FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 22, 2008
CONTACT:
Brian Kennedy (202) 346-8826
Chris Tucker (202) 346-8825
IER CEO: Obama Science Pick’s “Intolerance for Dissent,” Persist Predictions of Global Collapse, “Legendary”
Houston — Institute for Energy Research (IER) CEO and founder Robert L. Bradley Jr. released the following statement today in response to the president-elect’s announcement that Professor John Holdren will serve as his science advisor:
“Dr. Holdren’s alarmist view of energy and climate reflects an anti-growth, Malthusian agenda — not science. His scares about automobiles, power plants, resource famines, global cooling, and now global warming have been proven exaggerated time after time. But instead of humility and midcourse corrections, his polemics have continued.”
Along with his mentor Paul Ehrlich, Holdren has advocated “a massive campaign … to de-develop the United States,” sounded the alarm over global cooling, called for “a rebellion against cars,” and endorsed a plan to place “strict depletion quotas on the natural resources of the United States.”
Holdren has admitted that his government-planning approach would require “undesirable social or political change” and a “loss of civil liberties.” This is because, in his view, “people are the bane of rational energy planning.”
The nominee’s most infamous scare prediction was documented by Paul Ehrlich: “As University of California physicist John Holdren has said, it is possible that carbon dioxide-induced famines could kill as many as a billion people before the year 2020.”
“Holdren’s exaggerations and intolerance for dissent are legendary,” added Bradley. ”Such inflexibility is not the hallmark of science but of a problematic, failing worldview. To the extent that the new president acts on Holdren’s advice on energy and climate, the American economy is most certainly at risk.”
NOTE: Bradley’s historical review of John Holdren’s views on energy and climate, including his lost bet against “doomslayer” Julian Simon, can be found here and in Capitalism at Work: Business, Government, and Energy (M & M Scrivener Press) chapters 9–11.
The Institute for Energy Research (IER) is a not-for-profit organization that conducts intensive research and analysis on the functions, operations, and government regulation of global energy markets. IER maintains that freely-functioning energy markets provide the most efficient and effective solutions to today’s global energy and environmental challenges and, as such, are critical to the well-being of individuals and society.
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www.InstituteforEnergyResearch.org
