The new Jackson Hole Climate Action Coalition “Roadmap" is a 55 page science fiction fantasy about saving the planet from total destruction by spending tax money to magically morph America’s wealthiest and most frivolous county into a shining beacon of carbon neutral sustainability by 2030. I appreciate JHCAC’s lofty ideals, active imaginations, and apparent sincerity. Their hearts are certainly in the right place, and — like the larger Cult of Climate Catastrophism — they intend to put even more of our money where their terrified mouths.
Full disclosure: I receive no funding from any Big Energy interests currently enjoying record profits thanks to record prices brought on by rampant inflation and orchestrated shortages. Also, I can understand the JHCAC’s concerns: as a child attending the finest private schools I was indoctrinated into the Cult of Climate Catastrophism. As a true believer, I wasted 20 years of my life worrying that bad weather brought on by carbon emissions would end life as we know it. About a decade ago I started diving deeper into the issues and slowly realized that the perceived threat of airborne plant food has been way oversold.
Earth’s climate is far too complex to run through computer models and draw distant conclusions about. Ninety seven percent of Climatologists will say whatever keeps the money flowing, just like 97% of bartenders have no qualms about slinging booze, and 97% of doctors will push experimental injections to protect their profitable careers.
True climate scientists doing real climate science would acknowledge that widespread and intentional weather modification has been impacting Earth’s climate for decades. Whether you know it or not, Earth’s weather has been covertly weaponized by the military industrial complex since at least Operation Popeye during the Vietnam War. When the heat index in Iran spikes to 152, it is not due to a gradual increase of atmospheric CO2. These concerns should be flashing red on the radars of all true environmentalists.
Furthermore, the impacts of human carbon emissions are only a fleeting concern to folks well aware that our civilization is deep in debt and actively engaged in kicking off WWIII while drowning in an broad sea of assorted toxicities far more deadly than carbon dioxide. If we want a truly sustainable society we might start by focusing on clean water, healthy food, safe consumer products, and ending several stupid wars before mandating electric cars and trying to control the global climate with geoengineering.
The fundamentally flawed climate models and completely controlled corporate media have made it quite clear that higher taxes, higher prices, and tighter regulations issued by bigger governments are the only thing that can save civilization from the bad weather boogeyman. The highly suspect, heavily subsidized, prolifically propagandized climate science is even more settled than the official stance was on Covid-19. We all saw how poorly that fiasco went for everyone outside of big pharma, big business, and big government.
May I remind you that the virus probably came from a US-funded biolab in China, the PCR tests definitely gave false positives, the death statistics were heavily subsidized, healthcare providers had to play ball because their other revenue streams were temporarily turned off, dissenting voices got censored, small businesses got shut down, and trillions of dollars flowed upstream. Mandatory lockdowns, masks, and experimental injections were forced upon the world while safe, affordable, effective treatments were actively suppressed. Wealthy countries that closely followed the Covid protocols had far worse outcomes than impoverished countries that couldn’t be bothered. The ventilators killed people, the lockdowns killed people, the jabs are still killing people, masks were a cruel joke, large swathes of the global poor got priced out of existence, billions of people are still living in fear, and the inflation brought on by all that senseless, pseudoscientific spending is still running amok.
Approaching the perceived climate issue from the same perspective promises similarly severe and unfortunate outcomes.
While perusing the Jackson Hole Climate Action Coalition’s lengthy list of proposed actions I noticed that all of their suggestions involve spending large quantities of tax money extorted and redistributed by federal, state, and local governments. For example, their list of “potential sources of funding” to meet JHCAC’s goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions from transportation includes:
Federal grant programs (Inflation Reduction Act, Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act), Town and County general funds, Specific Purpose Excise Tax (SPET), Lodging Tax, WYDOT
State. Local. Federal. Funding. Every action proposed by JHCAC sports a similar list, so let’s ponder the underlying logic here: can we really tax, spend, and regulate our way towards a truly ecological future? I doubt it.
We tried bombing our way to peace, and 20 years, millions of lives, and trillions of dollars later the global war of terror is growing on par with the national debt. We tried injecting our way to health, and Americans are sicker than ever before. We tried censoring our way to a consensus, and now division and distrust are dangerously prevalent. Surely the government is sincere and will succeed at their expensive effort to save the planet.
Of course, deficit spending is simply conjured into existence and rolled through by the snowballing 34,000,000,000,000 dollar national debt, but in the real world government funding is taken from the proceeds of human economic activity.
All modern human economic activity depends entirely on the endless consumption of affordable, plentiful energy and the materials extracted from the so-called fossil fuels. When taxes go up to fund sustainability initiatives — notably, proposed taxes on carbon emissions — the price of everything surely follows suit. Deficit spending devalues the dollar, driving the cost of living even higher. This forces the entire populous to work ever harder — to burn more fuel and consume more resources — trying to keep up with the quickening pace of the ecologically destructive rat race.
In short, best case scenario, the proposed tax and spend solution will only exacerbate the problem by driving up the cost of everything. Worst case scenario, these “sustainability initiatives” eventually crash the global economy and end up killing off billions of human beings. The collective carbon footprint of the billions who survive would surely stomp around in the ensuing societal climate of demoralized chaos.
How does that saying go? The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
Locally, we philosophers can’t help but laugh at JHCAC’s attempt to “sustainably” steer a fundamentally frivolous and incredibly wasteful economy built on high dollar tourism, high end real estate, high adrenaline hobbies, high and mighty people, and mighty high people living mighty high on the hog.
The notion that Teton County, Wyoming can show the world how to live in harmony with nature is utterly absurd. Prior to the Oil Age, only a few hundred hardy souls lived in Jackson Hole year round because the high mountain valley’s cold, snowy climate is almost as inhospitable as its current economic climate. Now tens of thousands of people live there, and contribute a whole lotta nada to the collective good.
Most (53%) of the “local” workforce embarks on long, dangerous, sometimes bumper to bumper, always eco-illogical commutes into and back out of the Hole every damn day. Aside from a couple of holdout ranchers and the Vertical Harvest greenhouse, no food is grown there and very little is made there, except — of course — copious quantities of money.
All of the food, fuel, building materials, liquor, drugs, consumer goods, and a steady stream of assorted luxurious stuff gets trucked or flown in from far, far away. Hundreds of heated driveways connect to heated walkways leading to heated hot tubs sitting on the sprawling decks surrounding empty, heated mansions. The bars, restaurants, hotels, resorts, shops, and streets are always hopping. It’s a modern boom town, a real Rocky Mountain gold rush tapped into a rich vein of good times amidst glorious scenery. As it was before the Oil Age, a few hundred hardy souls brave the frigid winters living outside the law in vehicles, sheds, and tents to avoid spending most of their income on rent or gas to take part in an insanely unsustainable commute.
A lot of non-working class folks “live” in Wyoming for tax purposes — and I can’t hardly blame them — which makes the JHCAC’s proposed tax and spend sustainability strategy almost as incomprehensible, fascinating, and hilarious as modern Teton County itself.
Recent local history provides a perfect example of how fruitless trying to tax and spend to save the planet can be. South Teton Area Rapid Transit (START) used tax money to buy eight fully electric busses for about a million dollars apiece. The buses did not perform as promised, and a mere three years later all eight of those buses are broken down and taking up space. Replacement parts are unavailable because the heavily subsidized California electric bus manufacturer — Proterra — has filed for bankruptcy.
President Biden, a man who thinks we can wage several proxy wars overseas while simultaneously saving the planet, virtually toured the Proterra factory in 2021 and showcased the company as a Build Back Better success story funded by the absurdly named Inflation Reduction Act deficit spending boondoggle. Disgraced Proterra CEO Garth Joyce is still one of Biden’s trusted advisors.
The federal government already has us on the hook for a $34 trillion debt to the global banking cartel. Multiple foreign wars rage simultaneously and expensively. Poverty and homelessness are widespread and growing. America’s drug addiction has gotten out of control. A dozen preventable pandemics are ignored, while the highly profitable plan-demic propaganda is still getting pumped out by the shameless corporate media. Most of the food most Americans eat is laced with chemicals banned throughout the rest of the world. The southern border has been breached, and some of the kids think they are cats. Most Americans are living paycheck to paycheck while drowning in debt. We seem incapable of saving our own crumbling empire.
Jackson Hole cannot even “sustain” a local workforce.
So, obviously, now is the perfect time for America to boldly save the planet, and who better than Jackson Hole to lead the charge. Let’s tax and spend and save the planet. Let’s tax and spend and regulate and speculate and obfuscate and litigate and legislate and be sure to turn a tidy profit while we save the planet. Let’s increase the debt, devalue the dollar, send the cost of living skyward, crash the economy, crumble the empire, crucify the global poor, and be sure to cross our T’s while cashing checks as we tax and spend our way to saving the planet.
Who cares that many large countries — China, notably —are building coal fired power plants has fast as they can, and that most of the people on this planet are far too poor to even consider the environmental impact of their actions. The wealthy wanna-be elites of Jackson Hole have got it all figured out, and sending more money their way will surely save the day.