Back to work post.

I am heading away again today but this time I leave you two offerings. Patrick over at Born Again Redneck is currently running a series of “One hit wonders” so I thought I would go into competition with the following, which was a hit in Australia, God only knows why.


But for those fans of Obama I give this to both of you.

Muslim demonstration with a difference.

Hattip Angry Exile.

When I first saw this I have to admit I thought it was a pisstake, but it is linked to an organization called “British Muslims for Secular Democracy."



I wish them success and safety.

“Carbon hypocrites, tax grabbers or power seekers?”

Cartoon by Glenn McCoy.

I am doing a lot of GW posts of late with good reason. In a matter of weeks, unless we stop them, western governments along with the green movement, and the powers that be in every corrupt totalitarian shit-hole on earth are set to meet in Copenhagen to establish another tier of governance over us. This time there will be no accountability, no elections, no redress, and no chance of ever getting rid of them.

The three layers of government we have already are excessive in cost, compliance, and their deleterious effect on our liberties, we don’t need a fourth, especially one consisting entirely of an unelected bureaucracy.

Viv Forbes is as usual spot on:

“Carbon hypocrites, tax grabbers or power seekers?”

Every day we hear some pious politician bleating about the end of the world unless we reduce our usage of carbon fuels like coal, oil and gas.

But every day we see them using taxpayers’ money to promote motor rallies, international sports functions, games, expos, carnivals, tourism and their own frequent jaunts to yet another conference in yet another posh foreign location. Every one of these activities requires the burning of tankers of carbon fuel for its success.

Are they fools, do they think we are fools, are they hypocrites, or are they just whipping up climate hysteria to disguise their greedy grab for more taxes on everything we use and more control of everything we do?

The Australian is no longer taken in:

On Monday The Guardian in Britain quoted a top European official who described the idea of negotiating on targets as naive and said the best that could be expected was that countries would put up what they wanted to commit to.

Just as well, really, if we consider figures published in an article in The Washington Post, also on Monday, by Danish statistician and environmentalist Bjorn Lomborg.

His Copenhagen Consensus Centre commissioned well-known climate economist Richard Tol, a contributor to the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, to estimate the cost of emissions targets needed to keep the rise in global temperature to under the 2C limit suggested by the IPCC's work. Tol's answer is a global price tag of $US40 trillion in 2100, to avoid expected climate damage costing $US1.1 trillion. These figures are based on mainstream economic models and subject to the usual limitations of modeling over long periods. …

Kevin Rudd has been using various arguments to push his case for urgent, substantial action on climate change and one he used in the US last week is the threat of a European carbon tax on exports from countries "not doing their bit on climate change".

Rudd only mentioned remarks by French President Nicolas Sarkozy, but it is actually a joint initiative by France and Germany's newly re-elected Chancellor Angela Merkel. Instead of, at least implicitly, accepting this as a legitimate tactic by the Europeans, Rudd should be denouncing it at every opportunity.

The last thing Australia and the world need is a global trade war sparked by European attempts to bully the world into adopting its climate change policies, which are under attack in the EU itself, to shelter its industries from the economic damage its climate policies will impose.

Some more figures from Lomborg. Economic estimates suggest freer trade would deliver global benefits of the order of $US50trillion. Why put these gains at risk to avoid global warming damage estimated at $US1.1 trillion? Fortunately there has already been a reaction in Europe and in other countries against the Franco-German threat.

Rudd will use any strategy to march in lockstep with anyone who will give him any excuse to introduce further micromanagement on Australians, especially if it gives him the chance to tax and spend at a higher rate.

The whole thing is an exercise in futility as China and India are staying out:

On October 22, an accord was signed by Xie Zhenhua, China's vice minister at the National Development and Reform Commission, and Jairam Ramesh, India's environment minister, in New Delhi. The memorandum provides an alternative framework to counter pressure from America and Europe to adopt mandatory limits on greenhouse gas emissions in a new UN treaty. …

China and India, along with Brazil, Mexico and South Africa, have been adamant about staying out of any global requirement. By forming regional alignments that keep policy in the hands of national governments, the developing countries expect to be able to resist Western and UN pressure.

It is easier to stay independent of the climate paranoia if one does not believe the planet is in peril. Xiao Ziniu, director general of the Beijing Climate Centre, told the British Guardian newspaper recently that, "There is no agreed conclusion about how much change is dangerous.... Whether the climate turns warmer or cooler, there are both positive and negative effects....In Chinese history, there have been many periods warmer than today." He disputed the disaster warnings of the UNIPCC, saying, "The accuracy of the prediction is very low because the climate is affected by many mechanisms we do not fully understand."

I recommend this full article as the Chinese present a good case. This will not end this matter as Global warming has long ago moved from science into the political arena from the time that Al Gore marched on to the scene and realized the profits that could be garnered from frightening people with science fiction. It is no longer about the environment, its all about power and profit.

Allan Ramsay on politics: “it's Pavlovian.”

Alan Ramsey was a longstanding member of the Parliamentary Press Gallery from 1966 pretty much forever. Interviewed on the 7:30 report he had some rather unflattering things to say about our politicians. He has recently written a book called “A Matter of Opinion,” recounting this career.

According to the presenter, “There was one career interruption when Ramsey was hauled back to Sydney for a suitable penance after calling then Prime Minister John Gorton a liar from the gallery.”

This is about Australian Politicians and rings true from my observations and rings bells as to my reading of overseas polys:

Alan Ramsey, I'd like to start with the big changes that you've seen in politics over the 40-plus years, in the nature of how the game is played.

ALAN RAMSEY, AUTHOR, A MATTER OF OPINION: …

The growth of MPs entitlements and staff. Every backbencher used to have one staffer. Mick Young, when he was in the Whitlam Government, gave them two. The Keating Government gave them three. The Howard Government gave them four. And it's all about moving the cost of getting elected from the political parties onto the back of taxpayers.

KERRY O'BRIEN: Have you worked out the number of people at Parliament houses when the House is sitting?

ALAN RAMSEY: Yes, it's 3,500. I mean, that's the size of a lot of small country towns in this ... 3,500 in a sitting week. To look after, to look after, 226 people.

KERRY O'BRIEN: Compare today's backbencher, walking through the doors of Parliament House for the first time, with the MPs that you saw arriving to Parliament for the first time in those earlier years.

ALAN RAMSEY: They were much more representative of the Australian community in the earlier years, they really were. They didn't come with their university degrees and they didn't come out of ministerial offices. They really did come from the community at large - the great majority of them.

Not anymore. It's a real - it's a career path now. We don't have two separate political parties; we just have two groups of people who represent political careers. The Labor Party, to all intents and purposes to what it was, up until relatively recently, is dead.

I mean, do you really think that the politicians of today, federal politicians of today, are a more interesting group, are a more representative group of the Australian community, when you see them, you know, carrying on in the Parliament or you hear a speech by them, or you hear them talking on radio.

They all have their messages. It's all about - it's all about, I don't know, it's this dreadful daily sludge that goes on, whether in Parliament or out of Parliament. They're not real people anymore! They're just not!

KERRY O'BRIEN: Do you find that they're more controlled from the top?

ALAN RAMSEY: Yep. Absolutely. I mean, during campaigns, the el mobile, Blackberries, whatever they call them - I hate them, I hate them. You know, the daily message: this is the line, this is the line. Everyone repeats it.

You know, it's Pavlovian, all the time, little puppies, running around, saying the same thing, barking the same bark. It really is, it's just a - it's - and in Parliament, it's the same. Parliament has become - well it's indescribable.

KERRY O'BRIEN: What about the press gallery? Describe the gallery that you first came to and compare it to today.

ALAN RAMSEY: All blokes, except one woman, on woman, and in a junior capacity. Been here forever. Most of the senior people had been here forever. And new, younger blokes were just starting to take over the so-called head of bureau and whatnot.

Much younger blokes started to take over, but people who stayed more than just five minutes. It wasn't just a production line of journalists - come in, do your 12 months or your 18 months or whatever and fiddle off to something else.

There aren't all that many stayers anymore, and I sometimes wonder because the news management that goes on by the political parties is so awful, so ingrained, but sweeps them all up. They all operate on a 24-hour basis. Nothing happened before 24 hours ago, and nothing - they don't look any further forward than the next 24 hours. And it's all...

KERRY O'BRIEN: So what's the end result of all of that?

ALAN RAMSEY: Oh, the same sludge I was talking about, you know, in terms of what happens in the Parliament. It happens in the media. I mean the press, so far as the political process is concerned, are parasites. I mean we feed off it.

They always have done. That's no different. It's just a very blunt word to use. But it is so much worse. And don't get on the drip with the Prime Minister's office. I mean they freeze you out. This mob in their now, they know how to run their PR and they do it very, very well. Every bit as well as John Howard did.

KERRY O'BRIEN: What about the bureaucracy? What change - what significant change have you seen in the bureaucracy in 40 years?

ALAN RAMSEY: It's lost tenure. It lost its tenure. It ceased to be an apolitical public service. They know where their bread and butter is. Howard made sure of that - put them on contracts. Essentially, in one fell swoop, got a direction through the Remuneration Tribunal that increased their salaries enormously - I mean, the heads of department. And they run the department - everybody else takes their lead from it. The Rudd Government runs exactly the same sort of public service. It's no freer, no more independent than was the one that Howard created. That's gonna be his lasting legacy - it really is. ….

KERRY O'BRIEN: That time you spent in a political office with Bill Hayden, did that change your view of politics and politicians when you returned to journalism?

ALAN RAMSEY: My word, absolutely.

KERRY O'BRIEN: In what way?

ALAN RAMSEY: Um, it made me much more cynical about how the political process worked. It really did. You know, you're viewing it from the inside. You're viewing it sitting around tables where people are talking, "How can we do this and how can we do that? How can we get somebody's vote? How can we get the electorate at large vote?"

And I'll tell you what, you know, there's nothing that's particularly altruistic about what goes on there, ever.

KERRY O'BRIEN: But if one of those politicians were sitting here they would say, "But Alan, we believe that the policies we would formulate for this country are good for this country, so therefore it justifies the process."

ALAN RAMSEY: Mate, the bottom line of that is the line that was always used when I used to talk about these sort of things. They'd say, "Listen, don't you forget: our bastards are better than their bastards." ….

The full transcript is here.

Lord Monkton; Loss of sovereignty.

In the post below Viv Forbes talked of the speech by Lord Monkton. Here is the conclusion to it. I recommend to those with a lazy hour swinging in the breeze the full speech which can be found Here.

This is the extract:


Despite his effective refutation of manmade global warming, his closing remarks about the Copenhagen Treaty are chilling:

“I read that treaty. And what it says is this: that a world government is going to be created. The word "government" actually appears as the first of three purposes of the new entity. The second purpose is the transfer of wealth from the countries of the West to third world countries, in satisfaction of what is called, coyly, "climate debt" because we've been burning CO2 and they haven't. We've been screwing up the climate and they haven't. And the third purpose of this new entity, this government, is enforcement.

“So, thank you, America. You were the beacon of freedom to the world. It is a privilege merely to stand on this soil of freedom while it is still free. But, in the next few weeks, unless you stop it, your president will sign your freedom, your democracy, and your humanity away forever. And neither you nor any subsequent government you may elect will have any power whatsoever to take it back. That is how serious it is. I've read the treaty. I've seen this stuff about [world] government and climate debt and enforcement. They are going to do this to you whether you like it or not.”

What happens in Australia and USA in the next few weeks is crucial. If the warmist wing of the Liberal Party, in an attempt to postpone their own dismissal, allows Rudd to arrive in Copenhagen waving the Ration-N-Tax Scheme bill like peace-in-our-time Chamberlain returning from his compromise with Hitler, Australians will give great comfort to the green mafia pushing the US senate to do the same
We must reject the Ration-N-Tax Scheme and keep rejecting it no matter what the political consequences. Ordinary people are looking for that sort of leadership.

When all of this collapses, they will not be gentle with the Climate Chamberlains.

Why Compromise is Defeat.

Cartoon By Nate Beeler.

By Viv Forbes

(Editors Note): This is an extract from the original article. The full text can be viewed at "Carbon Sense."

The next few weeks are crucial. Australians can choose to assist the creation of the World Carbon Rationing, Tax and Redistribution Authority, administered by the United Nations, or we can take a step on the road back to energy and climate sanity.

The first step to sanity is to ensure that the opposition votes at all times to REJECT whatever Ration-N-Tax Scheme the Rudd government tries to get on the law books before the Copenhagen Climate Conclave. We must give no encouragement whatsoever to this international cabal of levellers.

Malcolm Turnbull and the warmist wing of the Liberal Party think that they are being politically savvy and achieving something useful by negotiating with the devil on a few clauses of the ETS (Extra Tax System). In matters as crucial as this, compromise is defeat.

In the long run, complete destruction of the ETS and the Climate Control Industry and its legislative mountain is far more important than one election, or the future of the Liberal Party. Like a dead fish, the Liberal Party is rotting from the head. Its survival is unimportant for Australians in the total scheme of things.

So we either block Rudd’s Ration-N-Tax Scheme now or, if blockage is impossible, we let them run riot and then use the backlash (and a new opposition with backbone) to then throw out ALL of the old extreme garbage of the Wong Ration-N-Tax Scheme, together with the Rudd government. We must not give birth to a compromise.

If Turnbull gets his way, and some weak compromise gets onto the law books, it will produce nothing but harm for ever more. Because of all the “mates-rates exemptions” and “free permits for friends” it will not be so obviously bad that people will throw it out at the first opportunity. With cunning manipulation, the initial effects may not be dramatic, and people will say: “Well the deniers ran a big scare campaign but the world did not end with the introduction of the Ration-N-Tax Scheme”.

However, even if many of the “compromise” exemptions remain for some time, all the red tape, regulators, hidden taxes, subsidies, redistributions, scams, frauds and mis-allocation of investment capital will infect the blood of the economy, remaining as a leaking stomach ulcer of chronic costs that no one can recognise, but everyone will suffer from.

Now is the time to draw a line in the sand.

Every one of us needs to make sure that our local member knows that, unless he opposes the Ration-N-Tax Scheme, he will not only lose our vote, but also that we will actively work against him (or her).

Which politicians can we support? The Climate Sceptics Party, though new and small, is the most informed and dedicated. Support them. Senators Barnaby Joyce, Ron Boswell and the Nationals have risked all on uncompromising opposition to the Extra Tax System. Support them. The brave Senator Steve Fielding stood alone against the tide. Support him and his Family First Party. Support also the DLP, the Citizens Electoral Council, One Nation and any Independent who opposes the Ration-N-Tax Scheme.

Use the preferential voting system to rank even the unpalatable options. Put all alarmists and fellow travellers last.

Finally, if in doubt “Throw the incumbent out”.

Make no mistake. The Ration-N-Tax Scheme is not something to take lightly. It will be as complicated as the Income Tax Act, as relentless as the GST, as destructive as the Global Financial Crisis and as prone to corruption as the UN.

And it will have no effect that anyone can measure on the climate. There is zero chance it will “improve” the climate. And the only way it can reduce man-made production of carbon dioxide is by depressing the economy. All of those fatuous targets discussed with great solemnity in conclaves of fools meeting in world tourist destinations have no chance whatsoever of being achieved except by a long chronic economic depression. As accurately as any other measure, emissions of carbon dioxide monitor economic activity. As China and India recognise very clearly, cap it and you cap economic activity.

The Ration-N-Tax Scheme has two more insidious elements.

Firstly, once they get any sort of watered down bill on the books, you can be sure it will give authority to the bureaucracy (ie the Minister of the day) to change rates, remove exemptions or reduce the cap without further reference to Parliament. Like so many government levies and taxes, once the principle is accepted, the rates will inevitably rise. In fact, after the first year at a low fixed carbon tax rate, the rate will be “set by the market”, and government will manipulate the permits issued to ensure the “carbon price” keeps rising. Politicians will then blame “market forces” for the increasing carbon tax with its noxious effect on jobs and consumer costs.

For those still contemplating the benefits of a compromise on the establishment of this monster new tax, ask this: “When did you last see a tax abolished”?

Secondly, the western world is teetering on the edge of the world carbon tax abyss. For the next month or so, there is no scare story too extreme, no compromise too tawdry, and no trade-off too un-principled, just to get something “agreed” and subject to some sort of “International Treaty”.

The unelected Climate Controllers in the UN’s IPCC know that the likes of Obama, Rudd and Brown will all lose office sooner or later. They want “The Copenhagen Treaty” to be so formatted that no-one can pull out once they put a foot on the sticky paper. Co-operative International Courts will try to override state sovereignty so that even if a new opposition is swept into power with a mandate to “clean the stables”, this “International Treaty” status will be used to defy the will of the people. Australian and US workers will become slaves, obliged to continually pay “climate compensation” to all the failed states of the world, and to pick up the tab to keep the IPCC cadre flying to places like Rio and Bali for their regular sabbaticals.

Christopher Monckton recently warned America about the likely loss of sovereignty. It was reported here:

You can watch his entire 1 hour 35 minute presentation. It is well worth the time if you can spare it.

The slide-show he frequently points to in this presentation can be viewed along with the video.

“Carbon Sense” is a newsletter produced by the Carbon Sense Coalition, an Australian based organisation which opposes waste of resources, opposes pollution, and promotes the rational and sustainable use of carbon energy and carbon food.

Big Government; the Facts.

I found this today while fooling around and decided to share with you. This video is from the Center for Freedom and Prosperity Foundation presents real-world data and research showing that the burden of government spending is far too high not only in the United States (where the Bush-Obama policies have increased the federal budget by more than 100 percent):