Posted on 04/04/2006 4:52:22 PM PDT by RWR8189
Click here for Al Gore and David Blood’s recent Opinion Journal piece on sustainable capitalism. If you can stand to read it.
You’ll be rewarded for your patience. Here’s the payoff... Watch how Nick Tredennick eviscerates Gore and Blood’s piece. (Thank, you, Russell Redenbaugh for sending along Tredennick’s response.)
Tredennick writes:
“Russell, were you baiting me with Gore and Blood's article? It is nonsense from beginning to end. They use high-sounding terms such as ‘sustainable development,’ ‘externalities," and ‘good of the planet.’ These words have no intrinsic meaning. Who will define these terms and levy costs on business for compliance? Why a designated intellectual elite, of course. It will be politicians and bureaucrats.
“Gore and Blood assert that the intended purpose of capital markets is ‘... to consistently allocate capital to its highest and best use for the good of the people and the planet.’ Dropping the last three words nets the ideal for a managed economy such as the former Soviet Union. It is the communist ideal and adding ‘and the planet’ doesn't change a thing. Experience tells us that politicians and bureaucrats don't know what is good for the people or for the planet. How many times will command-economy experiments have to fail before we abandon the idea?
“Terms such as ‘sustainable economy and society,’ ‘sustainable development,’ and ‘unsustainable business practices’ imply that situations are either sustainable or that they are not. This is a red herring. Suppose sustainable development had been adopted for wood-based fuel sources at the beginning of the industrial revolution. The pace of progress may have slowed to the ‘sustainable’ growth rate of forests. We might be cooking outdoors on wood fires, reading by whale-oil lights, and have life expectancies of less than forty years (i.e., not much improvement). Businesses under capitalism are experimental and evolutionary. Some succeed, others fail; new businesses are continually created. Some grow, some die, and some evolve—and the same thing happens to the demand for resources. Progress is capitalism's most important product. Shoehorning business into "sustainability" changes the model from capitalism to a managed economy.
“Competition raises productivity, reduces wastes, improves efficiency, and lowers costs. Businesses in managed economies have incentive to lower productivity, to increase waste, to decrease efficiency, and to raise costs, because benefits generally are allocated based on costs in the absence of competition.
“The authors suggest that businesses ‘... strategically manage economic, social, environmental, and ethical performance.’ I'm not sure ‘strategically’ managing any of these makes sense, but it's certain only a politician would suggest managing "ethical performance.’
“Of the problems mentioned to justify control of business; that is, climate change, HIV/AIDS, water scarcity, and poverty; two, climate change and water scarcity, are based on junk science and at least two, HIV/AIDS and poverty, result from dysfunctional government or dysfunctional economies. Not one is related to ‘unsustainable business practices.’ The authors want to tax business to solve problems that don't derive from business.
“The authors assert that ‘civil society is demanding response from business and government... in a carbon-constrained world.’ Not only is this assertion not backed by any proof of the ‘demand,’ but also the conclusion and subsequent example (carbon exchange) are built on an ‘unsustainable’ scaffolding of junk science.
“It assumes global warming. It assumes carbon dioxide is the primary greenhouse gas driving warming. It assumes business-based carbon emissions are a significant contributor. It is likely that none of this is right. Global warming and cooling cycles, which fluctuate substantially over short periods, are thousands of years in duration. Conclusions cannot be drawn from a few years or a few decades of local recordings. Further, cycles are well correlated with sunspot activity (not amenable to political control). The primary "greenhouse gas" isn't carbon dioxide; water vapor (also not amenable to political control) is a hundred times more effective as a greenhouse gas because it determines cloud cover. Global climate models don't model clouds well, so they emphasize carbon dioxide and methane and, while they are unable to produce results that can duplicate measured data from the past, they do produce the dire predictions desired by their government funding agencies.
“The authors are unable to name a single "externality" without resorting to junk science and plain assertion as opposed to reasoning and proof. Do I want to give them control of business? No, thank you; I'll trust the market. It doesn't matter that the authors think that the theory is based on invalid assumptions of infinite resources, because businesses are real systems running in the real world. If there were "externalities" that the market missed, they would accumulate over time to detrimental effect; that isn't happening.”
And I thought John Kerry was the stupidest man ever to run for President of the USA. I see I was mistaken. Great article.
Bang! This is how the pen is mightier than the sword: with ruthless, devastating and beautiful logic that shreds sophistry's attempt to aggrandize its practitioners and subjugate its consumers.
Blood and Gore? Is that some kind of joke? Rogers and Hammerstein, it ain't.
You don't have to look to far to find someone with far superior intellect to answer Gore whenever he opens his mouth.
There are some pretty unrealistic assumptions in that rebuttal; for example voters (even most conservative voters ) recognize the reality of “externalities” resulting from market failure, and as a result elect representatives willing to pass laws to deal with such situations. If the author does not believe this he should compare (for example) the LA smog of 40 years ago with the air quality in the same area today, an improvement that has resulted almost essentially from government regulation and despite the fact the intensive development has continued through out that period.
Of course he's trying to run in '08. First, he's trying to see if people will glom onto one of these deluded ideas he comes up with. Inventing the internet didn't work. Being the role model for "Love Story" didn't work. Discovering the Love Canal problem didn't work. Being the former VP didn't work. Now this! If someone starts the National Putz Party, Algore's a shoe-in.
The nearest brick will do...
bookmk ping for a.m. coffee
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