Sad day for Australian Democracy

[Guest]

Just a couple of questions.

1. It's designed to reduce the emissions of Carbon Dioxide...a plant food right?

2. When this "toxic tax" comes in next year, how much will the temperature of the planet drop?

3. Will it happen straight away or 1000 years from now?

4. Will this tax also stop Orica (and other companies) releasing Hexavalent chromium and related gases?

If anyone who advocates this plan that will either save the planet or destroy what's left of our economy can answer those, I would be very grateful.

[melon....]

Just a couple of questions.

1. It's designed to reduce the emissions of Carbon Dioxide...a plant food right?

2. When this "toxic tax" comes in next year, how much will the temperature of the planet drop?

3. Will it happen straight away or 1000 years from now?

4. Will this tax also stop Orica (and other companies) releasing Hexavalent chromium and related gases?

If anyone who advocates this plan that will either save the planet or destroy what's left of our economy can answer those, I would be very grateful.

Look at it his way....even if CO2 ws the biggest maddest thing out there - this tax will not stop emissions. The compensation package will ensure its OK to continue burning coal. The rest of the world will ensure tehy do burn coal. Its teh biggest wealth redistribution rort devised.

And for those who believe the revenue will go into renewables...get real.

Another tax and their dream surplus is still a million miles away.

[Guest]

No but ignorance is a very close relative of your good friend "blinkered narrow mindedness" and lacking the ability to understand that people have an alternate opinion, well that is ignorance in my book

and don't bullshit me, both sides do not agree that a market based approach is best. I am sure there members of both sides that probably do agree but just as probable there are members on both sides that do not agree with this notion but remember people keep their mouths shut due to party politics.

Make up all the shit you want and combine it with other bits that are fact or something someone else made up, it doesn't make you supremely correct.


The Carbon trading scheme better work, else this country is going to something I didn't think could happen, get even more ****ed over by the red headed idiot, the even dumber Swan and the most evil of them all Bob Brown

Rant all you want but to even consider the country is f**ked up shows you too are an ignorant fool

[sretsoor]

http://www.dontcopit.com/internation...asy-and-fraud/

International carbon trading halfway between fantasy and fraud
November 3, 2011By FeistyTiger
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By Greg Sheridan



EVEN more than the carbon tax itself, the central mechanism of the Gillard government’s clean energy bills now making their way through parliament is the international carbon trading market.

Although the carbon tax will cost Australians $9 billion in its first year, our greenhouse emissions continue to rise under the tax. We hit our target of a 5 per cent reduction mainly by buying carbon credits on the international market, which the government assumes will be functioning by 2016.

I recently interviewed two of the best-informed international statesmen on this issue, and the interviews left me convinced that the international trading scheme lies halfway between a fantasy and a fraud and is never going to make a serious contribution to diminishing greenhouse gases.

The two statesmen are John Baird, the Canadian Foreign Minister, and Shyam Saran, the former Indian special envoy on climate change. For the record, neither is a right-wing attack dog, nor a shock jock, nor a denier, nor a neo-liberal or neoconservative ideologue, or any of the other labels the many taxpayer-funded advocates of a carbon tax use to demonise people the government disagrees with.

I have reported some of Baird’s comments in a news story but they deserve fuller consideration.

The Conservative government of which he is part, under Prime Minister Stephen Harper, won an absolute majority for the first time at the last election on the platform of rejecting a carbon tax or an emissions trading scheme.

Australian policy should pay a lot more attention to Canada, for no other economy is so similarly structured to ours. Baird is a good friend of Australia, feels warmly towards the Gillard government, and speaks glowingly of his friendship with Kevin Rudd. He explicitly did not criticise Australian policy. But the implications of his words are deadly.

The fact that both Canada and the US have rejected a carbon tax or ETS, and that China, India and Indonesia equally will never go down such a road, means there is no prospect of global action on climate change anything like that which Australia is taking. Baird believes that neither Canada nor the US will ever implement a carbon tax or an ETS.

But it is his judgment on the international carbon trading system that is most devastating for the Gillard government’s approach. I asked Baird whether Canada would ever join an international carbon trade. He replied: “There’s nothing to join. Where is it going on today?”

More generally, on carbon trading he said: “One of the problems I have with that (approach) is that everyone just lines up to get credit. My province has a lot of trees, where do we get credit for that? We had an enhanced oil recovery project that pumps carbon into oil wells to get an additional 15 per cent of oil out of them and we had a pipeline importing carbon from the US. So they wanted to get credit for sequestration.

“I said to them ‘You’re not even doing it in our country.’ They said ‘We’re doing something good, we want the credits.’

“(Carbon trading) is like a pyramid marketing scheme. You don’t have to actually sell the dog food, you just have to get 10 of your friends to do it and you’ll get royalties.”

Baird says the Canadian government will reduce greenhouse gas emissions but it will do so through regulation. It is worth noting in passing that while Baird certainly made no comment on Australian politics, this is essentially the same as Tony Abbott’s “direct-action” approach, which all the government’s paid propagandists routinely mock.

Baird thinks his government’s approach is more effective and less costly than a carbon tax or ETS would be: “We’re bringing forward regulations to ban new dirty coal-fired electricity generating stations. The existing ones, when their life ends, they have to close. That will tangibly reduce greenhouse emissions. And you know what? We’re not going to pay people for closing down a coal-fired power plant that had a life span of 25 years but has operated for 40 years, because they were going to close it down anyway.”

Baird, who was twice Canada’s environment minister, is too polite to use these precise words but says, in effect, that the international politics of climate change trading is a giant scam.

He offers this example: “If we all decided we had to lose 6 per cent of our 1991 body weight to be healthy, and I told you last year I lost 100 pounds anyway, that wouldn’t be too credible as a commitment.”

By this he is referring to Europe’s use of 1991 as the base year for carbon calculations. Britain was switching from coal to gas. West Germany absorbed East Germany and then shut down East German industry. France ramped up nuclear power. None of these actions was taken for greenhouse gas abatement reasons but they all allowed Europe to claim outsize carbon credits.

Baird asks: “Where are the countries that are actually reducing greenhouse gas emissions from 1997 when they signed the Kyoto Protocol?”

Saran is an immensely distinguished Indian diplomat, who was head of the Indian Foreign Ministry before later serving as India’s envoy on climate change. In a recent interview he told me: “Emissions trading was never seen as a mechanism for reducing global emissions. It was seen as providing a little flexibility at the margins … How it is implemented is also important and has been subject to a lot of controversy. How do you judge what would have been business as usual and how do you judge what was actually avoided?”

There are many ways international emissions trading can fail to deliver as advertised.

The first is positive fraud, of which there has been a staggering amount in the European scheme. The second is paying people to do what they were going to do anyway. If you’re a Third World country and you’re planning to close down a dirty, coal-fired power station, you can pretend you weren’t going to do it unless you get your payment.

And the third way is the perversity of incentives that the scheme sets up. Europe has paid more than €2 billion ($2.6bn) to China to destroy a greenhouse gas that is produced as a by-product of manufacturing a refrigerant gas. But it turns out the Chinese chemical plants involved make much more money destroying the greenhouse gas than they make selling the refrigerant gas. So they actually produced the greenhouse gas only so that they could be paid to destroy it.

There are a million other ways the scheme can be rorted, perverse or ineffective, yet the Gillard government’s whole policy is predicated on us paying tens of billions of dollars for foreign carbon credits.

It’s not a prudent way to deal with money and it’s not going to be effective. In fact, really, it’s nuts.

[Rocky Rhodes]

We live in the age of stupid. Only an idiot would believe a carbon tax can fix the environment. The major pollutors just pass on the cost to us therefore it is business as usual for the big pollutors. There is no incentive for the pollutors to change their ways if ultimately they are not paying. This carbon tax will do little if anything to the environment. It's the biggest scam since evolution theories.

[Rocky Rhodes]

Chris, if Australia didn't want a carbon tax, they should have voted in a majority government. Instead they gave no one a clear majority so this is not a Gillard Labor government, it is a Gillard minority government with Greens and Independent crossbench support.

If Australia wanted Labor to deliver on their promises, as they were promised, they should have given Labor a majority. They didn't.

Ya gets what ya pays for.

The carbon tax wasn't even on the agenda. You are forgetting this was brought in on a massive lie. If the public knew they were voting on this carbon tax then the liberals would have romped in. 60% of Australians don't want this tax scam, you will find out this during the next election. People's like me won't be voting labor just based on this.

[Guest]

The carbon tax wasn't even on the agenda. You are forgetting this was brought in on a massive lie. If the public knew they were voting on this carbon tax then the liberals would have romped in. 60% of Australians don't want this tax scam, you will find out this during the next election. People's like me won't be voting labor just based on this.

yet you wish to vote in a party whose own climate change policy is not endorsed by anyone, thats no one. Treasury has estimated that it will cost nearly double to the taxpayer

In effect under Abbotts scheme we the taxpayers will pay polluters to pollute less.

You endorse this ???

Not one economist or climate scientist does.

[Kingbilly]

Rant all you want but to even consider the country is f**ked up shows you too are an ignorant fool

Round and round in circles you go Henry.
Oblivious to the rest of the world.

This country is ****ed and its not all Gillard, Swan, Rudd or even little Bobby Brown's fault.
Its not as ****ed as some countries, but if you think times are good and there is real inspiration to work hard for your family then well, round and round in circles you go Henry

[Kingbilly]

Not one economist or climate scientist does.

And they all suport your opinion, well the ones that count do (the ones that have a different opinion don't count do they Henry)

Round and round in circles you go, never really getting anywhere, proving nothing nor disproving nothing.

You better go off and find some more "facts" in the internet

[stephenj]

un many other older people i do not want to return to the unenlightened dark ages that Abbott so craves, that bloke is likely to have an inquisition too? i refuse to be brainwashed by the likes of hadley and anal jones, im not one of the 2gb set, i am very excited about the nbn, something that would never happen under a conservative government, just like trhe snowy mountain scheme and the harbour bridge!

[melon....]

un many other older people i do not want to return to the unenlightened dark ages that Abbott so craves, that bloke is likely to have an inquisition too? i refuse to be brainwashed by the likes of hadley and anal jones, im not one of the 2gb set, i am very excited about the nbn, something that would never happen under a conservative government, just like trhe snowy mountain scheme and the harbour bridge!

Have you blokes who have had your common sense sucked out of your eye sockets by the Labor Party who Abbott has as his top cabinet women? Look it up and youll be surprised. Both Women, one, Peta Credlin the Chief of Staff, most likely to be our first real Female PM, and commands fear and respect, is a great sort, well educated and an absolute star.

Look it up and youll see the Labor and their GetUp cheer squad have been pulling the wool over your eyes. Sure Abbott hates Women...he just hires strong intelligent ones to run his cabinet. He calls one The Boss.

The Darkest Days are upon us now....its never been worse and yet lets join GetUp and cheer Hooray!!!

[Guest]

And they all suport your opinion, well the ones that count do (the ones that have a different opinion don't count do they Henry)

Round and round in circles you go, never really getting anywhere, proving nothing nor disproving nothing.

You better go off and find some more "facts" in the internet

Do me a favour and name just one KB , name just one economist or climate scientist who agrees with the alternative Lib/Nat position.

Lord Monckton certainly hasnt !

[Guest]

Have you blokes who have had your common sense sucked out of your eye sockets by the Labor Party who Abbott has as his top cabinet women? Look it up and youll be surprised. Both Women, one, Peta Credlin the Chief of Staff, most likely to be our first real Female PM, and commands fear and respect, is a great sort, well educated and an absolute star.

Look it up and youll see the Labor and their GetUp cheer squad have been pulling the wool over your eyes. Sure Abbott hates Women...he just hires strong intelligent ones to run his cabinet. He calls one The Boss.

The Darkest Days are upon us now....its never been worse and yet lets join GetUp and cheer Hooray!!!

Compared to the rest of the world its never been better !

[Kingbilly]

Your missing the point circle boy, unlike your claim, they don't all agree with you.
Its not necessarily about who is right or wrong, its about being able to view the world without the blinkers you wear.

Its about opening your mind, not blindly following the labor party.

Anyway you aren't going to change and I am sick of watching you run around in circles, so that will do me for a while.

[Guest]

Your missing the point circle boy, unlike your claim, they don't all agree with you.
Its not necessarily about who is right or wrong, its about being able to view the world without the blinkers you wear.

Its about opening your mind, not blindly following the labor party.

Anyway you aren't going to change and I am sick of watching you run around in circles, so that will do me for a while.

No circles, a straight question and one that you and fellow conservatives on this website refuse to answer. Should the next election as Rocky Rhodes suggests 60% of the public vote against labour they will choose a new climate change policy that NO ONE endorses other than the mad monk himself. Even the opposition climate minister Greg Hunt wrote his thesis on the benefits of a market based trading scheme.

So answer the question which economist ,climate scientist or snake oil monger agrees that in comparison the Direct Action plan as proposed by Abbott is the best policy.

I agree not everyone agrees with my views, hey Im even sceptical whether they can administer it successfully but no one endorses the alternative . no one.

You cant can you ?

Hey I got one for you George Pell !