I didn't quite believe it when I heard that America's commander-in-chief had addressed the graduating class of the Coast Guard Academy and delivered a speech about climate change. But it's true:
This brings me to the challenge I want to focus on today -- one where our Coast Guardsmen are already on the front lines, and that, perhaps more than any other, will shape your entire careers -- and that's the urgent need to combat and adapt to climate change.
What a bore this time of year is. There seems to be only a couple of topics the ever shrinking list of approved speakers get to talk about to America's youth. So Obama droned on about climate change and Mann-boosting hack Bill Nye the Science Guy discoursed on race. Maybe someone switched their speeches.
Over at The Washington Free Beacon, Aaron MacLean kept a cool head about the President's Warmageddon scenario:
In his parade of apocalyptic horribles that we will face or are facing as a result of global warming—a list that now includes the war in Syria—Obama remarked that, "It's estimated that a further increase in sea level of just one foot by the end of this century could cost our nation $200 billion." If the president is trying to scare people into action, he will have to do better than this. Federal expenditures for FY2014 were in the neighborhood of $3.5 trillion. That's for one year of government spending. So let's say that the president is lowballing the potential sea-level rise, and we can expect, say, a four foot increase in sea levels between now and 2100. (Every other warming-related apocalyptic prediction made over the last forty years has failed to come to pass, but work with me here.) Assuming a simple relationship between the rise in sea levels and the cost, that brings the expected damage up to $800 billion, which is still less than one-fourth of one year's federal budget today. Spread out over 85 years.
Obama's estimated tab for sea-level rise of $200 billion over 85 years works out per annum to (put on scary Dr Evil voice) two-and-a-third billion dollars - which is a rounding error in federal budgeting.
This part of the crappy sloughed-off boilerplate suggests the truly indestructible insulation of the Obama bunker:
Around the world, climate change increases the risk of instability and conflict. Rising seas are already swallowing low-lying lands, from Bangladesh to Pacific islands, forcing people from their homes. Caribbean islands and Central American coasts are vulnerable, as well. Globally, we could see a rise in climate change refugees. And I guarantee you the Coast Guard will have to respond.
"Globally, we could see a rise in climate change refugees": What - from zero to three? At the beginning of this week, Ramadi fell, and so far, from just one Iraqi city, 100,000 refugees have been sent fleeing westward to Baghdad. The implosion of the Middle East has driven millions of refugees everywhere from Jordan (where they're destabilizing the least worst Arab nation) to the shores of Italy and Greece.
And Obama hasn't let this vast refugee tide cut short a single golf game. Why should he take a mythical herd of sparkly unicorns fleeing climate change any more seriously? "I guarantee you the Coast Guard will" never "have to respond" to the President's climate-change refugee crisis. Not this century.
~The real tragedy is that these guys appear to be serious about it. Today's Tweet from the State Department:
As
#climate changes, way we execute operations may be altered/constrained.@DeptofDefense#climateaction roadmap 2014 http://go.usa.gov/39agC
So with global warming we're going to lose wars more sweatily?
~As you know, along with Dr Willie Soon, Dr Richard Lindzen and other figures targeted by Obama's political allies, I'm a co-author of the new book Climate Change: The Facts. I'm glad to say Climate Change is doing rather well on the Climatology Hit Parade - although Michael E Mann's latest tome is nipping at our heels at Big Hit Sound #452,354. So, when I first heard Obama's warning to the Coast Guard cadets to be alert for "climate change", I confess I thought Dr Mann had tipped him off to our new book and the threat it poses to the Big Climate consensus:
As America's Maritime Guardian, you've pledged to remain always ready -- Semper Paratus -- ready for all threats. And Climate Change is one of those most severe threats... Climate Change will impact every country on the planet. No nation is immune.
That's true. We've shipped copies to Lithuania and Singapore and Vanuatu.
So I'm here today to say that Climate Change constitutes a serious threat to global security, an immediate risk to our national security. And make no mistake, it will impact how our military defends our country. And so we need to act -- and we need to act now...
Act now! Buy a copy of Mann's new book - before the hurricane of denialism sweeps you away!
If you see storm clouds gathering, or dangerous shoals ahead, you don't sit back and do nothing. You take action -- to protect your ship, to keep your crew safe. Anything less is negligence. It is a dereliction of duty. And so, too, with Climate Change. Denying it, or refusing to deal with it endangers our national security. It undermines the readiness of our forces... Wishful thinking in the face of all evidence to the contrary would set us on a course for disaster. If we are to meet this threat of Climate Change, we must be realists. We have to readjust the sails.
Yes!!! Help Dr Mann readjust his sales!!!!!
That's why confronting Climate Change is now a key pillar of American global leadership... the effects of Climate Change are so clearly upon us. It will shape how every one of our services plan, operate, train, equip, and protect their infrastructure, their capabilities, today and for the long term... All of which is why the Pentagon calls Climate Change a "threat multiplier"...
I certainly hope so.
~Later today I'll check in with Hugh Hewitt, live coast to coast at 6pm Eastern/3pm Pacific. Hope you can join me.
