For some of our readers, you’ve probably heard me raise the issue that federal land managers can and do use “climate change” as the excuse du jour whenever something bad happens on those lands.  This is particularly true with the increase in wildfires in the past decade or so.   Fuel load buildups caused by numerous environmental group lawsuits and the resultant conflagrations are routinely blamed on climate changes.  Examples of wildfire reductions in areas which utilized management programs are ignored and testimony from forestry officials are discounted in order to advance the climate change narrative.

However, this isn’t the only area where our politicians and bureaucrats seek to divert blame away from the real issues and blame everything on climate change.

Recently the media was full of stories from Dubai, the location of the UN’s climate change gathering. Of course, politicians from all over the world including King Charles to our Secretary of Interior were there to tout how the world’s citizens must do more to reduce their fossil fuel consumption.  U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry of course was in attendance. When he is not dodging House of Representative questions about his special department, he is busy sounding alarms about how climate change is already forcing thousands of refugees to flee their home countries in an effort to avoid climate impacts.  But is that really what is happening?

I would postulate that people are fleeing their current countries because of tyrannical leaders who wreck their economy and then use the power of the gun to dissuade any who would question their failed policies.

One such example would be Venezuela.  Remember when a socialist was elected president of that country in 1999?  Many of our home-grown socialists, led by former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, immediately traveled to Venezuela to tout what a wonderful thing Hugo Chavez’s election was.  Venezuela, which at one time had one of the better economies in South America, went downhill – fast!  This led poverty ridden Venezuelans to exit the country however they could, which included making the trek north to the United States.  These refugees joined the flood of refugees from Central American countries whose politicians had mismanaged their own economies to cross into Mexico on their way to our border.  

Indeed, since our border is so porous, we hear of Chinese traveling to Mexico and then trying to make it across to the U.S.  It seems odd that people living in a country with the second largest economy would be trying to get into the U.S., oh wait, China is a dictatorship – maybe that could be a reason.

Meanwhile climate activists rush around raising alarms that the refugee crisis is a result of climate change not political mismanagement.  Of course, many of these folks have a vested interest in trying to divert attention from problems caused by socialism or some other totalitarianism government in many of these regions since many of them feel that capitalism is the main culprit for our climate woes.  When one looks worldwide, we see similar examples of poor economic management of a country by its leaders who then precipitate devastating economic conditions which lead to migrations and internal strife.  

So, the next time you hear a climate activist announce that climate change is the driving factor behind the migrations, ask yourself if that might be the problem, or if as happened in Venezuela, poor government policies are the problem. To try and divert attention from these problems by announcing they are caused by climate does a disservice to all of us and diverts resources away from trying to address the real issue(s).