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Even before September 11, critics of the "unilateralist" stance of the Bush administration were criticizing his declaration that the Kyoto protocols would not be adhered by the U.S. (although it has since been seen that other nations were waiting for an excuse to bail out themselves). A good deal of the criticism, it seems to me, is due to the deliberate coonflation of two uses of the phrase "global warming". The first of these is a description of a phenomenon: the Earth is getting warmer (and has been since the late 18th century). Whilst there is and can be legitimate debate over the magnitude of this phenomenon, no one can seriously debate that it is fact. On the other hand, "global warming" is also used to describe an ideology: that this warming is essentially anthropogenic, that it is uniformly and imminently harmful, that it can only be combatted by massive de-industrialization, and that that can be accomplished only by putting unpredecented amounts of money and power in the hands of the appropriately "concerned" NGOs and the politicians who love them (at least until they control that money and power). The main obscurant of the debate, then, is when a person agrees to the phenomenal use of the term, and various ideologues from well-meaning fellow travellers to self-styled deep environmentalists insist that that agreement must also pertain to the ideological use of the term. A person must either deny the undeniable, or find herself in constant danger of being included in an illusory mass of "supporters". John "Akatsukami" Braue Tuesday, April 16, 2002 |
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