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blue bits. red rocks.
Friday 12 February 2010

The Skeptic admits that these fellow have Trillions (with a T) staked on preserving that status quo — on preventing America from moving toward energy efficiency and independence. He admits that a conspiracy among fifty petro oligarchs seems a lot more plausible than some convoluted cabal to “push green technologies” — a supposed conspiracy involving tens of thousands of diverse people, most of them nerdy blabbermouths, squabbling over far smaller sums of money. Further, the Skeptic admits something pretty darned creepy and suspicious — that the main “news” outlets pushing the Denier Movement are largely owned by those same petro-moguls. (Just one Saudi prince holds 7% of Fox, while other princes own smaller shares, plus a lot of Rupert Murdoch’s debt, stock and commercial paper. Russian oligarchs and international oil companies own more.) Because of this, the Skeptic has moved away from getting any of his news or sense of “reality” from propagandists who are paid to keep America divided, weak, passively addicted to dependence, respectful of aristocracy, and mired in “culture war.” The Denier, in contrast, suckles from the Fox-Limbaugh machine. He shrugs off any notion that oil sheiks, Russian oligarchs or Exxon moguls could possibly have any agenda, or ever, ever connive together. They are pure as driven snow… compared to weather scientists. Right. Elaborating a bit: the Skeptic has noticed that the Denier Movement is directly correlated with a particular “side” in America’s calamitous, self-destructive Culture War. The same side that includes “Creation Science.” The same side that oversaw the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression, based on mythological asset bubbles and magical “financial instruments.” The same side that promised us “energy independence” then sabotaged every single effort, including all of the energy-related research that might have helped us get off the oil-teat. (And that research gap is a bigger smoking gun to pay attention-to than carbon credits.) David Brin

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