Fracking Foes Jump the Shark

Latest anti-drilling claims are so much laughing gas

In their desperation to block Gov. Cuomo from giving the okay for fracking in New York, die-hard opponents of the natural gas drilling technology are floating laugh-out-loud-funny health and environmental threats.

Most hilariously, the enviro-activists have demanded that state officials explore an alleged link between fracking and — we kid you not — syphilis.

They argue that a drilling boom would draw an influx of male workers from other states who would engage in activities of a kind that would spread sexually transmitted diseases.

They also contend that a boom would trigger a housing crunch, adding to homelessness and the health ailments that go along with it.

And that increased truck traffic would not only lead to more road fatalities, but would also — again, no kidding — discourage people from getting the outdoor exercise they need to stay fit.

This is absurd. If New York starts saying no to entire industries on the grounds they might trigger population changes, rising home prices and truck traffic, it might as well turn out the lights.

This is a pretty common pattern in the extreme environmentalist movement.  Claim that whatever they want stopped has effects on X, which has effects on Y, which may have effects on Z that they assume will be negative, and usually the end of the world as we know it.

Sure, the world is full of unintended consequences, and many of them are negative, but the alternative is living in a cave in Africa, living a short life due to leopard predation and untreated diseases.  Most often you treat the unintended consequences and move on.

Remember, they're not pro-environment, they're anti-human.

jump the shark:

a term to describe a moment when something that was once great has reached a point where it will now decline in quality and popularity.

Origin of this phrase comes from a Happy Days episode where the Fonz jumped a shark on waterskis. Thus was labeled the lowest point of the show.

The precise moment when you know a program, band, actor, politician, or other public figure has taken a turn for the worse, gone downhill, become irreversibly bad, is unredeemable, etc.; the moment you realize decay has set in.