Sec. Canned Jesus Ham's Moment In The Climate Spotlight Could Bring Home Teh Stupid Gold

[hatrack]

EDIT

Two other remarkable things came from this vacuous statement. By all news reports, the Arctic Council delegates received Mr. Pompeo with uncommon politeness. And save for a few on-the-scene dispatches, the news got buried under the daily load of a dozen other Trump-related absurdities.

Pompeo is eager to get at the Arctic's resources, without a glimmer of acknowledgement that the competition up there, particularly with the Russians, is a potential new global security flashpoint. Or that the plundering of melting poles will be an opportunity for modern man to run the table on ecological plunder. Or that the loss of Arctic ice could unleash a chain reaction of wind, weather, and current changes that could theoretically put Europe in a deep freeze while warming, drying, and burning other parts of the northern hemisphere. Or that the melting of land-based ice atop Greenland and elsewhere could submerge coastal populations from Myanmar to Mar-a-Lago.

This isn't honest political dissent. It's suicidal. Stupid. Blissfully vacant. And for Americans, deeply embarrassing. And it's not overkill to point out that prior to his ascent in the Trump regime, Pompeo was the home Congressman for the Wichita-based Koch Brothers.

EDIT

It's deeply disturbing to know that such screaming ignorance has worked its way up the ladder from fringe nonprofits and a rank-and-file delegate to Secretary of State, even as the climate crisis deepened and the on-the-ground evidence mounted under Pompeo's clueless nose. NOAA reported this week that May 2018 to April 2019 were the wettest 12 months in recorded history in the U.S, and a stunning United Nations report projected a million-species march into extinction due to climate change and other modern pressures. It's even worse to know that we were better off two years ago, when our chief diplomat was the guy from ExxonMobil.

EDIT

https://www.dailyclimate.org/peter-dykstra-we-have-a-winner-loser-2636923483.html

[BlueJac]

1. K&R

[mountain grammy]

2. K&R

[Martin Eden]

3. Stupidity, or Blind Greed?

We know that greed is behind the quack science and politics of climate change denial. The fossil fuel industry reaps enormous profits, and they use that wealth to wield political power.

There is no shortage of willing servants like Pompeo, whose own wealth and prestige are condioned on his service to the likes of the Koch brothers.

Though what they're doing is stupid in the broader context of human survival and long term economic prosperity (including the rich), they are highly skilled at convincing huge swaths of the American citizenry to vote for those who are leading the march towards an ecological suicide that will come crashing down on all of us.

The question is whether they believe their own propaganda, or know full well the consequences of the course they're setting -- but they do it anyway because it makes them rich now, and perhaps they also believe the End Times are coming so there will be no need for this planet.

EVIL may be a more accurate characterization than stupidity.

[2naSalit]

4. K&R

It's deeply disturbing to know that such screaming ignorance has worked its way up the ladder from fringe nonprofits and a rank-and-file delegate to Secretary of State