The Inconvenient Truth
Al Gore, along with the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has won the Noble Peace Price. Gore received the award as a result of his campaign to raise awareness of global warming. One of his major tools in this pursuit was his film "An Inconvenient Truth." Although much of "An Inconvenient Truth" seems to be propaganda and the "scientific un-denability" of man's influence on climate change is still up for debate, I applaud Mr. Gore's efforts. In a free society, people should be able to offer their opinion on issues about which they care and attempt to affect change by persuasion. It is up to the rest of us to judge whether their opinions are true, whether their facts are valid, and whether we want to go along with them or not. Unfortunately, that's where Al Gore and I really part ways. Gore, along with most politicians and many environmentalists, see the world's governments as the vehicle by which to solve global warming. Ironically, as has so often happen in the past, the "peace" prize has been awarded to those who would use violence, even if it is veiled in a velvet glove, to get their way.
The Inconvenient Truth is this: government is violence, as George Washington said, it is force. The Inconvenient Truth is authoritarianism, the bane of the 20th century, is once again on the rise, both in the U.S. and around the world. The Inconvenient Truth is that those who advocate environmental mandates are modern day tyrants, even if it is a tyranny of good intentions. The Inconvenient Truth is, if current trends continue, global warming is going to be the least of our problems.
The Inconvenient Truth is that government harms the environment much more than private entities do. For example, the biggest single polluter in the world is the United States Department of Defense, producing more hazardous waste than the five biggest U.S. chemical companies combined. In San Diego, the U.S. Navy has created over 100 toxic waste sites and has polluted the San Diego Bay with mercury and radioactive compounds. In Fallon, NV, the Naval Air Station is blamed for jet fuel and radioactive material in the ground water. In addition, the DOD is responsible for soil and water contamination and pollution at U.S. military installations overseas including those in Canada, Germany, Great Britain, Greenland, Iceland, Italy, Japan, Panama, the Philippines, South Korea, Spain, Turkey, as well as other countries.
State and local governments do no better. Much of the water pollution in American can be attributed to cities dumping raw sewage into rivers. In Canada, raw sewage is dumped into rivers that empty directly into oceans on both coasts. These are the same people to whom the environmentalists look to solve what they consider the world's most pressing problem? The solution to pollution is not more government regulations but a strengthening of property rights. When people own something, they have an incentive to take care of it and protect it. Government has no such incentive. In fact, it has no incentive not to pollute. After all, you can sue a private company if it pollutes your property. On the other hand, if the government does it, you can only sue them if they let you.
In his essay "Civil Disobedience," Henry David Thoreau says that "government is at best but an expedient," meaning simply that it is a means to an end; albeit, because of its legal ability to use force, it is often the quickest and seemingly most efficient means to that end. Thoreau goes on to warn, however, that "most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient." The Inconvenient Truth is that most of us have forgotten this advice. We have forgotten that force, violence, and coercion are dangerous and that power sometimes ends up in the wrong hands. We have forgotten Lord Acton's axiom, "power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."
In our pursuit of expediency, our zeal to protect ourselves from both drugs and terrorists, we have forfeited many of our liberties and the shield of law, and now stand naked before the force of our own government. The Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures, has been nearly destroyed by the War on Drugs and legislation like the USA Patriot Act. British subjects, secure in the Rights of Englishmen, once bragged that "A man's house is his castle; even though the winds of heaven may blow through it, the King of England cannot enter." In America today, the FBI can and does. Due process, habeas corpus, and posse comitatus, all traditional bulwarks against tyranny and oppression, are now either greatly weakened or completely destroyed. Meanwhile, the United States federal government runs around the world whacking every hornet's nest it can find. The Inconvenient Truth is that Americans are much less safe today than we have ever been in the past.
Now, Al Gore threatens to the same thing with environmental matters. You will not find any arguments against voluntary efforts to protect the environment here; the planet that we live on is an asset and it is in the best interests of everyone to take care of that asset. However, the word "voluntary" has been hijacked. At summits between world governments, at the U.N., we hear that "nations" must "voluntarily" reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. This statement implies that nations have a life of their own; that they are entities which are independent from the individuals within their geographical boundaries. Of course, this supposition is absurd. The collective known as a "nation" cannot "voluntarily" do anything on its own. Since the "nation" only exists on an abstract level, it is the individuals within the nation which actually act. Thus, the phrase "nations should voluntarily reduce their greenhouse gas emissions" really means "governments should force the individuals within their country to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions." The Inconvenient Truth is, when referring to government, that "voluntary action" means coercive force.
America was once the beacon of liberty and freedom to the world, a place where, ideally, the dignity and rights of the individual were paramount. Although reality always proved quite different, America gave hope to the world that such a place was possible. Today, because of the actions of the United States government, America is despised around the world. Where she was once a sanctuary of liberty that inspired the oppressed, she is now the oppressor; a bully who gets her way through threats and military force. At home, the government that was formed to secure the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness has become the greatest threat to those rights.
However, we are not alone. The liberal ideas upon which America was founded had a long tradition in England. The U.S. Constitution was largely based on John Locke's "Second Treatise on Government." Our legal system has its roots in English common law and was greatly influenced by the great British jurist Sir William Blackstone. In 1215, the Magna Carta limited the powers of the King, bound his will to the law, and forced him to recognize that his subjects possessed certain rights, including the great writ of habeas corpus. If liberty came to fruition in America, the seeds were planted and incubated in Britain.
Unfortunately, the Britain of today more closely resembles the Oceania of Orwell's 1984 than it does the enlightened and liberal ideas of Locke, Adam Smith, and others. The U.K. is the most surveilled nation in the world. London alone has 4.2 million surveillance cameras. In addition to the cameras, British are subject to, among other things, DNA collection, massive government databases, taps on communications, and smart cards which track school children. Even more innovations are on the way. Not to be outdone, France, home of the great 19th century economist and classic liberal Frederic Bastiat, is going to triple its amount of surveillance cameras by 2009.
By advocating more government mandates, environmentalists such as Gore are asking for even more government intrusion into our lives and putting even more power into the hands of politicians and bureaucrats. Not only does this necessarily limit and restrict individual liberty, the ability of people to choose how to live their live in the way they wish, politicians and bureaucrats have an awful track record of incompetence and outright abuse.
Al Gore was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize because he wants to save the world. The Inconvenient Truth is: is the world that the statists like Al Gore envision really one worth living in?
The Inconvenient Truth is this: government is violence, as George Washington said, it is force. The Inconvenient Truth is authoritarianism, the bane of the 20th century, is once again on the rise, both in the U.S. and around the world. The Inconvenient Truth is that those who advocate environmental mandates are modern day tyrants, even if it is a tyranny of good intentions. The Inconvenient Truth is, if current trends continue, global warming is going to be the least of our problems.
The Inconvenient Truth is that government harms the environment much more than private entities do. For example, the biggest single polluter in the world is the United States Department of Defense, producing more hazardous waste than the five biggest U.S. chemical companies combined. In San Diego, the U.S. Navy has created over 100 toxic waste sites and has polluted the San Diego Bay with mercury and radioactive compounds. In Fallon, NV, the Naval Air Station is blamed for jet fuel and radioactive material in the ground water. In addition, the DOD is responsible for soil and water contamination and pollution at U.S. military installations overseas including those in Canada, Germany, Great Britain, Greenland, Iceland, Italy, Japan, Panama, the Philippines, South Korea, Spain, Turkey, as well as other countries.
State and local governments do no better. Much of the water pollution in American can be attributed to cities dumping raw sewage into rivers. In Canada, raw sewage is dumped into rivers that empty directly into oceans on both coasts. These are the same people to whom the environmentalists look to solve what they consider the world's most pressing problem? The solution to pollution is not more government regulations but a strengthening of property rights. When people own something, they have an incentive to take care of it and protect it. Government has no such incentive. In fact, it has no incentive not to pollute. After all, you can sue a private company if it pollutes your property. On the other hand, if the government does it, you can only sue them if they let you.
In his essay "Civil Disobedience," Henry David Thoreau says that "government is at best but an expedient," meaning simply that it is a means to an end; albeit, because of its legal ability to use force, it is often the quickest and seemingly most efficient means to that end. Thoreau goes on to warn, however, that "most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient." The Inconvenient Truth is that most of us have forgotten this advice. We have forgotten that force, violence, and coercion are dangerous and that power sometimes ends up in the wrong hands. We have forgotten Lord Acton's axiom, "power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."
In our pursuit of expediency, our zeal to protect ourselves from both drugs and terrorists, we have forfeited many of our liberties and the shield of law, and now stand naked before the force of our own government. The Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures, has been nearly destroyed by the War on Drugs and legislation like the USA Patriot Act. British subjects, secure in the Rights of Englishmen, once bragged that "A man's house is his castle; even though the winds of heaven may blow through it, the King of England cannot enter." In America today, the FBI can and does. Due process, habeas corpus, and posse comitatus, all traditional bulwarks against tyranny and oppression, are now either greatly weakened or completely destroyed. Meanwhile, the United States federal government runs around the world whacking every hornet's nest it can find. The Inconvenient Truth is that Americans are much less safe today than we have ever been in the past.
Now, Al Gore threatens to the same thing with environmental matters. You will not find any arguments against voluntary efforts to protect the environment here; the planet that we live on is an asset and it is in the best interests of everyone to take care of that asset. However, the word "voluntary" has been hijacked. At summits between world governments, at the U.N., we hear that "nations" must "voluntarily" reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. This statement implies that nations have a life of their own; that they are entities which are independent from the individuals within their geographical boundaries. Of course, this supposition is absurd. The collective known as a "nation" cannot "voluntarily" do anything on its own. Since the "nation" only exists on an abstract level, it is the individuals within the nation which actually act. Thus, the phrase "nations should voluntarily reduce their greenhouse gas emissions" really means "governments should force the individuals within their country to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions." The Inconvenient Truth is, when referring to government, that "voluntary action" means coercive force.
America was once the beacon of liberty and freedom to the world, a place where, ideally, the dignity and rights of the individual were paramount. Although reality always proved quite different, America gave hope to the world that such a place was possible. Today, because of the actions of the United States government, America is despised around the world. Where she was once a sanctuary of liberty that inspired the oppressed, she is now the oppressor; a bully who gets her way through threats and military force. At home, the government that was formed to secure the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness has become the greatest threat to those rights.
However, we are not alone. The liberal ideas upon which America was founded had a long tradition in England. The U.S. Constitution was largely based on John Locke's "Second Treatise on Government." Our legal system has its roots in English common law and was greatly influenced by the great British jurist Sir William Blackstone. In 1215, the Magna Carta limited the powers of the King, bound his will to the law, and forced him to recognize that his subjects possessed certain rights, including the great writ of habeas corpus. If liberty came to fruition in America, the seeds were planted and incubated in Britain.
Unfortunately, the Britain of today more closely resembles the Oceania of Orwell's 1984 than it does the enlightened and liberal ideas of Locke, Adam Smith, and others. The U.K. is the most surveilled nation in the world. London alone has 4.2 million surveillance cameras. In addition to the cameras, British are subject to, among other things, DNA collection, massive government databases, taps on communications, and smart cards which track school children. Even more innovations are on the way. Not to be outdone, France, home of the great 19th century economist and classic liberal Frederic Bastiat, is going to triple its amount of surveillance cameras by 2009.
By advocating more government mandates, environmentalists such as Gore are asking for even more government intrusion into our lives and putting even more power into the hands of politicians and bureaucrats. Not only does this necessarily limit and restrict individual liberty, the ability of people to choose how to live their live in the way they wish, politicians and bureaucrats have an awful track record of incompetence and outright abuse.
Al Gore was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize because he wants to save the world. The Inconvenient Truth is: is the world that the statists like Al Gore envision really one worth living in?
Comments