Lack of Air Conditioning, Not Climate Change, Is the Real Summer Heat Wave Threat
By Ben Lieberman | CEI | July 11, 2022
Climate change policies often pose a greater risk than climate change itself, and that is especially true during summer heat waves. Each new heat wave invariably brings media coverage drawing overstated links to climate change, but the bigger threat to public health comes from climate activists’ war on affordable air conditioning.
It has always been the case that summer heat can be deadly, especially during heat waves, and the evidence points away from any appreciable increase attributable to anthropogenic climate change. In fact, the data show much worse heat waves in 1930s than today, though there has been a smaller uptick since the 1960s.
Far more important is access to air conditioning, which greatly reduces heat-related deaths where available. Studies show that widespread air conditioning use in the United States has considerably negated the health impact of high temperatures and prevented an estimated 18,000 heat-related deaths annually. The benefits would be even greater if and when the rest of the world acquires air conditioning, especially the nearly 3 billion people who live in tropical nations where residential air conditioning is still relatively uncommon.
That is where the cure-worse-than-the-disease part comes in. Climate activists have targeted air conditioning in numerous ways, all of them compromising affordability.
Congress passed production quotas on refrigerants called hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) on the grounds that they contribute to climate change. Most residential systems use one such HFC for which the price has skyrocketed to the point that replacing refrigerant lost from a leak costs several hundred dollars more than it did last year. New systems designed to use one of the supposedly environmentally friendly alternative refrigerants will also carry a hefty premium, which is why their producers, including Honeywell and Chemours, joined environmentalists in lobbying Congress to push the cheaper HFCs out of their way. Thus, both repairs of existing systems or purchases of new ones have been adversely impacted.
The Kigali Amendment, a United Nations climate treaty, imposes overlapping global restrictions on these affordable HFCs. The Senate may soon decide whether or not to ratify the Kigali Amendment, adding yet more environmental red tape to air conditioning.
Operating costs have also shot up thanks to climate policy. The war on coal and natural gas has contributed to electric rate increases—up 12 percent in the last year alone. Thus, low-income (and even some not so low-income) households now need to be careful about how much they run their air conditioners.
Overall, both owning and running an air conditioning system has gotten costlier in 2022, and that trend will very likely continue for as long as the climate agenda does.
Thanks to climate change, a future that is slightly warmer than today is quite possible. But thanks to climate change policy, a future with less air conditioning to counter the effects of summer heat is more likely.
Eighty Times More Excess Deaths Associated With Cold Each Year than Heat

BY TOBY YOUNG | THE DAILY SCEPTIC | JULY 17, 2022
Amid all the hysteria about next week’s extreme temperatures – which could climb to 41°, according to the Met Office – it’s worth bearing in mind that many, many more excess deaths in England and Wales are associated with cold each year than with heat. According to a recent study in the Lancet Planetary Health, between 2000 and 2019, there were an average of 65,000 excess deaths per year in England and Wales associated with cold, but fewer than 800 a year associated with heat. In other words, roughly 80 times more deaths per year are associated with cold than heat.
Needless to say, the report’s authors blame these excess deaths on ‘climate change’ in general and have nothing to say about the likelihood of the 65,000 figure increasing next winter as a result of rising energy bills.
The researchers analysed 10.7 million deaths that occurred in England and Wales between 2000 and 2019 across over 37,473 small areas that include around 1,600 residents, also known as lower super output areas (LSOAs). They then linked these data with high-resolution gridded temperature maps and potential drivers of vulnerability to heat and cold, including demographic and socio-economic factors, health and disability, housing and neighbourhood, landscape, and climatological characteristics. This allowed the researchers to characterise differences across small areas and map variation in temperature-related mortality risks across the two countries.
Dr Pierre Masselot, Research Fellow in in Environmental Epidemiology and Statistics at LSHTM and co-author of the study, said: “The results come at a critical time as countries and communities face increasing health impacts due to climate change and need to find effective ways to adapt to changing temperatures. The analytical framework also provides a flexible tool that can be adapted for future studies which aim to model temperature-related risks and impacts at small-area level under different climate change scenarios.”
The authors emphasised that, while the research showed that excess mortality attributed to cold was significantly higher than that attributed to heat, these results should be interpreted with caution as more cold than hot days were recorded throughout the year. Despite this, they highlighted that cold-related mortality is evidently a considerable health burden, particularly in deprived areas, and should be addressed with targeted public health interventions.
Nevertheless, any un-biased person reading this report cannot help but conclude that the rising cost of utility bills caused, in part, by the Government’s pursuit of ‘net zero’ will result in far more deaths than next week’s heat wave.
If you really care about reducing deaths due to extreme temperatures, shouldn’t you focus your energies on getting the Government to scrap its ‘net zero’ target, lift the ban on Fracking and start investing billions in nuclear[?], instead of disrupting traffic and sporting events?
You can read the Lancet Planetary Health study here.
The West’s Duplicity in the Food Crisis Caused by the Shortage of Grain
By Vladimir Danilov – New Eastern Outlook – 17.07.2022
Governments of many countries have recently been talking more and more about a possible food crisis in the near future, actively involving representatives from the UN and other international organizations, and numerous media platforms in this information campaign.
Yet, in addition to drawing everyone’s attention to the issue of combating hunger, which is especially threatening to the world’s poorest countries, the US and its Western allies are actively trying to use this situation to fuel their latest Russophobic campaign. Such provocative actions very quickly become understandable when, amidst the so-called “threats” of the global food crisis, the West places the blame on Russia alone because of its special operation against the neo-fascist regime in Kiev, sponsored by the USA and its allies. In doing so, the West is making unfounded accusations of Russia allegedly preventing the export of grain from Ukraine by sea, while keeping suspiciously silent about it not being Russia, but the regime in Kiev who has mined not only all Ukrainian ports, but even the distant shores of the Black Sea, and these mines have already left their anchors, which requires Ukraine to clear the mines from sea transport lanes and routes.
Today it has become clear to everyone that, in terms of the energy crisis and global economic collapse, and even more so in food problems, the United States itself and its Western allies are primarily to blame. It is their treacherous sanctions policy that has destroyed the international order and brought chaos to logistics and transport chains. Accusations by the West against Russia over the food crisis can only be considered as evidence of American efforts to redistribute the global agro-industrial market, which implies ousting Russia from the field of food trade, according to the Telegram channel of the Russian diplomatic mission in Washington.
The recent statements by member countries of the G7 about the shortage of wheat and the food crisis allegedly caused by Russia being a political provocation is pointed out by Hu Bingchuan, a researcher at the Institute of Rural Development of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, in an article for the Chinese newspaper Huanqiu Shibao. As follows from his explanations, based on an objective assessment of the processes on the world food market, the absence of wheat from Ukraine will quickly be ironed out due to offers from other countries that supply grain growing – this is primarily Russia, Canada, and several European countries. It is already known that this year the total volume of grain production in the Russian Federation could reach 130 million tons, of which 87 million tons will be wheat, which is an absolute record. Wheat exports in 2022-2023 from Canada will also increase by 8.5 million tons, and by five million tons from the EU. The purpose of Western statements about Russia’s alleged “wheat war” is to create new restrictions against Moscow. The expert emphasizes that such statements have a clear political Russophobic orientation, and the current rise in wheat prices is not provoked by the lack of grain, but “its inconsistent global distribution among those who want it.”
Due to the recent policy pursued by Western countries, food prices in European nations and a number of other countries have already risen sharply, with many goods being sold in limited quantities. At the same time, if for rich countries the current situation simply portends a looming crisis, then for poor nations it threatens a real famine, which, in turn, could provoke an even greater crisis in the world, as it will lead to uprisings, revolutions, and wars.
Against the backdrop of the food crisis, the demand for Russian agricultural products around the world (which was quite high before), has increased several times. According to results from last year, Russian agro-industrial and fishery complex products were sent abroad to the tune of more than $37 billion. Under these conditions, and in order to avoid anti-Russian sanctions and the influence of Western food speculators regarding price, the Russian authorities will now only sell domestic grain and other agricultural products on the National Commodity Exchange and only for rubles.
As for the story artificially inflated by the United States about the amount of Ukrainian grain ready for export, it’s no secret to anyone that this is simply informational hype provoked by Washington to denigrate Russia. And this confirms the complete inconsistency with the truth of the story about 20 million tons of Ukrainian grain allegedly being blocked by Russia, previously disclosed by US President Biden. Even with a superficial analysis by experts, it turns out that at best there are 5 million tons of grain today in Ukraine. But it is constantly being exported in the direction of the states of the EU, immediately being poured into their storage facilities, and not sent somewhere south to those African countries suffering from hunger, which European politicians and experts constantly talk about. The German Ministry of Agriculture stated that in May alone Europe received 1.7 million tons of grain from Ukraine. Additionally, don’t forget that Ukraine’s share of world grain production is only 1.5%.
Russia has repeatedly stated its readiness to facilitate the export of even this remaining amount of grain from Ukraine, guaranteeing the unimpeded passage of ships with grain through the Black Sea. This is confirmed by the recent meeting in Istanbul of delegations from Turkey, Russia, Ukraine, and the UN to discuss the grain issue.
Meanwhile, what the West deliberately remains silent about, thereby demonstrating its frank duplicity, is all the obstacles created by the regime in Kiev over the “grain issue.” Per an official statement by the deputy head of the military-civilian administration of the Kherson Region, Kirill Stremousov, Ukraine is deliberately setting fire to wheat fields on the border of the Kherson Region. “Helicopters flew and set fire to wheat fields on the demarcation line. This is a Nazi regime and they don’t care,” Stremousov said.
The attempts to set fire to wheat fields in the Kherson Region by Ukrainian helicopters will be suppressed by air defense systems, said the head of the regional administration Volodymyr Saldo. He also stressed that “they stoop so low so as to destroy the labor of rural workers who have put their heart and soul into it.” The head of the administration called the Ukrainian military’s actions malicious and inhumane, describing them as an attempt to scare the local population.
Yet, no reports on this issue in the Western media, and even more so the censure of the authorities in Kiev for such crimes, can be expected from the West…
Scotland to scan vehicle license plates to enforce “low emission” zones
By Ken Macon | Reclaim The Net | July 13, 2022
In the cities of Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee, and Aberdeen, in Scotland, Low Emission Zones (LEZs) have been launched – however enforcement will not begin until June 1, 2024 for Aberdeen and Edinburgh, June 1 2023 for Glasgow, and May 30 2024 for Dundee.
Transport Scotland said the grace period will allow ample time for compliance. Enforcement of the LEZs will be facilitated by automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) systems.
Vehicles entering the LEZs will be required to meet the Euro VI standards. Those that do not meet the standards are not allowed in the LEZs.
Penalties for non-compliance will be cumulative. The first incident of non-compliance would result in a £60 fine. Subsequent violations will result in a fine double the previous one up to a maximum of £960. The fine is reduced by half if paid within two weeks. The starting fine is reset if there are no subsequent violations within a 90-day period.
There has been a low emission zone in Glasgow that applies to buses since 2018.
Saudi Arabia outlines what it will do for oil output
Samizdat | July 16, 2022
Saudi Arabia is ready to increase oil production to its maximum of 13 million barrels per day but does not have the capacity to pump out more, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said during his address at the US-Arab summit in Jeddah on Saturday.
“The kingdom has announced an increase in its production capacity level to 13 million barrels per day, after which the kingdom will not have any additional capacity to increase production,” he was quoted as saying by UAE’s newspaper The National.
The crown prince also said that the global community should join forces to support the global economy, but noted that unrealistic policies regarding energy sources would only worsen the situation.
“Adopting unrealistic policies to reduce emissions by excluding main sources of energy will lead in coming years to unprecedented inflation and an increase in energy prices and rising unemployment, and a worsening of serious social and security problems,” he stated.
Mohammed bin Salman’s words come a day after his talks with Joe Biden, who was in Saudi Arabia on his first visit as US president, and urged the kingdom to increase oil production in order to reduce global reliance on supplies from Russia.
Commenting on his trip to the kingdom, Biden said Saudi Arabia’s “energy resources are vital for mitigating the impact on global supplies of Russia’s war in Ukraine.”
Saudi Arabia, one of the globe’s largest oil exporters and the leading producer within the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), currently pumps out more than 12 million barrels of oil per day. The kingdom previously said it plans to reach production capacity of 13 million barrels per day by 2027. The Crown Prince did not reveal whether the timeframe for the boost in capacity has changed.
Following the start of Russia’s military operation in Ukraine, the US and other Western nations have stepped up sanctions on Moscow, calling, among other things, for a boycott on Russian energy supplies. The US stopped importing Russian oil earlier this year, and the EU placed a partial embargo on Russian fuel last month.
Washington is now planning to set a price cap on the Russian commodity, and the US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is currently in Asia attempting to garner support for the scheme. The US is especially eager to secure the participation of China and India in the price cap mechanism, as both countries have not only refused to sanction Russia over the Ukraine conflict, but have recently stepped up purchases of Russian oil.
Dutch MSM attacks Keean Bexte’s honest coverage
TCS WIRE | July 14, 2022
Dutch state broadcasters have come out swinging on behalf of the WEF and are attacking TCS Editor-in-Chief Keean Bexte’s coverage of the Dutch Uprising.
In a video entitled “The Great Reset: the recurring fabrications,” Nieuwsuur, a program produced by government broadcasters, claims that Bexte travelled to the Netherlands to perpetuate supposed conspiracy theories, saying that the WEF has “absolutely nothing” to do with the “nitrogen crisis” — by which they mean the nitrogen policy to cut emissions by 50% and destroy farmers’ livelihoods.
“These bloggers from far-right websites have travelled to the Netherlands especially to see that image confirmed,” the host says before playing a clip of Bexte talking about the WEF’s support for the career-destroying nitrogen policy being protested.
“But the WEF has absolutely nothing to do with the nitrogen crisis,” he continues. “It was the highest judge who ordered the Netherlands to comply with the nitrogen standards of the European Union.”
Yes, but where did the “nitrogen standards” of the European Union come from?
The nitrogen policy that was introduced is just one of many policies being brought forth by the EU to better align with the UN’s radical Sustainable Development Goals to cut all emissions, which is itself part of the UN’s Agenda 2030.
According to the European Commission’s website, “Sustainable development is a core principle of the Treaty on European Union and a priority objective for the Union’s internal and external policies. The United Nations 2030 Agenda includes 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) intended to apply universally to all countries.”
Moreover, in an EU briefing entitled “European policies on climate and energy towards 2020, 2030 and 2050,” the European Parliament states the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals will impact European policy, specifically regarding climate policy:
Within the framework of the commitments laid down in the Paris Agreement, in November 2018, the European Commission published a new long-term strategy which confirms Europe’s commitment to lead on global climate action and to achieving net-zero GHG emissions by 2050, through a socially fair transition in a cost-efficient manner… The strategy does not intend to launch new policies, nor does the European Commission intend to revise the 2030 targets. It is rather meant to set the direction of transition of EU climate and energy policy, and to frame what the EU considers as its long-term contribution to achieving the Paris Agreement temperature objectives, in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals, which will further affect a wider set of EU policies.
Now, who has been a core contributor in shaping the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals? Why, the World Economic Forum, of course.
In 2019, the WEF and UN signed a strategic partnership “to accelerate the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.”
“The new Strategic Partnership Framework between the United Nations and the World Economic Forum has great potential to advance our efforts on key global challenges and opportunities, from climate change, health and education to gender equality, digital cooperation and financing for sustainable development,” said UN Secretary-General António Guterres at the time.
So, yes. If the Netherlands is abiding by the EU’s climate policies, and the EU’s climate policies are based on the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, and the WEF signed a partnership with the UN to control what these goals are, I think it’s safe to say that the WEF absolutely has something to do with the nitrogen policy being protested right now.
This should be obvious, as founder Klaus Schwab’s whole Great Reset book (which the host says he read) is all about utilizing the COVID pandemic to get countries to achieve the 2030 Agenda on time.
The WEF has even gone so far as to create a virtual reality world to promote SDGs.
Besides licking Schwab’s boots, Nieuwsuur also goes after legal philosopher Eva Vlaardingerbroek and Dutch politicians opposed to the WEF, specifically Thierry Baudet, the leader of the Forum for Democracy, lamenting the popularity of Baudet’s critical posts regarding the Great Reset.
The host also admits that Klaus Schwab didn’t have enough time to do an interview with him to talk about the Great Reset (embarrassing) before continuing to defend the World Economic Forum. He claims that everything negative that people say about the WEF is “sheer nonsense.”
Funnily enough, speaking at the WEF in 2020, Dutch PM Mark Rutte advised that governments and businesses around the world should start paying off journalists to control the narrative and bring the people honest coverage. It appears we are seeing the fruits of this initiative.
“You need the free press at these moments to be able to explain to the people what is really happening. But that costs money,” Rutte explains. “So, one of the pleas I have with big business here in Davos [is] don’t put all your money in the internet advertising. Make sure that our newspapers, our news outlets — also our TV stations — also in the future will be able to pay sensible and real salaries to our journalists to be able to do this.”
The globalists, of course, applauded the plea for more corruption, which the Dutch are now dealing with right now.
Petro Government in Colombia Poised to Return Key ‘Stolen’ Asset to Venezuela
By José Luis Granados Ceja | Venezuelanalysis | July 11, 2022
Troubled agrochemical company Monómeros, a subsidiary of Venezuela’s state-owned Pequiven, could return to Venezuelan control, Colombian President-elect Gustavo Petro told local radio Tuesday.
The Colombia-based agrochemical producer is considered Venezuela’s second most important foreign-held asset. It came under the control of Venezuela’s hardline opposition in May 2019 alongside a number of other foreign assets following the recognition of Juan Guaidó as “interim president” by Washington and its allies as part of efforts to oust the Nicolás Maduro government.
Since being handed over to the opposition, Monómeros has been plagued by scandals and corruption allegations, which has severely impacted its productivity and has generated serious problems for Colombia’s rural producers.
Colombian Senator Luis Fernando Velasco Chaves, a member of Petro’s transition team managing the Presidential Administrative Office file, reiterated concerns about the management of the firm following a meeting Tuesday with officials from the government of outgoing president President Ivan Duque.
“I am very concerned that Monómeros is still in the hands of Guaidó, Monómeros in the hands of Guaidó was a disaster, it disappeared,” said Velasco.
The senator also ridiculed Guaidó’s management of Monómeros, saying the incoming government could not negotiate with “ghosts that do not exist”.
The agrochemical enterprise, which has two main plants, played a major role in Colombia’s food chain, previously supplying nearly half of the fertilizers and 70 percent of the agrochemicals used by coffee, potato and palm oil production, according to local sources.
“Please look at what is happening to us, ask our peasants, ask our farmers, we are not producing and we are paying three times the [previous] cost of supplies,” said Velasco.
Mismanagement and infighting by the Venezuelan opposition eventually led Colombia’s Corporation Superintendency to assume control of Monómeros. Colombian law allows the corporate watchdog to employ such a process when an enterprise is in a critical “judicial, accounting, economic or administrative” situation.
The Maduro government called the superintendency’s takeover a “flagrant theft” of Venezuela’s assets and demanded they be returned to its rightful owner, the state-owned petrochemical company Pequiven. Maduro has said that Venezuela was engaged in “permanent diplomatic, political and legal activity” to recover the country’s foreign assets and the government has made the return of seized foreign assets a condition of a return to talks with the opposition.
The agrochemical producer did not fare much better under control by Colombian officials, with Petro claiming the company was driven into the ground, leading to a sharp increase in costs for Colombia’s agricultural sector.
“The company ended up practically closing its operations and lost the market it had in Colombia,” said the president-elect in a recent interview.
Monómeros faced yet another scandal after officials from the US Embassy to Venezuela revealed to Guaidó insider Enrique Sánchez Falcón that the company’s board had hired a lobbyist with ties to former US Ambassador to Venezuela Otto Reich without the knowledge or authorization of Guaidó’s team.
Sánchez Falcón told the outlet Efecto Cocuyo that the lobbyist was allegedly working to renew Monómeros’ sanctions waiver with the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) but that the effort was “unnecessary” since the license was likely forthcoming anyway. Guaidó subsequently announced an investigation into the irregular hire of the lobbyist. The OFAC license was eventually renewed in late June.
The current leadership of the firm has apparently failed to even update officials from Guaidó’s team about the status of the Monómeros. Guaidó ally Yon Goicoechea said he believes the secrecy is tied to a hostile takeover effort. The US-backed “interim president” has pledged to overhaul the management of the corporation but the efforts have led to corruption accusations and further infighting amidst the opposition camp.
A press spokesperson from Guaidó’s office did not respond to a request for comment on the possible return of Monómeros to Venezuelan state management.
Outgoing Colombian President Iván Duque has steadfastly refused to return control of Monómeros to Venezuela, given that he does not recognize Maduro as president.
Duque recently said that he would also decline to extend an invitation to Maduro for Petro’s inauguration. The president-elect has said invitations are the purview of the outgoing government but said Maduro’s attendance would be “prudent”.
Petro, who has committed to reestablishing diplomatic and economic ties between Colombia and Venezuela, takes office on August 9.
Edited by Ricardo Vaz in Mérida.
Are angry Dutch farmers spearheading an uprising against the elites?
By Kathy Gyngell | TCW Defending Freedom | July 12, 2022
Ignored in the media feeding frenzy over Johnson’s resignation were no less than 30,000 Dutch farmers who last week rose up in protest against new nitrogen emission limits set by their government and who are fast bringing their country to a halt. You would think it would be a lead new story, but no.
Only yesterday did any British mainstream newspaper pay attention to this huge story. The Independent took time out to tell its readers that ‘Anger simmers for Dutch farmers who oppose pollution cuts’.
That is not however how social and alternative news media outlets have been reporting this drama. The Dutch government’s new edict will require farmers to so radically to curb their nitrogen emissions, by up to 70 per cent in the next eight years, that it will mean a massive reduction in the number of livestock they can maintain resulting in the loss of their livelihoods and, some say, a State take-over of their farms. It’s for this reason they have been blocking supermarkets, distribution centres and roads, a protest to which, shamefully, the police have responded with brutality, opening fire on tractor-riding farmers and arresting others.
Maybe large farming companies could, at least hypothetically, meet these (climate) goals but for smaller farms, often family-owned over several generations, these new environmental regulations are so extreme they’ll be forced out of business.
That’s why farmers are blockading roads and refusing to deliver their products to supermarket chains, and why the Netherlands is starting to suffer serious shortages of eggs and milk. The global impact is not without significance either. Just as so many people remained unaware until recently how dependent the world is on Ukraine for wheat and fertiliser, enlightenment is yet to dawn about global food dependency on the Netherlands.
In a rare (mainstream) article on the subject last week in Newsweek, Ralph Schoellhammer, an Austrian assistant professor of economics, explains that the Netherlands is the world’s second largest agricultural exporter after the United States, a country of barely 17million inhabitants, a food superpower. Given global food shortages and rising prices, the role of Dutch farmers in the global food chain, he writes, has never been more important: ‘But if you thought the Dutch government was going to take that into account and ensure that people can put food on the table, you would be wrong; when offered the choice between food security and acting against “climate change,” the Dutch government decided to pursue the latter.’
It appears to be an extraordinary own goal, given post Lockdown supply chain problems and the impact of the Ukraine war, but such is the zealotry of these political climate ideologues that they are prepared to attack their own people, just as Pierre Trudeau did with the Truckers. Like Mao, they seem to have little regard for the cost in human lives and suffering in order to achieve their revolutionary goals. And a revolution it is, driven by global elites who can afford high food and energy prices.
Schoellhammer believes that ‘there is a growing resistance by the middle and lower classes against . . . the “luxury beliefs” of the elites, as everyday folks realise the harm it causes them and their communities’. Let’s hope there is.
Rebel News reporter Lincoln Jay, embedded with the farmers since last week, reporting back to Laura Ingraham of Fox News last Friday said ‘the farmers genuinely believe that this is going to destroy their livelihoods’. He believes ‘these new environmental policies are going to make it practically impossible for the younger generation here in the Netherlands to get into farming’.
You can watch the interview here.
In a more recent Rebel News report with Lewis Brackpool he says that the Dutch farmers are not backing down against ‘the authoritarian climate agenda of Prime Minister Mark Rutte’ who they describe as a World Economic Forum insider; and that the farmers’ rebellion is now countrywide, and has brought parts of it to a halt. In the northern town of Drachten, not far from the German border, they watched waves of farm tractors form a convoy along the A7 highway. In Leeuwarden, tractors blockaded government buildings, and farmers tried to confront provincial government officials.
Elsewhere it’s been alleged that that the Dutch minister who pushed the nitrogen law that grants the government the power to expropriate the farmers’ land has a brother whose online supermarket is one in which Bill Gates invested $600million. The Epoch Times reported yesterday that the Dutch Government’s strategy is even more invidious; that the plan is to take the farmers’ land and convert it into housing.
Rutte of course is not the only example of a government’ leveraging ‘climate change concern’ against specific segments of the economy and working people at a time when it will inflict maximum damage. The Western Canadian Wheat Growers have warned that Trudeau’s proposed fertiliser emissions reduction will devastate Canadian prairie farmers, with serious implications for the country’s food security. These also are the heartlands of conservatism in Canada that are targeted.
Whether the Dutch farmers will be the spearhead of what Schoellhammer predicts will be a ‘popular uprising of working-class people against the elites and their values that started with the Canadian Truckers and is crossing the globe’, only time will tell. He says the sympathies of the Dutch are not with their government; they are solidly with their farmers that polls indicate that the Farmers Political Party, formed just three years ago in response to the new regulations, would gain 11 seats in Parliament if elections were held today (it currently holds just one seat out of 150).
The real worry he notes is that the ‘elites are behaving much as they did in Canada and the US, and not just those in government. He points to mainstream media outlets refusing to even report the protests, or when they do, ‘casting the farmers as extremists’; acting as in effect as government mouthpiece.
That, so far, is the problem here too. At the time of writing the main print and broadcast media outlets are still ignoring the Dutch farmers protest – with the honourable exception of guess who but Mark Steyn on GB News.
You can read the full Newsweek article here.
The Administrative State Moves To Show Who’s Boss On Energy Policy
By Francis Menton | Manhattan Contrarian | July 08, 2022
Last Thursday, June 30, the Supreme Court issued its decision in West Virginia v. EPA, holding that, absent a further explicit statute from the Congress, the EPA did not have the authority to orchestrate its planned fundamental restructuring of the electric power generation sector of the economy. More generally, the Supreme Court stated that in cases involving “major questions,” including regulations that affect large portions of the economy, the government must demonstrate “clear congressional authorization” to support a sweeping effort to regulate.
Do you think that such a Supreme Court decision might cause the various regulatory bureaucracies to slow down and reconsider a little before plowing ahead with other dubious plans for fundamental economic restructurings? That’s not how these bureaucracies work. And such is most particularly the case with regard to regulators of the energy sector, sometimes known as “climate change” arena, where the bureaucrats are burning with a righteous religious fervor that they believe entitles them to cast the evil sinners into the fires of hell.
And thus, contemporaneous with the Supreme Court’s decision, several agencies promptly doubled down on efforts to strangle the oil and gas industries with regulatory restrictions, essentially daring the courts or anyone else to stop them. Thousands of pages of statutes give them thousands of arguments to claim they have the “clear congressional authorization,” any one of which arguments might stick. They are now out to show who’s boss.
EPA Administrator Michael Regan wasted no time in getting a statement out on the afternoon of June 30. Excerpt:
[W]e are committed to using the full scope of EPA’s authorities to protect communities and reduce the pollution that is driving climate change. . . . EPA will move forward with lawfully setting and implementing environmental standards that meet our obligation to protect all people and all communities from environmental harm.
In other words, we will just have to find other ways to implement the restrictions that we want to implement. The very next day, July 1, David Blackmon at Forbes reported that “EPA Targets Permian Basin, Widening Biden’s War On Oil And Gas.” The Permian Basin is currently the most productive oil and gas region in the United States, providing about 40% of the oil production and 15% of the gas of the entire country. The Permian Basin is also the site of about 40% of the nation’s active drilling rigs. And so it seems that EPA is gearing up to declare the Permian Basin a so-called “non-attainment area” with respect to ozone. Blackmon:
[T]he Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced [this week that] it may soon issue a ruling declaring that vast parts of the Permian Basin are in “non-attainment” status under the agency’s ozone regulations. If such a declaration is made, it will constitute a direct governmental assault on what is by far America’s most active and productive oil-producing region and its second most-productive natural gas area.
What would be the effect of such a declaration on current and future U.S. domestic oil and gas production? Blackmon again:
Placing the Permian Basin in non-attainment status would force a significant reduction in the region’s rig count, severely limiting the domestic industry’s efforts to increase U.S. oil production at a time when the global oil market is already severely under-supplied.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott promptly called on the Biden Administration to back off, saying that an EPA “non-attainment declaration “could interfere in the production of oil in Texas which could lead to skyrocketing prices at the pump by reducing production, increase the cost of that production, or do both.” But Blackmon notes that the plan comes from an office headed by a Biden-appointed anti-fossil-fuel activist, and thus is likely a core element of the administration’s program:
Mr. Biden appointed Joe Goffman, another of the many anti-fossil fuel activists that now hold senior posts at his various agencies, to head up EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation on an acting basis. That appointment might have been made with this specific policy action in mind.
Meanwhile, over at the Interior Department, July 1 was also the day for issuance of a statutorily-mandated five-year off-shore oil and gas leasing plan. Nicholas Groom at Reuters has a summary here. The bottom line is, we’re going to completely shut down leasing off both the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, but maybe we’ll allow a little in the Gulf of Mexico or the Cook Inlet (Alaska). The number of auctions over the five-year period will be in the range of “zero to eleven,” and supposedly we’ll take public input as to which way to go. But Interior Secretary Deb Haaland in a statement left no doubt as to where she wants and expects this to come out:
“From Day One, President Biden and I have made clear our commitment to transition to a clean energy economy,” Haaland said in a statement. “Today, we put forward an opportunity for the American people to consider and provide input on the future of offshore oil and gas leasing. The time for the public to weigh in on our future is now.”
There is a 90 day period for public comment. You can be sure that environmental activist groups will flood the zone with thousands of comments to support the approach of the “zero” option of ceasing all further off-shore leases.
Other agencies were eerily silent in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s June 30 decision. Notable among those were the SEC and the Federal Reserve, both of which have recently ventured into adding “climate change” to their missions with only the most questionable of statutory support. Neither has given any indication of an intention to slow down.
And then on July 2, President Biden issued his now-famous tweet blaming the rising price of gas at the pump on gas station owners:
My message to the companies running gas stations and setting prices at the pump is simple: this is a time of war and global peril. Bring down the price you are charging at the pump to reflect the cost you’re paying for the product. And do it now.
A bureaucracy-wide campaign is ongoing under this guy’s direction to suppress oil and gas production in any way they can think of, and yet he has the gall to blame high prices on “companies running gas stations,” the majority of which are small independent businesses. At this point Biden has become malicious.
Over 300 Trucks From Kaliningrad Region Queue at Border With Lithuania
Samizdat – 11.07.2022
KALININGRAD, Russia – More than 300 trucks are queuing at the Russian-Lithuanian border attempting to exit the Russian exclave region of Kaliningrad, with another 200 trucks awaiting entry into the region, Kaliningrad customs service said on Monday.
“As of 9 a.m. on July 11, in the past 24 hours employees of Chernyshevskoe checkpoint processed 200 heavy trucks heading to the Republic of Lithuania and 298 trucks arriving to the territory of the Kaliningrad region. Departure from the Russian Federation is expected by 310 vehicles, entry – by 200 trucks,” the custom said.
Kaliningrad trucker drivers complain about spending days in queues, while lacking access to basic necessities.
“People [truck drivers] basically have no food, not everyone can buy it in stores, and you still have to drive to them, not everyone has euros. No toilets, no showers, they just stand in the woods in Lithuania and wait,” one of the truck drivers told Sputnik.
Queues of trucks at the Russian-Lithuanian border in Kaliningrad region at Chernyshevskoye checkpoint appeared in late June and since then their intensity has been escalating. On June 23, 150 trucks were waiting to leave the region, on June 25 their number increased to 250 trucks. Kaliningrad custom service said that the number of trucks allowed out of the region decreased because of the breakdown at Lithuanian customs.
The European Union banned Russia-registered trucks in early April but made an exemption for those transiting to Kaliningrad, which is located on the Baltic Sea coast. The current restrictions on the transit of Russian goods, announced by Lithuania, apply to all transit of goods sanctioned by the EU. Lithuanian Railways notified the Kaliningrad region’s railway of halting the transit of a number of goods subject to EU sanctions on June 18.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russia is considering various options for responding to Lithuania’s “unfriendly” move. Kaliningrad Region Governor Anton Alikhanov said that the restrictions would not affect transit of oil products at least until August 10 and that the region would mobilize its ferry fleet to compensate for railroad cargo cuts.
Justin Trudeau’s opponent would ban ministers from attending WEF
Free West Media | July 10, 2022
Pierre Poilievre, who will be running for the leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada later this year, said at a meeting in Calgary that he would ban ministers from attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Canada’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Chrystia Freeland sits on the WEF’s Supervisory Board. Shadow Minister of Natural Resources Michelle Rempel Garner can also be found on the organisation’s website. She denied in an article that Canada was run by the WEF.
Earlier, WEF chief Klaus Schwab had boasted however that more than half of the Canadian cabinet was made up of Young Global Leaders of the WEF.
Poilievre thus indicated that he wanted to take Canada in a completely different direction. He is planning to take on Trudeau in the next election and defeat him.
“I have made it clear that I will ban my ministers in my cabinet from attending the World Economic Forum if I become prime minister,” he said at an earlier meeting. “Work for Canada. If you want to go to Davos, to that conference, buy a single ticket. You cannot be part of our government and pursue a policy agenda that is not in line with the interests of our people.”
Poilievre is running in the 2022 Conservative Party of Canada leadership election and is considered to be the frontrunner. He has supported those in the Canada convoy protest against vacccine mandates who were protesting peacefully and said the federal government had abused its power by invoking the Emergencies Act during the protest and proposed limiting its power and use to prevent it from being used similarly in the future.
Poilievre demonstrated his support for army reservist James Topp’s anti-mandate protest walk from Vancouver to their planned Canada Day freedom protest on Parliament Hill, by joining Topp, Paul Alexander, Tom Marazzo, a self-declared spokesperson for the Canada convoy protest and an ex-military officer, on June 30, 2022 in the final stage of Topp’s march to Ottawa.
