Following the staggering tragedy of the fires on Maui, the media is screeching about climate change as a cause or exacerbating factor. But the reality is that government negligence and foolish policy-making, driven by climate change propaganda, led to the massive devastation on Maui—and elsewhere.
Last week, I joined a media call on government negligence, “climate change,” and the Maui fires, that included multiple climate experts: Gregory Wrightstone of the CO2 Coalition, H. Sterling Burnett of the Heartland Institute’s Arthur B. Robinson Center on Climate and Environmental Policy, and Trump transition team member Steve Milloy of JunkScience.
Preventative measures have been ignored or actively ended (even cheap measures like fire brakes) by governments obsessed with spending millions on “green” measures like windmills. The media encourages the obsession with its unscientific drumbeat of impending climate doom (which has been falsely predicted for more than 50 years now). Hawaii Electric even gave the Hawaiian government “a $190 million plan last June to prevent wildfires, and the government just sat on it,” according to Milloy.
In other words, as Milloy put it, “Lahaina was just a sitting duck for something to get out of control.” The government continued to display gross incompetence once the Lahaina, Maui, fire started. Water was not initially released to fight the devastating fire, people were blocked from escaping, and the exact death toll is still unknown as hundreds of people are still missing, including many children. Because government negligence had exacerbated the flammable nature of the area, and because the government spent taxpayer money on all the wrong measures due to climate hysteria, possibly hundreds of people died in Maui. In Lahaina, climate fear-driven policies turned deadly.
The experts noted that California turned its forests into tinderboxes with foolish “green” policies that put an end to preventative measures like logging. Milloy had previously commented in July, “Whether drought or no drought, California will remain at risk of out-of-control wildfires as long as greens block sensible forest management, including logging. Wildfires since 2012 have ironically entirely offset the emissions cuts from the state’s expensive cap-and-tax program.” In other words, climate alarmists are shooting themselves in the feet, allegedly trying to cut emissions while creating situations ripe for polluting fires.
California wildfires too often turn deadly. For instance, fires in 2020 killed 15 people; in 2018, wildfires killed 85 people. Would those wildfires have been as deadly had commonsense preventative measures been taken instead of heeding climate alarmists? We don’t know for certain, but the answers of the climate experts above indicate the answer is likely “no.”
Some of the people who push climate alarmism and “green” policies really believe, to a greater or lesser degree, that the narrative is true and that they are saving the planet. This is especially true of young people, although many of the teens and youth who glue themselves to priceless works of art or highways don’t really want to sacrifice all their comforts like air conditioning and travel and iPhones—they want the government to come up with a magic solution. Oh, and they want to feel like heroes.
Then there are the people who are in it for the fame and fortune—individuals who make lots of money or earn notoriety and important positions by being apostles of climate hysteria. Al Gore, for instance, moved on to the next doom prophecy as soon as his last one was found to be wrong and is still making money and earning positions like a board seat for the World Economic Forum (WEF). John Kerry got himself an appointment in the Biden administration as the first-ever U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate for his climate alarmist views. Then there’s Greta Thunberg, who became an international celebrity and sought-after speaker because she accused us of stealing her dreams and polluting the earth.
I would also argue that some leaders in politics and powerful international groups are weaponizing climate alarmism to increase government control and change society as we know it. You can take a look at WEF’s plan for the year 2030, which is a dystopian tyranny but allegedly better for the environment, the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda, or the Biden administration’s campaigns against ceiling fans and gas stoves.
The climate crisis movement is a scam, and a dangerous one. We have to start rejecting the lies, or more people will die as they did in Maui and California.