Steamboat Pilot & Today

Steamboat Springs — It is often said that "unlimited power is apt to corrupt the minds of those who possess it."

As one looks back over history, it is hard not to suggest a corollary: "The corrupted seek power." There are clearly too many examples to enumerate without running the risk of omitting the reader's favorites, so I will center my discussion around the myth started by Eugene P. Odom in the 1953 edition of his book "Ecology" that the greenhouse gasses created by the Industrial Revolution (i.e., man) would bring about the demise of the Earth in 10 short years.

In spite of the fact that we have not only survived but prospered over the past five "apocalyptic" decades, junk science, funded and perpetuated by your tax dollars, together with a total suppression of conflicting views that have emanated from an examination of the data at hand, have fostered a tsunami of misinformation designed to (1) expand and instill what I refer to as "the guilt of prosperity" and (2) establish an elite oligarchy of leftists by bureaucratic and judicial fiat who could never gain power from the ballot box.

Scientific evidence indicates the Earth has gone through warming and cooling cycles throughout its existence with the most logical cause being the changes in our sun's radiation. While our ability to measure the average temperatures of Earth and Mars is a recent development and limited, the data we do have suggests that Mars seems to be warming in direct proportion to the warming on Earth.

And, guess what folks? To date, we have not been able to put a "greenhouse gassing man" on Mars. This leaves the sun as the common denominator. Do you remember the global cooling scare, the inspiration for the first Earth Day (also said to be caused by fossil fuels, a theory championed by the same folks who have now completely reversed themselves to say fossil fuels cause global warming), the Minamata Bay mercury scare, the Alar apple scare, the heterosexual AIDS epidemic scare, the millennium computer crash scare, the we are going to bury the planet in trash and run out of sand and glass recycling scare, etc., etc., and etc.

The concept of "Indulgences" is often misunderstood, but it is really a quite simple method of monetizing sin and, more accurately, a way of taxing it. To wit, a sinner must not only confess his sins, he must pay for them. In order for an individual to demonstrate repentance, the concept of "temporal punishment" was invented. The sin would not be expiated until the sinner had done some "good works," such as feeding the poor or caring for the sick. In lieu of these good works, however, individual bishops could sell indulgences to pay off any temporal punishment obligation accumulated by the individual sinner.

Thus, for the leftist elite to promulgate their socialistic goals, they must get the masses to accept and seek absolution of their collective guilt - in this instance, the dastardly consequences of their prosperity. They must also shut off and squelch all dissenting views. They must accomplish by deceit what they cannot do at the ballot box. By way of example, Al Gore, Michael Moore, John Kerry and their ilk are trying to effectively establish the right and authority of the environmental elite to collect "environmental indulgences" by purchasing "greenhouse gas offsets." They justify their continued opulent lifestyles, which include multiple mansions, SUVs, private jets, etc., by making tax-deductible payments to the self-anointed fourth branch of government.

Yes, power does corrupt, but more importantly, it seems that corrupt people seek power.

Paul Epley is a longtime Routt County conservative activist, holds a PhD in biology from the University of Southern California, and is a director of the Conservative Leadership Council of Northwest Colorado.