Desperate Candidates Call for Desperate Times

Remember Al Gore’s 2006 Documentary, An Inconvenient Truth? Gore won a Nobel prize, and not one, but 2 Oscars for his climate catastrophe eulogy. In it Gore claimed that if humans didn’t radically alter our way of life within 10 years, the planet would be doomed as temperatures rose, ice floes melted, and seas rose. Between the book, movie, and speeches, it’s estimated Gore made about $50 million.

Not surprisingly, a 2017 sequel didn’t do quite as well, presumably because people put off by his failed prophecy of earth’s ruination chose instead to see Despicable Me 3.

And so here we are in 2019 staring down the barrel of still more predictions of climate catastrophe, but this time the disaster prognosticators are, well, just about every one of the 21 Democrat candidates for President.

If we can judge how desperate a candidate is by considering the extremity of their rhetoric, then you’d have to say that at least right now, Beto O’Rourke is as desperate a candidate as any.

Mr. O’Rourke, channeling Al Gore, told Iowa flood victims a few days ago that their plight is clearly due to climate change and that if we don’t move immediately, then within 10 years we will all be under water.

O’Rourke is hardly the only Democrat who’s made such a prediction, but he is the one candidate whose offered a plan that puts your money where his mouth is. O’Rourke has proposed spending $5 trillion over the next 10 years, with much more to follow, in an effort to reach net zero emissions by 2050.

Interestingly, O’Rourke’s plan was met with rabid criticism, but not just by those you would expect either. He was attacked most viciously by those who felt his plan didn’t go anywhere near far enough. O’Rourke apparently wasn’t desperate enough.

His critics on the left will settle for nothing less than replacing the capitalist economy in toto with a socialist system as outlined in The Green New Deal — which O’Rourke and a great many other Democrats have publicly supported, at least in principle.

The problem for O’Rourke though, and for most of the Democrats who came out early for the GND, is the heart palpitations caused by its estimated cost. Most experts say the GND will cost between $70 trillion and $93 trillion in the first ten years. But that’s only the direct cost for implementation. That doesn’t count the cost of upending the economy and eliminating millions of jobs.

That kind of price tag makes O’Rourke’s measly $5 trillion rip-off look more like kids playing army than the full scale war demanded by climate radicals.

But hey, $5 trillion is still a lot of money, it’s a 15% increase in federal spending each year. And that’s before you count all the other trillions worth of stuff Beto is promising.

Then there’s this reality, never was so much spent to achieve so little.

In the next 80 years, climate scientists suggest temperatures could rise 6 degrees, and sea levels about 2 feet. Our country’s contribution to that change is about 15%, or less than 1 degree of the estimated possible increase - roughly half of China’s contribution.

So even if O’Rourke’s plan eliminated our climate change contribution all together, the $5 trillion price tag would double our national debt in the next 10 years - which is just the down payment, additional costs would accrue in following years - all to impact climate change by less than 1 degree between now and 2100.

The human cost is even worse. O’Rourke’s plan would end drilling and fracking. That would cost the jobs of 600,000 American families, and erase $116 billion in value from our economy.

If you’re in the market, there’d be much to make from shorting oil and gas stocks and buying Chinese solar makers. If solar won’t work at your house, maybe a windmill will do the trick, they only run about $50,000.

And what about all the cars that we won’t be able to use anymore? There are about 270 million registered vehicles in the U.S. That’s a lot of yard cars. Talk about the beautification of America.

It’s all even wilder when you consider that those crazier than O’Rourke want to spend 15 times as much.

Of course, nothing about this makes any sense — whether it’s the $70 trillion plus that some Democrats suggest or just the $5 trillion O’Rourke’s still outrageously overpriced and ineffective plan calls for.

Isn’t it a lot smarter to promote policies that encourage innovators to do what they do best - find solutions to the problems our world faces, then let them enjoy the rewards of their creativity and hard work? I know it won’t appeal to the radical left, but it’s a pure fact of the capitalist system that reward for innovation actually works. In fact, history has proven it’s the only thing that consistently works - especially when it comes to making huge technological leaps.

The fact the left is so intent on tossing over capitalism as a component of their plan to address climate change should tell you they’re a lot more interested in promoting leftist ideology than they are in stopping rising seas.

It was all a lot funnier when it was just Al Gore fleecing Hollywood, Nobel Committee members, and liberal moviegoers. But now all the wild rants and ever-growing hyperbole look like petty political desperation. O’Rourke may head the list at the moment, but you can be sure it won’t stop with him.