December 18, 2024 • 26 mins
In this episode of The Heartland Daily Podcast, Karen Schoen is joined by H. Sterling Burnett, Director of the Arthur B. Robinson Center on Climate and Environmental Policy and Managing Editor of Environment & Climate News. Together, they dive into the critical issues shaping America’s energy future and environmental policies.
Burnett shares his expert insights on:
- Why the Paris Climate Treaty was never about the climate and how to put an end to it.
- The case for repealing the Biden administration's electric vehicle mandates and revitalizing oil, gas, and coal production.
- How offshore wind projects threaten consumers, ecosystems, and coastal communities.
- The importance of regulatory reform to promote transparency and restore common sense in environmental policy.
Join us for a compelling discussion packed with actionable ideas and bold strategies for a prosperous, energy-independent America. H. Sterling Burnett brings unparalleled expertise to the conversation, making this a must-listen episode for anyone concerned about the future of climate and energy policy.
This episode features audio from The Prism of America’s Education podcast, hosted by Karen Schoen.
In The Tank broadcasts LIVE every Thursday at 12pm CT on on The Heartland Institute YouTube channel. Tune in to have your comments addressed live by the In The Tank Crew. Be sure to subscribe and never miss an episode. See you there!
Climate Change Roundtable is LIVE every Friday at 12pm CT on The Heartland Institute YouTube channel. Have a topic you want addressed? Join the live show and leave a comment for our panelists and we'll cover it during the live show!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Karen Schoen (00:25):
Hello, everyone and welcome. This is Karen Shawn
and you are listening to theprism of America's Education
brought to you on the AmericaOut Loud dot News Network. We
have been going through somevery interesting weather events,
And, that is part of educationbecause, unfortunately, our
(00:47):
children have been taught to beafraid of weather, not to
understand it, embrace it,prepare for it. And as a result,
anytime we have a weatherchange, the left goes bonkers
and blames it on us. So what Inoticed recently, I'm in
(01:08):
Florida, the Panhandle, and wehave
of our weather patterns.Fluctuation of our weather
patterns. One day it's 70degrees, and the next day it's
45 or and even it gets down intothe twenties at night, And
that's very unusual. So asidefrom what I was thinking, which
(01:29):
is, I guess we're using too manyplastic straws, there has to be
another reason. And we shouldunderstand these reasons because
president Trump is addressingthe green issue, the weather
issue, and how it affects us,especially economically.
So I have asked our residentexpert, who is a wonderful,
(01:54):
thank you so much, SterlingBurnett from the Heartland
Institute, and to come on andmaybe explain, why, all those
plastic straws are creating allof this cold? What do you think,
Sterling? Is that am I on theright track?
H. Sterling Burnett (02:11):
I'm I'm I'm gonna say pretty pretty
definitively that, Karen, youare on the wrong track.
Karen Schoen (02:17):
Oh, my goodness. But I learned that in school if
I just give up those straws.
H. Sterling Burnett (02:22):
Yeah. Plastic straws have nothing to
do, you know, despite the factthat all those people are
sucking, sucking the thoughtinto their straws, when they get
their soft drinks, at the localfast food joint, that that's not
affecting the weather. And infact, you know, you you preface
this with, Trump is gonna bedealing with weather. In fact,
(02:45):
he's not, because we can't dealwith weather. Humans have no
control over the weather.
And, you know, you you youmentioned what Florida is
experiencing right now. Texas isgoing through something similar.
We're, we've been for about aweek now, below average
(03:06):
temperatures for the time ofyear. You know, highs a few
degrees below average, lows afew degrees below average.
Karen Schoen (03:14):
But Sterling, they told us if we give up meat, then
the weather will get better.
H. Sterling Burnett (03:18):
Yeah. Well, I didn't say the weather was
bad. We we needed some of that.Yeah. But the point is, both in
Florida and Texas and in if youwanna go farther north in
Buffalo, the snow they'reexperiencing, it's called
weather.
It's has nothing to do withclimate change because there's
(03:40):
no sustained trend. In fact,what Florida is experiencing,
you know, if you're belowaverage, well, how do you create
an average? When you're in whenyou're in school, right, you
take a test, and your teachergrades all the tests, and the
average is just the gradesassigned to each student divided
(04:00):
by the, you know, added up anddivided by the number of
students, and that gives you anaverage. It tells you nothing.
Well, okay.
Florida has average temperaturesfor this time of year. Texas has
average temperatures for thistime of year. Buffalo has
average amounts of snow for thistime of year and temperatures,
and you get averages bysometimes it's higher than
(04:21):
normal 1 year. You know, Texascan have hot winter days, and
that's how you create theaverages, but it says nothing
about whether there's some kindof a long term change in weather
systems. And what we look atwhen we're talking about climate
change, you look at 30 yearaverages, long term averages for
(04:43):
weather systems.
And what we are finding is thereis no change. Sometimes it's
hotter, sometimes it's cooler,but there's no sustained
warming, no sustained cooling.So there's no trend that
indicates humans are changingthe climate.
Karen Schoen (04:58):
No. And you're right because, I was in college
in Oswego, which is not far fromBuffalo, on Lake Ontario. And
when I was, there during thewinter, one winter, I think it
was 66. We had a 102 inches ofsnow. We were jumping out of the
(05:20):
2nd floor window to get to ourclasses in order to be able to
do that.
And when I spoke to the peoplethat live there, they said, oh,
this is nothing. This happens.It's snowing. It's usually
snowing. Let's
H. Sterling Burnett (05:35):
get honest. You you you weren't jumping out
to get to your class. You justwanted to see what it felt like
to jump in.
Karen Schoen (05:40):
That was fun too.
H. Sterling Burnett (05:42):
Exactly. Exactly.
Karen Schoen (05:45):
But from what you're saying is we're really
not experiencing anything thatis abnormal. And I think that
the problem is when they go backand track something, they don't
go back far enough. They'll onlygo back to the next, available
data where it makes theirpremise fit. So they don't go
(06:07):
back and say, well, in the last,1000 years, we've had this
amount of snow and that type ofweather. They'll just go back
maybe a 100 years.
H. Sterling Burnett (06:17):
Or they'll go back the last year. I mean,
meteorologist your your localweather person, man or woman,
has gotten their marchingorders. When I grew up, we had
some meteorologists we trustedhere in the Dallas area, and
they would tell you what thedaily high and low was and how
it compared to the average.Never once never once did they
(06:39):
say, oh, and because it's belowaverage, this could be a sign of
climate change. You know, backthen, the worry was it's getting
cooler.
They didn't comment on that.They commented on the weather,
and they just said below orabove average. And they'd show
you what the averages were forthe time of year. Now
meteorologists feel like everytime it's below average or every
(07:02):
time it's above average, theyhave to say something about
climate change, which reinforcesit in people's minds. So, in
truth, this is one of thoseinstances where they pulled the
curtain back on the wizard, andhe says ignore the man behind
the curtain.
Nothing bad is going on here.And the truth is nothing bad is
(07:23):
going on here. It is weather,folks, and weather varies from
day to day and year to year andalways has, and humans have no
control over that whatsoever.
Karen Schoen (07:33):
The fault that I see with our government is that
instead of scaring the people,they should be preparing the
people, because now we have thetools that can predict, and we
have a general idea of thedirection of a hurricane. So I
know in Florida when and inTexas, when we know that
something is coming, we prepare.That's the idea of how you get
(07:59):
out of this. You're not going tochange it. But if you prepare
for it, we're not going to haveanother, issue like they did for
a 100 years ago, in Galveston.
When they didn't know thehurricane was coming in, it hit
Galveston and destroyed thewhole community. Well, we don't
have to go through that anymorebecause we should be prepared.
H. Sterling Burnett (08:21):
Over time over time, deaths have declined
due to extreme weather eventsbecause we we have hardened our
infrastructure. We do preparebetter. We have more warning.
But even even with all our, youknow, modern technology, storms
are gonna hit. People are gonnadie.
Property is gonna be destroyed.And the more people that move
into hurricane zones or areaswhere tornadoes or earthquakes
(08:42):
are likely or wildfires, themore people who are gonna be
affected by this. But thatdoesn't have anything to do with
climate change. It has to dowith demographics and people
where they live. Now as far asgovernment, let's talk about
that for a second because yousay, government should stop
scaring people.
That's right. But they shouldalso we have something called
FEMA. Right? And whether I thinkit it's a good idea to have a a
(09:05):
federal agency involved in in,emergency response or not. We
have it, and it's telling usthat we can't recover fast
enough.
We can't do things in NorthCarolina right now where people
are a little bit intense amonth, month and a half after
the hurricane. And you say, whyis this when Biden gives away
(09:26):
$1,000,000,000 to Africa orgives away another $700,000,000
to Ukraine? I'm not saying weshouldn't help Africa or
Ukraine. What I'm saying is putAmerica first. And if we've got
people here in North Carolinasuffering, get them that they
shouldn't be living in tents 2months after a hurricane.
Karen Schoen (09:45):
No. And there were many private organizations that
brought the the little houses,the small houses. You know,
whatever it was was better thana tent, and FEMA wouldn't let
them give them out. So here youhave, I think they said 75 small
houses that could have come date75 families, and they're not
(10:07):
allowed to give them thatbecause of a regulation. That
makes no sense at all.
None at all. Well,
H. Sterling Burnett (10:14):
that's that's typical government,
though. Right?
Karen Schoen (10:16):
Yeah. Unfortunately, you're right.
H. Sterling Burnett (10:18):
I live I live in an age where used to,
churches and charities wouldgive up food to homeless people.
They, you know, they they givethem brown paper bags with
sandwiches in it, hand out waxpaper wrapped sandwiches and an
apple or something. And then thegovernment got involved and
said, no. No. No.
These haven't been food qualitychecked. It'd be better that the
homeless people starve ratherthan, you know, someone might
(10:41):
get one bad sandwich. So you'vegotta stop all that.
Karen Schoen (10:45):
Yes. The government has, has managed to
get in the way of progress. Itusually always does. Your
institute, I when I I love yourwebsite, everybody, you should
be going toheartlandinstitutedot It's
heartland.org. And, the, thereis a wealth of information, not
just on climate, but that'swhere I get my climate
(11:07):
information from.
You came up with a list ofthings that top ten of climate
and energy action items forpresident Trump. Now we all know
he's not going to be able to doeverything, but I thought maybe
we could go over a few of thoseitems. So people would be able
to know what to look for and toeducate their legislators.
(11:31):
Because if the legislators donot do their job, then president
Trump's 4 years will be fornaught. We don't want that to
happen.
H. Sterling Burnett (11:42):
Yeah.
Karen Schoen (11:42):
So one of the things was we hear about this
Paris climate treaty. Why is itbad, and why should people want
why should we wanna get out ofit?
H. Sterling Burnett (11:54):
Well, it it's not a treaty. It it it I'm
sorry. It is a treaty, but, whenit was agreed to by the Obama
administration, he said it's nota treaty. He said it's an
executive agreement. Why did hesay that?
Well, so he could sign on to itand didn't have to get it
through the senate forratification because it couldn't
be ratified. So they have usedthis agreement that the
(12:20):
president signed on to to tryand force the US to cut carbon
emissions. The goal is 80%below, 2,005 levels by 2050.
That has spawned, the EV mandatethat Biden put out. It has
spawned multiple attempts toshut down, largely successful
(12:44):
coal fuel power plants through,the various power clean power
plants, so called clean powerplans out of the government.
They should be called wreckingpower plans because they're
causing more blackouts thanwe've ever experienced. And yet
(13:05):
it is not the law of the land.It was never agreed to. Now,
when Trump was the presidentpreviously, he signed and he he
got us out of the agreement. Butunder the terms of the
agreement, it took 3 years fromthe time he signed it for us to
officially be out.
By then, his term was almost up,and Biden put us back in. Trump
(13:26):
on day 1 this time can get usout. And when he signs it this
time under the way theagreement's written, we're out.
But we suggest that he goes astep further, which is to submit
the agreement to the Senate forratification. Some would say,
oh, well, that
Karen Schoen (13:46):
It's a good idea.
H. Sterling Burnett (13:47):
That makes it dangerous because if they
ratify it, we're in it. Well,yeah. But their problem is
they're not going to ratify.There may be there may be a
majority of senators who wouldagree that we should be in this
treaty. But you don't get amajority for a treaty.
You have to have 2 thirds, 66.And there are not 66 senators
(14:07):
that would agree to this treaty.And if it goes to the senate, no
future president can enact itagain. They can't reverse Trump
on it. It sits there until thesenate acts.
If the senate doesn't act, thepresident can't touch it. If the
senate does act and doesn't,enact it, which they wouldn't,
then it's dead. So, we suggestthat.
Karen Schoen (14:31):
That makes a lot of sense. And this is something
that We The People have to takeup. So go to heartland.org,
learn about the Paris Treaty,and speak to your senator
because they are the ones thatwill have to ratify or deep 6
this agreement, and we want themto get rid of it. We we don't
(14:54):
want to see this treaty hangingaround anymore.
H. Sterling Burnett (14:58):
Yeah. It's a bad agreement because for for
a lot of reasons. First off,carbon dioxide is not a
pollutant. It's the, themolecule of life. Plants need
it.
And if plants need it, we needit. But even, were it a problem?
(15:19):
If you look at the agreement,all the nation, a lot of nations
signed on. Even China signed up.People say, oh, China is not
part of the no, they are.
But China's agreement China,which is already the largest
carbon dioxide emitter in theworld, they emit more than
double US emissions. They aren'tbound under the treaty to cut
(15:39):
their emissions. What they'veagreed to is they're gonna peak
their emissions sometimes around2050, they expect. Peak them at
what level? If it's double that,if it's double what their
present emissions are, they'llbe emitting more than half of
the emissions in the world.
They're already up above 25%.India, also, no immediate
(16:02):
emission cuts. Gonna peaksometime in the future. Well,
that just puts us it doesnothing for the climate, and it
puts the US and, you know,Europe, though I'm less
concerned about Europe sincethey stupidly have pushed this
stuff. It puts us in acompetitive disadvantage.
(16:23):
It it it wrecks our economy andfavors our enemies' economies or
our competitors' economies. Sothat's why it's a bad agreement.
Karen Schoen (16:31):
Well, then it's something that we have to pay
attention to, and it's somethingthat we can help president Trump
make sure that the legislators,that our senators are going to
say no to this. And I thinkthat's a great idea. Also, the
mandates, the EV mandates areinsane because if the people
(16:53):
understood where where doeselectricity come from? You need
oil and gas in order to produceelectricity. So how are you
going to curtail oil and gas,stop production, and then
produce electricity for electriccars?
Can you tell me how that works?
H. Sterling Burnett (17:13):
Well, it's not just electric cars, right?
It's it's
Karen Schoen (17:15):
It's everything.
H. Sterling Burnett (17:16):
Wind turbines, it's electric
appliances because they want youout not using gas appliances.
It's it's solar panels. But evensolar panels and wind turbines,
they all require fossil fuels.Wind turbines have oil running
through them to to lubricateparts. The concrete that is used
to sink those things into theearth, lot tons and tons of
concrete, use fossil fuels toproduce the fibers, the, you
(17:46):
know, the the carbon fibers inin plastics that go into those
things.
The mining all uses fossilfuels. So, Biden has imposed
through his, EPA, air emissionsregulations, and he's given
waivers to California to settheir own emission regulations
on vehicles. That essentiallyhas become an EV mandate.
(18:10):
Everyone well, all but about 2020 to 30 percent of the cars by
2,035 would have to be electricunder these rules. They're about
3% or less today.
So basically, you're talkingabout
Karen Schoen (18:25):
Nobody's going anywhere.
H. Sterling Burnett (18:27):
Yeah. So basically, you're talking that's
what, you know, that's trulythat's the real the real goal.
It's not that they want to buyelectric vehicles. They want
everybody in no vehicles. Theywant them staying home.
They want people, notthemselves, mind you, John
Kerry, and, Leonardo DiCaprioand, Joe Biden. They'll still
(18:49):
get to ride in private planes,spewing 8 times the emissions of
the average person in one trip,the average person puts out in a
year. It's only the the poor,the peasants that they don't
want moving about. So they wantto force them into cars that
(19:10):
don't work as well as, you know,internal combustion engines that
are more expensive than internalcombustion engines that they
can't charge, for fear ofburning up their homes if they
have a charger in their house.So you think, well, if it just
can't work, you know, if inCalifornia, where there's more
(19:33):
EVs than any other state wherethere is less fossil fuel use
than any other state forelectricity, and every year in
California, they tell you we'regoing to have blackouts.
Oh, and by the way, don't chargeyour vehicle at this time of
year. Well, hold it. You told uswe have to have these vehicles.
(19:54):
We have to get to work. We haveto shop.
We get get the kids to school.But now you're telling us not to
charge them because it'll wreckthe, electric grid. Okay. So
what you're telling us is you'reputting people into an
impossible situation, whichtells me because these people,
they may be, venal. Some of themmay be evil, but I wouldn't
(20:15):
accuse many of them of beingstupid.
They know what they're doing.
Karen Schoen (20:20):
Yeah. That's the sad part. And to me, all of this
is designed for the same thing,and that is to depopulate,
depopulate, depopulate. Becauseif we get rid of carbon dioxide,
you can't breathe. And, I lovewatching, Bill Gates' YouTube
where he said he wants to livein a world without carbon
(20:41):
dioxide.
Please go there. Please. Please.
H. Sterling Burnett (20:45):
Wait. Hop on a hop on a x's next, like,
test, you know, the the the nextSpaceX, shuttle to Mars and, and
live there because you can livein the world without carbon
dioxide there. Oh, yeah. Youknow, it has no oxygen, but, you
know, piddling, you know,niggling things like that.
(21:06):
Though, I'll I'll say this,Karen, if they get their, if
they get their wish andeverybody has to stay home, it's
it's not it's not clear to methat that results in
depopulation.
I think that increasespopulation, because what we know
is birth rates go up after everysnowstorm.
Karen Schoen (21:22):
Oh, that's true.
H. Sterling Burnett (21:23):
The more you stay at home, you gotta do
something while
Karen Schoen (21:25):
you're there. Right. Now the other thing that
I wanted to talk about islitigation because that's really
how a lot of these things getpassed. They have a little game
that they play where, the EPAwill make a rule and then the,
like, Sierra Club will go andfight the rule in court, and
then they'll make a settlement.And then we get stuck with a
(21:48):
mandate.
So what is, what do you think weshould suggest to our
legislators with regard to that?
H. Sterling Burnett (21:56):
That's it. There's a lot of things Trump
can do with executive ordersbecause a lot of these things
were done with executive ordersby Biden. Anything Biden did
just with an executive order canbe reversed by Trump. Biden did
the same thing to Trump. Butmany things have to actually be
done through law.
And one of the things they cando is, Congress can pass a law
that says, agencies may not sueand settle, that they have to
(22:24):
fight these regular they have tofight for the regulations. They
can't settle. It could take awaystanding for environmental
groups to sue if they can't showparticularized harm to
themselves. But moreimportantly, the the lawsuit
thing cuts both ways becauseit's not just environmentalists
who sue over regulations to getthem make made it even harder.
(22:46):
One of the things that's goingon is because many of these
regulations are major, you know,having huge, a $100,000,000 or
more impacts on the economy,states are suing to fight these
regulations.
They could pass a law that sayswhile suits are going on,
regulations are are noteffective. They cannot take
effect. Because what whathappens a lot of times is, the
(23:09):
regulation goes into effect. Thestate sue. But while it's going
on, the courts say, well, we'regoing to allow the the rule to
to go forward until the courtsmake a final determination.
They don't always do that.Sometimes the courts intervene.
They know we're halting it untilwe make a decision. But
oftentimes they don't do that.And when they don't do that
because, say, utilities have toplan years into the future, they
(23:33):
just plan on the rule beingeffective, and they start making
their plans that that says, oh,yeah, we're going to close this
coal fuel power plant becausethere's this rule.
And by the time the courtsoverturn the rule, if and when
they do, it's too late becausethey've already made their
plans. They've already investedin the new technologies. So you
can stop that. But the secondthing is, for for Trump, what
(23:56):
Trump can do is when in in theserules that states have sued
over, like the power plant ruleor the EV mandate rule, the
Trump administration can say,we've just decided he could
direct his justice departmentnot to defend these rules in
court. So when the case isheard, no one represents the
(24:18):
federal argument.
Karen Schoen (24:19):
Interesting. In which case
H. Sterling Burnett (24:21):
in which case, the court can either, a,
appoint a proxy to represent thestate, or, b, just say, look. In
the absence of anybody defendingthis rule, we're gonna assume
that it's not, you know, a goodrule and we're going to fine for
the plaintiffs. Or they could gointo court and say, we've
(24:42):
decided this rule is wrong.We're going to rewrite it. We
ask that you throw it out anduntil we've rewritten it.
But that's something the Trumpadministration could do, and
we're gonna be watching to seeif they do things like that.
Karen Schoen (24:54):
Well, Sterling, I wanna thank you so much. This is
so interesting. And what I amgonna do is ask you to come back
after president Trump getsinaugurated and after he is
passed his 1st week in office,and let's see what he has come
up with and let's comment onthat so that we, the people know
what we can do, and you canspeak to our legislators and
(25:17):
make sure they know what theyshould be doing. So thank you so
much. Tell everyone where theycan find you.
H. Sterling Burnett (25:25):
Well, they can find me at
www.heartland.org, or they cango if they want a daily update
on the climate change, lives ofthe day, go to climate
realism.com.
Karen Schoen (25:37):
Thank you. I appreciate that. Folks, you've
been listening to Karen Shone.This is the prism of America's
education. Hope you had a goodeducation today, and I know we
did.
Hello, everyone and welcome. This is Karen Shawn
and you are listening to theprism of America's Education
brought to you on the AmericaOut Loud dot News Network. We
have been going through somevery interesting weather events,
And, that is part of educationbecause, unfortunately, our
(00:47):
children have been taught to beafraid of weather, not to
understand it, embrace it,prepare for it. And as a result,
anytime we have a weatherchange, the left goes bonkers
and blames it on us. So what Inoticed recently, I'm in
(01:08):
Florida, the Panhandle, and wehave
of our weather patterns.Fluctuation of our weather
patterns. One day it's 70degrees, and the next day it's
45 or and even it gets down intothe twenties at night, And
that's very unusual. So asidefrom what I was thinking, which
(01:29):
is, I guess we're using too manyplastic straws, there has to be
another reason. And we shouldunderstand these reasons because
president Trump is addressingthe green issue, the weather
issue, and how it affects us,especially economically.
So I have asked our residentexpert, who is a wonderful,
(01:54):
thank you so much, SterlingBurnett from the Heartland
Institute, and to come on andmaybe explain, why, all those
plastic straws are creating allof this cold? What do you think,
Sterling? Is that am I on theright track?
H. Sterling Burnett (02:11):
I'm I'm I'm gonna say pretty pretty
definitively that, Karen, youare on the wrong track.
Karen Schoen (02:17):
Oh, my goodness. But I learned that in school if
I just give up those straws.
H. Sterling Burnett (02:22):
Yeah. Plastic straws have nothing to
do, you know, despite the factthat all those people are
sucking, sucking the thoughtinto their straws, when they get
their soft drinks, at the localfast food joint, that that's not
affecting the weather. And infact, you know, you you preface
this with, Trump is gonna bedealing with weather. In fact,
(02:45):
he's not, because we can't dealwith weather. Humans have no
control over the weather.
And, you know, you you youmentioned what Florida is
experiencing right now. Texas isgoing through something similar.
We're, we've been for about aweek now, below average
(03:06):
temperatures for the time ofyear. You know, highs a few
degrees below average, lows afew degrees below average.
Karen Schoen (03:14):
But Sterling, they told us if we give up meat, then
the weather will get better.
H. Sterling Burnett (03:18):
Yeah. Well, I didn't say the weather was
bad. We we needed some of that.Yeah. But the point is, both in
Florida and Texas and in if youwanna go farther north in
Buffalo, the snow they'reexperiencing, it's called
weather.
It's has nothing to do withclimate change because there's
(03:40):
no sustained trend. In fact,what Florida is experiencing,
you know, if you're belowaverage, well, how do you create
an average? When you're in whenyou're in school, right, you
take a test, and your teachergrades all the tests, and the
average is just the gradesassigned to each student divided
(04:00):
by the, you know, added up anddivided by the number of
students, and that gives you anaverage. It tells you nothing.
Well, okay.
Florida has average temperaturesfor this time of year. Texas has
average temperatures for thistime of year. Buffalo has
average amounts of snow for thistime of year and temperatures,
and you get averages bysometimes it's higher than
(04:21):
normal 1 year. You know, Texascan have hot winter days, and
that's how you create theaverages, but it says nothing
about whether there's some kindof a long term change in weather
systems. And what we look atwhen we're talking about climate
change, you look at 30 yearaverages, long term averages for
(04:43):
weather systems.
And what we are finding is thereis no change. Sometimes it's
hotter, sometimes it's cooler,but there's no sustained
warming, no sustained cooling.So there's no trend that
indicates humans are changingthe climate.
Karen Schoen (04:58):
No. And you're right because, I was in college
in Oswego, which is not far fromBuffalo, on Lake Ontario. And
when I was, there during thewinter, one winter, I think it
was 66. We had a 102 inches ofsnow. We were jumping out of the
(05:20):
2nd floor window to get to ourclasses in order to be able to
do that.
And when I spoke to the peoplethat live there, they said, oh,
this is nothing. This happens.It's snowing. It's usually
snowing. Let's
H. Sterling Burnett (05:35):
get honest. You you you weren't jumping out
to get to your class. You justwanted to see what it felt like
to jump in.
Karen Schoen (05:40):
That was fun too.
H. Sterling Burnett (05:42):
Exactly. Exactly.
Karen Schoen (05:45):
But from what you're saying is we're really
not experiencing anything thatis abnormal. And I think that
the problem is when they go backand track something, they don't
go back far enough. They'll onlygo back to the next, available
data where it makes theirpremise fit. So they don't go
(06:07):
back and say, well, in the last,1000 years, we've had this
amount of snow and that type ofweather. They'll just go back
maybe a 100 years.
H. Sterling Burnett (06:17):
Or they'll go back the last year. I mean,
meteorologist your your localweather person, man or woman,
has gotten their marchingorders. When I grew up, we had
some meteorologists we trustedhere in the Dallas area, and
they would tell you what thedaily high and low was and how
it compared to the average.Never once never once did they
(06:39):
say, oh, and because it's belowaverage, this could be a sign of
climate change. You know, backthen, the worry was it's getting
cooler.
They didn't comment on that.They commented on the weather,
and they just said below orabove average. And they'd show
you what the averages were forthe time of year. Now
meteorologists feel like everytime it's below average or every
(07:02):
time it's above average, theyhave to say something about
climate change, which reinforcesit in people's minds. So, in
truth, this is one of thoseinstances where they pulled the
curtain back on the wizard, andhe says ignore the man behind
the curtain.
Nothing bad is going on here.And the truth is nothing bad is
(07:23):
going on here. It is weather,folks, and weather varies from
day to day and year to year andalways has, and humans have no
control over that whatsoever.
Karen Schoen (07:33):
The fault that I see with our government is that
instead of scaring the people,they should be preparing the
people, because now we have thetools that can predict, and we
have a general idea of thedirection of a hurricane. So I
know in Florida when and inTexas, when we know that
something is coming, we prepare.That's the idea of how you get
(07:59):
out of this. You're not going tochange it. But if you prepare
for it, we're not going to haveanother, issue like they did for
a 100 years ago, in Galveston.
When they didn't know thehurricane was coming in, it hit
Galveston and destroyed thewhole community. Well, we don't
have to go through that anymorebecause we should be prepared.
H. Sterling Burnett (08:21):
Over time over time, deaths have declined
due to extreme weather eventsbecause we we have hardened our
infrastructure. We do preparebetter. We have more warning.
But even even with all our, youknow, modern technology, storms
are gonna hit. People are gonnadie.
Property is gonna be destroyed.And the more people that move
into hurricane zones or areaswhere tornadoes or earthquakes
(08:42):
are likely or wildfires, themore people who are gonna be
affected by this. But thatdoesn't have anything to do with
climate change. It has to dowith demographics and people
where they live. Now as far asgovernment, let's talk about
that for a second because yousay, government should stop
scaring people.
That's right. But they shouldalso we have something called
FEMA. Right? And whether I thinkit it's a good idea to have a a
(09:05):
federal agency involved in in,emergency response or not. We
have it, and it's telling usthat we can't recover fast
enough.
We can't do things in NorthCarolina right now where people
are a little bit intense amonth, month and a half after
the hurricane. And you say, whyis this when Biden gives away
(09:26):
$1,000,000,000 to Africa orgives away another $700,000,000
to Ukraine? I'm not saying weshouldn't help Africa or
Ukraine. What I'm saying is putAmerica first. And if we've got
people here in North Carolinasuffering, get them that they
shouldn't be living in tents 2months after a hurricane.
Karen Schoen (09:45):
No. And there were many private organizations that
brought the the little houses,the small houses. You know,
whatever it was was better thana tent, and FEMA wouldn't let
them give them out. So here youhave, I think they said 75 small
houses that could have come date75 families, and they're not
(10:07):
allowed to give them thatbecause of a regulation. That
makes no sense at all.
None at all. Well,
H. Sterling Burnett (10:14):
that's that's typical government,
though. Right?
Karen Schoen (10:16):
Yeah. Unfortunately, you're right.
H. Sterling Burnett (10:18):
I live I live in an age where used to,
churches and charities wouldgive up food to homeless people.
They, you know, they they givethem brown paper bags with
sandwiches in it, hand out waxpaper wrapped sandwiches and an
apple or something. And then thegovernment got involved and
said, no. No. No.
These haven't been food qualitychecked. It'd be better that the
homeless people starve ratherthan, you know, someone might
(10:41):
get one bad sandwich. So you'vegotta stop all that.
Karen Schoen (10:45):
Yes. The government has, has managed to
get in the way of progress. Itusually always does. Your
institute, I when I I love yourwebsite, everybody, you should
be going toheartlandinstitutedot It's
heartland.org. And, the, thereis a wealth of information, not
just on climate, but that'swhere I get my climate
(11:07):
information from.
You came up with a list ofthings that top ten of climate
and energy action items forpresident Trump. Now we all know
he's not going to be able to doeverything, but I thought maybe
we could go over a few of thoseitems. So people would be able
to know what to look for and toeducate their legislators.
(11:31):
Because if the legislators donot do their job, then president
Trump's 4 years will be fornaught. We don't want that to
happen.
H. Sterling Burnett (11:42):
Yeah.
Karen Schoen (11:42):
So one of the things was we hear about this
Paris climate treaty. Why is itbad, and why should people want
why should we wanna get out ofit?
H. Sterling Burnett (11:54):
Well, it it's not a treaty. It it it I'm
sorry. It is a treaty, but, whenit was agreed to by the Obama
administration, he said it's nota treaty. He said it's an
executive agreement. Why did hesay that?
Well, so he could sign on to itand didn't have to get it
through the senate forratification because it couldn't
be ratified. So they have usedthis agreement that the
(12:20):
president signed on to to tryand force the US to cut carbon
emissions. The goal is 80%below, 2,005 levels by 2050.
That has spawned, the EV mandatethat Biden put out. It has
spawned multiple attempts toshut down, largely successful
(12:44):
coal fuel power plants through,the various power clean power
plants, so called clean powerplans out of the government.
They should be called wreckingpower plans because they're
causing more blackouts thanwe've ever experienced. And yet
(13:05):
it is not the law of the land.It was never agreed to. Now,
when Trump was the presidentpreviously, he signed and he he
got us out of the agreement. Butunder the terms of the
agreement, it took 3 years fromthe time he signed it for us to
officially be out.
By then, his term was almost up,and Biden put us back in. Trump
(13:26):
on day 1 this time can get usout. And when he signs it this
time under the way theagreement's written, we're out.
But we suggest that he goes astep further, which is to submit
the agreement to the Senate forratification. Some would say,
oh, well, that
Karen Schoen (13:46):
It's a good idea.
H. Sterling Burnett (13:47):
That makes it dangerous because if they
ratify it, we're in it. Well,yeah. But their problem is
they're not going to ratify.There may be there may be a
majority of senators who wouldagree that we should be in this
treaty. But you don't get amajority for a treaty.
You have to have 2 thirds, 66.And there are not 66 senators
(14:07):
that would agree to this treaty.And if it goes to the senate, no
future president can enact itagain. They can't reverse Trump
on it. It sits there until thesenate acts.
If the senate doesn't act, thepresident can't touch it. If the
senate does act and doesn't,enact it, which they wouldn't,
then it's dead. So, we suggestthat.
Karen Schoen (14:31):
That makes a lot of sense. And this is something
that We The People have to takeup. So go to heartland.org,
learn about the Paris Treaty,and speak to your senator
because they are the ones thatwill have to ratify or deep 6
this agreement, and we want themto get rid of it. We we don't
(14:54):
want to see this treaty hangingaround anymore.
H. Sterling Burnett (14:58):
Yeah. It's a bad agreement because for for
a lot of reasons. First off,carbon dioxide is not a
pollutant. It's the, themolecule of life. Plants need
it.
And if plants need it, we needit. But even, were it a problem?
(15:19):
If you look at the agreement,all the nation, a lot of nations
signed on. Even China signed up.People say, oh, China is not
part of the no, they are.
But China's agreement China,which is already the largest
carbon dioxide emitter in theworld, they emit more than
double US emissions. They aren'tbound under the treaty to cut
(15:39):
their emissions. What they'veagreed to is they're gonna peak
their emissions sometimes around2050, they expect. Peak them at
what level? If it's double that,if it's double what their
present emissions are, they'llbe emitting more than half of
the emissions in the world.
They're already up above 25%.India, also, no immediate
(16:02):
emission cuts. Gonna peaksometime in the future. Well,
that just puts us it doesnothing for the climate, and it
puts the US and, you know,Europe, though I'm less
concerned about Europe sincethey stupidly have pushed this
stuff. It puts us in acompetitive disadvantage.
(16:23):
It it it wrecks our economy andfavors our enemies' economies or
our competitors' economies. Sothat's why it's a bad agreement.
Karen Schoen (16:31):
Well, then it's something that we have to pay
attention to, and it's somethingthat we can help president Trump
make sure that the legislators,that our senators are going to
say no to this. And I thinkthat's a great idea. Also, the
mandates, the EV mandates areinsane because if the people
(16:53):
understood where where doeselectricity come from? You need
oil and gas in order to produceelectricity. So how are you
going to curtail oil and gas,stop production, and then
produce electricity for electriccars?
Can you tell me how that works?
H. Sterling Burnett (17:13):
Well, it's not just electric cars, right?
It's it's
Karen Schoen (17:15):
It's everything.
H. Sterling Burnett (17:16):
Wind turbines, it's electric
appliances because they want youout not using gas appliances.
It's it's solar panels. But evensolar panels and wind turbines,
they all require fossil fuels.Wind turbines have oil running
through them to to lubricateparts. The concrete that is used
to sink those things into theearth, lot tons and tons of
concrete, use fossil fuels toproduce the fibers, the, you
(17:46):
know, the the carbon fibers inin plastics that go into those
things.
The mining all uses fossilfuels. So, Biden has imposed
through his, EPA, air emissionsregulations, and he's given
waivers to California to settheir own emission regulations
on vehicles. That essentiallyhas become an EV mandate.
(18:10):
Everyone well, all but about 2020 to 30 percent of the cars by
2,035 would have to be electricunder these rules. They're about
3% or less today.
So basically, you're talkingabout
Karen Schoen (18:25):
Nobody's going anywhere.
H. Sterling Burnett (18:27):
Yeah. So basically, you're talking that's
what, you know, that's trulythat's the real the real goal.
It's not that they want to buyelectric vehicles. They want
everybody in no vehicles. Theywant them staying home.
They want people, notthemselves, mind you, John
Kerry, and, Leonardo DiCaprioand, Joe Biden. They'll still
(18:49):
get to ride in private planes,spewing 8 times the emissions of
the average person in one trip,the average person puts out in a
year. It's only the the poor,the peasants that they don't
want moving about. So they wantto force them into cars that
(19:10):
don't work as well as, you know,internal combustion engines that
are more expensive than internalcombustion engines that they
can't charge, for fear ofburning up their homes if they
have a charger in their house.So you think, well, if it just
can't work, you know, if inCalifornia, where there's more
(19:33):
EVs than any other state wherethere is less fossil fuel use
than any other state forelectricity, and every year in
California, they tell you we'regoing to have blackouts.
Oh, and by the way, don't chargeyour vehicle at this time of
year. Well, hold it. You told uswe have to have these vehicles.
(19:54):
We have to get to work. We haveto shop.
We get get the kids to school.But now you're telling us not to
charge them because it'll wreckthe, electric grid. Okay. So
what you're telling us is you'reputting people into an
impossible situation, whichtells me because these people,
they may be, venal. Some of themmay be evil, but I wouldn't
(20:15):
accuse many of them of beingstupid.
They know what they're doing.
Karen Schoen (20:20):
Yeah. That's the sad part. And to me, all of this
is designed for the same thing,and that is to depopulate,
depopulate, depopulate. Becauseif we get rid of carbon dioxide,
you can't breathe. And, I lovewatching, Bill Gates' YouTube
where he said he wants to livein a world without carbon
(20:41):
dioxide.
Please go there. Please. Please.
H. Sterling Burnett (20:45):
Wait. Hop on a hop on a x's next, like,
test, you know, the the the nextSpaceX, shuttle to Mars and, and
live there because you can livein the world without carbon
dioxide there. Oh, yeah. Youknow, it has no oxygen, but, you
know, piddling, you know,niggling things like that.
(21:06):
Though, I'll I'll say this,Karen, if they get their, if
they get their wish andeverybody has to stay home, it's
it's not it's not clear to methat that results in
depopulation.
I think that increasespopulation, because what we know
is birth rates go up after everysnowstorm.
Karen Schoen (21:22):
Oh, that's true.
H. Sterling Burnett (21:23):
The more you stay at home, you gotta do
something while
Karen Schoen (21:25):
you're there. Right. Now the other thing that
I wanted to talk about islitigation because that's really
how a lot of these things getpassed. They have a little game
that they play where, the EPAwill make a rule and then the,
like, Sierra Club will go andfight the rule in court, and
then they'll make a settlement.And then we get stuck with a
(21:48):
mandate.
So what is, what do you think weshould suggest to our
legislators with regard to that?
H. Sterling Burnett (21:56):
That's it. There's a lot of things Trump
can do with executive ordersbecause a lot of these things
were done with executive ordersby Biden. Anything Biden did
just with an executive order canbe reversed by Trump. Biden did
the same thing to Trump. Butmany things have to actually be
done through law.
And one of the things they cando is, Congress can pass a law
that says, agencies may not sueand settle, that they have to
(22:24):
fight these regular they have tofight for the regulations. They
can't settle. It could take awaystanding for environmental
groups to sue if they can't showparticularized harm to
themselves. But moreimportantly, the the lawsuit
thing cuts both ways becauseit's not just environmentalists
who sue over regulations to getthem make made it even harder.
(22:46):
One of the things that's goingon is because many of these
regulations are major, you know,having huge, a $100,000,000 or
more impacts on the economy,states are suing to fight these
regulations.
They could pass a law that sayswhile suits are going on,
regulations are are noteffective. They cannot take
effect. Because what whathappens a lot of times is, the
(23:09):
regulation goes into effect. Thestate sue. But while it's going
on, the courts say, well, we'regoing to allow the the rule to
to go forward until the courtsmake a final determination.
They don't always do that.Sometimes the courts intervene.
They know we're halting it untilwe make a decision. But
oftentimes they don't do that.And when they don't do that
because, say, utilities have toplan years into the future, they
(23:33):
just plan on the rule beingeffective, and they start making
their plans that that says, oh,yeah, we're going to close this
coal fuel power plant becausethere's this rule.
And by the time the courtsoverturn the rule, if and when
they do, it's too late becausethey've already made their
plans. They've already investedin the new technologies. So you
can stop that. But the secondthing is, for for Trump, what
(23:56):
Trump can do is when in in theserules that states have sued
over, like the power plant ruleor the EV mandate rule, the
Trump administration can say,we've just decided he could
direct his justice departmentnot to defend these rules in
court. So when the case isheard, no one represents the
(24:18):
federal argument.
Karen Schoen (24:19):
Interesting. In which case
H. Sterling Burnett (24:21):
in which case, the court can either, a,
appoint a proxy to represent thestate, or, b, just say, look. In
the absence of anybody defendingthis rule, we're gonna assume
that it's not, you know, a goodrule and we're going to fine for
the plaintiffs. Or they could gointo court and say, we've
(24:42):
decided this rule is wrong.We're going to rewrite it. We
ask that you throw it out anduntil we've rewritten it.
But that's something the Trumpadministration could do, and
we're gonna be watching to seeif they do things like that.
Karen Schoen (24:54):
Well, Sterling, I wanna thank you so much. This is
so interesting. And what I amgonna do is ask you to come back
after president Trump getsinaugurated and after he is
passed his 1st week in office,and let's see what he has come
up with and let's comment onthat so that we, the people know
what we can do, and you canspeak to our legislators and
(25:17):
make sure they know what theyshould be doing. So thank you so
much. Tell everyone where theycan find you.
H. Sterling Burnett (25:25):
Well, they can find me at
www.heartland.org, or they cango if they want a daily update
on the climate change, lives ofthe day, go to climate
realism.com.
Karen Schoen (25:37):
Thank you. I appreciate that. Folks, you've
been listening to Karen Shone.This is the prism of America's
education. Hope you had a goodeducation today, and I know we
did.
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