Every Australian ought to read the Ergas article in The Australian. For non-Australians, it’s a case-study of just how thin and fragile all our democracies are. The government was elected NOT to do this. The Treasury are paid to provide their modeling and assumptions to the Australian people but they won’t. The Labor Party is planning to put in the crippling legislation that can’t be unwound, even if 99% of Australians wanted it to be.
No, this is not a master plan to destroy the country, it’s just filthy ambition — to rule at all costs, the nation be damned. The ALP doesn’t particularly want to sacrifice itself over the Carbon Tax, but in clawing for every tiny election advantage (No, you can’t campaign to remove the toxic tax!) they are resorting to breaking unspoken principles of western democracies and revealing something they normally hide in their darkest recesses: their naked disdain for the citizens. It’s the end result of crumbling standards of ethics in parts of the public service, and a lack of intellectual debate within the Labor Party.
A mortally wounded, weak government, is a dangerous creature.
Where would we be without The Australian?
———————————————————
Lies, deception and carbon tax
- by: Henry Ergas
- From: The Australian
- September 26, 2011 12:00AM
START with what is uncontested. First, once carbon emitters are issued permits, those permits will be property they own, so any government that abolishes them will have to pay compensation, possibly in the billions of dollars.
Second, entitlements created by statute may be found by the High Court to be property even if that is not specified in the legislation creating them. But specifying it in the legislation, as the government intends, makes that outcome, and the need to pay compensation, far more certain.
Third, a future government could not get around the need to pay compensation simply by mandating a zero carbon price. This is because that would almost certainly require rejecting the Climate Change Authority’s recommended abatement trajectory. But unless that government could convince both houses of parliament to adopt another abatement target, such a rejection triggers a default pricing mechanism. And far from reducing the carbon price, the legislated mechanism could increase it by up to 10 per cent in a single year.
Fourth, nor could a future government get its way by modifying the membership of the Climate Change Authority.
Rather, the legislation creating the authority limits the number of members it can have: unlike, for example, that establishing the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission. And a government has little scope to dismiss members once they have been appointed. The new government would therefore be stuck with its predecessor’s authority.
In short, a new government would be comprehensively locked in. But that, Mark Dreyfus, the Parliamentary Secretary for Climate Change, assures us (The Australian, September 22), is not the legislation’s intention. Rather, its aim is merely to provide certainty.
Dreyfus does not explain why certainty should be provided here but not for water entitlements, taxi licences, fishing quotas or development approvals.
But even putting that aside, Dreyfus’s stated aim makes no sense. For the Gillard government can no more eliminate uncertainty about the future regime for climate change than King Canute could turn back the waves. Rather, that uncertainty is a fact. And its costs cannot be wished away.
Nowhere is that clearer than with the prospects for global agreement. Yes, credible agreement to reduce carbon emissions might be reached some time soon. But it is at least as likely that it will not, as the same changes in the global political economy that have killed the Doha round of world trade negotiations stall progress on climate change. And if that happens, abatement by Australia will be futile and economically harmful. Forcing it to continue would only compound the harm.
As a result, when the Gillard government promises investors in “green” activities certainty, it is not eliminating risk: it is merely shifting it from those investors on to taxpayers and the community, magnifying its cost along the way. And while private investors get a choice about whether to bear risk and are compensated accordingly, the victims of this risk transfer do not.
To add insult to injury, the victims are not even being told how big the resulting loss could be. This is because Treasury has not modelled, or if it has modelled has not released, the scenario in which those losses eventuate: that is, in which Australia implements ever higher carbon prices while the rest of the world does not.
Dreyfus does not mention, much less attempt to justify, that fact. Nor does he mention, much less attempt to justify, the government’s decision not to publicly release the models and data used by Treasury, though they were paid for by taxpayers. Rather, he claims Treasury’s work has been “one of the largest economic modelling tasks ever undertaken in Australia”.
Perhaps, but that only increases the need for full public scrutiny, especially given what is at stake. This is all the more the case as the modelling rests on implausible assumptions. Not that Dreyfus denies those assumptions. Rather, faced with the fact the modelling assumes much of Australia’s abatement will be sourced from the former Soviet Union and “other Asia”, Dreyfus merely says overseas abatement “may” provide emissions reduction that “can” reduce the scheme’s costs.
That is indeed possible. And it is also possible that countries such as Uzbekistan, Burma and Laos will undergo the greatest moral regeneration since The Pilgrim’s Progress and become the credible vendors of abatement to Australia Treasury’s modelling assumes. But betting on that outcome is no way to sleep well at night. To get an idea of what is pokies or online pokies have a look at this pokies website.
And if taxpayers and the community are to pick up the tab for Labor’s lock-in, why shouldn’t they know just how big the loss would be if things don’t go to plan?
That assessment should have been in the legislation’s Regulation Impact Statement. But rather than analysing the risks, it parrots Treasury’s assumptions, including about global agreement, and then adds mistakes of its own: for example, it argues market mechanisms are better than direct action, but ignores the myriad forms of direct action the government proposes to introduce; in estimating compliance costs, it ignores the costs of securing and auditing abatement overseas; and it also ignores the fact as the carbon price rises, the incentives to cheat, and hence the costs involved in preventing cheating, increase with it.
For all that, there can be no excuse. Nor is there any excuse for as intelligent a man as Dreyfus descending to such contortions. But the underlying reality is simple. Labor campaigned on Gillard’s promise that “there will be no carbon tax under the government I lead”.
Once in office, it turned its back on that promise. Now it wants to prevent an Abbott government from honouring its promise to repeal Labor’s scheme. And if that inflicts massive costs on the community, more’s the pity.
Little wonder the government faces a credibility problem. But what is surprising is that its own members don’t worry about the ethics of its conduct.
Is that what Australia’s oldest political party has come to?
If so, it will take far more than a make-over to save it from a historic defeat.
Reprinted in full with permission from The Australian.
H/t Neville.
Rodney Cavaliers article on the decline of Labor and the plunder by apparatchiks is worth a close look.
UPDATE: Let M.P Alex Hawke know what you think at this poll.
G’day Jo! You wrote “The Labor Party is planning to put in the crippling legislation that can’t be unwound, even if 99% of Australians wanted it to be.”
In the US, the congress can pass a bill to repeal any legislation. If the president vetoes the repeal bill then the congress can override the president’s veto by a two thirds majority and the bill becomes law and it is an act of congress. Forgive my ignorance of how Australia’s government functions but certainly there must be a way, perhaps even more difficult than the US congress overriding a presidential veto, to repeal a carbon tax, right?
20
Well to get the ball rolling and for a change being 100% on topic I replicate my comment I submitted to The Australian (though it doesn’t look like they are accepting comments on this article):
If one takes the Government as the sole supplier of “carbon units” (the credits to allow emissions of CO2-e, which is CO2 equivalents) then the demand curve for said credits is highly inelastic, but not perfectly inelastic. In a market-based system the Government can choose the amount of carbon units to supply, but ultimately the price is set by the demand curve.
Or to put it another way, given the number of carbon units is known and fixed for a given year, any price determined by the Government (through the Climate Change Authority – CCA) that is not a market-clearing equilibrium price, is by definition NOT a “market price.”
20
Just heard some of professor Chubb’s answers before a Parliamentary Committee on the midday news, and a few questions from labor and greens. What a joke…Royal Commission is what is needed.He says scientists need to get out more with their propaganda…and the media are not giving warmistas a fair go…
10
Eddy Aruda,
It is not the power to repeal legistlation that is the problem. The Australian Parliament has that power. It is the bestowing of property rights to the holders of the carbon permits that forces, under our constitution, that recompense be paid if any property is acquired by the Commonwealth that puts the cost of repealing such legislation prohibative. The only executive powers we have are with the Queen of England and via proxy her representative in Australia, the Governor General, and those powers are quite limited and have no real probability of being invoked in this case.
10
Another professor resigns a prestige organization…over lies and bad behaviour
10
@ Truthseeker
Thank you for your edifying response to my post.
10
I don’t get it, you aren’t usually critical of Tony Abbott…..
10
I read this article this morning.
Congratulations Mr Henry Ergas. You have simply stated the cold hard facts about this insidious tax.
Be Warned, Deputy Prime Minister Bob Brown will not like it !!!
You will be targeted for a possible media enquiry grilling and they will want to shut you up !!
We demand an Election now PM Juliar.
10
I’m confused about the supposed inability to shut down the scheme. Surely the permits are for one year, and expire at that end of that time? So they only have value for the current year, and after that should be worthless. That is how I’d do it anyway.
10
Henry Ergas also broke another hidden aspect of our government’s senility back in August:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/opinion/australia-will-send-57bn-a-year-overseas-by-2050-treasury-modelling-shows/story-e6frg9k6-1226118430293
10
When milk quotas were abolished there was no need for the governments to compensate producers because although they belonged to producers, had value and were initially issued by governments, governments had never sold or traded milk quotas for profit. I think you will find the parallels compelling. (The opposite to taxi plate trading by governments.)
A different but equally compelling argument is that quotas to emit may have their value reduced to zero but they can remain in place. Governments introducing legislation which has the secondary effect of reducing the value of property are under no obligation to compensate. (eg issue of new taxi plates dilutes the value of existing plates but does not lead to compensation; or if a government puts a noisy road outside your bedroom window you get nothing more than they agree to give you out of the goodness of their publicly funded hearts.)
Can someone who has actually given this matter a modicum of thought please explain why there is this hysteria about compensation?
10
JB in 9,
Thats a fair question and it is the logical way to do something like this but there must be something else that causes the permits to be a property of the emitter.
Can anyone please explain in more detail.
If Ergas is correct then this is a very fool hardy thing to do by Labor would you agree?
10
What a waste. Surely we can put our resources to better use than to feed a wunch of bankers with this oxymoron of a carbon tax?
How many trees could be planted for the money that will be creamed by the aristocrats of the age? How many australian kids in danger could be helped with all those Billions of dollars?
All going into the pockets of goldman sachs and the other parasitic middlemen.
How much real conservation could be done with all the resources that are going to be sucked out of our economy by this zombie vampire tax?
And what will it be like in 10 years time when the bribes (with a little b) to the people have been eliminated completely and the price is upped?
And what will be the excuse for keeping it in place in the future as the climate continues to just not conform to the models?
Time will tell, but lets make sure anyone interested will be able to quickly find the names of their MPs who supported this undemocratic act.
I predict in a very short space of time as people really start to feel the effects of the greater depression/recession, they will become extremely angry at was has been done and with so little justification and such flawed logic.
10
If the surviving ALP MPs after the next election were to consider what is in their self interest, they would vote down the bill.
The tax will become politically toxic and as long as it exists it will remind voters of the current government. In other words, while the tax lives the ALP will be out of power.
The best thing (for themselves) the ALP MPs could do, would be to make the tax easily repealed.
10
I read the Australian daily which made me aware of this sinister and probably illegal legislation some days ago. After allowing myself plenty of time to think about it, I am still filled with rage.The Govenor General needs to call a double dissolution now, and sort out the legalities later, before these totalitarians take thier chance to render the economy irreparable.
10
Truthseekes @4
You are correct when you say that there are limitations to the Govenor Generals powers, fortunately these restrictions don’t apply to The Queen. Any citizen of The Commonwealth has the right to petition the Queen on any issue, in this case an issue of governance in the manner and method of introducing The Clean Energy Bills. There is an online petition that was a Letter to The Queen asking her to refuse consent to The Clean Energy Bills on a number of grounds. Whilst The Queen, to my knowledge, has never refused consent to legislation, we have never had such dangerous legislation proposed in such a mendacious and undemocratic way.
Gnome @ 11
If you are talking about compensation paid under The Clean Energy Bills. The Government reckons that The Clean Energy Bills will reduce CO2 by 165,000,000 tonnes. @$23.00/t that comes to $3’795,000,000 worth of tax that won’t be available to compensate consumers and exposed industries for the increased costs, more when you add in the ammouny going to the UN.
If you are talking about compensation for permits if a repeal bill passes it very much depends on how long and how many permits have been issued under the Clean Energy Bills. Easiest thing to do is look at how much the government says will be needed to be spent on international offsets, these are the cabon permits that are property that will need to be paid for by the taxpayer.
10
I heard a hopeful Labor wonk on Radio National this morning bleating on about how by the 2013 election with the Carbon Tax in place and fat compensation packages flowing the C tax won’t look so bad and the Gillard Government might claw back enough happy voters to hang on to office. He’s dreaming.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/opinion/black-hole-in-governments-carbon-tax-compensation-plan/story-e6frgd0x-1226090123278
10
I am not as pessimistic as some on this. A referendum at the right time will put paid to whatever bunch of “carbon” poo-bah potentates that the ALP fascisti create.
The price of these “credits” will be zero sooner than we think; just like the tulips in 17th. century Holland. They will have been created out of thin air and that’s where they will end up. And that will be sooner rather than later.
Interesting that the slime Dreyfus needed Green preferences to get over the line last year.
http://results.aec.gov.au/15508/Website/HouseDivisionFirstPrefs-15508-219.htm
Reckon he’s dead meat next time around.
10
Never thought I would see the day that an Australian political party would not only push through legislation that is so obviously against the wishes of the voters but to make it such that it can not be easily repealed.
Hope the labor party is so punished at the next election that they are vying with the greens for relevance.
John Brookes @ 9
Yes I would have thought so to.But maybe someone can enlighten us on that
10
For the same reason that Peter Spencer has a case in the High Court, so potentially would every holder of carbon permits, if they were suddenly deemed to have no value. All the people who invested in solar, or wind, or grew trees, for starters, who thought that their money was well spent would have a reasonable case to ask for compensation from a government that changed the rules. Every company that paid for efficiency improvements to reduce CO2 emissions, on the expectation that the carbon permits earned would offset the cost, would expect to be paid for the carbon permits.
Just as a government which forces people to give up their farm for a highway ought to pay the owners of the land a fair price, so a government which takes away carbon credits (deemed to be property rights) would be expected to pay compensation for legislation that removed the value of the carbon credits.
There is no “out” clause, no caveat apparently — if all “the government approved science” proved to be weak, inconclusive and wrong, if the world cooled, if all other carbon schemes failed and closed around the world, we Australian’s would be committed to paying billions to reduce CO2, even though any CO2 reductions would turn out to be a net loss in every conceivable sense.
The Labor government is acting as Kings or Gods. They think they can change the weather, control global markets, and are smarter than 21 million Australians. They have overplayed their hand.
10
Wes @ 10
Thanks Wes for highlighting this other piece by Prof Ergas. I had not seen these figures before –it makes absolute nonsense of Adam Smith’s argument that no future Government will repeal the legislation because of the cost of compensation. His latest estimate was $10 bill in compensation ( I’m not going to dispute this figure). But if Australia is heading towards an annual cost of $57billion down the track for absolutely no benefit then a “one off” $10bill, to stop that on going cost, is small change ( relatively speaking).
10
For those having difficulty understanding the property rights issue of the Clean Energy Bill, I would point you to this Link Jobs and Copetiveness Program. This section deals with the free permits that will be issued to compensate exposed industry.
10
Henry Ergas has been a lone voice of accurate information on the real consequences of the carbon dioxide tax because:
1. The leftwing (chiefly Fairfax) press refuses to provide in-depth coverage because, unlike a real news organisation, it is barracking for a minority, extremist political ideology.
2. Even if it wanted to provide credible coverage, Fairfax’s editorial resources were gutted in the 1990s by the rapacious Brierley Investments (which also gutted Ansett) in a cost-cutting drive. Editorial budgets were almost halved and have never recovered.
3. As a result of (2), a succession of Fairfax editors, chosen for their subservience to accountants, invented a new news ideology, which raised the importance of opinions to the status of facts because of lack of resources, paving the way for the group’s sharp political left turn, reflecting the bias of most who worked there.
4. Hence, Fairfax has become a propaganda mouthpiece for the climate gravy train and the Greens. This has an added benefit for the group’s websites, which rely heavily on impressionable youngsters susceptible to the doomsday fables being fed to them by Al Gore and Hollywood. Of course, it will be detrimental for the group in the long term.
The Australian is the only broadsheet newspaper in Australia prepared to devote opinion space and resources to reporting of the carbon dioxide tax and its attendant issues that isn’t an extension of the government’s propaganda.
The job of the press is examine and criticise incumbent governments, which all Australian papers always did until a decade ago, when Fairfax abrogated its responsibility because it wanted more of its financial resources diverted to buy mansions for its shareholders on the insistence of greedy little oxygen thieves like Ron Brierley.
It could only happen in Australia, the cut-price scam capital of the world.
10
Thanks Paul in 22
Jo in 20, so it comes down to simple math then, we either pay 650 billion plus to someone or we compensate the victims of the scam. We choose which ever the cheaper option……….result either way………….Labor wander the political landscape until a generation of memories has faded.
I can live with that.
10
Once in office, the coalition should first use whatever money it reserved for its ‘carbon’ measures, to offset the cost of removing Gillard’s ‘carbon’ tax. I think that only the Labor/Greens and their supports, will complain; but they will do so anyway.
10
Classic case of deception:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/02/brazil-amazon-rainforest-hydroelectric-dam
Here we have a link to the Brazil wanting to build a dam for hydro electrickery purposes, naturally it has been opposed by the green element. The dam will produce 11 GW of electricity.
So my question to all those inclined to answer:
What alternative did the green element offer that could produce the equivalent 11 GW?
Now the deception, the green element failed in their bid to stop progress so now they claim “there is no point building a dam because AGW will ensure there is no water to actually dam”
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/brazil/110203/drought-belo-monte-dam
And this is the bit that really gives me the ……………, the green tinge chant, protest, chain themselves to things claiming we are killing the globe so in an effort to appease them we look to more *friendly* alternatives but they are still not happy so lets stop trying to make the buggars happy and simply ignore them.
10
Sean,
I hear you but it would be a shame. Whilst I don’t agree with he motivation behind the direct action measures, I gotta say that I do like the real environmental aspects of the DA plan.
Planting more trees I am in favor of, lining bankers pockets I am not.
I would prefer the coalition to finda way to have these un-mandated travesties made illegitimate in some way, if possible to avert the needfor compensation.
If there is no other way, well then I guess they may have to. It will e a real shame to see the rent seekers gain the money that could help us leave australia in better shape for future generations than would otherwise be the case though.
The rent seekers must be rubbing heir filthy hands with glee right now.
10
If one had to sum up very briefly the GetUp/Green approach to problems, real or factitious, one might say that all solutions are required to be:
a) enormously, nay, stupendously indirect
b) enormously, nay, stupendously rortable
10
“START with what is uncontested. First, once carbon emitters are issued permits, those permits will be property they own, so any government that abolishes them will have to pay compensation”
Why do the opposition not say right now that they will not be held to this undemocratic parcel of garbage and warn that no reparation will be paid on the carbon bonds. Trust me, no investor worth his salt would touch the things. Floated on the U.S. market they are now worthless!
10
I understand that the authors of the IPCC AR4 stated that they were 90 percent sure that CO2 was the primary cause of dangerous warming. Chief Scientist Prof Will Steffen said that they are more sure now, putting it at 95 percent. That is, a 1 in 20 chance that CO2 is irrelevant. Surely the legistation must contain a roll-back provision? If not can Will Steffen be asked if he agrees that there should be no roll-back allowed for?
10
Chief Scientist Chubb said on the ABC:
‘scuse me Mr Chief Scientist: Are ALL the natural events modelled?
It’s impossibly expensive to make the real world conform to a computer model.
Chubb wants scientists to make their voices heard. Is this loud enough for you, Chubb? (link to NoTricksZone)
— Dr. Ir. Henri A. Masson resigning from the Société Européenne des Ingénieurs et Industriels (European Society of Engineers and Industrialists – abbreviated SEII)
I cannot but agree especially with the sentiments of the latter.
10
Better informed??
10
Paul D Scott @ 15
Sorry Paul, but the GG can’t simply “dissolve” parliament. The Reserve Powers do give the GG the power to do many things, including dissolving parliament, but only as a result of a specific set of “triggers”.
The road towards such a trigger could at least be started if enough people petitioned the GG to withhold Royal Assent from the Bills and return them to the parliament for reconsideration.
However, since people won’t, it becomes academic as to whether she would actually do it or not.
10
Tom @ 23.
“It could only happen in Australia, the cut-price scam capital of the world.”
You have nailed it on this aspect Tom! Quite aside from the fact that the incredibly complex carbon (dioxide) tax legislation is based on computer-modelled rubbish making up the greatest scientific fraud ever, the rorts history of even simple schemes like pink batts, school halls and various other “Green” schemes introduced by this Government makes one shudder to think of what the scammers will do with this one.
I feel that Gillard is in urgent need of psychiatric help as she is clearly becoming more delusional by the day. She is a serial blame-shifter and seemingly no longer knows or cares whether she is lying or not.
The last time I can remember her telling the truth was when she announced her intention to go back on her promise and introduce the carbon tax and said “it will raise costs, that’s what it’s designed to do!”
We can only hope that economic commentators like Henry Ergas, Terry McCrann and others keep chipping away to educate enough voters to increase pressure on Labor MP’s virtually certain to lose their seats at the next election if the carbon tax insanity becomes law.
Nothing galvanises pollies quicker than the thought of their own job loss!
10
PaulM @ 16
Actually, weird as it may seem Paul, that’s sort of arse-about these days.
With the passage of the Australia Acts, it is highly debatable whether the Queen could do anything at all except refer the matter back to the GG. Even if she could, it would require first of all that the GG set aside the legislation for the Queen to grant Royal Assent. The Queen can’t just “barge in” and start dictating things. Not now, and not even before the Australia Acts.
Given that the GG has a choice:
– grant Royal Assent, or
– refer the bill(s) to the monarch for Royal Assent, or
– return the bill(s) to the parliament for further consideration,
it would seem if anything at all was to happen, it would start with the GG sending the bill(s) back to the parliament as a result of being convinced (through petition), that the bills did not represent the WILL of the Australian people.
However, given that we are talking about the mother-in-law of the future Leader of the Labor Party, I won’t be holding my breath.
Which is absolutely NO reason why we shouldn’t do it, as I stressed many times in relation to the “Convoy of No Confidence”.
10
Madjak @ 27:
Even though I would rather that Abbott had let his scepticism win out, I am not advocating he abandon his commitment. Rather he should direct the initial money flow toward offsetting the cost of removing Gillard’s tax.
10
Not too many people would be aware of the requirements of the Constitution and how it is that acts of deception occured at the swearing in ceremonies at the last election.
It is acknowledged that the Australian Constitution is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, so therefore it is a bit difficult to see how an Act of the Australian Parliament can change it.
Section 42 of The Commonwealth Of Australia Constitution Act says – Every senator and every member of the House of Representatives shall before taking his seat make and subscribe before the Governor-General,or some person authorised by him,an oath or affirmation of allegiance in the form set forth in the schedule to this Constitution.
Schedule – Oath
I,A.B.,do swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Victoria,Her heirs and successors according to law.SO HELP ME GOD!
Affirmation – I,A.B.,do solemnly affirm and declare that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to her majesty Queen Victoria,Her heirs and successors according to law.
Note: The name of the King or Queen of the United kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland for the time being is to be substituted from time to time.
If one Googles YouTube – “Julia Gillard being sworn in as PM” it is shown that she isn’t sworn in Constitutionally and has no legal right to take her seat in Parliament.
If one Googles YouTube – “PM Julia Gillard Affirms Allegiance to the Queen” it will be seen that those to be sworn in were already seated and that the affirmation was taken as a group with the affirmation wording being read to them beginning – “Do each of you swear that you will be faithful….”, whereas the requirement is that the oath be taken individually as prescribed before seats are taken.
And then there is section 44…
10
KeithH @ 34
Can I offer a simpler explanation?
JuLIAR, Frau Milne, Rhiannon, and several of the other prime movers and shakers in all this, come from a lifetime background involved with ideologies committed, in their own words, to “the destruction of the West”. I think a little bit of digging would uncover Brownshirt Bob’s past involvement in similar ideologies.
Can you look at what is happening today in OZ, NZ, the UK, the USA and and elsewhere, “in the West”, and not agree that what these people, and their counterparts in those countries’ devoted a large chunk of their lives to, is not exactly what is coming to pass?
In other words, far from being “failures”, just maybe they are being far more successful at what they actually intended to accomplish, than we dare give them credit for?
10
Says Ergas:
To remind & confirm, lets go to the official Climate Control government website:
http://www.climatechange.gov.au/government/international/finance.aspx
Like this REDD scheme?
This is NOT the first time the Australian LaboUr Government has been in cahoots with UN-REDD fraud:
Someone call the carbon cops…
10
PaulM @ 16
I think you may be correct on a technical standpoint, but I specifically couched my answer in terms of probability because I think that the probability of the Queen not consenting to the legislation is vanishingly small.
10
Surely this should make the pig ignorant dummies here wake up and take notice.
What’s more important stupid green schemes or the lives and property of these poor people.
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/save_the_planet_evict_the_humans/
10
incoherent rambler: #14
But they can’t, at least not easily. It is the job of the Party Whips to make sure that the back benchers don’t get lost and exit by the wrong door (metaphorically speaking, in this digital age).
Mind you, the independents aren’t under the Whip.
What a fantastic way for one or two of them to make a strong statement – by voting with the opposition. They could cement their bums to their seats for life.
10
Notice that hoary old lefty Kenneth Davidson, who imagines he is up to date with climate science, has an article in today’s Age giving a serve about the billions being invested in coal and how Gillards carbon tax is just a very small beginning (which of course is the real fear that those of us au fait with the massive de-indutrialisation implicit in attempting to switch to renewables like wind and solar, hold).
Are all lefties brain dead? About the only lefty I knew of who knew CAGW is a scam is Alexander Cockburn. Wondered if he had been bashed into alarmist submission by his otherwise bedfellow lefties. Looks like they haven’t been successful.
http://awesternheart.blogspot.com/2011/04/alexander-cockburn-dumps-on-nuke-loving.html
Some good lines here. So here is at least one lefty who is not brain dead when it comes to AGW.
10
Wes George: #10
That might have something to do with “Our Kevin” putting his mark on the Kyoto Protocol without getting somebody to translate the fine print into monosyllablic words for to him.
10
Rereke Whakaaro,
Being a New Zealander this info may be of interest –
“Is New Zealands Government and court system unlawful?
http://www.hiddenmysteries.org/themagazine/vol14/articles/timebomb.shtml
10
catamon: #32
Missed it in one!
10
memoryvault @ 35
It is truly wierd that there does appear to be a disparity due to the Australia Acts, it was one of the many aspects that intrigued me when I took it upon myself to learn about the system of governance I had chosen to fight for if needed. I was quite lucky to have access to a family friend who is a QC and experienced in Constitutional Law and was disappointed to find out that much of my concerns had no answers as the various provisions, ammendments etc had never been tested. In the 1/4 century that has passed since, very little has changed, although on the issue of Regal Consent V Vice Regal Consent, even in the circumstances where the GG gives assent, the Regal Consent must still follow (he described it as similar to how our UN Delegates can sign a UN Treaty but it still has to be ratafied by Parliament to have legal force.) In this manner the Sovreign always has final say, regardless of the GG’s opinion, IMO, an excellent and vital check and balance for the subjects of The Commonwealth against unwise wielding of Vice Regal power. Especially in our current circumstances where we have a GG who continuously fails to respond to properly constituted petitions and formal letters from Her Majesty’s loyal subjects. Funny how our GG won’t lower herself to respond to corespondence but Her Majesty’s Secretary has always responded within 7 days, and has noted my complaints about this particularly offensive habit of the current office holder.
And in response to you and Truthseeker re: the vanishimgly small probability of denial of Royal Consent, true, but no reason not to participate in group petitions, or as I do individual petitions to both the GG and Her Majesty. Conventions never change nor are precedents set until the legislation or convention is tested.
10
Some notes on S.51
http://www.enotes.com/topic/Section_51(xxxi)_of_the_Australian_Constitution
This paragraph is of particular interest:-
While statutory licences have sometimes been equated with proprietary interests, the removal of rights enjoyed under a statutory licence does not typically constitute an acquisition of property within section 51(xxxi), as licence conditions are inherently susceptible to change.
As PeteH noted above, if the Opposition warns prospective buyers that they will do their damndest to void these perfidious laws they will think twice. Look at what successive governments did to the survivors of the Melbourne-Voyager disaster (1964). They used every legal trick in the book to delay paying out until all the claimants finally all died.
Where there’s a wiill, there’s a way!
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Kevin Moore: #45
Hell yeah! You don’t think Australia has a monopoly on criminals do you? We just put ours higher up in the penal system.
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A common theme here is that the carbon tax will be bad for the economy. I’m not so sure. While people of a greenish tinge might put on their rose coloured glasses and pretend that the transition to a low carbon economy will be easy, its actually likely to be pretty bloody hard. But strangely, that would be a good thing for the economy.
What ended the great depression? An incredibly wasteful event known as WW2, where countries around the world devoted their efforts to destroying rather than building. No one would recommend WW2 to solve economic problems, but a radical change to our energy production regime may do just that, without the loss of life….
10
Forget JG. I would like to know what laws exist and the associated penalties for providing information that is intended to deceive the parliament of Australia (either house).
I would expect that they exist and I would expect that the penalties would be draconian (assuming you are not an MP).
Methinks that those in the employ of the government who have deliberately provided deceptive information regarding AGW, CO2 etc. would be open to criminal prosecution.
Does anyone know?
10
O/T, apologies
John,
Nice thought there, and I most sincerely hope you might be right. You may be suprised about this, but for more than a couple of years now I have mulled over the very thought that you have expressed.
I have been mulling over why wars always seem to be the circuit breakers for a depression. Yes, they recalibrate values, yes new technologies emerge from them, and crap technologies and immaturity get extinguished in them, and yes they are the worst possible thing. And who knows, maybe wars are really just the culmination of anger and resentment, who really knows. I haven’t seen a good enough answer yet.
I thing the main reason wars seem to have this effect is the fact that in any economy, consumers that don’t consume and therefore producers that don’t produce are, economically speaking, a dead weight. Wars replace the consumers with the ultimate destruction.
The key thing here is that this measure is coming in at exactly the wrong time. We are heading into a greater depression, and this tax will only add to the frustration and misery. As it stands, the Greater depression has allready snuffed out large amounts of consumption. And yes, some of that was overconsumption, but as allways it is going too far.
In short there are allready ample triggers to recalibrate things. This sort of tax will only act to compound the situation.
This has and will continue to result in people in he developing world getting the cruellest taste of success before it is robbed from them.
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Bulldust @ 2
I think the lack of comments may be due to technical difficulties The Australian seems to have been having most of the day. A shame as that was a fine contribution from yourself.
Below was my submission:
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John Brookes @ 50
Equating the supposed clean energy transition to the gearing up of industry during WW2 is not only simplistic it is completely irrational.
1) In wartime a large percent of the potential workforce enters military service creating employment vacancies in the private sector at the same time it increases the public sector workforce, increasing the flow of money through taxes to the government coffers and an increase in total disposable income for the economy as a whole.
2) Wartime production creates a demand for capitalisation for heavy industry to be established or expanded to meet the materiele demands of warfare.
3) Expansion of heavy industry leads to an increased demand for resources including power and leads to a potential drop in production costs which flows on over time as an additional boost to industry and an increase in their ability to expand or pay down debt incurred in establishing or expanding manufacturing and distribution centers.
This bears no resemblence to the Clean Energy Bill which artificially inflates the cost of one method of generating power to make renewables more competitive. Nor does it (despite the compensation to a select section of industry) reduce the production costs of industries, it does the opposite. This reduces the ability of businesses to expand or pay down debt and will act as a massive brake on investment, capitalisation of systems/inventions/ideas that have passed the proof of concept phase of development, that is unless there is an increase in government funding from an ever dwindling revenue pool.
As for your assertion that this all can be achieved without loss of life, what about the people who will die from starvation in the developing world who can no longer afford the cost of basic food stuffs like wheat, rice, sugar etc that comes from the developed nations like Australia who will have higher production costs that must be passed on to the end user if they are to remain viable. Do you seriously believe some of these nations are just going to sit by whilst their food security is threatened by what happens here or do you thing they will look to take land to secure it for themselves? What about those peace loving nations whose economy is solely dependant on oil revenues or highly dependent on resource imports or exports, do you think they’re just going to sit and take that too? Food and energy security and economic prosperity/security to pacify their own peoples are key factors that drive the desire for militaristic expansion, that you think that what we do here will have no other ramifications other than totally local ones beggars belief.
10
Last year, one of our associate companies did a report on the EU ETS and the UN AAU systems, the cross over between them, and the numerous rorts and frauds that grew up around the trading of credits.
I can’t give many details, but I can quote one part of their conclusion:
Now, the research that preceded this conclusion discussed some eighteen different illegal scams and schemes that arose from either the EU ETS or the UN AAUs, or the cross-trading of carbon credits between them.
Australia is about to introduce a different scheme again, so what are the chances that the bureaucrats are going to be able to second-guess the creativity of the criminal mind, when we have three schemes where transactions are processed at close to the speed of light?
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Madjak @ 52
Depressions are caused simply by banks withdrawing money from circulation.
The same people own the worlds weapons of mass deception.
By the power of money and propaganda they bring about war, and finance both sides, which in the end on analysis will show that the real victor is the money power whose harvest is their greater grip on world control.
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John @50
I gave you a thumbs up there because, although I fear you are incorrect in your assertion, you were thoughtful, polite and unemphatic. In my opinion that was a valuable contribution to the thread and allows people like Madjak and PaulM the opportunity to respond in kind, in stark contrast to the mind numbing ramblings of AS and Blvr, and Catamon that we have endured recently. I hope you are correct, but unfortunately I fear world events will conspire against you. Timing is everything in life, and to me this seems like we are playing with fire and are going to be incinerated, big time. Anyway, credit where it’s due, thanks for your input.
10
Couldn’t this legistation be gought in the High Court,over the prooding it it agains repeal? I have sought advice on this issue via the CLRG website and this is my question,and their answer
Provision:
“Once the carbon change legislation is in place, he said, repeal would
amount to an acquisition of property by the commonwealth, as holders of
emissions permits would be deprived of a valuable asset. As a result,
the commonwealth would be liable, under s.51(xxxi) of the Australian
Constitution, to pay compensation, potentially in the billions of
dollars. A future government would therefore find repeal prohibitively costly?
Answer:Michael
The carbon tax is beyond the Federal legislator as it is not described in sections 51 or 52 or 55 of the Commonwealth Constitution Act 1900. They cannot bring in any legislation regarding the environment without an extra subsection being added to section 51 and this can only be achieved via section 128 of the Commonwealth Constitution Act 1900 being a referendum.
Any legislation allowing a Carbon tax is ultra Vires and therefore invalid.
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— Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency, April 2011
Ben Cubby
April 8, 2011 SMH
Someone call the Keystone Carbon Cops….
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Kevin @ 37:
So because they were sitting down, they weren’t properly sworn in??
I suspect that as each of them said the words themselves that probably meets the individuality requirement. I also think the “seats” referred to may be their seats in parliament, rather than where they have to park their bums in the GG’s presence.
Hang on…… your having a lend o me arent you chum??
10
I did see a post on FB from someone asking for a barrister to take Julia Gillard to court on grounds of lying to the Australian people,but I don’t know whether such an action would be successful.
10
Whew, lucky its an ETS and not a Carbon Tax then.
10
Actually the Clean Energy bill says it a tax on carbon,transitioning into an ETS in 2015. Anything else wouldn’t make sense as you can’t have an ETS transitioning into an ETS,but since when does this government makes sense?
10
Hi Jo, would it be “Deceiving the people” to publish a handbook saying that UAH records show no warming, when in fact they do?
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/from:2001/plot/uah/from:2001/trend
10
So where does it say it starts as a tax?
Certainly in the Preliminary is says:
Unless you are equating fixed charge as a tax. If so, no banana for you mate! Its a charge for a carbon unit, not a tax.
10
It permits SOME trading in CREDIBLE markets under market prices, but not for the whole amount, and it REGULATES the price of the units traded between a floor of $15 and a ceiling $20 above the market rate There will be two stages. For the first three years, the carbon price for each tonne of pollution will be fixed, and will operate like a carbon tax. Then, from 1 July 2015, the mechanism will shift to a ‘cap and trade’
You’Ll notice how it says “like a carbon tax”
10
Sadly you are all clutching at straws. The Carbon Tax will become Law and Australians will pay it. When the next election comes the result will depend on what the Gillard Government has done with the money. Australian Voters have short memories and how they vote depends on what’s in it for them. We have a Government that wants to tax the rich because why should they have all the money and give it to the poor because it makes them look good. I’m sure the Labor Party has done the figures and more than 50%(conservative estimate) of Australians would consider themselves poor or low income and that’s what the Government is banking on. When I emailed every Federal Labor MP about how I was worried that the Carbon Tax would do irreparable damage to our economy, the few replies I got consisted of “What are you worried about, just have a look at the compensation package you will get”.
10
Also the advice I linked earlier is as so “They cannot bring in any legislation regarding the environment without an extra subsection being added to section 51 and this can only be achieved via section 128 of the Commonwealth Constitution Act 1900 being a referendum.” Where did such a referendum take place because if it didn’t it sounds like the bill is invalid,but I could be wrong.
10
Which is an analogy, not a definition. So, at law, its not a tax then?
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Blimey @ 64:
Here is what the UAH series looked like in 2009 when Jo published it.
We can conclude two things from this:
* Book contents are frozen at their publication date.
* As the world changes and new information becomes available, old plans may need to be revised.
* Blimey is a nasty cheating cretin.
I think there’s a lesson in this for everybody, Jo included.
10
Not being a constitutional lawyer by profession i’ll defer to your wisdom for now rather than arguing. However, would surprise me if the Govt had missed something THAT big that may invalidate this part of their legislative program. I mean, they have passed what, 190?? pieces of legislation through the HoR so far in a hung parliament. It would appear they have the procedural stuff down pretty well and i suspect after the Malaysian / AS thing they are going to be considering the potential for legal challenge pretty carefully.
10
Here is what the UAH series looked like in
20092010 when Jo published it.http://joannenova.com.au/2010/07/finally-the-long-awaited-italian-translation/
But thanks for showing us the danger of relying on short term cherry picked science. 😉
10
So, in what universe does:
not count as an ad hominem attack??
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Joanne,
The Treasury modelling for the ETS is here:
http://treasury.gov.au/carbonpricemodelling/content/default.asp
It includes an update that was released last week.
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And here is the RSS plot for the same period:
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/from:2001/plot/rss/from:2001/trend
Notice how small the anomaly is from the y-axis in any case, well within 0.1. Could easily be explained by different statistical methods.
Is that your best punch blimey, tiny minded gnat!
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Blimey,
No no, thank you Blimey, for showing us this enduring white elephant in the skeptic’s room.
Because without you we would not have known that -0.09°/decade translated to Italian is -0.09°/decade.
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from Kevin Moore @45.
Real Govts evolve from revolution..USA, France, China, Russia and others. The outposts of the empire derived from old totalitarian rule of Kings of Merry England are not.
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For those arguing that the fixed price period isn’t a tax:-
To tax is to impose a financial charge or other levy upon a taxpayer, be they individual or legaly constituted entity or enterprise by a state or the functional equivalent of a state such that failure to pay is punishable by law.
Taxation has four main purposes or effects: Revenue, Redistribution, Repricing, and Representation. There are many types of tax including taxes on income, taxes on payroll, taxes on property, taxes on goods and services and other types such as environmental taxes.
An Environmental Tax is defined as a tax or levy imposed with the stated purpose to reduce the environmental impact by repricing. This includes such taxes as natural resource consumption taxes (Mining Royalties), pollution taxes (Pigovian Taxes) and greenhouse gas taxes (Carbob Tax).
These are classifications and definitions that are accepted as true and correct by the OECD, those that try to assert or argue otherwise are ignorant of accepted definitions and are deceptive individuals driven by ideology who use deception and distraction to try to prop up theories they lack the intelligence or understanding to argue effectively.
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Oo goody! Lets have the Govt not pass ANY legislation till this is sorted and we have a new constitution in place. In the meantime can we make paying tax voluntary till we have actual tax laws in place??
And of course we will have to stop any Govt payments to anybody as they are all made under legislation that shouldn’t exist??
I suspect that if this theory was found to be valid then at the very least it would be within the power of the sovereign (who’s position is not in dispute) to decree that the document known as the Constitution of Australia (or NZ) is in fact valid, and all laws passed subject to it are in fact valid, for the good and continuing prosperity of her subjects in Australia.
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catamon @72:
Yes it was an ad hominem attack, quite a rarity for me, and I invite the moderators to delete that comment if they feel it is completely undeserved or something not to be tolerated.
If you think Blimey can come in here and make unfounded insinuations on the character of our generous host without that also being an ad hominem attack then you have some `splainin’ to do.
My opinion is that either both comments stay, or they both go, for the same reason they are both ad hominems.
If Blimey is a cretin I guess I don’t need to point it out, it should be plain, so my comment was quite gratuitous for a bystander’s point of view. Also, it need not be a permanent disability: attacks are meant to provoke a favourable change in circumstance, but that is ultimately something for Blimey to decide, not me.
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Fine, but are those OECD definitions of any relevance to Australian law. Any precedent out there??
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Perhaps slightly off topic (or not):
Link to story
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Johnnie@50
The face of true evil is utterly banal.
Green fantasies of human mass murder and global destruction are now so ubiquitous Johnnie feel uninhibited by shame to mindlessly compare the carbon tax ETS to World War as a bloody argument IN FAVOUR of the ETS!
Wouldn’t it be great if ebola wiped out 90% of humanity, teaches a respected ecology professor in America to his students. In England eco-fascists make a promotional film about blowing up school children who question Green orthodoxy. Mike Carlton in Sydney Morning Herald fantasises about tattooing Deniers. The Bob and Julia show plot inquiries into ways to gag free speech in Australia.
So naturally, favourably comparing the carbon tax to WWII in which about 60 million people were slaughtered in 5 years is imagined as a positive, optimistic assessment of the carbon tax’s potential.
God save us from these murderous lunatics!
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Neville @ 41
I read the original article http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/22/world/africa/in-scramble-for-land-oxfam-says-ugandans-were-pushed-out.html?_r=3&scp=3&sq=uganda&st=cse – if this is true -it is the start of the big Carbon Credit Land Grab in Third World countries – the crooks will rake in the green dollar. And Australia will be paying for the misery inflicted on these people! It’s going to get ugly sooner than later for everyone except the traders and investors in this scam of CO2 Tax/ ETS = Evil Trading Scheme.
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Mark,
Is there even such a thing as clean coal? It sounds like a contradiction. It’s not exactly gleaming white on the way in and particulate soot would shoot out the chimney without decent filters.
Or is this another instance of “colourless odourless gases are dirty”?
10
So I guess it is up to one of the states to hold a Royal Commission into the veracity of Climate “Science”.
In Victoria (at least) the penalties for deceiving or lying are quite severe. I can see it now …
“No, I do not wish you to quote the opinion of others. Tell me what you believe to be true.” The unsubstantiated guff from several of our climate “science” professors and publicists would disappear in instant after an RC summons.
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Andrew @ 83,
It’s marketing.
I think it’s the electricity that is clean. 🙂
Frankly I’d never heard of the ACCCE before the article was sent to me.
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Twenty countries originally signed the Convention on the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development on 14 December 1960. Australia became a Member State on ratification of the convention 7 June 1971.
So in answer to your inane rationalisation, yes as a Member State the definitions are relevant to Australia, and yes there are precedence for adhering to the policies and frameworks of conventions of which we are a signatory nation.
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incoherent rambler @84
The private property poison pills mean this would be of little help in unravelling the legislation.
The CEF bill’s direction that the carbon credit issuing authority will have “privileges of the Crown” means that States can’t take away assets owed to the Commonwealth. If a State declares carbon credits void, they are attempting to destroy a property owed back to the Commonwealth at the end of the year. They might catch some High Court action about that.
This nonsense has to be nipped in the bud now or else it will cost us one way or another.
10
Will be interesting to see it tested in court then, if it ever comes to it.
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PaulM@54:
Don’t get carried away. I’m quite sure the people of third world countries don’t eat a lot of food grown here. The fake concern for the poor while defending the interests of the rich is never a good look.
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Wes@81:
That is weird – I didn’t recommend WW2, but rather suggested a large mobilisation of our national effort to combat climate change might bring economic benefits without the loss of life of a war.
But if you want to think I’m recommending killing people, go right ahead. Its your brain and you can use it however you want.
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PaulM @47
I have indeed participated in the petition to the Queen because doing nothing achieves nothing. However, I think that an approach with a greater chance of success is to put direct pressure on the independents as they are the most vulnerable to a voter backlash and not subject to Labour Party pre-selection.
John Brookes @ 50
I have your “without loss of life” right here …
10
And PaulM is right, the fixed price period is definitely a tax.
Given that emissions trading may lead to corruption, with developed nations buying permits from poor nations, it might be better to leave it as a tax for an extended period. At least until a workable international system with proper checks is in place.
I’m not happy with people who refuse to see that global warming is a possible threat, but I abhor bad policy even more.
10
I have a genuine concern for the poor while defending the interests of the rich. Whoever developed the automatic washing machine liberated more human beings than Abraham Lincoln, Simon Bolivar and Nelson Mandela put together.
I hope that guy got stinking rich, and I hope Australian farmers get filthy stinking rich growing food for the world.
10
Ha ha Truthseeker. That some people/countries have the sort of values which leads them to kill for financial gain is not a reason to condemn financial gain. They would have killed for oil or gold or anything that would make them money, not just for tree plantations. Nice try though, I’m sure some people will be fooled by that contorted logic into believing that tree farms are the equivalent to the gas chambers.
Go on, believe whatever you want. Petition the queen about it. It will brighten up her day.
10
Andrew McRae says:
Apparently not.
10
But according to the government we as a nation aren’t acting alone and the rest of the world will follow our example.
As for your argument about our food exports, well Australia exported 12 million tonnes of wheat in 09/10 with the major importers including Indonesia, Yemen, Vietnam, Iraq, Sudan, Tanzania, PNG and Fiji. Then there is barley, sugar, sorghun, dairy products, beef and lamb. A large proportion of these go to our reigon particularly Indonesia, PNG & Vietnam but with significant quantities going to Africa and the Middle East. So much for your surety that the developing world doesn’t consume our agricultural products.
Nice to see that when faced with a polite reasoned argument that you can’t refute you revert to type and go for baseless assertions and ad hominem attacks. You’re all class and intelect aren’t you.
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mosomoso says:
You may like this presentation then.
http://www.viddler.com/explore/heartland/videos/369/
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Like I said, the face of true evil is banal.
Sure, you didn’t recommend it. Heck, maybe you were just following orders? No one expects you to enjoy destroying our economy. But our Great Leader says it’s in the “national interest” and you’re a patriot!
Your large mobilisation of our national effort to COMBAT weather is like another WWII analogy—The Final Solution. Tim Flannery said it would take a 1,000 years reign to control the weather. Hey, and you got the Deniers all lined up for tattoos. I don’t know if there is enough cattle cars left in Australia for all of us though. School kids wearing bombs ready for detonation. Check. The government is organising an inquiry in how to silence dissent. Check.
You’re good to go, Mr. Banal. All you need is a brown shirt and a snappy salute.
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memoryvault @38:
Where is this evidence?
How do they benefit personally?
How did this escape the attention of Labor powerbrokers?
I love a good conspiracy theory but I prefer the ones that fit the most facts the best.
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Blimey@64
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1998/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1998/trend
You call that a CATASTROPHIC warming trend that justifies a multi-billion dollar world war against climate change? Really?
10
I’ll ask the trolls in this thread the same question they couldn’t answer last thread:
By how much will an Australian Carbon Tax slow global warming, you know, assuming the planet is even really warming any more?
If you refuse to honestly answer this fundamental question of policy effectiveness that’s proof that you’re aware the carbon tax has nothing to do with moderating climate change and that your arguments for the tax are fundamentally mendacious.
That leads to ultimate question: What is the real agenda of those who seek to impose the carbon tax upon Australia?
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wes george says:
Er, no I didn’t wes, that’d be your alarmist words.
I see it as one source of short term cherry picked temperature data.
you should at least try looking at several sources, like this.
or even better, a longer timeframe like this.
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and wes, your question was answered so please stop spamming.
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Truthseeker
Katter – don’t know where he will stand when it comes to the vote but I get the impression that he will probably vote against it with the inclusion of diesel and the impact on farm production costs.
Wilkie – nothing that oath breaker says is of any interest to me.
Windsor and Oakshott – both will vote for it, they know full well they are gone at the next election regardless of what their vote is on the carbon tax.
At best Oakshott and Windsor will vote against the Pokies legislation, Wilkie will back a vote of no confidence after the pokies legislation fails and an election results. Personally I hope something happens between now and the end of the year that causes an election so as to enable an Abbott gvt to petition the GG for an immediate election, introduction of the repeal act by Jan and DD by May with the repeal act passed in a joint sitting before July 1.
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So i’d assume you didn’t watch him on QANDA tonight?
Big call mate. Its actually looking more and more like the Govt will have the numbers for this. Crook from W.A. Nats will vote for it i think. Pokies are NOT popular in W.A. even though they are restricted to only one or two venues in the state.
I think it likely that in the event of the pokies legislation failing, Abbott would call a vote of no confidence. When push comes to shove, would Wilke wreck EVERYTHING else that has been achieved by this parliament to date?? Dont know. He’s firmly into hard bargaining mode at the moment.
If it was won on that basis, then, given the Govts previous record of passing other legislation the GG may require the PM to test the confidence of the house again rather than call an election straight away. Wilke could easily change his mind then having made his point.
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PaulM@96:
Yeah, I’d still bet that the genuinely needy in (say) the Sudan don’t end up eating Australian dairy, beef or lamb. They can’t afford it.
As for faux concern for the poor, I’d stick with that. Maybe some “skeptics” are genuinely concerned, but many simply find it conveniently supports their argument. I can’t prove it, but I’m no stranger to the techniques of argument…..
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Paul M at 16. Betty Windsor is a supporter of the Scam.
10
And pokies are an abomination. Give people cheap beer and meals subsidised by the weak losing their houses. That has to be a good idea.
Of course, you could give the vulnerable punter a mandatory pre-commitment, so they would choose in advance how much they are willing to lose. But no, that really wouldn’t be fair to them.
Does “skeptics” concern for the poor extend to those reduced to poverty by pokies?
10
Andrew@99,
It’s true that Lee Rhiannon was a communist supported by the Soviets until the CCCP collapsed and then she switched to the party with beliefs most similar to her own, Bob Brown’s Greens.
She not only supported the Soviet Union until it collapse but she wrote propaganda articles supporting Soviet oppression long after it was well understood that the Soviets had engaged in the worst sort of totalitarian excesses—genocide, torture, gulags, etc, etc. She has never issued an apology or explanation. Now she leads a boycott campaign against Jewish business owners and, obviously, she adores the Carbon Tax because it’s about wealth appropriation and redistribution.
http://www.thesydneyinstitute.com.au/issue-111/
Hey, Johnnie, maybe you and Lee could start a Gillard Youth movement, you know, like the boy scouts, only with, uh, a different kind of code of honour. The ability to put a couple of thousand (or more likely 5 losers counting Matt B) youths on the streets might come in handy next time those anti-carbon tax rioters try to torch Canberra again.
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John Brookes@107 brags…
On the contrary, Johnny, you have well proven that you’re a total nube when it comes to the techniques of argument. However, that doesn’t mean you’re innocent, just a chump.
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JB @ 109
What’s to stop problem gamblers from circumventing the system by using machines that don’t require pre-comittment or choosing other avenues to gamble?
If Wilkie, The Greens and yourself were truly concerned about problem gamblers they would be after a complete suite of measures that addressess the problems not just one gambling method. If one method of indulging a compulsion or addiction is closed the addict always finds another, that is the nature of addiction, this legislation is nothing more than pure tokenism designed to hold onto power.
catamon @ 106
No, I didn’t, I prefer quality entertainment not ideology and had much more fun preparing my next batch of sourdough starter, tormenting the cat and playing with the latest version of Ubuntu server.
10
With a decent panel (some are worthless and never spark up) the questions without notice format can be quite informative.
10
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1998/plot/hadcrut3gl/from:1998/trend
Blimey@102,
Mate, you chose the time frame (see your own comment @64, duh) and then called Jo a liar for writing there has been little or no warming since 1998.
Yet, in fact, there is strong evidence for no warming since 1998. (see hadcru graph above)
How do you explain that, troll?
btw, please answer the simply question for the curious:
If you refuse to answer this most fundamental question then the rest of your comments in support of a carbon tax are simply discredited as trollcraft.
10
Gawd, I hope something is going to come of all this.
Here I am, with my organic bamboo forest, carbon footprint like a flea’s, and I’m a bloody skeptic. Doesn’t seem fair. It helps me, in this mood, to check out my region’s weather records. I mentioned on another thread how September’s records show nearly all extremes occurring long ago. Now I see that October has been equally undramatic in recent decades:
Our warmest October day: 1965
Our coolest October day: 1983
Our wettest October day: 1982
Our hottest October: 1913
Our coolest October: 1929
Our wettest October: 1972
Our driest October: 1908
Temps are by mean max. The high and low minima are all pretty much in the past, like our worst floods, 1949-1950, and worst flood cluster (three in quick succession in the 1890s). I thought the last drought was terrible, but our BOM records show that the record dry for each month was set fifty years ago, most much longer ago than that.
It’s those record monthly averages that get to me. That much weather could almost be climate!
Don’t even ask me about November. A couple of recently set records there…but for cold!
Doesn’t mean much or prove anything, of course. Just statistics. Helps a little with perspective. However, I get the impression if there were a whole bunch of 2000+ dates attached to those records we might hear a little more about them.
10
My opinion, for what it’s worth, is that Q&A is nothing more than agenda driven propaganda, there is no true debate on the show nor is the audience or screened questions truly representative of the nation.
10
As noted above the question of how long the permits are good for is the key. If they are are for one year only (or for any limited time that requires renewal) then the legislative threat lasts only for that period of time. All the rest of the arguments fade away.
Are the permits annual? Is there an “evergreen” clause to the permit holder to entitle him to consider it a lifetime-plus type of property?
10
What happens in a cashless society when the power cuts out?
10
if you vote for me, each australian will get for free during my legislature 1000 carbon credits per year.
after 5 years the value of carbon credits will be so low we can scrap it for free.
everybody will be happy and I will be re-elected.
10
A Major Deception on Global Warming
by Frederick Seitz
Wall Street Journal, June 12, 1996
Last week the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a United Nations organization regarded by many as the best source of scientific information about the human impact on the earth’s climate, released “The Science of Climate Change 1995,” its first new report in five years. The report will surely be hailed as the latest and most authoritative statement on global warming. Policy makers and the press around the world will likely view the report as the basis for critical decisions on energy policy that would have an enormous impact on U.S. oil and gas prices and on the international economy.
This IPCC report, like all others, is held in such high regard largely because it has been peer-reviewed. That is, it has been read, discussed, modified and approved by an international body of experts. These scientists have laid their reputations on the line. But this report is not what it appears to be–it is not the version that was approved by the contributing scientists listed on the title page. In my more than 60 years as a member of the American scientific community, including service as president of both the National Academy of Sciences and the American Physical Society, I have never witnessed a more disturbing corruption of the peer-review process than the events that led to this IPCC report.
A comparison between the report approved by the contributing scientists and the published version reveals that key changes were made after the scientists had met and accepted what they thought was the final peer-reviewed version. The scientists were assuming that the IPCC would obey the IPCC Rules–a body of regulations that is supposed to govern the panel’s actions. Nothing in the IPCC Rules permits anyone to change a scientific report after it has been accepted by the panel of scientific contributors and the full IPCC.
The participating scientists accepted “The Science of Climate Change” in Madrid last November; the full IPCC accepted it the following month in Rome. But more than 15 sections in Chapter 8 of the report–the key chapter setting out the scientific evidence for and against a human influence over climate–were changed or deleted after the scientists charged with examining this question had accepted the supposedly final text.
Few of these changes were merely cosmetic; nearly all worked to remove hints of the skepticism with which many scientists regard claims that human activities are having a major impact on climate in general and on global warming in particular.
The following passages are examples of those included in the approved report but deleted from the supposedly peer-reviewed published version:
“None of the studies cited above has shown clear evidence that we can attribute the observed [climate] changes to the specific cause of increases in greenhouse gases.”
“No study to date has positively attributed all or part [of the climate change observed to date] to anthropogenic [man-made] causes.”
“Any claims of positive detection of significant climate change are likely to remain controversial until uncertainties in the total natural variability of the climate system are reduced.”
The reviewing scientists used this original language to keep themselves and the IPCC honest. I am in no position to know who made the major changes in Chapter 8; but the report’s lead author, Benjamin D. Santer, must presumably take the major responsibility.
IPCC reports are often called the “consensus” view. If they lead to carbon taxes and restraints on economic growth, they will have a major and almost certainly destructive impact on the economies of the world. Whatever the intent was of those who made these significant changes, their effect is to deceive policy makers and the public into believing that the scientific evidence shows human activities are causing global warming.
If the IPCC is incapable of following its most basic procedures, it would be best to abandon the entire IPCC process, or at least that part that is concerned with the scientific evidence on climate change, and look for more reliable sources of advice to governments on this important question.
Mr. Seitz is president emeritus of Rockefeller University and chairman of the George C. Marshall Institute.
http://www.congregator.net/articles/majordeception.html
10
(In an attempt to actually post on topic)
Why has nobody discussed the role of the Climate Change Authority in all of this?
The CCA is the body that will set GHG targets. In the long term, it therefore defines the permit price. A low target will result in a low price and vice versa (once the flexible price period commences).
Ergas makes an unbelievable assumption: if the rest of the world takes no action and AGW is shown to be malarky (I’m open this this possibility, by the way), the CCA will continue to force Australia to reduce its emissions down to zero.
Surely we need to give this group more credit. Doubtless many here will wring their hands with worry that the CCA will be stacked with Marxists. Surely your time is therefore best spent looking at this entity’s charter. As long as it is accountable to someone – it would be impossible for it to have absolute autonomy – surely this governance will provide a safety valve that protects the country and the economy from undesirable outcomes.
Ergas’ main concern seems to be that the government won’t be able to “get its way” because the CCA will be out of its control. Nobody seems to have this same concern about the RBA, and this is exactly as it should be. The CCA is independent precisely because it needs to be separated from all of the monkeys in the political circus.
10
Jo/Moderators
The OP puts forward the argument that it will be difficult or impossible to modify or repeal the Australian government’s proposed carbon tax because of the way the legislation has been written. It talks about economic modelling and peripherally refers to the transaction costs of international abatement.
Kevin Moore’s post at 121 is not related to the topic. It is simply a regurgitation of a 15 year old WSJ article written by someone who passed away three years ago complaining about an IPCC report written in 1995 that has now been updated twice.
It is completely irrelevant. The OP is about the Australian government, not the IPCC. The OP is about carbon tax legislation, not the peer review process.
[Thanks for your concern. Kevins topic is not irrelevant because the justification for the introduction of his legislation is at least partly based on the IPCCs reports and therefore their practices. But to be on the safe side I’ll just take this one off AS’s tab then eh? ] Yoda
Just sayin’
10
catamon: #71
The same thing could have been said about the UNFCCC and the EU, and yet 18 different criminal scams (as at the beginning of 2010) emerged from those “carefully crafted frameworks”, and the twenty or so governments that passed legislation to enable those frameworks.
Organised crime is organised crime, and you never know who is making back-door contributions, or indulging in graft. And that includes political parties, and the judiciary, senior public servants, and even the union movement.
Sometimes the thought of all that loverly, untraceable cash, can blind a person to the bleeding obvious.
10
John Brookes: (#50)
September 26th, 2011 at 8:01 pm
“What ended the great depression? An incredibly wasteful event known as WW2, ”
That’s the Broken Window fallacy. This might help you:
Milton Friedman: The Most Persistent Economic Fallacy of All Time
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hrg1CArkuNc&feature=related
10
John Brookes: (#50)
September 26th, 2011 at 8:01 pm
“What ended the great depression? An incredibly wasteful event known as WW2, ”
By a lucky coincidence the WSJ just has an article about this myth up.
Not posting this to pile on; but it’s just fitting, and interesting.
“Many assume that World War II spending singlehandedly brought the economy out of the Depression, but nearly half of the increase in nonmilitary hours worked between 1939 and the peak of the war already had occurred by 1941, well before the major wartime spending took place.”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904787404576532141884735626.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
10
“IPCC reports are often called the “consensus” view. If they lead to carbon taxes and restraints on economic growth, they will have a major and almost certainly destructive impact on the economies of the world. Whatever the intent was of those who made these significant changes, their effect is to deceive policy makers and the public into believing that the scientific evidence shows human activities are causing global warming.”
“To me consensus seems to be: the process of abandoning all beliefs,principles,values and policies in search of something in which no one believes,but to which no one objects; the process of avoiding the very issues that have to be solved, merely because you cannot get agreement on the way ahead. What great causes would have been fought and won under the banner ‘I stand for consensus”?
– Margaret Thatcher
10
was checking business news last nite and could hardly believe the spruiking on Sky Business channel, with James Day of the Carbon Disclosure Project. be very wary of your Super Funds folks. good ol’ Goldman Sachs’ name comes up in the first minute, along with HSBC. Switzer REPEATEDLY and SHAMELESSLY suggests CDP’s latest nonsensical report on what companies are doing about “climate change” to be ENCOURAGEMENT for the Prime Minister and her CO2/ETS plans:
26 Sept: 11 mins: VIDEO: Sky Business News: Switzer Segment Four Monday
http://www.skynews.com.au/video/?vId=2732389&cId=Programs&play=true
Wikipedia: Carbon Disclosure Project
The CDP represents 551 institutional investors, with a combined $71 trillion under management…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_Disclosure_Project
17 Sept: SMH: Paddy Manning: Business comes clean on emissions, or so it says
Meanwhile, not in Canberra, the investor-backed Carbon Disclosure Project came out this week with its 10th annual report on the greenhouse gas emissions of the world’s top 500 listed companies…
Most day one headlines were positive, like this from The Guardian: ”World’s largest firms ‘acting on climate change’, analysis shows”. The take-out: despite political uncertainty and dysfunction, the world’s most powerful corporations are getting on with emissions reduction.
The reality is far less reassuring. When you try to grab onto something tangible in the report, it slips through your fingers. One key statistic, that 68 per cent of companies are now ”integrating climate change initiatives into their overall business strategy”, up from 48 per cent in 2010, could mean absolutely anything. It’s woolly and subjective.
http://www.smh.com.au/business/business-comes-clean-on-emissions-or-so-it-says-20110916-1kdr3.html
10
Deceiving the people:
25 Sept: UK Telegraph: Edward Malnick: MP fights wind farm while planning his own
A Tory MP joined residents protesting against proposed turbines in his constituency while simultaneously battling to erect four turbines on his farmland in another part of the country…
Opponents of the Northumberland plans branded the politician a “hypocrite” and claimed his proposals would destroy their area’s rural character forever.
While Mr Carmichael was a Conservative candidate at last year’s general election, he described a single turbine that already exists in Stroud as a “monstrosity”…
Yet organisers of the protest group were unaware that on his land 230 miles away, Mr Carmichael was behind plans to build four 410-foot-high turbines, each one 17 feet higher than the structures proposed in Stroud.
The project is proposed for Bavington Hill Head Farm, one of two tenanted farms owned by the MP in Northumberland…
Bill Short, another local resident, accused Mr Carmichael of “total hypocrisy”.
He said: “He is building one on his own land because it’s not going to affect him as he is down south, and he is going to make a lot of money out of it.
“He is opposing it in his own area because he will lose votes if he doesn’t – so it is entirely a matter of convenience for him.”
Back in Gloucestershire, anti-turbine campaigners said the MP should have been more open with them….
The MP, who entered details of the RWE npower proposal in the Commons register of interests in October 2010, said he stood by his objection to the single existing turbine in Stroud, because it was “in the wrong place.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/windpower/8786363/MP-fights-wind-farm-while-planning-his-own.html
10
I’m no economist, but I keep running some options in my head and what I see is that if I had a company based in Australia, the CO2 permits have just granted me a huge proactive kick in the pants to relocate overseas. It’s cheper in many cases to manufacture overseas and the CO2 permits have just given me the financial impetus for bank loans and investor confidence to go asap. I hope I’m wrong.
10
Is the whole scheme even in its ETS phase not a tax?
The classic definition of a tax was set out by Latham CJ in Matthews v Chicory
Marketing Board,
a tax … is a compulsory exaction of money by a public
authority for public purposes, enforceable by law, and is
not a payment for services rendered. Admittedly this definition has undergone some revision by the High Court.
But it looks like one, acts like one and is a tax. Another lie from Combet and the ginger dalek. So how can a tax be a property???
10
Off topic and maybe everyone else has seen it too but this story via Bolt is utterly sickening and deserves a wide audience Hope the link works Cheers
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/save_the_planet_evict_the_humans/
10
blvr at #123
I’m late to this discussion – but I agree with you that if it proves necessary to subvert the legislation of the carbon tax then there will be a legislative way. I like the idea of taxing the carbon credits at 100%…then not enforcing either the tax or the property rights until some court gets their nickers in a twist.
The CCA is not an independent group since it has been recruited on an ideological and political basis rather than a scientific basis. Unfortunately there’s no way it could be anything else. But I am disturbed that the ex-head of the Climate Change Department is now the head of Treasury. I think Treasury is now very politicised, and their analysis is suffering – the Treasury report on the carbon tax was a really sad piece of work, with no relation to real world economics (@the offsets issue) and no analysis of the science to boot (not that that would be a necessary requirement, but I would have added a such a section if I were the author).
The way this whole thing has been ideologised and politicised can been seen in what happened to me – I sent a short and scientifically based submission to the MPCCC, under my own signature and scientific credentials, and received no response at all. They didn’t want to know.
All the ALP are doing with this legislation is digging themselves a hole that will take a generation to get out of. India and China are building 4 coal fired power stations a week between them, and even Mr Obama is now saying there is no prospect of the US ever regulating CO2, certainly not by 2016 as the modelling is assuming. Yet people like Ken Davidson are saying things like Australia won’t be able to sell coal to China after 5 years because China will have stopped using it. Lunacy. Here’s what he said yesterday:
My boldface. What planet are these people on?
10
Off-topic, but related I guess. See the brouhaha about Demetriou lambasting the NRL over the clubs anti-pokies legislation campaign? It was widely portrayed across the MSM that the AFL supports the legislation. However on Alan Jones this morning he reiterated his entire comment, of which the bit about the AFL being against the legislation but annoyed they weren’t consulted about the campaign. Their approach to tackling the legislation is different, however the MSM deliberately isolated the NRL so as to marginaliae them in the debate.
As for attacking problem gambling, what utter hypocrites! The governments in this land make massive amounts of money from the vices of it’s citizens in the form of excises and other taxes. They’re only putting through the legislation to save their hides, bending over for Wilkie. Seriously, the hypocrisy makes my blood boil!
10
PaulM @ 78
Just to take your reasoning a step further Paul, all those arguing that the carbon tax is not a tax had better hope they are wrong.
For if it is NOT a tax – which would make it legal under S51 (ii) – then it certainly DOESN’T come under the auspices of any other sub-section of S51, and the earlier comment about it requiring a referendum becomes valid.
http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/general/constitution/par5cha1.htm
Also, I hadn’t noticed before, but it would appear under S56 such proposals would appear to have to have been granted GG approval to proceed BEFORE they can be passed.
If that is the case, then all the more reason to be petitioning the GG.
And S59 gives cause to continue to petition the queen, even after the laws are passed (if that happens).
Also S51 (ii) disallows any discrimination (in the imposition of a tax) “between states”. So there would appear to be ample opportunity for Victoria, for instance, with its reliance on brown coal, to challenge on the grounds of discrimination, compared to say, Tasmania, with its abundance of hydro.
10
Before the pedants start typing furiously, I curse my iPhone’s spell checker! I know it should have been “its”, but computers know better I guess.
10
Kevin Moore@127 posts:
There was recently a paper published in The Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences in which groups of people were asked to guess how many jelly beans were inside a large glass jar. It turns out that if you average all their guesses together you get a pretty accurate estimate of how many jelly beans are inside the jar. It’s really just a statistically phenomena, ask enough people to submit a guess and the outlier guesses cancel each other out when averaged.
Sounds like we have evidence for consensus wisdom, eh?
Well no, because in the second part of the experiment the psychologists let people peek at what others had guessed before making their own estimate. And knowing what your neighbours guessed totally skewed the final average estimate off the chart in one direction or another.
Conclusion: “Social influence” taints the accuracy of consensus estimates!
In another study (this time in Europe) psychologists asked two groups of people to guess the population density of various countries. One group was shown other people’s guesses and it caused them to offer second guesses influenced by the information. Knowing what others thought “narrowed the range and pointed them in the wrong direction.” Worse, when other guesses confirmed their own, they doubled down on their errors confident they were correct….
So Margaret Thatcher was right. She didn’t need no stinking experiment to confirm her gut instinct that expert consensus is fraught with error brought on by peer influence.
Now I know what the Alarmists would be thinking, if they knew how to think, which the ones here don’t seem to be capable of…
The experimental results showing consensus-based estimates are unreliable cuts both ways. After all skeptical scientists hang out and compare notes with skeptical scientists almost as much as “The Team” scientists hang out “adjusting” various datasets, you know, to better reflect the consensus.
But there is a difference, of course. Because skeptical scientists philosophically have a firmer grip on the one cognitive system which is designed to ameliorate the effects of the tyranny of consensus and that is the strict and proper implementation of the scientific method in all cases, especially your own! On the other hand the The Team defend the Orthodox CAGW theory according to their IPCC bible by citing group consensus as the ultimate trump card over all other avenues of inquiry.
Whose jelly bean count would you trust?
10
Richard Hill in 30,
Will Steffen here Dick, may i call you Dick? Firstly thanks for the thoughtful question re roll back. Here at the CSIRO we have a lot of faith in the 95% figure and we are currently researching the where abouts of faith for the remaining 5%, we are confident that by the time this tax is pushed through parliament and into legislation we will have found sufficient faith to make a 100% claim. So in answer to your question, NO, there is no need for a roll back provision.
Once again i thank you for finding the time to ask such a relevant question.
Cheers
Bill
This post is produced for general information only
and does not represent a statement of the policy of the
Commonwealth of Australia. While reasonable efforts
have been made to ensure the accuracy, completeness
and reliability of the material contained in this post,
the Commonwealth of Australia and all persons acting
for the Commonwealth preparing this post accept no
liability for the accuracy of or inferences from the material
contained in this post, or for any action as a result
of any person’s or group’s interpretations, deductions,
conclusions or actions in relying on this post.
10
Catamon in 107,
I heard Oakshott say on radio this morning he does not think the pokie legislation would work.
I think Oakshott can smell an election, time to change sides.
10
memoryvault @ 135
I don’t agree with you on the s51 interpretation as I can’t see, under the various International Conventions we are a signatory to wher the Clean Energy Bill in either the fixed or variable price phases could be considered anything other than a tax/levy. IMO s51 will be the basis for any High Court Challenge. This also applies to the MRRT legislation, which also falls under the OECD definition of a tax, as do State based royalties.
Your s56 idea is interesting, although I think it is more for interstate transfer fees and tariff’s, an interpretation which may well be erroneous.
Myself, I think s59 & s60 are the most important part of our constitution as they are the foundation and confirmation of The Sovreign being the final word for Bills becoming Law, despite the implications of The Australia Act.
10
Who gets the impression that the Climate Change Authority will be a haven for thoroughly awful people, just as WWF and Greenpeace are havens of human awfulness?
This not a scientific point for which I can present relevant data. Just an impression.
Awful, awful people.
10
PaulM @ 140
Actually Paul, I was agreeing with you – sorry if I didn’t make myself clear.
What I was trying to say – apparently poorly – is that it certainly HAS to be considered a tax (by its supporters), otherwise it most certainly would be open to challenge under S51 (ii) since it doesn’t come under any other section or sub-section.
Therefore people trying to argue that “it isn’t a tax” while at the same time supporting its legality are blowing hot air up their own backsides.
10
Ready?
From the government’s Clean Energy Bill 2011: Exposure draft, Part 4, Division 2, Section 100, Issue of carbon units for a fixed charge (emphasis added):
Charge payable
(10) If a carbon unit is issued to a person in accordance with this section, the person is liable to pay a charge for the issue of the unit.
(11) Subsection (10) has effect only so far as it is not a law imposing taxation within the meaning of section 55 of the Constitution.
Note: See also:
(a) Part 2 of the Clean Energy (Charges—Excise) Act 2011; and
(b) the Clean Energy (Unit Issue Charge—General) Act 2011.
So.
Where a carbon permit (a “unit”) is issued, and a person is liable to pay a charge for the issue of said unit – in other words, in the most basic function of the “mechanism” for the introductory “fixed price period” – the power of the Act to enforce payment for the unit only has effect insofar as “it is not a law imposing taxation” within the meaning of section 55 of the Constitution*.
Can it be any clearer, dear reader?
I was right.
It is NOT a tax.
The government’s own legislation specifically says so.
10
mosomoso @ 141
I wouldn’t be surprised if the CCA isn’t made up of members of Greenpeace and the WWF, maybe with Flim-Flannery as chairman, and GarNUT as “economic advisor”.
With lots of paid aids and assistants hand-picked from GetUP employed in subsidised “green” jobs.
10
Fred Allen@130
Sadly, you’re spot on, Fred. And you don’t have to be an economist. It’s called “sovereign risk,” and it runs much deeper than just the how the brass tack details of the ETS policy will effect your business directly (assuming anyone could calculate that unknown.)
It’s as much about the message this government is projecting about the level of risk involved with capital investments in an Australia whose intellectuals and pollies seem to have gone completely schizophrenic.
Investors are more worried about catastrophic climate change in the business climate than the weather.
I imagine that during Nero’s reign in Ancient Rome, investors fled the city in droves too. Not so much because this or that particular insane law that Nero just announced was bad for business, but because the Emperor was so bat-sh*t mad that you really couldn’t predict with any confidence what the bastard would do next. But one thing was certain, you sure didn’t want to catch his eye! Better to relocate the amphorae factory to Capua…
Gillard and Greg Combat and Penny Wrong, et al, love to sing that their Carbon Tax train wreck will give the business community “Certainty.” And that true. The one thing Australian business is now absolutely certain of is that this government is a cabal of lunatics capable of just about anything, but competent governance.
10
Jeez you guys are a tough audience,
In post 138 (response to post 30)i pretend to be Will Steffan stating that my views on AGW are based on faith i even threw in a copy of the disclaimer in “the critical decade” for good measure……….was my sacasm a little too subtle?
Cheers
Crakar24
10
Wes George, you’re so right. That word “certainty” has become the favourite justification word of the foolish, the heedless and the malignant.
10
Michael Petterson 143
Okay, no argument from me – if their proposed legislation states that is NOT a tax, then it immediately becomes subject to challenge under S51.
It will require a referendum to expand the powers S51 to accommodate the legislation since S51 (ii) is the only sub-section that could be remotely applicable.
Unless, of course, it was considered under S51 (xxviii) – “the influx of criminals”.
I feel it is certainly going to have an effect there.
10
memoryvault @ 142
No probs MV, I wasn’t targeting you, another simple misunderstanding, and one of the most common types, also one of the main reasons why I prefer direct interaction over online interaction. When you see the facial expresion of the person you are conversing with, when you can see their eyes and hear the inflections in their speech you are better able to understand what they are saying.
Note in my response I said “on the s51 interpretationn not, on your s51 interpretation, thus targeting the interpretation rather than your response, face to face interaction means these types of misunderstanding are less likely.
Crakar24 @ 146
As a Trainer and Assesor, I come across tough rooms all the time, if my presentation falls flat then that is a reflection on me. I have failed to either accurately read the audience I am presenting to or my material has failed to reach them. To overcome these failings I either change my approach or my material.
10
What I said is part of a much larger post at http://barnabyisright.com/2011/08/03/the-carbon-pricing-scheme-is-unconstitutional/
You might want to have a look,as I didn’t feel pasting 2 pages or so on why it’s unconstitutional would be helpful to the debate here.
10
“A mortally wounded, weak government, is a dangerous creature.”
THE LAST KICKS OF A DYING HORSE ARE THE MOST VICIOUS. (Old Zimbabwean saying)
10
PaulM:
The pre-comittment only applies to “high stakes” machines – ones which will allow you to lose ~$1000 per hour. You won’t need a card to play the machines that only let you lose ~$100 per hour.
And as far as addiction goes, you are wrong. Back in the very early 80’s I was addicted to Pacman, which I played during my lunch hour. Sometimes I would get back to work and have to wait 5 minutes before my arm would work properly again (technique was not my strong point). Then one day the video arcade doubled the price, from 20c to 40c. Addiction cured. I never went back. This doesn’t prove anything, other than that sometimes very simple actions can have a dramatic effect on behaviour.
But if you think its a good idea to defend an industry which tries to develop the best possible methods of taking money from people with a character flaw, go for it.
10
MPatterson@143
It doesnt really matter what the government says it is in the legislation. The issue is whether the charge is a tax. Its an objective test. The government’s intentions are pretty much irrelevant.
The High Court in Air Caledonie International v
Commonwealth, in its unanimous
judgment, expressed the following comments in relation to Chief JusticeLatham’s
formula:
The [Latham formula] … should not be seen as providing
an exhaustive definition of a tax. Thus, there is no
reason in principle why a tax should not take a form
other than the exaction of money or why the compulsory
exaction of money under statutory powers could not be
properly seen as taxation notwithstanding that it was by
a non-public authority or for purposes which could not
properly be described as public.
They then went on to characterise the “ïmmigration fee” as a tax because it
possessed all of the positive attributes which have been
accepted in this Court as prima facie sufficient to stamp
an exaction of money with the character of a tax: it was
compulsory; it was exacted by a public authority (the
Commonwealth itself) for public purposes (consolidated
revenue…); it (or its ’amount’) was enforceable by law
10
Yes but requiring the clubs to pay for the machines themselves is plain stupid,as smaller clubs can’t afford that and the resulting loss in revenue would likely shut them down. There’s been numerous complaints from the clubs around my area that employ 60+ people,each that the resulting costs of such a scheme would do nothing,as the resulting gamblers would jump on the internet,and the costs of implemeting such a scheme would shut them down,resulting in a loss of jobs.
10
You sir, are a pathetic joke, what you describe is not an addiction merely an idle and lazy mind. You accuse me of many false motivations and flaws yet joke about addiction, you are beneath contempt.
10
Michael Petterson @ 150
Thanks for the link Michael. Having read through it, however, we are STILL in the same position:
Either A) it IS a tax, in which case all our trolls who insist otherwise are wrong,
or B) it isn’t a tax, and its legality is open to challenge under S51.
I think until and unless it is actually challenged in the High Court, we’ll all just be second-guessing.
A more fruitful area for discussion is the point John Brookes raised way back at comment 9:
I’ve wondered about the same thing myself. If the permits are only for one year (as I understand them to be – corrections welcomed), then surely all a future government has to do is announce the scheme comes to an end “at the end of the life of the current permits”, and the question of compensation simply disappears.
Or are John and I barking up a very wrong tree?
Not looking for a fight on the subject – just enlightenment. I haven’t read through the proposed legislation yet.
10
Kevin Moore@121 posts an ancient Wall Street Journal article from 1996:
Thanks for the walk down memory lane, Kev!
I was a subscriber to the WSJ back in 1996 and I also fully subscribed to the AGW hypothesis (although not the more robust CAGW version.) I loved my daily WSJ, but I was suspicious of their bias against the AGW hypothesis, which popped up in numerous editorials. You know Big End of Town and all. But I vaguely recall that this one editorial began to ring some alarm bells for me, however, I shrugged it off as part of the standing editorial bias the WSJ certainly had against AGW.
Obviously, I was SO wrong.
The WSJ was a decade ahead of its time. Even today, some 17 years later with dozen of fully documented cases of scientific fraud, our ABC and Fairfax media pretend the Emperor is still fully clothed. If the media matters at all, we can blame the ABC for most of the ignorance in the climate debate which ultimately precipitated the fatal error on the part of Gillard to sign up for the carbon tax.
Oh, and just as a note…
Did you know that The Australian’s editorial position on AGW is that it is real and of sincere concern, but The Oz is committed to presenting arguments from both sides of the case? The Australian is pro-AGW, but refuses to violate journalism’s code of ethics to bat exclusively for The Team…. For that lack of commitment to SAVE THE PLANET by sacrificing fair debate, Bob Brown is demanding a parliamentary inquiry to explore ways to force The Australian to censor dissent in its pages.
If only our ABC was so committed to the free expression of both sides of the debate, then quite possibly the poor Gillard government would not have been deluded into a death embrace with the lunatic and marginal Greens.
That’s the great irony of our age. The absolute one-sided bias of the climate debate facilitated by the self-righteous censors at the ABC created such a febrile level of irrational passion for a position based on total ignorance of the contrary evidence that both the labor and the Green parties are now on the verge of being wiped out politically. And things are only going to get worse for Labor as the full horror of the truth slowly percolates into public awareness.
Not to mention that Auntie’s street cred is in the gutter. Imagine… A 70-year old highly regarded national brand flushed down the loo all because their corporate culture had become so sybaritic they reckoned the best way to save a planet that didn’t need saving was to tell the people lies, over and over and over and over again for years.
Lest we forget!
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Hey, Johnny. That’s what you do every day here, mate!
Although, I suppose in the Climate Change Industry it’s people with a character flaw trying to develop the best possible method of taking money from anyone, flawed or not.
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Why would there intentions be irrelevant? If they mean this to be a tax,or otherwise they should say so,not bury the meaning behind legistation like this. I’d say the intentions behind whaqt they say in the legistation are very much relevant.
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On a side issue:If Australia is a nation why the Australia Acts, 1986? If Australia is an independent nation how come a bill of law can’t become an Act of law without the vice-regal signature of a GG or Governor themselves apponted by a Queen of a country half a world away who themselves has been appointed by a parliament foreign to Australia? Is that why no law can be passed in America until the Japanese Emperor signs it?
Prove Australia is a nation. How? Clause 8 of the constitution Act specifies that the Commonwealth of Australia is a “self-governing colony” (can it be any clearer?) of a UK that hasn’t existed since the Anglo-Irish Peace Treaty in 1921 (I think)?
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John at 152
First time I’ve heard it called Pacman.
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let’s face it, they are just making it up as they go along:
26 Sept: ABC America: AP: EU Eases Cap-and-Trade Plan for Airlines
An EU program aimed at slowing climate change will allow airlines to emit 85 percent of their carbon dioxide limits for free in the hope they will use the money to modernize their fleets, an official said Monday…
Next year, all airlines flying to and from Europe will be brought into the program, which is currently being challenged in court by some U.S. carriers…
The cap is set at 97 percent of the average aviation emissions from 2004-2006.
For the 2013-2020 period, the cap will fall to 95 percent of that number, and the free allowances will decline to 82 percent…
Delbeke said airlines would be allowed to pass on to travelers the additional cost of those permits…
The EU’s position is that when aircraft touch down or depart from European airports, it has the right to regulate them.
“As much as the EU prefers global action, we can’t defend that the aviation sector is exempted from contributing because they can’t agree internationally,” Hedegaard said in a statement Monday. She said the EU would continue to fight for global regulation of airlines at the next U.N. climate conference to be held in Durban, South Africa, on Nov. 28-Dec. 9.
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/eu-eases-cap-trade-plan-airlines-14609221
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Wes and mosomoso,
That load of cobblers about the costs to business for the uncertainty fo climate change policy was started by the climate change commission lobby group.
It was done as a spin to imply to people that by not passing a new tax was somehow adding an added cost to business. Of course the next step was to claim the businesses actually want the tax to go through.
But hey, what more do we expect coming from people making statements like:
“we need to combat climate change by reducing carbon emissions”
I know the english language is a bastard language, but really, these sorts of statements are beyond ridiculous.
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Conolly @ 153
Thanks for the post and quote. So, if it looks like a tax, sounds like a tax, and smells like a tax, then as far as the High Court is concerned it IS a tax, regardless of what the gubmint of the day tries to pretend it to be.
Quite apart from totally putting paid to the drone of our trolls – “it isn’t a tax”, that raises an interesting point.
S56 requires that the GG has basically given approval for the purpose of any tax bill (appropriation) before it is passed.
Which means either JuLIAR has sought and gained such approval – stamping herself once again as a LIAR – OR she hasn’t, and the legislation is immediately open to challenge under S56.
It will be interesting to see which turns out to be true.
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who cares about figures?
27 Sept: SMH: Lenore Taylor: Business Council fears risk of a carbon budget hole
THE Gillard government’s emissions trading scheme poses a $9 billion risk to the already stretched federal budget in its first five years if carbon price estimates prove optimistic, an analysis conducted for the Business Council of Australia says…
The government has estimated the Australian carbon price will stand at about $29 when the carbon tax becomes an emissions trading scheme in 2015, but Bloomberg has forecast a $16 price in that year…
Ms Westacott said the lack of bipartisanship on carbon pricing added to investment uncertainty and business ”had not yet seen any detailed plan by the Coalition about how it could repeal the carbon pricing legislation”.
A former Liberal leader, John Hewson, appearing before the joint select committee on the carbon legislation in his capacity as an economist, said it would be best for investment certainty if the carbon tax legislation was ”set in cement”.
The Business Council said the government had also assumed all countries would meet the emission-reduction pledges made to the United Nations and had not made any provision to amend or wind back the Australian scheme if that did not happen.
Australia should recognise many of these promises were not binding and were subject to provisos that countries would make ”best endeavours” while continuing to achieve economic growth, it said.
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/business-council-fears-risk-of-a-carbon-budget-hole-20110926-1ktpm.html
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crazier and crazier:
27 Sept: Herald Sun: AAP: Carbon tax will cost coal sector $18bn – ACA
THE planned carbon tax will cost coal mines $18 billion over the next 10 years, the Australian Coal Association says.
Chairman John Pegler is to attend a parliamentary inquiry into Labor’s Clean Energy Future legislation in Melbourne today.
He will argue the level of compensation the Government proposes to give the coal sector to soften the blow of the tax isn’t anywhere near adequate.
“The $18 billion cost impact of the carbon tax will hit many of Australia’s mines making them uncompetitive on international markets,” Mr Pegler said today.
“In our view the Government has underestimated the impact of the carbon tax as evidenced by the poor design of the Coal Sector Jobs Package.”.
The predicted $18 billion hit includes a tax on fugitive emissions, and increases in fuel and electricity, Mr Pegler said.
Allowing for compensation of $1.3 billion, the net cost would still be $16.9 billion, he said…
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/carbon-tax-will-cost-coal-sector-18bn-aca/story-e6frf7ko-1226147498460
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You might find this posting interesting as well:
http://ace.mu.nu/archives/321843.php
Excerpt:
“Across Africa, some of the world’s poorest people have been thrown off land to make way for foreign investors, often uprooting local farmers so that food can be grown on a commercial scale and shipped to richer countries overseas.
But in this case, the government and the company said the settlers were illegal and evicted for a good cause: to protect the environment and help fight global warming.
They’re planting trees for the carbon credits market. Well then, all’s well that ends well! I’m sure that 8 year old child burning to death in his home was a worthy sacrifice to Gaia the multi-billionaires who are still trying to make money off their feculent carbon credits scheme.
It’s a revealing conceit too, that growing food is considered less of a “good” cause for uprooting people than growing trees for absorbing carbon.
Feh. People. Bleh. Why grow food for them? If you keep feeding them, they’ll only keep eating!
Pine and Eucalyptus. That’s what they are planting, by the way. Isn’t that nice?
What?
Maathai said apart from the negative impact on water systems, the eucalyptus, which is called the water drinker or guzzler in her native Kikuyu, is also hostile to other species and almost the entire local biodiversity.
“When you go into these monoculture plantations, they look like dead forests because it’s only them,” she said. “You don’t see birds, butterflies, other trees, animals—anything other than them because they don’t allow any other growth.”
In Maathai’s country, Kenya, eucalyptus planting is already being restricted. The country’s Environment minister, John Michuki, three months ago ordered the uprooting of eucalyptus trees from wetlands and banned their planting along rivers and watershed. He said the species was a threat to the environment especially in water catchment areas.
So. These…environmentalists, for lack of a word denoting lower intelligence, are planting non-native invasive species as carbon sinks. A species that parches the land and squashes the native biodiversity (in researching this post, I learned over and over again that virtually nothing else will live among imported eucalyptus forests).
A species so loaded with flighty oils, that the conditions for fire cause it to literally explode and form enormous, spreading conflagrations.
Well, look on the bright side; they’re not planting food. PHEW.”
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This is the busy time for moso bamboo, time to get covered in ticks, leeches and lantana scratches. Have to keep an eye on the weather and wind constantly. I’m in no doubt that the CCA would find the appropriate spin for what follows, but here goes.
Hope this isn’t too off-topic.
Interesting to know that my region had every monthly heat record set between 1911 and 1919, except for August, which had its highest mean maximum in 1946. I’ve said all that before.
Know what else is interesting? Our rainfall records are a fair bit older than our temp records, which only started in 1907. Would you believe this? Each month set its lowest rainfall record before 1958. Five of those monthly records were set over a hundred years ago, our driest April was in 1896, our driest June was in 1883.
Of course, the CCA is safe from all records before the 1880s. Should they ever need to smoothe or proxy or adjust or whatever one does with uncomfortable statistics, they won’t have to worry about most of the nineteenth century on the Mid Coast of NSW. Small blessings.
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mosomoso
Totally O/T Mo, but isn’t Moso a running bamboo?
How do you control it?
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MV, with Jo’s permission, I explain all that here:
http://mosomoso.wordpress.com/2011/09/18/control-of-moso-bamboo-you-eat-it/
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pat at comment 165 says:
Gee!
That throws up a truly remarkable coincidence, eh!
For the year starting 2016, the Government’s proposed legislation states that their Base set floor price for the issuing of those Carbon Credits is $16.
So, if the bottom has fallen out of the market and the Credits are actually worth less than that, the emitting entity has to pay the Government that set floor price for the Credits that the Government says is equal to their own set emissions for that entity.
Keep in mind that with each new year, the emissions cap for that emitting entity has been lowered.
So, if it’s a coal fired power plant that has to keep producing the power it always has, hence burning the same amount of coal, hence emitting the same amount of CO2 it always has, then it has to purchase more credits to make up what it actually has emitted.
No problem there, because if those Credits have a lower price, then it will cost the emitting entity not as much to purchase those ‘make up’ Credits.
However, for every Credit over their original allocation that the entity emits, besides having to purchase those extra ‘make up’ Credits, there will be an ADDED penalty paid for the number of Credits over that original allocation in the amount of 1.5 times the cost of those extra emission Credits, and that is set at the Base price of $16, hence $24 per Credit.
Then, on top of that again, the amount of Credits over their original allocation will then be subtracted from the following years allocation, which has already had the cap lowered.
Can you see now how there is the very real prospect of power blackouts, as emitting entities note the extreme penalties applied to them, and when their Cap is reached, it will become uneconomic to run the Plant, probably spread throughout the year.
Also keep in mind that foreign Credits purchased to add to the entities own Australian based Credits are legislated to be worth less than home traded credits at the Australian price.
I know it’s a little difficult to understand, and I probably haven’t explained it all that well, but this is aimed directly at those CO2 emitting electrical power providers, because that is an absolutely captive target.
Also keep in mind, that if CO2 emitting power providers fall into difficulty, then this same legislation has in place provisions to secure electrical supply in the form of loans to those power plant operators.
Se also how this is now not a ‘mechanism’ to actually lower emissions, but a ‘mechanism’ to ensure an ever increasing Government income.
Tony.
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Pat mentions the effect of the “carbon” tax on fuel.
In my reading of the Bills, it seems that the CO2e emissions are based on the volume of fuel used in aviation. WHich is going to be a total feadhuck for those accounting the actual amounts to be taxed because, to the best of my knowledge, aviation fuels are bought, sold and used on a mass (weight) basis. The main reason for that is that engines use fuel based on the amount of fuel; which is determined by its mass.
A perverse effect is that the southern airports of Australia will tend to have a lower tax liability than those in the North; where the fuel is usually warmer and therefore of higher volume for the same weight. 10 degrees C makes a significant difference in the volumetric flow rate of fuel that’s fed into engines to produce the required amount of power. And the fuel can be 30 degrees C warmer.
The warm-fuel discrepancy creeps into road use as well. Higher fuel consumption is apparent if one only monitors the volume of the fuel. Road trains that have a fuel consumption of several litres of diesel per kilometre would definitely suffer an unequal tax.
And before somebody chimes in; yes, fuel excise is per litre as well. But that’s also wrong because of the inequity. Two wrong’s don’t make a right. But they’re a start of an ALP-led government.
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It will be an interesting scenario when the ATM’s are run on solar power.
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mosomoso @ 169
Thanks Mo – interesting site. Just having a read now.
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Madjak@163:
One of my favourite Carbon Tax deceits was a too clever by half Orwellian abuse of meaning first committed by Fran Kelly last winter on RN’s breakfast show. She was interviewing Tony Abbott about his recent statement that if returned to power the Coalition would rescind any climate tax… Of course, the hot new selling point about the carbon tax back then was that most Aussie households were going to be OVER-compensated for their losses by the soon-to-be World Greatest Treasurer…
CHA-CHING!
So Fran Kelly actually had the chutzpah to ask Abbott if by repealing the ETS that means he supported TAX INCREASES FOR THE POOR!
ROTFL
I nearly choked to death on my first cuppa morning tea.
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The latest vid from Galileo.
There is a part two following and I’m looking forward to part three being released. There is also a dedicated page in support.
Never seen Malcolm in a suit before.
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P. Gosselin find this Yale Paper which Shows That Climate Science Skeptics Are More Scientifically Educated
Read the lot by following the links through NTZ.
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Magna Carta 1215 says, “No free man shall be taken indeed imprisoned, either dispossessed, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any manner destroyed, nor pass over him, nor send over him, except by means of the legal judgment of his own equals indeed the law of the land. To no one will we sell, to no one will we deny or delay right or justice”.
– Written by John Wilson, http://www.rightsandwrong.com.au
Note This Applies In Any HM Court including America, Canada and Australia HM Stands For Her Majesty… Meaning that court is aligned to the rules of England and Magna Carta 1215
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Michael Petterson @ 178
Before you get too far off the track you should first study this site – http://basic-fraud.com/
Make sure you save all the info as the site has a tendency to get hacked.
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wes george @ 175
It’s chutzpah and pilpul at our ABC in my opinion.
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I would rather pay a carbon tax than be ruled by a foreign monarch!
(MV- I have left you a minor warning on Moso’s site.)
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Michael
The intention of a government is irrelevant in the characterization of a tax because the test it what it does. There is a good reason foe this type of test being applied. Governments do rather like to impose taxes on us and claim they would never do such a thing. They in fact lie. Fortunately the High Court doesnt waste its time considering what a government thinks or says about a taxation law. So whatever the serial liars and smart arses in the Gillard government might say and write into the legislation the court will look at what the law does. It is a useful principal in dealing with governments. Deeds not words. It does bring us back to the opriginal question. How can a tax (which this abomination is) and a formulae of taxation calculation (which is a carbon credit) be a property? Only the most devious, venal and incompetent government in the history of the Commonwealth could (and would) throw up such an issue.
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The deception, worldwide now, seems to have started with secret 1971 agreements of world leaders to avoid the threat of mutual nuclear annihilation [1,2] by
a.) Adopting the 1967 Bilderberg* model of the Sun as a stable H-fusion reactor (in equilibrium);
b.) Uniting nations against man-made global climate change;
c.) Ending the Apollo space program; and
d.) Building world peace.
1. “A video summary of my research career (1961-2011)”
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10640850/Summary_of_Career.pdf
2. “Deep roots of the Climategate scandal (1971-2011)”
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10640850/20110722_Climategate_Roots.pdf
With kind regards,
Oliver K. Manuel
Former NASA Principal
Investigator for Apollo
http://myprofile.cos.com/manuelo09
*PS – The absurdity of the Bilderberg Sus is illustrated by news reports on Sunspot 1302
http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-09-sunspot-big-bad.html
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Wes,
Maybe we can have these dopes tried for crimes against communication? Maybe the punishment could be writing a couple of thousand lines:
” I will learn to think for myself, I will learn to …..”
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Contracts based on fraud are invalid. That would seem to be the case here.
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wes george@157:
The only obvious thing about WSJ is that it is a Murdoch rag. After that, there is not much more you need to know about it.
PaulM:
I was not making light of addiction. But simple measures can help. For example, when the casino in Perth went smoke free, turnover dropped by about 20%. Why? Because smokers had to leave the gaming room to have a smoke. Out in the fresh air, away from the machines, they realised that they’d lost all they wanted to and went home. That is my take anyway.
BTW, I reckon a really easy way to reduce boat people coming to Australia is to declare our detention centres smoke-free. I reckon quite a few would rather risk the cane in Malaysia than give up the ciggies and come to Oz.
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Madjak@163:
I actually agree that the “uncertainty” bogey is crap. Just look at the cost of commodities like oil and copper – there is far greater uncertainty around these than around any carbon tax.
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The Constitution said:
Could anyone explain why this does not represent a chance to divert the carbon tax to a Royal Commission?
Could anyone explain why this does not represent a chance to petition for a new election?
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Could anyone explain why this does not represent a chance to divert the carbon tax to a Royal Commission?
Quite simple really, a Royal Comission is constituted by one of the Houses of Parliament, the GG may only return legislation to the House that originated the legislation. In effect what you are proposing requires the GG to withold Vice Regal assent and return the legislation to the House of Representatives where there is no possibility of the Government proposing a Royal Comission regardless of any recomendation of the GG to dop so. The GG would not be able to propose a Royal Comission (only suggest one is appropriate) as all they can do is propose ammendments to the legislation. A comission of enquiry isn’t an ammendment.
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AUSTRALIA’s peak union body says Julia Gillard’s carbon tax will drag down national and personal income levels, but the financial pain will be offset by long-term environmental benefits.
And what benefits would that be? Halting the environmental destruction due to feral animals and weeds? Eradicating the Asian bees that in time will wipe out our bees which will result in up to 60% in crop losses due to no pollination? Halt the spread on their watch of Myrtle Rust that has the potential to adversely affect the entire east coast’s bio system?
What a mess!
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Looks like Bwak finally came through on an election promise.
http://iceagenow.info/2011/09/obama-promise-sea-levels-fall/
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Paul M in 149,
I will take that on board.
cheers
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Me @ 189 & 191
Sorry about the ugly posts there folks, way too many consoles open at the moment, I shall take myself outside for a good talking to…..
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Kevin,
That site is the opposite of true.
The British monarch was and still is Australia’s head of state, and is therefore not a “foreign power” for the purposes of “treason” in the constitution. It is infantile to take a literal interpretation of those words; just because the queen is foreign does not make her a “foreign power” under the constitution as it stands today.
In fact an oath of allegiance to anyone other than the Queen is an act of treason, and it was the Australia Act of 1986 that tried to illegally override the constitution by requiring such oaths for PMs, judges, etc.
In my opinion the queen should be a foreign power because becoming a Republic would be no bad thing, but that’s a different issue to describing the current disposition. It is odd that although the Australia Act was illegal and creates a viral outbreak of tacit treason in all official proceedings today, the technical illegality seems to make very little practical upset.
She has never been crowned the “Queen of Diego Garcia” or the “Queen of Essex” or the “Queen of Redfern”, but is nonetheless the ultimate head of state in those regions, even if only ceremonially.
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Heh, well when you put it that way…
Seems kinda obvious in hindsight.
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http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/opinion/pm-fiddles-while-apparatchiks-plunder-alp-empire/story-e6frgd0x-1226142979550
This decline in diversity and tolerance for alternative ideas seems to be a hallmark of our entire polity left of center. That’s why the climate wars closely parallel in content and style the cultural wars. The science is settled and the debate is over for the Left not just in climatology, but also in history, immigration, nuclear energy, population, mining development, indigenous identity, city planning, NBN, art, music, David Hicks, Iraq, economics, health care, Israel, Islamists, Christianity, Gay marriage, the Murray-Darling, irrigation, dams, Top End development, fraking and a hundred other issues.
Because the one true way is settled and known, there is no need to entertain diversity of opinion or voice, much less tolerance of dissent. Banishment from polite society is now common practice. Like the incurious and pious John Brookes who says the only thing he needs to know about the Wall Street Journal is who owns it. The close mindedness has become medieval.
Bob Brown is perfectly within the spirit of our times to demand a media inquiry into ways to stifle anti-government dissent. He sums up the command of our anointed elites to the Australian people: STFU. Civil protest, once a democratic duty against Howard is now treasonous hooliganism.
I suppose none of this would matter if the cultural decay were confined within the Labor Party. It could then all catastrophically implode at the next election and after some time in the political wilderness a new political organisation based on more democratic values could be built to fill the vacuum left.
But this decline and fall is far more vast a collapse than just the Labor party machine. Labor’s death dance is just the most obvious symptom. The rot extends through all levels of our intelligentsia, from our state schools to universities and research institutions, through to our theatres, arts, museums and into our publishing industry and across our mass media organisations, especially the ABC and the Fairfax corp. The snobbish orthodoxy, the intolerance, the self-righteousness and the meanness of spirit is palpable in almost every task our creative elites undertake. The range of acceptable ideas and topics, and thus possibilities, becomes more and more narrow every passing year.
The term Politically Correct was popularized in the late 1980’s to describe elitist moral disdain for social concepts deemed bogan. But no one would have believed you back then if you told them in 2011 an arts teacher could endanger their career for not conforming to PC approved language when describing the weather in the facility lounge.
And so we are becoming a more precise and careful people. It’s the first step to living in anxiety. Fear of losing your job, fear of damaging your career potential if you so much as speak your mind. Conformity creeps forward, creativity withers, the range of possible thoughts shrinks…rinse, repeat cycle.
Everywhere across all our cultural institutions encompassing the entire cultural life of our nation (outside of the rodeos, races, pubs and farm shows) we are suffering a plague of priggish self-policed thought conformity in which any dissent or innovation arrives stillborn.
We’re dominated by a moralising, self-hating, self-limiting philosophy, in which whole realms of possibilities have names that cannot even be mentioned on TV… How many ideas are now black-listed from ever even being thought about, much less spoken of, at the ABC or the CSIRO, much less included in a university level curricula or research department funding proposal?
As we are now, ruled by who rules us now, Australia is committing suicide as a culture.
Interestingly, as the scope of acceptable Australian culture shrivels, our cultural elites seem to seek to fake organic diversity by embracing outsider cultures. Any ideologies or foreign value systems antithesis to our own traditional values cannot be questioned. But this is just another passive aggressive self-harm inflicted on who we are.
As a nation this diseased state is unsustainable. We need a culture that confirms a living identity of ourselves and our positive place in the world. A culture that considers big ideas from where ever they come from based on merit not conformity to preconceived orthodoxy. A culture that is a healthy inspiring place for children to grow up within. A culture that says to children think big, reach for the stars. Take risks. Invent without fear and most of all feel free to be curious! Ask questions of everything.
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Andrew McRae @ 196
It’s all good Andrew, we all trip over our own logic at times.
Anyway, time to go pickup backup tapes, back in a few hours.
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For one of the best and most comprehensive commonsense articles I have read on the whole AGW/carbon tax issue, check the following now featured on ICECAP.
Sep 26, 2011
Why these Bills should be resisted, rejected or repealed
By Viv Forbes, Carbon Sense Coalition
http://wwww.icecap.us/
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I’ve done it again. Put an extra w in the icecap link! Try this.
http://www.icecap.us/
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There’s a Queensland state election coming up next year,and given the current lack of confidence in labor I think that they are going down,big-time. Could someone tell me,if the results of that election could finally bring on the election that we need,before Labor totally stuffs the country up?
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Because, by convention, the GG (being holder of an un-elected position) only acts on the advice of the Queens Prime Minister of Australia. I strongly suspect that if it weren’t for “convention” the monarchy would have been been quietly done away with some years ago, so the conventions of government do have some relevance to our system.
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Catamon @ 202
Try telling that to Gough Whitlam.
Seriously, we’ve already done this to death with Team Adam. A convention only holds for as long as all parties continue to agree to it. After that, the written law takes over, which is the constitution, which says NOTHING about the GG “getting advice” from anybody.
“Pairing” in the House of Reps was a convention right up until a couple of weeks ago, when Tony Abbott decided he wasn’t going to play anymore. So much for conventions.
Having said all that, by convention the GG can only call an election under certain circumstances, basically as a result of parliament becoming unworkable. The first step in that direction for us minions is to petition the GG that the proposed legislation does not represent our WILL, and asking her to withhold Royal Assent and return it to parliament for reconsideration.
And no, we can’t petition her to subject the proposed legislation to a Royal Commission. Only the parliament can do that.
Which is why it is exactly what Tony Abbott should be threatening if there is a change of government.
The fact that he isn’t should tell everybody something.
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Wes George @ 197:
That is one of the best blog comments I have ever read. It really captures PC. As John Brookes is mentioned, perhaps he might like to comment too.
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Maybe Tony is thinking that way,but he wants to keep it out of the press for now,and suprise them with it.
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Yes Wes @197, I think you’ve captured the nature of the left, for want of a better term, mindset. Perhaps only Elle McPherson, unwittingly, summed it up better when she announced some time ago that she never read anything except what she had herself wrote.
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wes george: #197
Nice one, my friend. Great analysis.
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.
Maybe we should present the Queen with a petition to that effect,as I’ve heard she is visiting Australia soon. I’d put my name,my fortune,and my sacred honour to such a petition.
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This tax is not being engineered as ‘non-reversible’ by accident or stupidy !
This is all about changing the fabric and framework of both our economy and society from free market capitalism (with minimal government control), to one of large government control and regulation. This would be achieved by a combination of big new taxes and targetted spending through new government owned utilities in the form of the many climate change related departments and of course the NBN.
Thus, a very large number of jobs would be moved from the private to the public sector, and many remaining private sector businesses would depend on compensation from the government to survive. This would have the combined effect of re-unionising the workforce (ie:govt jobs) to create a base of funding and voter support, and at the same time keep small business in Labor’s back pocket through the compensation needed to survive the carbon tax impact. Not to forget the old age pensioners who vote liberal today, but who would need Labor handouts to have power at >80 cents kw/h. This is akin to a gun to the head !
This socio-economic structural change is part of a recipe needed for Labor to survive ‘Moving Forward’ due to the loss of union support which has been steadily occuring ever since Paul Keating deregulated and globalised the economy back in the ’80’s (very ironic !). Remember, the only way Labor got back into power in ’07 was via a climate change scare campaigne (which can only be sustained for so long), and not by it’s traditional ideological policy platform. This is all so evident when you look at Labor’s primary vote today now that the climate scare has largely faded !
So, the reality here is about Labor staying in power by stealth and at any cost!. By setting up the carbon tax as non-reversible ensures that a structural base of control is created for the long term even if it means losing a term or two in office in the short term. Of course Labor plans to use the over-compensation of carbon tax revenue for the next 3 years to buy votes for the next election and maintain a continuation of power into the very long term. (I won’t use the Totalitarian phase just yet :-)…)
The big question here is, “Will we accept a Labor/Green re-design of our country to help cement their political ambitions at the expense of our prosperity ?”
This is a big question and there is much at stake here. Certainly, I have never seen this kind of brute-force politics used in Australia before. Even the Whitlam era of proposed multi-national buyouts and shady loan deals didn’t seem so sinister as they did silly.
Sadly, my bet is that Labor/Julia & Greens will win.
I hope I’m wrong… !
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wes george says:
Wrong, Nova chose the timeframe.
http://itsnotnova.files.wordpress.com/2011/09/nova-handbook.gif
In post 104 I suggest using more data rather than cherry picking.
No, I call her a cherry picker and I explained why.
For the exact same reason. In order to support your claim you need to be careful about what timeframe and dataset you use.
Already did in the previous thread.
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Wes George @ 197. Yes Wes, great post but it goes even deeper than that. The majority of Australians are blissfully ignorant to what is really afoot worldwide. Most just dismissed or ignored Bob Brown’s advocacy and enthusiastic support of a system of global governance in his recent address to the Press club. It was no ‘greenie’ nutters pipe-dream!
A Google of ‘UN Global Governance’ will bring up 6,700,000 hits. Choose any one of many sites which lay out the now well-advanced Agenda 21 plans and also have a look at Earth Summit Rio 1992 to see what the UN and the now disgraced Maurice Strong have set in motion. The Earth Summit planned for Rio in 2012 will review and further refine efforts to bring about that Global Governance.
The concepts of freedom and choice as we have known them have never been under such a sustained and massively funded attack.
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A.C. @ 132
This was eluded to by Lord Monckton and others on this Blog over the time I have had the priviledge to be a part of it.
It is just one of the many diversions we will have from the real problems that exist or will be the direct result of in our own country and planet because of an innocuous trace atmospheric gas that has been beaten up to be mankinds bully.
This is just the start to the imbecilic attempt to change the weather.
This Australian government will go down in history as the most corrupt and vilified since federation and all those that support this Carbon Tax, ETS or what ever you may wish to call it will reap the rewards and believe me they will come and they will be doosies.
The bottom line on this is “Why try to fix something that isn’t broke ?”
Say YES to an election now !!
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Perhaps something like, even Abbott wouldn’t stoop to indulging the paranoid persecution fantasies of Australia’s latest crop of conspiracy theorists??
And that is a BIG call as there is not much he wouldn’t do to get the keys to the lodge.
However, if he WAS to get down to that level, i’m sure there will be no problem having the terms of reference for the commission written so that in the interests of fairness they also examine the utterances, writings and connections of Pilmer and Monkton as well.
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Deceiving the people:
27 Sept: SMH: AAP: Income hit worth it to save planet: union
Asked about the figures at a federal parliamentary inquiry into the carbon tax in Melbourne today, the ACTU’s legal work co-ordinator Joel Fetter said he accepted the modelling because the point of the scheme was “to reduce our emissions, thereby reducing the GDP (gross domestic product)”…
“We will clearly have lower income than the income we could generate if we continued to burn dirty coal and we continued with business as usual,” Mr Fetter said.
“But we will also have very high emissions and so at some point in time the planet will catch up with us and then you’ll see what happens to GDP.”…
Opposition climate spokesman Greg Hunt said the union movement had abandoned its members by supporting a carbon tax.
“It is appalling that this organisation, which is supposed to be about representing workers, is happy to let their members’ income be cut,” he said…
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/income-hit-worth-it-to-save-planet-union-20110927-1kv5a.html
Menzies Foundation: JOEL FETTER – 2005 Menzies Scholar in Law
Joel commenced his one year scholarship in October 2005 at the London School of Economics studying for the LLM.
http://menziesfoundation.org.au/scholars/bio_f.html
27 Sept: Ninemsn: Lisa Martin: Climate: ‘short-term tax effects worth it’
Australian Manufacturers Workers Union spokesman Tim McCauley likened tackling climate change and investing in clean energy to the transition from horses to cars.
“The cost of a car was more expensive than a horse,” he said.
“Where would you put your bet … buy up big on horses or betting on cars?”
He said Australia was only at the start of a clean energy revolution and the tables would soon turn, allowing renewable energy sources to be become more affordable.
Mr (Joel)Fetter said a two degree temperature rise expected by 2100 could result in a high frequency of extreme weather events such as the 2011 Queensland floods, which severely hit Australia’s gross domestic product (GDP)…
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/national/8352539/climate-short-term-tax-effects-worth-it
(Subscribers only) Australian trade unions throw support to clean energy package
Shanghai Daily (subscription) – 4 hours ago
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Like many here I have seen Gee, Mr Doctor Smith, BlVr and Blimey posting large swathes of comment on spelling, punctuation, philosophy of science, psychology of science, the lack of peer reviewed papers in posts by others and manners.
The format for their posts is available on bloggs like skeptic science and after a short course at SkS University they come out fully qualified to fight the good fight.
Not sure that they aren’t abusing the good will of the moderators and that their real purpose is not to ” put large spaces of verbiage ” between other posts to disrupt the continuity of the threads.
It is useful to interact with them for a while because we all need to keep in mind just what is going on out there.
For the time being, however, I think they have overstayed their welcome.
Sabotage is a strong word but !!
What do you think?
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I was listening to the Senate Commitee when ACTU’s legal work co-ordinator Joel Fetter said he accepted the modelling because the point of the scheme was “to reduce our emissions, thereby reducing the GDP (gross domestic product)when he made that remark and he was also asked to produce his e-mail and mail logs of any and all complaints made as well. I suspect after that remark hits the News and gets around the Net they’ll have a lot of complaints to submit to the Commitee.
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If it’s true that Abbott is this ruthless pragmatist with no Big Picture vision, I am SO voting for the coalition. (Okay, okay…there’s a bonus in it for me. I’m in Lyne, so voting against the incumbent is going to be ugly, but it’s going to be beautiful in its ugliness.)
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wes@197:
Basically I agree with a lot of what you say. Curiosity and an inquiring mind are wonderful things, and should be encouraged. Non-conformity is great (a long time ago, I spent a year at uni where I only wore footwear on one day).
But there is no virtue in having a strong opinion on topics where you have no expertise (unless you like arguing for its own sake….). And there is no virtue in deliberately offending people (I might do it here, but it is a vice, not a virtue).
In my mind one of the great things about society is that people do things for other people in return for money. That may sound a strange thing to admire, but if someone is willing to pay you, that means they really want it done, and it will generally produce better outcomes than any other way of deciding where your effort should be applied.
This should be the starting point for government. But an entirely laissez faire system won’t be great, and there will be situations where everyone will be better off if there are rules governing what we can and can’t do. Anti-trust laws spring to mind. I want government to create an environment where the participation of everybody is maximized. Where everyone has the chance to meaningfully contribute.
Wes, there are versions of political correctness I agree with. If any turkey wants to say that the holocaust didn’t happen, then I’m happy if his views are shunned, and he is shunned. What do we do about the wowserish version of political correctness? Australia has always had wowsers, and probably always will. Maybe the best thing is to ignore them when you can, and ridicule them when you can’t.
So why do I hold the Murdoch media in contempt? It is boring and predictable. When I read an opinion piece in The Oz, very rarely do I feel that the writer was giving me new or interesting views on the world. Mostly I feel that they are either preaching to me, or worse still, deliberately trying to mislead me. Contrast this with the the Australian Financial Review, or The Economist. Even when the writers in these publications have an axe to grind, they still inform and enlighten – I go away knowing a bit more about the world, which is great.
Why is the Murdoch media so crappy? I don’t know, but it hasn’t always been so. The Oz ran a “Yes” campaign for Australia to become a republic only a decade ago. I can’t imagine it doing so now. I used to be a regular contributor the Letters to the Editor page, and used to look forward to reading the witty submissions from Larry Foley et al. But then the humour vanished, and they started printing crappy letters just because they fitted the editor’s mindset. I was not happy with the company my letters were keeping, and stopped writing.
You know the worst example of wowserish behaviour I’ve seen recently, was the sacking of a couple of workers for planking. It was totally unbelievable that a harmless prank should lead to a sacking.
My sisters boyfriend served in Vietnam, and tells the story of how men from his ship painted a kangaroo on a US ship. The US bigwig came over and the Australians had to stand on deck in the hot sun being dressed down for their outrageous act of vandalism. And they kept standing there, until he left, at which point their commander said, “Well done chaps”, and dismissed them. Ahh, the good old days.
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mary # 215
Thanks for the post. I had noted that on the occasions when I am mildly coherent, my posts are followed by a deluge of guff. Good to know it is part of the technique. Maybe the admins could add a small feature that allowed each user to filter posts from selected posters?
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John Brooks,
you mentioned this, and I’m sorry to go wildly away from the topic, but there is a valid explanation:
During my stay in the Air Force I served at five flying Squadrons, one of them 77 Squadron when they had the Mirages.
We would do the same thing, with a stencil and a spray can, spraying the squadron logo on virtually everything, especially when we were away on exercise at bases away from or ‘home base’.
We were at an exercise in Darwin in the early 70’s, just prior to the ‘big blow’.
As was always the case, foreign Air Forces joined the exercises, and this time we had the wonderful Vulcans of the RAF’s 617 Squadron, (The Dambuster Squadron)
Late one night, mid exercise, some of our guys got through onto the Tarmac where those Vulcans were ‘parked’, and sprayed the Squadron Logo onto 4 of the 6 Vulcans.
The next day, the bovine waste products came into exceedingly violent contact with the rotating wind generating device.
Our whole Squadron was lined up and ‘reamed’ solid. They didn’t want ‘volunteers’ as to who had committed the dastardly deed, because, well, something of a similar nature was done by everybody wherever they went, them or us.
What the English Squadron CO wanted to tell us was not how ‘colonial’ and ‘boorish’ something like this was, but just how damaging it actually was.
You see, those Vulcans were painted with a special paint, that meant that the radar return ‘paint’ for the huge Vulcan showed up as something to be almost insignificantly small, and I can see some of you shaking your heads in disbelief, but Military combat aircraft do use ‘stealthy’ paint, and in fact, the British were pioneers in this, and those Vulcans were some of the early trial beds for that, still in the secret stage at that time.
By the simple spray painting of our Squadron logo on those Vulcans compromised that painted surface. The Vulcans would have to be stripped back to bare metal and repainted, at enormous cost.
We thought this was quite obviously bogus, as the logo would just come off with some thinners etc.
However, those 4 Vulcans left Darwin the following day, and 4 replacements flew in a further day later, an exercise that probably cost tens of thousands of dollars.
It was a salutary lesson we all learned.
It did have one good result from it though. We always thought those Poms were aloof and secretive, understandable because those Vulcans were in the main still pretty secret in what they could do, but after that episode we mixed a hell of a lot better. Man, those Poms could sure party.
So, sometimes a simple thing has a deeper explanation than what it seems to be on the surface.
Tony.
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I became aware of the New Conformity in my days as a keen bushwalker and conservationist type in the 80s. When the Franklin-Gordon controversy was at its height, even the staid burgers of the North Shore declared themselves “passionate” about “saving” that part of remote Tasmania.
When I questioned them as to why they objected to hydro and dams or how they expected any useful project to be be achieved without entropy, displacement of species etc, the answers were vague and dismissive. It was if the practical middle classes were determined to take a holiday from being themselves, and the pensive classes had found the ideal target for their free-floating indignation in remote Tasmania.
A great spiritual plague was born in that time: Global Ingratitude.
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catamon:@213
To Tony Abbot’s credit he didn’t stoop as low as Juliar Gillard in order to get the keys to the Lodge.
Tony Abbot didnt do a deal with the Greens and Independants that contravened Party lines or what they campaigned on.
Kneel.
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Truthseeker @3
I appreciate your post as it is very succinct in what the problem is. However, I have 2 questions (and if answered after your post, I appologize for the duplication).
#1 – since the “cost” to the company is nothing (it is being given to them), when why cannot the government “condemn” the propery and pay the cost? Which in essense is nothing (you get what you pay for).
#2 – I understand the ultimate power of the Australian Constitution, but could the courts rule that “creating” an asset by government decree is unconstitutional? While the cost is nothing, in time, it would gain value. But the gain would come at the expense of other assets since real wealth is not created by government decree, but by increasing the production of a country.
The answers may be simple, and just my lack of understanding of the Australian government is holding me back from understanding the totality of the solution to repeal (other than government inertia – it has no problem rolling forward, but is almost impossible to roll back).
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Julia Gillard – Kevin Rudd
Who is the most dangerous?
Former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on 21 member panel – Agenda 21.
“Sustainable Development Policy and Practice” – Agenda 21
http://uncsd.iisd.org/news/un-secretary-general-launches-global-sustainability-panel/
News
UN Secretary-General Launches Global Sustainability Panel 9 August 2010: UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has launched a new High-Level Panel on Global Sustainability tasked with finding ways to lift people out of poverty while tackling climate change and ensuring environmentally-friendly economic development.
The Panel will comprise 21 representatives from government, the private sector and civil society, and will be co-chaired by Finland’s President Tarja Halonen and South African President Jacob Zuma. In a press conference held at UN Headquarters in New York, US, Ban stressed the need to “promote low carbon growth and strengthen our resilience to the impacts of climate change.” He added that “we need a blueprint for a more liveable, prosperous, and sustainable future for all.” He informed that the Panel will report by the end of 2011, to feed into key intergovernmental processes, including the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD) that will take place in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 2012, and the annual conferences of the UNFCCC. Janos Pasztor will head the Panel’s secretariat.
Panel members include: Gro Harlem Brundtland, former Prime Minister of Norway; Han Seung-soo, former Prime Minister of the Republic of Korea; Yukio Hatoyama, former Prime Minister of Japan; Luisa Dias Diogo, former Prime Minister of Mozambique; and Kevin Rudd, former Prime Minister of Australia; David Thompson, Prime Minister of Barbados; Sheikh Abdallah Bin Zayid Al Nahayan, United Arab Emirates Foreign Minister; Ali Babacan, Turkish Deputy Prime Minister; and Micheline Calmy-Rey, Foreign Minister of Switzerland; Alexander Bedritsky, Aide to the Russian President on climate change; Hajiya Amina Az-Zubair, Adviser for the Nigerian President on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs); Zheng Guogang, Director of the China Meteorological Administration; Jim Balsillie, Chair of the Board of the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI); Susan E. Rice, US Permanent Representative to the UN; Jairam Ramesh, environment minister of India; Julia Carabias, former Secretary of the environment of Mexico; and Cristina Narbona Ruiz, former environment minister of Spain; and Connie Hedegaard, EU Commissioner for Climate Change
10
At my post @ 224 I could also have asked who is the Dick Tator and who is the Oxy Moron.
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Then why have you made a cottage commenting industry out promoting closed-mindedness and relentlessly championed smug satisfaction with the state of our knowledge about climate?
You have endless knocked back anyone who dares show the slightest spark of curiosity about climate beyond the accepted orthodoxy. The whole premise of the carbon tax is that the science is settled and further inquiry is not just unnecessary but unpatriotic since the ETS is “in the national interest,” as Gillard nauseating repeats daily. And that’s the side have barracked for in hundred of comments here.
How can you sincerely claim to be allied with curiosity and inquiry after all you have done to bash it back here? Shame on you, John.
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Mary@215
I like your analysis but I think you’ve misunderstood me. I’ll live with it though.
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John, having long hair and going to uni lectures sans footwear, then becoming a college dropout, WAS conforming back in the day, you twit. Did you smoke mother nature, wear purple bell bottoms and dig The Doors as well? You wild and crazy rebel, you!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qRJIBtbc2c
I’m beginning to see a trend here.
You don’t really believe that words and sentences strung together create meaning that should reflect some tenuous connection to experiential reality, do you? You just say stuff and that makes it so, right? So, when you say you’re curious, inquiring and once were a nonconformist, the fact that this characterisation of yourself flies in the face of the evidence that you, yourself, have provided us with, doesn’t worry you in the least, does it?
That’s why it’s not any fun to deconstruct your comments, because you seem totally unconscious of the relationship that most of us dearly seek to protect between the content of our comments and the evidence on hand. When someone can show a cognitive disconnect between our rhetorical postures and hard reality, we blush and are forced to realign our thoughts and words to better reflect the evidence. I get the feeling, you don’t feel the same existential urgency when cognitive dissonance rears its disquieting head.
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More wordage totally disconnected from your reality, eh? Every second post you make is a strong (if weak) opinion on a topic where you have no expertise, but then you aren’t claiming to be virtuous.
Nevertheless, there is no sin in having a strong opinion outside your specific field of expertise. In fact, it would be impossible to live otherwise. Every day we make a hundred decisions based on less than an expert-level grasp of the facts and many of these we justly feel strongly about.
After all, one can only be expert in a rather narrow range of topics, by definition. Yet life is as broad as the universe is wide. Perhaps the wise have very little to say. I wouldn’t know.
However, when an acolyte of the prevailing orthodoxy counsels those skeptical of said orthodoxy on the virtue of silence beyond their narrow field of expertise, is it not just a polite way to ask them to shut the f8*K up?
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Wes,
nice link to The Doors there.
We could use an analogy here with another Doors song, one of my favourites, mainly because of Ray Manzarek’s keyboards, The Crystal Ship.
They’ve built this lovely looking looking Crystal Ship in the form of a Carbon Tax, telling us just how wonderful it really is.
If we keep throwing enough pebbles at it, the whole thing will just shatter.
Tony.
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JB in 218,
You do realise that in some countries it is illegal to question the holoco$t if you do you go to jail, is this the type of world you admire?
10
Leave it to a Lefty to think he’s complimenting free enterprise by characterising it as a kind of admirable bribery or prostitution necessary to grease the grind of life.
John, you’ve hit on what may be the source of most of the pain and suffering in the world. Leftist intellectuals all failed Economics 101, or in your case never attended class in the first place.
No, John, the great thing about free enterprise is not whoring yourself. It’s that in a free society where everyone has certain civil liberties, including the right to free expression and own property, free markets of goods, service and IDEAS spontaneously arise to form a human ecosystem where, if undistorted by war or monopolies or crushed by over-regulation and taxation the best products will be selected for, while inferior ones will fall by the wayside. Commodities, like food and wine will find a natural price equilibrium determined by the to and fro transactions based on supply versus demand. Assuring that when demand is high prices rise so that the incentive to go out and increase supply is rewarded.
But the really brilliant part of a healthy market ecology for humanity is that it is what a tropical rain forest or coral reef is for competitive diversity in nature—a hot house of accelerating evolution. Free markets reward innovation and creativity and ultimately technological and social evolution based on merit not the latest royal edict or moral orthodoxy. Today the rate of human techno-social evolution is rapidly accelerating and has been since the Enlightenment. Over-taxing and overregulating the marketplace economy has the same effect as clear cutting in a rain forest, the innovation and the diversity literal go extinct.
I repeat—The driving force behind accelerating scientific and cultural evolution is the expanding free market of ideas, goods and service. NOT government technocracies centrally orchestrating economic production. Why not? Because governments can’t even install pink bats without burning houses downs. They can even build a divided highway between Brissy and Sydney. And they certainly can NOT command the inventive creative spirit needed to transform our culture and technologies down a totally nonlinear path of innovation into the future.
That said, history shows that modern governments certainly are good at SLOWING technological and social evolution. In fact, that’s what they do best.
Now the Greens believe that we must change our lifestyles rapidly in order to SAVE THE PLANET! But the way they want to accelerate change is by taking an ax to the very free market forest that’s driving all innovation! Green policy is to harvest the free market for taxes and turning the rest into chipboard with onerous over-regulation. Green policy is a totally regressive misconception of how creativity and innovation and rapid cultural evolution is generated.
If you really want to save the planet then primacy of our civil liberties and free markets must be as protected as a world hertitage rather than oppressed. To do anything less will simply slow the rate at which we transition to cleaner technologies and lifestyles in the future, while ever expanding and more powerful government bleeds us in order to fund corruption and crony capitalism.
10
Wes, suffice it to say that your side of the debate is not displaying genuine curiosity. They are, I admit, curious about every attempt to explain global warming without reference to CO2. But that is not genuine curiosity, it is just hunting around for arguments to support a pre-determined position.
As I’ve said many times here, I have trouble accepting that AGW is real. It seems so unlikely that we are actually heating the atmosphere. But the people who have actually taken the time and effort to get to grips with the science & maths needed to understand what is going on have mostly come to the conclusion that doubling CO2 will cause a global temperature increase of 2 – 4.5 degrees celsius. While I’m not convinced that they are right, I figure we need to go with their estimates until we know better. That is, we should reduce emissions now.
The last 20 years have seen increasing temperatures. The next 10 should be enough to know for sure whether AGW is real and dangerous, or real but not dangerous, or just a figment of an overactive imagination.
And Crakar24, should holocost denial be illegal? Probably not. But its proponents should be treated like dirt.
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JB in 233,
Your post speaks volumes………….
First you claim the skeptics (AKA deniers) are not genuine in debating AGW as we have some perverted hidden agenda via a preconcieved position, a position which you fail to explain, do we secretly wish all life on the planet to be destroyed or are we all big oil employees?
Then you state that you have grave doubts about the theory of AGW but feel compelled to accept it because one group of scientists said it is so. Therefore we should reduce emissions now.
I dont see how these two positions can exist in the same reality.
However it becomes a little clearer when you say a holoco$t denier should be treated like dirt, much like a climate change denier is to be treated. I suspect JB that anyone who disagrees with what you believe should be treated like dirt, is this the case?
For example if i said the Palistinians should be given statehood by the UN and the Israelis should pull back to the 1967 borders and you disagree am i nothing more than dirt? Or should the Israelis be treated like dirt now that they plan to bulldoze more Palistinian homes to build 1100 more settler homes on Palistinian land?
Who is covered in dirt here JB?
How do you decide what is right and what is wrong, which is correct which is not?
Meanwhile in other news
http://michiganmessenger.com/52729/electrical-problems-trigger-radioactive-steam-release-at-palisades
Entergy’s Palisades nuclear plant near South Haven on Lake Michigan is venting radioactive steam into the environment as part of an unplanned shutdown triggered by an electrical accident.
Also
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-26/fukushima-desolation-worst-since-nagasaki-as-population-flees.html
Boy i cant wait to build one of these babies here in Oz, the sooner we do the quicker we can protect and care for the environment, wont Gaia be pleased.
One more just for laughs
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/worlds-leading-climate-sceptic-sees-his-funding-melt-away-fast-2362056.html
Thats because he is covered in dirt (his scientific work is buried…get it….)
10
John, the bits that we lay people can grasp, namely, the proposed solutions and alternatives, are so risible that it is inevitable that we will doubt the parts we don’t grasp.
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Mosomoso,
Having worked with radiosonde weather balloons one thing i can grasp quite well is that the thermometer is a much more accurate method of measuring the temperature than using the GPS. When Dessler and co claimed the opposite there was something else i wanted to grasp with both hands.
The sad fact is people like JB get sucked in hook, line and sinker by simple methods of propaganda. Which is why i asked the question
Of course i know i wont get an answer.
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John Brookes @ 233
If you know of a way for the removal of CO2 from the atmosphere Sir Richard Branson will give you $25 million if Tim Flannery etc reckon your idea will work.
Sir Richard Branson, multibillionaire and founder of the Virgin group of companies. Sir Richard has certainly jumped on board the Global Warming bandwagon in a big way. According to Branson during a brief discussion over breakfast with Al Gore, “my views on global warming were changed 180 degrees.” That Al guy sure must be persuasive!
Branson has since pledged to donate three billion dollars (!!) to “fund the fight against climate change.”
Branson has also launched his ‘Climate Challenge’ which offers a prize of $25 million to anyone who can remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
The panel of judges for this challenge are Al Gore, James Lovelock, Sir Crispin Tickell, Tim Flannery and James Hansen.
“It will have to be a mix of the best solutions from all these areas that will win the battle to keep CO2 levels below those at which Gaia will strike back at some stage, and kill the problem – in this case us .” – Richard Branson interview
http://green-agenda.com/neweconomy.html
10
This is money for jam,
Fisrtly you revoke Al Gores passport
Secondly you ban Branson from launching rockets
Thirdly you divert funding from Flannery’s bottomless pit to more productive research
Fourthly you take on Hansens advice and turn off all government air conditioners
Who do i give my address to so they can send the cheque?
10
Wes, you’ve hit on an important point when you say the educated left is failing to understand the human eco-system. And I wonder what effects that will have on the global eco-system they claim as their primary concern. Green dogma, in the form of organic farming, anti-GM, anti-infrastructure, anti-development, localist movements and so on, would make humans like locusts upon the earth.
Of course, the GetUp/Greens will argue for low population as a key environmental solution. Maybe they have plans for a cap-and-trade on families. Market-based solution!
They just haven’t worked out that the only effective way of reducing population is by having a society dominated by its middle class, its working prosperous. It’s not your North Shore solicitor or Dee Why plumber who’s going to knock out eight kids.
Nor are we forced to ring-bark marginal acres to feed and clothe people in an era of GM and advanced synthetic chemicals.
Money is the key environmental solution, making real conservation possible. Not the envy of money, not the love of money, not the manipulation of money, not the appearance of money, not the promise of money.
Just actual money. Put money in thy purse.
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Crakar24 238
Real bite in that one Crakar.
If only we had enough people to ring their local MP and complain about the Carbon Tax hoax.
We might just get to see your wish list in action.
10
@233
Well my first response is:
WTF?????
My second response is…
10
[snip? Really?] are promoting a new holocaust called Agenda 21.
“…Earl John Russell presided over the Irish Famine 1845-50 in which 1 million Irish died, and the population was nearly halved by death and emigration, while food continued to be exported from the country and rent continued to be extorted from the starving people.
http://humphrysfamilytree.com/Royal/2nd.duke.bedford.html
Here’s Russell’s inbred psychopathic grandson in his own words predicting the likes of David McWilliams and backing up Kissinger on the ‘food as a weapon’ issue.
“Second as regards population … to deal with this problem it will be necessary to find ways of preventing an increase in world population. If this is to be done otherwise than by wars pestilences and famines, it would demand a powerful international authority. This authority should deal out the world’s food to the various nations in proportion to their population at the time of the establishment of the authority. If any nation subsequently increased its population it should not on that account receive any more food…..”
http://www.sovereignindependent.com/?=19939
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This is OT like everything else.
http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/israel-set-to-approve-1-100-new-jerusalem-homes-beyond-the-green-line-1.387024
So, to bring you all up to date, Israel has ordered the United States (and its other slaves) to block Palestinian statehood at the United Nations, under the claim that only through talks with Israel can Palestine become a state (just like how the United States came into being through talks with King George III and Israel itself came into being through talks with the Palestinians). Then after forcing the US Government to publicly abase itself before Israel at the United Nations, Israel turns around and slaps Obama in the face by starting construction on more Jewish homes in the Palestinian section of Jerusalem, thereby guaranteeing that Abbas cannot even consider peace talks, whereupon Israel will scream, “We were ready to talk but the Palestinians refuse” one more time.
See how Israel plays the game?
See what utter fools the US Government are for ever trusting Israel with their part in 9-11 and not realizing that Israel would then use 9-11 to blackmail the US Government into being their slave before the world?
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Freedom of speech is under attack:
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100002576455806#!/pages/Support-Andrew-Bolt/218143364912547
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Mark D 241,
My second response is… (wheres my block quote button?)
Anyway let me finish this statement for you, a quick google search tells us the following:
Gaia was the great mother of all: the heavenly gods and titans were decended by her union with Uranus, the sea gods with her union with Pontus, the giants from her mating with Tartarus and Earthly creatures were sprung or born from her Earthly flesh. So basically these guys pray to a God that is a bueatiful female figure that slept around quite a bit.
Interestingly the google search also gives us The Goddess Association in Australia, i wonder if they have picked the right God?
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Thank God for that snip at 242. Well done, mods. Don’t want to argue about it on a climate site, but I just can’t get hot over the idea of establishing another decrepit, theocratic backwater in the Middle East. I’m sure Stormfront or Aryan Nation or whoever has plenty of info and opinion should I ever want it, but why bring it here?
Just on the subject of religion, I go out into the bamboo sometimes to tell Gaia she doesn’t exist, that she is a false god…but that, if she does exist, she should get [self-snip].
It’s very empowering, as the luvvies say.
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In defence of post 242, let me say that these types of things do have a connection of sorts.
Many people here believe there is a massive conspiracy underway perpetrated by many governments and scientific organisations with the sole purpose of world domination (sounds like a James Bond plot).
However these very same people cannot for the life of them see how LHO could of acted in unison when shooting a president, cannot see beyond the official story of 9/11 and the justification of the crusader wars and the tearing up of every human rights treaty we have ever signed that followed and dare not look beyond the Israeli propaganda over the German treatment of peoples of many nations during the war, and why?
Because these are all tin foil hat conspiracies apparently and yet they have the bewildering gullibility to believe in the biggest conspiracy ever concocted. Many claim Agw belief is based on faith but that is not the only faith on display.
Now lets look at 242 again, All Kevin is saying that agenda 21 is another form of genocide. Believe that if your faith allows, i personally think there are many sociopaths out there in positions of power and every now and then their true evil bubbles to the surface. Whilst they stand in isolation they are of no problem Copenflopen proved that, the danger is when a few of them get together a good example of that would be Europe.
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Here is an interesting concept, rather than sit here discussing how to stop world domination via a failed and unproven theory of AGW before it has even begun, maybe we should be trying to stop the world domination that began over a decade ago.
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=26686
This is an interesting link which describes the process of destroying a country that you have no control over and then rebuild it by loaning it lots of money at an interest rate they can never repay (gee that scenario sounds familiar, …Greece…Ireland….soon USA). You can destroy your friends countries using the fiscal approach and you can destroy your enemies country by the shock and awe approach (Afghanistan, Iraq, Lybia, Kosovo etc)
Reminds me of that old song by country joe Macdonald
Hey all you young men of this land uncle sams got himself in a jam, way down yonder in Vietnam, singing 1, 2, 3 what are we fighting for, yippee i dont give a dam next stop is vietnam, singing 5, 6, 7 open up those pearly gates…………….
Be the first parent on your block to have your son come home in a wooden box singing 1, 2, 3, (well you get the picture)
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Crakar24 @ 248
Thanks for those words.I was pushing the boundaries a bit and expected the response. But it only takes a few minutes on the internet to check the veracity of the post. But some things must never be mentioned.
To quote George Orwell: “During times of universal deceit,telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.”
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IX. Toward the Green Global Dictatorship
An ‘agricultural world’ in which most human beings are peasants, should be able to support 5 to 7 billion people…. In contrast, a reasonable estimate for an industrialized world society at the present North American material standard of living would be 1 billion people.
UN Global Biodiversity Assessment
Current lifestyles and consumption patterns of the affluent middle class- involving high meat intake, use of fossil fuels, appliances, home and work-place air-conditioning, and suburban housing- are not sustainable. A shift is necessary which will require a vast strengthening of the multilateral system including the United Nations……..
Maurice Strong, Secretary-General, UN Conference on Environment and Development
Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrial civilizations collapse? Isn’t it our responsibility to bring that about?
Maurice Strong
Over the past century, writers such as Aldous Huxley (Brave New World), George Orwell (1984 and Animal Farm), and H.G. Wells (The Open Conspiracy) have described the kind of totalitarian one-world government long envisioned by the global ruling elite of the International Criminal Conspiracy. Basically, their “Plan” calls for depopulation of 2 to 4 billion humans and establishment of a despotic feudal system, with confinement of most of the remaining robot/slaves to isolated “human settlements,” as outlined in the Wildlands Project and Agenda 21 above. The international ruling elite would then control virtually all the earth’s wealth and resources. As incremental steps en route toward fulfillment of this utopian nightmare, their Plan calls for the elimination of all nations, private property, and all religions except their New World Order Religion, a hybrid of pantheism and witchcraft.
From: Global Green Dictatorship – Natural Climate Change Website
http://www.naturalclimatechange.us/GlobalGreenDictatorship.html
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Conspiracy?
I’m not aware of any conspiracy in history that was not eventually found out. 🙂
Humour aside. Conspiracy theories are invariably wrong, because they rely on ridiculously flawed ideas about human nature and operational logistics.
For instance, 911 “truther” conspiracy theory requires an army of black hat secret agents to, without being noticed, kidnap 3 plane loads of business commuters on the morning of September 11, 2001 and either kill them all or hide them in a special community on a secret island like in The Prisoner. In the decade since none of the hundreds of secret agents that must have been involved managed to get a book contract deal or feeling contrite spilled the beans to 60 Minutes. Yet Truthers are out there.
In a weird way the CAGW theory is a kind of scientific conspiracy theory, in which 100 parts per million of a hither to harmless and vital gas for life on Earth is now some how threatening to destroy the entire biosphere. Definitely B-grade sci-fi. But I digress.
Fact is that there is no conspiracy to form a one world government to enslave us all under the pretext of fighting faked global warming.
But this is not to say that thousand of pollies, NGOs, media orgs, universities, unions and a whole socio-economic agenda aren’t all swirling around together as fellow travellers moving in the same direction, a bit like a herd of cattle heading toward the milking barn. The movement is largely uncoordinated and full of contradictory self-interests, nevertheless the ideological inspirations are all drawn from shared sources. Historians call this sort of mass, semi-self-aware, movement a Zeitgeist or “spirit of an age.” Psychologists call the complex network of motivations both intellectual and emotional that drive a zeitgeist, a gestalt. A cohesive whole that is greater, more powerful than a simple sum of its parts.
This explains why people who yearn for society to subsume the autonomy of the individual into the collective, who clamour for bigger more muscular government, who cheer when free speech is trampled in the name of “civility”… who are comfortable with crushing debate when “the science is settled” naturally gravitate to any narrative which glorifies the power of the group over the individual. We call this kind of gestalt, “Leftist” or ironically “Progressive” or even more ironically in America “liberal.”
Obviously, you can see the natural appeal of the CAGW narrative to “Leftists” in which the destruction of the biosphere is blamed upon unchecked individual freedoms such as property rights, free market economics aided by the right of every individual to think freely and speak out freely for his or her own self interest unhindered by state regulation.
CAGW is an excuse to oppress those who the Leftists have been dying to oppress long before AGW. Clearly, in order to SAVE THE PLANET according to CAGW politics civil liberties will have to be reduced in order for us to act together as a collective in a war against Climate Change without the frivolous luxury of allowing individuals to freely dissenting whenever they please. It’s the AGW version of the endless vague state-of-war that George Orwell predicted would be used to curtail our civil liberties.
And so the leftist zeitgeist rolls forward renewed and empowered by the new myth that the planet is dying and it’s all our fault because we veered to far toward individual liberty.
No conspiracy theory necessary, just the ubiquity of the human penchant for despotism for which we must forever be vigilant against or risk losing all the progress we have made since The Enlightenment.
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Gee Aye 227
You aren’t all the same.
Obviously you don’t pollute the site with piles of “blue wallpaper” but you only seem to be involved in commenting on how people express ideas and analyse them.
Can you offer any analysis of your own?
I think I asked this before; What are you doing here?
Does the site need a resident philosopher?
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Wes, you’ve said it for me, and rather better than I could have said it. Where there is a Zeitgeist, there are individuals in positions of influence and leadership within that Zeitgeist. They exploit it, they enhance it, they are themselves carried along by it. They are not causing it.
There is a simple reason why people like Gore, Strong and Soros are not the puppetmasters of the world. If they were that smart, they’d have something interesting to do with their time. They are walking inadequacies. They are tormented, frenetic, super-focused tossers. They are the chips on the shoulders of the world’s chronic resenters. And then they are dead.
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I think these quotes are applicable to climate change and the defence of free speech.
“All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Secondly, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.” ~ Arthur Schopenhauer, German philosopher
“Strange times are these in which we live when old and young are taught in falsehoods school. And the person that dares to tell the truth is called at once a lunatic and fool.” ~ Plato
“Make yourselves sheep and the wolves will eat you.” ~ Benjamin Franklin
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John Brookes @ 218 said to Wes @ 197:
So cliché.
http://www.barefooters.org/
If you were really serious about making a gratuitous statement, you’d have worn your underpants on the outside.
Does one need to be an expert in religion to be strongly of the opinion that the Greek god, Zeus, didn’t really exist?
What’s this ‘versions’ red herring? John, you know the PC (political correctness) that Wes was talking about had nothing to do with the Holocaust. It was about the Green/Left/elitist/(now Labor too) thought-police mindset. It was about the PC that now tries to silence negative reporting and views in the press. It was prophetically about the PC that had Andrew Bolt found guilty today, for simply saying what was true. It was about reader comments I saw in the paper today, being removed by the time I got home. It was about Jo Nova not being game to allow any comments appended to her article on the matter. It was about lots of free-speech issues like that, John.
Then don’t read it. I don’t read the SMH because I know they will be supporting Labor no matter what. Unlike the Australian, their position didn’t change when it became obvious the Labor/Greens party was toxic. I don’t watch the ABC either. Dorothy Dix belonged to the fifties.
They’re human. Like the rest of us, many of them are probably ‘crappy’ about what Labor/Green is doing to the country. At the top Jo cites a very fine Australian article from Henry Ergas, on this very matter.
The same could be said for many of us. I have never certainly felt such anger toward a government before. However one will still find more left-wing views in the Australian than they would find right-wing views in the Sydney Morning Herald. As for the ABC, they are comtemptible. They are essentially the taxpayer funded, propaganda arm of the government.
It’s not just the Oz, the once-interested public has lost interest in becoming a republic. For me it happened when I became aware that it had become another tenet of political correctness and had nothing to do with gaining Australia more freedom – quite the opposite, in fact. Better the flag you know, than the devil’s rags in red, Green and Brown.
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Crakar24: You ask what I think the “skeptics” motivations are.
Well, I think “skeptics” are generally elderly, and are a bit disappointed with their achievements in life, or who were once influential and important, but are slipping into irrelevancy. To protect their egos they must blame someone other than themselves. So they rail against governments and environmental regulation in particular – anything restrictive. Restrictions which might explain their lack of success.
It should be noted that this same dynamic applies to people in their late teens and twenties. But they turn to green causes, and view industry and greed as spoiling the “perfect world” in which they would be happy and successful.
Why do you think people don’t want to accept AGW, Crakar?
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John@257
Because the case being made is entirely unconvincing to anyone who doesn’t have a biased inclination to believe it. The behaviour of its major proponents demonstrated collusion, manipulation of data, hiding from FOI requests, attempts at bullying and marginalising those who opposed their dictum, ridiculous predictions of catastrophe that have not come close to being true (and refusing to acknowledge said facts when they have proven false), and the attempts by Big Money and Big Government to profit either financially or politically or both from the scaremongering it entails. The solutions proposed are neither directly or indirectly beneficial to the alleged problem, and the attempts at justifying the various approaches to future energy needs are nonsensical and ill-conceived. And all this at a time when the world economy is swinging on a precipice when very little would be required to tip us over into a world wide Depression. I believe that die is already cast, with the consequent suffering and deaths that will result, and which all proponents of your ideology share culpability.
As to your characterisation of skeptics, and what little I know of you, I suspect I am more successful than you, wealthier than you, younger than you, more influential, successful and significant, relevant and important than you. I seek to blame no one for anything, merely to warn of the downfall I believe humanity is headed for. My ego doesn’t seek protection or to blame others, I’m quite confident wear my many faults on my sleeve in front of my peers as I have no desire for anyone’s approval or affirmation- quite to the contrary, I avoid it at all costs. I have always had a dislike of Utopian ideologies, which I believe have contributed to more human death and destruction than any other single ideological force in the last century, and promising to escalate into the next unless people such as myself are prepared to speak up. Your desire to believe in AGW is, I believe, an intellectual dishonesty born of a misguided belief in your moral and intellectual superiority, as evidenced by the tone of your post, which is dripping with intellectual snobbery.
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Annoying when people make assumptions about you, isn’t it John?
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Hey Winston, no doubt you are also handsomer 😉
You see AGW as a utopian scam.
I see it as a practical problem to be fixed.
Anyway, lets wait and see what happens – I reckon I’ll last 20 years…..
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John Brookes @ 257
A skeptic examines things critically. Others accept things without question.
“If you’re not a Socialist before 30 you have no heart.If you’re still a Socialist after 30 you have no head.”
I read The Communist Manifesto and it took me a while to work out who ultimately had control. Then it dawned on me that not once in the Manifesto was the Banking fraternity mentioned.
To sort out fact from fiction takes time. The older one gets the more they realise how they have been fed a myriad of deceptions. As a result to examine things critically becomes second nature with those with the ability to think and an abhorence of being lied to.
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JB @ 257:
Permit me to take a crack at this:
The reason is quite simple John, because AGW is promoted by and believed by people that think in the way that you have exposed with your posts at:
218
233
and 257.
The more you speak the stronger my doubt in AGW becomes. Thank you for that.
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Winston @ 258, Nice, very nice.
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JB in 257,
You dont talk to many skeptics do you.
For the record (and not going into too much detail) i have worked all over the country, i worked in a other countries, i have a good paying job but most importantly i have been happily married for years and have 3 wonderful children and am generally happy with my lot in life
So i guess i broke the mould John, care to cast your net a bit wider?
Why do i think people do not accept AGW? Not sure John but it is a good question, i can tell you why i do not. Actually i think i can tell you why people began to show an interest.
You see originally i looked at AGW as just another fad (dont eat meat, eat meat, dont eat eggs, eat eggs)and did not pay much attention to it, then the government said they may have to tax it to fix it. At this point i think as a collective we all said “hang on a second”. You see John you cannot fix something by taxing it, you can only make money from it.
So i then began looking more closely at AGW and the more i read the more i understood, the more i understood the more doubt i had. Now granted John a climate expert i am not but i am not stupid you yourself have expressed doubts over the theory and if not for the consensus you most likely would be a skeptic.
I think this is how most skeptics started out but how we became skeptics is probably due to individual reasons, i have two that convinced me.
The first was Al Gore and his movie, the only peice of science he used in the movie was the ice core data which he claimed showed CO2 leading temp therefore he told the world that CO2 is causing teh temps to rise. Of course we both know this is not true as more detailed ice core data shows the exact opposite, Al knew this John, Al used the old data not the new. This is nothing less than fraud, so when the most vocal believer is reduced to fraud then you know something is wrong.
The second was the debunking of the radiosonde data, i have worked extensively with radiosondes and i know how accurate the thermometers are so when a “climate scientist” claims the thermometers are not accurate enough and uses the GPS data instead i know he is full of shit John. I know he is lying through his teeth, i know he is a fraud.
As i said John everyone would have their own story to tell about how they became a skeptic but i believe we all started down the same path for the same reasons.
I hope this helps.
Crakar24
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Sorry John i forgot to mention something, once one is resigned to the fact that AGW is a non problem you tend to see things in a different light. For example i heard on the radio today that scientists from the CSIRO and various other gov/scientific establishments from around the world have discovered that plants my absorb up to 25% more CO2 than first thought. This finding has the potential to overturn everything we thought we knew about the carbon cycle.
If we dont know all there is to know about something as basic as this then how can the science be settled John?
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I too wish it were not blue.
I’m not sure why I am here apart from out of an interest in environment, climate change and how things are being debated (here and elsewhere) and where that is leading us.
And yes, I like to watch but without a pacman in my hand.
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Just to put a full stop at the end of recent posts by me i would like to clarify a few things.
Firstly i agree wholeheartedly with Wes in 252, the point i was trying to make was that Agenda 21 will not get you world domination/one world government but it will help you control it. World domination comes from the pointy end of a gun or in some cases fiscal indebtedness.
For example what is the difference between the old USSR and the EU? Not much i would say, the EU is the experiment that is being exported all over the world.
The plan is simple enough, make an excuse to blow the crap out of a country to dispose of a non compliant thug and then insert your own compliant thug. We did it in Afghanistan and Iraq and we have now done it in Libya. Next stop is Syria, if you dont believe me then ask yourself this.
Why did the world sit silent when Saudi Arabia (known as the worlds largest out door prison) crush the protesters there or sit silent when the Saudi tanks rolled into Bahrain to literally crush the protests there but squeal like a pig about Egypt, Libya, Syria etc.
The only thorns still standing are Syria and Iran, once they fall we will have most of the worlds oil supplies under control (well Hugo Chavez is still a small problem) and so here is a brief history lesson.
We used to have Iran under control via our thug the Shah, however the Ayatolla got sick of all the western debauchery like gambling, drink, drugs and prostitution so they had a revolution and the west left (except for a few unlucky embassy staff) but the show must go on so we then approached a young Iraqi living in exile as he was fighting against the then Iraqi government, his name was Saddam Hussein, the deal was that we destabalise the Iraqi gov. and put him in power as long as he kicked off a war with Iran, we gave him weapons etc and the rest is history.
But we still did not control Iran, undeterred we tried even harder to goad Iran into a war, the first thing we did was to shoot down an Iranian passenger jet instantly killing 293 odd people but Iran would not bite. We tried accusing them of providing weapons to Al Qaeda, we tried sailing into their territorial waters and letting them capture us only to have them returned safe and well so nothing would work.
Then we allowed them to build a nuclear power plant and as co signatories of the NNPT we were obliged to help them but instead we accused them of building a bomb (why not we duped the people that way with Iraq), we have assassinated scientists, killed political leaders, sabotaged the software but still they wont bite. Fortunately they have signed a defence pact with Syria so all we have to do now is stir up some trouble and then get NATO (Neutralise Any Troublemakers Organisation) to bomb the crap out of Syria on humanitarian grounds just like Libya and we finally get our war with Iran.
This is how world domination/one world government works and it is happening now, before our very eyes. Agenda 21 will come later along with a host of other policies from our non elected rulers just like the
USSRsorry EU.Thats why the Palistinians cannot become a state because they would lose control, the new Libyan government had to wait 63 hours to get state hood the Palistinians have waited 63 years.
The people in charge of this are as i said before sociopaths
http://www.ehow.com/about_5067762_definition-sociopath.html
recent examples of sociopaths are, Hitler, Bush (both senior and junior), Obama, Netanyahu, Blair, Rudd (although he did not have the military might to reach his full potential) and every two bit tin pot dictator known to man.
Real world example of a sociopath and a human being
One sociopath (Netanyahu)ordered a fleet of ships sailing in international waters to be stopped at all costs so he sent his soldiers in, they boarded a US flagged ship and assissinated 8 Turkish and one US citizen (3 shots to the chest and one to the head at point blank range).
One human being (Recep Tayyip Erdogan)raced to the UN to lodge a protest over the event, a sociopath (Obama) also rushed to the UN to veto the protest.
The world is rapidly dividing not along religious lines but along moral and ethical ones and i fear we may find ourselves on the wrong side of that line.
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http://whatreallyhappened.com/IMAGES/Shah-nukeIran.jpg
It used to be ok for Iran to build a nuclear power station.
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Well you live and learn.
I was drawn into the AGW mystery a few years ago and found the mix of science, politics and money grubbing absolutely spellbinding. Science has never been the same.
But. There are still major mechanisms that pop up for consideration.
The most recent, for me, has been the Daily Diurnal Atmospheric Bulge and its presence, location and properties just goes to show how much has been hidden by the Warmers to create the illusion of Global Guilt.
Here we have a gigantic rolling thermal steamroller traversing the equatorial regions that needs some attention from AGW professionals.
Is the effect small enough to be dismissed?
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MFJ,
I am sure everyone has their pet hate with the AGW theory when you combine them all together it is a wonder it ever got of the ground to begin with.
The thing about the radiosondes is that they are a throw away item, that is once they are launched you never see them again and if you do you throw them in the bin. With this in mind the designers need to keep an eye on the costs so what you have is three measuring devices (PTU) that are expensive and accurate all wrapped up in a cheap cardboard box.
The GPS is not a true GPS, it is not like the TOM TOM you use to get directions, it is not like the ones used in aircraft or on a ship. It is a cheap and nasty GPS engine only, it gets its co ordinates from the ground station and when launched transmits its info back for the ground station to work out where it is (LAT, LONG and ALT).
The data stream that is sent back to the ground station is very limited in bandwidth so what that means is the PTU info (thats the important info) gets updated quite quickly so you can see small incremental changes in conditions whilst the GPS info is sacrificed. Therefore it only gets updated at a very low rate, which means sudden and quick changes in direction ect can be missed. This is OK because who really cares anyway?
So the radio sonde thermometer data conclusively proves the hot spot does not exist but yet a climate scientist claims he can see the hot spot through the GPS data. This would have to be one of the greatest scientific frauds ever perpetrated.
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Hi Crakar 24
The Daily Diurnal Atmospheric Bulge mentioned above actually does exist but it is several hundred kilometres up so its influence is a little ” up in the air” so to speak.
This isn’t the warmers hot spot — it actually is non existent.
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MFJ @ 271
I don’t think Crakar was having a shot at you and equating the “hotspot” you mentioned to that “other” hotspot.
I think he was just adding his own favourite “pet peeve” to your comments.
Mine is “ocean acidification”.
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Hi MV
No I didn’t assume he was having a go at me, just that the warmers “hot spot” is very low in the atmosphere compared to the Diurnal Bulge which is way above what I would normally think of as the atmosphere. I learned something new and very interesting.
My pet peeve is “down-welling” radiation.
This definitely doesn’t exist because there is instant thermal dispersion of any IR energy absorbed by CO2 into surrounding air.
This rises until it reaches equilibrium P,V,T . There has to be a fairly constant temperature gradient from about 10 metres a.g.l and definitely no band of superheated CO2 spewing Global Death down on us.
Ha Ha.
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Yes MV at worst it should be “ocean neutralization”.
Sounds so BAAAD doesn’t it?
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You got it in one MV
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Adam Smith puts its head up again here. Much more contrite and careful. Know Adam you are in the sight.
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Blimey – If you have answered the question from Wes George, then you can point to the thread and comment number when you did so. Go ahead. I have searched your comments on a number of threads and Wes George’s basic question has never been addressed by you. You wont because you can’t. You will reply with something like “I have already done so” without proof and avoid the question yet again.
If your graphing exercise in showing about 0.7C of warming over 100 years is meant to be proof of Catastrophic AGW then I guess we must be having a catastrophe every day when the temperature changes upwards by 10C going from night to day. Funny how the rest of the biosphere has not noticed anything wrong …
Try not to view the world through the heavily tinted glasses of dogma. You will see a lot more.
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Phil Jordan @ 223 – Missed your post earlier, but let me address it now.
My understanding is that the cost is not nothing as the companies are purchasing the carbon credits as a right to emit carbon dioxide. That is where the government revenue stream is coming from. Also the value can be argued to me not just the cost but the future business value in allowing a company to operate normally for the relevant period of time. Any attempt by the government to legislate this value away could trigger the compensation mechanism of the Constitution.
My technical expertise is not the law, however government decree creates assets all the time. Lots of property ownership is considered to be assets of the owner because the law says so (e.g. shares in a company). There is nothing unconstitutional about the government passing a law giving ownership of something to the purchaser of that thing even if that thing is not necessarily tangible.
(Blimey – take note – question asked – question answered – just in case you needed a worked example to see how it is done).
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Mary Johnson @ 269 & 271
You may want to look at the following analysis that looks at the Diurnal Bulge in the atmosphere (Diurnal means daily) which shows not that it is not a hot spot in the computer climate modelling sense, but that it could be the major driver of heat transference in the atmosphere and that the whole greenhouse gas thing is a fallacy of science.
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Thanks Truthseeker @ 279
Looked at he article and that’s the one that got me interested in Diurn Bulg.
Most other refs seem to be very old papers from the 1960s.
It does seem along way out to have an effect but needs to be considered and quantified.
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TruthSeeker @278
Thank you for the response. If you have the time, I would like to ask a follow up.
Given the Government is “selling” the indulgences (carbon credits), what is to prevent the government from “buying” them back at face value? I understand that their value will not remain static, but we are not talking about a long time here (from what I have heard, a couple of years at most). The government does lose the revenue from the sale (having to refund it) and there is a huge inertia in any government willingly giving up already claimed revenue, but that seems more to be the inelasticity of government revenue, not an iron wall to repeal of the law that from most indications, at least 2/3rds of the citizens do not want or like.
Thanks again for your response.
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Am U.S., an Independent for decades(not Democrat or Republican Party affiliated)and I know this AGW is an absolute scam for governments to obtain revenue under the pretense to con the populace into believing they are saving the environment, thus they become willing dolts to the scheme.
It is very sad that all world governments are corrupt and that they will do anything to pursue their ideologies at the expense of the citizens. At the same time, all these welfare society experiments have resulted in massive debts in developed countries, debts that cannot be paid and will ultimately result in the destruction of their currencies.
Aussies are super !!! Wish you the best under the yoke of your terrible government.
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