Poor Giles Coren. The London Times restaurant critic has his proverbial knickers in a twist over all those global warming jokes he has to endure. I don’t blame him. There are a lot of insufferable jokes out there, including mine.
Of course, Coren is referring to witticisms created by dolts who can’t tell the difference between climate and weather. You know the kind – “Hey, Goreacle, where’s you warming when it’s forty below and Minnesota’s being invaded by randy polar bears?” And in case you don’t know who’s telling these execrable jokes – and, more importantly, being such a moron as to confuse such highly technical terms as climate and weather – Coren makes it explicit:
I appreciate how enjoyable it is for middle-aged rightwingers, who think that climate change (along with racial prejudice, gender inequality and Aids) is a lefty invention by softies on Camden Council, to make a mockery of it every time there is any sort of weather at all, but it is driving me absolutely insane.
Well, he’s got me there, at least some of the way. I am middle-aged. As for the rest of the bigoted bilge he’s spewing, it may interest Coren to know (assuming he’s picking this up on Google Alerts) that I am an ex-civil rights worker, am pro-gay marriage, believe Aids is a serious matter to which we should donate tons of money and…. think anyone who still believes anthropogenic global warming is anything near settled science is a BLOOMIN’ IDIOT (caps because Coren is addicted to them in his own column – a sign the author is a tad insecure about his message).
Even regarding Coren’s tedious differentiation between climate and weather (yes, yes, we’ve heard this), it seems the restaurant critic missed one of the key emails in the ClimateGate scandal from Kevin Trenberth, head of the Climate Analysis Section at the National Center for Atmospheric Research: “The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t.”
But never mind. There must be another meaning for “travesty.” [Wasn’t that a Stoppard play?-ed] Anyway, moving along to the real story (money), the invaluable Watts Up With That has been covering the revelations surrounding UN IPCC Chief Rajendra Pachauri that were originally made public by Christopher Booker and Dr. Richard North of EU Referendum.
What has also almost entirely escaped attention, however, is how Dr Pachauri has established an astonishing worldwide portfolio of business interests with bodies which have been investing billions of dollars in organisations dependent on the IPCC’s policy recommendations.
These outfits include banks, oil and energy companies and investment funds heavily involved in ‘carbon trading’ and ‘sustainable technologies’, which together make up the fastest-growing commodity market in the world, estimated soon to be worth trillions of dollars a year.
The fastest growing commodity market in the world? Why didn’t my broker tell me? Meanwhile it appears the Pachauri story is metastasizing back in India. From India Today:
During his tenure, first as director from 1982, and then as director-general of The Energy Research Institute (TERI) since 2001, Pachauri was a member of the boards of the Oil and Natural Gas Commission (ONGC), Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC), three of India’s biggest public sector energy companies, all of whom by the very nature of their business contribute heavily to greenhouse gas emissions. These emissions, according to the IPCC, are adding to the country’s growing carbon footprint and hastening climate change.
TERI, in fact, entered into business dealings with these companies and allegedly benefitted from Pachauri’s association with them.
Or, as Watts Up With That puts it so succinctly, “Follow the money, not the temperature.” Your turn, Mr. Coren.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member