Local Inanity, Global Insanity

At their last two regular meetings, the Rancho Palos Verdes City Council took dauntless stands against violence and air pollution. At least that’s what they told themselves.

Just one day after the Virginia Tech shootings, the RPV Council endorsed the “Mayors Against Illegal Guns” campaign, in order to create an America free of gun violence. Of course, illegal guns are, well… illegal, and this vacuous motion does not make them any more illegal. One councilman was not happy about joining in support of a nationwide legislation without seeing the complete legislation, understanding it, making sure that it is not brought to us under false cover. Still, the motion was passed unanimously.

This is just one part of the larger Brady anti-gun campaign that aims to eliminate or severely curtail gun ownership in America. Interestingly, the brave anti-gun movement is out of step with mainstream Americans who appreciate the benefit of guns for sport and home defense. The fastest growing gun-owner demographic is single women.

Liberal legal academics have finally come to see gun ownership as a right guaranteed by the Constitution, the right position long understood by conservatives. The New York Times reports that in March, for the first time in the nation’s history, a federal appeals court struck down a gun control law on Second Amendment grounds. Liberal law professor Laurence Tribe (Harvard) said he had come to believe that the Second Amendment protected an individual right. “My conclusion came as something of a surprise to me, and an unwelcome surprise,” Professor Tribe said. “I have always supported as a matter of policy very comprehensive gun control.”

Does anyone know the last time a shooting homicide was committed in Rancho Palos Verdes? The City Council would have more effect on the homicide rate by fencing off the Oceanside cliffs.

The other local inanity was the vote by the RPV Council to endorse the “US Mayors Climate Protection Agreement” also known as the “Cool Cities” pledge. By signing the pledge, RPV effectively ratified the Kyoto Protocol, thereby agreeing to reduce citywide carbon dioxide “pollution” to 7 percent below levels set in 1990 by the year 2012, or something like that. One councilman expressed concern as to the degree of commitment that the city might find itself in. “It's one thing to make a statement that you're in support of something; it's then another thing to go out and wage a complete commitment to incur costs and do studies. We did not do that part, but we wanted to show our support for the concept of what Cool Cities represents.”

Is this inanity, or what? The motion passed 3-0.

RPV now joins Seattle and the State of California in setting a goal to reduce pollution that is not pollution (Tell it to the trees.) and our action will have not the slightest effect on local or global temperatures. But it sure feels good. According to the UN climate commission, avoiding the horrors of global warming (assuming the climate models are right) will cost on the average of 3% of world GDP per year. In 2006 dollars that’s 3% of 45 Trillion dollars or $1.3 Trillion. (or $400 Billion from the USA).

I have an idea. There is at least one councilman who is an avid biker. He is known to consume more than his share of oxygen and produce more than his share of carbon dioxide pollution while pumping his two-wheeler. Give it up, Tom, save the Earth.

Fortunately, the local inanities are merely annoying examples of useless government interference. On the global level, however, the bad ideas verge on insanity. Here is a fun example.

Children are bad for the planet! John Guillebaud of the Optimum Population Trust says that “the greatest thing anyone in Britain could do to help the future of the planet would be to have one less child.” The effect on the planet of having one child less is equivalent to reducing a family's carbon dioxide output by 620 round trip flights a year between London and New York. The EU average is currently 1.5 children per family, but the Professor says “rich countries should be the most concerned about family size as their children have higher per capita carbon dioxide emissions.” He has not yet suggested mass suicide.

On that note, Paul Watson, president of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society warns that mankind is “acting like a virus” and is harming Mother Earth. Watson has called humans a disease (the “AIDS of the Earth”) and wants the population to be reduced to less than 1 billion people. To the Sea Shepherds, saving the whales is more important than saving 5.5 billion people.