In regards to the ninth annual Freedom 21 conference which was held in July in Dallas, the Southern Poverty Law Center reports,
One former popular Freedom 21er was disinvited. Bob Barr, a former conservative Republican congressman from Georgia, was asked not to return by the head of APC, Tom DeWeese, because Barr had talked to Al Gore about global warming. “This is not some nice little debate,” DeWeese said he told someone in Barr’s office. “This is war.”
74 responses so far ↓
1 paulie cannoli // Dec 13, 2008 at 8:48 am
2 paulie cannoli // Dec 13, 2008 at 8:50 am
3 paulie cannoli // Dec 13, 2008 at 8:52 am
4 Sivarticus // Dec 13, 2008 at 3:35 pm
What an unbelievably dumb move on Barr’s part the discussion with Gore was. I don’t understand what he was ever hoping to gain by this. There was no hope of ever reaching out to liberals firmly behind Obama or their own alternative third party candidates. And no real Libertarian or conservative takes the enviro-scam seriously. In fact, with the worsening economy, I wouldn’t be surprised if the global warming hype falls off the radar next year.
5 Ross Levin // Dec 13, 2008 at 4:04 pm
I’ll take you up on that, Sivarticus. How much do you want to bet?
6 Trent Hill // Dec 13, 2008 at 6:21 pm
South Louisiana got 4-8 inches of snow thursday. First time since 1915 that my city had gotten over 6 inches.
Global warming, WOO!
7 Catholic Trotskyist // Dec 13, 2008 at 7:00 pm
Pathetic.
8 George Dance // Dec 13, 2008 at 8:37 pm
7: “Pathetic.”
If you mean comments 1-3, I agree.
9 JimDavidson // Dec 13, 2008 at 8:46 pm
“Helena got six inches in the night. Helena, Montana that is!” – Weather report from “Bloopers” many years ago. Re: 6.
Poor Babarr. Can’t get invited to play with the other conservative reindeer.
10 HumbleTravis // Dec 13, 2008 at 10:10 pm
Look I’m as critical of Barr as the next guy, but it is stupid groupthink to disallow somebody to attend a “freedom” conference based on who they’ve talked to.
11 Ross Levin // Dec 13, 2008 at 11:39 pm
You can’t judge global warming on a single weather event.
12 Steven R Linnabary // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:00 am
Mr Travis:
It isn’t so much that Barr “talked” to Gore. It was that he agreed with Gore on the global warming hoax. See:
http://www.independentpoliticalreport.com/2008/07/rush-limbaugh-more-libertarian-than-bob-barr/
And:
http://www.independentpoliticalreport.com/2008/07/al-gore-praised-by-bob-barr-for-commitment-to-addressing-climate-change/
Besides, this wasn’t so much of a “freedom” conference as a conservative conference. Too many folks confuse the two.
Pacem en Terris
Steve
13 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:07 am
“You can’t judge global warming on a single weather event.”
Ross—do me a favor and read something on global warming from the other side.
14 RedPhillips // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:16 am
This strikes me as very petty. I suspect this has more to do with Barr being the LP nominee than it does global warming. They just don’t want to say that.
15 G.E. // Dec 14, 2008 at 1:00 am
Good for Freedom21!
The LP continues to marginalize itself within the greater Freedom Movement.
If you’re in the LP, recover your dignity and QUIT NOW.
16 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 1:08 am
This is trivial, it seems to be petty infighting. To blame Barr for trying to reach out to the left, for simply “talking” to Al Gore—seems ridiculous.
17 G.E. // Dec 14, 2008 at 2:17 am
Trying to reach out to the left = good.
Reaching out to the regime = bad.
Al Gore is a regimist. Let’s not forget how Barr wouldn’t even be on stage with “people like” Cynthia McKinney, but he’ll hobnob with warmongering global-governmentalist hypocrite Al Gore.
18 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 2:26 am
Why is reaching out to the regime bad? Ron Paul reaches out to the regime constantly. T. Coleman Andrews was an entrenched establishment guy who was converted.
19 G.E. // Dec 14, 2008 at 2:42 am
Come on. Ron Paul would NOT have done what Bob Barr did with Al Gore. The suggestion that he would is idiotic. Quit being contrarian for contrarianism’s sake.
20 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 2:55 am
There was no hope of ever reaching out to liberals firmly behind Obama or their own alternative third party candidates.
Funny, though, they reached me when I became an ex-Democrat in 1992, and converted me more fully over the next two following years. Same with GE, who actually ran as a Green before becoming a libertarian, and many, many other people. As a matter of fact, contrary to the prevailing popular story, both scientific polling (Rasmussen) and a wide variety of endorsers at Reason and Taki/AmConMag among self-described or commonly regarded libertarians showed many more libertarians supporting Obama (and a few Nader) than McCain.
Prominent LPers who swung to the left included Tom Knapp, who wrote in Cynthia McKinney (and I seriously considered doing so had I voted), and Trevor Southerland of the Georgia LP who went to work on the Obama campaign. On the other side of the coin, Ron Paul got a lot of love from the left, so the potential was certainly there.
And no real Libertarian or conservative takes the enviro-scam seriously.
I guess that depends on who you consider a real libertarian. Tom Knapp and George Phillies immediately come to mind as staunch defenders of the anthropogenic global warming theory. I personally take it seriously, but not as gospel.
In fact, with the worsening economy, I wouldn’t be surprised if the global warming hype falls off the radar next year.
It ain’t going anywhere except to get bigger.
South Louisiana got 4-8 inches of snow thursday. First time since 1915 that my city had gotten over 6 inches.
Global warming, WOO!
Oversimplified term. Global climate destabilization is more accurate. As such, snow in Louisiana bolsters the theory rather than disproving it. And even if it didn’t, nothing in the theory argues against exceptional events.
7: “Pathetic.â€
If you mean comments 1-3, I agree.
Oh please. That was not a slam. Just some silly humor. I was putting up the same sort of thing in other comment threads – it was just the sort of mood I was in.
Red Phillips – what, no slam for citing the SPLC? And before I put you in a mind to do so, yes, many other portions of the cited article were…um…opinionated.
I suspect this has more to do with Barr being the LP nominee than it does global warming.
The two are intimately linked.
If you’re in the LP, recover your dignity
Too late. That would be like Paris Hilton recovering her modesty.
do me a favor and read something on global warming from the other side.
This goes for both sides.
21 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 3:21 am
“Come on. Ron Paul would NOT have done what Bob Barr did with Al Gore. The suggestion that he would is idiotic. Quit being contrarian for contrarianism’s sake.”
I never asserted that Paul would do what Barr did, so quite throwing around strawmen.
But for the record, Ron Paul has spoken with, and even converted, elements of the entrenched establishment–Walter Jones was a Republican Bush-loving lapdog until Paul got to him.
22 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 3:24 am
“Global warming, WOO!
Oversimplified term. Global climate destabilization is more accurate. As such, snow in Louisiana bolsters the theory rather than disproving it. And even if it didn’t, nothing in the theory argues against exceptional events. ”
Quite aware Paulie. It’s still bogus, unfortunately.
23 JimDavidson // Dec 14, 2008 at 6:15 am
@10 Wasn’t it Barr who proclaimed the standard for political conduct was not to appear on the same stage with Nader and McKinney while they were *agreeing* to major principles currently at stake? If Barr thinks that disrespecting Ron Paul’s Campaign for Liberty on the basis of being seen with socialists, and then goes and not only gets seen with Gore, but agrees with Gore? Hoist by his own petard.
24 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 9:28 am
“Global climate destabilization is more accurate. As such, snow in Louisiana bolsters the theory rather than disproving it.”
In fact, as currently specified, the theory is non-falsifiable. ANY deviation from the norm is treated as evidence.
It reminds me of the War on Drugs. If drug use goes down, it shows that the War on Drugs is working, and deserves more funding. If drug use goes up, it shows that the War on Drugs is not working, because it doesn’t have enough funding. Therefore, we should give it more funding.
25 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 9:29 am
That last post should have said, “ANY deviation from the norm is treated as evidence that the theory is true.”
26 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 9:34 am
“In fact, with the worsening economy, I wouldn’t be surprised if the global warming hype falls off the radar next year.”
On the contrary, I predict that Obama declares a “War on Climate Change”, and uses it the same way that Bush has used the War on Terror, i.e. as an excuse to pass all sorts of new authoritarian decrees, on the grounds that they’re necessary to combat this “grave threat to the world”, or some such nonsense.
27 Libertarian Joseph // Dec 14, 2008 at 10:03 am
Freedom21 = conservative scum suckers. Wouldn’t want to go there anyhow. Anarchism is the only freedom you can offer humanity
28 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 10:31 am
“ANY deviation from the norm is treated as evidence that the theory is true.â€
No, not any deviation from the norm – just a greater prevalence of deviation and what earlier would have been extremely extraordinary.
29 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 10:35 am
It’s still bogus, unfortunately.
So you think the sum of all human actions is incapable of destabilizing the climate balance? The climate is very complex – so things which may be very minor can set of chain reactions and counter-reactions. Destabilization is entirely possible. Accurately predicting whether it will end up causing warming, cooling, warming in some areas and cooling in others, or simply greater swings everywhere seems to me to be much more difficult given our present state of knowledge (although I grant that the current state of knowledge has grown a good deal since I quit keeping up with the current scientific literature on the topic in the mid-1990s).
30 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 10:43 am
So, what sort of weather patterns would be classified as evidence AGAINST the theory?
31 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:02 am
Ones that have about the same level of deviations from about the same norm as previously – although that norm has, in fact, fluctuated continuously over time.
32 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:31 am
Exactly. By switching the theory from “global warming” to “global climate change”, they’ve effectively rigged the game.
33 Libertarian Joseph // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:35 am
Even if GW were true, why would it be a state issue? The free market can handle everything better than the evil state.
Paulie, on the other hand, worships state power, so that’s all we ever hear from him…
34 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:37 am
Exactly. By switching the theory from “global warming†to “global climate changeâ€, they’ve effectively rigged the game.
It was global climate change all along, and there is nothing rigged about it.
35 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:43 am
No, it wasn’t. Back in the late ’80s and early ’90s, there was little to no talk of “temperature extremes” or anything like that. It was always “global warming” or the “greenhouse effect”. Then, about 10-15 years ago, when the evidence for such a phenomenon began to become more suspect, they changed the theory to “climate change”, allowing them to claim that ANY change in the climate was evidence that the theory was true, even though the climate has always changed, in many cases far more drastically than now (e.g. prehistoric Ice Ages). That’s what I mean by the term “rigged”. There’s no way to disprove the theory.
36 Libertarian Joseph // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:47 am
The free market can survive any climate given enough time to innovate
37 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:55 am
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change
38 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Note that the wikipedia article has a section on “evidence for climatic change”, but there’s no section entitled “evidence against climatic change”, because the theory is not falsifiable.
39 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:15 pm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming
40 LibertarianGirl // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:16 pm
yesterday sucked w/o you Paulie
41 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:16 pm
42 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:17 pm
I don’t know how to make a blushing smiley.
I said you could call me tho.
43 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:17 pm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming_controversy
44 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Both those articles discuss opposition to the idea of “global warming”, rather than “global climate change”.
By definition, if the theory of “climate change” is taken to include both warming and cooling, then it can’t be disproven, unless the temperature stays exactly the same for a long period of time, which itself would be a historical anomaly.
45 LibertarianGirl // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:38 pm
isnt the sun in a phase that is in fact warming all the planets , i.e global warming is happening just not because of anything we’ve done . It is a natural thing , no?
46 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:44 pm
“isnt the sun in a phase that is in fact warming all the planets , i.e global warming is happening just not because of anything we’ve done . It is a natural thing , no?”
I think that’s probably the most likely explanation, although I’m not a scientist, so I can’t say for sure.
Of course, if global warming is, in fact, out of our hands, then politicians no longer have an excuse for enacting tyrannical environmental regulations, which means they no longer have a reason to give large research grants to climate scientists. So, most climate scientists tend to insist that warming is manmade.
47 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Of course, if global warming is, in fact, out of our hands, then politicians no longer have an excuse for enacting tyrannical environmental regulations,
Even if anthropogenic global climate change is a fact, politicians have no excuse for enacting tyrannical environmental regulations. Government action is a time-tested and proven way to fail to solve any serious problem that actually exists. How have they done at addressing terrorism, poverty, drug abuse, etc.?
48 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 12:56 pm
I agree completely, but they need to have some “crisis” to scare the public into accepting their decrees, and manmade global warming, like the other subjects you listed, fits the bill nicely. Cue the audio of Nancy Pelosi shrieking about how she’s “trying to save the planet!!!”
49 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 1:00 pm
I think we have two challenges here:
One is to separate the debate over the scientific validity of global climate change theory from its political use to justify big government.
The other is to break the general link that if a serious problem exists in the world, government must be the way to solve it.
50 Ross Levin // Dec 14, 2008 at 1:19 pm
The amount of skeptic material I read is relative to its credibility and relevance. Therefore, I barely read any.
51 RedPhillips // Dec 14, 2008 at 4:40 pm
Science should not be subject to ideology. A scientific theory is not false because it goes against an ideological construct nor is it true because it conforms to an ideology. It is telling that the people who deny man made GCC tend to have political reasons to deny it, and those who support it tend to have political reasons to support it. (At least in the popular debate.)
I agree with langa that by making it “climate change” they have rigged the game, but it is not inconceivable that man’s activity has some climatic effect. To deny that out of hand because it doesn’t conform to a political ideology is silly. The facts of science care nothing about ideology.
The point that opponents to government intervention on behalf of GCC (and I am one of them) should be making is that even if GCC is contributed to by man, there is not a dang thing we can do about it. The cost and impact of the needed change are just not going to happen. People are not going to go back to wearing loin clothes and the death and human suffering that would accompany such would be intolerable. A cure worse than the disease. If man is contributing to GCC then we are just going to have to live with it.
52 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 4:52 pm
“The amount of skeptic material I read is relative to its credibility and relevance. Therefore, I barely read any”
31,000 scientists disagree.
9,000 PhD scientists disagree.
http://www.enterstageright.com/archive/articles/0508/0508gwpetition.htm
53 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 9:24 pm
“I think we have two challenges here:
One is to separate the debate over the scientific validity of global climate change theory from its political use to justify big government.”
The only way to do that is to somehow change the current system, where most scientific research is funded by the government. Just as state-funded schools teach what the state wants taught, so too state-funded scientific research comes to the conclusions that the state desires. That doesn’t necessarily mean that those conclusions are wrong, but it does mean that those conclusions should be treated with extreme skepticism, in my opinion.
“The other is to break the general link that if a serious problem exists in the world, government must be the way to solve it.”
This is really, in my opinion, the biggest hurdle that libertarians face, not only with regard to the environment, but in general. Unfortunately, most people today seem to be of the opinion that to call for the state to withdraw from a particular area is tantamount to “giving up”, and therefore unacceptable.
This mindset, I believe, is the product of years of indoctrination from both the mainstream media and the public school system. Unfortunately, I have no easy answers on how to eliminate it.
54 Libertarian Joseph // Dec 14, 2008 at 9:30 pm
GW is here to punish people for supporting anti-free market politics
55 George Phillies // Dec 14, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Barr interacting on global warming was, to his credit, one of his reasonably positive stands. Of course, it does mean that the far right wing could continue to validate the belief that conservatism is the philosophy of stupid.
The people who claim that a weather event disproves climate change are like the people who say they have disproved the claim that the tide is rising because they are watching a breaking wave that has crested and is now receiving.
There is actually an extremely wide range of evidence that supports climate change. For example, if you could show that over the last century the planting weather zones in use in the US, and the matching weather zones around the world, have moved substantially toward the equator, that would be refutational evidence. In fact, those zones are moving polewards, with growing seasons getting longer, precisely because we are having global warming.
The solar power output has been measured be satellite for nearly four decades, and by Mauna Loa observatory for rather longer. The output has a cycle of modestly over a decade, tied to solar faculae and sunspots, which has been included in the model and which accounts for a modest piece of the total.
56 Libertarian Joseph // Dec 14, 2008 at 9:39 pm
What do you want to do about it, Mr. Phillies? Statism won’t do anything, even if GW is happening.
57 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 9:54 pm
“The people who claim that a weather event disproves climate change are like the people who say they have disproved the claim that the tide is rising because they are watching a breaking wave that has crested and is now receiving.”
We call that anecdotal evidence George,and in any case,it was meant as a joke. Still, the fact is that the erasure of the ozone layer can be blamed more on Volcanic eruptions and cow flatulence than human actions. And even if it was our fault, taxing it would not be the solution George. How are you different than a low-tax Democrat?
58 Libertarian Joseph // Dec 14, 2008 at 9:55 pm
Trent, how are you different than a low-tax bigot?
59 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 10:05 pm
“For example, if you could show that over the last century the planting weather zones in use in the US, and the matching weather zones around the world, have moved substantially toward the equator, that would be refutational evidence.”
That would just be evidence of cooling, which is subsumed by the new, all-inclusive theory of “climate change”, which assumes that any change in climate must be manmade.
60 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 10:07 pm
LJ, what the hell are you talking about? Trent may be a statist
, but I’ve never seen any evidence to suggest that he’s a bigot.
61 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 10:11 pm
Langa, LJ is a troll.
As for falsifiability:
Climate change theory predicts greater destabilization – higher highs, lower lows, stronger storms, worse floods, more severe droughts, etc. If you can show that is not happening, you falsify the theory.
Anthropogenic climate change theory posits that much of this change is due to human action. That may be harder to falsify, but nevertheless, if you can show how non-human causes create all or almost all of the extant change, if we agree such change is happening, then you have also falsified the theory.
62 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 10:16 pm
That seems like a lot of hoops to jump through, especially when it seems the burden of proof should be on supporters of the theory. Also, who’s to say that even if you proved all that, they wouldn’t just change the theory again, in the same way that Bush kept changing the justification for invading/occupying Iraq?
63 Libertarian Joseph // Dec 14, 2008 at 10:26 pm
I always find myself rooting for the “terrorists”
Why should we object to attacks against the army of the state? I mean, yeah, they’re people, but they’re also robots that sold their lives to the state. Theyre gone.
64 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 10:42 pm
Troll Liberation Army?
65 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:05 pm
http://www.fortunecity.com/banners/interstitial.html?http://www.fortunecity.com/lavender/loxwood/38/settle.wav
66 Ross Levin // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:06 pm
A few points -
1. The impact of cow flatulence on the climate is man’s fault. We feed cows a diet of grain, generally, that they aren’t adapted to eat and it causes them to fart methane. Also, we raise huge numbers of cows.
2. The ozone layer is not tied to climate change (I mean, it is, but that is complicating it more than necessary). The typical problem with the ozone layer is that it’s being depleted by CFCs and is failing to block UV light because of that, something not related to climate change.
3. Red, the solution is not to go back to the Stone Age, but to advance beyond the “Fossil Fuel Age.” There’s no reason we still need to be relying on 19th century technology to fuel our 21st century needs. We have the technology to get away from fossil fuels now, but we’re just not utilizing it in the right ways. And it could substantially increase the standard of living for most of the world’s people.
4. While I don’t necessarily disagree that government funding is a bad thing for research, the private sector isn’t necessarily better. I mean, look at nutritionism, for example. There’s a lot of private sector based research in that field – in fact, nutritionism was invented by the private sector – and yet it has produced a lot of falsified information and distorted statistics that favor the companies who sponsor the research. I don’t have a solution, I’m just saying.
67 langa // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:17 pm
Ross,
I agree that private funding is also susceptible to bias. However, I think that most people are at least somewhat suspicious of privately-funded studies, and tend to take them with a grain of salt. On the other hand, I think a lot of people tend to give government-funded research the benefit of the doubt, and just assume that it’s honest and objective, absent strong evidence to the contrary.
68 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:32 pm
“Trent, how are you different than a low-tax bigot?”
Because my wife is cuban. =)
69 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:33 pm
“LJ, what the hell are you talking about? Trent may be a statist
, but I’ve never seen any evidence to suggest that he’s a bigot.”
There is no evidence. And I am most certainly not a statist.
70 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:35 pm
“1. The impact of cow flatulence on the climate is man’s fault. We feed cows a diet of grain, generally, that they aren’t adapted to eat and it causes them to fart methane. Also, we raise huge numbers of cows.”
So in addition to curbing emissions and implementing a carbon tax we have to…what? Tax cow holdings or feed cows something more environmentally friendly? How far do these initiatives go?
71 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:38 pm
“Red, the solution is not to go back to the Stone Age, but to advance beyond the “Fossil Fuel Age.â€
I agree completely. So when those technologies advance enough so that they are economical, they will be used worldwide, just like refrigerators displaced “Ice men” (men who carried buckets of ice to each home), cleaner fuels will replace fossil fuels–naturally–in a free market economy.
72 paulie cannoli // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:41 pm
I agree completely. So when those technologies advance enough so that they are economical
They might be economical now, but for the impact of various government actions such as corporate welfare, nonconcensual limited liability, military-industrial complex actions on behalf of petrochemical interests, prohibition of hemp…and less obvious ones, such as the disproportionate impact taxes and regulations have on new and startup businesses that could challenge prevailing ways of doing things.
73 Libertarian Joseph // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:41 pm
How do you know, Trent? Maybe the free market will invent a new energy source. Antimatter is the perfect energy storage!
74 Trent Hill // Dec 14, 2008 at 11:44 pm
“They might be economical now, but for the impact of various government actions such as corporate welfare, nonconcensual limited liability, military-industrial complex actions on behalf of petrochemical interests, prohibition of hemp…and less obvious ones, such as the disproportionate impact taxes and regulations have on new and startup businesses that could challenge prevailing ways of doing things.”
Preeeecisely.
Leave a Comment