Here's Why We're All Doomed!

I don’t want to unduly alarm anybody, but our civilization is totally doomed.

And it’s all because of fossil-fueled climate change.

Any day now, rising world temperatures (or is it lowering world temperatures?) will wreak havoc on the planet and turn our society into something resembling the latest Mad Max movie.

Yes, I realize some still don’t believe climate change is real, but when it comes to the complicated science of predicting future global climate patterns, I, for one, totally believe what the experts say, and by experts I mean, of course, Hollywood celebrities.

If Kermit the Frog says climate change is a threat to humanity, that’s good enough for me.

Anyway, the reason for my pessimism is because we’re told time and time again that the only thing that can stop the impending environmental Armageddon is government.

Government? Really?

I don’t know about you, but I don’t trust government to deliver my mail, so how am I supposed to have confidence it can somehow stop global climate change?

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying government is totally incompetent. Indeed, government can perform some functions exceedingly well, such as putting people in jail and waging wars and ... well actually those are the only two things that come to mind.

At any rate, my point is, relying on government for our salvation, isn’t much of a hope.

Certainly the Canadian government’s record when it comes to fighting climate change isn’t all that great.

Recall, that former Prime Minister Jean Chretien’s scheme to save the planet mainly involved paying lots of money to CBC comedian Rick Mercer, whose job was to appear on TV ads and nag us into joining “The One-Tonne Challenge.”

Unfortunately that campaign turned out to be a One-Tonne Flop, mainly I suspect because the Canadian government didn’t know how to spell the word “ton.”

Of course, our current prime minister is Justin Trudeau, and his number three priority (after selfies and photo ops) is to stop climate change in its tracks.

Yet, I’m dubious he can make much of a difference.

After all, so far Trudeau’s big environmental idea is to impose a tax on carbon. Oops, silly me, it’s not a carbon “tax”, but a carbon “price.”

But whether it’s called a “tax” or “price”, the idea is to make gas and heating oil and electricity more expensive, which the government says will provide it with the revenue needed to pay for important green initiatives, such as funding Trudeau’s trips to exotic foreign locations where he can urge capitalists not to invest in Alberta.

The major problem with this plan is no one really knows where to set the carbon price.

As a result, this policy is less like economics and more like a TV game show --The Carbon Price is Right.

If contestants make the carbon price too low, Leonard DiCaprio will cry; if they make it too high, taxpayers will.

I also don’t have much faith in Trudeau’s other idea, which is to offer government subsidies to “green” industries.

Sure, I get the concept in theory: government-subsidized companies will invent something amazingly innovative and environmentally friendly, such as machines that run on the warmth generated by Trudeau’s “Sunny ways”.

Yet, the sad truth of economics is that companies which rely on government handouts are usually only good at innovating one thing: new ways to get government hand outs.

So you see, for all our sakes we better hope the climate change alarmists are wrong or else we’ve had it.

It’s not that I’m not a “climate change denier” so much as I’m a “government competence denier.”