It’s Earth Day, and the Left has one mission — no, not to save the environment, but to make you feel terrible about yourself, especially as an American. [some emphasis, links added]
Every April 22, we are invited to feel guilty for driving, flying, eating meat, having children, and existing as a prosperous, industrial civilization.
The premise hasn’t changed since the first Earth Day in 1970. Humans are the problem, and the less we produce, consume, and build, the better off the planet will be.
This is not a robust argument designed to solve environmental problems. It’s a theology of decline dressed up in simple narratives fit for children’s books and cartoons, such as The Lorax or Fern Gully.
It’s as if the environmentalists haven’t read the news in the past half-century. Maybe back in the 70s, shutting down manufacturing facilities and railing against automobiles could be interpreted as good for the environment.
Back then, smog choked cities, air quality was mediocre, and waterways certainly could use some cleaning. You could possibly explain their regressive “solutions” as the well-meaning byproduct of their limited imaginations.
But today, the environment is dramatically better than it was when Earth Day was founded, and it got better not because the United States shut down but because America did more.
Combined emissions of the nation’s six key air pollutants have fallen 78% since 1970, while the U.S. economy grew more than 320%, the public drove twice as many miles, and the population grew by over 130 million people.
New cars are 99% cleaner for common pollutants than 1970 models. The Cuyahoga River, which famously caught fire in 1969, runs clean.
What did it? Not Earth Day guilt, but American innovation, economic growth, and industrial ingenuity.
That’s because when this country produces, we do it cleaner.
The shale revolution — which Earth Day environmentalists fought tooth and nail — cut U.S. carbon emissions to a 25-year low during Trump’s first term, reducing emissions more than any other country, including every Paris Agreement signatory.
AI-driven data centers are currently deploying the largest private clean energy buildout in American history — solar, batteries, and advanced nuclear — not because of government mandates, but because the market demanded it.
And U.S. manufacturing is four times more emissions-efficient than China’s. When America steps back, China fills the void and doesn’t care one iota about clean air or clean water.
China generates more than 60% of its electricity from coal and emits more greenhouse gases than the entire developed world combined.
When environmentalists oppose U.S. reindustrialization, they show their hand: environmental stewardship is secondary to their anti-American ideology.
Read rest at Washington Examiner
