Student walk out to villainize natural gas, ODOT, private business

By Taxpayers Association of Oregon
OregonWatchdog.com

Over 1,000 students skipped school last Friday to protest against climate change.

The Oregonian notes, “…speakers railed against four organizations and agencies the protest organizers dubbed the region’s biggest “climate villains” — NW Natural, Zenith Energy, the Portland Business Alliance and the Oregon Department of Transportation.”

That’s right…students against natural gas.

It was enough of a scare that NW Natural gas coincidentally did a full page ad in the Sunday Oregonian touting their eco-friendly ways 48 hours after the protest.

America has spent billions replacing coal with cleaner natural gas and now natural gas is the enemy.

On villianizing ODOT (Oregon Dept. of Transporation) one  student  interviewed called for ODOT to stop building roads.

We are unaware of many actual roads (longer than a mile) that ODOT has actually built in the past decade.  Maybe a few, but not many.

No new roads?

It has not dawned on these students that vehicles stuck hours in traffic cause more pollution than vehicles traveling normally.   These student policies may actually end up causing more pollution than less if you stop building roads and drown our cities in colossal, smoggy traffic jams.

The third villain targeted by student protesters is the business association called the Portland Business Alliance.

Students are attacking Portland businesses when these same Portland businesses suffered 140 days of rioting and when they suffered the worst job recovery of any area in Oregon during the pandemic.

Oregon has passed some of the nation’s most strictest environmental rules and yet student wrath appears to be targeting these struggling businesses for extinction.

As Oregon students demonize businesses … guess what? …  businesses leave.

Intel announced their $20 billion new plant will be built not in Oregon but in Ohio.

No carbon is actually reduced if you kick businesses across state lines.

You just lose jobs.

Look at this chart showing how some environmental rules kill jobs and move them to other states.

Many businesses leave America and go to Asia.

This is where the carbon pollution is expanding the worst.

Portland Public Schools is backing this strike.

The School District just passed one of the nation’s most toughest policies as noted by the Mercury, “After two years of work and 25 drafts, the Portland Public Schools (PPS) board adopted what is possibly the most robust and aggressive climate policy of any school district in the nation Tuesday. The policy tasks the district with achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2040 and creating emotional support for students experiencing climate anxiety. “

Read more on this protest: “1,000 student walk-out protest: ‘Burn Politicians. Not Oil’

and also 1,000 Student walk-out protest: ‘Capitalism is killing us’