“Extinction Rebellion isn’t about the climate” says one of its founders
“I’ve been with Extinction Rebellion (XR) from the start”, Stuart Basden explains. And for the sake of transparency: that previous paragraph is all about me ‘pulling rank’ — I’m trying to convince you...
View ArticleYou keep using that word “economy”. I do not think it means what you think it...
“UK green economy has shrunk since 2014”, laments the Guardian. The number of people employed in the “low carbon and renewable energy economy” declined by more than 11,000 to 235,900 between 2014 and...
View ArticleForest fires, bank bailouts and resilience
The recent massive Australian bushfires have provoked a lot of controversy, with some people claiming that this is largely driven by Man-made global warming, and others pointing to how other factors...
View ArticleThe Wokists are losing the Mandate of Comedy
Here’s how the Bursar of St John’s College Oxford responded to a student demand that the college “declares a climate emergency and immediately divests from fossil fuels”. “I am not able to arrange any...
View Article“The real will of the people”
“A citizens’ assembly on climate is pointless”, writes Stephen Buranyi in the Guardian, “if the government won’t listen”. Perhaps a better person than I am would not have split the quotation at...
View ArticleHow would she know?
“I will not be slienced.” (Greta Thunberg in Bristol) How would she know? Indeed, how would we know? It savours less of English understatement that of pointed irony to say that noone has tried to...
View ArticleNo more cheap cars
In the Continental Telegraph, Tim Worstall points out that electric cars ain’t cheap. So when all cars must be electric, no cars can be cheap. This is where “trickle down economics” is actually true....
View ArticleSamizdata quote of the day
Overall it’s just that Birkenstock stamping on a human face, forever, again isn’t it? – Tim Worstall
View ArticleThe return of the Test Acts
The (Glasgow) Herald reports, Mandatory climate change classes plan for Scottish leaders MSPs, business leaders and newly enrolled university students may be asked to take mandatory climate change...
View ArticleSamizdata quote of the day
“The humanist ethic begins with the belief that humans are an essential part of nature. Humans have the right and the duty to reconstruct nature so that humans and biosphere can both survive and...
View ArticleNow, that’s what I call optimism!
“Council borrowed £1bn from taxpayers to bet on British sunshine”, report Gareth Davies and Charles Boutaud of the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. Among Thurrock’s rundown council estates and...
View ArticleSamizdata quote of the day
Tin whiskers. If you use a pure tin solder then the electronics will grow little whiskers which will, over the course of perhaps 3 or 4 years, short circuit the system. Hmm, OK, has a good chance of...
View ArticleTo a background of Coldplay, Lomborg fisks Stiglitz
“Greta Thunberg’s message of doom is religion not reality”, writes Iain Martin in the Times: Earlier this month, Thunberg set out in an open letter a list of demands that, if implemented, would make...
View ArticleSamizdata quote of the day
As George Monbiot is pointing out, but cannot bring himself to say, the government is not your environmental friend. – Tim Worstall
View ArticleThere seems to be a stage missing
Lest anyone look at the previous post and think that it is only the Yank media that thrills to the sound of breaking glass, here is our very own Evening Standard giving over its pages to Gail...
View ArticleSamizdata quote of the day
“Fall is almost here in California. So we know the annual script. A few ostracized voices will again warn in vain of the need to remove millions of dead trees withered from the 2013–14 drought and...
View ArticleCheap electricity should be a noble cause, not something to be embarrassed about
I was watching this interview with “lukewarmer” Matt Ridley, who agrees that global warming is a problem but who thinks technology and market-driven solutions are a way to address it, not State...
View ArticleSamizdata quote of the day
“Our fearless leader has descended from the mountain with a 10-commandment plan for a green industrial revolution. At a cost of £12 billion, he will have all Britons driving electric cars powered by...
View ArticleSamizdata quote of the day
I pledge to assist my government in achieving ‘net zero carbon emissions’ by 2050, but due to the seriousness of the climate crisis I will try to achieve this by 2030 through changing my personal...
View ArticleWell in that case…
When I read this zinger: “It is absolutely clear that climate change is a threat to our collective security and the security of our nations,” said British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who presided...
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