Guilt By Association

After that very well written detour into America's pastime (THANKS, Brett!), I figured it was about time to go back to why I began writing this blog in the first place. So, I started thinking back on my post about things that really get me cranked up and decided to take a step back and elaborate further on why I don't now (and never will) consider myself an environmentalist. At some point, I might be happy with the label of steward or conservationist, but never the "E-word."

First, over the years, many commentators (George Reisman and Rush Limbaugh among others) have noted that the environmental movement is the current residence of many former communist leaders (e.g., Mikhail Gorbachev) and current socialists (e.g., Al Gore). Reisman takes it a step farther and states that the environmental movement also contains recycled elements of Nazism. While the second part of Reisman's assertions are tough for me to accept, the tendency for state control and central planning by an elite committee of scientists (social or otherwise) makes the claim of recycled communism easier to believe. I am very much a free market capitalist (Adam Smith is a hero of mine), so why on earth would I want to associate with a bunch of communists and socialists sporting different titles.

Next, those in the environmental movement that we are being told are "moderates" stress the importance of the emissions trading schemes and reductions in carbon dioxide emissions. These guys want to reduce U.S. carbon dioxide to some large percentage less than 1990 levels (Kyoto numbers). That particular scheme was rejected something like 97-0 by the Senate. I would assume that nothing would make these people happier than reducing the U.S. economy to Third World levels. People like that are generally not very much fun at parties because they are always telling you why we should feel guilty for our American lifestyle.

Finally, among the environmentalists, there are those that believe that “if all humanity disappeared the rest of life would benefit enormously . . . If the ants were all to disappear, the results would be close to catastrophic.”* There are others (like Les Knight) who have founded organizations whose purpose is the extinction of humanity (Voluntary Human Extinction Movement). These guys don't sound like ordinary college students out there recycling or riding their bikes instead of driving to me. They sound like extremists fanatics that want at least a 90% reduction in the world's population. Again, these are not people that I want playing against me in fantasy football or on my team in a bowling league.

So, if you're curious, I am not an environmentalist because of who my associates would be if I accepted that label. You can call me anything in the book (I have probably been called it before on the football field), but please don't call me the E-word.

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*Edward O. Wilson