The Objective Eye

"Every movement that seeks to enslave a country, every dictatorship or potential dictatorship, needs some minority group as a scapegoat which it can blame for the nation's troubles and use as a justification of its own demand for dictatorial powers. In Soviet Russia, the scapegoat was the bourgeoisie; in Nazi Germany, it was the Jewish people; in America, it is the businessmen."
- Ayn Rand, "America's Persecuted Minority: Big Business" (1961)

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Location: Los Angeles, United States

Monday, June 09, 2008

CARBON BELCH DAY IS JUNE 12 - SPREAD THE WORD!

Now Playing: Hidoi Ame from "Los Angeles" by The Brilliant Green

If you've been looking for a nice symbolic way to tweak the delicate sensibilities of adherents to burgeoning eco-collectivism, search no more.

This Thursday, June 12th, is "Carbon Belch Day" - spread the word and make your pledge.

It's very simple: Given that the entire concept of CO2 as a significant causal factor in "global warming" is blatantly false, and given the entire dubious premise that...the globe will, er, warm at all, on Carbon Belch Day you intentionally make your "carbon footprint" as big as you possibly can for at least one day.

Critics of it who claim it's a demand that people "pollute" for a day miss the point entirely, and, I presume, intentionally. There are multiple points to Carbon Belch Day, at least in my interpretation:

First, it's an expression of long-overdue contempt for the entire "global warming" sham - which, oddly, becomes "climate change" during the, er, winter months;

Second, it illustrates the point that CO2 is largely irrelevant as a causal factor in climate change - historically CO2 increases have lagged, not led, temperature increases, usually by hundreds of years; compared with proportionally vast greenhouse gases that actually do impact global temperature, with water vapor being the overwhelming #1 on the list, CO2 is negligible even as a contributing factor.

No legislation yet on keeping them outlaw oceans in line with eco-dogma...

Third, it demonstrates, albeit in oblique fashion, that the very fact of being a living organism involves constant alteration of the "environment" by every one of us - from basic respiration to every action we take in maintaining our lives, such as cultivating food, building shelters, interacting and trading values in the marketplace. A day of exaggerated consumption is a defiant assertion of your right to exist.

Fourth, it serves as a refutation, again oblique, of the neo-Medieval asceticism that's been a constant undercurrent of the "green" religion - through the proud reassertion of the right to use one's property however one sees fit.

Fifth, it's a long-overdue lampooning of the bizarre, feel-good cottage industry of "green" fads that has grown out of the Climate Armageddon hysteria: The "carbon trading" lunacy; the aesthetic atrocity that is the Toyota Prius; the whole potentially-deadly fad of "organic" products; the self-flagellation that is the "vegan" lifestyle, also occasionally deadly; etc.

Other criticisms of it carry more weight: That random waste comes across as irrational, and therefore undercuts the effectiveness of the message. I think that's an overstatement - do you "waste" the paper and ink you use to make placards for a political demonstration? The point is the message behind it; the products consumed in the process are the means of drawing attention to that message, and are the property of those who've bought them in any case. Anything that's likely to cause a budding eco-collectivist to question his dogma is worthwhile, IMO.

So I've calculated my Carbon Belch, made my pledge, and kicked in a monetary donation to Grassfire.org. I urge you to do the same.

My estimated Carbon Belch, BTW, will be 121 pounds. I'm sorry it can't be more but I have no flight plans and don't own a speedboat. Maybe next year.