California never could distinguish reality from fantasy

On Nov. 4, 2008, the very day Barack Obama was elected president, writer and producer Michael Crichton died at age 66 in Los Angeles.

Had Crichton lived until today, he would have seen at least one of his homes – the landmark Richard Neutra house – destroyed by fire. Its destruction would not have surprised him.

A contrarian by nature, the Harvard trained M.D. enjoyed a spectacular career. Several of his bestselling, science-rich novels had been turned into movies.

These included hits like “Andromeda Strain,” “Jurassic Park” and “Lost World.” He also had success as a screenwriter and a director, and he produced the mega hit TV show “ER,” which he also conceived.

Despite this resumé, or perhaps because of it, the leading progressive online journal, ThinkProgress, saw fit to headline his obituary “Michael Crichton, world’s most famous global warming denier, dies.”

To the eco-warriors of the Left, Crichton had no other meaningful credential.

What galled the Left was that Crichton used his high-profile platform to tell his fellow Californians they had their priorities screwed up.

He did so most flamboyantly on the evening of Sept. 15, 2003, at the famed Commonwealth Club in San Francisco.

As to the nature of his talk, he had been handed a weighty assignment, namely to address the most important challenge facing mankind. The one he chose was unexpected – “distinguishing reality from fantasy, truth from propaganda.”

Without the ability to make these distinctions, Crichton argued, it was useless to try solving more tangible problems.

As an example of the challenge at hand, Crichton spoke about environmentalism, a bold move in a city that spawned the Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth and a swarm of other like-minded groups.

But if anyone had the chops to challenge environmental orthodoxy, it was Crichton. At this stage of his career, Crichton did not need anyone’s approval, and, in San Francisco, he wasn’t about to get it.

After reassuring those in attendance that, like all rational people, he understood man has a responsibility for his environment, he cautioned them that too often civic leaders failed to make the right decisions on fixing the environment and, even worse, refused to learn from their failures.

One can only imagine what he would have thought of the half-assed decision making that fed the L.A. fires, let alone the epic responsibility-ducking by those ostensibly in charge.

As a student of anthropology, Crichton thought he knew why this willful ignorance prevailed. Although America was said to be a secular society, one in which “the best people, the most enlightened people” had transcended religion, Crichton argued that the religious instinct was innate.

Even the best people, he argued, needed to believe in something beyond themselves that gave meaning to life and shaped their sense of the world.

For the Western world, said Crichton, “one of the most powerful religions” was environmentalism. He called it, in fact, “a perfect 21st century remapping of traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs and myths.”

Crichton went on to explain how environmentalism mimics Christianity. It starts with the “initial Eden, a Paradise, a state of grace and unity with nature.”

Man then overreaches, he plucks the technological fruit from the tree of knowledge, and this leads to pollution. “There is a judgment day coming for us all,” said Crichton. “We are all energy sinners, doomed to die, unless we seek salvation, which is now called sustainability.”

Not above a little humor, Crichton described communion in the church of environmentalism as pesticide-free organic food that is consumed by the elect, “the right people with the right beliefs.”

“Facts aren’t necessary,” jibed Crichton. “It’s about whether you are going to be a sinner, or saved. Whether you are going to be one of the people on the side of salvation, or on the side of doom. Whether you are going to be one of us, or one of them.”

As Crichton argued, in some circles what is “believed” has more weight than what is known. Appeals to scientific fact would probably not “impact more than a handful of you, because the beliefs of a religion are not dependent on facts, but rather are matters of faith. Unshakeable belief.”

As the fires consumed L.A., California state legislators proved themselves unshakably stupid. They went into emergency session plotting not on how best to protect the citizens, but on how best to “Trump-proof” their state.

In so doing, they proved themselves incapable of “distinguishing reality from fantasy, truth from propaganda.”

The fantasy is that the legislators are in charge. The reality is that, come Monday, President Donald Trump is their daddy.

And yes, daddy will save their sorry arses, but not without a very serious application of tough love.

Jack Cashill’s newest book, “Ashli: The Untold Story of the Women of January 6,” is available in all formats.