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… is from page 382 of Jonah Goldberg’s 2008 book, Liberal Fascism [2]:
Ultimately, however, environmentalism is fascistic not because of its airy and obscure metaphysical assumptions about the existential plight of man. Rather, its most tangible fascistic ingredient is that it is an invaluable “crisis mechanism.” Al Gore constantly insists that global warming is the defining crisis of our time. Skeptics are called traitors, Holocaust deniers, tools of the “carbon interests.” Alternately, progressive environmentalists cast themselves in the role of nurturing caregivers. When Gore appeared before Congress in early 2007, he proclaimed that the world has a “fever” and explained that when your baby has a fever you “take action.” You do whatever your doctor says. No time to debate, no room for argument. We must get “beyond politics.” In practical terms this means we must surrender to the global nanny state and create the sort of “economic dictatorship” progressives yearn for.
DBx: Yep. And so it is also now with Covid-19. Authoritarians love widespread fear and the sense of crisis that such fear fuels. Fearful people in a panic are much more likely to allow themselves to be ordered about by the power-mad. Indeed, Covid-19 has been a far greater gift to the power-mad than has the emission of carbon. “Do exactly as I say, or you and your loved ones will die by the end of the week!” is a much more alarming assertion, if believed, than “Do exactly as I say, or your yet-to-be born descendants will die by the end of the century!”