In the spirit of full disclosure I am a global warming/climate change denier. I’m not even sure what the term “climate change” means. The climate is changing all the time. Most of us out here in Flyover Land call it “the weather.”
I have often posed the follow question to my global warming alarmist friends. Let’s just say for a minute that you are right and that the slight increase in the average temperature worldwide is caused by man and not a natural variation as seen throughout geological time. Why is this bad? What is the optimal temperature for the survival of the planet? What is the optimal temperature for human civilization to thrive? I live in the Midwest, does Florida have the copyright on good weather? If it heats up just a few degrees I could be wearing shorts and playing golf at Christmas.
Hotter weather would mean longer growing seasons in the upper Great Plains and southern Canada. Greenland didn’t get its name because the early Vikings were color blind, it was green. When I say green I mean green with foliage not “green’ as in taking a stupid canvas bag to the grocery store that won’t give you a plastic bag for your food but will be glad to sell you as many as you want. They’re back in aisle four between the Styrofoam cups and plastic knives and forks.
So, today I am reading my local paper and see an article where the President’s science advisor, John Holdren, has an idea about getting the temperature back down. He says we should shoot a bunch of dirt into the upper atmosphere. I don’t want anyone to get the wrong idea, I am not anti-science. I like science. But I like my science to have been field tested and verified by the scientific method. These guys who want to start shooting crap into the upper atmosphere are the same guys who wanted to spread coal dust and other dark material over the polar icecaps a few years back because they thought the Earth was getting to cold. The same enviro-maniacs who demanded we go out and buy a bunch of “green” light bulbs that turned out to be loaded with mercury.
These are the same kind of folks who don’t want us to eat foods made safer with irradiation and won’t eat a genetic engineered tomato. Geo-engineered weather is not like an ill-considered economic policy, you can’t go back and correct your mistake or hope inflation and future growth will rescue you. I am reminded of the Strother Martin line from Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid, “Morons, I am surrounded by morons!”