RUSH: Here’s Ivory in Hayward, Wisconsin. Hi, Ivory.
CALLER: Hi, Rush. It’s nice to talk to you.
RUSH: Nice to talk to you. How old are you? You sound young.
CALLER: Yeah, I’m a senior in high school.
RUSH: Ah, a senior in high school. I remember those days. You like it?
CALLER: Yeah, it’s fun. But I’m going to be doing a persuasive speech on global warming for my class next week. I was just wondering, I’m going to be doing this speech on why global warming is not such a serious issue as people say, and I was just wondering what you would say to my class. How can I convince my liberal environmentalist teacher and classmates that global warming is not a big issue?
RUSH: In the first place, change your objective. You’re not going to persuade ’em. If they’re really environmentalists and activists, you can try, but don’t think of yourself a failure if it doesn’t work. Change the expectation on this. Still try to do as persuasive a speech as possible. I don’t have a whole lot of time here. I need to ask you: are you or your parents subscribers to my website?
CALLER: No, we’re not.
RUSH: Well, I’m going to make you complementary subscribers. Do you have a computer and use a computer?
CALLER: Mmm-hmm.
RUSH: You go online and all that? Good. I’m going to make you a complimentary subscriber of my website, so when the call is over, hang on, and somebody will tell you how to access it, because I’ve got a whole encyclopedia of the stuff —
CALLER: Okay.
RUSH: — that you could research and put together your own presentation, which would do you better than if I write the paper for you here on the radio. But I’ll give you a couple of items — and I know I’m going to get grief. “She set you up, Rush! All she wants is a free subscription.” I don’t think that about you, Ivory.
CALLER: Okay.
RUSH: But I’m going to get all kinds of complaints from people. Nevertheless this is a worthwhile project. Microsoft gives discounts. I give comps. Now, the first thing that you should say is that global warming cannot possibly be science.
CALLER: Okay.
RUSH: The reason it can’t be science is because there are too many scientists who disagree with it — and they are prominent, and they are many and they have written books, and you will find who they are and you will find the books on my website. The global warming advocates like to say that there is a “consensus” among scientists that global warming is manmade. The problem is that when you’re talking about science, there can be no consensus. Science is not a subject to a vote. We don’t take a vote on what we want our science to be and whatever wins turns out to be our science. Science is precise and it is what it is, and there’s a method for determining scientific fact and it has not been met with global warming. That, to me, is the most basic point. But you’re going to have a problem with that, even, because to most of the people like your teacher… My belief is that their belief in global warming is more a religious belief than it is anything scientific, because it isn’t scientific.
People like your teacher and some of your classmates have just, because of guilt, bought into the notion that they are destroying — that we are destroying — the planet and that we must pay a price for this. But what you need to point out to these people is that global warming is just the latest of a long line of efforts on the part of liberals around the world to grow government, to raise taxes, to increase regulation, and to limit the behavior of a free people, because
CALLER: Okay.
RUSH: But don’t do that. Well, yes, do it however you want, but do the work yourself so you will learn it. Don’t hang up.
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: Somebody will be right with you.