Can Paranoia Save the World?

For the second year in a row, President Bush’s State of the Union address proposed a highly rational reason to reduce America’s dependency on oil without acknowledging the global warming argument. While Bush’s continuing denial with respect to climate change may be seen as ignorant or downright idiotic to a growing number of citizens world-wide who see the environment as the key issue of our century, one need not chide Bush too harshly for his stance.

According to the president the best reason to treat America’s addiction to oil is to stem it’s reliance on foreign sources, primarily in the Middle East, which pose a grave security and economic threat. Xenophobic as this argument appears it is nonetheless a useable one. Any guiding principle that will lead to a reduction of reliance on fossil fuels must be embraced.

The oil industry and rogue environmental scientists (many who probably receive “research grants” from these giants) have done a world class job of marketing the idea that perhaps this global warming thing is not happening at all. Conservative economists too have done their part to ensure that the public is aware that a massive change in our energy policies—as proposed for example by the Kyoto accord—would devastate our economy and send millions to the poorhouse.

While it is true that Canada’s New Government has had to seriously rethink it’s policy of “we’ll tackle the environment problem with a 50-year reduction scheme,” and in the process replaced a lapdog minister with one of the government’s biggest stars, it is equally true that many politicians, industry leaders and citizens continue to take a wait and see approach.

For example: how many fewer cars are we seeing on the streets of Winnipeg these days? Did the mayor and council who killed rapid transit pay for it at the polls? Are there any new houses being built in this city that weigh in at less than 2000 square feet? Has the provincial government any intention of encouraging the abandonment of livestock production? Are there plans to institute an environmental levy on domestic and international flights?

On paper the issue of climate change appears to be the most serious challenge of our young century. And yet, despite the posturing of many Western governments and individuals there has been little in the way of making the kind of monumental sacrifices that are required to curtail the problem.

Bush’s reasoning may seem specious to many outside of the United States, and the fact that it comes from someone who is so broadly abhorred probably doesn’t help the situation. But the major point is that Bush has found a marketable justification on which to pin the need to reduce fossil fuel consumption. True, it plays on the terrornoia and isolationism that seem to be taking over twenty-first century America, but we do tend to live in a Machiavellian world where calculated deception is a far more powerful and fast acting tool than international accord.

The cynical, self-serving policies of a Bush have a far better chance of seeing the light of day than consensus driven, morally based initiatives such as Kyoto. Much as we admire activists like David Suzuki everyday people respond to men like Bush. Weighing the arguments and making decisive moral sacrifices is too much to ask of ordinary people today. What is needed is a man of action with pragmatic and concrete answers that bear little or no scrutiny. While the prospects of climate change may still be debated, and what to do about it may be harder still to comprehend, the idea that foreign oil is a threat to America is a relatively easy sell.

So while Bush’s legacy is in serious jeopardy it has much more to do with some bad choices, or what his sympathetic biographer might label as over-ambitious schemes, than his style. I think it is almost commendable that Bush has found a way to address one of the world’s major concerns without admitting being wrong about anything, a gesture he—like his equally unpopular predecessor Nixon—would be utterly incapable of in any event.