Climate Change + Politics + Journalism

CLIMATE CHANGE

If climate change proves a significant challenge, today’s youth will have more resources and technology to grapple with it than any other generation in the history of mankind. --Rich Lowry, National Review Online

POLITICAL POTPOURRI

How about just five simple commandments to see us through until November 2020?

1. I will not lecture on the evils of gun ownership if I own a handgun or if anyone in my security details carries one. Given Joe Biden’s advice just to rely on a few random blasts of a shotgun on the front porch, perhaps his private security guards could do the same.
2. I pledge not to sermonize on the unfairness of wealth distribution or carbon-emission greed if I own more than one home, and if any of my homes is larger than 2,500 square feet.
3. If I continue to virtue-signal about the Green New Deal, I promise that, from this day forth, I will not fly on a private jet, not own a heated swimming pool or hot tub, not own or ride in an SUV, and not own or use air conditioning. The green future starts now, with me!
4. I swear not to rail about the failure of the public schools in general, the evils of non-union and charter schools, and in particular the asymmetries in the quality of our education system — if I place my own children in private academies and prep schools or if I attended a private school myself.
5. Finally, I will cease pontificating about “white privilege” and “white supremacy” if I live in a nearly all-white, non-diverse neighborhood and my children have ever attended a wealthy, predominately white school.

If our multimillionaire scolds would just adopt these five promises, Americans might at least listen to some of the nonsense they espouse. Otherwise, their debate screeds are mostly virtue-signals intended for their own career advancement, and reflections of their own psychological insecurities about squaring the circle of their wealth and privilege — and how much they think they must feign to feel badly about both.  --Victor Davis Hanson, NRO

CONTEMPORARY JOURNALISM

I remember Brinkley saying, "It is impossible to be objective, so we must try to be fair." Contemporary journalism would greatly benefit from re-visiting that high purpose and restoring some degree of public trust in what used to be called a profession, before major media appeared to lean toward the left and advocate for mostly liberal points of view. --Cal Thomas, Townhall