Pirate's Cove

The question now is “will the judge buy into the scam?”

Young plaintiffs’ attorney closes Montana climate change trial with call for action

An attorney for 16 young plaintiffs urged a judge Tuesday to strike down as unconstitutional a Montana law that prohibits state agencies from considering the environmental effects when it weighs permits allowing the release of greenhouse gases.

Attorney Nate Bellinger made the plea in his closing argument at the end of a seven-day trial. Plaintiffs say state officials violated their right to a clean and healthful environment, part of the Montana Constitution, by allowing companies to build power plants and expand coal mines, among other things.

“Like other monumental constitutional cases before, the state of Montana comes before this court because of a pervasive systemic infringement of rights,” Bellinger said.

During the first-of-its-kind trial, plaintiffs testified about how increased heat, smoke from wildfires and drought affect their activities and mental health. Native Americans said climate change affects their ceremonies and traditional food sources, and climate experts warned the window to address the environmental damage is rapidly closing.

Montana Assistant Attorney General Michael Russell said in the state’s closing Tuesday that the climate change issue is much larger than Montana can address on its own.

He said calls by the plaintiffs for the state to take the lead in addressing climate change was a social statement, not a legal argument. The case put on by the young plaintiffs was a “weeklong airing of political grievances that properly belong in the Legislature, not a court of law,” he said.

If you’ve paid any attention to this suit, you notice that the plaintiffs were long on politics, fearmongering, personal stories, and demagoguery, and short on facts, law, and Constitutional reasoning. It belonged more in opinion pieces in the local papers, not a court of law.

Emily Flower, a spokeswoman for Attorney General Austin Knudsen, described the trial as a “publicity stunt staged by an out-of-state organization that is exploiting well-intentioned children.”

The plaintiffs were represented by attorneys for Our Children’s Trust, an Oregon environmental group that has filed similar lawsuits in every state since 2011 and raised more than $20 million in contributions. None of the previous cases had reached trial.

Again, it’s yet another astroturfed suit, where a big money climate scam group enlists a bunch of young folks, has them trot out some sob stories, then does their cult stuff. BTW, since the kids are so against power plants, when will they stop using all that power for their smartphones, streaming videos, uploading videos, streaming shows on their TVs, and so forth?