Today's news carries stories of terrorist plots, further inconvenience to travellers, cell phones and explosives, dead children, media photo-fakery, and the purported ascendency of the hard left. So naturally, I'm going to write about environmentalism...

A while ago, I noted a series of dishonesties emitting from 'environmentalist' Grist magazine, broadcast by Bill Moyers and his ilk (is he a card-carrying member of the Ilk? sounds fishy!) and apparently believed by the naive and angry.

The allegation -- bolstered by faked quotes, no less -- was that Christians believed and were taught they could trash the environment because Jesus was coming back soon. My take was that the main point was just as authentic as naugahide.

In response to my response, "Tom" wrote:

The main observation that Glenn Scherer’s article revolves around is the constant destruction of the environment by Republicans/evangelical Christians. That has become even more obvious since Bush became president...

I do not doubt that there are Christians that believe destroying the environment will bring the second coming of Christ. However, I doubt there are as many as Glenn Scherer thinks. When I was a zookeeper I would put on animal/environmental shows talking about different topics. Well at the end some woman walks up to me upset saying that she "didn't like being told that she should recycle. And that whatever happens to the earth will happen as a result of God's will." This woman exactly fits one of those people in that article. Some moron who takes the Bible literally.

So I want to know your view on why republicans/Christians are destroying the environment. Do they just not care? Are they too stupid to not know what their doing? Or do they really believe nothing bad is happening to it? This mystifies me because lately they have been claiming to be the “moral ones” when comparing themselves to democrats. Well its hypocritical to say you are the moral ones when you destroy God’s creation without hesitation and remorse. Interesting how the ones who are not moral fight to protect the environment.

Again, I'd point out Tom's theology is wrong: I don't know of a single Christian who thinks you the way to bring Jesus back is to pollute. He seems to have swallowed Scherer's fabrication hook, line, and sinker -- even the example he gives doesn't fit his allegation. (She's being lazy and doesn't like being controlled -- not polluting to make Jesus return.)

But the problem, as I see it, is not that Tom cares while everyone else doesn't: the problem is that conservatives and liberals are working from a different set of facts and values. For example...

1. We differ on pollution trends

Where Tom thinks the US is becoming more and more polluted, I think it is becoming cleaner and cleaner. Frankly, I think I have the facts on my side here.

For example, here is a chart showing days of hazardous ozone levels in the LA area. Note that in the late 70s there are frequently 200+ bad days per year. Watch the number head down -- even under the Bush administration. As Gregg Easterbrook summarizes:

All pollution regulated by the Clean Air Act is declining, has been declining for years, and continues to decline under George W. Bush... Aggregate air emissions, everything rolled into one, have declined 25 percent since 1970... though the population has risen 39 percent in the same period.

Easterbrook notes that a whole host of indicators of environmental health are improving in the US -- drastically (and cites the EPA data that proves it) -- and takes Time and other mainstream periodicals to task for deceptively giving the exact opposite impression.

My assertion isn't radical or hard to verify: In the 1950s thousands died in England of air pollution. LA used to be covered in a thick blanket of choking smog. Currently none of these things happen anymore. The only questionable area involves a slight rise in "greenhouse" gases.

The real question is why -- despite both hard and anecdotal evidence to the contrary -- does the most the left believe air and water pollution levels are skyrocketing? Again, I think media spin accounts for this. A paper will announce that Bush is "raising" Mercury levels -- when, in fact, Bush bringing them down to lower levels than under the Clinton presidency.

So there's a simple reason we're not worried about the huge increase in pollution in America, especially under George Bush: the data shows it's not true.

2. We disagree on causes

Tom asks: "I want to know your view on why republicans/Christians are destroying the environment. Do they just not care?" To illustrate his case, he gives the example of a woman who uses her theology as an excuse for litering: Since she believes God will take care of the world, she doesn't have to. Such people do indeed exist.

But he doesn't look at the broader view.

First, just as that woman believed it was God's job to clean up her waste, so also there are people who believe they can litter because they have adopted the socialistic view that it's the government's job to take care of their messes. The link gives an example of people who live in public housing who won't clean up their trash because it's the government's job to do so. That's no different than the exuse it's God's job to clean up your trash.

I've been to Boulder, Colorado, and noticed that they have plenty of SUVs. Same goes for New York, New Jersey, and Los Angeles -- which are extremely "blue" areas. Arianna Huffington flies around the country in a Gulf Stream -- which emits far more pollution than any land vehicle -- lecturing people on the evils of driving SUVs. I can understand why a farmer or construction worker drives a big truck, I can't understand Huffington.

Second, some of the worst polluters in the world are not conservative nor Christian-type governments, but, in fact, leftist, atheistic ones. The USSR was an environmental disaster, unparalleled in the twentieth century. China is also a socialist nation, but is leading the world in new pollution. In cases like these, secular humanist ideology -- the good of the people is tantmount -- is or was used to justify the mess.

So, whereas Tom seems to think Republicans and conservatives are destroying the world -- and perhaps if we were removed it would be all clean and sparkly -- I view pollution as a result of human activity, in general.

3. We disagree about solutions

Inasfar as I think everyone would prefer cleaner air to more polluted air, conservatives aren't convinced of drastic panic-driven solutions like Kyoto. Kyoto is a very nice step towards world government, but it won't do much to stop greenhouse emissions.

Europe wasn't even going to sign Kyoto until Bush openly admitted he wouldn't either. Seizing the opportunity to make him look awful, they change their minds and ratified it. Of course, like everyone else, they're way off target -- and even the Japanese city of Kyoto isn't complying with Kyoto! So it looks to me as though Bush was simply honest where Europe's leaders were hypocritical.

Further, Kyoto doesn't do anything about developing nations which are expected to be the main source of pollution and greenhouse gases. So, as far as I can see, it's simply a feel-good measure, with no real positive effect. (Though it probably would have the effect of harming our economy.)

Likewise, I constantly hear, from the left, cries to fund solar power and wind turbines. Yet I have a friend who was a government solar researcher for years -- and he confirmed it for me: solar can't deliver enough power, and is environmentally toxic. I've also looked into wind, and determined it doesn't deliver either. So there's this nice set of myths floating around about the usefulness of these sources, and everyone repeats they believes them because they're either ignorant or they're afraid of being criticized.

(In contrast, I notice nuclear power -- especially if done with breeder reactors -- really is much cleaner than coal. In fact, that's the reason Europe has clearer skies than the US: because countries like Germany and France get a huge percentage of their power from nuclear. But the left doesn't support that, even though it works quite well in Europe.)

So, from this vantage point, sad to say, it looks like the "left" likes to put on a show of "caring" publicly -- but there's a huge difference between saying the "right" words (even if they're factually wrong) and actually doing things which are likely to have a significant positive effect.

4. We disagree about values

Though, like everyone, we prefer cleaner air and water, frankly, conservatives don't think pollution is the worst problem facing the world today.

How many people have been directly killed by their governments? About 100 million. How many people have been killed by terrorism? Thousands. How many people have been killed by malaria, which flourishes because we unnecessarily banned DDT? Millions.

And how many have been killed by global warming?

Okay, I'll make it easier: How many have been killed by pollution in the US, after 1980? Very, very few in comparison.

Instead, I think improving medicine, drinking water availability, DDT spraying, and getting unstable nations to settle down and go to work (it's called "capitalism", and it's a dirty word on the left) will save far more lives than Kyoto ever could.

To answer Tom's charge directly:

Well its hypocritical to say you are the moral ones when you destroy God’s creation without hesitation and remorse. Interesting how the ones who are not moral fight to protect the environment. Interesting how the ones who are not moral fight to protect the environment.

In terms of moral certitude about their own superority, I haven't found the left to be lacking in that, sadly. (As the above quote seems to illustrate.) But Tom's main point is basicly that if you don't care about the environment -- or at least don't say you care (which is all most liberals I know do) -- you certainly can't be a moral person.

The simple fact is that secularists and Christians have different values. Christians aren't uninvolved -- they just focus on other activities than environmentalism.

Christians donate tremendous money to feed starving people, provide clean water, and attempt to stop slavery (which is still going on, by the way). They also have an ethic of trying to love even the people who hate them. We also tend to do a lot to oppose socialistic solutions (like welfare) because we believe it hurts people more than it helps them. You might argue we're wrong on the facts (good luck) but you can't say we're not at least trying.

And I'd gently point out that pretty much every study out there finds that religious people (including Christian) give far more to money and time charitable causes than non-religious people.

(But none of that counts because it isn't 'environmentalism'.)

Finally, in terms of benefitting others, I'd point out that most of us are busy trying to spread JudeoChristian values. We do this because we honestly believe such things give people better lives. (And, once again, study after study seems to confirm this: religious people are much happier, healthier, etc. than secularists.) We don't do this because we hate people, but simply because we want to offer them what we've benefitted from.

Conclusion

So, to wrap this up, it's not that Christians simply "don't care" -- they just have different values than you do and thus express that caring in different ways.

In my experience, Christians generally do think the environment is important, but they're not convinced (a) there's a huge crisis, (b) that if there was, your solutions would work anyway (what solutions??? global warming -- what is your solution, for example?), and (c) that it ranks higher than saving the lives of people in Darfur or Ethopia.

If you have an issue, it's not that you're inherantly good and caring, and everyone who sees things differently is simply uncaring and evil -- instead, you and I work from a different set of facts and values.

So you have to explore the differences in those facts and values to get anywhere. Is the air in the US getting cleaner or worse? Is pollution the worst killer of humans? Is human life more valuable than, say, a certain variety of squirrel? Do proposed leftist solutions actually solve anything? Why are we even here in the first place? What is the purpose of planet earth, anyway? Should we save people's lives or let them die? Which would be better?

Next: A Christian view of the environment