Left Wing Quackery

Yuval Levin discusses the essential argument underlying the global warming controversy and notes that it has been an effective tactic of the Left for a long, long time. Yet, surprisingly, people still fall for it. He writes:

The equation of left-wing ideals with pure reason (and therefore of opponents with dark ignorance) is an old crutch of course, and never quite goes out of style....

There are elitist and populist forms of this argument. The elitist form says your enemies are themselves incapable of rational thought, which has the satisfying advantage of leaving you smug, but the unfortunate drawback of requiring you to call the voting public a bunch of dupes. The populist form of the argument helps you out of this jam by asserting that your enemies are outright enemies of reason, actively working and conniving to fool the public and darken the stage, so that rather than a bunch of dupes the voters are victims to be rescued. Gore seems to be aiming for the latter case. It’s a view that borders on conspiracy quackery, but is amazingly common among the intellectual elite now.

Indeed it is. Read the whole thing here.