Too many damn people

As Thanksgiving Day approaches I look forward to our yearly tradition of 30 or so of my favorite in-laws celebrating with us at our house. It is always fun. I also enjoy the inevitable political discussions I will have with my father-in-law. He used to get me with the old “It’s not fair to the poor” argument. I silenced him with my eventual reply (several years in the making) of “you’re right it’s not – it sucks to be poor. Let’s help them not be poor”.

I am expecting him to have new ammo for me this year so I figure I need a new comeback. I’m going to go with there are just “Too many damn people”. Let’s see how he responds to that! Let’s look at some facts:

The world population is up to 7 billion and still growing. The US population is up to 300 million, probably doesn’t include several million illegal immigrants, and is still growing. So you see it’s an easy and effective argument killer.

Climate change
We’re using up all of our planet’s resources. We’re producing too many greenhouse gasses.

Too many damn people

Energy
We’re using too many fossil fuels.  Gas prices are too high.  Alternative energy can’t fulfill our needs.

Too many damn people

The National Debit
We have too many entitlement recipients - Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid – people are living too long.

Too many damn people

Unemployment
Not too few jobs but, you guessed it –

Too many damn people

Wow, this may work for any argument. The important thing about this comeback is that no one, and I mean no one, will be willing to say out loud the one thing that will defeat the reasoning. Why? Because they’ll have to admit we need to eliminate a billion or so people worldwide and put in population controls. That would stop the dinner conversation wouldn’t it? Only China is allowed to do that.

So after this year’s engaging Thanksgiving discussions, and all the relatives have left our house, I expect my daughters will be complaining about cleaning up the mess. And you know what I’m going to say . . .

Too many damn people

All the best to you and yours this Thanksgiving and Christmas season.

Our Current Orwellian Moment

Remember George Orwell's 1949 novel "1984" ? I remember reading it in high school. I was struck by the concept that the government had so much power and control that it could change and manufacture the truth and even re-write history. While Mr. Orwell was off by a few decades, his vision is becoming eerily more poignant.

Let's talk terms. I define Global Warming as meaning humans influence on our climate. Climate Change is the term I use to talk about natural changes in temperature of the decades based on nature's influence (sun activity, winds, etc).

The major report supporting Global Warming is the IPCC report. IPCC stands for Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The mere name implies government influence. All of the hysteria today has been caused by this biased report funded by people with larger agendas. There is plenty of bad science that was used to support Global Warming claims but government funding supports the science so what would you expect?

There is a much better report out by the NIPCC. NIPCC stands for the Non-governmental International Panel on Climate Change. This organization, by name, is not motivated by ulterior agendas, it is just based on science.

Here is a link to this report. http://www.sepp.org/publications/NIPCC-Feb%2020.pdf . I warn you, it is a bit dry, full of a lot of technical information, and you may not understand all of it (God knows I didn't). But you'll get the idea that we are about to make a lot of major policy decisions based on bad and biased science.

Of course we have Climate Change. We've had it since the Ice Age. We have been warming since then. We've been warming before we developed the internal combustion engine and the power plant. Data shows we've had some cooling periods as well. As humans we like to think we have more power and influence then we really do but Mother nature still has the final say.

So here's my idea. Let's work on developing alternative fuels so we can lessen our dependence on foreign oil. Let's try to conserve when possible because it's just smart and it'll save us money. But let's do this on our terms, based on good science, and in a framework of capitalism.

Let's make George Orwell wrong a little longer.