That's part of it - he loves to tweak Nation readers, and no better
way to do that than endorse a Bushite view on climate change - but I
suspect a couple of other things. One is that he just loves big old
cars. Last I heard, he had about a dozen stashed in various locations
around the US. And another is that he seems to want to blame
environmental problems on Corporations, and spare any critique of the
masses' contribution. So it can't be suburbanization, sprawl, and gas
guzzling, because that would be the position of, as he once accused
me of being, "an urban weenie who hates the West." Not like manly,
bold Alexander Cockburn, guiding his Imperial along the highways of
California.
And man, is this dumb: "[I] regard oil "shortages" as contrivances by
the oil companies and allied brokers and middlemen to run up the
price." No, it can't be strong Chinese growth, low levels of
exploration by oil companies (because shareholders want the money
instead), already limited refinery capacity made worse by Katrina -
it's gotta be a conspiracy!
Doug
I think he certainly likes tweaking Nation readers and I agree he takes pains to blame corps but leave out the masses' contribution but I don't know what liking old cars has to do with it. I have several old and classic cars and believe that climate change may be worse than we expect in the medium term and I certainly believe that some problems will arise associated with peak oil but that it will not be catastrophic. Classic car ownership doesn't make people embrace minority scientific viewpoints out of convenience.
Incidentially his taste in old cars is wretched. '59 Imperial? '62 Belvedere? Everyone knows the Imperial was a monstrosity from '57 through '63 and the Belvedere looked like crap until '63. Sounds like he just bought the ugly cars no one wants because they are inexpensive! Either that or he has an affection for ugliness.
John Thornton