I have been afforded the opportunity to interview academics and scholars from throughout the world. I have to say I am quite frightened by what I have learned. I am even more concerned about what the average citizen does not know about what is happening in our world today.
For instance, due to a virtual media blackout, unless you peruse certain internet sites or watch Fox News, you have not heard about what is perhaps the greatest scientific scandal of our time involving some leading scientists and academics on the subject of global warming. The scandal has been dubbed “Climategate”. It involves the most important and central scientists in the world who have led the effort which would serve to scare us into believing that the core manufacturing, transportation and energy sectors of the world are destroying the planet and something must be done immediately or else.
Well, somebody hacked into a computer and made public a number of very incriminating emails exchanged among these leading scientists which detail fraud and a coverup. The facts are, the planet quit warming ten years ago and nobody on Al Gore’s bandwagon wants to fess up to the fact. In fact, in spite of the scandal, just the opposite is true. Barack Obama is slated to go to a meeting in Copenhagen to encourage negotiations that will serve to produce a global treaty to save the planet. Such a treaty would undermine our national sovereignty and destroy what is left of the manufacturing and industrial sectors of our economy. It will cause all of our energy prices to go through the roof and actually result in energy rationing as will California’s own version of these type of regulations.
In California, we have a similar scandal involving rules affecting diesel engines. It turns out that the lead staff member of the California Air Resources Board (CARB) faked his Ph.D and in the process cast a huge cloud of uncertainty over the findings of a series of studies that stand to cost the California economy over $20 billion. To make matters worse, it was discovered that some members of the Air Resources Board knew about the academic fraud and kept the information from their fellow board members and the regulated community for as long as they could. I have interviewed bonafide scientists from UC Irvine and UCLA and they assure me that the diesel engine rule is based upon junk science.
In light of these scandals, it really turned my stomach to witness Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger posing for a picture of what San Francisco is going to look like when it is underwater due to rising ocean levels, due to melting ice caps, due to global warming. In light of Climategate, he could not be more oblivious. He has also thus far ignored the CARB scandal even though he is directly responsible for the agency as it is filled with his own political appointees!
All this brings me to a quote from the late Michael Crichton, the famous physician, author, director and producer who wrote a book called State of Fear, which dealt with the subject of a coverup concerning global warming. In a speech to the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco, Mr. Crichton said the following,
“I have been asked to talk about what I consider the most important challenge facing mankind, and I have a fundamental answer. The greatest challenge facing mankind is the challenge of distinguishing reality from fantasy, truth from propaganda. Perceiving the truth has always been a challenge to mankind, but in the information age (or as I think of it, the disinformation age) it takes on a special urgency and importance.”
Andy Caldwell is host of the Andy Caldwell Show and the Executive Director of COLAB. For contact information, visit the COLAB website at www.colabsbc.org.
This column first appeared in the Santa Maria Times.