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For more than a century, the Rockefeller family has lived well off the proceeds of crime, apparently. But not any more. In a bold but empty public relations move, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund — controlled by heirs of John D. Rockefeller, the genius founder in 1870 of what eventually became Exxon-Mobil — announced that it will “begin” divesting itself of oil company stocks, part of a global campaign to help rid the world of carbon emissions.
“There is a moral imperative to preserve a healthy planet,” Valerie Rockefeller Wayne told The Washington Post on the eve of a UN climate summit in New York. Ms Wayne, a great-great-granddaugher of John D., said that if he were alive today he would be “investing in alternative energy sources and renewables right now.”
Maybe he would, but if the great Mr. Rockefeller were alive today he would not also be liquidating his Exxon-Mobil shares. Looking to the future, and being a smart man, he would again realize it is dead certain that the world will need growing supplies of his oil company’s fossil fuels to feed, clothe, transport and otherwise raise the standard of living of the world’s billions. Keep the shares, daughter, he might say, and use the income to invest in renewables if you want and they are profitable.
Come to think of it, if oil money is so bad, why don’t today’s Rockefellers walk away from all of their personal wealth. The origins of that wealth, after all, is dirty oil. When does the taint of fabulous wealth from more than a century of carbon emissions cease to be a moral burden?
Welcome to the murky ideological world of climate change activism, a movement that this week appears to have been taken over by politically unemployed Occupy Wall Street activists. Instead of occupying the centre of world capitalism over inequality, a giant fizzle, the same crew of unions, leftists, religious groups and global economic reformers took to the streets of lower Manhattan Monday with the latest hashtag slogan: “#floodwallstreet Stop Capitalism! End the climate crisis!”
The #floodwallstreet march, on the heels of a giant climate rally in New York on Sunday, takes aim at the United Nations’ Climate Summit that opens Tuesday. Convened by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, the summit is intended as a warm-up for attempts by the United Nations to secure agreement by 2015 on draconian fossil fuel cuts.
No such targets are likely under current global geo-political conditions, not to mention global economic conditions. National leaders from China, Canada and India are not attending. What the world wants is growth that won’t happen if policy makers adopt economic controls that try to reverse the growth miracle fossil fuels delivered to the world in the 145 years since John D. Rockefeller founded Standard Oil.
For the rest of this article, click here: http://business.financialpost.com/2014/09/22/terence-corcoran-rockefeller-heirs-fossil-fuel-divestment-is-more-bluster-than-real-action/