The Guy on the Street

More on Rick Perry, now officially a Republican Presidential candidate...

I read today in a headline (and subsequently in the accompanying article) that Governor Perry is alleging, very publicly, that climate change is a hoax created by scientists in order to make money. Of course, what the headline should have read was: Rick Perry Claims Climate Change is Hoax Created by Scientists to Make Money so that He Can Make Money. And he will, because that will assure him more campaign contributions from those most responsible for the climate change. See, here's the basic problem: here in America, we don't believe in experts. Anybody can be an expert about anything, just so long as they heard something about the subject in question somewhere at some point in time. When anybody is allowed to say anything they damn well want, knowing that huge numbers of people will believe to them (as millions will believe Perry), it tends to devalue the actual experts. You know, the folks who went to college for four and eight and twelve years so that they can attach the title "Doctor" to their names, because that's supposed to add a little weight to their words. It should be a given that those people, the ones who actually have spent years, perhaps decades studying climate change should know a little more about it than your average guy on the street. For all intents and purposes, Perry is that guy on the street. I'd be surprised if he's spent more than several minutes in his life reading anything factual regarding climate change. Yet here he is, saying things for which he has no evidence. He says that more scientists are coming forward every day to challenge the "theory" of climate change. Well sure, if you ask a group of thousands of people, even experts, about just about anything, there will always be a few who don't buy into the widely agreed-upon view. That doesn't make them right. Even a few qualified historians will tell you that there was no Holocaust, but the vast majority agree, rightly, that there was, and the vast majority of qualified scientists agree that the climate is changing and that it is caused by humans since the Industrial Revolution.

Why is this man Perry, or anyone like him, even considered a viable presidential candidate? When people cast votes for politicians who place bluster, talking points and dubious claims over actual facts, well, that's when we end up with presidents like George W. Bush, and that's when we end up with things like a fucked-up worldwide climate, a complete lack of access to affordable or effective health care, piles of debt, pointless wars without an end in sight, and increasing disparity between the rich and the poor. I see no reason to believe that four years under President Rick Perry would be unlike any four years under President Bush the Younger. Yet, America actually considers him. What the fuck is wrong with everybody?