The confusing politics behind John Stossel asking Are We Doomed?

As member of Climate Feedback I just reviewed a YouTube video by John Stossel. In that review I could only respond to factual claims, which were the boring age-old denier evergreens. Thus not surprisingly the video got a solid "very low" scientific credibility. But it got over 25 million views, so I guess responding was worth it.

The politics of the video were much more "interesting". As in: "May you live in interesting times". Other options would have been: crazy, confusing, weird.

That starts with the title of the video: "Are We Doomed?". Is John Stossel suggesting that damages are irrelevant if they are not world ending? I would be surprised if that were his general threshold for action. "Shall we build a road?". Well, "Are We Doomed?" "Should we fund the police? Well, "Are We Doomed?" "Shall I eat an American taco?" Well, "Are We Doomed?"

Are we not to invest in a more prosperous future unless we are otherwise doomed? That does not seem to be the normal criterion for rational investments any sane person or corporation would use.

Then there is his stuff about sea level rise:

"Are you telling me that people in Miami are so dumb that they are just going to sit there and drown?”

That remind me of a similar dumb statement by public intellectual Ben Shapiro (I hope people hear the sarcasm, in the US you can never be sure) and the wonderful response to it by H Bomber Guy:

Bomber also concludes that this, this, ... whatever it is, has nothing to do with science:

"How have things reached a point, where someone thinks they can get away with saying something this ridiculous in front of an audience of people? And how have things reached the point where some people in that audience won't recognize it for the obvious ignorant bullshit that it is?

This led me down a particular hole of discovery. I realized that climate deniers aren't just wrong, they're obviously wrong. In very clear ways, and that makes the whole thing so much more interesting. How does this work if it's so paper thin?"

Politically interesting is that Stossel wants Floridians to get lost and Dutch people to pay an enormous price, in this video, while the next Stossel video Facebook suggests has the tagline: "Get off my property". And Wikipedia claims that Stossel is a "Libertarian pundit".

So do we have to accept any damages Stossel wants to us to suffer under? Do we have to leave our house behind? Does Stossel get to destroy our community and our family networks? Is Stossel selling authoritarianism where he gets to decide who suffers? Or is Stossel selling markets with free voluntary transaction and property rights?

In America, lacking a diversity of parties, both ideologies are within the same (Republican) party, but these are two fundamentally different ideas. But either you are a Conservative and believe in property rights or you are an Authoritarian and think you can destroy other people's property when you have the power.

You can reconcile these two ideas with the third ideological current in the Republican party: childish Libertarianism, where you get to pretend that the actions of person X never affect person Y. An ideology for teenagers and a lived reality for the donor class that funds US politics and media, who never suffer consequences for their terrible behavior.

But in this video Stossel rejects this childish idea and accepts that Florida suffers damages:

"Are you telling me that people in Miami are so dumb that they are just going to sit there and drown?”

So, John Stossel, do you believe in property rights or don't you?