The Koch Brothers and climate change

[Stavros]

Stavros, you have the reading-comprehension level of a severely inebriated derelict. Nowhere in any of my writings have I said that government has killed more people than anything else. Rather, I point out the fact that by far the greatest murderer in history is government.

Thank you for your insult, at the very least it adumbrates your intellect.

Cause of death is the issue. Your sophistry attaches the word 'murder' to the cause of death in order to excuse your ignorance of the impact of disease on human populations. It would be tedious for me to mention the Black Death, Malaria, Smallpox, and so on -the literature on this is vast, and in some cases compelling history -Frank Snowden's Naples in the Time of Cholera (1996) being one fine example. Diseases have been amongst the greatest killers of all time; human creativity and science has also defeated them or brought them under control -I may not be the only person who notes how you never, ever celebrate the achievements of science in this regard.

Your oddly liberal use of the word murder also enables you to blame the US Government for deaths in the US Civil War, presumably because you share Di Lorenzo's view that it was a war waged by Lincoln to crush freedom in the South and impose the tyrannical rule of Washington DC and the Beastly Government over all Americans. Even some Old Faithful Sons of Dixie might protest that their forefathers were not recruited by Old Abe Lincoln to secede from the Union, assassinate their own folk as well as the Union armies, and burn down Atlanta. But there is, I am led to believe, even in this 21st Century, a lot of moonshine in your famous United States of America. A lot of it is in Florida.

The greatest murderer in history? On your own evidence, we shall know on that great day when the universe collapses, when superhuman mankind with the help of Jesus resurrects all human life that has ever lived to live forever in the light of God's Majesty, and you may inspect the records...

The Gates of time wide open stand,
and through them streams a deathless band...

[an8150]

It's hardly news that the infamous Koch Brothers have been funding right wing causes - including substantial support for the Tea Party. It now emerges with ever greater clarity the role they are playing in bogus research to debunk evidence of climate change.

This appeared in Scientific American a few months back

http://www.scientificamerican.com/ar...ontrariness-on

and today The Independent Newspaper in the UK had an expose of their tricks.

http://www.independent.co.uk/environ...e-8466312.html

This was a report from December 2012.

http://www.democracynow.org/2012/12/...global_warming


Surely it is time the US government did something concrete to stop these people and their lies?

All sorts of people and organisations fund a variety of political movements, in a more or less shadowy manner. Idealistic nutters like me say the only way around this is to shrink government so it has no capacity to dish out favours, or is your point, Prospero, that you wish to ban the opinions merely of those with whom you disagree?

[Prospero]

No I have no wish to BAN opinions at all. it is the shady manipulations and secretive funding of bogus "objective" groups by those whose agenda is secretive that I object to an8150. The Koch brothers clearly wage war through their well-funded proxys.

And thanks for self identifying yourself as an idealistic nutter. Idealism is admirable but as i recall you're the minarchist - are you not?

[an8150]

No I have no wish to BAN opinions at all. it is the shady manipulations and secretive funding of bogus "objective" groups by those whose agenda is secretive that I object to an8150. The Koch brothers clearly wage war through their well-funded proxys.

And thanks for self identifying yourself as an idealistic nutter. Idealism is admirable but as i recall you're the minarchist - are you not?

It can't be that secret if you and The Independent know about it. Yes, I am the local tame minarchist, and was described by you on a thread called 'Democracy' as a "niaive idealist".

Should I disclose how I pay for the computer and internet connection which enables me to spread my niaivete?

[an8150]

For that matter, what if my agenda is secretive?

And what of trades unions who fund think tanks and highly-publicised surveys? what of agitprop fake charities which actually subsist on government funding?

[Prospero]

Sorry an8150 - not going to rise again to your provocations.

The simple truth about the Kochs is that they use a wide range of front organisations to try to propagandise on behalf of the anti-climate change lobby... the fossil fuel industry.
And that is one of many reasons why we need rules, limits and so forth on big business... why laws and regulations are needed. Capital strives to maximise its profit with no regard for the environment or the welfare of individuals unless forced or unless it is in their interests.

Oh and before you get smartarse about it, my new avatar - of Leon Trotsky - is there for my own amusement. Pure and simple.

[Stavros]

I would agree that the use of the words 'secret' or 'secretive' are misleading in many cases, and that what the newspapers are doing is giving greater exposure to facts which most people are not aware of, and doing so for their own political purposes -the Daily Telegraph does it as well as The Guardian here in the UK.

There are so many think-tanks out there I doubt if most people have ever heard of them or know who funds them; I recently looked at one in the UK which was advertising a job only to discover that its origins and personnel are poles apart from me. Every now and then someone in the papers discovers these things and publicises it on a 'shock! horror! basis; what is much worse is when elected politicians make policy decisions which are not faithfully recorded for public exposure, this I consider to be an abuse of power.

I don't have a problem with debating politics, I think if people become abusive its a failing on their part, but I wouldn't ban anyone unless the poster was being a pest.

The problem with so-called 'minarchy' is that the debate rarely gets going. The USA has had minimal government and in spite of Di Lorenzo's critique of the Lincoln administration, government did not interfere widely in business until the 20th century, and yet the 'minarchists' don't want to discuss the behaviour of the 'robber barons' of the last quarter of the 19th century -JP Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, JD Rockefeller, Andrew Mellon, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Leland Stanford et al. Until the Sherman Act, passed by Congress in 1890 was imposed on Standard Oil in 1911, these 'free market buccaneers' had it all their own way at the expense of each other-when they were plotting and trying to wreck their competitors business- with scant regard for the general public. Violence, deception, criminality were synonymous with this 'free market'. This free for all was repeated in Russia in the 1990s when there were no real laws to prevent a few men from amassing staggering wealth, possibly bumping off opponents or critics or whistle-blowers. The unfettered capitalism trumpeted by Ayn Rand, Hans-Hermann Hoppe and the so-called 'Austrian School' can no more guarantee liberty, freedom and prosperity than any other economic arrangement. Just as the 'minarchists' refuse to discuss private property except as a pre-ordained given that cannot be challenged, they can't just wish away the recorded behaviour of industrial barons as 'competition'. Is it any surprise that the Mafia consider themselves to be businessmen?

[an8150]

Sorry an8150 - not going to rise again to your provocations.

The simple truth about the Kochs is that they use a wide range of front organisations to try to propagandise on behalf of the anti-climate change lobby... the fossil fuel industry.
And that is one of many reasons why we need rules, limits and so forth on big business... why laws and regulations are needed. Capital strives to maximise its profit with no regard for the environment or the welfare of individuals unless forced or unless it is in their interests.

Oh and before you get smartarse about it, my new avatar - of Leon Trotsky - is there for my own amusement. Pure and simple.

At the risk of provoking with my smart-arsery, or even with my niaive idealism, what rules can we expect to circumscribe you? Or are you unfamiliar with Kip's Law?

I preferred the Rathbone avatar, btw.

[an8150]

I would agree that the use of the words 'secret' or 'secretive' are misleading in many cases, and that what the newspapers are doing is giving greater exposure to facts which most people are not aware of, and doing so for their own political purposes -the Daily Telegraph does it as well as The Guardian here in the UK.

There are so many think-tanks out there I doubt if most people have ever heard of them or know who funds them; I recently looked at one in the UK which was advertising a job only to discover that its origins and personnel are poles apart from me. Every now and then someone in the papers discovers these things and publicises it on a 'shock! horror! basis; what is much worse is when elected politicians make policy decisions which are not faithfully recorded for public exposure, this I consider to be an abuse of power.

I don't have a problem with debating politics, I think if people become abusive its a failing on their part, but I wouldn't ban anyone unless the poster was being a pest.

The problem with so-called 'minarchy' is that the debate rarely gets going. The USA has had minimal government and in spite of Di Lorenzo's critique of the Lincoln administration, government did not interfere widely in business until the 20th century, and yet the 'minarchists' don't want to discuss the behaviour of the 'robber barons' of the last quarter of the 19th century -JP Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, JD Rockefeller, Andrew Mellon, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Leland Stanford et al. Until the Sherman Act, passed by Congress in 1890 was imposed on Standard Oil in 1911, these 'free market buccaneers' had it all their own way at the expense of each other-when they were plotting and trying to wreck their competitors business- with scant regard for the general public. Violence, deception, criminality were synonymous with this 'free market'. This free for all was repeated in Russia in the 1990s when there were no real laws to prevent a few men from amassing staggering wealth, possibly bumping off opponents or critics or whistle-blowers. The unfettered capitalism trumpeted by Ayn Rand, Hans-Hermann Hoppe and the so-called 'Austrian School' can no more guarantee liberty, freedom and prosperity than any other economic arrangement. Just as the 'minarchists' refuse to discuss private property except as a pre-ordained given that cannot be challenged, they can't just wish away the recorded behaviour of industrial barons as 'competition'. Is it any surprise that the Mafia consider themselves to be businessmen?

Are you saying that Prospero has misled us by claiming that the Kochs are secretive?

Incidentally, http://fakecharities.org/about/ helps lift the veil of unknowing that surrounds many front organisations.

Some years ago I spent a profitable few days reading Pilger's book Hidden Agendas and was struck by, among other things, his explaining that a report attributed to the Adam Smith Institute did not clarify that the ASI is a free market think-tank. A good point, in a book called Hidden Agendas. Unfortunately a few pages later, he quoted a report from the Institute of Public Policy Research, without, mirabile dictu, clarifying that it is a left-wing think-tank. Secretive, lui? Jamais!

I gave up debating minarchism with you, Stavros, just as an aside, when it became clear to me that, for all your undoubted learning, and perhaps because of your undoubted learning, you don't understand it.

[an8150]

Oh and before you get smartarse about it, my new avatar - of Leon Trotsky - is there for my own amusement. Pure and simple.

Hm, let's see how far I get proclaiming my amusement at having an avatar of Reynhard Heydrich.