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The Environmental Spectator
With Obama It’s Top and Bottom Against the Middle
Among the 47 percent, there’s a sucker born every minute.
All the talk about the “1 percent” and the “47 percent” have created the impression that this Presidential election will be a matter of rich versus poor, people who pay taxes versus people who collect government benefits, the top of the economic ladder against the bottom.
But this is not entirely true. One constituency that is very important to the Democrat President — and has enormous influence over its economic policies — is that small slice of the population that embraces full-fledged environmentalism.
Perhaps the signature accomplishment of the Obama Administration has been its opposition to large energy and industrial projects. The President has blocked the Keystone Pipeline, which would have brought a million barrels of oil to Texas refineries. His administration has shrunk the leasing of federal oil lands and slowed offshore drilling to a crawl. Its Environmental Protection Agency has closed down coal plants and constantly making noise about cracking down on fracking for natural gas.
Say what you will about the 47 percent who don’t pay taxes or the people who depend on food stamps, housing vouchers and Social Security Disability benefits, it is certainly not their concerns that are being expressed by these government actions.
Yet even as President Obama has pursued the most aggressive environmental agenda in history, attempting to regulate carbon emissions and cracking down on fossil fuels, the nation’s environmental enthusiasts have remain largely unsatisfied. They are upset because he licensed two new nuclear reactors. They want to close down Vermont Yankee and Indian point, even if it leaves the northeast short of electricity. They are currently sponsoring a referendum in San Francisco to tear down the Hetch Hetchy Dam, even though it provides the City by the Bay with 25 percent of its water and 40 percent of its electricity.
Environmentalists proclaim that they only oppose these technologies because they envision a new world built on wind and solar energy. Yet when it comes to implementing these visions, they end up equally opposed. Environmentalists are already suing to stop President Obama’s plans for solar installations in the California desert. In Vermont, activists have already laid down in front of bulldozers to prevent construction of the windmills that are supposed to replace Vermont Yankee. After a certain point, you have to ask, “Exactly what do these people want?”
The answer was provided by early 20th century sociologist Thorstein Veblen in his famous book, The Theory of the Leisure Class. In a largely forgotten chapter called “Industrial Exemption,” Veblen posed the question, “Why is it that people who have benefited most from industrial society are often the most violently opposed to its further expansion?”
The answer, he said, is that as people grow more affluent, they eventually reach a point where it becomes less important for them to acquire more wealth and more important simply to prevent others from achieving what they already have.
This is what environmentalism is all about. It is an aristocratic attitude, long honed in the upper reaches of European society, which says that “trade” is something to be looked down upon and that there are “higher things in life than the mere accumulation of material possessions.” Easy enough to say when you’ve already got all you want.
But it’s worse than that. Veblen warned that a combination of this aristocratic disdain for industrial progress and an ill-informed proletariat that had no real understanding for business but simply resented businessmen as “the rich,” could form a lethal tandem to undermine any advanced society. This alliance between the top and the bottom would squeeze the productive middle classes that produce most of the wealth.
That is what we are seeing in the current Presidential Election. The growing numbers of people who are dependent on the government may succeed in reelecting President Obama. But it will be the upper-crust agenda of opposition to further industrial development that will be put into effect.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (26) | Leave a comment
More Articles by William Tucker
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c. j. acworth| 10.11.12 @ 8:24AM
I live in NH not far from Vermont Yankee. As nukes go, it's small, about 630 MW peak I believe. It is also a bit long in the tooth, and has had some problems in recent years. It may be that it's useful life is over, maybe not, I don't know. One thing I do know is that sunbeams and pinwheels will never be able to replace it. Also a few miles away is the Lempster Mt. wind farm. 12 turbines with a peak output of about 25 MW all told. Of course, you almost never get peak power, you average maybe 25% if you're lucky, say 6 MW. The turbines are spread out over about 1.5 mi. of ridgeline. so to replace Vermont Yankee (average output of say 550MW) you need well over 500 turbines spread out over God only knows how much real estate. And you still need to have a real generator of some sort nearby (gas or coal) for when the wind doesn't blow at all. Wind and solar will never provide more than piddle-power for niche applications only.
Nancy in NC| 10.11.12 @ 8:34AM
The tree humpers want to take us back to the Dark Ages.
Harry the Horrible| 10.11.12 @ 9:00AM
True - as long as they get to live in the castle...
Trish| 10.11.12 @ 11:11AM
Your scarf, Mr. Tucker? Where have you stashed it?
I clicked on your piece just to see that sensational photo of you-- a Hermes scarf draped artistically around your neck.
What a disappointment to see that you have changed photos. Drats.
DRed| 10.11.12 @ 12:00PM
I too am worried about the picture change. I hope it doesn't mean that Mr. Tucker has lost the certain joie de vivre that made his columns so unique.
Yvonne| 10.11.12 @ 12:32PM
And he looks so old in this new photo. Old people are so ugly. You wanna know what I call them?
I call them senior shitizens.
I just can't stand the sight of old people.
wolf| 10.11.12 @ 1:19PM
yvonne....may your mirror be kind to you for many years to come..
Stkman| 10.11.12 @ 3:29PM
Why would you make a comment like that Yvonne?
R. Sutton| 10.11.12 @ 3:53PM
I am inclined to agree with Yvonne about old people being unattractive, but I think Yvonne is a little too harsh.
It seems to me that senoirs--and I am one--could exercise, diet, and dress a little better than most of them do.
At age 70, I get up every morning at 5 and hit the gym. I exercise for two hours, and I am slim and women tell me I am still handsome and look "dignified."
All right, seniors, time to lay that remote down and drag yourself out of that hideous recliner and walk for two hours. Try looking good for a change.
SYAsked| 10.11.12 @ 6:59PM
Bats are deafened by the change in air pressure as they fly by the huge blades and birds continually die. The greenies disregard this slaughter and cruelty. I see little of such things from well run Atomic Energy facilities, even while terrible potential exists.
Albertus Magnus| 10.11.12 @ 9:26AM
Marxist Historiography preaches that History is a series of struggles between the very rich and the very poor. This is false. The very rich and the very poor have always had a symbiotic relationship, where the very rich support the very poor economically and the very poor support the very rich politically, while the middle class is taxed and out voted to pay for it all. This is why Marxists hate the middle class and seek their destruction, you don't love the one you steal from and you can't buy the support of the middle class the way you can the very poor. Rome had what we call "Bread and Circuses" where rich patrician politicians seeking office for themselves of members of their extended families would expend great sums of money (usually plunder from provinces) to provide free food, free entertainments, and free housing to the indigent poor in Rome, the Proles. The Proles in turn could be counted on to vote in annual elections accordingly. Democrats buying votes with taxpayer money is just a modern version of Roman corruption, a system where power, prestige, and money are the ultimate goals, and politics is the means to those goals. It is no accident that most Republican politicians have money BEFORE going in to politics, while most Democrats go in to politics to ACQUIRE money.
TLP| 10.11.12 @ 3:45PM
The very Rich and the Very Poor have also always had a Symbiotic Relationship with Dictators.
The Rich love their Money, and will Tow the Dictator's line, because they Love their Money, and want to keep it.
Case in Point: The Defence Contractors are, as we speak, holding back on sending out THOUSANDS of Layoff Warnings until after the Election - In Violation of The WARN LAW - a Law that Obama voted for - because they were BRIBED TO, by this Administration, through its Labour Department.
Obama has Promised (Good luck with that) that they would be Exempted from paying the Money (Required by Law) for the Retraining of these people. The Taxpayer will now be on the hook, for that Money.
GE is on board, with its CEO - Jeffery Immelt - heading up an American Jobs Committee, entrusted with enticing American Companies to bring jobs back to America, even as Immelt, Himself, has been shipping GE Jobs, off to China, at Breakneck Speed. Plus, GE paid ZERO TAXES last year, on $5 Billion in Profits.
Warren Buffet has his nose up The Muslim's @ss, and was Repaid by the guy named after Mohammed's Horse, with his cancellation of the XL Pipeline, thus leaving Buffet Owned Trains, as the only means to transport Canadian Oil, down to the Refineries.
Get the picture?
The Very Poor have Nothing, and are easily assuaged by Getting Stuff.
OBAMAPHONE MOTHRFCKR!
Again: Get the Picture?
SYAsked| 10.11.12 @ 6:42PM
Apologetic for interloping in front of other posters, that posted earlier, but did so appreciate this little synopsis by Albert the Great. Another worthwhile reason to visit American Thinker.
SYAsked| 10.11.12 @ 6:49PM
May I add an observation new to me but old news to many, from Ben Franklin. In effect, when a person gets into office, and realizes he can get power and wealth in that office, he will move Heaven and Earth to stay in power. Individuals are stupid, if they think we are different in 2012.
Von Mises Jr| 10.11.12 @ 9:44AM
Nonsense. The environmentalists are simply communist. Alinsky taught that communist agitators should never be focused on one issue. If the issue is negated, the communist plan "forward" is derailed.
So you have GayBLT's, Man Boy Rape Assoc., Nags, Planned Abortion, Code Stink, New Black Panhandlers, and "Greed" Energy Socialist.
They are all just smoke screens for "commie."
They want the government to own the oil, natural gas, coal, copper, water, farmland and fisheries if only they will pay for a free ride for these commies to fornicate and get high. It is really that simple.
DRed| 10.11.12 @ 10:46AM
Look who else was a communist: George Romney!
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-G.....e-Activism
Von Mises Jr| 10.11.12 @ 11:57AM
D'Red Communist, you are back. Fortunately, we did not miss you.
Why don't you and Perp get back under that bridge before I summon my Brother Knights?
DRed| 10.11.12 @ 12:07PM
But think about it, Von. Furrow your brow and really think. Why would Governor Romney tell his friends "I think you ought to listen to Alinsky"?
Von Mises Jr| 10.11.12 @ 1:41PM
I read "Rules for Radicals" as well as "Art of War," "The Prince," "The Coming Insurrection" and more troll.
I understand liberals and I understand revolutionaries. That how I know you are such a greedy, envious, disgusting communist.
Discussion over, troll boy.
DRed| 10.11.12 @ 1:48PM
Reading and understanding are two very different things, my friend.
SYAsked| 10.11.12 @ 6:52PM
Von Mises has my admiration, as one should know the enemy. We have students of re-written History, fueled by the falsehoods, teaching in our schools and universities, often wrong, but never in doubt.
Tom Kyba| 10.11.12 @ 12:10PM
Look who else is irrelevant. DRed.
A Grin without a Cat| 10.11.12 @ 10:03AM
Is this what Van Jones meant by "top down, bottom up"?
William L. Gensert| 10.11.12 @ 11:16AM
Environmentalists, like the president, are the true 1%. They already have big houses and nice cars. Polluters are those who want big houses and nice cars.
Read more of my article: http://www.americanthinker.com.....z290If1bFY
Who Knows?| 10.11.12 @ 11:53AM
Ah, the leisure class. Thor Veblen---brings back memories.
I can still vividly remember Luanne B., in 1960 when we were both seniors in high school, and she introduced me to the word “acquisitive”.
Even then, there it was! Disdain for acquiring worldly goods, from a girl from a very lower class family of deeply committed Christians.
And, let’s not forget the other oldie but goodie---for all of us youthful “liberals”, who felt so sorry for the vast mass of other humans on Earth who were suffering deadly lacks of THINGS, we were always reminded that even if we---
SPREAD THE WEALTH---
Of all Americans and other developed people, it still wouldn’t be enough to raise everybody’s well being much.
What goes around…
I saw “Lone Star”, a 1995 film about a Texas town last night. The Mexican-black-Caucasian “dance” was very well done! It was a big surprise to me, since it was almost conservative in its message.
Anyway, what else is the “I’ve got mine, screw you” attitude, but separation, in full bloom?
THAT’S the contracted essence of our acquisitive reality.
SYAsked| 10.11.12 @ 6:36PM
One would expect him to see things as his mentors, parents and grandparents did, and all he has hung with since. They need exposure, but will not get it from the press. Want to know what a man is like? Check his friends.