Yesterday President Trump signified his intent to withdraw from the Paris Agreement. Predictably the left has been going insane about the announcement prophesying the end of America and the world as we know it. I will outline why the alt-right is against this agreement and debunk each argument the left has for it. If there are any arguments I do not get to please leave them in the comments and I will get to them in the next article.
Opposition
We are opposed to both NAFTA and the TPP because it incentivized and encouraged companies to move to other countries costing American jobs. We oppose the Paris agreement on the same principle. Article 9 section 1 of the Paris agreement creates an obligation for developed countries to fund the climate change activities of developing countries. The initial agreement calls for 100 billion a year to be increased steadily over time. Theoretically this money will come from all developed nations. In reality we all know where this money is coming from. It is not like Norway or Denmark with less than 5% of the GDP of the United States will pick up the tab. This is only the beginning. The United Nations is already clamoring for more money and India and China are griping that the developed nations are not giving as much as they say they are giving. In 2016 we had a budget of 4 trillion. Of that 4 trillion around half or 57% to be exact is used for entitlements. The Paris Agreement casually throws another 5-10% of what is remaining in yet another entitlement. One that does not even directly benefit American citizens.
The US is the largest economy in the world and is rightly classified as a developed nation. The next largest economy in the world, China, is classified as a developing nation. Germany and Japan each with about a quarter of the GDP of China are both developed nations. Norway, Sweden, and Denmark all have GDP less than 5% of China and are classified as developed nations. Given how rich China is nobody has adequately explained to me why we should fund their climate development. China has already gotten funds from the climate fund provided by developed nations for their projects.
On another point we also believe that no single person, even President Trump, should be able to commit the country to an international treaty with more signatories than the United Nations on their own. It must go thru the senate. The only response I get from liberals on this point is that the senate would not have voted for it. Using this logic why not cancel elections in all red states and have the senators appointed by the DNC. After all you may not win them.
Escalating Emissions
The left argues that without the Paris agreement we would not have a target to reduce emissions. Let me be clear there is no need for the Paris agreement to set environmental goals. If we wanted to set these goals then we are free to. The best example I can give is the states of New York and California. They are not signatories to the Paris agreement yet they still want to reduce emissions by certain amounts. More power to them. We can set goals like this without being contractually bound to fund the development of all the developing countries.
As an additional point pay attention to the language these states use in the next couple of days. They will be heavy on pollution in the United States and how it affects us but will not utter a single word about funding the programs of other nations. The reality is they want to use their tax dollars for their own programs and not to fund those halfway around the world.
The World and America Support it
Of course the world supports it. More than half the signatories are developing nations and would be getting money under the agreement. If I went to a restaurant and asked who wanted free money I would get very positive responses as well. It sounds nice to the rest of the developed nations because again they are not going to be funding most of it. If you were to ask me if I wanted to get free money from all rich people I would say yes as well.
This applies to the American public too. All everyone knows about this is that it is supposed to be good for the environment. Of course people are going to say Yes. If you change the question to would you be in favor of the Paris Agreement if we had to send 100 billion of your money every year to other nations then the answer would be different.
Climate Change is also a bureaucratic dream. It is a nice important sounding issue that is pleasing to people. There is effectively no accountability for it as any change would take decades to effect and would be barely noticeable. If you actually did fail you can always chalk it up to a wrong model. You could literally spend your entire career from graduation to retirement on climate earning a very high salary and producing no tangible result. You cannot do this for terrorism, poverty elimination, or any other issue.
Technology Backwater
The next argument is that if we left the Paris Agreement we would be a technological backwater. Other countries would surpass us in terms of clean energy technology. Think of the logic here. If we were to spend the money building up technology in third world countries we would not be a backwater but if we were to spend the money building up our technology since we are not obligated to give it away then we will be a backwater.
At this point when presented with logic liberals will offer the example of India and China who have made great strides in solar technology. Projects funded by, you guessed it, the climate fund from developed countries.
Retaliation
This argument mainly comes from business leaders. They allege that because we left the agreement the entire world will now band together and impose tariffs on all American goods. Let us be clear on something. The US is a nation that runs a trade deficit. Not just a trade deficit but a massive trade deficit. It is not a good thing but it does mean that we buy a lot more than we produce and sell. Our top exports are mostly military related as well and not something you can just casually slap a tariff on. What these business leaders hate to admit is that the consumer has power and we are the consumer.
Why?
Have you ever asked yourself why the world is so upset that America is leaving? After all we are not even the biggest polluters in the world China is. It is simple. We are supposed to pay for all this. Germany is upset that they are now holding the bag and they can't even pay for their self-inflicted refugee crisis or national defense. China and India are upset that they don't have an open wallet to grab money from anymore.
We believe that each nation should be sovereign. Let everyone select their own targets and pay for it as well.
Opposition
We are opposed to both NAFTA and the TPP because it incentivized and encouraged companies to move to other countries costing American jobs. We oppose the Paris agreement on the same principle. Article 9 section 1 of the Paris agreement creates an obligation for developed countries to fund the climate change activities of developing countries. The initial agreement calls for 100 billion a year to be increased steadily over time. Theoretically this money will come from all developed nations. In reality we all know where this money is coming from. It is not like Norway or Denmark with less than 5% of the GDP of the United States will pick up the tab. This is only the beginning. The United Nations is already clamoring for more money and India and China are griping that the developed nations are not giving as much as they say they are giving. In 2016 we had a budget of 4 trillion. Of that 4 trillion around half or 57% to be exact is used for entitlements. The Paris Agreement casually throws another 5-10% of what is remaining in yet another entitlement. One that does not even directly benefit American citizens.
The US is the largest economy in the world and is rightly classified as a developed nation. The next largest economy in the world, China, is classified as a developing nation. Germany and Japan each with about a quarter of the GDP of China are both developed nations. Norway, Sweden, and Denmark all have GDP less than 5% of China and are classified as developed nations. Given how rich China is nobody has adequately explained to me why we should fund their climate development. China has already gotten funds from the climate fund provided by developed nations for their projects.
On another point we also believe that no single person, even President Trump, should be able to commit the country to an international treaty with more signatories than the United Nations on their own. It must go thru the senate. The only response I get from liberals on this point is that the senate would not have voted for it. Using this logic why not cancel elections in all red states and have the senators appointed by the DNC. After all you may not win them.
Escalating Emissions
The left argues that without the Paris agreement we would not have a target to reduce emissions. Let me be clear there is no need for the Paris agreement to set environmental goals. If we wanted to set these goals then we are free to. The best example I can give is the states of New York and California. They are not signatories to the Paris agreement yet they still want to reduce emissions by certain amounts. More power to them. We can set goals like this without being contractually bound to fund the development of all the developing countries.
As an additional point pay attention to the language these states use in the next couple of days. They will be heavy on pollution in the United States and how it affects us but will not utter a single word about funding the programs of other nations. The reality is they want to use their tax dollars for their own programs and not to fund those halfway around the world.
The World and America Support it
Of course the world supports it. More than half the signatories are developing nations and would be getting money under the agreement. If I went to a restaurant and asked who wanted free money I would get very positive responses as well. It sounds nice to the rest of the developed nations because again they are not going to be funding most of it. If you were to ask me if I wanted to get free money from all rich people I would say yes as well.
This applies to the American public too. All everyone knows about this is that it is supposed to be good for the environment. Of course people are going to say Yes. If you change the question to would you be in favor of the Paris Agreement if we had to send 100 billion of your money every year to other nations then the answer would be different.
Climate Change is also a bureaucratic dream. It is a nice important sounding issue that is pleasing to people. There is effectively no accountability for it as any change would take decades to effect and would be barely noticeable. If you actually did fail you can always chalk it up to a wrong model. You could literally spend your entire career from graduation to retirement on climate earning a very high salary and producing no tangible result. You cannot do this for terrorism, poverty elimination, or any other issue.
Technology Backwater
The next argument is that if we left the Paris Agreement we would be a technological backwater. Other countries would surpass us in terms of clean energy technology. Think of the logic here. If we were to spend the money building up technology in third world countries we would not be a backwater but if we were to spend the money building up our technology since we are not obligated to give it away then we will be a backwater.
At this point when presented with logic liberals will offer the example of India and China who have made great strides in solar technology. Projects funded by, you guessed it, the climate fund from developed countries.
Retaliation
This argument mainly comes from business leaders. They allege that because we left the agreement the entire world will now band together and impose tariffs on all American goods. Let us be clear on something. The US is a nation that runs a trade deficit. Not just a trade deficit but a massive trade deficit. It is not a good thing but it does mean that we buy a lot more than we produce and sell. Our top exports are mostly military related as well and not something you can just casually slap a tariff on. What these business leaders hate to admit is that the consumer has power and we are the consumer.
Why?
Have you ever asked yourself why the world is so upset that America is leaving? After all we are not even the biggest polluters in the world China is. It is simple. We are supposed to pay for all this. Germany is upset that they are now holding the bag and they can't even pay for their self-inflicted refugee crisis or national defense. China and India are upset that they don't have an open wallet to grab money from anymore.
We believe that each nation should be sovereign. Let everyone select their own targets and pay for it as well.
