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LWe must address the central dilemma: The Microsoft founder denies political realities. Though he came to it late, he now acknowledges climate change facts. But he lives in flat, embarrassing denial about how politics works. His new piece on climate, shared days ago, approaches climate change without political context. He pens words that disregard governmental authority, and pretending massive fortunes aren't relevant.

The Main Contention

His main contention is that financial resources are scarce, so the delegates at this month's climate summit in Brazil should direct money away from "near-term emissions goals" towards climate resilience and spending on poverty and disease.

Admittedly, resources for positive initiatives are insufficient, but it's not caused by inevitable rules, an unavoidable reality of communities. It's because oligarchic power has waged war on government social programs, resulting in the elimination of development assistance and severe reductions in assistance funding of other countries. Austerity is a political choice. The selection to enforce it originates with governments bowing to the wishes of billionaire class.

Existing Wealth

There are truckloads of money available. Just after Gates published his new missive, research showed that the total wealth of the top ten US fortune holders expanded by hundreds of billions during the previous twelve months. These funds independently, the increment in the wealth of 10 people, is approximately ten times the money needed each year to stop deep deprivation worldwide. How have they managed to channel so much of global wealth into personal accounts? Why can't society reclaim it through proper tax policies? The explanation involves their transformation of financial influence into governmental control. The richer they become, the stronger their capacity to shape the state and economic system to their preferences, ensuring that they become richer still. But the billionaire mentions nothing in his essay about how and where extra money for both climate solutions and hardship alleviation could be found.

'His essay reads like nothing so much as a peace offering to Donald Trump.' Bill Gates, right, with the Trumps at a private dinner for corporate executives in the capital.

Rich-Poor Dynamic

An obvious relationship appears between the economic hardship Gates professes to address and the riches he overlooks. In the US, housing insecurity is achieving unprecedented levels, and so is the percentage of resources held by the ultra-rich. Although this may not describe Gates' personal approach, by holding down wages, racking up rents, weakening labor organizations and achieving lower taxes and diminished public funding, the ultra-rich thrive on impoverishing other people.

Research Findings

A remarkable study in Perspectives on Politics, among limited studies accessing this exclusive domain, found that extremely wealthy individuals hold vastly distinct political perspectives from the great majority. The multimillionaires it interviewed, sharply different from average people, considered fiscal shortfalls as critical of the issues it listed, and ecological crisis as insignificant. They were significantly more prone to argue that social security and federal healthcare should be cut, and much less inclined to think that the unemployed should have a "decent standard of living", or that there should be increased oversight of energy firms, financial institutions and insurance providers. They were fiercely opposed to redistribution.

Governmental Access

What opinions win out? The tiny minority or the great majority? Even though the investigation happened under Obama, it found that billionaires maintained closer relationships with government figures than regular individuals. What about currently? The current reality seems obvious.

Missing Elements and Presumptions

This represents another significant omission in Gates' writing: at no point in its 5,000 words does it mention Donald Trump. If Gates included this, he'd have to recognize that an important foundation of his argument is unstable: reductions in the cost of new green technologies lead inexorably to environmental progress. Certainly, it's positive that clean technology prices are falling dramatically than conventional power. But The former president and comparable figures are doing everything they can to impede the transition.

In part due to these factors, traditional energy sources stay very profitable. This could be why, despite Gates's claim that his foundation had divested all its "direct holdings in oil and gas companies" in 2019, its fossil fuel stock and bond holdings have, actually grown.

Cognitive Considerations

Regarding Gates, confronting extreme wealth power could appear inconceivable. This isn't just about conflicting with his perspective. Based on his notable omissions regarding this topic, he may actually be unable to conceptualize it. This might indicate "wealth-induced cognitive distortion": a fundamental failure to comprehend alternative viewpoints. While the ultra-rich are notoriously hard to study, drawing conclusions from studies about wealth's impact on thinking could suggest that gaining massive wealth resembles experiencing brain trauma. Fortunes seem to disturb particular brain operations, notably those concerning understanding and outlook.

Political Calculations

However, strategic thinking might also be involved: his article seems designed as appeasement toward Trump. Trump definitely understood it as such: "Our victory over climate misinformation is complete." Bill Gates has finally admitted that he was completely WRONG on the issue. This demonstrated nerve, and we're thankful. MAGA!!!"

Historical Context

The billionaire has consistently been incorrect on climate matters, though not for the reasons Trump imagines. He has repeatedly been behind current understanding, repeating traditional energy arguments (renewable energy could lower carbon output only with massive expenses) long after they've been discredited. He has propagated misunderstanding and inaccuracies, like the baseless statement in his latest article that the purpose of Sri Lanka's disastrous ban on chemical fertilizers involved emission reduction.

Additional Tough Truths

The billionaire titles his piece Three Difficult Climate Realities. Thus, here's another difficult reality he carefully avoids. Should, as appears probable, vital planetary systems reach critical thresholds and rapidly fail, the consequences for people, ignoring the persistence of additional organisms (a topic he fails, as usual, to mention), would destroy the smooth and steady progress he foresees. Given that climate alteration may not happen incrementally and steadily, but via abrupt transitions, the conceivable consequences for people's quality of life are nearly impossible to anticipate. His position that all resources should follow existing data-driven assessments of human betterment, although it may appear reasonable, introduces in the face of systemic change a profound irrationality, {prompting us to ignore the greatest