You were happy to poke fun at me for using FAR rather than AR/4 to refer to the IPCC report...the least you could do is figure out who works for AEI, and who works for CEI. You can look this stuff up on the net, you know. But to save you the trouble, Chris Horner works at CEI, not AEI.

I work at AEI, not CEI.

Ken Green

Kenneth Green Resident Scholar American Enterprise Institute kgreen@aei.org

I still think he's wrong and all, but that aside, he's pretty cool.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/01/the ...

The next time the Daily Show has a skeptic on like this, I would hope they do at least a little bit of homework to detect BS.

I was also really annoyed by the Stewart bit, that has been used many times before, about how he knows nothing about science. He makes it sound like it's almost cool to know nothing about science. I strongly believe this sort of sentiment could very well be our downfall. Science and math education is severely lacking in this country and it certainly does not help to have cool, hip people like Jon Stewart push forward the idea that it's okay to be a complete idiot when it comes to science. It will not be acceptable in the future as we face more dire and complex problems related to natural resources.

The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research (AEI) is a conservative think tank, founded in 1943, whose stated mission is "to defend the principles and improve the institutions of American freedom and democratic capitalism--limited government, private enterprise, individual liberty and responsibility, vigilant and effective defense and foreign policies, political accountability, and open debate." AEI labels itself as an independent nonprofit organization. It is supported primarily by grants and contributions from foundations, corporations, and individuals.

Like most think tanks that maintain non-profit status under the federal tax code, AEI is officially nonpartisan and takes no institutional positions on pending legislation or other policy questions.

AEI has emerged as one of the leading architects of the second Bush administration's public policy. More than two dozen AEI alumni have served either in a Bush administration policy post or on one of the government's many panels and commissions. AEI, along with the more conservative Heritage Foundation, is often cited as a center-right counterpart to the center-left Brookings Institution. In 1998, AEI and Brookings established the AEI-Brookings Joint Center for Regulatory Studies.

CEI     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Competitive_Enterprise_Insti ...

Environmental Policy
According to CEI, the Wall Street Journal has called it "the best environmental think tank in the country."[1] CEI says it promotes "free market environmentalism" and says market institutions are more effective in protecting the environment than is government.

Among other things, CEI has been an outspoken opponent of government action on global warming that would require limits on greenhouse gas emissions. In March 1992, CEI's founder Fred Smith said of global warming: "Most of the indications right now are it looks pretty good. Warmer winters, warmer nights, no effects during the day because of clouding, sounds to me like we're moving to a more benign planet, more rain, richer, easier productivity to agriculture". [2]

One of CEI's projects is the Cooler Heads Coalition, which operated the website globalwarming.org. Myron Ebell is the chairman of CHC, and the Director of Global Warming and International Environmental Policy at the CEI.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin

Must make you very proud Ken!  Congratulations.

When will you be signing up to fight in Iran?

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin

Is there such a thing as "democratic capitalism"?  One could argue that a free marketplace requires that all who participate in it have the same rights and freedoms and access to public discourse.  But does that situation ever really exist?

In a game of Monopoly, all players begin with the same amount of spending money, and their markers -- the iron, the thimble, the Scottish terrier, the Spanish-American War battleship -- are all in the GO square.  But as soon as the order of play is determined, by chance, there is an element of unequal advantage.  At the end of the game, one player has all the wealth, and the others are penniless.

In America, and anywhere else for that matter, there has historically never been an opening situation in which everyone is perfectly equal, with regard to wealth, power and prestige.  To say that there has been in the past, and is now; and to wrap capitalism in the rhetoric of democracy; is misleading, even deceptive, and therefore wicked.  The more the operation of a capitalist system works to concentrate wealth, power, influence and prestige in the hands of a small number of citizens, the less does it deserve to be called democratic.

On the CEI: I am puzzled by this sentence: "According to CEI, the Wall Street Journal has called it 'the best environmental think tank in the country'."  Well, is CEI telling the truth, or not?  Did the WSJ actually say that, or is CEI making it up?

And to follow up, what are the characteristic virtues appropriate to environmental think tanks, such that CEI is "the best"?  Here I was, believing that Grist was the best environmental think tank in the country!

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

I think it's because Gristmill makes us all part of Grist.  It's a dialectic think tank.

The comedy of Ken's pride at being an AEIer instead of a CEIer is truly precious, hehey.  I wonder if the CEIers were insulted?  That would be a shame.  

But on the bright side, a hissy fit between these two groups might boost adult diaper sales and maybe revive the US economy?  Or are all the diapers now imported from China?  Typical, NASA invents the super diaper (the MAG) and China makes the money from it.

When The Wall Street Journal calls them "the best environmental think tank in the country", it is from their somewhat skewed, next quarter, bottomline  perspective.  

Translated into normal non-propagandist lingo, that would read "the most effective think tank at using the big lie technique to undercut environmentalism".


http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin

As far as monopoly goes, I think that simply enforcing anti-trust and insider trading laws would get a level enough playing field to restore enough economic democracy for reform on the energy/environmental front to go forward.

But I think the emergency of GHG climate disaster warants the extra step of cutting subsidies to energy monopolists and giving them over to individual tax credits for consumers of renewable energy and renewable energy and conservation systems, like plugin cars, solar panels, wind power systems,and geothermal heating/cooling systems.

Do this for 10 years, then eliminate all subsidies.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin

When he first came out, he made his point with creative historical analysis, vague factiods, and random speculation.  After that, he started going downhill.  The NYT found a scientist who would tell them what they wanted to hear about icebergs: CONSPIRACY!  Some guy from the German Green Party (did he even have a name?) said that he envisions a communist society, and apparently wants more young boys in brothels: COMMUNISM!

It was almost as if he had copied his arguments from How to Talk to a Climate Skeptic,, but couldn't be bothered to read the rebuttals.  

--

Taking accounting to the extreme since 2004.

This is true.  He respects other peoples' freedom to disagree, which I think is sorely lacking in America today.  And he's charming and quick with the comebacks, which makes him perfect for his job, namely, going onto cable news shows and chucking out "facts" that nobody will attempt to check.  He's charming enough (when he's not threatening to kill you) that you want to believe what he says.  So in the eyes of John Q. Public, who doesn't know/care enough about climate change to go online and investigate for themselves, he makes some very good points.

--

Taking accounting to the extreme since 2004.