In These Times’ Ethan Corey and Jessica Corbett are really amped about Naomi Klein’s hyper-alarmist book on “climate change” and offer 5 crucial lessons. Let’s look at two which underscore what I and others have noticed about the Warmist movement (red bold by me)
1. Band-Aid solutions don’t work.
“Only mass social movements can save us now. Because we know where the current system, left unchecked, is headed.â€
Much of the conversation surrounding climate change focuses on what Klein dismisses as “Band-Aid solutionsâ€: profit-friendly fixes like whizz-bang technological innovations, cap-and-trade schemes and supposedly “clean†alternatives like natural gas. To Klein, such strategies are too little, too late. In her drawn-out critique of corporate involvement in climate change prevention, she demonstrates how profitable “solutions†put forward by many think-tanks (and their corporate backers) actually end up making the problem worse. For instance, Klein argues that carbon trading programs create perverse incentives, allowing manufacturers to produce more harmful greenhouse gases, just to be paid to reduce them. In the process, carbon trading schemes have helped corporations make billions—allowing them to directly profit off the degradation of the planet. Instead, Klein argues, we need to break free of market fundamentalism and implement long-term planning, strict regulation of business, more taxation, more government spending and reversals of privatization to return key infrastructure to public control.
5. Confronting climate change is an opportunity to address other social, economic and political issues.
“When climate change deniers claim that global warming is a plot to redistribute wealth, it’s not (only) because they are paranoid. It’s also because they are paying attention.†(WT-note: I have highlighted this passage from Klein’s book)
In The Shock Doctrine, Klein explained how corporations have exploited crises around the world for profit. In This Changes Everything, she argues that the climate change crisis can serve as a wake-up call for widespread democratic action. For instance, when a 2007 tornado destroyed most of Greensburg, Kansas, the town rejected top-down approaches to recovery in favor of community-based rebuilding efforts that increased democratic participation and created new, environmentally-friendly public buildings. Today, Greensburg is one of the greenest towns in the United States. To Klein, this example illustrates how people can use climate change to come together to build a greener society. It also can, and indeed must, spur a radical transformation of our economy: less consumption, less international trade (part of relocalizing our economies) and less private investment, and a lot more government spending to create the infrastructure we need for a green economy. “Implicit in all of this,†Klein writes, “is a great deal more redistribution, so that more of us can live comfortably within the planet’s capacity.â€
This is exactly what we’ve been talking about: “climate change” is being used as a means to push far left Progressive (nice fascist) Big Government policies. Control of economies, control of people, restrictions on business, restrictions on private investment, government doing it all, taxing people out the ying yang, government owning businesses (particularly infrastructure and energy, which gives Government control over your life). Look back at that quote from Klein again
“When climate change deniers claim that global warming is a plot to redistribute wealth, it’s not (only) because they are paranoid. It’s also because they are paying attention.â€
We are paying attention. To bad the average brain dead Liberal isn’t. They might see the reality, and understand that they will not be immune to the fascist tendencies of their Warmist leaders.
Fascism is an extreme position on the political right, not the political left. Your misunderstanding of this basic concept undermines the point you are trying to make. Fascism is the combining of big business with government, where government becomes co-opted by business. A near synonym for fascism is corporatism. Fascism implies a militarization of a corporatist state.
The political left moves toward socialism and (in the militarized extreme) to communism.
Our current situation, and apparently the form of government you’d prefer, leans very far toward the political right of center — somewhere between free market fundamentalism and crony capitalism. It can accurately be called corporatism. Fascism would be a more extreme form of government somewhere down the road we’re already on.
Klein is advocating a movement toward the political left (the opposite direction from fascism). I happen to agree with her. She is suggesting that we try democratic socialism. We are, truly, all in this together, so let us band together and make policies that help all the people, not just the few with money (and therefore political power).
If you want to use extreme language regarding Klein’s new book (not yet released, so neither you nor I have read it), then please accuse her of being a communist. Calling her a fascist just does not make any sense, and shows that you don’t know what that word really means.
And please join us in New York City September 21 for The People’s Climate March.
I’d suggest that you read Jonah Goldberg’s book Liberal Fascism for an understanding. While Political Theory puts Fascism on the extreme right, in practice it easily serves those on the Left. I actually do not like lumping most Progressives with Socialists, because part of socialism is Political and Moral (individual) freedom. That is not what Progressives want.
If you want, we can refer to Progressives as the Extreme Right. Regardless, what they want is akin to Fascism. Consider what Benito Mussolini said about it
1.”Everything in the state”. The Government is supreme and the country is all-encompasing, and all within it must conform to the ruling body, often a dictator.
2.”Nothing outside the state”. The country must grow and the implied goal of any fascist nation is to rule the world, and have every human submit to the government.
3.”Nothing against the state”. Any type of questioning the government is not to be tolerated. If you do not see things our way, you are wrong. If you do not agree with the government, you cannot be allowed to live and taint the minds of the rest of the good citizens.
The use of militarism was implied only as a means to accomplish one of the three above principles, mainly to keep the people and rest of the world in line. Fascist countries are known for their harmony and lack of internal strife. There are no conflicting parties or elections in fascist countries.
That is what Progressives, the Hard Left, are striving for.