This is one of the most interesting, realistic articles from the climate cult I’ve see, though it verges on TDS, because it is actually introspective
Could Trump Accidentally End Greenwashing?
Following the election of President Donald Trump, U.S. multinationals wasted little time in purging mentions of the climate from their websites. Breakthrough Energy, a joint venture between Bill Gates and a handful of other climate-conscious billionaires, recently laid off a significant portion of its staff. Some $4 billion in U.S. pledges for the U.N. Climate Fund has been rescinded. The response to all of this has been virtually unanimous: Trump is bad—very bad, in fact—for the climate. To be sure, the second Trump administration has already rolled back a number of significant environmental regulations, increased logging in national forests, ramped up oil and gas production, and made sweeping cuts to the EPA.
But love him or loathe him, Trump is not the only problem. He is a symptom of voter frustration and disillusionment. We must accept that for years, global multilateral climate policy has been marked more by talking the talk than walking the walk. Indeed, you could be forgiven for growing slightly cynical of the big pledges, glossy roadmaps, endless subsidy schemes, and constant climate conferences.
To paraphrase Glenn Reynolds, “I’ll believe it is a crisis when the people who tell me it’s a crisis act like it’s a crisis by changing their own lives to match their doomy beliefs.” I won’t delve more into the practice what you preach stuff, I’ve done it quite enough over the years.
Whatever Trump believes personally about the climate crisis, he could unintentionally be part of the solution to it, as a force of Schumpeterian “creative destruction”. His election may have sounded the death knell for performative, feel-good, socially acceptable climate policies and created an opportunity for pragmatic, climate-conscious people to design something much more effective at both the domestic and the global levels. Such an approach could entail less greenwashing and less bureaucracy and a much greater emphasis on results. It could entail more independent control of companies’ actual impact. For instance, we can appeal to companies’ self-interest to use new technologies that accurately measure emissions. The new approach to climate policy can, and should be: What here, in this market, with these tools, would deliver the fastest, biggest, cheapest gains?
Time Magazine’s Antoine Rostand was almost there, but, he missed the part where the Warmists need to change their own behaviors. Missed it by that much.
Truly smart regulation could include something like a methane speeding ticket slapped on those who are spewing the gas too freely into the atmosphere and have the financial means and moral obligation to eliminate externalities. If Trump blocks progress domestically, other major trading partners (like the EU, Korea, an Japan) could impose climate-friendly trade rules, like carbon border adjustments or import standards. That could nudge the U.S. market to comply indirectly, even under the current administration.
And Rostand is right back to government control. Sigh.
Read: Could Trump End “Greenwashing” And Force Warmists To Practice What They Preach? »
The world’s biggest corporations have caused $28 trillion in climate damage, a new study estimates as part of an effort to make it easier for people and governments to hold companies financially accountable, like the tobacco giants have been.
President Donald Trump targeted Democratic fundraising group ActBlue and other online fundraising platforms with a presidential memorandum on Thursday that the White House said was aimed at cracking down on illegal foreign contributions in U.S. elections.
The Pentagon will resume gender-affirming care for transgender service members, according to a memo obtained by POLITICO, an embarrassing setback to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s efforts to restrict their participation.
The Democratic National Committee is going to force David Hogg to decide: Get out of the primary game or lose his DNC post.
UK scientists are to launch outdoor geoengineering experiments as part of a £50m government-funded programme.
