Last Friday, West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin was delivering a talk to a small group at the Harvard Institute of Politics. His presentation was interrupted by a handful of radical climate activists.
They got in his face, chanted and yelled at him for his support, among other things, of the Mountain Valley Pipeline. One protester got in Manchin’s personal space and said, “You sold our futures, and you got rich doing it, you sick f—k.”
Manchin has been heckled by climate radicals before, so this was nothing new. However, this particular verbal assault seemed to set him off. Manchin stood up and he looked like he was getting ready to punch the guy out.
Manchin’s long-time aide and friend Jonathan Kott stepped in just in time. He gave the protester a firm shove and he collapsed like a cheap suit. The protesters continued to harass Manchin even as the Senator promised to listen to their complaints. “Y’all want to sit down somewhere so we can talk?,” he asked them.
Of course, they don’t want to talk; they want to disrupt. The protesters belong to the radical environmental organization Climate Defiance, and they want conflict. As they say on their website, “When we engage in direct action—whether through a strike, a blockade or a mass occupation—we break through.”
“People see us. People tune in. People engage. Our movement grows,” they claim. I’m sure they tell themselves that when they are planning their publicity stunts, which feed their egos but have no impact on the climate issue.
The antics of environmental radicals—harassing people, blocking traffic, splashing paint in art galleries—only turn people off. The average person would not watch video of the foul-mouthed protester and think, “You know, they have a good point.”
Climate Defiance has their own skewed take on the events at Harvard. In the video clip on social media the group said Kott “brutally assaulted our volunteer.” So the person who started the fight now claims he’s the victim.
The radicals want to go cold turkey on all carbon-based fuels, which would be a disaster. More alternative power sources are coming on-line all the time, but grid operators warn that if the switch away from coal and natural gas happens too fast, the country will face energy instability.
Carbon emissions that cause climate change have been on the decline in the United States since 2007. China now emits more than twice as much greenhouse gases as the U.S., and China continues to expand its use of fossil fuels.
The Climate Defiance bunch could take their protests to China, but we know how that would go. Manchin just happens to be a soft target. Except that if you insist on getting in someone’s personal space and calling them a “sick f—k,” don’t whine if you find yourself on your rear end.