Liberty Defined: 50 Essential Issues That Affect Our Freedom

by Ron Paul

  Crucial to this whole scheme has been the voice of radical environmentalism. Many of the people in this movement simply do not desire economic progress. They loathe the internal combustion engine. They are against pesticides, asphalt, oil, cars, meat, and modernity in all its forms. They long for a simpler time when there were only 500 million people living on earth because that is all that the food supply would sustain. This attitude is creepy and dangerous, an unserious, intellectual luxury that, in fact, if taken to its logical conclusion, could unravel economic progress and lead to suffering and death.

  Building up fear and manipulating people into demanding that government save us is how radical environmentalists operate. Artificial fear not only generates support but demands that we pursue war policies, no matter how dangerous and ill-advised they may be. We saw how fear worked to build the state in 2008 and the following years. Bailouts for huge banks and corporations were rushed through Congress and assisted by the Federal Reserve after the people, and even members of Congress, become convinced that an economic Armageddon was at our doorstep.

  The same type of fear propaganda has been raised to the extreme by the environmental movement determined to socialize our nation and deindustrialize it, seemingly on purpose.

  Radical environmentalism has systematically undermined the defense of free markets for decades, but especially in the past twenty years. Everything from early public school indoctrination to our media and Hollywood have created such a poisoned atmosphere of political correctness that any questioning or dissent on the science used to support the radical environmentalist position is ridiculed and written off as crazy talk. Even reputable scientists who question the assumption and data used are not afforded the slightest respect regardless of the authenticity of their challenges.

  The whole movement is energized by pumping up fear and nonverifiable propaganda. This radical environmental movement evolved from the antinuclear hysteria that stopped all nuclear plant development for the past thirty years, causing a severe price to be paid by our economic system. Some have estimated that the loss of efficiency resulting from this policy of obstructing development of nuclear power has cost us an estimated ten trillion dollars. Hysterical resistance to nuclear power also forced an increase in the rise of less environmentally friendly alternatives.

  Instead, these same individual groups promote government-subsidized wind power. I’m sympathetic to the idea of wind power, and in the right circumstances, it’s quite practical. I happen to own a windmill attached to a well pump. It may cut my electric bill a couple of dollars, but the truth is, wind power is not competitive, nor is it a good environmental alternative. To replace one nuclear power generator you need windmills to cover an area the size of Connecticut. Sensible green environmentalists are becoming aware of this and are taking a second look at nuclear power.

  The other incentive for the extremists to propagandize against technology and free markets has been the obvious failure of socialism in the twentieth century after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Yet that is when the world recognized the total failure of socialism. It had been predicted many years before by Ludwig von Mises. Tactics changed and great emphasis was placed on “saving the planet” as the excuse needed for government takeover of economic activity. Defending socialism openly was no longer good political strategy, but its failure in the twentieth century did not diminish the desire of many to pursue the same goals but with a varied strategy and different terminology.

  Actually, the precise type of socialism changed as well. The Soviet and Chinese communist type of socialism is no longer the ideal they strive for. Government intervention that works with corporations—a form of corporatism—is now an acceptable form of socialism, sometimes referred to as fascism. Unfortunately, if left unchecked it leads to outright military fascism of the worst kind. The medical care takeover by government demonstrates this. Even with the massive government takeover of health care by the Obama administration, the drug companies, insurance companies, health management companies, large hospitals, and even the American Medical Association are all bidding for a piece of the pie. Corporations thrive, the patients suffer, and the free market deteriorates further.

  The radicalization of the country by the environmentalists pursues the same strategy. Cap and trade legislation will introduce a whole new product of CO2 permits that will be created and traded by the big financial interests bailed out after the crash, such as Goldman Sachs. Control over industrial production will be achieved, which is the socialist goal, and the corporations and certain Wall Street financial firms will be big players and beneficiaries in the process.

  How does all this come about? Why do so many fall for propaganda and the pseudoscience that this whole movement spews out? It’s out of fear. It took quite a few years to convince the majority of Americans to accept the idea that CO2 was a poison whose production caused global warming of crisis proportion. Public school indoctrination cannot be dismissed as being a major contributor to this gross misunderstanding.

  The real message that underlies the goal of the radical environmentalists is to blame modern man for every change in nature. They have avoided blaming volcanic eruptions as man caused—so far. Nature itself is a cause of atmospheric pollution, and this source is gigantic and comparable to all the man-made ills one can name. Calling attention to the comparison is something the CO2 police are not interested in.

  As one sided as the debate over global warming has been for decades, common sense and true science have begun to have an impact. Not only have the scientific arguments against global warming alarmists been challenged, but evidence now points to ulterior motivations and manipulation of pseudoscience as proof of global warming being a consequence of industrial manufacturing.1 The availability of e-mails written by promoters of global warming documented much of what many suspected. Statistics were biased, and evidence was destroyed. The environmental globalists lost a lot of credibility, but the debate is far from over. Washington, DC, and our major universities and media all pump up the fear that an environmental catastrophe awaits us. To challenge this in public is equivalent to being the archenemy of the people, un-American, and unpatriotic.

  Most Americans have been bamboozled into believing that all reputable scientists believe in global warming and that CO2 emissions are a major problem. The truth is there are just as many and even more qualified scientists refuting the sketchy and questionable evidence regarding global warming. The evidence presented was chosen to support a predetermined conclusion.

  Supporters of global warming theories vary. Some truly believe, some are brainwashed, some join to keep an academic career going, others know it is politically correct, but the real philosophic motivation came from the authoritarians who sought more power and resented progress. Some are also neo-Malthusians who see a grave danger in an unwanted pregnancy and population growth that compounds the threat to the environment. They do not understand how industrial growth in a free market is the only solution to poverty and hunger. There was a time when I did not choose to take on the radical environmentalists, giving them the benefit of the doubt for their good intentions. And there are many who have been influenced by the false science. Only good science can refute this. In the past, I stuck with some neutralizing advice since so few extreme environmentalists are open minded, pleading with them that they at least study both sides of the argument. This is still good advice for some, but beware, the Al Gores of the world won’t be yielding to this advice anytime soon.

  The greatest challenge to those who believe man is not guilty could be the charge that they don’t care about the environment. The truth is that if the CO2 hysteria is a hoax, new regulations not only will hurt the environment but will massively increase poverty and hunger in the world. Evidence is strong that cap and trade type legislation not only undermines productivity and wealth, many believe it increases CO2 emissions. This results from factories leaving more efficient conditions and being pushed into third world countries where the c
heapest form of fossil fuel is used.

  The charge that defenders of the free market don’t care about the environment is obviously false. Polluting one’s neighbor’s property, air, or water is contrary to market ethics and law. Trading permits to pollute would not be considered. Only central economic planners come up with schemes like this.

  If this were just an academic discussion it wouldn’t matter that much, but it has major ramifications; if the extremists are not refuted we will pay dearly for it and compound the economic crisis that we’ve already brought on ourselves.

  Once the radicals realized that the decades-old rant on global warming was losing credibility because evidence was showing that temperatures may well be falling, they shifted their propaganda language to “climate change.” Climate change has been going on for millions of years, but now it’s all the fault of man’s operating in a free market economy. And it’s become just another excuse for more government—global in scope—to deal with the “impending disaster.”

  Man, over the centuries, became more civilized and, with technology, advanced and learned how to harness energy to protect us from the elements and at the same time raised our standard of living. By using energy placed on the earth for a purpose, we overcame the deadly natural elements of weather—heat and cold, wind and rain, floods and droughts. People conquered the difficulties of persistent and unpredictable climate change, and now we’re told that we caused the very problem we have so successfully been able to overcome to a large degree.

  Dr. Arthur B. Robinson, publisher and editor of the newsletter Access to Energy, and other scientists confirmed that climate change and temperature variations are related to sunspot activity and water vapor. “A sixfold increase in hydrocarbon use since 1940 has had no noticeable effect on atmospheric temperature or on the trend of glacial length,” according to Dr. Robinson. The CO2 in the atmosphere has increased by 2 percent in the past fifty years but is unrelated to temperature changes. It has been shown that higher CO2 levels will cause plants to grow faster and larger with less water.

  It took a lot of years of concerted effort to scare the people into believing that grave danger lies ahead unless we institute radical new laws worldwide limiting growth and taxing energy. Though the tide is turning, it will require many more years and hard evidence to come back to sanity with regards to CO2 emissions and the use of hydrocarbons for energy. Truth, though inconvenient at times, will win out in the end. Al Gore is already on the defensive. His Nobel Peace Prize is hardly evidence of his credibility. Don’t forget that Barack Obama got the Nobel Prize for peace while massively expanding the war in south-central Asia. War is peace; superstition is science. All with a straight face!

  The green movement has brought about all kinds of changes in the way we live. Some of the changes are not necessarily bad, but the good changes and conservation could have come without all the programs that actually have a negative economic and environmental impact. Certainly, recycling for the most part consumes more energy than it saves.2 Recycling aluminum makes economic sense, but that would happen even without the demand to recycle everything from paper to glass and plastic.

  The same people who demand that we quit using hydrocarbon fuels usually hate the cleanest and cheapest source of energy—nuclear. That’s the reason we have not had a new nuclear plant built in thirty years. (Hopefully, this will change. A license has finally been granted for two new nuclear reactors in my district in Bay City, even though all hurdles have, as of yet, not been overcome.)

  And to top it off, they also express great fear that we are now at “peak oil,” and for that reason too, we are told, we must conserve (and suffer a bit if necessary) for the benefit of future generations.

  If the extremists had not gained the upper hand there would still be plenty of fretting about “peak oil,” and they would still be wringing their hands and demanding a federal government policy that will guarantee energy independence. Don’t use oil or coal, avoid nuclear, and stay energy independent at low cost. Taxes constantly rising, regulations increasing, inflation increasing, and obstacles placed in the way of developing new fuel, and the planners decide that national economic planning is not enough—to regulate energy, we are told, there must be a globalized solution.

  Authoritarians are obsessed with planning and despise free market policies. They have no interest in an objective analysis of the peak oil theory that argues the world will soon be out of oil. Peak oil is a nonproblem for a couple of reasons. Trillions of dollars are being misallocated into seeking “green” replacements at very high costs and a detriment to our environment. Windmills and solar panels to replace hydrocarbon without using nuclear would destroy unbelievable acreage in the United States and around the world and would never come close to providing the energy needed to sustain a decent standard of living for the people of the world.

  Whether or not we have reached “peak oil” would be of little relevance if the market were allowed to solve the problem of providing the cheapest and cleanest energy needed. We may well be at that point where we will no longer see an increase in available oil for drilling. My guess is that fear tactics and pessimism have influenced this consensus. The fear is driven by those who don’t want hydrocarbons to ever be used. Some are too pessimistic, because over the past decades new discoveries have constantly surprised the economic planners.

  Besides, technology is quite capable of obtaining clean liquefied coal—something the United States has in abundant supply—as well as providing a safe and clean and cheaper way of using oil from sand or shale. The truth is, I don’t know nor does any other human being know how much hydrocarbon energy is available worldwide. Not even Al Gore! And whether or not it can be used in an environmentally approved manner, my guess is that there’s a lot more oil and gas yet to be discovered.

  This whole scandalous debate is misleading. The only thing that counts is whether the free market or government planners are in charge of providing energy to the people. “Energy independence” shouldn’t be the goal with the government in charge. That’s a sure way to create an unwanted foreign dependence and for shortages to develop.

  A free market would allow alternate fuels to develop more efficiently than large central economic planners dictating a program. Nuclear energy is safe and clean and cheap. If we were forced to rely on nuclear power we could easily adapt. Other countries already have.

  A national energy policy, a Department of Energy, an energy czar, thousands of regulations and multiple taxes and subsidies are totally unnecessary. A national policy of freedom would ask for no more government planning for energy needs than a cell phone planning program is necessary to make sure all poor people can afford a government-approved cell phone distributed by a department of mass communications run by the government. The organic progress of markets is the source of economic development.

  It’s a loss of both confidence and understanding of how markets work that causes so many people to accept the need for government to provide us with goods and services. There should be no difference between the distribution of cell phones, computers, TVs, medical care, or energy. It’s amazing that people don’t understand that the more the market is involved and the smaller the government, the lower the price, the better the distribution, and the higher the quality. The authoritarian approach too often wins the propaganda war, using fear as its weapon in gaining public acceptance of flawed economic thinking. If the economic arguments are too complex to understand, simply defending liberty as a moral right should suffice.

  Anderson, Terry. 2001. Free Market Environmentalism. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

  Horner, Christopher. 2007. The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming. Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing.

  GUN Control

  The gun control movement has lost momentum in recent years. The Democratic Party has been conspicuously silent on the issue in recent elections because they know it’s a political loser. In the midst of declining public support for new gun laws, mo
re and more states have adopted concealed-carry programs.1 The 9/11 terrorist attacks and rising fears about security only made matters worse for gun-control proponents, as millions of Americans were starkly reminded that we should not rely on government to protect us from criminals.

  Gun-control advocates tell us that removing guns from society makes us safer. But that is simply an impossibility. The fact is that firearm technology exists. It cannot be uninvented. As long as there is metalworking and welding capability, it matters not what gun laws are imposed upon law-abiding people. Those who wish to have guns, and disregard the law, will have guns. Paradoxically, gun control clears a path for violence and makes aggression more likely, whether the aggressor is a terrorist or a government.

  I don’t really believe “gun-free” zones make any difference. If they did, why would the worst shootings consistently happen in gun-free zones such as schools? And while accidents do happen, aggressive, terroristic shootings like this are unheard of at gun and knife shows, the antithesis of a gun-free zone. It bears repeating that an armed society truly is a polite society. Even if you don’t like guns and don’t want to own them, you benefit from those who do. It is better that criminals imagine they face an armed rather than an unarmed population.

  History shows us that another tragedy of gun laws is genocide. Hitler, for example, knew well that in order to enact his “final solution,” disarmament was a necessary precursor. While it is an extreme case that an unarmed populace was killed by their government, if a government is going to kill its own people, it will in fact have to disarm them first so they cannot fight back. Disarmament must happen at a time when overall trust in government is high, and under the guise of safety for the people, or perhaps the children. Knowing that any government, no matter how idealistically started, can become despotic, the Founders enabled the future freedom of Americans by enacting the Second Amendment.