A Few Thoughts, January 2024

As we enter this new year, I thought I’d spend a few moments considering the issues of the day. Things political, social, natural, and religious. As always these are my thoughts and are open for debate, rejection, or perhaps even acceptance on the part of the reader. I know this last sentence seems to fly in the face of modern society where things are black or white with few shades of gray permitted. 

George (Jorge Agustín Nicolás Ruiz de Santayana y Borrás) Santayana, a Spanish born, American Philosopher is famously remembered for his aphorism, “"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” While it has grown into a cliché, nothing reflects its truth more than the youth of today. Three generations were trained, not to think critically, but to accept the dictates of those they believe in. We have generations who follow beliefs and chant support for causes they don’t fully comprehend, but are pushed by the activists who give them 30-second sound bites. It is much easier to live in the echo chamber of your click than to question the values you say you believe in.

Life:

In 1972 a socially activist court rendered a decision that divided the country for 50 years. Politicians on either side of the issue did little to actually shore up or destroy that opinion, preferring to use it as a political football. From the very beginning legal scholars questioned how the Burger court could justify its overreach of the Constitution.  Of course, those who supported the decision found no issue in how the court could reject the protections of the 14^th Amendment.  Activists, on the other hand, went back to the court time and time again to challenge, defend, or expand the rights of that decision. Finally, in 2022, a conservative court was asked to rule on the issue when Jackson Woman’s Health challenged a Mississippi law that set a limit of 15 weeks for an abortion. In its 6-3 ruling the Roberts’ court effectively overturned Roe v Wade, saying the Constitution was mute on the issue and it was therefore a right for the states to decide.  Of course, both sides went crazy.  One side with complete and often irrational outrage, the other with the joy of seeing their efforts rewarded.  

What our elected officials did next did nothing to move the nation forward.  One side blamed the court, while the other side, which had worked to elect state legislatures, began passing increasingly restrictive laws.  The idea of working for a democratic solution on this was thrown out the window almost 50 years earlier when the court decided they knew best what the law should be. What most fail to understand is when the Supreme Court has done this in the past it invariably will come back to be redecided.  For example, in Plessey v Ferguson, the court decided as long as Negros had “equal facilities” they didn’t have to be allowed into places occupied by whites.  It took until the mid-1950s for the court to correct that overreach. For the record, that ruling lasted for about 60 years, not so different than Roe.

The tough question is deciding on the value of life versus the avarice of mankind. Those who seek an end to abortion cite the sanctity of life and the innocence of the unborn. Those who support abortion see the abuses of children and hope that they will be spared from the dangers of life, by not allowing their birth in the first place.  Once a child is born, for true political activists those positions change, and in some cases almost completely. We see from the left demands that we must stop killing children with guns, while the right (at least here in the USA) defends the right to bear arms, even with the risks of violence associated with that choice. We argue incessantly about the protections of the 2^nd Amendment, but in today’s black-and-white world, no one is willing to change those protections, preferring to nibble away on the edges with challenges they hope the “right” court will implement.

Of course, corporate profits have nothing to do with the decisions of those politicians who seek to justify one side or the other, but all campaign donations are gratefully accepted.

War:

War has been with us since at least the invention of the written word.  Some 7,000 years of history have taught us men like to kill other men. Our evolution over that time has not changed that simple fact. The illusions of Hollywood aside, it seems unlikely we will suddenly turn into a society where reason outweighs emotion.

Thanks to our evolving industrial capability we have dramatically changed the nature of war from that of our ancestors.  Back in history men would take up arms when necessary and set out on a battlefield to fight other men with ever-increasing lethality.  From clubs to swords, lances, bows, and arrows, to trebuchets. With the Chinese discovery of black powder, we changed to guns, cannons, and rockets. The invention of internal combustion engines and flight gave us tanks and aircraft.  Today with have moved to remote control devices, and soon artificial intelligence will give us the ability to kill without having to get our hands dirty at all.

In the last truly global war, we invented the ability to destroy all mankind. Fortunately, at the time we were governed by reasonably rational men and women who realized the nuclear weapon was an end game. For a very brief instant, some thought this weapon would mean an end to war since its use would signal the end of our current civilizations. Sadly, that was not the case. Now we seem to be moving beyond that rationale where lesser men, with lesser concern for humanity, have access to those weapons and the potential for their use appears to be increasing.

Today, thanks to the fractured nature of the US government we no longer seem to be a leader of nations, with the ability to control and limit conflict. Our politicians and military leaders no longer understand the basic principles of diplomacy and the use of force as an instrument of national power. We are willing to sustain indefinite conflict, as long as the personal political cost isn’t too great. 

The great international organization we established and once led has become something of a joke when it comes to negotiating peaceful resolutions between opposing nations. For example, the UN once fielded an army to stop Communist aggression of Northern Korea against Southern Korea.  That war continues to this day, although both sides have agreed to a truce, now coming up on 80 years. The one time a US President actually set foot into North Korea the Democratic party yelled so loudly about his being a traitor, that it was heard in Peking, whoops I mean Beijing.

We fought a war in Afghanistan and Iraq for 20 years without ever achieving a desired end state. In fact, I’m not sure we ever actually decided what the best interest of the United States was in that conflict. We called it a global war on terror after the attacks of September 11, 2001, but now 23 years later terrorism is going stronger than ever, as evidenced by the Islamic attacks on the Jewish state of Israel. In response, Israel has begun a campaign to wipe Hamas off the map. Anyone who thinks rationally about their approach will realize its futility, but after 77 years of existence what approach should Israel take with the religious zealots (there is some irony with that term) of Islam who wish to destroy the nation and take possession “from the river to the sea.” In its counter-violence, Israel is creating tomorrow's terrorists.

The one thing this war has shown, here and in Europe, is the degree antisemitism exists, both among the educated liberals and the average white supremacists. They have finally found something to agree on. What I find somewhat amusing is so many modern Jews identify as educated liberals totally buying into their ideas of diversity, equity, and inclusion while facing discrimination based on religion by those organizations they praise.

For those paying attention to the ongoing Russia versus Ukraine/NATO conflict you are seeing a gradual evolution in the West where a negotiated settlement is now recognized as the probable best-case outcome. Sure, there is some “gaslighting” on this issue since the original position of the West was, that we would bankrupt and destroy Putin and his stooges, preserve Ukraine and perhaps even return those parts annexed by Russia during the Obama administration.  Now some three years into the war that potential seems less and less likely. SECSTATE Blinken is now saying negotiation has always been a goal. Like our border security, this administration seems to have a strange way of doing what it says it’s doing.

Meanwhile, what’s going on in the rest of the world? As far as I can tell by modern reporting the rest of the world doesn’t really exist, except as it comes to payments of the Trump and Biden families.

Politics in the USA:

Here we are, entering the campaign year to elect our next President and his/her trusty sidekick. The media is swamping us with poll after poll showing how weak Biden is and how strong Trump is, while also telling us how evil Trump is and how our Democracy will die if he is reelected. Of course, the media has proven objective reporting is a thing of the past and now opinion polls are where we find truth. What they don’t say is how eager they are for the ratings Trump will bring to their networks as they praise or condemn him. He is the modern version of P.T. Barnum. There is no such thing as bad publicity. As long as his face is in the news 24/7/365 life is good.

The DNC has spent the last 8-years vilifying Trump, with impeachments and show trials in their effort to make him disappear. We should remember all this started with what has now been proven to be a campaign “dirty trick” from the Hillary Clinton camp. In all their efforts he has been able to portray himself as the defender of all that is holy and good, while those nasty guys on the other side are trying to burn him at the stake, just like they did with Joan of Arc.  A line from the original Star Wars film comes immediately to mind, “If you destroy me, I will come back more powerful than you can imagine.”

If it turns out to be a Biden vs Trump campaign, I think one thing is safe to say. Election integrity will be a central issue, and the media has so heavily invested in the “Election Denier” mantra that whoever loses and questions the results will be put into stocks and pilloried in the public square unless, of course, it’s a Democrat.

Justice, Social, Equal, and otherwise.

It has long been a central point in our society and among our politicians that we are a nation of laws and those laws must be fairly and evenly applied to all citizens.  If this century has proven anything it has proven how absolutely false that belief was. No one, and I really mean no one, wants equal treatment under the law. Every identifiable group: Blacks, Latinos, Greeks, Irish, Muslims, Palestinians, Environmentalists, Animalists, Atheists, Christians, City Dwellers, East Europeans, Women, Gays/Transsexuals, and even English, Germans, and French all want preferential treatment by the courts and by the public. As we’ve moved to the extremes in appointing our judges and our prosecutors it appears our judicial system is moving to provide those treatments for the oppressed person of the day. 

If, heaven forbid, some group feels they haven’t received that fair and demanded treatment they will call attention to this by taking to the streets and disrupting the lives of anyone unfortunate enough to be nearby.  My favorite cause of the day is the anti-petroleum protestors who’ve taken to gluing themselves to the streets. It appears most of them are using a petroleum-based adhesive to display their outrage. It appears that most authorities are caught in the horns of a dilemma on how to handle these poor, outraged, victims of modern society and are leaving them to their protests.  If I were king for a day, I would carefully remove the pavement they’ve attached themselves to, move them, and the pavement to the nearest landfill, and let their protest continue there. Then I would add guards to ensure they are not disturbed by anyone who might want to interfere with their protest/hunger strike.

Science and Academics, Natural and Otherwise.

In the name of science, we have a large group of people who believe the end of human life approaches if we don’t abandon all use of fossil fuels.  Those who would disagree with them are called science deniers, for in their studied opinions the “science is settled.” As Forrest Gump once said, “I’m not a smart man.” That holds true for me as well, but back when educators were trying to fill my brain with useless facts for the upcoming invention of Trivia Pursuit, I do remember them saying Science was the pursuit of knowledge and it was always possible some new bit of knowledge would change the beliefs of the scientific community. For example, we once thought an atom was the smallest piece of matter, now we know atoms are really pretty massive and made up of much smaller particles and bits of energy. This theory holds no water with the climate scientists who call anyone who disagrees with them science deniers.

These are, by the way, the very same people who believe gender is a matter of personal choice and that any 10-year-old, who was allowed to be born, should be able to make itself whatever it wants.  We all know how informed the average 10-year-old is, so what could possibly go wrong?

Somebody watched one too many Steven Spielberg movies and we now have Artificial Intelligence emerging to save mankind. Today, it is in its infancy but people are already using it to write their school assignments. It is also useful if you wish to call a renegade Ph.D. or three to task by checking their work for plagiarism. We’ve all been told plagiarism is a mortal sin for the academic world. For those who are not Catholic, you can find its definition “on the internet.”[1]  What the latest trials by fire have proven is even the most entitled and elitist of the Academic elite are not that concerned with actual plagiarism unless it’s a student’s paper they are grading and they can appear to be an academic god.

Speaking of God.

One final thought. God certainly has a sense of humor. He creates mankind, then confuses everyone with the creation of womankind, and then gives them “free will” to make choices. Along the way, we developed beer and then pickup trucks and now everyone is trying to outdo each other with stupid stuff.  We have three worldwide religions who all claim to worship the same God and most of the time we are arguing about who has the right version of what God wants done and how he would like us to deal with each other.  As if that isn’t confusing enough; we have people who think they know more than God and reject him as a concept. Unfortunately, those who believe in God get upset with those who don’t but those who don’t are one of those social justice groups that demand everyone agrees with them.

The End.

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[1] See the World Wide Web and search for mortal sin.

Living in the Real World

Perhaps one of the funniest things I watch these days is the variety of Twitter storms that flash up and are feed by people who’ve come to believe their opinions are totally insightful.  Of course, I approach these festivals of insight with a bias; developed from years of listening to self-important people explain to me all that is wrong with the world, and how if we just do what they suggest it will be great.

For example, as an impressionable young man growing up in the hometown of Franklin Delano Roosevelt I was persuaded by the charism of JFK, and then the social conscience of LBJ as he proposed we greatly expand the welfare state to help those struggling with poverty and no medical insurance.  That plan was going to create a “Great Society” where poverty would be a thing of the past.  Although I didn’t pay too much attention to the details I was sure the creation of Medicare would dramatically improve the health of the nation.  It was only years later that I began to wonder who was paying the bills for it?

Then the self-important created federal enterprises to encourage mortgage companies to write more loans so more poor people could buy houses.  Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac would buy the mortgages from the banks, in theory freeing up bank money to write more loans.  Of course, with the assurance of the Federal Government to back the loans the bankers assumed increasingly less risk and wrote increasingly more risky loans.  Then, in 2008, we had a day of reckoning and all that risk came crashing down.  How many people lost their homes because they had paid far too much for a house, based on an assumption that if they lived in it a couple of years they could turn around and sell it for far more than they paid for it?  It was almost as if we just knew we couldn’t be as foolish and greedy as those poor saps in 1929.

Now we are told the world will end in 12-years, or so, if we don’t get rid of everything that uses fossil fuel.  Again, it seems eerily like the warnings issued a few dozen years ago that unless we immediately got rid of nuclear power we would suffer catastrophic meltdowns what would burn through the earth’s core.

The issue I have with these self-important people making these catastrophic predictions is they seem totally unwilling to lead by example.  It is almost like they are our fathers.  “Do as I say, not as I do!”  Those who seem to have the loudest voices regarding the end of the world also seem to be the ones flying on their own jets, or living in their own multimillion-dollar homes.

Recently, the freshman Representative from New York’s 14^th District proposed a radical new approach to saving the world, one that by her reckoning will end in 12 years, where aircraft would be abandoned for highspeed trains and cars powered by hydrocarbon fuels would go the way of the Edsel.  When the NY Post observed she routinely flies from DC back to NYC she posted.  “Living in the world as it is isn’t an argument against working towards a better future.”  Last time I checked there was a train that ran from NYC to DC and back. 

Apparently, socialists don’t like to be called out for their inconsistencies’.  As one commenter to her tweet noted, “I’ll start listening to your advice when you do.”

Climate Change

“Global Warming,” “Climate Change,” “Environmental Disaster,” all terms we hear fairly often in the news, across social media, and in government positions.  As in most things in today’s America we’ve chosen to make this a political issue that rages on, but is really about the size and role of government, the desired priorities of spending, and just who should be in charge since they know best what to do.  Actual effective action is never really part of the script.

There are certain truths, certain fictions, and undeniable consequences to modern society.  This post will give my views on those three things as I see them.  I tend to believe my views are rather centrist on this whole climate change battle.

Truth 1:  The climate is changing.  Anyone who says it’s not -- has no concept of the reality of the earth.  The questions that swirl around this truth deal only with the speed of change, and its root cause.

The earth has gone through vast ranges of temperature change during its existence.  At one point the northern polar ice cap reached down to central North America, Southern Europe and into what is today China.  The glaciers carved vast swaths of land as they moved forward with the cooling and left behind wide valleys and deep channels as they receded.  We, the western civilizations, have studied the weather in a scientific or near-scientific manner for what, about 200 years?  Prior to that, we have anecdotal data derived from the few scattered scientists (after they invented the thermometer), and the other earth sciences like geology and paleontology.  But prior to the advent of advanced computers, we could not accurately model something global in nature like the interaction of the various weather patterns?  The best we could do was observe localized weather and make predictions on what those localized patterns would do over the next several days.  A hundred years ago, or even 50-years ago we heard little about the long-term projections of what the climate would do and the environmental impacts of those projections.

The U.S. Department of the Interior has an interesting publication on the Great Ice Age,[1] published in 1992 before the great polarization of views, it makes an interesting statement about temperatures during the Great Ice Age.

“After a period of warm and equable climate, a worldwide climatic refrigeration initiated the Great Ice Age glaciers. At times during the Great Ice Age, the climate was cooler and wetter and at times warmer and drier than today.  Many attempts have been made to account for these climatic fluctuations, but their ultimate cause remains unclear.  Although we cannot predict a period of climatic cooling, another Ice Age in the future is a possibility.”

Truth 2:  Our ability to accurately predict future outcomes is, at best, limited. 

Because of the lack of verifiable historical data, the computer models and predictive tools used by scientists must, of necessity use assumptions to fill in the blanks.  As errors in data are found and corrected the questions surrounding those decisions lead to legitimate questions regarding their value in the computational models.

Also because of the polarization of views and the geo-economic/political implications of those views, the dialogues over how the models are affected and what variables actually have the greatest effect on change has been shut down.  On the one side, we have those who defend the models claiming those who question them are science deniers, and on the other side we have those who question the models accusing the defenders of fake science.  Nothing highlights this foolishness better than the statement “The science is settled.”

Truth 3:  The human population has skyrocketed since the pre-industrial era.

If we accept the industrial revolution began in the late 18th and early 19th centuries then it is striking to see the magnitude of the population growth linked to it.  As noted in the World Population Clock^[2] “At the dawn of agriculture, about 8000 B.C., the population of the world was approximately 5 million. Over the 8,000-year period up to 1 A.D., it grew to 200 million (some estimate 300 million or even 600, suggesting how imprecise population estimates of early historical periods can be), with a growth rate of under 0.05% per year.”  It had reached 1-billion by 1800.  Today it stands at about 7.6-billion, with the greatest change coming in the 20th century, where growth rates were close to 2.0%.  Although growth rates are declining they are still around 1%.

To say an exponential growth in mankind does not have an impact on the global climate would seem to fly in the face of logic.

Truth 4:  The modern industrial nations have moved from the natural packaging of natural products to petrochemical-based packaging of increasingly synthetic products.

In the 20^th century, we began to fully exploit the chemical possibilities of petroleum to make synthetic polymers that are today used in everything from nylons to the plastics that make up much of our world.  The unfortunate by-product of these materials is the fact they do not break down in nature when disposed of.  We see this in modern awareness campaigns that talk about all the plastic drifting around in the oceans, and its adverse effect on marine wildlife.

Truth 5:  The modern industrial nations have become societies where consumer consumption has skyrocketed and all products have relatively short lives before disposal.

It can be argued that the modern industrial nations have become ones of consumer excess where products are routinely thrown away rather than repaired and reused.  Consumer electronics is a wonderful example of this.  As a boy, I remember having to occasionally replace the tubes in the television, or if something more serious was wrong having the repairman come to fix it.  Today I am not sure television repairmen even exist.

The entire world economy now revolves around the production of raw material, like crude oil, into these disposable items demanded by consumers with sufficient funds to meet not only their needs for shelter and food but their desire for entertainment and connectivity.

Truth 6:  There are more truths (but I don’t feel like spending more time on them).

While there are undoubtedly more facts that can be laid out I think I’ve touched on the major ones with a possible exception of what all the climate alarmists focus on, which is the use of petroleum as an energy source.  There is enough information about that you can form your own opinion and won’t be persuaded by anything I say anyway.

Fiction 1:  Signing a UN agreement is a vital first step in solving all the world’s climate problems.

The United Nations is a wonderful ideal.  Unfortunately, that ideal has not been realized because of man’s greed and ambition.  As an organization, it is capable of good things, but as often as not, the political agendas of the various nations get in the way of effective action.  Take, for example, one of its founding purposes: to end wars between nation-states.  I suppose it could be suggested it has limited war, but one could equally argue it has stood idly by while various wars have been waged.  What is often forgotten are the wars it has actually approved of, like Korea, Desert Storm, and Iraqi Freedom.

At the basis of this fiction is the belief that a central world power would be able to marshal the world's resources to engage in what must be a unified effort if there is to be any hope to succeed.  Unfortunately, nothing in the history of the UN suggests it has either the will or power to actually do that.

The Paris Accord is little more than a wealth redistribution plan with no ability to actually lower the petrochemical emissions at all.  True – it sets targets for a reduction in climate temperature increase, but it leaves to the signatories the actual implementations to meet those goals.

What it does do is effectively create fiction 2

Fiction 2:  Creating another bureaucracy will ensure all nations remain focused and committed to action.

Bureaucracies seem only to grow, they become self-serving and ultimately focus more on their own long-term survival than implementing the visions for which they were created.  There is nothing in my personal experience to suggest they ultimately are either extremely efficient or timely.

For this, I will draw on my experience in military acquisition for an example.  Almost everything we do today with regards to the acquisition of a new weapon system comes as a result of some corrupt act that Congress felt needed to be corrected and remedied through legislation.  We have moved the act of buying equipment from the people who will use it into a vast bureaucracy of acquisition “professionals.”  These are men and women trained to comply with the myriad of laws and regulations we have put into place to ensure no one can defraud the government (although that seems to happen fairly routinely) while getting the “war-fighter” the best possible weapon.  What this organization does very effectively removes personal accountability except in the grossest cases of mismanagement.  Even then, the person who ultimately failed is probably protected from any real penalties other than reassignment or resignation.

As a result of these new regulations and the organizations created to deal with them, as well as the federally approved destruction of competition in the aerospace business the cost of a C-130 has gone from roughly $3M in 1975 to a little over $70M today.  Although some of that can be attributed to inflation (actually only $10.6M) [3] the majority of the cost is from regulatory compliance, new engineering standards and corporate profiteering due to a lack of competition.

Fiction 3:  Government rules and regulations can force a change in human behavior.

Many people believe if we just right the right laws, rules, and regulations then everything will change and all the problems will go away.  Looking at society I believe nothing can be further from the truth.  We are for the most part a law-abiding society, until such time as those rules and regulations get so burdensome people begin to ignore them.

A case in point is the increasingly popular view by some communities that the consumers are drinking too much sugar-based soda and that it is in their best interest for the government to step in and make it illegal to sell or consume the offending product.  A case in point was NYC’s decision to outlaw the “Big Gulp” size soda, or the Obama administration’s rules on what was acceptable for the school lunch program.  The most recent example was Seattle soda tax that effectively doubles the cost of a case of soda.  Costco made the news with its pricing that shows consumers what they would pay, the taxes they must pay and the new total for a case.  It was also rumored Costco advised patrons where they could go to circumvent the new tax.

Finally, as we’ve seen with our sixty-year war on drugs effort, if the government were to ban the use of popular plastics I believe all we would do is create an underground market for those who find a use for them.  But at this point is it really possible to replace the cheap petrochemical-based products with environmentally sound organic solutions?  This leads to fiction 4.

Fiction 4:  Climate change regulation will help the poor.

The NAACP has recently decided to join the bandwagon of climate justice warriors with their statements that “Environmental injustice, including the proliferation of climate change, has a disproportionate impact on communities of color and low-income communities in the United States and around the world.”^[4]

A wonderful statement that turns a blind eye to the actual injustices levied on the poor by government regulations that increase the cost of living and industry so the poor will never achieve a viable living wage.  Oh sure, we have movements pushing for something called a living wage, but all it really does is raise the minimum wage for the unskilled worker, causing job opportunities to diminish and the consumer cost index to rise, again trapping the poor in a no-win situation.

How much did the move to ethanol in our gasoline cost those at the poverty level who needed their car?

As we force the move to renewable energy sources how much will the average utility bill go up, forcing the poor to choose between warmth and food?

Do we expect that the government should cover all the cost increases so the poor see no change due to climate change initiatives?  If so, what incentive do they have to participate?

Oh sure, if we could without reservation quantify the cost of a series of actions and define their specific effect on the climate then perhaps the cost/benefit analysis would show us the best course of action, but we have moved far away from logical discussion on what we can and what we should do.

Undeniable Consequences

If the polar ice caps (both north and south) recede in the long term, there are undeniable changes that will occur over the coming years. What is questioned is exactly what those changes will be, and how best to respond to them.  I believe the problems we human beings face is our timeline of concern is measured in years, decades, and sometimes centuries.  While actual climate shifts are measured in centuries, millenniums, and eons.

The changes in coastlines would seem to present the biggest immediate risk if the oceans rise, but because of the nature of the modeling, the complexity of the variables and the shutdown over debating the issues; it is unlikely we will ever have a clear and understandable cause-effect-options-solution discussion presented for public understanding. 

If we banned the use of petrochemical-based products like plastics and eliminated the use of oil as an energy source would it actually stop the climate change?  If so, what would be the cost to our global economy?  Would life as we appreciate it today continue or would we return to the golden days of ox-drawn carts around the world?  One of my favorite experiences was being on a huge cruise ship steaming up to a glacier in Alaska and being told how man is destroying the environment.  On the way in and the way out we must have passed a dozen other ships doing exactly the same thing.  Maybe if those concerned with the environment would forsake their money making efforts and stop cruising up to the glaciers they might not recede quite as fast?

A generation of young seems to have bought into the fear mongering campaigns of the alarmists.  I’ve seen comments where they say it is already too late to fix the planet.  If they are right then we can end the debate today, and go along our merry way until the earth is flooded, the sky turns red and the current species are turned to dust (or mud) if that is what will actually happen?  In the end, the cycle of existence will start over again as the earth appears to be self-healing over the long term.  That is, of course, assuming the sun keeps burning at its current rate.

Finally, the poor will bear the greatest cost to whatever course is chosen.  This is a simple fact, it may be debated but it is inescapable.  They are the economic class least able to handle change, and they are the largest of the population groups.  Therefore through sheer numbers alone they will be impacted to the greatest degree.

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[1] https://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/ice_age/ice_age.pdf

[2] http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/

[3] http://www.usinflationcalculator.com/

[4] http://www.naacp.org/issues/environmental-justice/

Global Warming

Ya know nothing says "I'm really concerned for the environment, and the global warming caused by the use of carbon based fuels," quite like taking you and your staff on a 747 to Spain where you are met by your security element who flew over on a couple of C-17's to carry your helicopters and motorcars.