Left Wing Meltdown Over Trump Withdrawing From Paris Agreement Is “A Priesthood Defending Its Religion”

The headline quote is from Tucker Carlson’s monologue last night on Trump’s decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris climate agreement. I thought he made some excellent points about some of the hysteria surrounding the decision.

The truth is that the agreement was a voluntary, non-binding pact (one never ratified by the U.S. Senate) which even some of its most ardent proponents admit will likely do very little to change the trajectory of climate change even if all signatories adhere to it scrupulously. Which, given the history of even binding international pacts, seemed an unlikely outcome.

Carlson has a helpful montage of overwrought media reactions in his segment to illustrate his point:

As I’ve observed the various activists and talking heads reacting to Trump’s decision – Democrat mega donor Tom Steyer has literally called him a traitor – I’ve been struck by how much of the scorn and derision seems rooted not so much in the practical outcomes the policy might have achieved but in the spectacle of the United States dissenting, in an official way, from the cult of environmentalism.

Trump isn’t being treated as a political leader who made what some consider to be a bad policy decision. He’s being treated as a heretic, an apostate, to what has become one of the most popular global religions.

We’re not supposed to debate climate change policy any more. We’re supposed to accept it as an act of faith as though the proponents of the policy have some divine right to govern as they please without objection.

It seems to me that this country once fought a revolution over that sort of thing. Trump said in his speech that he was elected to represent Pittsburgh not Paris, which was a great line even if the Mayor of Pittsburgh disagrees.

The truth is that Trump’s decision will likely change very little. “Despite Paris Accord Exit, Companies Expect Little Change,” the Wall Street Journal reports this morning.

There are echoes of that here in North Dakota. “North Dakota Coal Industry Not Backing off Carbon Capture,” the Associated Press reported after news of Trump’s withdrawal from the agreement broke.

The importance of the Paris agreement has, like so many of the claims we see from the environmentalists movement, been embellished and exaggerated. Trump’s bluster about how draconian this deal was for American business was, because of the voluntary nature of the pact, largely imaginary. But on that same note, so too are the dire predictions about the consequences of withdrawing from the agreement from Trump’s critics.

I’m glad Trump withdrew our country from the agreement, if for no other reason than to undermine and marginalize the global Cult of Green.