Conspiracy theory: Krayton Kerns on climate change

February 5, 2007 in Global warming, Krayton Kerns

by Jay Stevens 

I know I’m a big proponent of transparency. I recently touted Montana’s Democratic legislators’ blog as an exercise of democracy, and a benefit to the voters of the state. But there are some folks better off without a website. Like Krayton Kerns.

You may remember Kerns. He made a splash in the news on Election Day because he beat out Democrat Emilie Eaton by three votes in the election. It’s safe to say that, with a 3-vote margin of victory, Kerns’ election was hardly a ringing endorsement of conservative values in Laurel.

But here’s what he writes – for example – about climate change (no link – you have to click “Weekly Postings” on the sidebar, then “The Biggest Hoax”):

Carbon dioxide emission as a cause of global climate warming is the biggest hoax of the last 30 years. In 1975 the number one slot was held by those who proclaimed that the earth was entering the next ice age because economic growth was producing pollutants that were eating a hole in the ozone layer and letting the earth’s heat escape into space.

I don’t remember that the hole in the Ozone would have caused an “ice age,” but it certainly has changed the climate. Used to be you could outdoors for an hour without getting burnt. Thank goodness we successfully regulated the gasses that destroy the ozone. This is actually a real-life success story for the environmental movement.

The environmental disaster wizards are much craftier this time, so those of you equipped with well adjusted logic-meters had better be on your toes. The shake-down technique is so refined this time many folks buy into it without seeing what is coming. Frighteningly, man caused global warming is being taught as a religion, and the ministers who promote it are particularly aggressive. If you cast doubt on their faith you become the target. (Did you see what happened on the Weather Channel the week of January 15th?)

What can I add here? This is hilarious. Kerns may be the first person who claims that the environmental movement is actually organized. A couple of notes: the majority of scientific consensus says that climate change is real, it’s here, and humans are – at the very least – contributing to it.

(And I find Kerns’ accusations that January’s weather was somehow involved in a “liberal plot” to foist climate change on all of us. I suppose the early snow melts and summer wildfires are the left’s fault, too.)

Here is how the scam works: Carbon credits are trading on the Chicago Climate Exchange. You folks in agriculture are viewed as an asset because you have CRP ground, forest land, and un-grazed pastureland containing vegetation that is being promoted as a vehicle to store carbon. (Plants are made of chains of carbon molecules.)
In the process of turning coal into electricity, the coal is burned and the carbon molecules are released into the air. The believers radically proclaim this release is causing global warming.

To counter this release, carbon-offset companies provide a mechanism whereby evil-multinational-electricity-generating plants pay you not to harvest your crop of timber, grassland or farmland so they can continue to produce carbon emissions. Although not much, any money is better than none so you take the cash. I would too. Step one of the shakedown is complete.

The years pass, and the $4.00 per acre per year of standing timber or $25 per acre of un-harvested hay ground has allowed you and the Mrs. to take a week’s vacation to Jackpot Nevada every winter before calving season. Things seem great. Then the other shoe drops.

Suddenly, Reverend Global-Warming-Climatologist announces that the biggest source for the release of carbon dioxide is not electricity generating plants, it is cattle. The shakedown now shifts direction. Your 300 momma cows are now assessed an annual carbon tax forcing you to BUY carbon credits from the Chicago Climate Exchange just to stay in business. Today Carbon Credits are trading in Europe for $16 a unit, so you will likely be forced to purchase them at even higher prices. You have just been conned.
Furious, you write your legislators and congressmen, but they reply the carbon tax regulations are set in concrete. Because of the narrow margins in agriculture, this tax will put you out of business. You struggle in the death throes for a few years living off the equity of your land, but the inevitable day comes: You are forced to sell the family farm to a conservation group who returns your land to the undeveloped state of the 1850’s. To the environmental extremist, the carbon-credit world is now in balance.

Nice conspiracy theory. Again, has anyone accused the left of being this organized before? I’d love to hear Kerns’ opinions on alien abductions and 9/11 theories. I’m sure he’s got a thing or two to say.

You move to town and get a job as a Wal-Mart greeter. Time slowly passes. When a blizzard rolls in you gaze out the window and across the parking lot and sadly think of the days when such weather meant moving the heifers into the calving lot.

“Will the heifer take the calf after it comes out of the hot box or will she kick it off,” you reminisce to yourself. But, none of that matters now.

At the day’s end you go home and dig through the mail looking for your Social Security check. Because of the lean years in agriculture, it isn’t much and your budget is tight. Once proud, now you are forced to beg the government for a bigger handout because you are completely dependent on them. Your economic freedom is gone and you are hopelessly trapped under the security blanket of socialism. The con is complete.
Carbon sequestration regulation is everywhere in this 60th meeting of the Montana Legislature. Get educated. Stay alert and be prepared. We will fight this one but it will get nasty.

This is the funniest bit: Walmart is part of the “socialist conspiracy.”

Okay, so how out of touch is this guy with reality? Pretty dang far.

As I’ve shown before, just about every scientist on the planet agrees climate change is a serious problem. The one MIT scientist who’s trotted out by the flat-earthers – Richard Lindzen – claims that the dangers of climate change are overstated, but agrees that human activity contributes to climate change.

And let’s face it, there’s no reason not to institute changes in our energy consumption, anyway. Higher gas mileage on cars saves our finite supply of fuel, makes us less dependent on oil. Ending subsidies for Big Energy will make gas and oil prices rise, allowing the free market to make alternative energy sources more attractive to consumers and saves taxpayer money. Filling our markets and restaurants with more locally grown food cuts down on gas consumption and gives an economic boost to local family farmers. Et cetera and company.

All the effects of weaning us of oil, gas, and coal are good for everybody but the big energy and agricultural multinationals.

That a legislative representative of Montana clings to a conspiracy theory that rivals staged moon landings and the dinosaur hoax is quite disturbing. As the wildfires again whip out of control this summer, I’m sure homeowners, ranchers, and taxpayers who shoulder the brunt of climate change’s damage to our local environment, property, and health and well-being will not find Kerns’ mubo-jumbo very amusing.