Environmental Underpants Gnomes

One of the best episodes of South Park (though not THE best, as that obviously is "Rainforest Schmainforest") is the episode "Gnomes." In "Gnomes," the character Tweek is harassed by gnomes who break into his room and steal his underpants. When the South Park gang catches them in the act, the "Underpants Gnomes" explain that they are collecting underpants for profit. When asked how collecting underpants translates into profit, the gnomes have some trouble explaining it, so they show their business model:


The gnomes have a three-phase business model, consisting of:

1. Collect underpants
2. ?
3. Profit

None of the gnomes actually know what the second phase is; they all assume someone else does.

I couldn't help but think of the Underpants Gnomes when watching this video of Harry Reid:



For those who can't get YouTube to run, here is the money quote from the current Senate Majority Leader:

the one thing we fail to talk about is those costs that you don't see on the bottom line. That is coal makes us sick, oil makes us sick; it's global warming. It's ruining our country, it’s ruining our world. We’ve got to stop using fossil fuel.

UFB.

OK, Harry. I'll bite. Let's replace fossil fuels.

With what?

Environmentalists like you don't like anything. Not coal. Not oil. Not natural gas. Not wind. Not solar. Not nuclear. Nothing. it's always either NIMBY or BANANA (Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything).

They take about "green" energy, "clean" energy, "renewable" energy, and they have no idea what that is or how it will work or how much it will cost or when it will be available or how we can power our economy with it. All they know is that they want it and they want to impose it on us at all costs ... costs to us, not them.

They are just like the Underpants Gnomes. Reid and the other Environmentalist Underpants Gnomes have adopted the original gnomes' business model:

1. Stop using fossil fuels
2. ?
3. Clean energy

Oh, it gets better. Reid compared coal companies to Hitler:

He accused the coal industry of using “the old Hitler lie — when you say things long enough people start believing them.”

The comparison of the coal industry to Nazis came before his keynote speech, which began and ended with references to “the Jewish sages of yesteryear.”

Reid is a disgrace. To Western Civilization. And Eastern Civilization. And Northern ... Southern ... Borg ... Extraterrestrial ... there is not a civilization in existence (or not) to which Harry Reid is not a disgrace.

Ed Morrissey:

This isn’t some fringe character, some crazy uncle that one has in the attic. This is one of the Democratic Party’s leadership explaining why he and his party will never allow for extensive increases in domestic supply for coal and oil, the two leading sources of energy in the US, along with natural gas. “Coal makes us sick. Oil makes us sick. It’s global warming. It’s ruining our country, it’s ruining our world. We’ve got to stop using fossil fuel.”

That would be great, except that no other mass-market solutions exist. Even nuclear power would take several years to implement, and Reid opposes nuclear. He wants wind and solar, even though neither have mass-production capabilities and we still haven’t solved the storage problem for alternative-sourced electricity. He thinks that we’d be better off without energy at all, rather than “making us sick” by producing coal and oil to meet current demands.

Michelle Malkin:

Liberals always claim that even if we start drilling for more oil today, we won’t see the benefits from that exploration for years so we shouldn’t try.

Instead, exactly as Harry Reid is advocating in that clip, they’re all for putting more money into alternative energy products, much of which will never pay off and if it does, we won’t see the benefits for several years.

Well, correction–we won’t see any energy benefits for several years. The Democrats get immediate political benefits, getting to stand up bravely to those shadowy Hitleresque overlords of Mordor Energy, Ltd. who are poisoning the Shire and spewing Carbon and Ringwraiths and Zyklon into the air.

Which is easier than standing up to Iran.

Beltway Snark:

Fossil Fuels Make Harry Reid Sick

What, is he eating them or something?

Please tell me, o wise and all-knowing Mr. Reid, whatever shall I put in my gas tank to get myself to work? I don’t want to make myself/others/the earth/you sick.

But we do have some constructive suggestions. James Lileks:

This made me realize that we really must change our ways, since we’re obviously not going to get any more power from coal or oil, because we’re sick and ruined. Not completely ruined; the process of ruining is ongoing, but ruined we will be. And so we should stop using fossil fuels. Not reduce, but STOP. Thus spake our leaders.

There’s only one sensible response: we have to shut down Las Vegas. Yes, I know, they get their power from hydro, but juice is fungible; the power that goes to light up Vegas could be used to take oil-fired plants off the grid. Closing down Vegas would reduce Nevada’s carbon footprint in other ways: a quarter of all tourists come from California, and I’d wager they drive. (Or drive to wager.) Thirty-six million visit Vegas each year – at least three million people a month arrive and depart from the airport on pollution-spewing fossil-fuel consuming planes.

There is no practical reason for Vegas to exist. Surely this is a luxury we can do without; surely Nevada can find other sources of revenue to fund the government. If Las Vegas does not voluntarily cease operations, I call upon the Senate to either ban flights entirely, or impose a luxury surcharge equal to 110% of the ticket price, because Las Vegas and the waste it represents is ruining the world.

Environmentalism is a luxury. Energy is a necessity. Modern environmentalism treats energy as luxury and environmentalism as a necessity. That reversal is driving us to ruin.

Right now an increasing number of people are deciding that environmentalism -- at least in its current incarnation -- is a luxury we can not afford right now.

Yet Harry Reid and his friends are promising more of the same pain. For us. Not for them.

They want to go to green energy, and have no idea how to get there, but they insist on dragging you on the ground behind their Toyota Prius as they drive around blindly.

In November, vote accordingly.

(crossposted at Pro Cynic and Circle City Pundit)