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“Distasteful Masterclass In Hypocrisy”: Elites Swarm Davos In Private Jets To Discuss Climate Crisis

January 16, 2023

“Distasteful Masterclass In Hypocrisy”: Elites Swarm Davos In Private Jets To Discuss Climate Crisis

The annual conference of the World Economic Forum begins today in Davos, Switzerland. Global elites landed in luxurious private jets over the last few days in airports around Davos to discuss important global challenges, such as climate change, behind closed doors.

“The rich and powerful are swarming to Davos to discuss climate and inequality behind closed doors using the most unequal and polluting form of transport: private jets,” Klara Maria Schenk, transport campaigner for Greenpeace’s European mobility campaign, told news website Politics.co.uk.

Greenpeace International published a new report that showed 1,040 private jets flew in and out of airports around Davos for last year’s meeting, causing CO2 emissions from private jets to increase four times more versus a weekly average.

“Given that 80% of the world’s population has never even flown, but suffers from the consequences of climate-damaging aviation emissions, and that the WEF claims to be committed to the 1.5°C Paris Climate Target, this annual private jet bonanza is a distasteful masterclass in hypocrisy. Private jets must be consigned to history if we are to have a green, just and safe future for all. So-called world leaders must lead by example and ban private jets and useless short-haul flights,” added Schenk.

WEF hopes to tackle what they believe is a climate crisis plaguing the world despite most attendees arriving by private jets, which are the most polluting mode of transport per passenger

And motorcades of WEF attendees were spotted in gas-guzzling SUVs and high-end sedans.

Meanwhile, climate protesters spent Monday morning blocking at least one airport used by the super-rich.

…click on the above link to read the rest…

Imperialism Of The Apocalypse

November 14, 2022

Imperialism Of The Apocalypse

Rich people are depriving poor people of cheap energy in the name of climate change. Why?

Clockwise from upper-left: Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sussex; Jennifer Lawrence; Prince Harry; Leonardo DiCaprio. Center: Pakistani boy with woodfuel for cooking (Getty Images)

Few appear to care about climate change more than global celebrities. In 2019, Leonardo DiCaprio told the U.N., “Climate Change is our single greatest security threat.” Late last year, DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence starred in the Hollywood climate disaster movie, “Don’t Look Up.” Said Lawrence, “You’re watching these hurricanes now and it’s hard, especially while promoting this movie, not to feel Mother Nature’s rage or wrath.” In a United Nations speech earlier this year, Prince Harry said “Climate change is wreaking havoc on our planet, with the most vulnerable suffering most of all.” All have urged individuals and nations to radically reduce their carbon emissions.

And yet global celebrities are, along with global political leaders, the planet’s biggest climate hypocrites. DiCaprio, Lawrence, Harry, and Meghan have been flying on private jets, partying on gas-guzzling yachts, and riding jet skis for years. Already 400 private jets, which are five to 14 times more polluting than commercial flights, have arrived in Egypt for United Nations annual climate talks. Last year, 40,000 people flew to Scotland, many on private jets, for climate talks, generating an estimated 102,000 tons of carbon dioxide, the equivalent of burning 237,000 barrels of oil. After they arrived, they were treated to a video of a talking CGI dinosaur, voiced over by Jack Black, urging African nations to not use fossil fuels.

It’s true that celebrities have promised to do better. DiCaprio flew commercial to climate talks last year. Meghan and Harry flew commercial back to London last year. Lawrence flew commercial after her private plane nearly crashed. And most of the 30,000 participants in this year’s climate talks will arrive in commercial airplanes.

…click on the above link to read the rest…

Still More Green Hypocrisy In the EU, This Time Hydrogen

July 11, 2021

Still More Green Hypocrisy In the EU, This Time Hydrogen

Let’s discuss the meaning of “Green” EU style.

Hooray More Green Energy!

The EU is cheering a new hydrogen project at a refinery in Germany.

The plant will be built by Shell and ITM power and will be able to produce about 1,300 tonnes of hydrogen per year, which can be fully integrated into the refinery processes, such as for the desulphurisation of conventional fuels. It will be the world’s largest hydrogen electrolyser.

Tudor Constantinescu, Principal Advisor, DG ENER at the European Commission stressed the the contribution of green hydrogen to the Energy Union objectives, saying: “Renewable electricity can support decarbonisation not only of the power sector, but, through sectoral integration also of other carbon intensive industries, such as refining. Green Hydrogen is a key enabler in this process, contributing to the Energy Union objectives both in terms of emissions reductions and increased renewables share.“

Ten Times the Hydrogen, Ten Times the Cost?

Euractive has some interesting details of the undertaking, allegedly Set to Multiply Capacity tenfold by 2024.

The 10 MW electrolyser, while already Europe’s largest of its kind, is a pilot project for grander ambitions.

If the pilot works out well, the partnership around Shell wants to add another 100 MW of electrolysis capacity which would complete construction in 2024. That would then be the largest electrolyser in the world.

Yet the pilot project depended on financing by the FCH JU at a 50% rate, meaning that the business case for a project ten times larger without public funding would be questionable at best.

Whether those ambitions come to fruition will therefore depend on the carbon price and the amount of additional funding available, which could come from either the EU or Germany.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Peter Schiff: Political Hypocrisy Provides Cover for Fed on Inflation

June 28, 2021

Peter Schiff: Political Hypocrisy Provides Cover for Fed on Inflation

From 2016 to 2020, Republicans were constantly trying to play up the economy. You’ll recall Donald Trump claiming it was the greatest economy in history. Meanwhile, Democrats were trying to play it down. Now, the roles have reversed. Since the Democrats own the economy now, they’re talking about how great the recovery is while Republicans are sounding warnings. As Peter Schiff explained in his podcast, this political hypocrisy is letting the real culprit get away without blame.

We saw this political hypocrisy on display during Jerome Powell’s recent testimony before the House Select Committee on COVID-19. The Democrats on the committee took the opportunity to grandstand about how great the economy is doing. As Peter put it, “They own the economy and they want to pretend that everything is great.” Their questions and statements focused on what a good job Powell is doing.

It’s interesting in that the Democrats are the ones that are trying to play down the inflation fears. They’re the ones that are trying to agree with Powell and reiterate the fact that everything is transitory and so we’ve got nothing to worry about.”

The Democrats don’t want to admit there is an inflation problem because that would be a blemish on this otherwise wonderful economy.

Meanwhile, the Republicans are pushing Powell on inflation and talking about it as a tax. But they’re not blaming Powell or the Fed. They’re placing the blame on Biden and the Democrats’ spending.

They’re not even really trying to blame the Fed for all the money printing. They’re just blaming Biden for all the money spending. But of course, Biden couldn’t be spending any money if the Fed wasn’t printing it…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Credibility from Apparent Hypocrisy

June 9, 2021

Credibility from Apparent Hypocrisy

Flip the script! Image by Gerhard G. from Pixabay

Purveyors of unpopular messages are often scrutinized for any inconsistent, seemingly hypocritical behavior that might give lie to their preachings and be used to discredit the unwelcome perspective. A famous example is Al Gore’s heavy air travel schedule to spread the word and take action against climate change, resulting in an enormous CO₂ footprint. If we all behaved that way, the very problem at hand would be substantially exacerbated.

Such accusations either knowingly or pathetically miss the obvious point that the net effect of Al Gore’s efforts may be positive owing to the simple idea of a lever: a little expenditure here can counteract vast expenditures elsewhere for an overall gain on the problem. For many, the glaring superficial contradiction is enough ammunition to discredit the entire enterprise.

But identifying possible hypocrisy in those who warn of future perils, as I have done, has a dark edge: if even those cognizant individuals cannot get away from behaviors they know to be damaging, doesn’t that only amplify the severity of the warning?

This is the part where I confess various behaviors that would seem to be inconsistent with my writings. It is true that my energy and resource footprints are far below the U.S. average—in electricity, methane, gasoline, food, and consumerism. I re-evaluated my footprint in comparison to average Americans in Chapter 20 of my textbook, confirming a factor-of-several reduction in most categories.

So I can perhaps justify some sense of credibility in putting my money where my mouth is. Or more accurately, I refrain from putting money places in accordance to what comes out of my mouth (and fingers). It can be hard to separate ecological responsibility from just being a cheapskate.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Incorrigible Hypocrisy of Conservatives

April 2, 2019

The Incorrigible Hypocrisy of Conservatives

Last week a Wall Street Journal editorial revealed the incorrigible hypocrisy with which conservatives have long suffered. Conservatives, of course, have long suffered this malady with respect to domestic policy given their ardent devotion to Social Security, Medicare, foreign aid, and other welfare-state programs even while decrying the left’s devotion to socialism. But this particular WSJ editorial revealed the incorrigible conservative hypocrisy with respect to foreign policy.

The editorial was entitled “Putin Pulls a Syria in Venezuela.” The opening sentence is comical: “Vladimir Putin has made a career of intervening abroad and seeing if the world lets him get away with it.”

Why is that sentence funny? Because it also describes ever single U.S. president for the last 100 years! Every president from Woodrow Wilson through today has made a career of intervening abroad and seeing if the world lets him get away with it. Indeed, the central feature of the U.S. government for the last 100 years has been and continues to be empire and foreign interventionism.

Clearly, conservatives do not see anything wrong with foreign interventionism as long as the interventionists are wearing an American flag on their sleeves and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance every morning. They obviously consider foreign interventionism to be bad only when those pesky Russkies (of Russia-Trump conspiracy fame) do it.

Another humorous aspect to the editorial is the verbiage that the Journal’s editorial writer uses to condemn Putin’s interventionism. The editorial condemns Putin for extending his interventionism in Syria to Venezuela.

Why is that point humorous? Because the U.S. government, with the full support of conservatives, has also been intervening in both Syria and Venezuela! Thus, the Journal could just as easily have stated that “Putin pulls a U.S. in Syria and Venezuela,” except, well, for one thing: The regimes in both countries invited Russia into their countries.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Sanctions and the Hypocrisy of Washington and London

October 31, 2018

Sanctions and the Hypocrisy of Washington and London

On March 4 this year a British spy and former Russian citizen, Sergei Skripal, was poisoned in the town of Salisbury, England. He recovered, as did his daughter who had also been affected, and is now in deep security with a new face and name and an increase to his already generous British salary. The toxin involved was a nerve agent usually referred to as Novichok. The British government immediately blamed the Russian government for the incident and ten days after it took place the BBC reported that the British prime minister had expelled 23 Russian diplomats which she described as “actions to dismantle the Russian espionage network in the UK.”

It is notable that it took only ten days for the British government to decide to take action against Russia, in spite of there being no proof whatever that the Russian government was involved in the toxin-induced collapse of Skripal. And London didn’t only expel diplomats, it cancelled all high-level bilateral contacts with Russia and froze “Russian state assets where there is evidence that they may be used to threaten the life or property of UK nationals or residents.”

Then Washington joined in, expelling 60 diplomats, and Reuters reported that “US sanctions against Russia tied to a nerve agent attack in Britain” would add “to the array of economic penalties it has imposed on Moscow in recent years.”

The definition of “sanction” is generally accepted as being “an economic or military coercive measure adopted usually by several nations in concert for forcing a nation violating international law to desist or yield to adjudication” (Merriam Webster), or in the same vein, but with slightly different emphasis, “measures taken by a state to coerce another to conform to an international agreement or norms of conduct” (Oxford).

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Brutally Honest: Facebook Removes then Restores Images from Yemen

October 27, 2018

Brutally Honest: Facebook Removes then Restores Images from Yemen

A couple of questions describe the problem with censorship: Who controls the censors? What biases do they have?

Please consider Photo of a Starving Girl in Yemen Prompts Facebook to Remove Posts of Article.

For a few hours after The New York Times published an article about conflict and hunger in Yemen, Facebook temporarily removed posts from readers who had tried to share the report on the social platform.

At issue was a photograph of a starving child.

The article included several images of emaciated children. Some were crying. Some were listless. One, a 7-year-old girl named Amal, was shown gazing to the side, with flesh so paper-thin that her collarbone and rib cage were plainly visible. Tens of thousands of readers shared the article on Facebook, but some got a message notifying them that the post was not in line with Facebook’s community standards.

Facebook had addressed the issue by Friday night.

“As our community standards explain, we don’t allow nude images of children on Facebook, but we know this is an important image of global significance,” a spokeswoman said in an emailed statement. “We’re restoring the posts we removed on this basis.”

It took Facebook a few hours to realize it made a mistake in removing brutally honest images of the effects of the civil war in Yemen.

The images expose the blatant hypocrisy of the US in backing the corrupt Saudi Arabia regime in its war in Yemen.

This was not a nude image. It is not a “community standards” image. Nor was there any doubt about the authenticity of the image.

Any censor can judge “community standards” however they want, but Facebook is an international phenom, not Podunk USA.

Facebook could have and should have said “we f*ed up yet again” but never expect that.

Rather than rejecting that image, Facebook should have promoted it.

Instead, we had temporary censorship. Next time it might not be temporary.

Skripal and Khashoggi: West Manufactures Absurd Fantasy to Pin on Russia, Lets Saudi Get Away With Chopping up WaPo Journalist Alive

October 20, 2018

Two disappearances, and two very different responses from Western governments, which illustrates their rank hypocrisy.

When former Russian spy Sergei Skripal went missing in England earlier this year, there was almost immediate punitive action by the British government and its NATO allies against Moscow. By contrast, Western governments are straining with restraint towards Saudi Arabia over the more shocking and provable case of murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

The outcry by Western governments and media over the Skripal affair was deafening and resulted in Britain, the US and some 28 other countries expelling dozens of Russian diplomats on the back of unsubstantiated British allegations that the Kremlin tried to assassinate an exiled spy with a deadly nerve agent. The Trump administration has further tightened sanctions citing the Skripal incident.

London’s case against Moscow has been marked by wild speculation and ropey innuendo. No verifiable evidence of what actually happened to Sergei Skripal (67) and his daughter Yulia has been presented by the British authorities. Their claim that President Vladimir Putin sanctioned a hit squad armed with nerve poison relies on sheer conjecture.

All we know for sure is that the Skripals have been disappeared from public contact by the British authorities for more than seven months, since the mysterious incident of alleged poisoning in Salisbury on March 4.

Russian authorities and family relatives have been steadfastly refused any contact by London with the Skripal pair, despite more than 60 official requests from Moscow in accordance with international law and in spite of the fact that Yulia is a citizen of the Russian Federation with consular rights.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Be Skeptical Whenever The Political/Media Class Converges On A Single Narrative

October 19, 2018

Be Skeptical Whenever The Political/Media Class Converges On A Single Narrative

The Trump administration has ended its weeks-long silence on the disappearance of the Saudi Arabian Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Following a briefing from Secretary of State Pompeo who has just returned from a visit to Riyadh and Ankara, the president has said that contrary to some hopeful speculation that had emerged early on after his disappearance, Khashoggi does indeed appear to have been killed at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. If it is determined that the Saudis were responsible, Trump warned that there will be “very severe” consequences. Secretary of the Treasury Steve Mnuchin has announced that he will not be attending the Future Investment Initiative summit in Riyadh next week.

I’ve been following this story with some interest, but I haven’t been writing about it until now. This is one of those rare stories that has drawn the focus of both mainstream and alternative media, the latter because it’s seen as an opportunity to criticize the west’s extremely immoral involvement in the depraved activities of a murderous theocracy, and because it’s an opportunity to attack the hypocrisy of the establishment in decrying the murder of a single man while ignoring Saudi Arabia’s far more unconscionable behavior like its war crimes in Yemen and facilitation of bloodshed in Syria. Killing one man is very, very far from the top of the list of the most horrific things Saudi Arabia has done; criticizing them for that is like criticizing Henry Kissinger for not tipping well at restaurants.

The dominant anti-establishment criticism of the mainstream coverage of this story has been that they’re only upset at the Saudi royals now because their bloodshed finally touched a member of the political/media class, who are meant to be untouchable. And hey, that could be it, who knows.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Last History of the United States

October 19, 2018

The Last History of the United States

Photo Source Boston Public Library | CC BY 2.0

The words “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal…”, from America’s Declaration of Independence, stands as one of the finest historical examples of what Hitler, and later Goebbels, called the big lie. Hitler wrote in Mein Kamf (1925) “that in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily…” In Jill Lepore’s These Truths– A History of the United States (2018), she painstakingly exposes the truth that America is founded on hypocrisy.

The greatest fear of the Founding Fathers was democracy. Their intent was to establish a white aristocracy of wealth largely based on the productivity of African slaves. Lepore shows that they succeeded beyond their wildest dreams of avarice and power. She shows that big lies and little lies have subsequently sustained the illusion of democracy in the United States and the façade of inclusivity and freedom it presents to the world. The nation’s underlying hypocrisy is rarely challenged; instead, political factions compete to demonstrate (or at least propagandize) their fealty to its foundational “truths”. Along the way, the means of communication, from broadsheet to newspaper, radio, TV, computers and now the internet have serially compounded the ability of partisans to disseminate their truths – to propogandize more effectively.

The narrative she weaves, over almost 800 pages, is more requiem than history – the ship of state, in her telling, now wallows adrift on a rising ocean bereft of a mainsail.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Ban Saudi Oil

October 12, 2018

Ban Saudi Oil

Alfred Eisenstaedt Egyptian Fishing Boats. Suez Canal near Port Said 1935

According to Middle East Eye, Richard Branson, Andrew Ross Sorkin, Economist editor-In-chief Zanny Minton Beddoes, World Bank president Jim Yong Kim, New York Times, Financial Times, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshah, Viacom CEO Bob Bakish and AOL founder Steve Case have all withdrawn from Saudi Arabia’s Future Investment Initiative conference, to be held this month in Riyadh. Branson also put a $1 billion investment plan on hold.

Also, on Wednesday, former US energy secretary Ernest Moniz said that he had suspended his role on the board of Saudi Arabia’s planned mega business zone NEOM, to which he was named on Tuesday. The Harbour Group, a Washington firm that has been advising Saudi Arabia since April 2017, ended its $80,000 a month contract on Thursday. JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon is still scheduled to speak at the conference, as is Mastercard CEO Ajay Banga, but they won’t risk the damage to their reputations.

All this is due, obviously, to the disappearance of Jamal Khashoggi, a former close aquaintance of the Saud family, who moved to the US and wrote for the Washington Post (how’s Amazon’s Saudi business, Jeff Bezos?) after falling out with the House of Saud.

As the what someone actually labeled “unfolding diplomatic crisis” takes shape, there is really only one thing to say about these people and organizations: they the worst group of hypocrites ever. And their reasons to boycott the conference must be questioned.

Because before Khashoggi vanished they all apparently though it was quite okay to go feed at the Saud trough, despite the still ongoing slaughter of millions of people in the ‘war’ in Yemen. Which makes one suspect it’s not so much about their principles but about their public image.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

US Trade Policy: Not Only are We Stupid, We are Hypocrites

August 4, 2018

US Trade Policy: Not Only are We Stupid, We are Hypocrites

The news agencies reported Trump would extend tariffs on Wednesday. Instead, we have an outline of possible actions.

The Wall Street Journal reports U.S. Turns Up the Heat on China.

The U.S. turned up the heat Wednesday on China, with the Trump administration threatening to more than double proposed tariffs on imports while Congress passed a defense bill designed to restrict Beijing’s economic and military activity.

The moves come as Beijing and Washington have failed to ease an escalating trade dispute, prompting the administration to seek additional leverage. The administration, which has already affixed tariffs on billions of dollars in Chinese imports, said it would consider more than doubling proposed tariffs on a further $200 billion worth of Chinese goods to 25%, up from an original 10%.

Meantime, the Senate approved a defense-policy bill that both tightens U.S. national-security reviews of Chinese corporate deals and revamps export controls over which U.S. technologies can be sent abroad. The bill, which also restricts Beijing in areas ranging from cultural activity to military exercises, passed the House a week earlier and President Trump is expected to sign it into law.

Administration officials are confident they have the upper hand in the trade fight because the U.S. economy is strengthening while the Chinese economy shows signs of growing slack. Moreover, China is more dependent on trade than the U.S.

But that confidence so far hasn’t translated into action.

President Trump has threatened to apply tariffs to all $505 billion in Chinese goods entering the U.S. if the two are unable to reach a settlement. Washington has already applied tariffs to $34 billion worth of Chinese imports, with another set of duties on $16 billion in goods scheduled in the days ahead.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

When Dealing with a Bear, Hubris Is Suicidal

March 16, 2018

When Dealing with a Bear, Hubris Is Suicidal

Assuming mankind finds a way not to destroy itself in the near future and assuming that there will still be historians in the 22nd or 23rd centuries, I bet you that they will look at the AngloZionist Empire and see the four following characteristics as some of its core features: lies, willful ignorance, hypocrisy, and hysterics. To illustrate my point I will use the recent “Skripal nerve-gas assassination” story as it really encompasses all of these characteristics.

I won’t even bother debunking the official nonsense here as others have done a very good job of pointing out the idiocy of that narrative. If you are truly capable of believing that “Putin” (that is the current collective designator for the Evil Empire of Mordor threatening all of western civilization) would order the murder of a man whom a Russian military court sentenced to only 13 years in jail (as opposed to life or death) and who was subsequently released as part of a swap with the USA, you can stop reading right now and go back to watching TV. I personally have neither the energy nor the inclination to even discuss such a self-evidently absurd theory. No, what I do want to do is use this story as a perfect illustration of the kind of society we now all live in looked at from a moral point of view. I realize that we live in a largely value-free society where moral norms have been replaced by ideological orthodoxy, but that is just one more reason for me to write about what is taking place precisely focusing on the moral dimensions of current events.

Lies and the unapologetic denial of reality:

In a 2015 article entitled “A society of sexually frustrated Pinocchios” I wrote the following:

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Assange Lashes Out: “Hypocritical Motherf*ckers… Remember How I Exposed Your Secret Deal With The Saudis”

March 10, 2018

Assange Lashes Out: “Hypocritical Motherf*ckers… Remember How I Exposed Your Secret Deal With The Saudis”

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange lashed out at the UK government over Twitter on Friday after Britain’s official UN account (UK Mission to the United Nations) tweeted “A free and independent media fulfils a vital role in holding the powerful to account and giving a voice to the powerless,” with a link to a puff piece waxing eloquent over the UK’s commitment to free speech.

Assange – apparently not included in the UK’s definition of “free and independent media” (facing arrest and detention should he leave the Embassy), fired off a stunning reply – claiming that the UK’s has spent roughly twice as much spying on him as it has on their entire international human rights program.

“And that is exactly why you have detained me without charge for eight years in violation of two UN rulings and spent over 20 million pounds spying on me you hypocritical mother fuckers. Your entire international human rights programme is £10.6m you pathetic frauds.”

Julian Assange

@JulianAssange

And that is exactly why you have detained me without charge for eight years in violation of two UN rulings and spent over 20 million pounds spying on me you hypocritical mother fuckers. Your entire international human rights programme is £10.6m you pathetic frauds. https://twitter.com/UKMissionGeneva/status/972057244593479680 …

7:28 AM – Mar 9, 2018

Assange then followed up with “Remember how I exposed your secret deal to put Saudi Arabia on the Human Rights Council?” referring to a 2015 vote-trading deal in which the UK approached Saudi Arabia in secret, promising it a seat on the UN Human Rights Council in exchange for council support.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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