Hypocrisy is not a admirable attribute, but it is unfortunately common trait for politicians.
For instance, I get very irked at allegedly conservative politicians who make speeches about fiscal responsibility, but then support bigger government when the cameras are off.
And I’ve also written about leftist politicians who impose taxes and red tape on ordinary people but then make sure they don’t have to live by those rules.
The hypocrisy on green issues is especially nauseating. There are plenty of politicians – and others – who pontificate about the supposed crisis of global warming, yet they use far more energy than average voters (i.e., they have big “carbon footprints”).
Yet they somehow think they can atone with occasional bouts of empty virtue signalling. Consider the case of a Spanish politician who is featured in a Wall Street Journal editorial.
European ministers of environment and energy are gathered in Valladolid, Spain, this week for an informal climate meeting. …Spain’s Ecological Transition Minister, Teresa Ribera, a member of the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party,…cruised on a city bike through the streets of the small metropolis on her way to the conference. Cameras were rolling. …The proletariat wasn’t buying it. The video of the minister’s “green” bike ride shows her escorted by two security cars—one in front and one behind. Besides allegedly snarling traffic, her carbon footprint was twice what was required. Some reports said that the minister had emerged from a limousine 100 meters from the event and got on the bike there. …All of this is highly amusing because the climate glitterati want so much to appear virtuous but can’t give up the travel and other benefits of evil fossil fuels. …European Council President Charles Michel used commercial aircraft for a mere 18 out of 112 flights from 2019 to December 2022. …included his travel to the U.N. climate summits last year and in 2021. Jets for the grandees, but bikes for the masses.
Makes me wonder if Ms. Ribera takes lessons from the jet-setting Pete Buttigieg?
But let’s set aside the vapid symbolism of her short bike ride and consider a much bigger issue. Why are all these European politicians and bureaucrats traveling to a nice tourist destination when they could easily have the same conversations and meetings using an online platform such as Zoom?
Regarding global warming and our friends on the left, Professor Glenn Reynolds of the University of Tennessee famously says that “I’ll believe it’s a crisis when they start acting like a crisis.”
Just like I’ll believe rich leftists who claim they want to pay higher taxes when they put their money where their mouths are.
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