2023 is here and the more things change, the more they stay the same. The weather has definitely changed the past few months with what must be near record amounts of snow accumulation in our neck of the woods and winter still has a ways to go.

What has remained constant is the hammering away of the anti-humanist environmentalists that blame any weather event on humans abusing the planet. Should we take them at their word? Are we the main problem with the planet? Is all this snow a result of our continual misuse of the planet’s resources to selfishly live a first-world lifestyle?

Surely all hope is lost unless we scale back the expectations of an existence that includes safe and drinkable water, a reliable and secure food source, jobs that pay the bills, and transportation that gets from point A to B.

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But this isn’t an abuse of the planet and should be the minimal provision for people living in every country. The more secure people are economically, the more they can consider their lifestyle choices and how they impact their environment.

Tell people who are concerned about heating their homes this winter that they should not burn wood, and I suspect they will tell you that their hope is in just trying to stay alive. You can virtue signal all over the planet, but it isn’t worth a single measure of thermal units to keep a family warm when it’s cold outside. There are some great thinkers who have different and unique ideas about how to solve real climate issues (Google “Superabundance”), but unless you buy into the hype and hypocrisy of the Davos crowd, you’re simply a denier and could care less about the planet’s imminent destruction.

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For too many years, I’ve read and listened to concerned scientists, politicians and prognosticators who have told us that unless I take immediate action, sea levels will rise, there won’t be enough food and temperatures will rise to levels that are unlivable. It started with “Silent Spring” 50 years ago and has continued as authors use climate as an idol to find meaning in their lives, which always requires much sacrifice from you but little responsibility from them, as they jet off to distant locations or sit around in their echo chamber meetings talking about how ignorant and full of folly us regular people are for wanting to live a life that includes some measure of security to avoid risks that are all too frequent in less resource reliant countries.

All hope is lost when some blathering bureaucrat tells me that I’m responsible for killing the planet because I work hard and want things to be better for my family or tell people living in a third-world country that they just have to be happy with a barely sustainable standard of living because the planet is in peril.

All hope is lost when some “fool for responsible environmentalism” lays down on a highway when people are trying to get to work, glues themselves to a work of art in order to bring attention to climate issues or insists that plastic bags need to be banned from grocery stores (but you can still use them for 10 cents each).

All hope is lost when we believe that these people have our best interests at heart. Like the Grinch, their heart is a dark place that sees you and I as an enemy to some protracted world vision of fewer people on the planet who can barely subsist.

To our peril we trust them but hopefully your hope is lost in those who tell you in 2023 that you must live with less so the select few can do much more — because they truly care about the planet. Like I said, the more things change, the more they stay the same. Different issues but the charlatans still line up to make the most out of demanding we live differently while their largess increases. I hope people will wake up in 2023!