mr. Cook writes about “critical, objective reasoning” but he doesn’t see the difference between donating to the Heartland Institute and taking money from the Heartland Institute. The only person to suggest Mr. Cook tainted by his associate with the Heartland Institute is Mr. Cook.
Insults attack a person rather than their arguments and statements. Criticizing Mr. Cook’s “manner of writing” is not an insult but rational debate. Unfocused, confused posts which include personal attacks are not an indication of a well-reasoned argument.
We could argue about the semantics of the word “associate” all day long, but once again, you fail to explain what it means to you, or what your implied meaning is to the reading audience here. The only person suggesting I’m tainted or anyone else is tainted by guilt-by-association with Heartland is YOU. Otherwise you couldn’t keep bringing it up if it has no relevance to any given AGW discussion. There’s no way for you to dodge that appearance. Btw, what was the donation size to me last year from Heartland? I’ve already disclosed the situation, kinda ironic how you don’t disclose it yourself, isn’t it? Meanwhile, AmericanThinker doesn’t provide me with the platform for my blog … they provide me the platform of THEIR pages for my writings. As did Breitbart when they accepted my articles. And suppose I was to pay entirely for my own personal blog platform while receiving zero donations from anyone, while continuing to do the identical analysis of the smear of skeptic scientists that I’ve done for the last 10+ years? Would I be clean as the wind-driven snow now in your book, or would you have to concoct some other desperate lines of reasoning to convince people that the details of my work are not worth reading?
Mr. Russell Cook writes, “…what was the donation size to me last year from Heartland? I’ve already disclosed the situation, kinda ironic how you don’t disclose it yourself, isn’t it?” I did ask Mr. Cook if he still received money from the Heartland Institute after his bio was deleted from their website nine months ago but he did not answer.
Mr. Russell Cook’s inability to understand common English word “associate” has nothing to do with me. I never wrote or implied that Mr. Cook was tainted by his direct relationship with the Heartland Institute. That is a false argument made by Mr. Cook. According to Mr. Cook, ““Dave James” will launch into a clearly obvious insinuation that this is evidence that I have some kind of insider nefarious association with Heartland.”
Mr. Cook argues that his opinion pieces published by Breitbart and AmericanThinker are the same thing as the Heartland Institute giving him money and providing a platform for his blog. Clearly receiving financial benefits from Heartland is not the same as have an op-ed published.
If Mr. Cook returned the financial benefits he has received from the Heartland Institute, then his claims to be “casual commenter” would be accurate.
Tom Harris blames governments and activists like Greta Thunberg and David Suzuki for the lack of a rational and scientific public policy debate regarding climate. However, as Mr. Harris’ supporter Don Hart shows crude/abusive language, insults and name-calling often comes from those who reject the scientific evidence of human-caused climate change.
Tom Harris asserts that words and phrases like ‘existential,’ ‘carbon pollution,’ and ‘green energy’ are plot by “the government and their activist allies” to “to control the thinking patterns, and, ultimately the behaviour, of our society.” Mr. Harris provides no evidence to support his vast political conspiracy theory.
Mr. Harris’ beef is not with the “the government and their activist allies” but with the English language. The words like ‘existential,’ ‘carbon pollution,’ and ‘green energy’ were not created by the government or by those who accept the scientific evidence of human-caused climate change.
Carbon in its elemental state and carbon in a CO₂ molecule is still carbon. Green Energy refers to energy resources are renewable, meaning they’re naturally replenished. In contrast, fossil fuels are a finite resource that take millions of years to develop and will continue to diminish with use.
Rather than attempt to dispute the arguments of David Suzuki, Greta Thunberg or President Barack Obama with scientific evidence, Mr. Harris claims there words are “duckspeak” and his worldview is treated as a “thoughcrime.”
Mr. Harris offers his own politically-correct form of language to battle his imaginary enemies. Mr. Harris promotes the phrases ‘climate realism” and ‘climate delusion’ to describe “…the ideas of people like Suzuki and Thunberg.”