Have I mentioned that I take requests? If you email
me, or leave
a comment asking for my take on a certain subject, there’s a very good chance
I’ll do as asked. And so: Anne wants to know what I think of Czech president
Vaclav Klaus’s editorial
in the FT, which Henry
Farrell describes as an attempt "to figure out how many denialist cliches
can be squeezed into a single 700 word op-ed".
Part of my problem with Klaus’s piece is that I honestly have no idea what
he’s talking about, much of the time. "Small climate changes do not demand
far-reaching restrictive measures," he writes. "Any suppression of
freedom and democracy should be avoided." Um, no disagreement there. But
what "restrictive measures" and "suppression of freedom and democracy,"
exactly, does he have in mind? We might learn more on Thursday, when Klaus will
respond to FT readers in a Q&A. But for the time being, I think we have
to assume that Klaus is simply performing the classic politician’s trick of
Blaming The Other – in this case, European technocrats who would slow
down his country’s economic growth in the name of preventing a global environmental
catastrophe.
There’s really no argument in Klaus’s piece, so it’s hard to argue against
it. I mean, how does one sensibly respond to a writer who can write this?
In the past year, Al Gore’s so-called “documentary” film
was shown in cinemas worldwide, Britain’s – more or less Tony
Blair’s – Stern report was published, the fourth report of the
United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was put together
and the Group of Eight summit announced ambitions to do something about the
weather. Rational and freedom-loving people have to respond.
The fact, of course, is that Al Gore, and Tony Blair, and Nick Stern, and the
scientists at the IPCC, and the politicians at the G8, are all very much "rational
and freedom-loving people". And frankly, the only way for rational and
freedom-loving people to respond to the IPCC reports and everything else is
by trying their darndest to minimise greenhouse-gas emissions. Because if they
don’t, they’ll find billions of environmental refugees swarming to the few places
on the planet which will still be inhabitable – places, I might add, like
the USA and the Czech Republic.
The fact is that the Czech Republic, of all countries, probably has more upside
than downside from at least the next degree or two of global warming. Its agriculture
will become more fertile, its winters will become milder, and overall it will
become a more attractive place to live. After that, when everything starts going
horribly pear-shaped, Vaclav Klaus, who’s turning 66 next week, will probably
be in no position to care.