| 113th Year, 46th Issue | Thursday, June 27, 2002 | Sparta, North Carolina |
A regional daily newspaper was all a-twitter recently over the EPA's "predictions" of global warming, as stated in the EPA "Climate Action Report 2002." Sell your Outer Banks property to some unsuspecting midwesterner and relocate to the mountains; time is short. In what has become a standard practice masquerading as journalism, the author regurgitates an EPA press release as justification for his newspaper paycheck and claims a front-page byline in the process. Had he actually committed the sin of journalism, he would have discovered that the action report was based on the same data that, as a result of a 2001 federal lawsuit, was acknowledged by the agency as junk science. But the exercise did fulfill one of the three primary functions of the Global Warming Litany – creating hysterical column-inches and sound-bites for the media. Helps circulation and viewership, ya' know.
A second function is the creation of a bottomless well of federal (read ‘your') money to finance seminars, junkets, computer classes and journal citations for legions of otherwise unemployable federal and state employees.
It does keep them off the street, I suppose.
But the third function, which I'm sure is unintentional, comes close to justifying the millions of dollars the Fed's spend to support the research — its contribution to that treasure trove of idiocy that provides so much humor to everyday life.
From the BBC News, March, 2000 – "EU quota likely for flatulent cows. Gas emissions from flatulent cows could soon be restricted by a EU quota system as penal as that imposed on milk production, an agricultural expert has predicted. Environmental scientist Professor Frank Convery claims cows breaking wind and belching account for 35 percent of Ireland's green-house gas emissions. These have been linked to global climate change… In the longer term, the solution could be the creation of a global market for ‘carbon trading,' said Professor Convery, who is working at University College Dublin's Environmental Institute." He suggests a solution could be "measures to recover the methane gas emitted by cows." I'm sorry, but the mental view of cattle running around with gas collection devices strapped front and rear, attended to by flocks of white-coated bureaucrats studiously taking notes for posterity, is a bit much for me to grasp. Professor Convery's alternate possibility is the elimination of cattle farming, justified by the UN's global warming stance — the Three Stooges, in the form of the UN, the EU and PETA, cooperating in the effort? Whoa!
From the UK Telegraph, June, 2002 — "Livestock tax is in the wind. A tax on farm animals' flatulence was proposed yesterday by a think-tank sponsored by the New Zealand government." In a report, the taxation review panel said: "We have been unable to find any explanation why ruminant methane should be excluded from a carbon tax regime." It said the tax would be levied on farmers according to how many head of animals they had and would accord with the Kyoto protocol on global warming. The proposal is part of a program to overhaul the tax system, including taxes on tobacco, alcohol and gambling because of their impact on low-income households. May I suggest that anyone under the impression that bureaucrats cannot, by nature, be considered creative may want to reconsider that position in light of these revelations.
One can just see the reams of qualifying regulations — variations in taxation by breed, feed source, size, surtaxes for diarrhea, etc. — developed by hundreds of government professionals which, of course, will require a general increase in revenue for appropriate funding of the new Department of Animal Flatulence Tracking (DAFT) and the hiring of hundreds of Flatulence Advisory and Recovery Technicians. One could project this line of thought to eventually include proposals for surtaxes on the consumption of chili, refried beans and beer. The policy approaches genius.
From the UK Telegraph, June, 2002 — "Earth Summit will produce 500,000 tonnes of Greenhouse gas. The 60,000 delegates to the Earth Summit in Johannesburg this September will produce the same volume of greenhouse gases through air flights, ground transport and hotel pollution as would half a million ordinary Africans in a year. The summit's South African organizers aim to raise £3.5 million to offset this pollution through energy-saving school programmes, solar power schemes and bio-gas plants." Laying aside the need for 60,000 participants on a junket to Johannesburg, the estimated costs for this summit have been stated as approaching $10,000 per participant or $600 million dollars. On a cost-per-ton basis, it probably exceeds even the EPA's hot air generation. Fortunately salvation is at hand with those energy-saving school programs and solar power schemes, for an additional $6-plus-million dollars.
In retrospect, it really isn't that funny after all.
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