Having spent a half-decade covering California politics – where not a day goes by without some story about tree protesters or lawsuits against multinational companies – I admit I came to Prague completely burned out on the whole debate of market freedom versus the environment.
So I had a familiar sinking sensation when I heard President Vaclav Klaus had recently published a new book, A Blue, Not a Green Planet. The book elaborates on Klaus’ well-publicized comments earlier this year in which he called global warming a false myth, a direct rebuke to findings by a UN panel in February that reached a supposed consensus on anthropogenic, or man-made, global warming.
“Global warming is a false myth, and every serious person and scientist says so,” Klaus told the Czech daily Hospodářské noviny.
While I haven’t been able to obtain an English copy of Klaus’ book, I was able to find comments by the contrarian president about his book in a recent interview with Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. They, too, have a familiar ring.
“I consider [the global warming issue] to be one of the greatest threats to freedom in the world,” Klaus said. “Of course, not global warming itself, but the opinions that are being smuggled in to us, thanks to the false threat of global warming by people like Al Gore and many others.”
Ah, yes. Sounds just like the good old boy timber execs back in California, the ones who claim environmentalism is a religion forced on the free market by a lot of “dirty, druggie hippies” and their “liberal scientist” buddies.
“The hysteria around [global warming] in Western Europe and the US is ridiculous and undignified,” Klaus continued. “This is not skepticism, but an appeal for realism, a rational approach to looking at the world. I’m not saying temperature rise cannot somehow accelerate. There are countless scientific debates about this…Nevertheless, it is just not true that there is a single view on this issue.”
Don’t mistake my sighs for nostalgia, but anyway.
I spend quite a bit of time these days at the main government office at Mala Strana, where I teach English to employees preparing for the Czech’s turn at the EU presidency in 2009. On a whim I thought I’d run Klaus’ comments by them, to see what they thought of his views. I also discussed the views with other Czech students and friends casually.
The response by most is a sort of subdued bemusement. No one is surprised. Klaus’ reputation as a skeptic and contrarian, especially regarding the EU and with global warming, is well known among his countrymen. And he’s popular, or at least respected – his approval ratings hover around the 70 percent range.
But does that mean Czechs agree with his stance on global warming, that it’s a “false myth?” Out of the people I talked to, the best response was from Hana, a government worker.
“Maybe, at the end of the day, we don’t know if man-made global warming is a myth or not,” Hana said. “But either way, it makes sense that we should care about the environment and try to live more responsibly.”
Her response struck me as typically Czech. You’ll note the hesitancy, but that’s hardly surprising. Generally most Czechs, at least those I’ve spent time with during my three years here, are wary of taking or accepting strong positions on anything. Blame it on historical memory of communist propaganda perhaps. But then there’s also the concern for “the nature.”
Meanwhile, Klaus’ fight against the “global warming myth” will continue in September, when he’s been invited to speak before a UN panel on the subject. He says he plans to give a tough speech. It’s difficult to predict what kind of reception he’ll receive, but his comments have already been well circulated in the international press, so the panel will be prepared.
In Klaus’ case, I don’t think he’s just being a stick in the mud. He sincerely believes that global warming, gun control and second hand smoke are “fairy tales” designed to increase people’s dependence on government and encroach upon economic and personal freedoms. I sympathize with President Klaus. I’m a smoker myself, and am tempted to smack people every time they warn me of the dangers of smoking. But I’m well aware of the fact that I’m deluding myself. Whether or not global warming is a myth or a scientific reality is – and this is where I agree with Klaus – still open to debate. There’s nothing wrong with a little healthy skepticism. My only question to Mr. Klaus would be: what if it’s not a myth?
At the end of the day I tend to side with my student Hana. It may turn out that global warming is indeed a myth – a media-perpetuated, gloom-and-doom tale similar to the “New Ice Age” craze in the 1970s. Still, it doesn’t hurt to try to live and act more responsibly.
By James Tressler 
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