A tacit rule of blogging: give your opposition credit where it’s due. Rob Schofield deserves credit for at least questioning the kinds of horsetrading, rent-seeking, and corporate welfare that is part and parcel to Senate Bill 3 — the “renewables” bill that is likely to emerge from committee today in Raleigh.
While Schofield apparently caught up the groupthink of climate hysteria, he’s perhaps starting to grasp a little of the deep problems special interests bring to this equation. Big Coal, Big Gas, and Big Nuclear (not to mention Small Pig Waste, Small Solar, Small Wind and Small Forestry) are preparing to step into the profitable gaps left by these all-costs-no-benefits climate regs. Schofield reserves most of his animus for all-things-corporate. But there are two sides to every collusive arrangement. And companies play by the rules that are set by government. Such is how unholy alliances are born.
But the scent of the “orgy” is becoming stronger. And Schofield is not alone among those on the left who’re starting to realize it (The Cockburn Trilogy – One, Two, Three – is worth a gander, for example.) Still, climate hysteria is moving many to embrace drastic measures. And the collusion is not just between corporations and government. There is also a strange alliance between ‘watermelons’ (people who find it convenient to believe in anthropogenic GW because they hate corporations; green on the outside, red on the inside) and ‘oil independence’ fetishists on the right who think that slowing trade with the Saudis will somehow control terrorism. “Bipartisan” Groups like the National Commission on Energy Policy (NCEP) love these two existential fears — terrorism and global warming — because they can tap into both and call themselves bipartisan while attempting to rearrange the energy sector as if it were some kind of chessboard. Their work ultimately legitimizes all the porcine activity going on behind the scenes. (I’ll pass over climate scientists at the teat of the IPCC who’re getting BILLIONs in funding to legitimize and expand the power of the UN in the wake of many failures.)
Anyway, I have warned against these unholy alliances elsewhere. (And here and here and here.) So, I’ll join with Schofield in registering my suspicions about Senate Bill 3. While we may not agree on much, we agree that this bill deserves our scrutiny and mistrust. (Speaking of unholy alliances…) -Max Borders
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