> First, I do think it's ridiculous that he takes it as a given that Oligarchs favour climate policy.

> I don't think any serious survey of the financial interests of the global superrich will support this view.

There is a subtlety here - one possible outcome is oligarchs cynically favouring climate policy while simultaneously having deep vested interests in fossil fuels.

The article isn't saying that the oligarchs want to do anything about climate change; the idea is that they are very keen on the principle of using centralised power to control others and will attach the things they want controlled to climate policies as implemented.

If I owned an oil company then backbreaking legislation that means nobody can start a new oil company would be strategically interesting; for example. Big companies don't fight regulation tooth and nail. They accept the regulation then lobby for loopholes that favour them and restrictions that disadvantage competition.

It is, in fact, rare to see a corporation moving to deregulate industries. They often fight changes, but rarely organise to reverse reverse things once they are in compliance with new rules.

The oil oligarchs strongly opposed renewable energy because it would simply replace oil, gas and coal consumption. New governmental regulations that forbid their companies from selling their products are of no use to them. If you don't believe me, do a google search on: fossil fuels stranded assets.

And one more point. There are a lot of big companies in the renewable energy field, but they are for the most part a whole different set of companies than the fossil fuel ones. And the fossil fuel companies know this, and that they are going to get replaced, so they have been denying global climate change for decades.

Big companies actively encourage regulation! Notice Facebook lobbying for privacy regulations.

I just turned on the television for the first time in years. There was an ad from an oil company talking about climate change as if it’s a given, and how they’re taking measures to stop it.

Is the ad superficial, meaningless bullshit? Of course.

But the presence of hypocritical financial interests is irrelevant. Or rather, it supports the thesis that the clerisy are interested in power rather than actual morality.

Regarding the poor academics, the conflict between members of the middle class is the point of the article.

Tenured professors v. adjuncts might be the best possible example of the authors point.

You are assuming the "yeomanry" mainly consists of the old, but I think that's an overly narrow and basically false assumption. The participants in the yellow vest protests in France - largely members of "yeomanry" I would think - are as much Gen X and Millenial as they are Baby Boomers.

As for the oligarchs, there are certainly wealthy individuals entrenched in the traditional fossil fuel industries, but the number of these individuals is dwarfed by the oligarchs in Media, Finance, Government, Technology etc, who are much farther removed both in business and culture from traditional modes of energy production and as such are able to take and advocate for radical positions on environmental policy without regard to the consequences for the "yeomanry".

This story plays out across the spectrum of issues that society contends with today. In general, sometimes for the same and sometimes for different reasons, elites in the corporate world and also members of the "clerisy" both desire a breakdown of traditional society to further their own agendas. In the case of the former that agenda is defined by profit seeking and in the case of the latter it is defined by philosophical and social beliefs.

So you see, I think while this piece is vague and steps on its own toes at points, it is addressing a real conflict that exists and is growing in contemporary society.

If you draw lines in society, you'll always be able to find scenarios where people on one side have a conflict with people on the other side. The question is whether the lines are drawn to reflect real differences, or to stuff all the author's political opponents in the same bucket.

But the yellow vests are overwhelmingly lower class - and in France you might even say peasantry.

Weather or not some rich people are using these people by manipulating them is another question

That hasn't been my impression. While they may not be business owners, I think many of the yellow vests could be considered working middle class.

Not by the normal definitions

This is certainly true for the Netherlands (alluded to in the article): the yellow vests (and the supporters of right wing populists in general) are overwhelmingly poor, both in terms of education and in terms of wealth.

This is a cut-and-paste patchwork of stock right-wing talking points - written by someone who is part of what he calls the clerisy, and who conveniently ignores the fact that the people who "hand down policy" are not university professors and academics, but a huge network of privately funded PR companies, social influencers, think tanks, and carefully on-message media outlets.

In short, it's a propaganda piece for that operation - designed to set up fake anti-intellectual resentment against a group with very little political influence.

The reality is that far from setting climate policy, social policy, or economic policy, left-wing academics and scientists have to fight tooth and nail to create any policy push back at all against the distorting influence of this organised and toxic lie machine.

Corporate and political power is under no serious threat from this academic "clerisy". Suggesting they're somehow complicit with the interests of oppressive oligarchs, especially about climate change, is so far from the truth it's practically crank talk, and is also - conveniently - a stock variation on the old trope that climate scientists are only in it for the money, while brave and noble fossil fuel corporations are there to help protect innocent citizens from their corrupting influence.

Pish. It's mostly based on an article by Thomas Piketty, which is linked.

Piketty may be many things, but right wing is not one of them.