Climate Change and Universal Lockdowns - Coming Soon to a Nation Near You?

Over the past year and a half, the powers that be have come to the realization that they really can lockdown the entire population of a nation without much pushback from their citizens.  This previously untried method of control has provided governments with the ability to use a similar tactic in the future; not for a future pandemic but rather as a means of controlling the emission of greenhouse gases.

 

While the world was distracted with all things COVID, Project Syndicate published a missive by Mariana Mazzucato, a professor in the Economics of Innovation and Public Value at University College London as shown here:

 

On her personal website, we find this quote about her:

 

Just what capitalism needs, another academic with an opinion.

Mazzucato is well connected as shown here:

 

 

...and here where we see her qualifications as a globalist and part of the ruling class:

 

...and here where she appears on a forum at the World Economic Forum "Solving the Green Growth Equation" on June 18, 2020, appearing with central banker and fellow globalist Mark Carney:

 

....and here where she speaks at Davos Agenda Week 2021 during Stakeholder Capitalism: Building the Future regarding government bailouts and building back better, the mantra of the Great Reset:

 

...and here where she discusses the need for government-funded innovation back in 2014, once again, on the WEF YouTube channel:

 

 

In her article "Avoiding a climate lockdown":

...Mazzucato opens by noting that governments introduced lockdowns to keep a health pandemic from "spinning out of control".  She follows that lead-in with these thoughts:

 

"In the near future, the world may need to resort to lockdowns again – this time to tackle a climate emergency.

 

Shifting Arctic ice, raging wildfires in western US states and elsewhere, and methane leaks in the North Sea are all warning signs that we are approaching a tipping point on climate change, when protecting the future of civilization will require dramatic interventions.

Under a “climate lockdown,” governments would limit private-vehicle use, ban consumption of red meat, and impose extreme energy-saving measures, while fossil-fuel companies would have to stop drilling."

That's a great idea, stop fossil fuel companies from drilling.  The implications of that are absolutely stunning; if we thought that the impact of the pandemic was hard on the economy, just imagine what the economic impact of a ban on drilling for oil and natural gas would be!

 

To avoid the spectre of yet another excuse for a society-wide lockdown, the author has a series of recommendations.  In an attempt to further scare us into submission, she goes on to state that the health and economic crises of the pandemic are interconnected with the climate crisis which she refers to as a "disease of the Anthropocene", claiming that climate change has exacerbated the social and economic problems that have been highlighted by the pandemic.  

 

But, being part of the global ruling class (or at least one of their spokespeople), she informs us that addressing this triple crisis requires the following:

"...reorienting corporate governance, finance, policy, and energy systems toward a green economic transformation. To achieve this, three obstacles must be removed: business that is shareholder-driven instead of stakeholder-driven, finance that is used in inadequate and inappropriate ways, and government that is based on outdated economic thinking and faulty assumptions."

 

She notes that corporate governance must now reflect stakeholders' needs rather than shareholders' whims and that building a sustainable economy requires the cooperation among civil society, the public sector and the private sector.

 

Here are additional quotes outlining her belief that the heavy hand of government is needed to avoid a climate catastrophe:

 

"Likewise, government assistance to business must be less about subsidies, guarantees, and bailouts, and more about building partnerships. This means attaching strict conditions to any corporate bailouts to ensure that taxpayer money is put to productive use and generates long-term public value, not short-term private profits.

In the current crisis, for example, the French government conditioned its bailouts for Renault and Air France-KLM on emission-reduction commitments....

These conditions are a start, but are not ambitious enough, either from a climate perspective or in economic terms. The magnitude of government assistance packages does not match firms’ requirements, and the conditions are not always legally binding: for example, the Air France emissions policy applies only to short domestic flights.

Far more is needed to achieve a green and sustainable recovery. For example, governments might use the tax code to discourage firms from using certain materials (which I assume means hydrocarbon-based materials)....

Because markets will not lead a green revolution on their own, government policy must steer them in that direction....

 

Governments should also take a portfolio approach to innovation and investment....

 

In conclusion, Mazzucato states the following:

"Finally, we need to reorient our energy system around renewable energy – the antidote to climate change and the key to making our economies energy-secure. We must therefore evict fossil-fuel interests and short-termism from business, finance, and politics. Financially powerful institutions such as banks and universities must divest from fossil-fuel companies. Until they do, a carbon-based economy will prevail."

You will note that she uses first order thinking when referring to renewable energy as the "antidote to climate change".  As examples, she would appear not to have allowed for the carbon footprint of the lithium mining process and its associated negative environmental issues, the fact that electric vehicles still use plastics in their construction which are sourced from hydrocarbons, the limited life of lithium batteries and their disposal, the fact that, in some cases, biomass energy production requires the input of millions of trees to create energy and the intermittent nature of renewable energy sourced from wind and the sun.

 

Let's look at the author's closing thoughts, keeping in mind that her alternative scenario includes climate lockdowns:

"The window for launching a climate revolution – and achieving an inclusive recovery from COVID-19 in the process – is rapidly closing. We need to move quickly if we want to transform the future of work, transit, and energy use, and make the concept of a “green good life” a reality for generations to come. One way or the other, radical change is inevitable; our task is to ensure that we achieve the change we want – while we still have the choice."

 

While I do agree that we need to wean ourselves from our carbon-based economy, the switch to a carbon neutral world will be fraught with difficulty.  The use of climate fear porn to justify the use of climate-related lockdowns should concern all of us, particularly given the events of the past 18 months.

 

Let's close with this quote from the United Nation's Special Envoy for Climate Action and Finance and former central banker, Mark Carney:

"Companies, and those who invest in them and lend to them, and who are part of the solution, will be rewarded. Those who are lagging behind and are still part of the problem will be punished."

God help us all when the ruling class gives themselves the right to tell us when we can leave home, where we can go, the type of transportation that we can use and buy, how warm or cool we can make our homes and where/if we can travel outside of our home nations.  All this in the name of controlling climate change and further controlling the masses of useless eaters.  Given society's willingness to be locked down during the pandemic, we can be assured that the oligarchy has considered this approach in their climate change arsenal.