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Climate Policy Is a Money-Making Opportunity for the Elite

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  • Climate Policy Is a Money-Making Opportunity for the Elite

    Climate Policy Is a Money-Making Opportunity for the Elite

    It would be more difficult to be skeptical about all the Left's causes if it weren't for so many of them profiting from them.

    “The climate transition presents a historic investment opportunity,” says BlackRock CEO Larry Fink. “What the financiers, the big banks, the asset managers, private investors, venture capital are all discovering is: There’s a lot of money to be made in the creation of these new [green] jobs,” chimes in presidential climate envoy John Kerry. Fink concedes that the economy remains “highly dependent” on fossil fuels. He also asserts that BlackRock is “carbon neutral today in our own operations.” It’s a claim open to challenge. “If a company or individual says to me they are net-zero, I know it is complete crap,” tweeted Glen Peters, research director of the Oslo-based Center for International Climate Research.

    Peters was taking to task former Bank of England governor Mark Carney, who had claimed that investments in renewable energy offset emissions from fossil-fuel investments. Carney quickly backed down, but the spat reveals the fissure in the climate movement that first became visible with Michael Moore’s 2020 movie Planet of the Humans, which pitted true believers on one side against those positioning themselves to reap profits from the climate money pouring into decarbonization.

    Carney is a leading light of the climate-finance oligarchy, positioned at the nexus of politics and finance. He is a climate adviser to British prime minister Boris Johnson and serves as UN secretary-general António Guterres’s special envoy on finance and climate action. He is also vice-chair of Canadian alternative asset manager Brookfield, heading its ESG and impact-investing business. One privilege of being a climate savior: any concerns over conflicts of interest don’t apply when the interests of the planet are at stake.

    Carney has written a book, Value(s): Building a Better World for All, and the BBC gave Carney the prestigious platform of the 2020 Reith Lectures. Net-zero investments are “turning an existential risk into one of the greatest commercial opportunities of our time,” Carney declared in his Reith lecture on climate. There’s little doubt who will do best out of building this better world. If you’re solving an existential risk, Carney told the World Economic Forum’s Radio Davos in January, it becomes a “tremendous opportunity” that “turns into the greed, or the opportunity part of the equation.”

    In normal times, before the Climate Emergency, it would be up to financiers and investors to ask the tough, unsentimental questions, such as: What’s the return on investment? How long is the payback period? But not when it comes to climate change. In its 2018 1.5℃ Special Report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) declined to conduct a cost-benefit analysis of the net-zero target. The target, the IPCC declared, implies “risk assessments and value judgments” – as if this nullified the need to assess whether the benefits of net-zero outweigh the costs.

    At the end of his Reith lecture, Carney was asked by historian Niall Ferguson if he’d read Bjorn Lomborg’s most recent book, False Alarm. Lomborg calculates that each $1 spent on cutting greenhouse gas emissions yields only 11 cents of future climate benefits. With trillions being spent on climate change, this estimate implies that a colossal burden is being placed on the current generation – especially those who can least afford to bear it – for little climate gain. Ignorance is no defense; nonetheless, Carney tried it. No, he hadn’t read Lomborg’s book, Carney answered Ferguson. He dismissed Lomborg’s as a “classic economic approach,” though he offered no data or evidence to show why Lomborg was wrong. “I want to say it’s 15 or 20 years ago when he first came out with his ‘Don’t worry about the climate.’ How’s that working out for us?”

    .....

    The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

  • #2
    You only just now figured that out?



    Securely anchored to the Rock amid every storm of trial, testing or tribulation.

    Comment


    • #3
      Originally posted by mossrose View Post
      You only just now figured that out?

      You knows better then that'n!
      The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

      Comment


      • #4
        Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post

        You knows better then that'n!
        I do, too!



        Securely anchored to the Rock amid every storm of trial, testing or tribulation.

        Comment


        • #5
          Hence the term, "Green New Deal".
          When I Survey....

          Comment


          • #6
            Originally posted by Faber View Post
            Hence the term, "Green New Deal".
            I see what you did there.
            The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

            Comment


            • #7
              With anything there are opportunities for making money.

              But I wouldn't be throwing stones in your glasshouse CP. Right-wing politics is fundamentally all about making the rich richer. That's, arguably, the single main reason right-wing politics exists. Whether this goes under the name 'trickle-down' - meaning that making the rich richer will supposedly have flow-on effects which make everyone else a little bit richer too, or is talked about in terms of 'tax cuts for the job-creators' - meaning that giving rich business owners tax cuts will supposedly have flow-on effects which will make everyone else a little bit better off too, fundamentally the idea in right-wing politics is always the same - to make the rich richer. It's all about giving more money to the wealthy elites.

              That left wing policies occasionally give some opportunity for rich people to make some money as a side-effect of their doing something good, isn't really something you can reasonably critique them for.
              "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
              "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
              "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

              Comment


              • #8
                Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                With anything there are opportunities for making money.

                But I wouldn't be throwing stones in your glasshouse CP. Right-wing politics is fundamentally all about making the rich richer.
                I don't think I can argue about "politics" because I just don't see many on either side who are NOT in politics to get rich.

                So, are you conceding that Climate Policy is "politics"?

                Oh, and whataboutsm.

                And bacon.
                The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                Comment


                • #9
                  Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post

                  I don't think I can argue about "politics" because I just don't see many on either side who are NOT in politics to get rich.

                  So, are you conceding that Climate Policy is "politics"?

                  Oh, and whataboutsm.

                  And bacon.
                  It is politics insofar as it is the lefties who tend to opt for science based policies.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Originally posted by kccd View Post

                    It is politics insofar as it is the lefties who tend to opt for science based policies.
                    Ah, you mean like keeping schools closed even though the science and professionals says they should open!

                    No, they turn to politics, not science.
                    The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      There's always going to be profit (and loss) when the government indicates a policy direction, especially when that means government expenditures, tax breaks, subsides, changes in regulatory burdens, etc
                      Last edited by Diogenes; 03-06-2021, 07:53 PM.
                      P1) If , then I win.

                      P2)

                      C) I win.

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                        With anything there are opportunities for making money.

                        But I wouldn't be throwing stones in your glasshouse CP. Right-wing politics is fundamentally all about making the rich richer. That's, arguably, the single main reason right-wing politics exists. Whether this goes under the name 'trickle-down' - meaning that making the rich richer will supposedly have flow-on effects which make everyone else a little bit richer too, or is talked about in terms of 'tax cuts for the job-creators' - meaning that giving rich business owners tax cuts will supposedly have flow-on effects which will make everyone else a little bit better off too, fundamentally the idea in right-wing politics is always the same - to make the rich richer. It's all about giving more money to the wealthy elites.

                        That left wing policies occasionally give some opportunity for rich people to make some money as a side-effect of their doing something good, isn't really something you can reasonably critique them for.
                        The naivety, or just stupidity (or you're just so wrapped up in this cult you can't see it) of leftists like you is assuming billionaires (typically the class with the biggest carbon footprints) are going to sacrifice their lifestyles and the lifestyles of their children for the sake of "saving of the planet." It's not going to happen. Their aim is for peons like you and I, outside of the billionaire class, to sacrifice what little quality of life we have. The fact the Davos crowd is pushing so hard for these policies would be a red flag to anyone with even sliver of common sense.

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
                          I don't think I can argue about "politics" because I just don't see many on either side who are NOT in politics to get rich.
                          Well there's plenty in my country who aren't in politics to get rich, so I know what they look like when I see them in the US.

                          And it seems to me that 100% of Republicans are in it to get rich. There are some Democrats who are, and some who aren't. e.g. I don't think you could reasonably accuse Bernie Sanders or AOC of being in politics to get rich, they are in politics because they really care deeply about helping the poor and needy. Pelosi on the other hand...

                          But there is a noticeable, and huge difference between the parties in general on the subject. Literally every last Republican seems to be in it for the money. The same is not at all true of the Democrats.

                          Oh, and whataboutsm.
                          Noting your stunningly immense hypocrisy of critiquing the left-wing for doing a tiny bit of what your right-wing does constantly, is not whataboutism, it's calling you out.

                          Ah, you mean like keeping schools closed even though the science and professionals says they should open!
                          Just because you personally believe that is what the science says on the issue, doesn't mean everyone else does. They are not opposing what they understand to be the scientific and professional recommendations on the subject.
                          "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                          "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                          "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                            Well there's plenty in my country who aren't in politics to get rich, so I know what they look like when I see them in the US.

                            And it seems to me that 100% of Republicans are in it to get rich. There are some Democrats who are, and some who aren't. e.g. I don't think you could reasonably accuse Bernie Sanders or AOC of being in politics to get rich, they are in politics because they really care deeply about helping the poor and needy. Pelosi on the other hand...

                            But there is a noticeable, and huge difference between the parties in general on the subject. Literally every last Republican seems to be in it for the money. The same is not at all true of the Democrats.

                            Noting your stunningly immense hypocrisy of critiquing the left-wing for doing a tiny bit of what your right-wing does constantly, is not whataboutism, it's calling you out.

                            Just because you personally believe that is what the science says on the issue, doesn't mean everyone else does. They are not opposing what they understand to be the scientific and professional recommendations on the subject.
                            You really are amuzing. Sometimes I think you post drunk.
                            The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Originally posted by Diogenes View Post
                              There's always going to be profit (and loss) when the government indicates a policy direction, especially when that means government expenditures, tax breaks, subsides, changes in regulatory burdens, etc
                              Agreed, the problem comes when politicians take advantage of that to enrich themselves - like brokers availing themselves of "insider trading".
                              The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                              Comment

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