Teen climate alarmist nominated for Nobel Peace Prize

Today is not just Friday, it’s the day of an international #ClimateStrike thanks to a sixteen-year-old Swedish teenager. Today all over the world, high school students are skipping school to participate in #YouthStrike4Climate, an extension of #FridaysforFuture. Greta Thunberg, the leader of the youthful climate change alarmists, has now been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.

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“We have proposed Greta Thunberg because if we do nothing to halt climate change it will be the cause of wars, conflict, and refugees,” Norwegian lawmaker Freddy André Øvstegård told Norwegian news outlet VG. “Greta Thunberg has launched a mass movement which I see as a major contribution to peace.”

In addition to Øvstegård, Norwegian lawmakers Mona Fagerås and Lars Haltbrekken also nominated the teen activist.

The young climate change scold launched her movement after Sweden experienced the hottest summer on record. In August she went on strike to force politicians to act. Called #FridaysFor Future, teenagers skip school on Fridays to demand politicians produce policy on environmental issues. It sounds like the kids have cooked up a way to have long weekends, doesn’t it? Greta lives in Sweden, though, and that country has been pushing an agenda of government controls on climate change since the 1960s. She’s upping the ante and encouraging school truancy for the cause, apparently. She protests in front of parliament on Fridays and says she’ll continue to do so until Swedish lawmakers produce policies to bring the country in line with the Paris Climate Agreement.

Sweden’s reputation as an environmen­tal pioneer began with a number of pro­active moves in the 1960s and 1970s. Recognizing a loss of limited natural resources, Sweden was the first country to establish an environmental protection agency, in 1967.

In 1972 Sweden hosted the first UN con­ference on the environment, which led to the creation of the United Nations Envi­ronment Programme (UNEP), the leading global environmental authority to this day.

Sweden was also one of the first na­tions to sign and ratify the international climate change treaty Kyoto Protocol, in 1998 and 2002 respectively.

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Thanks to her student activism, plenty of adults give Thunberg platforms to push her message of alarm. During her speech at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Poland, she lectured politicians that they were not “mature enough to tell it like it is.” That must have gone over well; coming across as an arrogant brat doesn’t seem like the most effective way of going about this. The rich and famous allowed her to speak at the World Economic Forum at Davos in January, too.

Greta’s Twitter feed is filled with posts from around the world of protests. Activist groups like Greenpeace and Amnesty International are on board and exploiting the kids today. Think of the fundraising emails that will go out with Greta’s young and innocent face to plead for money.

So, of course, a shot is taken at President Trump because he wisely took the U.S. out of the Paris Accord. America, by the way, is the only country to exceed its commitments to reduce carbon emissions. If nations are to be scolded, she should begin with China and India, the worst offenders.

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In an article on CNN.com, we are told that mankind only has 11 more years “to avoid disastrous levels of global warming”. That’s a year earlier than our intellectual betters, AOC and Beto O’Rourke, give us. They both say we have 12 years. Thursday Beto upped the ante by saying we face “extinction” if action isn’t taken. He didn’t, however, say exactly what action must be taken. Beto does love AOC’s New Green Deal, though. It’s an authoritarian’s dream proposal and an economic disaster for the U.S. to take on. Meanwhile, the kids don’t need no stinkin’ school. Why waste time going to class?

Right now, they say, they’ve got bigger things to worry about.

That’s because world leaders only have 11 more years to avoid disastrous levels of global warming, according to a 2018 report from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

If human-generated greenhouse gas emissions continue at the current rate, the planet will reach 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels as soon as 2030. That threshold is critical.

Here’s what the kids in America demand.

Kids in the US want a radical transformation of the economy. Here’s what that agenda includes, according to the Youth Climate Strike website:

*a national embrace of the Green New Deal
*an end to fossil fuel infrastructure projects
*a national emergency declaration on climate change
*mandatory education on climate change and its effects from K-8
*a clean water supply
*preservation of public lands and wildlife
*all government decisions to be tied to scientific research

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A national emergency declaration on climate change? Oh. You mean when the enviro-fascists on the left take back the White House there will be a demand for an emergency declaration on climate change? Well, it won’t be border security so I guess that’s fine. And 100 American scientists have signed on. It’s settled science, people.

A group of more than 100 US-based climate scientists released a letter last week in support of the US strike, saying that students’ demands for immediate action on climate change are consistent with the latest science.

“They need our support, but more than that, they need all of us to act. Their future depends on it; and so does ours,” the letter said.

Not all adults are onboard overseas, though. There is still some common sense left.

A spokesperson for UK Prime Minister Theresa May criticized student protests in February, saying that striking “increases teachers’ workloads and wastes lesson time,” adding that kids should be in school training to be scientists and engineers so that they can tackle the problem. That same month, an Australian education minister warned students and teachers that they would be punished if they went on strike during school hours.

The ACLU is offering information on resources for the teens. I’ll be interested in how much this takes hold in the U.S. because so many school districts are on Spring Break this week.

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Ed Morrissey 12:40 PM | December 16, 2024
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