Australia’s refugee problem has attracted global attention. This from the New York Times.
Hamilton: Garnaut report is Rudd’s greatest test
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The release of the Garnaut report tomorrow provides the Rudd Government with an opportunity to stop campaigning and start governing. The auguries are mixed. For two weeks Prime Minister Rudd allowed himself to be sucked in to the vortex of petrol price populism, until he and his fellow ministers began to fight back against the unscrupulousness of the Opposition. Rudd began testing his lines in Parliament, working out how to persuade the public to return to thinking about the future. It worked, putting Nelson and Turnbull on the back foot. They were forced to reaffirm that they are not climate sceptics and accept the science of global warming. That this had to happen only proves how antediluvian the climate debate is in this country compared to, say, Britain where the Tory leader David Cameron has positioned the conservatives as greener than Labour. Even for the cynics amongst us, the willingness of Nelson and Turnbull to undermine the shaky political consensus on the greatest threat to the welfare of future Australians in exchange for a small and very short-term political gain is breathtaking. The best news we have had for a while came in the form of this week’s Newspoll results. The results showed strong public support for an ETS — 61% for and 25% against. Perhaps we should not be so surprised — both parties promised an ETS and Australians voted for it. Perhaps the petrol price panic is only skin-deep, a bit like an anxiety attack that soon passes. Kevin Rudd may be right that the Opposition has been lying about accepting climate science and the ghost of Howard still rules the party room, not to mention the Opposition leader’s office. After all, Nelson appointed one of Australia’s foremost climate denialists as his international adviser. As opinion editor of The Australian, Tom Switzer was always eager to give space to the latest denialist pseudoscience or ideological warriors who equate action on climate change with capitulation to green extremism. But over the next few days there is much more at stake than petrol price parochialism and ute men complaining about the price of girlie drinks in Gippsland. Last December, when Kevin Rudd went to the Bali climate conference to receive the ovation of his life, he chose the boldest words to underline his and Australia’s commitment to responding to global warming. “Australia now stands ready to assume its responsibility,” he declared. “Climate change is the defining challenge of our generation … one of the greatest moral, economic and environmental challenges of our age.” In the most decisive break from the approach of the previous government, he promised the assembled delegates that his government is “prepared to take on the challenge, to do the hard work now and to deliver a sustainable future”. It is a long fall from such a high peak. This week he stands on the precipice, looking into the abyss. It is the greatest test of his political courage. But it won’t be the last on climate. The test this week is the comprehensiveness of the ETS. The next, and bigger, test will occur late this year or next when the Government must decide on the level of the cap on emissions. There is an expectation that the target for 2020 will be a 25-40% cut. Unless energy producers and consumers begin changing their behaviour very soon, an emissions limit in that range will mean very large price rises. It’s worth pointing out, given the widespread misunderstanding, that the Government will not be setting a carbon price. It will set a quantitative limit on emissions (the cap) that will become tighter over time. The limited number of permits will make them valuable to the extent demand for them exceeds their availability. The price of polluting forms of energy will rise according to how much those required to own permits are willing to pay for them. Few Australians are aware of just how closely the rest of the world has watched the greenhouse debate in Australia. Kevin Rudd was received with such acclaim in Bali because the thousands of delegates knew in all its brutal detail how the Howard Government had spent years attempting to sabotage global efforts to reach an effective agreement. The cheering of the Bali delegates marked the end of that era. Kevin Rudd now has to deliver on his promises. |
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13 Comments
mixed augeries? you are so pretentious! At leat thjere were no fake talking points this time.
Connor, another climatologist? The debate is over? Its over when you dont want to look at the evidence. As for the Australian people, look at the Gippsland election result.. Traditional Labor booths voted conservative. Will someone tell the workers in the Latrobe valley the debate is over. “What f***ing debate?” I can hear them saying.
Connor, it is not just John James . I agree with him: There gas been little or no debate in Australia.
“In stark contrast to the often repeated assertion that the science of climate change is “settled,” significant new peer-reviewed research has cast even more doubt on the hypothesis of dangerous human-caused global warming.”
Open Letter to Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations, Dec 2007
Written by 100 Prominent Scientists
The letter was signed by renowned scientists such as Dr. Antonio Zichichi, president of the World Federation of Scientists; Dr. Reid Bryson, dubbed the “Father of Meteorology”; Atmospheric pioneer Dr. Hendrik Tennekes, formerly of the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute; Award winning physicist Dr. Syun-Ichi Akasofu of the International Arctic Research Center, who has twice named one of the “1000 Most Cited Scientists”; Award winning MIT atmospheric scientist Dr. Richard Lindzen; UN IPCC scientist Dr. Vincent Gray of New Zealand; French climatologist Dr. Marcel Leroux of the University Jean Moulin; World authority on sea level Dr. Nils-Axel Morner of Stockholm University; Physicist Dr. Freeman Dyson of Princeton University; Physicist Dr. Zbigniew Jaworowski, chairman of the Scientific Council of Central Laboratory for Radiological Protection in Poland; Paleoclimatologist Dr. Robert M. Carter of Australia; Former UN IPCC reviewer Geologist/Geochemist Dr. Tom V. Segalstad, head of the Geological Museum in Norway; and Dr. Edward J. Wegman, of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.
Even if we do accept anthropogenic global warming (and by the way I do), the extent of it and the possible repercussions are even less well understood. If debate at the scientific level is being stifled (and it is) then we may truly heading for a man made disaster…..again!.
have you been in bed for a while clive? looks like you missed all of 2007 and half of 1008… get up man, wash the sleep outa your peepers, have some breakfast and tune into what’s happening but mostly what’s not happening in our government.
Rolled oats (they’re cheap, nutritional and will fire up your brainpower) are good.
that should read ‘2008’, clive - it was my shaky fingers as i pondered our fate in the other half of 2008 and 2009, 2010…
JJ: Gippsland? I’m sure you’ll find that those Labor booths voting conservative were voting for the good job Julie Bishop is doing. My argument is a baseless as yours.
JamesK: 100 scientists have written a letter to the UN? There is an excellent rebuttal of most of the influences of the individuals, and especially some of their theories (Sun Spots etc) in either Nature or Scientific American sometime in Feb. I can’t lay my hands on it this morning. I’ll raise you my 5000+ scientists to your 100.
You are correct Connor. It is still a majority scientific opinion still although funnily enough probably less convincing now than it appeared 10 years ago.
The thing to recognise is that there are legitimate dissenters in this science.
There is even more disagreement on the possible ramifications.
There is even less agreement again on what action to take.
I subscribe to the majority (scientific) view but I hope to maintain an open mind (as hopefully more science is done if it has not already been stifled).(What is the point in financing research when we already know the answer. Science is not open ended. You must ask specific questions and test the theory to see that answers are what might be expected if the theory is valid. If not, your theory is incorrect. Which is GOOD not bad.The only things we truly KNOW are the theories we have proven to be false or more properly shown to be invalid).
No the meat and potatoes. What do we do about it?
That is largely in the hands of Ross Garnaut. Who? What?
And no he is not a scientist.
Climate change has not been debated in any proper sense of that word. To express scepticism about the science is to be immediately shouted down. But shouting is a poor substitute for considered discussion. Professor Don Aitken had a piece published in The Oz some weeks ago in which he expressed his conviction that Climate Change was a green mirage and then when on to describe what he considered more important environmental questions.
What was interesting about Aitken’s piece however was his description of the ‘warnings” he was given by well meaning colleagues that he should not express any scepticism, however deeply felt, because he would be labelled and subjected to ridicule. ‘Political Correctness’ in all its glory. The Left live on it.
More recently , The Oz highlighted more of the same PC when quoting the ABC Radio National Science anchor, Robyn Williams, who dismissed Aitken because he ” did not have a science background. He was not a climatologist”
As The Oz commentary observed , neither Williams himself, nor Stern, nor Garnaut have “science backgrounds’
The Australian people are not fools.
JamesK: The debate is “over when you dont want to look at the evidence” is a nonsense. It’s the same sort of argument delusionists use for Creation Science over evolution. There is no evidence that is enough for such people.
How much more evidence do people need? How many opinions are enough? If you have majority scientific opinion, but a tiny minority of dissenters, do you start the “debate” again? Do nothing? It will be a man-made disaster of Biblical proportions should we sit around doing nothing.
You did not answer JJ’s first point either by the way. You’re answer to his second point was really more a response to what’s on second?
I will reiterate JJ’s first point to help you (as you obviously need all the help available):
The debate is “over when you dont want to look at the evidence”.
“Perhaps the petrol price panic is only skin-deep, a bit like an anxiety attack that soon passes”.
Perhaps, but I suspect ‘Our Kev’ is being wisely counseled to backpeddle rapidly on the Garnaut soon-to-be-released recommendations if he wishes to be ‘Our’ Kev-11
Remember ‘Our Kev’ campaigned on the “pain” felt by “working families” with groceries and petrol. Who is truly guilty of “unscrupulousness”? Nelson? Rudd? Or Clive Hamilton who says thet he is”keen to revive public debate on the big issues affecting Australians”.
I’ll bet.
John James: “Climate change has not been debated in any proper sense of that word.” ?? Did you miss most of the 1990s and the early 2000s?? The debate is over.
You point out that the Australian people are not fools and therefore will dismiss your attempts to claim continued debate, when we should be moving on to extents and mitigation.
You did not answer the point I made but it was a predictable response from you Connor.