Well wonder no more. Tonight has the distinct honor of being a huge piece of yellow journalism parading as reality tv. It stunk almost as bad as those Vince Foster videos distributed during the Clinton Administration. Seriously, all that was missing, was a big money shot of Hal Lindsey burning books and performing exorcisms.
I was thoroughly disappointed. Jesse Ventura was a Navy Seal, he has been a popular governor, and most of the time, his stuff seemed pretty common sense. So when he took this departure into hack-land, I was really really disappointed on all levels. It was the most dispicable form of tea-baggery I have seen in a while.
First he sets it up. He says he thinks that saving the planet is a good thing. But then in the show, he kept making statements that indicated, Jesse had already changed his mind, --that global warming science was junk science. Little slips here and there. Phrases like, "So-called science," etc., and so on. Subtle stuff for audience members who aren't necessarily used to listening or watching for these little phrases that indicate the actual position of the speaker as opposed to their proposed position on the matter.
Then he keeps going on about how Global Warming Science is a lead-in for industry, and that people like Al Gore are going to make Billions, Trillions of dollars from taxing the shit out of "Just folks" like Jesse--you and me. No mention is made about the gazillions of dollars made by oil companies over the last 100 years.
Anyone worth their salt, understands that in a global economy, the way to make things stick, is to make them marketable. Sort of like that quote from Ted Nugent. "If you want to save an animal, then eat it." Because people preserve things they eat by breeding them and growing them. Well market forces preserve things that generate capital. Its pretty simple stuff.
There was an alleged scientist on his show who refused to use his name or be shown on television because of death threats from environmentalists or from opposing camps hellbent on making money on global warming. Because if you can control Carbon--which is a ubiquitous element, then you can control every aspect of human life on this planet through regulations. Hence the new, and improved New World Order with scrubbing bubbles.
Anyhow there was nothing for me, to suggest that this man was a} really a scientist, and b} had actually received credible threats to his person or family, due to his professional stance regarding this manner. It was just some dude in silohette. It could have been Joe the Plumber for all we know. But what stuck out at me, was the little bits of dog whistle politics. Joe-the-Scientist mentioned the "New Religion" of Environmentalism. Ah yes, that new--religion--the big giant, super sekret threat to Christian Republicans everywhere! They are coming to take you away ha ha! To where everything is green--and there is no Jesus, and they will force you to have abortions in the name of Gaia, while feeding you tofu through a tube, and making you do yoga! The Environmental Movement will turn you all into a bunch of GAY BABY-EATING HEATHENS! RUN Joe RUN!
When Jesse had his crack team of investigators on the job researching these claims about the hoax of global warming and its true-economic/world domination goals--all I oculd think, was and..... um, if you are really researching a conspiracy, don't you need to research the background of the people coming to you with this tripe? What makes their credibility irrefutable as opposed to the people and industries they impugn? Just saying. What industries are THEY connected to? Because these people didn't look like the type that lived in basements or bought their clothes at biglots.
I will confess, my eyes glazed over at some point. I turned the channel. Its the same old shit I have been reading and hearing since I first set foot into a Baptist church in the 70s, to listen to preaching against Vegetarianism and transcendental meditation--these habits often went hand in hand with Lovelock's Gaia Hypothesis.
GASP!
SPUTTER!
Unlike the rest of America, that seems to suffer amnesia, I remember the times when Pat Robertson did not sell healthbars and shakes on the 700 club or through GNC. I remember a time, when people who went to healthfood stores were--ahem---frowned upon, perhaps as much as those who dabbled with ouigi boards or tarot cards.
Back when being green was almost the same as eating healthy--for a variety of reasons, and all of it was considered synonymous to the lifestyles of Nazis and considered behavior that only occured within dangerous, deviant cults. All of it was considered a cluster of symptoms that represented a new, dangerous religion for hippies and feminists.
Anyhow got on a tangent. The point is, whether we go green or keep using up finite resources, someone[s] will make money. End of story. Someone[s] is always poised to benefit from innovation, in changing times, yesterday's trash is tomorrow's commodity.
Now if that person in silohette had appeared in name, and if it had been verifiable through credible means, I would have been intrigued. Whenever one has a movement that gains power and importance, there are always the dangers of true believers, and profiteers.
But what was presented to me in that 15 minutes was tripe. It was dissapointing, it was it's own conspiracy theory. I was not impressed. And after all the billions of dollars spent by big energy interests to spread misinformation about pollution, global warming and the like--I cannot help but raise an eyebrow and wonder who is funding this show? I didn't see Dick Armey's name on there, but it sure stunk like something of his. Anyhow, the New York Times had this to say on the matter April 23 2009:
For more than a decade the Global Climate Coalition, a group representing industries with profits tied to fossil fuels, led an aggressive lobbying and public relations campaign against the idea that emissions of heat-trapping gases could lead to global warming....The coalition was financed by fees from large corporations and trade groups representing the oil, coal and auto industries, among others. In 1997, the year an international climate agreement that came to be known as the Kyoto Protocol was negotiated, its budget totaled $1.68 million, according to tax records obtained by environmental groups. Throughout the 1990s, when the coalition conducted a multimillion-dollar advertising campaign challenging the merits of an international agreement, policy makers and pundits were fiercely debating whether humans could dangerously warm the planet.
Ventura's bunch believes that the people who promote global warming, and the industries that are springing up to counter it--through reduced carbon emissions, carbon trade and the like, are trying to control the world. Instead of the Jewish Banking Conspiracy--we will now have the Carbon Footprint Conspiracy.
If Ventura had offered something other than inuendo and statements by anonymous characters, I might have been intrigued enough to watch all the way through. I have no doubt that there are powerful market forces getting into place, in the hopes of profitting on new industries, new technologies, and who knows what else. I mean just look at Big Pharma Lobbyests.
I also have no doubt that somewhere out there, the next Dick Cheney and Karl Rove are looking for ways to install themselves in positions of power and authority within whatever passes for the Military Industrial Complex, so that they can drive the market this way or that. We did just fight a war over oil in Iraq--if that ain't a conspiracy--then I don't know what is. It's also a sign. Petroleum is a finite resource in a world with a growing population, that is more and more dependent on petroleum products--whether its cars, planes, heating fuel, plastics--you name it.
The smart money is on finding alternatives before we hit the 11th hour, if we haven't already. Even if global warming weren't a threat, fossil fuel shortages will be. Potable water shortages will be.
As for the fears that fanatical environmentalists will create laws to control Americans, to reduce our carbon footprints and our population {think Forced Chinese Abortions}--heck--look at the fight we have to have to get an elective abortion in this country--then imagine doing that under the Stupak Amendment. Its sort of like some of those gun nuts out there. The big self fullfilling prophecy. Some of these people are so busy trying to "get theirs" that they cannot seem to regulate their own behavior--so they seek to regulate everybody else's.
I also find it ironic that conservatives would get pissed about Americans taking advantage of capitalism. They are making money. That is what you guys said this was all about.
Its a shame. I was expecting something of higher quality from Mr Ventura. And that comment I saw about people being Lemmings. That too was disappointing. American People, especially Blue Collar Americans bust their asses everyday at jobs that don't pay nearly enough, with few benefits, and very little actual down time. And somewhere in all that they manage to raise families and keep this country going. Lemmings is not the word I would use to describe that behavior. Its insulting because it doesn't recognize how Corporate America works hand in hand with the government to force the rest of us into dead end jobs while simultaneously disenfranchising us from the government that is supposed to serve US.
Like I said, Teabaggery of the lowest sort. I will say it again, I really expected more from Mr Ventura.
