Daily Caller Piece: No, ExxonMobil’s Deal With Pioneer Is Not A ‘Threat To Democracy’

[Note: This story is also published at the Daily Caller]

One of the most tiresome exercises in American politics and media in recent years has been the habit of those on the political left declaring that anyone or anything they don’t like constitutes a “threat to democracy.” Whether it is Donald Trump, young moms speaking up at school board meetings, voter security legislation in Georgia and Texas, complaints about debt-funded subsidies for green energy or over-ripe watermelons at the local grocery store, if the left doesn’t like it, then it’s a threat to democracy.

So I can’t say it really surprised me that management at the New York Times decided this week to run a guest essay with the unintentionally hilarious headline, “Exxon Mobil’s Pioneer Acquisition is a Direct Threat to Democracy.” The Times is, after all, the media bible of America’s political left, so what else should we expect? The Times doesn’t like ExxonMobil – has never liked ExxonMobil – and so was no doubt thrilled to run a piece containing such a specious claim.

The piece is authored by a fellow named Jeff D. Colgan, a professor of political science and the director of the Climate Solutions Lab at Brown University. Just as an aside, think about that job title for a minute, combining it as it does political science with this thing called “climate solutions.” The title itself is a tacit admission of what I’ve always contended, which is that climate alarmism is not a scientific endeavor so much as it is a political and religious movement.

But I digress.