Vaclav Klaus on Communism and the Ideology of Environmentalism

RUSH: You want to hear some conservatism? Vaclav Klaus, president, Czech Republic, yesterday, National Press Club, trying to warn everybody in America that we are being hoaxed with global warming and Algore. Here is first of several bites we have from the president of the Czech Republic, Vaclav Klaus.

KLAUS: I spent most of my life under the communist regime which ignored and brutally violated human freedom, and I remember quite well, wanted to command, not only the people, but also the nature, to command wind and rain is one of the famous slogans I remember since my childhood. In the past, it was in the name of the Marxist or the proletariat, this time in the name of the planet. Structurally, it is very similar. The current danger as I see it is environmentalism and especially its strongest version, climate alarmism.

RUSH: Vaclav Klaus, who grew up under communism, is telling us that he sees it all over again in the environmental movement. Here’s the next bite.

KLAUS: We are now at the stage where the facts, reason, truth are powerless in the face of the global warming propaganda. We have probably and regretfully already reached that stage. Now, the whole process is already in the hands of those who are not interested in rational ideas and arguments. It is in the hands of climatologists and other related scientists who are highly motivated to look in one direction only because a large number of academic careers has evolved around the idea of manmade global warming. It is fodder in the hands of politicians who, through the manipulation of people, maximized the number of votes they seek to get from the electorate.

RUSH: And here he describes, Vaclav Klaus, president, Czech Republic, here he describes the real aim of the environmentalist movement.

KLAUS: The green movement is trying to dictate, control, regulate, mastermind our lives. This is what we see every day. They want to discuss how many children we can have because the man is a creature which damages the atmosphere because of breathing. They are dictating us what kind of cars we can use, how big the refrigerators we can have. I speak as someone who lived in a communist era and who knows what it means to eliminate freedom, as someone who knows what it means to eliminate the market economy, someone who knows what it means to regulate, to command, to mastermind the economy from above.

RUSH: A question: ‘Do you see any dangers to the environment out there, Mr. President?’

KLAUS: I don’t believe that man is destroying the planet and environmentalism is based not on small issues of saving electricity here in the National Press Club or of greening one pond or lake or water. That’s not environmentalism. Environmentalism is an ideology which wants to control the world.

RUSH: See, he’s speaking on one level, and, ‘Well, is there any environmental damage? Don’t you admit to any, Mr. President?’ See, he’s a reformed communist, and therefore he’s the enemy to the National Press Club. The next question: ‘If you found yourself on an airplane sitting next to Algore, what do you think you’d talk about?’

KLAUS: I met him in the past many times, so there would be no special question. I many times tried to talk, to have a public exchange of views with him, and he is not too much willing to make such a conversation. I’m ready to do it.

RUSH: What he’s saying is Algore won’t debate his side, because it wouldn’t stand up. Now, this next bite, this perhaps is the piece de resistance. Last night on Fox News Channel’s Special Report with Brit Hume during the panel discussion, the All Stars, Brit Hume spoke with Juan Williams about Vaclav Klaus, and Hume said, ‘Do you think Klaus is on the right track here or that he’s an alarmist in the other direction?’

WILLIAMS: What he’s saying is really interesting to me. I hadn’t thought this through. But he’s saying it’s now beyond the scientists. He is saying in fact that it’s an ideology that’s seeking to take control of the world, is gonna tell us how to live, what cars to drive, whether you can have a refrigerator and all that, and suggest that it would somehow go beyond politics and not the way that suggests, oh, we have a green movement that everybody gets behind, but in fact would have political consequence not unlike a dictatorship. In all honesty, it struck me as something different. I had not heard this line of argument before because I’ve never felt threatened by an environmentalist. I think my consciousness is raised.

RUSH: I’m speechless. This is so typical. Here is a learned man, Juan Williams is a smart guy, and only yesterday has he ever heard somebody suggest that the environmental movement is not about environmentalism, that it’s about large government, total control, dictatorial powers? He doesn’t see with his own eyes they’ve been trying to wipe out SUVs? He doesn’t see that they’ve banned lightbulbs? He doesn’t see that people can’t turn on their lights at night nine months a year for some turtles? He doesn’t see any of this? He does not see the effort that is being made to not become energy independent with oil in our own county? He doesn’t see this? Thank God Vaclav Klaus showed up and opened his eyes. But for crying out loud, Juan, turn on the radio here. We’ve been on this for, hmm, 20 years.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Okay, now, remember. We’re going to listen to Fox News All Stars here. The Fox News All Stars commenting on what you just heard Vaclav Klaus, just heard Juan Williams say, ‘I never thought of this! I never thought that environmentalism was about controlling my life! I never met an environmentalist I didn’t like.’ Up next was Nina Easton. Here’s what she said she thought.

EASTON: I thought it was alarmism. When he says ‘climate or freedom,’ I didn’t feel my freedom threatened after watching the rivers burn in the seventies when we had the Clean Water Act and growing up in Los Angeles which, you know, I choked (laughing), you know, and getting the Clean Air Act. When he says ‘climate or freedom,’ let’s not forget: with freedom, the biggest problem now is our dependency, is — in the US the biggest national security issue, the biggest freedom issue is our dependence on foreign oil —

RUSH: No, no, no.

EASTON: — and to me that’s the freedom issue —

RUSH: No, no.

EASTON: — not the question of whether we’re going to have more environmental controls.

RUSH: No, no, no, no, no, no. Gosh, I like Nina Easton. This is so hard. Nina, who do you think is standing in the way of us getting our own oil? The very people Vaclav Klaus is talking about, Nina! It is about making sure this country is not energy independent. Think of the additional freedoms and lower prices we would have, Nina, if we could get you’re own oil. (long sigh) The Fox All Stars!