{"id":15914,"date":"2013-02-18T09:28:08","date_gmt":"2013-02-18T15:28:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/gregladen\/?p=15914"},"modified":"2013-02-18T09:28:08","modified_gmt":"2013-02-18T15:28:08","slug":"charge-of-the-lite-brigade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/2013\/02\/18\/charge-of-the-lite-brigade\/","title":{"rendered":"Charge of the Lite Brigade"},"content":{"rendered":"

On February 17th, some 40,000 people showed up at an event in Washington DC<\/a> in order to draw attention to the most pressing issue of our time: Climate Change. Another group of people also attended that rally. They represented the Climate Science Denialists, which in the US overlaps considerably with the Tea Party. They wore yellow jackets and called themselves “The Light Brigade.”<\/a> This follows the tradition of the Tea Party, who in their early days used the nickname “Teabaggers” for themselves, a term which refers to a particular sexual act, or so I’m told. I was reminded of this because the original Light Brigade was a hapless military unit commanded by incompetent boobs who made major mistakes causing the unnecessary deaths of a large number of people carrying out a futile and senseless act.<\/p>\n

In other words, the Light Brigade that showed up at the Forward On Climate Rally in Washington DC on February 17th, 2013 of which there were about 15 according to reports, resembles the Light Brigade, the unit of light calvary at Battle of Balaclava in the Crimean War that charged to their deaths on October 15th, 1854, in a number of ways. However, the real victims of science denialsm is everybody, not just the soldiers who forgot to question, to reason.<\/p>\n

So, in honor of Climate Science Denialism and the new Light Brigade, which I’ve decided to rename the Lite Brigade, I’ve adapted the famous poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson. As follows:<\/p>\n

\nThe Charge of the Lite Brigade<\/strong>
\nby Greg, Lord Mockingyou<\/em><\/p>\n

Half a brain, half a brain,
\n Half a brain onward,
\nAll in the valley of Climate Change
\n Rode the six hundred.
\n“Forward, the Light Brigade!
\n“Charge for the facts!” he said:
\nInto the valley of Climate Change
\n Rode the six hundred.<\/p>\n

“Forward, the Light Brigade!”
\nWas there a man inform’d?
\nNot tho’ the soldier knew
\n Someone had blunder’d:
\nTheirs not to make reply,
\nTheirs not to reason why,
\nTheirs but to do and die:
\nInto the valley of Climate Change,
\n Rode the six hundred.<\/p>\n

Carbon to right of them,
\nCarbon to left of them,
\nCarbon in front of them
\n Tornadoes and thunder;
\nSuperstorm’d with surge befell,
\nBlindly awash in the the swell,
\nInto the rise of temps,
\nInto the mouth of Hell
\n Ocean acidification.<\/p>\n

Flash’d all their untruths bare,
\nFlash’d as they denied in air,
\nScience and data there,
\nCharging and lying, while
\n All the world wonder’d:
\nPlugged in the battery-charger,
\nBut the coal based grid was broke;
\nHannity and Rush they
\nReel’d from the IPCC report
\n Shatter’d and sunder’d.
\nThen they got a new contract, but
\n Not the six hundred.<\/p>\n

Carbon to right of them,
\nCarbon to left of them,
\nCarbon behind them
\n Hurricanes with thunder;
\nSuperstorm’d with surge befell,
\nNew Orleans went to Hell,
\nTea did not come out so well
\nLies through their jaws brought Death
\nTold science to go to Hell,
\nAnd left it all to them,
\n Storms for our grandchildren.<\/p>\n

What were they thinking, crazed?
\nO the wild charges they made!
\n All the world wondered.
\nWTF are have they said?
\nLook at the Light Brigade,
\n Ignorant six hundred.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On February 17th, some 40,000 people showed up at an event in Washington DC in order to draw attention to the most pressing issue of our time: Climate Change. Another group of people also attended that rally. They represented the Climate Science Denialists, which in the US overlaps considerably with the Tea Party. They wore … Continue reading Charge of the Lite Brigade<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15920,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[148,856,3635,20,1882,3636],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5fhV1-48G","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15914"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15914\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}