RFK Jr.’s Climate Rant is Short on Facts by Paul Driessen

To the Editor of the Washington Times:
In Kennedy says climate skeptics merit jail for treason, war crimes, Washington Times, September 23, 2014, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. says people who don’t believe in “dangerous man-made climate change” should be jailed.

He wants to punish us for the “crime” of exercising our First Amendment rights, demanding actual evidence to support alarmist hypotheses, and insisting that people’s needs for reliable, affordable energy be part of the conversation — and should even take precedence over unsubstantiated claims that climate change is “the world’s most fearsome weapon of mass destruction,” posing “greater long-term consequences” than the Islamic State, terrorism or Ebola, as Secretary of State John F. Kerry recently claimed.

Mr. Kennedy needs to get his facts right. None of us says climate change “does not exist.” Global warming and cooling, “climate disruption” and “wild weather” have been “real” since Earth began.

What we challenge is assertions that human carbon-dioxide emissions have replaced the powerful, complex natural forces that caused repeated ice ages, little ice ages, warm periods, droughts, storms and other fluctuations throughout Earth’s and human history. We also challenge claims that CO2 is “pollution.” This is what we exhale. It’s the trace gas (0.04 percent of our atmosphere) that enables plants to grow and makes all life on Earth possible.

What Mr. Kennedy proposes would deprive billions of people of the energy that improves, enhances and safeguards lives: fossil fuels that provide 80 percent of America’s and the world’s power. That would slash Americans’ living standards and cause millions of deaths. It is already causing millions of deaths every year in developing countries — by depriving people of modern energy and perpetuating poverty, misery, disease and premature death.

An estimated 2.8 billion people worldwide still use wood, charcoal, coal and dung in open fires to heat and cook. More than 1 billion still do not have electricity. The result is millions of deaths every year from lung and intestinal diseases. The vast majority are women and children.

My colleagues and I would gladly serve time for “treason” and “polluting” the atmosphere with life-giving CO2. Perhaps Mr. Kennedy and his comrades should also be tried and sentenced; namely, for eco-manslaughter and crimes against humanity, for the disease and death their policies cause and perpetuate.

The International Criminal Court might be the proper venue. Perhaps the climate alarmists’ trials should be held — and sentences served — in countries that have suffered the most at the hands of climate demagogues, for their war on women, children and the poor.

Finally, since he mentioned my organizations, let me suggest that people read my new climate report on www.CFACT.org and visit www.ClimateDepot.com to learn the facts about these issues.


Note: This article was published at cfact.org.

About the Author: Paul Driessen

Paul Driessen is senior policy adviser for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), which is sponsoring the All Pain No Gain petition against global-warming hype. He also is a senior policy adviser to the Congress of Racial Equality and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green Power - Black Death.
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