Mr. Obama’s Cross of Carbon

In 1896 the Democratic Party Convention was electrified by William Jennings Bryan's "Cross of Gold" speech which advocated the addition of a silver standard to the gold standard then in use. His plea for "bimetallism" struck a resonant chord at the convention and defined Bryan as the leading economic populist as he famously compared the use of the gold standard as the basis for the monetary exchange rate to "the crucifixion of mankind upon a Cross of Gold".

Fast forward 113 years and we see a nation about to be sacrificed to the theory that global warming is the result of human activity. Global Warming is just that, a theory. It has not been proved and there is just as much evidence available to disprove it. This cause has been taken up by the Progressives who appeal, not to logic, reason and fact, but to emotion. This is the main strategy of Progressives ignore the facts of an issue and focus on raw emotion, paint your opponents as having sinister ulterior motives while you are concerned about saving polar bears and other fuzzy creatures. Never mind that, if we were to believe the most vocal proponents of Global Warming, anything we do now will be too late. Other predictions, such as the total disappearance of the polar ice cap by 2008, made by these same super-alarmists have failed to bear fruit as well.

So, without knowing whether Global Warming is real and is the result of mankind's industry, our government at the urging of our newly elected President is in the process of enacting the most sweeping restrictions (Cap and Trade) on human enterprise ever conceived, the cost of which will be borne by every citizen of this nation in the form of higher energy prices, potential fuel shortages, and increased inflation in general. Let the individual citizen decide whether to "Go Green" or not, do not legislate it.

To paraphrase Mr. Bryan:

Having behind us the producing masses of this nation and the world, supported by the commercial interests, the laboring interests and the toilers everywhere, we will answer their demand for a carbon emissions standard by saying to them: You shall not press down upon the brow of the people this crown of thorns, you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of carbon.