This morning, Drudge links to the latest news coming out of Copenhagen.  


It appears that the darling of the climate conference is Venezuelan thug, Hugo Chavez.  Speaking yesterday at the conference, Chavez wasn’t only treated to a rousing round of applause for his largely incoherent and rambling speech; he even received a standing ovation for his anti-capitalist, anti-U.S. tirade where he reveals the real motivation behind Copenhagen–change the system.   


“I have been reading some of the slogans painted in the streets [outside the conference venue],” he said. “One said, ‘don’t change the climate, change the system.’ And I bring that on board for us – let’s not change the climate, let’s change the system. And as a consequence, we will begin to save the planet. Capitalism is a destructive model that is eradicating life that threatens to put a definitive end to the human species.  [O]ur revolution seeks to help all people…socialism, the other ghost that is probably wandering around this room, that’s the way to save the planet, capitalism is the road to hell….let’s fight against capitalism and make it obey us.” 

Apparently those applauding conveniently forgot that Venezuela is one of the largest exporters of oil in the world.  According to a 2009 Council on Foreign Relations Report, “Venezuela’s proven oil reserves are among the top ten in the world. Oil generates about 80 percent of the country’s total export revenue, contributes about half of the central government’s income, and is responsible for about one-third of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP).” 


But no matter…because in Copenhagen, it isn’t about Venezuela’s contributions to global warming, it matters more that Chavez delivered an anti-capitalist/anti-American speech.  After all, isn’t this really what Copenhagen is all about? 


This week in the American Spectator, Ben Stein examined this issue in greater detail.  He assesses the doubt and scandal now surrounding climate science and asks “what on earth are we doing seeking to drastically change man’s activities on the planet in this quixotic campaign? Why are we seeking to turn industry upside down in the cause of something that may not even be real?”


Stein’s answer? 


Maybe because the real goal of the climate change elites is not to save anyone from anything but to have as much social control as possible. Just as the real goal of Marxism was to elevate the power of the Marxists, possibly the real goal of climate change champions is to elevate their status in the world.

Karl Marx was a demon sent from hell, but he said a mouthful when he said that “all history is the history of class struggle.” Maybe what we are seeing now is class struggle between the academics and bureaucrats and the businesspeople and oil people and utility people. Maybe that’s what this recent tomfool notion of declaring CO2, a life-giving gas, a dangerous pollutant is. If the government can have a right to control CO2 emissions, it can control every aspect of life everywhere. This is a recipe for blowing up the Constitution. In the name of a goal which may be unrelated to carbon dioxide emissions, which may not even be a real target, which may be a wholly specious goal, we are considering giving government control over our lives beyond what would have been considered conceivable just a few months ago.


Surely this breathtaking assault on freedom merits absolutely total certainty by everyone with a microscope that we will all die very soon from carbon dioxide emissions if we do NOT take away freedom. To allow the government this kind of control over our lives, climate change should be an imminent, life and death issue understood as such by everyone. It should not have to be protected from inquiry and truth seekers as it obviously has been judging from the hacked East Anglia e-mails. The Constitution is far more important, human freedom is far more important, than bowing down to the climate change gods with their smoke and mirrors.