Hysterical pronouncements by politicians can lead to both bad policy and higher costs. You don’t get much more hysterical than Arlington Mayor Robert Cluck, who told an audience that simply breathing the air in some parts of Texas places people “as at [much] risk for cancer as a smoker.” Cluck-cluck, clucks Cluck.

Mayor Cluck made his pronouncement at the screening of “Fighting Goliath,” a slanted “documentary” extolling the virtues of big (tax) monied activists fighting the creation of clean-coal technology-powered plants in Texas. These are the people who will only be happy when the rest of us are living in the 1740s — while they stick to their LearJet lifestyle.

The film was financed by an advocacy group that includes the aging left-wing heart-throb Robert Redford, who narrated the flick. It was screened in Waco and Dallas last week for an adoring audience of left-wing activists with too much time on their hands.

A friend of a friend in the audience couldn’t help but laugh that “if I don’t laugh I might be really scared” kind of laugh at the escalating rhetoric of doom and gloom on display.

The Arlington mayor took part in a panel discussion when he made his insane link to air quality and cancer rates of smokers. While no one wants to breathe polluted air (hence the push for clean-burning coal technology), it’s a stretch to say anywhere in Texas has anything close to the pollution levels of L.A. smog, and certainly nowhere has  such pollution that you might as well be a daily two-packer. Sorry, just isn’t accurate.

But it did endear him to the aging liberals and young hippies in the audience — all of whom have guilty access to big bucks. The aging liberals’ own money, the young hippies from the allowance from mummy and daddy provide.

The facts are that our environment is getting cleaner every day, thanks to market demand and technological improvements.  But no one wants facts to interfere with the heated quasi-religious apocalyptic rhetoric of the socialists environmental masquerade.

Michael Quinn Sullivan

Michael Quinn Sullivan is the publisher of Texas Scorecard. He is a native Texan, a graduate of Texas A&M, and an Eagle Scout. Previously, he has worked as a newspaper reporter, magazine contributor, Capitol Hill staffer, and think tank vice president. Michael and his wife have three adult children, a son-in-law, and a dog. Michael is the author of three books, including "Reflections on Life and Liberty."

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