Obama's Science Czar Demonstrates the Dangers of Progressivism

Why is John Holdren a perfect progressive?

Because he believes in grand government schemes cooked up and implemented by cognoscenti rather than letting people make their own decisions. Secondly, he has no regard for the constitution, or he is purposely stupid about its meaning. This is a dangerous combination

Population Bombs and Other Progressive Power Grabs
Zombietime has the definitive summary on his population control views, complete with page scans from the book Holdren wrote with the Ehrlichs of "The Population Bomb" fame. If you want to understand the issue completely, along with rebuttals from the Obama camp, go read that article.

Chris Mooney at Science Progress mounts a defense of Holdren, but the best he can come up with is that Holdren, in his book, was merely presenting an array or resume of population control methods, not actually advocating any of the abhorrent practices. Read his article then go to Zombietime and decide for yourself.

Holdren's Constitutional Ignorance
My criticism of this man is aimed at his obvious constitutional ignorance. Here is what Holdren wrote on page 838 of the 1977 Book, Ecoscience:

Individual rights. Individual rights must be balanced against the power of the government to control human reproduction.

Some people—respected legislators, judges, and lawyers included—have viewed the right to have children as a fundamental and inalienable right. Yet neither the Declaration of Independence nor the Constitution mentions a right to reproduce.

Where the society has a “compelling, subordinating interest” in regulating population size, the right of the individual may be curtailed.

How did congress let this constitutionally ignorant man assume an executive branch position? No right to reproduce in the constitution? Well, there's no right to smoke cigarettes, write a book or get an abortion in there, either.

The Constitution is not an exhaustive list of our rights. It is a contract between the people, the individual states, and the federal government that was set up to serve them.

Consider the 10th Amendment:

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Holdren and his ilk have is bass-ackwards
Our rights come from God, not the government. Holdren, good progressive that he is, has it exactly backwards. In his worldview, Government is all-powerful and the rights of the people are limited.

WRONG!

The Constitution limits the powers of government to what is stated in the document and acknowledges that the rights of individuals can only be circumscribed in specific instances. For a good, short commentary on this amendment, see Findlaw.

Progressives: Wrong on Eugenics, Wrong on Population Predictions, Wrong on Global Warming

That these neo-Malthusians were oh so wrong about the "population bomb," that was supposed to have killed millions by now, should give us pause as we consider the hysterical global warming claims. Predictive science is only as good as the models. And global warming advocates, like the overpopulation screamers before them, are working off of simplistic and highly speculative models with more gaps than data.

Also, ask Europe, Russia and China how population control is working out. A preponderance of old people with no one to care for them, and in Europe's case, people from other parts of the world come in to fill the vacuum, fundamentally changing the continent's culture.

This is why grand progressive schemes should always be viewed with skepticism.

Washington Examiner
Shepherd's Voice
Zombietime.com - Page Scan
LifeNews.com
Daily Dose
Zombietime.com - Holdren
Science Progress - Chris Mooney

Apocalypse Soon?

Dystopian tales have always fascinated me. Player Piano, by Kurt Vonnegut and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley being two of my favorites that describe an orderly but disordered and scary future.

Then there are the grim but morbidly fascinating predictions of an overpopulated, Hobbesean world where man devolves into unwashed, feral tribes at constant warfare with one another over dwindling resources.

For a more restrained view of what could happen if Europe were to be swamped by waves of poor immigrants, read Camp of the Saints, by Frenchman Jean Raspail.

Now comes Paul Farrell conjuring a fusion of catastrophic climate change and a demographic tidal wave that produces a global cataclysm making the fall of Rome look like a kids birthday party breaking up.

Thomas Malthus predicted as much almost 200 years ago, and people on the left and right have been hanging on his famous words ever since. This despite the fact that we have not yet seen his dire conclusions realized.

Our scientific minds have continued to pull our collective fat out of the fire for lo these many years, so I wouldn't yet be digging that bomb shelter with the 5,000,000 gallon water tank and a 100 years supply of MREs.

Nonetheless, Mr. Farrell does place his finger on an inexorable trend: Global population is increasing, and there are large swathes of benighted humanity that have not the technology to ameliorate the expansion of the teeming hordes. Wars are not fought for religion; wars are fought over resources, and the resource to person ratio is decreasing. Can science keep up?

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/Five-reasons-population-boom-biggest/story.aspx?guid={66A7D394-5E73-4D74-8C22-4E1BC7BFB98B}