{"id":19119,"date":"2013-10-10T12:23:13","date_gmt":"2013-10-10T16:23:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/?p=19119"},"modified":"2013-10-10T12:26:26","modified_gmt":"2013-10-10T16:26:26","slug":"the-los-angeles-times-opinion-page-bars-opinions-about-climate-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/19119\/the-los-angeles-times-opinion-page-bars-opinions-about-climate-change\/","title":{"rendered":"The Los Angeles Times Opinion Page Bars Opinions About Climate Change"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a chilling decision to silence discussion about climate change, the Los Angeles Times<\/em> opinion page announced<\/a> that letters to the editor that \u201cdeny global warming,\u201d imply that \u201cclimate change is a hoax,\u201d claim global warming is \u201ca scheme by liberals to curtail personal freedom,\u201d or dispute that \u201cthat human activity is indeed linked to climate change\u201d are banned from its pages<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The choice by the hysterically hyper-environmentalist loons that run the LA Times<\/em> opinion pages to restrict sincere debate and differences of opinion from a forum that is intended to challenge readers\u2019 views is equal parts depressing, disgusting and alarming.<\/p>\n

The LA Times<\/em> opinion page points out<\/a> that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recently claimed \u201cit was was 95 percent certain that we fossil-fuel-burning humans are driving global warming.\u201d The problems with that statement are numerous. For one, that nagging 5 percent of doubt should be enough to keep the channels of discussion and debate open. Also, there remains a significant minority of members of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change who disagree with the assertion that humans alter the Earth\u2019s climate. Many others debate the extent to which human action is responsible for changes in the climate. \u00a0In the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change\u2019s majority rule structure, their voices are powerless.<\/p>\n

Even if there were indisputable proof that human actions directly cause climate change, there would be the question of \u201chow much?.\u201d Solar activity appears to play a much larger role<\/a> in climate change than humans ever could \u2013 and we can\u2019t do anything about that.<\/p>\n

That means the real debate should be: \u201cIf humans play a minute role in climate change, what reactions are actually justified?\u201d<\/p>\n

If human activity causes temperatures to rise or fall a tiny fraction of a degree over some long period of time, should we prevent developing countries from rising out of poverty? Should we stand in the way of economic growth that would lead to greater global stability, improved health and educational outcomes, and increased longevity? Should the poorest people in the world be left without food, medicines and clean drinking water in the name of stopping them from producing CO2?<\/p>\n

Those are serious questions that must be raised, considered and debated in years to come. Sadly, it appears the LA Times<\/em> is more than happy to keep such discussions out of its pages.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In a chilling decision to silence discussion about climate change, the Los Angeles Times opinion page announced that letters to the editor that \u201cdeny global warming,\u201d imply that \u201cclimate change is a hoax,\u201d claim global warming is \u201ca scheme by liberals to curtail personal freedom,\u201d or dispute that \u201cthat human activity is indeed linked to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[26,205,4320,4319],"class_list":["post-19119","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-posts","tag-climate-change","tag-global-warming","tag-intergovernmental-panel-on-climate-change","tag-los-angeles-times"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19119","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19119"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19119\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19121,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19119\/revisions\/19121"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19119"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19119"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19119"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}