In his book, “Liberal Fascism,” Jonah Goldberg explains that the primary mechanism utilized by progressives in restructuring society to their liking is to disassociate every step in the program from the preceding and following ones. “It’s just this one little brick,” they explain to the conservative who is opposed to the idea of the proposed wall. “Don’t be so paranoid … you didn’t mean to take it seriously when we said we intended to build an entire wall. What’s the matter with this one brick?”
Of course, the minute that the conservative foolishly accedes to progressive blandishments and allows the brick to be placed, the progressive immediately declares the pressing need to move on to the next brick in the wall. Climategate notwithstanding, Al Gore must feel that the present brick is being satisfactorily laid at Copenhagen, because he has already moved on to declaring the need to further handicap the global economy by reducing the carbon emissions 25 percent more than the climate agreement that will be announced next week.