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LWe must begin with the fundamental problem: Bill Gates ignores the role of politics. Though he came to it late, he now recognizes environmental science. But he lives in flat, embarrassing denial about political realities. His latest essay on climate, published last week, treats the issue as if it existed in a political vacuum. He writes as if there were no such thing as political power, and as if extreme wealth didn't exist.

The Main Contention

His main contention is that financial resources are scarce, so the participants in the upcoming climate meeting in Brazil should direct money away from "immediate carbon reduction objectives" towards climate "adaptation" and investing in poverty reduction and healthcare.

Yes, the funds available for any good cause are scarce, but this isn't due to universal principles, some implacable truth about human society. It's because oligarchic power has waged war on benign state spending, leading to the destruction of USAID and severe reductions in assistance funding of additional nations. Budget cuts represent political decisions. The choice to implement it comes from authorities yielding to the demands of billionaire class.

Available Resources

Substantial financial resources are present. Just after Gates published his new missive, Oxfam revealed that the net worth of the 10 richest US billionaires grew by $698bn during the previous twelve months. These funds independently, the growth in ten individuals' fortunes, is almost 10 times the annual amount required to end extreme poverty worldwide. What methods enabled such concentration of global wealth into personal accounts? And why can't we get it back through proper tax policies? The answer is their translation of wealth into policy-making authority. The richer they become, the greater their ability to influence political and economic frameworks to their preferences, guaranteeing continued wealth accumulation. But the billionaire mentions nothing in his essay about how and where extra money for both environmental measures and economic assistance could be located.

'His writing appears primarily as reconciliation with Donald Trump.' The billionaire alongside Trump at an exclusive meal for industry figures in Washington.

Rich-Poor Dynamic

A clear connection exists between the deprivation Gates says concerns him and the fortunes he ignores. In the US, homelessness is breaking records, and so is the percentage of resources held by the ultra-rich. Even if this doesn't characterize Gates' specific methods, by suppressing salaries, driving up rental prices, weakening labor organizations and securing tax reductions and budget decreases, the ultra-rich thrive on impoverishing other people.

Study Results

A remarkable study in political science publications, one of the rare examinations of this private sphere, found that extremely wealthy individuals hold vastly distinct political perspectives from the general population. The wealthy respondents in the study, completely unlike ordinary citizens, considered fiscal shortfalls as critical of the issues it listed, and environmental collapse as unimportant. They were far more likely to insist that social security and federal healthcare should be cut, and significantly less prone to accept 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 vehemently anti-taxation and redistribution.

Governmental Access

So whose views prevail? The tiny minority or the great majority? Even though the investigation happened under Obama, it found that the very rich had far more access to politicians and officials than regular individuals. What about currently? I scarcely think I need to spell it out.

Missing Elements and Presumptions

That's another telling absence in Bill Gates's essay: across extensive text, the former president receives no reference. Should the billionaire address this, he'd have to recognize that an important foundation of his argument is unstable: lower prices for sustainable technology inevitably produces environmental improvement. Of course it helps that wind, solar and other green technologies are becoming radically cheaper than traditional energy sources. But Trump and similar demagogues are taking all possible actions to block the shift.

Partly as a result, oil and gas continue generating substantial profits. This could be why, notwithstanding Gates' assertion about eliminating petroleum company stocks in 2019, its fossil fuel stock and bond holdings have, actually grown.

Mental Aspects

For Gates, challenging billionaire influence might seem impossible. I don't mean only that it clashes with his worldview. Based on his notable omissions regarding this topic, he could genuinely find it impossible to consider. Perhaps this is a symptom of "billionaire brain": a fundamental failure to comprehend alternative viewpoints. While the ultra-rich are notoriously hard to study, extrapolating from research into how gaining wealth and status affects cognition could suggest that obtaining enormous fortunes compares to cognitive damage. Fortunes seem to disturb particular brain operations, especially those involving compassion and viewpoint.

Strategic Considerations

But perhaps there's also calculation here: his writing appears primarily as reconciliation with the former president. The former president clearly interpreted it this way: "I (WE!) just won the War on the Climate Change Hoax. The billionaire has acknowledged his complete error. This demonstrated nerve, and we're thankful. MAGA!!!"

Background Information

Gates has always been completely WRONG on climate matters, even if not for the explanations Trump provides. He has consistently lagged behind the curve, reciting fossil fuel claims (clean technology could decrease pollution only through enormous spending) long after they've been discredited. He has spread confusion and misinformation, such as the groundless assertion in his new essay that the objective of Sri Lanka's catastrophic restriction on chemical fertilizers involved emission reduction.

Further Difficult Realities

Gates calls his essay Three Tough Truths About Climate. So here's another tough truth he studiously ignores. If, as currently expected, essential environmental mechanisms pass turning points and quickly deteriorate, the effects on human life, not to mention the existence of other species (a topic he fails, as usual, to mention), would eliminate the gradual advancement he predicts. Given that climate alteration may not happen incrementally and steadily, but via abrupt transitions, the potential effects on human welfare are very difficult to forecast. His argument that we should align all funding to current "data-based analysis" of improvements in human welfare, even if it seems logical, creates significant illogic when confronting systemic transformation, {prompting us to ignore the greatest