John Holbo finds this piece of stupidity from Mark Steyn:
Ann Coulter's new book Godless: The Church of Liberalism is a rollicking read very tightly reasoned and hard to argue with. After all, the progressive mind regards it as backward and primitive to let religion determine every aspect of your life, but takes it as advanced and enlightened to have the state determine every aspect of your life. Lest you doubt the left's pieties are now a religion, try this experiment: go up to an environmental activist and say "Hey, how about that ozone hole closing up?" or "Wow! The global warming peaked in 1998 and it's been getting cooler for almost a decade. Isn't that great?" and then look at the faces. As with all millenarian doomsday cults, good news is a bummer.
Holbo says:
This is a job for ... distributed mockery. Take it away!
**Shorter Mark Steyn:** Today we'll be showing you how you can make your own good news -- entirely from scratch!
Hmm. More KoolAid, straight from the Steyn.
Hmm...maybe he conflated global warming and peak oil?
I thought he was spot on, as it happens!
The ozone hole does seem to be starting to show signs of improvement... thanks to the fact that the world at large didn't get completely caught in the trap of denying that it was a problem and refusing to do anything at all about it.
The lesson here is quite the opposite from the lesson Steyn thinks it is.
-Rob
Steyn also is a defender of Intelligent Design! He's wackier than a car full of clowns.
Mark Steyn is to science what Storks are to human reproduction.
Need we say more when some of their most regarded "thinkers" (Coulter/ Steyn) are creationist? Talk about dead-end species.
Meanwhile, back in reality:
"Washington - After 17 years of work to phase out the production and use of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), chemicals that harm the Earth's protective ozone layer, ozone depletion has stopped, scientists say, but has not yet begun to reverse.
Experts predict that the ozone layer could be completely restored by 2060-2065 if releases are halted of manmade substances containing the chemicals chlorine (such as CFCs) and bromine, and if Earth's surface has not warmed by then - a condition that could increase the damaging effect of CFCs on ozone."
[Link](http://newsblaze.com/story/20060825225749nnnn.nb/newsblaze/TOPSTORY/Top…)
I guess you can't expect a journalist to grasp the subtle difference between "getting smaller" and "not getting any bigger".
But jsut think how much better off we'd all be in those socialistic government-types hadn't signed the Montreal Protocol.
Personally I think instead of trying to prevent ozone depletion (which for all we know could have positive consequences we don't know about yet) we should have accepted its inevitabiltiy and planned to adapt to it - just think of the economic boon that'd be for the sunscreen manufacturers and the oncologists and radiologists.
Here's why Steyn is so stupid , from ,
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/counterpoint/stories/2006/1706380.htmMichael "Duffy: I've read that you quit education in high school, which I assume means you never went to a university.
Mark Steyn: No, I never went to college, no.
Michael Duffy: Do you think that's helped you, as a commentator?
Mark Steyn: I don't think journalism is something that you can be taught in universities. I don't think it is a profession and I think the over-credentialisation of life actually ties in with what the Cardinal was saying, that in fact if you prolong childhood and adolescence, if you say to people that every worthwhile professional activity in your adult life you need to study and train for, so that instead of people starting work at 16 they start work at 28, or in Germany they basically...in Germany they come out of university at 38 and take early retirement at 43 and they wonder why the country is going caput. But that kind of deferred adulthood is actually one of the factors that is to blame for this demographic crisis that the Archbishop was talking about."
Duffy is also very stupid but for genetic reasons I think.
Wow! So Germany gets a strong economy and universal health care with people only working a 5-year career? We should copy them; that's fantastic!
Well it's thansk to Mark not wasting his tim at University that he can ignore the fact that Germany's high unemployment rate over the past decade can be attributed almost entirely to a rise in the participation rate caused by people retiring later because of cuts to health benefits and pensions.
Synchronicity! I just happened to run into this again a couple of days ago:
"This war is over. The only question now is whether a new provisional government is installed before the BBC and The New York Times have finished running their exhaustive series on What Went Wrong with the Pentagon's Failed War Plan."
-The war? That was all over two weeks ago
By Mark Steyn
The Telegraph
05/04/2003
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2003/04/05/d…