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228 Responses to “General Debate 25 November 2009”
A Maori walked into WINZ, marched straight up to the counter and said ‘Hi, I’m looking for a job’.
The man behind the counter replied ‘Your timing is amazing.We’ve just got one in from a very wealthy man who wants a chauffeur/bodyguard for his nymphomaniac twin daughters.
You’ll have to drive around in a big black Mercedes and wear the uniform provided.
The hours are a bit long but the meals are provided. You also have to escort the young ladies on their overseas holidays. The salary package is $200,000 a year’.
The Maori said ‘You’re bullshitting me!’
The man behind the counter said ‘Well you started it!’
Are win a state of something that resembles brown steamy stuff?
With the whole Hone racist behaviour and John Key pretty much ignoring it.
The Mowree party as whole just taking it lightly and basically accepting and agreeing with Hone’s disgusting comments
And now John Key pretty much letting this whole ETS scheme, which is BS through legislation….
John Key, I have been very accepting of the fact you have changed your mind set, have accepted this as the global economic situation has dictated things, but you my friend of late are loosing myself as a voter, and am sure a great many more National voters… I am merely a hard working Kiwi, whom came back from overseas, which cost me financially to basically just a very aesthetically pleasing country. Well my friend, a country needs far more these days than to just be aesthetically pleasing……
Start listening to the people, it was the people after all whom put you in power!
I don’t like being called a white mother fucker by a politician and a Prime Minister who does nothing about the depraved words from a shit stirring idiot.
I think those celebrating the CRU email release like it was a win in Lotto with Powerball are a bit premature. It is more like winning a Strike bonus line for next week.
Do we live in some parrallel universe…the CRU emails could possibly expose be one of the greatest frauds ever and our MSM are completely ignoring it? WTF?
So Phil Goff believes that the polluters should pay the cost under the ETS not the taxpayer…I won’t even bother to explain, as I’ve lost the will to live!
Pita Phill Goff has NO issue with the ammount of money we’re going to be hit up for, hes just bitching about who gets it first. By labeling our farm industry as “polluters” he’s shown he’s happy to just smear one sector that never votes for him in the hope it will make the others like him.
The reality is that if we want to eat we WILL get the bill. Does he really think that our farmers are sittting on 110 billion dollars? Costs get passed on to the consumer. Eating isn’t a luxury… unless you’re Kate Moss.
We’re getting the bill people, is your desire to feel rightous worth $92,000?
Does anyone else think that the release of alarming information about climate change and resource consumption has just cranked up a couple of notches and every statement has a comment embedded attributing it to carbon, greenhouse gases or manmade Global Warming. It seems liked Plan B has gone into gear. (or am I being a bit too charitable by thinking that this is all being manipulated somewhere?
In just the last 24 hours we have been told that the earth is now consuming 2.5 planets worth of resources to keep mankind alive and well, the East Antarctic Ice sheet is going to raise sea levels by about 5 metre and AGW is responsible for all the “extreme weather events” on the planet.
Is this a response to the challenge coming out of the emails from Anglia? A sort of “If you challenge my small lies I’ll trot out some REALLY REALLY big ones to frighten you and that’ll shut you up”?
and is this what we will see with bulk funding of legal aid, as Minister of Justice Power wants to bring in? Note as well that in the last 8 years the numbers of solicitors undertaking legal aid in Britain has almost halved.
Stuff yells: “Big rise in kids being raised on benefits”
which is naterally interpreted as an in increase, ie not a good thing.
Later in the story it says: It shows the number of children reliant on a benefit recipient has fallen since 2000 but is likely to rise in the near future
So what’s the truth? Perhaps stuff are playing the climate scientists ‘trick’ and using different period start/end dates to show a trend. Or perhaps they’re just being alarmist. Or both.
David, getstaffed, don’t you think it is more likely just Plan C(openhagen) – this was always likely to be to focal point for pro and anti information and propaganda. Expect more over the next couple of weeks.
Even George Monbiot, one of the fiercest media propagandists of the warming faith, admits he should have been more sceptical and says the science now needs to be rechecked:
“It’s no use pretending that this isn’t a major blow. The emails extracted by a hacker from the climatic research unit at the University of East Anglia could scarcely be more damaging. I am now convinced that they are genuine, and I’m dismayed and deeply shaken by them.
Yes, the messages were obtained illegally. Yes, all of us say things in emails that would be excruciating if made public. Yes, some of the comments have been taken out of context. But there are some messages that require no spin to make them look bad. There appears to be evidence here of attempts to prevent scientific data from being released, and even to destroy material that was subject to a freedom of information request.
Worse still, some of the emails suggest efforts to prevent the publication of work by climate sceptics, or to keep it out of a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. I believe that the head of the unit, Phil Jones, should now resign. Some of the data discussed in the emails should be re-analysed.”
Sure, Monbiot claims the fudging of what he extremely optimistically puts as just “three or four” scientists doesn’t knock over the whole global warming edifice, yet…
If even Monbiot, an extremist, can say that much, why cannot the Liberals say far more? And will now the legion of warmist journalists in our own media dare say as Monbiot has so belatedly:
I apologise. I was too trusting of some of those who provided the evidence I championed. I would have been a better journalist if I had investigated their claims more closely.
Do we live in some parrallel universe…the CRU emails could possibly expose be one of the greatest frauds ever and our MSM are completely ignoring it? WTF?
But, Pita, they are not ignoring it… they are actively running a counter programme of global warming related stories this week, for example the one last night about the disintegrating Antarctic ice shelf, complete with 12 year old reporter standing ankle-deep in Otago Harbour claiming that it will be up to her waist if we do not watch out!
“When a brigade of Greenpeace activists stormed a nuclear power plant on the shores of the North Sea a few years ago, scrawling “danger” on its reactor, Tindale was their commander. Then head of the group’s British office, he remembers, he stood outside the plant just east of London telling TV crews all the reasons “why nuclear power was evil.” ”
“It really is a question about the greater evil — nuclear waste or climate change,” Tindale said. “But there is no contest anymore. Climate change is the bigger threat, and nuclear is part of the answer.”
Climate change sceptics have seized on the combative, conspiratorial tone of some the correspondence as evidence of a plot among academics to mask the truth about global temperature changes.
But the scientific establishment remains united in the view that the documents reveal no smoking gun to manipulate data, and point out that the figures produced by the unit tally with two other major international studies.
Some of one group’s methods have been discredited a bit, but as with the vast majority of climate data their results are still are in line with other studies.
Oh look it’s big blouse in with another attack. Time will fix you girlyman. You are wrong again I am not angry nor a racist but that does not matter to a coward like you eh blouse. You are a disgrace to kiwi’s, how about that meeting? Haha yeah right. Have a good day backstabbing me just like yesterday and the day before that. What a fruit cake fill of venom.
You are scum big blouse. How about a meeting? Your opinion of me cannot be allowed to go unchecked as I am sick of your nasty rhetoric towards me. Fairs fair, say it to my face? Your beef is sickening.
@ dad4j and big bruv – can you guys take your beef outside and sort it out? This is the third day of name calling and counter-accusations, and frankly, it all gets a bit repetitive
Why don’t you go & tell that joke to Hone Harawira’s face? Might as well break the news you don’t like being called a white mofo. I’m sure you’ll both have a robust debate.
@ dad4j and big bruv – can you guys take your beef outside and sort it out? This is the third day of name calling and counter-accusations, and frankly, it all gets a bit repetitive
Aaah … I think I’ll be giving the GD a wide berth today.
But getstaffed – you must admit that D4J’s rants are just so nuts that there is some humour in them. These rants and tirades against our hell bent judiciary are all he ever offers. Let him vent a little more…
I don’t think so Andrei, I’m prepared to question both sides of the argument. It just happens that one side seems to keep saying they are completely right while the other side admits to a lot of uncertainties and possibilities/probabilities, which is more in line with scientific process. The evangelical naysayers only want to listen to their own sermons, they are more like ostriches.
Some of one group’s methods have been discredited a bit, but as with the vast majority of climate data their results are still are in line with other studies.
What other studies? That is a hollow talking point.
Understand this
The claims over the past few years have been
(1) the planet is undergoing unprecedented warming over the past century
(2) the consensus of scientists is that CO2 released by humans is the cause
This scandal cuts to the quick of both these claims because we now have proof the historical record has been fudged to make the past both cooler and more stable than it really was
and
the proof of the shutting out of scientists who tried to publish papers contradicting the first point.
Now a serious question why are the emissions of a dairy cow more harmful to the planet than those of a hippopotamus or a blue whale?
Many of you are rightly outraged at the racist comment of John Harawira, yet these same people are prepared to overlook D4J’s racist outburst and his call for a race war.
If you are one of these people then please take your faux outrage and shove it where the sun does not shine, you have no right at all to get all hot under he collar about Harawira when you let what D4J has to say slide.
“..It must have been about the time that Barack Obama was being born or toddling around that I got my first, alarming introduction to the white man’s idea of Africa.
As I remember it, I was sitting in my grandmother’s parlor, watching TV while she bustled about the kitchen.
The images are fractured now: beating drums, a blood oath, white people sleeping in an isolated farmhouse and large, gleaming African men on a rampage with machetes, closing in, in high-contrast black and white; letters scrawled across the screen in a classic scare font, “Mau Mau!”
Maybe this was 1959, when British colonial forces in Kenya finally crushed the seven-year peasant revolt through a counterinsurgency campaign of murder, mutilation, torture, concentration camps and mass public hangings.
Or maybe it was 1963, when the Africans of Kenya secured their independence.
And maybe a television programmer somewhere thought that the 1955 grind-house shockumentary Mau-Mau, narrated by a proper newsman, Chet Huntley, was good enough to excerpt in a proper news broadcast years later ..
.. or even to run as entertainment on a slow afternoon, censoring out the naked black women and half-naked white women on the edge of ravishment ..
.. the filmmakers’ whole reason for calculating they could make money off such a flick in the first place.
These shards of memory came to mind when I saw the image of Obama as Witch Doctor, which Dr. David McKalip, a right-wing Florida neurosurgeon, forwarded to a listserv of tea-party zealots a few months ago.
Liberal bloggers who had made a cottage industry out of caricaturing George W. Bush were predictably appalled ..
.. but the unknown graphic artist and McKalip did the country a perverse favor.
More than all the words on the subject spilled so far, this lone image banishes the nonsense of postracial America ..
.. and reminds us of the sturdy foundation blocks upon which racial America in the modern period has rested:..
.. white supremacy/anxiety, anticommunism and sex.
The image is a pastiche.
Obama’s head is grafted onto a picture of a man wearing nothing but bead necklaces and a loincloth, his legs spread wide, his long, thick fingers grasping a stick in front of him.
There’s a bone through his nose and a confection of feathers and flowers on his head.
The picture evokes the world of National Geographic that once gave children a guiltless excuse to indulge their curiosity in the flesh.
Under the witch doctor picture is the slogan “Obama Care,” with the red, white and blue campaign symbol serving as the O and a sickle and hammer as the C.
The statement McKalip and his cohort were making is thus a political pastiche as well: ..
.. Obama is foreign, strange, not “natural born”; half-naked, he is a figure of danger, seductive perhaps for his exoticism, his magic–the promise of cures–but ultimately loathsome ..
.. at once clownish, somehow thrilling to confront but also frightening ..
.. certainly not someone a white man would want to leave alone with his daughter…
.. and a communist to boot.
It’s demented, but not in the way commonly suggested when liberals laugh off the birthers, their fellow travelers in Congress and those now trying to breathe life into the rattling bones of anticommunism as “crazies.”
What seems to be a hodgepodge of interests is all of a piece, following a familiar logic ..
.. welded to sex; ..
.. its mouthpieces merely had to come up with a diverting language..”
phil(whoar.co.nz)
that makes it easier for us to ‘understand’ them..eh..?
even to feel some sympathy/sorrow for them..?
(poor luvvies..!
nightmares about rampaging black men..and all that
BB, while what you call the “race war” comment yesterday was over the line, I think most people are prepared to accept that there is a place for race based humour, I’d laugh at a good joke that targeted pakeha stereotypes.
big bruv – dad4j’s outburst the other night was indeed racist, and you called him on it – quite rightly IMHO. You’ve now both made your positions clear – you think dad4j is a “racist idiot”, and he wants to deal to you. I doubt that either of you is going to back down, so can’t you just agree to disagree?
Articles like that wsay more about the writer than about the people they are trying to comment on. I think it is called projection, or something like that.
If Honi was merely a commentator on a blog, I’d call him on his racism the one time and then leave it at that.
As it is, Honi is an MP, and one with quite a significant public profile and followers, and there is a cold-blooded rationality to what he says – at least in it’s intended purpose. People who support and oppose his words take them seriously: his words simply carry more weight than those of D4J.
And there’s always RIP, which is why I’ve not had to follow this thread within a thread.
Now a serious question why are the emissions of a dairy cow more harmful to the planet than those of a hippopotamus or a blue whale?
I have never considered that before. Apart from the fact that we breed and farm a lot more cows (on land cleared of forest) than we do the hippopotamus or a blue whale. And hippopotamus and blue whale numbers have reduced substantially. Maybe they are a part of natures balance. Maybe they don’t fart as much methane. Maybe some of their emissions are sequestered by the water they are in.
I’m actually uncertain about the cow problem, don’t know enough about it. I would have thought that grass growing balances cow farting but I have heard that the conversion to methane, which is worse as a greenhouse gas than CO2, is a major reason.
Maybe possums are worse than blue whales and we should increase the 1080 drops. But that will reduce bovine TB so more cows will survive, maybe it’s not such a good idea.
Pete George – I believe that the buffalo hunters in 19th C America were actually enlightened environmentalists. Imagine how bad the planet would have been if there were another 70 million buffalo farting.
Pete,
Perhaps we should declare cows to be a pest, legislate some protection against their eradication and then merrily exclude them from the ETS. Shame also that sheep numbers hit a record low about the same time as the emissions baseline was drawn.
The real nonsense is that for some reason a Brahman bull in India is different from a Bison Bison in North America is different from a Holstein Friesan in New Zealand is different from a gnu in Africa is different from a Holstein Friesan in Holland is different from ……..
I wouldn’t use the RIP thingy, it sounds like a system people can use to insulate themselves not just from dross comments, but also from opinions and facts that don’t suit them.
Andrew – given the commentary over the last couple of days I think you’ll find it’s being primarily targeted at philu, mainly because he uses so much screen space to say so very little, and say it nastily.
I have never considered that before. Apart from the fact that we breed and farm a lot more cows (on land cleared of forest) than we do the hippopotamus or a blue whale. And hippopotamus and blue whale numbers have reduced substantially. Maybe they are a part of natures balance. Maybe they don’t fart as much methane. Maybe some of their emissions are sequestered by the water they are in.
(1) Did you know Pete that there is more forest in both Europe and North America today than there was is 1900 – do you realize that this is a function of the wealth that technology and the use of fossil fuels brings and that deforestation is something that occurs in poor societies.
I’m actually uncertain about the cow problem, don’t know enough about it. I would have thought that grass growing balances cow farting but I have heard that the conversion to methane, which is worse as a greenhouse gas than CO2, is a major reason.
(2) Did you know that the original name for methane was marsh gas because of the volumes emitted by swamps – enough at times to spontaneously combust giving rise to the will o’ the wisp. It is almost certain that New Zealand’s wetlands emit far more methane (by many orders of magnitude) than New Zealand’s dairy herds. I cannot quantify this because of course nobody is interested in giving me or anybody else grant money to try and quantify natural methane emitters.
On the other hand grant money has been given to try and quantify that emitted from dairy herds.
Why do you suppose that is?
If methane is truly the environmental threat the screechers say it is it matters not one wit whether is comes from a swamp or the arse of a dairy cow to the planet.
Couldn’t we reduce atmospheric methane by draining wetlands? Yes we could.
Do you get a sense of how utterly stupid this whole thing ETS thing is?
Since poor old Cha is still heavily into mockery of right-wingers – Sarah Palin in particular – I’m sure that the following will be appreciated.
It seems that somebody at the wonderfully progressive magazine Slate, posted up an excerpt from Palin’s book on their reader forum, The Fray:
“The apartment was small, with slanting floors and irregular heat and a buzzer downstairs that didn’t work, so that visitors had to call ahead from a pay phone at the corner gas station, where a black Doberman the size of a wolf paced through the night in vigilant patrol, its jaws clamped around an empty beer bottle.”
As Cha would say, the responses are Comedy Gold. Some choice bits:
Wow! That wouldn’t make it through freshman English class, and I mean high school, not college. What’s the sentence about anyway? The apartment? The gas station? The Doberman? How about sticking with one complete thought before going on to three more? Just goes to show that some people should stick with politics and give up any presumptions of being a writer.
…….
“That sentence by Sarah Palin could be entered into the annual Bulwer-Lytton bad writing contest. It could have a chance at winning a (sic) honorable mention, at any rate.
…….
That’s great, all it needed was the lead-in “It was a dark and stormy night.” Great stuff!
You get the picture -abusive, disdainful, sneering, mocking, “Cha-rish”
The whole thing rather comes to a grinding halt when it is revealed that the sentence actually comes from the first paragraph of Dreams From My Father, by Barack Obama.
Well, actually it does not come to a halt – they actually keep going!!!
Truly – parody and satire are redundant nowadays.
Re: wild animals versus cows. The answer is simply that because nobody knows how to calculate to GHG emissions of wild animals, they’re not counted. That means say, the increasing number of white-deer in the US as a consequence of less predation (not enough wolves/big cats) is not counted towards global emissions.
Methane is a curious GHG because its effect is more intense than CO2, but it does not persist in the atmosphere for very long. Ruminants tend to produce more methane than other animals btw. (I just have to find me a cheap source of crocodile meat in NZ).
Re: the RIP thingy. I try to read everybody’s contributions when I can, and occasionally post responses to a wide cross-section of posters. I think it is important to realise that a lot more people read KB than comment on it. (These viewpoints are more varied than might be divined by just reading what’s on the surface). The exception is one frequent poster whose posts I tend not to read, and RIP appears to be a good tool in just side-stepping that problem. I believe that most people using RIP are very selective as to who they ignore, hence are not using it as a general filter of unpalatable facts and opinions.
1) Did you know Pete that there is more forest in both Europe and North America today than there was is 1900
(2) Did you know that the original name for methane was marsh gas because of the volumes emitted by swamps – enough at times to spontaneously combust giving rise to the will o’ the wisp. It is almost certain that New Zealand’s wetlands emit far more methane (by many orders of magnitude) than New Zealand’s dairy herds.
Interesting – can we have some sources for that please?
On the other hand grant money has been given to try and quantify that emitted from dairy herds.
Couldn’t we reduce atmospheric methane by draining wetlands? Yes we could.
And yes we do. I’d quite like to see some figures for how much wetland remains & how much methane it produces compared to dairying.
I thought the consensus was Nicky Hager was a scum sucking bottom dweller for using hacked emails from Don Brash?
But now it’s all o.k. to do so if it gives ammo to fight AGM.
Using hacked emails (maybe out of context) is wrong IMHO and is a slipper slope on which to mount an argument.
Or do we have no standards anymore?
Is the paradigm set by the loony left now acceptable to the mainstream?
Methane (CH4) is emitted from a variety of both human-related (anthropogenic) and natural sources. Human-related activities include fossil fuel production, animal husbandry (enteric fermentation in livestock and manure management), rice cultivation, biomass burning, and waste management. These activities release significant quantities of methane to the atmosphere. It is estimated that more than 60 percent of global methane emissions are related to human-related activities. Natural sources of methane include wetlands, gas hydrates, permafrost, termites, oceans, freshwater bodies, non-wetland soils, and other sources such as wildfires.
“..An 11th hour revolt within the Maori Party is threatening to torpedo the Emissions Trading Scheme deal with the Key Government.
Even if the revolt does not succeed – Environment Minister Nick Smith is hoping to secure passage of the bill this afternoon -
- the damage to the relationship between the Maori Party and the Government could be irreparable.
The Maori Party’s national council, 26 senior representatives that make up the party’s ruling body, will hold an urgent telephone conference this afternoon or evening.
Some of them, though it is unclear whether it is a majority, want the party’s MPs to scuttle the deal with the Government.
The Parliamentary caucus had not consulted some members of the party’s ruling body.
“Even though there is a signed deal on the table between the Maori Party and National, the third and final vote is yet to be taken,” a senior party source said..
“The Maori Party membership are becoming increasingly aware of the huge debt that our people are going to have to pay ..
.. despite all the window dressing going on by the leadership about deals struck with Iwi..
.. and the $4 per week being saved with cheaper petrol and electricity prices for two years.
“That figure fails in comparison with a 40 year debt of anything between $110 and $220 billion.
“Many Maori Party supporters are threatening to leave the party ..
.. as the real issues behind this legislation are becoming known by the wider public.
“Our people are gutted that their opinion has not even been sought by the caucus, let alone listened to.
“This legislation could spell the end of the Party -
- the caucus have two days to regain the support of members.”
But the Government is hoping the third reading speech – the final step before a bill is put to a final vote -
- will happen in the House of Representatives this afternoon.”
(there would seem to be hope this tawdry deal will be scuttled..)
dad4j there is often a price to pay for idiotic racism, one idiot in Christchurch of middle age thought it was good form to call my wife a nigger lover after I had left her outside the shops.
He was bloody lucky it was my younger lad who grabbed him by the throat giving my wife time to intercede and who my younger lad will still listen to.
If it had been me or my older lad he would have had the shit beaten out of him for good reason
The Wegman Report highlights a group of 42 scientists (including all the main players at CRU) who “peer reviewed” each others work, collaborated on various projects and looked after each others backs. I’m fairly sure all of the have been “lead authors” for IPCC reports.
This is not 4 or 5 scientists who have had a bad light cast on them. Those 42 must have their claims investigated. Anyone who worked with those 42 needs to have their claims investigated. Do you see how big this could be? All their data must be investigated. The methodologies they used need to be held up to independent peer review?
It’s becoming obvious that CRU’s master data set was a complete mess and that when they tried to recreate stuff they had done in the past and couldn’t make it work they made stuff up or ‘massaged’ other data to get the same result.
These people need to be subjected to a rigorous investigation into their methods and data now.
————————————————————————————————————–
India has around 283,000,000 cows – how many in NZ?
Oh dear, oh dear, should the US go back to having education tests for voting ? look at this video and decide.
Liberals, clear a space, you may hurt yourself while rolling on the floor with laughter.
Respiration and decomposition produce CO2 as a natural event.
Generally though,these physiological processes won’t generate emissions in the same order of magnitude as modern lifestyles.
The emissions problem is that rather a lot of ‘carbon’ has been stored as fossil fuels (coal, oil, natural gas) and a lot has been stored as forests. We have a giant atmospheric experiment running whereby lots of that stored carbon has been abruptly released into the atmosphere. This is going to cause CO2 levels to overshoot historical levels. Despite the fact that I do not agree with Al Gore or Greenpeace, I can’t see that we can assume that this overshoot will be a good thing.
In comparison, farming isn’t a process whereby stored carbon is released. It’s a cycle where GHG are released and reabsorbed back into the same system. This isn’t a matter of science or the like, this is a policy issue. Should burning fossil fuels be treated the same way as grazing cows? Why are we treating current carbon-cycles as the same ‘problem’ as releasing stored carbon?
“The question needs to be asked, do we want to be remembered as a party that gave future generations a horrendous debt, or do we want to be known as a party that took a principled stand against a terrible scheme?” the party source said.
It’s wrong of me, but I can’t help taking a certain amount of enjoyment out of watching this fiasco..
(next on the agenda: will Big Bruv and cohorts stand up in support of the Maori Party?)
Repton – If someone you detest saves you from being flattened by a bus would you complain? As much as I detest the racial-based policies of the Maori party, if they do something right and halt the ETS then I’ll be 1st in line to offer my thanks.
Family First is calling for higher standards concerning violent and sexual content in the media, as a first step towards tackling family violence.
However, Family First says the anti-violence message contained in campaigns such as “It’s not OK” is being undermined by violence in the media, a lax approach to pornography and the sexualisation of children in marketing which are normalising unacceptable behaviour.
Director Bob McCoskrie says the use of violence against women as the punch line in comedies such as Family Guy and American Dad also trivialises the seriousness of the issue.
But it is a public attitude as much as anything.
It’s White Ribbon Day, which is aiming to raise awareness of men’s violence against women. Worth supporting.
I don’t ever watch Family Guy, don’t like it. I doubt I would have laughed at family violence. I don’t see it as a joking matter. Too many people end up crying. If they survive.
@ Chthonniid “In comparison, farming isn’t a process whereby stored carbon is released. It’s a cycle where GHG are released and reabsorbed back into the same system. This isn’t a matter of science or the like, this is a policy issue. Should burning fossil fuels be treated the same way as grazing cows? Why are we treating current carbon-cycles as the same ‘problem’ as releasing stored carbon?”
I asked the same question. I’m told that, although in carbon terms its clearly a closed loop (grass absorbs CO2, cows eat grass and emit), the “problem” is the cow emissions are really bad “greenhouse gases”, methane benig 7x (or some number) worse than CO2.
Of course NZ accounts for something like 3% of global dairy production (and declining) and none of the major producers (India, China, US) are signatories to Kyoto but that shouldnt stop us bulleting our dairy industry.
If you are truly interested in what these guys were doing and the integrity of the information we were using to not only pass our own ETS, but also that which has been used to justify Kyoto and Hoaxenhagen (yup, I haven’t called it a hoax before but this file just shows fraud on an unbelievable scale). HARRY_READ_ME is going to become the most famous computer file of all time.
Ignoramus question here
Methane is a complex molecule with high energy bonds right?
Therefore won’t it happily break up under UV bombardment?
If it didn’t wouldn’t there be ridiculously high levels of the stuff in our atmosphere from millennia of natural build up from farting dinosaurs and such… just waiting for one almighty boom?
Just to put this racism accusation against me in perspective. I have a father from Zimbabwe staying with me and he expressed outrage that a politician in New Zealand would use the WMF smear, because he said he would expect to hear that from his President back in his sad homeland.
CH4 has an estimated 58x the ‘warming potential’ of CO2 but an atmospheric life of 10 years, not 120.
Fwiw, N20 is even worse with estimates of warming factor (206x CO2) and atmospheric life of 150.
But I’m not an atmospheric scientist so don’t hold me to the figures
I think the methane issue becomes a problem because we are only looking at the end-point of this cycle. If we are looking at the whole chain- where the source is, what its used for, where it ends up, then it’s not so clear. I haven’t been convinced that burning fossil fuels is the equivalent problem of pastoral farming.
What is it with lefty dropkicks and cow farts. Can some climate change religious zealot please explain to a simple dairy farmer why a cow in NZ must be taxed but a cow in the US or India is not counted as producing gas emissions that contribute to climate change. It is said that over 50% of our emissions come from agriculture and so we must be made to pay. 28% of the US greenhouse gases come from agriculture but these are deemed irrelevant. If cow farts don’t count in any other country in the world then why should they count here. I believe we have been sold out by our self serving governments, both the stinking socialists and the National socialists, because it’s the only way they could steal real money when all other avenues of revenue generation were drying up. I have lost any faith I once had in NZ politicians , they are wankers of the highest order.
PhilU I pray the shit hits the fan and the National traitors get dealt to.
The European Dairy Management Committee last week decided to reduce the level of export subsidy refunds on butter and butter oil to zero. This means that export refunds for all dairy products are now set at zero.
The IPCC have released today report The Copenhagen Diagnosis. The report is a summary of the science, the projections and the recommended actions to avoid the worst case scenarios, all of which are already in the public domain.
Real Climate have kindly summarised the main points and provided a discussion forum. Real Climate do not claim independence as three of their members took part in writing the report.
It would be great to see Kiwiblog posters actually engage with the scientists involved with the report and openly express any scientific disagreement with the science presented in the report.
It’s a one stop shop for all with concerns who can string together sentences with valid science, but without ad hominem rants, and enter into genuine debate with specialists.
It would also be great if DPF started a separate thread on this report. Posters who communicated with Real Climate could post the interaction in this thread to save us sifting through what will undoubtedly become a huge forum.
I would suggest it’s a good opportunity for real names only to be used. And it’s a good opportunity for DPF to change the tone of the debate, at least on this site.
I have a serious problem with agricultural emissions being a threat, I really do.
I can see that burning lots of coal is bad as I have seen the appalling results of acid rain and pollution it causes.
Enormously powerful private cars are pumping out huge amounts of crap into the air we breathe from non renewable energy sources, especially around urban centres.. and it sucks.
But cows and sheep.. seriously, this is a joke right? The methane from each animal must be a small % of the gas emitted or it would kill them. Haven’t noticed any spontaneously combusting balls of fire running around the paddocks recently.
I suspect this is a ploy by the really really really big polluters to take the heat off themselves. New Zealand, now that’s a bloody easy target… oh look everyone, it’s them, it’s their fault. Evil wicked kiwis, how dare you ruin our atmosphere… bastards.
Gases released into the atmosphere either get reabsorbed back or broken up. It takes time. Hence, we like to describe things as cycles.
The theory is by digging up and drilling for lots of stored carbon, and by suddenly deciding that tropical rainforests look better flattened, we’ve released billions of carbon (and related gases) into the atmosphere. Hence, the cycle is being abruptly ‘front-loaded’ with the new emissions. So, while we wait for this stuff to be reabsorbed back into sinks and forests, we will ‘overshoot’ historical atmospheric conditions. Nobody is exactly sure what the overshoot will mean, but its enough to make a lot of people nervous.
Can some climate change religious zealot please explain to a simple dairy farmer why a cow in NZ must be taxed but a cow in the US or India is not counted as producing gas emissions that contribute to climate change.
In a “climate change religious zealot’s” ideal world, the US and India would be signatories to Kyoto (or something similar). In that world, cows anywhere would be the same, and it would be up to the countries to decide how to manage it. e.g. the US could decide not to include dairy farms in its ETS, which would mean the US Government would have to buy carbon credits on the international market to cover the shortfall (either that, or make bigger cuts elsewhere to balance it out).
@Luc: DPF won’t read that, so if you want him to do anything, you need to send him an email.
During his last years, the late Aaron Wildavsky, then Dean of the School of Public Policy at UC Berkeley, became more and more interested in the role of group ‘culture’ in shaping social behaviour. One of his observations was that the more the individual is incorporated into bonded unit, the more individual choice is subject to group determination.
Aaron was generally regarded as ‘the father of Public Policy’ and in this group of books and papers he was challenging the ‘rational man’ model of decision-making. He was not denying the importance of reason and scientific method, but was emphasising that human behaviour is also modified by strongly held beliefs and traditions, and in particular, by group loyalties.
I suspect if Aaron was still alive he would be setting a bunch of his graduate students onto this episode of the leaked Climate Research Unit emails as a textbook example of how a ‘culture of group belief’ can impact on the behaviour of the supposedly rational and impartial people who are presumed to occupy the scientific community.
These emails may be an early demonstration of one of the downsides of the internet, and of email in particular.
The rapid and prolific communication enabled by email certainly promotes the free and widespread sharing of information and knowhow.
But the same ease of communication may well promote the development of inward-looking and intolerant tribal culture which can seriously undermine the established disciplines and traditions of the scientific method.
Scientists have always been passionate about their theories. Dawkins, Teller, Feynman, Pinker, Gould and Gliek are hardly famous for their lack of commitment to their beleifs.
But prior to the internet such scientists have tended to be passionate individuals working at their desks within their own studies, and sharing their ideas with suitably sceptical colleagues and graduate students.
Fifteen years ago I presented a paper to the Quest organisation’s 1995 AGM in Florida, on how the internet would promote Tribal Marketing.
The release of the CRU emails suggests suggest that sadly the internet has promoted the development of Tribal Science.
Certainly the key players, as revealed in this collection of leaked emails, have been behaving like members of a fervent and passionate tribe – defending their territory, shaping evidence to support their beliefs and waging war on outsiders.
Wildavsky would be the first to point out that there is no need to call on conspiracy theory, or financial incentives, to explain this tribal behaviour; just the power of the culture of the group.
The CRU team and their internet colleagues had taken on the intolerant behaviour and inemperate language of the fervent tribes that build up around extremist blogs on the Internet.
@Chthoniid
I accept what you are saying but (with less tongue in cheek this time from me) but this looks like a slick half arsed ’smoke screen’ to reduce the culpability of the non- renewable carbon emitters, this is universally the big boys who have the power to blame us while adjusting their own halo, and we have to eat it or lose our trade status. Misdirection and bullying.
We have 70% renewable power, this is however meaningless in the grand scheme.
“I would suggest it’s a good opportunity for real names only to be used”, yeah I bet you would. My real name is Bob Smith, don’t believe me, prove otherwise. Won’t work. “And it’s a good opportunity for DPF to change the tone of the debate”, why, and who sets the “tone”, you Luc. No thanks, you are the one that is not happy with the “tone”. Why don’t you preach over at the sub standard, they would probably give you cult status over there given you unblinking belief in AGW, preaching to the converted, much more satisfying.
Chicken Little – “India has around 283,000,000 cows – how many in NZ?”
The world cattle population is estimated to be about 1.3 billion head. India is the nation with the largest number of cattle, about 281,700,000 or 28.29% of the world cattle population. The United States has 96,669,000 cattle, 34.32% of India’s total, 9.71% of world cattle population. New Zealand is included among “other countries”: 49,756,000 5.00%. [New Zealand's entire emissions - everything - is 2% of the world total]
This was in relation to India calling on the West to stop eating meat and therefore eliminate cattle farming and the gases and water wastage in that, while their sacred cows [three times the number of those in the USA] probably live longer and may be, I guess then cremated, instead of barbequed.
Such are GW arguements . . .
Real Climate have kindly summarised the main points and provided a discussion forum. Real Climate do not claim independence as three of their members took part in writing the report.
As for their lack of independence, you forgot to mention that Mike Mann (the hockey-stick fraud man) is donkey deep in all this, yet considers RealClimate his/their own, managed voice:
Mike: “Anyway, I wanted you guys to know that you’re free to use RC [RealClimate] in any way you think would be helpful. Gavin and I are going to be careful about what comments we screen through, and we’ll be very careful to answer any questions that come up to any extent we can. On the other hand, you might want to visit the thread and post replies yourself. We can hold comments up in the queue and contact you about whether or not you think they should be screened through or not, and if so, any comments you’d like us to include.”
So anyone who takes RealClimate to be a source of balanced views is only slightly more stuipd than anyone who suggests it.
The link pertains more to the media coverage of scientific issues than how the debates proceed inside the scientific community – but I think it provides a valuable insight into how society is dealing (or not) with AGW.
The article deals with the subject of how a mistaken ‘consensus’ can be arrived at and explains how this is quite a common phenomenon that social scientists call ‘cascade theory’.
But the thrust of the article is the real-life example of how such a cascade occurred over a period of 30 years with the whole issue of diet, fat and heart disease.
We like to think that people improve their judgment by putting their minds together, and sometimes they do. The studio audience at “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” usually votes for the right answer. But suppose, instead of the audience members voting silently in unison, they voted out loud one after another. And suppose the first person gets it wrong.
If the second person isn’t sure of the answer, he’s liable to go along with the first person’s guess. By then, even if the third person suspects another answer is right, she’s more liable to go along just because she assumes the first two together know more than she does. Thus begins an “informational cascade” as one person after another assumes that the rest can’t all be wrong.
Because of this effect, groups are surprisingly prone to reach mistaken conclusions even when most of the people started out knowing better, according to the economists Sushil Bikhchandani, David Hirshleifer and Ivo Welch. If, say, 60 percent of a group’s members have been given information pointing them to the right answer (while the rest have information pointing to the wrong answer), there is still about a one-in-three chance that the group will cascade to a mistaken consensus.
Cascades are especially common in medicine as doctors take their cues from others, leading them to overdiagnose some faddish ailments (called bandwagon diseases) and overprescribe certain treatments (like the tonsillectomies once popular for children). Unable to keep up with the volume of research, doctors look for guidance from an expert — or at least someone who sounds confident.
But I don’t think we’re seeing anything quite as accidental in the case of the CRU.
getstaffed, this attack on me using my actual name is just a projection of your own insecurities and obsessional tendencies. It’s not my fault that your sleuthing talents are so abysmal that you can’t overcome an unlisted telephone number.
Why don’t you hire a PI and find me, if you are that interested? Or save yourself some money and just send me an email (via my blog) with your number and I’ll call you.
@getstaffed 12.41pm posted an extract from an email:
Mike: “Anyway, I wanted you guys to know that you’re free to use RC [RealClimate] in any way you think would be helpful. Gavin and I are going to be careful about what comments we screen through, and we’ll be very careful to answer any questions that come up to any extent we can. On the other hand, you might want to visit the thread and post replies yourself. We can hold comments up in the queue and contact you about whether or not you think they should be screened through or not, and if so, any comments you’d like us to include.”
Real Climate were challenged on this email in their forum and explain:
[Response: This is a moderated site, and always has been. We do screen out a lot of the random squawk of the blogosphere and the baseless accusations of malfeasance that are commonplace on open forums. We do that unapologetically in order to maximise the signal-to-noise ratio in threads. When there are technical issues that we aren't qualified to judge, we often ask people more involved to comment - and these comments appear inline with the questions so that the answers are not lost and are provided at the same time as the question appears. This leaves a record for later readers that is much easier to follow. We don't screen out comments just because they disagree with us (as is evident in any comment thread). - gavin]
The story i hear about people that own houses from trading in it with its false value created from the law against piss me of.
Not only that, half the people i know should also be in jail for life had the cops been as efficiant as we aim for them to be, because they would of all been arrested hundreds and thousands of times.
Quite apart from the validity of GW, why is Key and Smith pushing through the current ETS? Is it just to have something to replace Labour’s effort before the start of the year, or is there some other obligation or motive?
Luc, not the slightest bit interested in finding you. We both post anonymously and that’s our right and choice. I just think it’s a bit hypocritical for someone who posts using a pseudonym to call others on it. That’s all. I’m sorry you feel attacked. Perhaps you should get some help?
I’ve just been to a lunchtime concert for White Ribbon Day, wanted to show support for those against violence towards women. There weren’t a lot of people there, but Maori influence was strong – there are people who want to make a difference and encourage changes.
Most people seem to prefer to grizzle about lowering standards of morality, grizzle about increasing levels of violent crime, but don’t think of what might help improve both apart from saying it is someone else’s problem.
Yvette- I think that the motivations are to duck the price increases that would otherwise occur in early 2010, and also so that they can go to Copenhagen and play the good global citizen card. If Rudd can’t even get a watered-down scheme in Australia, there should be some political capital heading into the next election from Key playing the we tried harder than most gambit.
What I really want to know, is that if Copenhagen turns to custard, whether the ETS will continue or whether something else will be adopted.
Most people seem to prefer to grizzle about lowering standards of morality, grizzle about increasing levels of violent crime, but don’t think of what might help improve both apart from saying it is someone else’s problem.
Does anyone here support the White Ribbon cause?
Because if we don’t wear the right ribbon and pay all the right people and tell everyone about it we don’t really care Pete?
‘Does anyone here support the White Ribbon cause?’
No I bloody do not!
Violence of any sort is almost always unacceptable, however this is not what ‘white ribbon day’ is all about.
White ribbon day is another in the long line of subtle reminders that having a penis is a crime in this country.
No mention is made of wimin on man violence, no mention is made of the high rate of verbal and psychological abuse many men cop from their partners, the real message is “it is wrong to be a man”
Perhaps the solutions could be to provide all the farmers with unlimited weed to smoke there brains out with then they couldn’t even be fucked growing there gas makers and we wouldnt have to pay all these bs taxs.
Most people seem to prefer to grizzle about lowering standards of morality, grizzle about increasing levels of violent crime, but don’t think of what might help improve both apart from saying it is someone else’s problem.
And most people make sweeping generalisations. FFS Pete, how do you know what any of us ‘do’ about anything other than post comments here?
Good on you for attending though. I have donated to this in the past, support a trust that helps with zero-interest loans to struggling solo parents, am a trustee of two other community-focused chaitable trusts and help pay living expenses for a youth worker who works with ‘at risk’ kids in years 7-8
I don’t support it either, nor the “Women reclaim the night” marches. Why should I be made to feel guilty or apologise for actions that I would never countenance doing myself?
In the meantime the perpetrators of this violence don’t give a fuck about your ribbon and probably aren’t even aware of the day (or much else).
And, to cap it all off, these women will still withdraw any charges, go back to the guy, and say he’s just a big teddy bear and/or a rough diamond.
EDIT to add: It’s not like these guys don’t have “THUG” written all over them in the first place (probably literally). No sympathy at all.
That sounds like a cop out bb. The message from men running the show I’ve just been to were saying it’s a shit thing for men to be violent. They weren’t saying “poor us, we won’t do anything about it until everyone stops picking on us”.
Would it be too radical for men to lead by example?
And most people make sweeping generalisations. FFS Pete, how do you know what any of us ‘do’ about anything other than post comments here?
Based on the fact that there is a lot of grizzling here about declining standards (and some poor standards demonstrated on posts), and little support for trying to make a difference.
It’s a hard thing to do to stand up against what is blighting our society. It’s a lot easier to just keep on bashing (literally and figuratively).
Leave it out then, getstaffed. Again, it’s not my fault that you don’t have the balls to use your real name. Now stop being childish.
Can’t resist can you? Caught red handed and you squirm. Look Luc, it’s about choice to comment anonymously (which we both have) and hypocrisy about that choice (which you’ve unapologetically demonstrated). Like I said, if you feel attacked then get some help. Or apologise. Or both.
Thieves have hacked into payment machines at the Downtown carpark in central Auckland and stolen the credit-card details of thousands of people.
The matter came to light after banking systems pinpointed the council-owned carpark as a common point of purchase on fraudulent card transactions.
It is unclear whether the thieves attached a skimming device to the payment machines or accessed the devices’ credit-card database internally, in which case those responsible could be overseas.
These new trains had better be cost effective too.
Oh, and I still hate James Coe, the tosser, and his shit lefty blog.
Though i do look forward to the day when there is an effective and viable transport solution that connects Wellington and the Horowhenua. I look forward to the day that we have decent trains and infrastructure, i look forward to the day we have a shiny new expressway, I look forward to the day we have a viable commercial airport on the Kapiti Coast, and i look forward to the day that the area starts to thrive as a direct result.
I also am positively dribbling at the thought of 2010 local body elections and the resulting size 13 that is going to be inserted up the KCDC’s collective asses as a result.
@getstaffed I think this is called cyberstalking. Let’s get back on topic(s).
Menace, my attitude to cannabis is legalise and tax, just as with alcohol, tobacco etc. With a baby daughter, I’m more concerned about these so-called party pills and drinks with excessive sugar and caffeine.
Pete, white ribbon is great, but the fact is that affliction has largely worked its way through our society except for certain groups and these groups are the ones that require extra attention-elsewhere labeled “closing the gaps” or “affirmative action”.
Hurf, who’s James Coe and is there any left blogs you <b.don't hate? Just asking.
And, to cap it all off, these women will still withdraw any charges, go back to the guy, and say he’s just a big teddy bear and/or a rough diamond.
EDIT to add: It’s not like these guys don’t have “THUG” written all over them in the first place (probably literally). No sympathy at all.
Quite true. Talk to any cop. Almost all their domestic violence calls are within certain demographics based around race, income and education. But we are continually fed the ‘it happens everywhere’ line. I have seen heaps of women in Naenae and Taita (the area I live) with black eyes, but fuck all, if any, in Eastbourne or Woburn.
I asked the cop who was handing out white ribbons at Wellington railway station this morning if he was serious. I said he should be at Hillary Court handing them out and he shrugged – not his job to allocate Police resources.
Dzmn, I think my post collided with senzafine’s and disappeared! Never mind. Try again.
@getstaffed, I think your behaviour is called cyberstalking. Let’s get back on topic. Maybe do yourself a favour and RIP me
menace, my attitude to cannabis is to legalise and tax. Britain’s top government scientific advisor was sacked recently for telling the truth; that cannabis is less harmful than alcohol.
British and US officials held secret discussions about ousting Saddam Hussein two years before invading Iraq and months before the September 11 terrorist attacks, the official inquiry into the war heard yesterday.
Senior civil servants said that the “drumbeats” from Washington had begun soon after the election of George W. Bush amid concern that sanctions against Saddam’s regime were ineffectual and losing international support. Overthrowing the Iraqi leadership was considered by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in 2001 but had been ruled out because it had “no basis in law”, the inquiry heard.
luc hanson. dead right.
only one problem with what you said,(not a problem actually)
decriminalize it and it would hold value of a quarter to half of its current value as it would still be an offence to grow it.
legalize it and it would become worthless and would therefore not be able to generate any tax.
anybody could be able to grow a couple in there back yard………….
Of course if its legalized then over 95 percent of associated costs would not exist so there would be no reason even to want tax from it.
I can say one thing that im very proud of my country about though, thats is our laws regarding home made alcohol, some friend and my self brew our own spirits, good clean stuff, especially if you let it rest for a year or more.
This costs us 2 dollars per 1 litre at 40 percent alcohol.
So if you have a huge night and get shit faced it ends up costing you less than 3 bucks by the time you buy your self a bottle of lemonade to mix with.
Theres a bit of a story there too, brewing your own spirits was illegal in nz up untill 1999. The authorities noticed it was costing to much to enforce the law so they looked at it and in the end just decided to simply allow it, one of the rare grants of freedom im aware of in this day and age.
No, we don’t need a ribbon to prove it. But if enough men stand up and demonstrate they are against domestic violence then it might get through to some young people who have had shit upbringings that violence isn’t normal and acceptable. If we say nothing they go on thinking it is what everyone does.
If you feel the need to wear a white ribbon to show the world you are not a wife basher then you go right ahead.
I don’t give my Mrs the bash, I don’t hit her, I don’t kick her and I don’t even give her a ‘hiding’ even though she costs me a small fortune, I do not need to wear a white ribbon to prove that, but most of all, I am not one of these blokes who is ashamed of being born a ‘bloke’
Brilliant, Dimmocrazy! Thanks for the link re: Climate change doubt.
If this is true and the climate change is a scam, then John Key will, in future, be nominated for Sainthood as he pretended to do something about it but didn’t have us go and “sell the house” as the Greens and Lucy Lawless would have us do!
The Obama administration has decided not to sign an international convention banning land mines.
More than 150 countries have agreed to the Mine Ban Treaty’s provisions to end the production, use, stockpiling and trade in mines. Besides the United States, holdouts include: China, India, Pakistan, Myanmar and Russia.
Of course NZ accounts for something like 3% of global dairy production (and declining) and none of the major producers (India, China, US) are signatories to Kyoto but that shouldnt stop us bulleting our dairy industry.
NZ is the largest exporter of dairy products, by a long shot. Other countries produce more but none export as much as NZ. Which makes NZ more vulnerable to the perceptions about our production methods in other countries. Witness the attempts in the UK to brand NZ farm products as having a higher carbon-footprint that UK products (since shown to be a fallacy for butter at least).
Arguments against trying to reduce farm GHG emissions have a striking similarity to the arguments advanced by the Detroit Big Three when fuel economy standards were introduced via the CAFE system. They worked assiduously to avoid the intent of the rules (truck-based SUVs were exempt etc) yet ultimately their reluctance to embrace the change was to their detriment (amongst other things). They focused their diminishing resources on a very profitable niche and neglected cars and masked the underlying non-profitability of their enterprises. The Japanese and latterly the Koreans did the hard work and made cars to meet the standards and which people wanted to buy. The Big Three generally made crap small cars to sell to patriots who wouldn’t countenance the superior Japanese vehicles. When the oil price rose most recently the Big Three were left high and dry with few decent cars. This finished them off, after a long slide.
Toyota made the Prius and have the best auto manufacturing system in the world. And GM and Chrysler have gone bankrupt and Ford is on the edge. 50 years ago this situation would have been seemed preposterous.
Another good example is Honda pulling off the CVCC engine when everyone else said it couldn’t be done and you needed a catalytic converter and it would make small cars too expensive. That achievement pushed Honda to the top as designers and innovators of petrol engines and arguable they’ve kept that lead for the last 40+ years.
NZ has always been a leader in low-cost farming. Whether or not you believe climate change is a problem, it would be a good thing to develop breeds of cattle and sheep which produced less methane. There are bound to be spin-offs, the least of which would be to offset the perceived carbon-footprint of NZ produce in overseas markets. Perception is reality. Cf the premium paid for organic produce when the benefits are unproven and in some cases shown to be non-existent.
Does this just mean that the countries producing, trading or using mines, aren’t bothering to sign the convention?
I think that’s par for the course, something similar recently with cluster bombs, and depleted uranium bombs? But I guess it’s worth highlighting who is responsible for all the lingering problems years after the hot wars.
“After having dug to a depth of 10 Meters last year, British scientists found traces of copper wire dating back 100 years and came to the conclusion that their ancestors already had a telephone network more than 200 years ago.
Australian scientists not to be outdone by the Poms, in the weeks that followed dug to a depth of 20 meters, and shortly after, headlines in the Aussie newspapers read: “Australian archaeologists have found traces of 250 year old copper wire and have concluded that their ancestors already had an advanced high-tech communications network 50 years earlier than the brits.”
One week later, Maori TV reported the following: “After digging as deep as 30 meters in his backyard in Patea, Hone Waiata Tane-Jones, a Taranaki Kaumatua, (ie: Elder) reported that he found absolutely nothing. Hone has therefore concluded that 300 years ago Maori had already gone wireless.”
I wonder how many additional billions the State will spend on the railways before common sense prevails and they realise a dreadful mistake has been made?
IIRC the Bush admin also declined to sign the anti-mine convention and said they didn’t want to take any weapons off the table and made the point that effective weapons shorten wars and ultimately reduce causalities. Not a bad argument.
They also said that a ban on mines would prevent the development of better mines, including ones which degrade and become inert after a period of time or which can be disabled remotely. So in effect a mine ban could just leave us with the worst type of mines which stays active and cause problems for years and years.
They also said that a ban on mines would prevent the development of better mines, including ones which degrade and become inert after a period of time or which can be disabled remotely. So in effect a mine ban could just leave us with the worst type of mines which stays active and cause problems for years and years.
Well, you can’t argue with that. It’s like saying banning biological weapons prevents the development of vaccines against biological weapons. Sure is!
I saw John Minto on the bus today. A very sad looking man. I was waiting for the seat next to him to come free and I was going to ask if he thought there might be any downside to his idea about capping NZ salaries at 150k. He got off at the Hospital so I didn’t get a chance.
I was going to add him to my little list of conversations with throw-backs who have nutty ideas. After my Lambton Quay chat with Bob Crow of the UK RMT Union a few weeks back.
I reserve a special hatred for Coe, Luc. Not only is the Herald demonstratably left wing with its choice of commentators and world section slant, Coe and his repulsive friends seems to think that the Huruld would only be “unbiased” if it was more like Alternet. People like you build a deranged Marxist slant on the world based on what you see and your experiences. I’m fine with that. Coe has built his own little world where he genuinely believes that the Huruld is a right wing newspaper! Next he’ll say that the Gradiaun is centrist.
It’s good to see the “moderate centre left” continue to shill for its con too.
I say DF start a General Climate Change thread each day, and all the crap spouted here can be relocated there.
Excuse me? The other day you complained about this and I said, fair enough, let’s discuss something else. But let’s face it, there is a bill being debated/passed under urgency right now – based on this science – that will have significant impacts on all of us over the next 30-40 years. And it’s just the start.
Most of us realise that we’re just layman compared to people with PhD’s in Atmospheric Thermodynamics and the like. But we’re also part of the ‘problem’ / ’solution’ – so we get a say in this. Moreover, history shows us that even less educated people can be right when they get stuck into the various assumptions being made – and the experts can be wrong.
I realise that you’re a teacher, but the appeal-to-authority approach, where one simply sits back and allows our betters to decide for us, really has been dumped from our society a long time ago.
“In comparison, farming isn’t a process whereby stored carbon is released. It’s a cycle where GHG are released and reabsorbed back into the same system. This isn’t a matter of science or the like, this is a policy issue. Should burning fossil fuels be treated the same way as grazing cows? Why are we treating current carbon-cycles as the same ‘problem’ as releasing stored carbon?”
Careful Spiderman. You’ll ruin the debate if you pose sensible questions. Please don’t fuck it up completely by asking how soil fertility affects that cycle. Nandor might get his hair in a knot.
I think I saw Minto once, crossing an intersection. Hunched forward, thin wiry hair, balding rapidly, stick-like liver spotted legs sticking out from worn blue shorts, cradling some books under his arm. He was very much the atypical depressed revolutionary, brooding of the lost chances, of the old days when he walked up Queen Street acting against Western interests. Sad, so sad.
President Obama’s delay in authorising a US troop surge in Afghanistan had contributed to falling public support in Britain for the mission, Bob Ainsworth said yesterday.
The Defence Secretary said that as well as the “period of hiatus” in Washington, the deaths of British troops and the disputed Afghan elections had also played a part.
Mr Obama is preparing to announce his decision on troop numbers next week, it emerged yesterday, ending months of wrangling.
Mr Ainsworth’s comments came as the British Ambassador to Kabul entered the bitter debate in the Obama Administration by openly siding with General Stanley McChrystal’s request to send thousands more troops.
It might be consumers wont want our dairy products because we dont tax our farmers, in the same way we all refuse to buy chinese or US manufactured products because of all their industrial emissions but I’ve yet to see that. We are being asked to swallow real actual costs for unreal intangible “benefits” (or rather fear of losing benefits). Most of our dairy exports are commodity WMP, SMP, cheese and butter, sold at commodity prices. If there was some massive premium for NZ WMP (over say Australia’s) then you might, just might be able to start running this argument – but I would argue that you could then let farmers or Fonterra get their own “carbon neutral” certification and market accordingly (just like the so-called “organic” food trade does). But there isnt.
New Zealand is nowhere near as “low cost” a dairy producer as we like to think we are.
It’s certainly true that Fonterra have yet to become the Nestle of the South Seas that was envisaged. But they are moving in that direction (slowly). It would help if the farmers could overcome their not-unreasonable suspicion that they’ll be fleeced by men in suits if they float their co-operative.
Ultimately Fonterra will only prosper if it can break free of the farmers, but it’s them who have the most to lose. Kind of like a parent keeping their kid at home working on the farm and stifling their own future.
Malcolm, fuck the men in suits!!!. If Fonterra needs cash there are ways they can do it without selling the silverware. I have no wish to work seven days a week for some smarmy smooth talking townie gits. Why is Fonterra so valuable, because we actually produce something other then bits of paper promising all the world but usually delivering sweet fuck all. As long as I have shares in Fonterra I will always vote for farmer control and I suspect so will 95% of my farming mates. Like you state we have a very deep suspicion of the suits, long may it remain.
Love those RealClimate links Luc. The partisan mouthpiece of the disgraced CRU scientists and chums, who moderate comments that they’d rather not play – as per my 12:41 response to you.
In years to come RC will be held up as deceit/spin exemplars, in the same was as Enron management techniques are now presented in the ‘how not to’ sections of corporate ethics training.
getstaffed, the major scandal about the email hacks isn’t that a bunch of boffins are twirling their moustaches and colluding to enforce vegetarianism according to their Soviet overlords, it is, as Ace so succintly puts it:
“To be honest, I don’t really understand that article, but what I find jaw-dropping is that critics continue to have to beg for these guys’ data, for their models, for their assumptions. JESUS LORD GOD ALL MIGHTY WHAT THE HELL KIND OF “SCIENCE” KEEPS ITS DATA, METHODOLOGY, AND ASSUMPTIONS “SECRET”?
That is not science. There are lots of emails from these guys where they say things like “There’s no point giving our data to the climate skeptics; all they want to do is punch holes in it.”
Well… yes. This is how science is done, you see. You make a claim; you present your evidence; other people try to punch holes in your claim and your evidence. If your claim and evidence stand up to the fire, congratulations, you just advanced science. If not — well, you also advanced science by failing. Not as much as success would have advanced science, but still — a failed theory, disproven, also advances science. At least it eliminates one bad theory from consideration.
But what these guys are doing — and this is the real scandal that no one wants to address — is merely presenting their claims as naked assertions, with charts and displays to “back them up,” and then when people ask for the data, methodology, and assumptions that went into creating those displays, they simply refuse.
Andrew w 4:53pm …yes, I would be delighted at such news; Minto is an evil, evil man who once caused actual and grave damage to our nation with his communist agenda.
Malcolm 4:55pm …not sure I understand your point; Wellington Hospital/Auckland Hospital/Greymouth Hospital – what difference does it make?
Hurf – kinda agree. The whole thing stinks to high heaven in my view.
Nations like NZ are lining up to trade in carbon, at a huge cost to industry, when the genesis of the justification (CO2 is harmful) come from these discredited scientists who were, to use a financial metaphor, cooking the books. The US is trading away, and there are already casualties. Unless you’re a ‘green investor’ like the great prophet Algore.
Any published scientist worth their salt should now be looking at their own research and ascertaining how many of their presuppositions can be traced back to the work of these guys. Any that are should be withdrawn. Papers that are withdrawn should invalidate other papers that cite them. And so on.
Well, the ETS has now been passed into law officially by a 63 to 58 vote. Idiots.
And Nick Smith is twice an idiot. They just f_cked the country over. They couldn’t have done it without bribing the Maori Party; John has learned well from Helen.
Shit, no posts since 9:00 am! Is DPF being held in an Iranian prison for supporting the Great Satan?
Just as well he’s away National has just taken a giant dump on everyone showing for once and for all the only people they give a shit about are their fellow Wellington troughers.
DPF’s trip coincided with the disgraceful behaviour of the National Party and its selling out to the racists. Once again, the spineless Tories have shown their absolute lack of balls.
“Hopefully none of the National voting dimwits will be shameless enough to defend their evil government any longer”
Hold that thought. You can always count on Adolf, the ultimate cheerleader, the sycophant who believes Key walks on water. His gullibility knows no limit.
The thing is, is that there doesn’t seem to be anyone with any common sense in positions of power. The release of the hacked emails a few days ago made the normal person stop and think and even made some hardened warmers change their minds.
For some reason Government (be it ours or overseas) just seems to plod along as though nothing ever happened!
Wise people take everything into consideration before making choices and they use the most recent information available. People in parliament are just pig-headed, can’t admit they’re wrong, won’t change their plans even if the science goes against them; hell I bet that even if the emails had shown that the data and results had been TOTALLY made up, the folks in power wouldn’t have changed their minds.
It’s like a runaway train on a broken track or a ticker on a bomb that you can’t turn back (thanks Meatloaf). They make a decision to do one thing and like an unruly child who knows he’s wrong they just keep on because of pure spite (yes, I’m looking at you, Nick Smith). I bet Smith never even looked at the Hadley emails, or read about what informed people had to say about them.
Once people enter parliament they get infected with the “I know better than you” syndrome. I think shaking Obama’s hand has gone to JK’s head. I don’t care how big someone is, or if they like you or not, if you’re in power you better do the best damn thing for your country based on all the evidence you have, not on the advice of your Science Advisor, who’s field of expertise of peadiatrics.
The Obama administration has decided not to sign an international convention banning land mines.
More than 150 countries have agreed to the Mine Ban Treaty’s provisions to end the production, use, stockpiling and trade in mines. Besides the United States, holdouts include: China, India, Pakistan, Myanmar and Russia.
What do you expect from this warmonger president in the White House. He is authorising the murder of innocent women and children in Pakistan and Afghanistan by terror bombing villages and wedding ceremonies. When will this madness end?
Betting time now, Brian: when are they gonna revoke his Nobel prize? I think never. That would require massive hubris from the leftists on the Nobel panel.
Man made global warming is an unproved theory that protectionists and greens are pushing to try and keep the status quo for them. Europe is going to use this as an excuse to keep other countries agricultural and horticultural products out. The real shame is that real debate and science is not occurring due to the mis-information campaign some global warming promoters are pushing. The fact is, we do not understand to what extent, if any, man is having on global warming. We do not understand what affect the current global warming combating schemes will even have on global warming, we only know that these schemes are going to make every country poorer… especially the poorer countries.
Perhaps the economic impact of these schemes will increase emissions… for example, with agriculture being exempt from these schemes in europe, but not in nz, nz agricultural products will become more exspensive making european products relatively cheaper, even though the unit cost to the environment for european agriculture is far greater, more european clients will be buying european agricultural products because of the cost, making the net affect to the environment worse.
Iwi leaders have thrown an olive branch to forestry owners left out of the Government’s amended Emissions Trading Scheme.
The deal struck between the National Party and the Maori Party this week allows five iwi whose Treaty of Waitangi settlements included pre-1990 forests to plant trees on Conservation Department (DoC) land and collect the carbon credits.
Willie Te Aho of the Climate Change Iwi Leadership Group says the next step is to provide a framework for other Maori landowners with pre-1990 forests to also plant on DoC land.
That could then be extended to other forest owners, he says.
Mr Te Aho says he has already spoken to the Forest Owners Association, which has called the iwi deal unjust, and he’ll be meeting its chairman again later in the week.
He says the deal is a great opportunity to offset the liabilities that owners of pre-1990 forestry land would have faced. The five iwi covered in the deal had been facing the prospect of their Treaty settlement forests plummeting in value.
Iwi leaders now have their eyes on 200,000 hectares of DoC land for afforestation. Mr Te Aho says DoC has been asked to identify suitable land with low conservation value, on top of the 35,000 hectares already earmarked for the five iwi.
Don’t shoot me! but i think it is pointless to argue the facts as they are irrelevant.
Facts rely on trust, if you trust the people in positions of power to do the right thing then why would you doubt the facts they report and consider them lies? not everyone is a scientist or mathematician capable of analyzing data so most will trust the government and not give this ETS deal a passing thought as they probably rely on the government for their income and way of life.
That is the problem, complacency of the populace is making us boil like a frog.
1. The 5 Iwi will lease land to ‘other’ interests and start generating cash immediatly
2. Other Iwi will start to make noises about why they were not included, and at some stage later they’ll be tossed millions more to secure the Maori party vote on a subsequent bill
3. There will be no ETS cost/benefit analysis done, and any figures generated by Treasury or industry will be rejected as extreme by the government
Side show bob, I understand where you’re coming from re Fonterra and farmers getting dicked by merchant banks, brokers etc during a pubic share offer or subsequently by a takeover and/or poor management etc. However do you have any sympathy for the idea that Fonterra is being held back because it has to essentially cash-up each year? So while it’s maximising the payout to farmers, it’s not maximising the potential for adding value to the basic products.
It’ll be interesting to see what the take-up is with the extra shares option.
Findings of the Copenhagen Diagnosis Report (by The University of New South Wales Climate Research Centre) 2009
Surging greenhouse gas emissions: Global carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels in 2008 were nearly 40% higher than those in 1990. Even if global emission rates are stabilized at present –day levels, just 20 more years of emissions would give a 25% probability that warming exceeds 2ºC. Even with zero emissions after 2030. Every year of delayed action increase the chances of exceeding 2ºC warming.
Recent global temperatures demonstrate human-based warming: Over the past 25 years temperatures have
increased at a rate of 0.19ºC per decade, in every good agreement with predictions based on greenhouse gas increases. Even over the past ten years, despite a decrease in solar forcing, the trend continues to be one of warming. Natural, short- term fluctuations are occurring as usual but there have been no significant changes in the underlying warming trend.
Acceleration of melting of ice-sheets, glaciers and ice-caps: A wide array of satellite and ice measurements now demonstrate beyond doubt that both the Greenland and Antarctic ice-sheets are losing mass at an increasing rate. Melting of glaciers and ice-caps in other parts of the world has also accelerated since 1990.
Rapid Arctic sea-ice decline: Summer-time melting of Arctic sea-ice has accelerated far beyond the expectations of climate models. This area of sea-ice melt during 2007-2009 was about 40% greater than the average prediction from IPCC AR4 climate models.
Current sea-level rise underestimates: Satellites show great global average sea-level rise (3.4 mm/yr over the past 15 years) to be 80% above past IPCC predictions. This acceleration in sea-level rise is consistent with a doubling in contribution from melting of glaciers, ice caps and the Greenland and West-Antarctic ice-sheets.
Sea-level prediction revised: By 2100, global sea-level is likely to rise at least twice as much as projected by
Working Group 1 of the IPCC AR4, for unmitigated emissions it may well exceed 1 meter. The upper limit has been estimated as – 2 meters sea-level rise by 2100. Sea-level will continue to rise for centuries after global temperature have been stabilized and several meters of sea level rise must be expected over the next few centuries.
Delay in action risks irreversible damage: Several vulnerable elements in the climate system (e.g. continental icesheets.
Amazon rainforest, West African monsoon and others) could be pushed towards abrupt or irreversible change
if warming continues in a business-as-usual way throughout this century. The risk of transgressing critical thresholds
(“tipping points”) increase strongly with ongoing climate change. Thus waiting for higher levels of scientific certainty
could mean that some tipping points will be crossed before they are recognized.
The turning point must come soon: If global warming is to be limited to a maximum of 2ºC above pre-industrial
values, global emissions need to peak between 2015 and 2020 and then decline rapidly. To stabilize climate, a
decarbonized global society – with near-zero emissions of CO2 and other long-lived greenhouse gases – need to be
reached well within this century. More specifically, the average annual per-capita emissions will have to shrink to well
under 1 metric ton CO2 by 2050. This is 80-95% below the per-capita emissions in developed nations in 2000
Now according to Owen McShane, Chris de Freitas and Ian Wishart the above is all just not true.
This is Rodney Hide’s speech on the CLIMATE CHANGE RESPONSE (MODERATED EMISSIONS TRADING) AMENDMENT BILL Second Reading, the bold parts are my edits
Hon RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT): Let me be clear about a number of things. First up we have a very, very good Government. Certainly, we have an excellent Government compared with* the Government that we had for the previous 9 years. But even a very good Government can make bad policy. Even a good Government can make bad policy, and with this Climate Change Response (Moderated Emissions Trading) Amendment Bill, we have a very good Government making atrocious policy. Not only do we have a very good Government making atrocious policy but also we have a good Government following an atrocious process. The Ministers of this Government who are voting for this bill and for this process have to accept that responsibility, and so does every member of Parliament who is voting for this legislation today and confirming the process that has been followed. Let me also make it plain that the ACT Party totally opposes having an emissions trading scheme for New Zealand. An emissions trading scheme for New Zealand will hike the costs to business, to farmers, and to hard-working New Zealanders right at the time when we can least afford it. There is no doubt about it, an emissions trading scheme will put up the cost of basic goods and services for ordinary New Zealand families. That is what this bill is doing to New Zealanders, that is what an emissions trading scheme will do, and that is why the ACT Party is the only party prepared to stand up in this House to oppose having an emissions trading scheme. Following the election we had a difficult situation with regard to the emissions trading scheme, because we had National committed to the emissions trading scheme and the ACT Party implacably opposed to it. We agreed to have a comprehensive review through a select committee. What we wanted, and what the select committee was supposed to do, was to do the rational thing for the country: to look at the options and to provide the costs and the benefits. It never happened. To this day this Parliament and the public of New Zealand still have no idea of the cost of this scheme. They have no idea of the cost of an alternative, such as a low-level carbon tax, or the cost of having a simple delay for a couple of years. They know nothing. Then we discovered that the Government had done a deal with the Māori Party in order to put through the select committee the changes that National wanted to make to Labour’s emissions trading scheme.
Charles Chauvel: Disgraceful.
Hon RODNEY HIDE: Well, that was not disgraceful; what was disgraceful was what happened next. That was the true disgrace. At that point, I said on behalf of the ACT Party to the Prime Minister and National that we understood that they did not have the Māori Party’s vote all the way through and that if there was any difficulty with the vote, then they should come and talk to the ACT Party. I said that we opposed the emissions trading scheme, but we were prepared to help the National Government for the good of the country and, indeed, we were prepared to swallow a dead rat. We were prepared to swallow a dead rat in order to get a better result for New Zealand. National never ever* came to the ACT Party in order to discuss the options for the reform or the delay of the emissions trading scheme. National made a decision to commit to the Māori Party and to lose any negotiating power that it might have had. I accept that it is the prerogative of Nick Smith and the Prime Minister to do that. They are the ones with the votes. They are the leaders of this Parliament and this Government, but I say that the result was bad policy. It was atrocious policy and an atrocious process, and New Zealanders were sold out. What have we discovered? We discovered that all of this had to be done in a great rush, ahead of the rest of the world, in order to be done before the talks in Copenhagen. We are ahead of every other country. We discovered today at question time that this deal with the Treaty clause in it was concluded, according to the Minister, only after 1 o’clock yesterday, which was a couple of hours before it was announced. We know from the Minister of Māori Affairs that the deal was concluded only at 12 minutes past 3—presumably, that was when he was told that it had been accepted at Cabinet—which was 18 minutes ahead of the deal being made public. The deal with these five iwi and with the Treaty clause will now be passed under urgency, with no proper parliamentary scrutiny and no public input. It was agreed to only yesterday and it will be passed into law today.
Hon Dr Nick Smit: Tomorrow.
Hon RODNEY HIDE: Oh well, it will be passed into law tomorrow, but I say to Dr Smith that we are in urgency thanks to him. I will read this Treaty clause to members: “In order to recognise and respect the Crown’s responsibility to give effect to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi.” I challenge the Minister for Climate Change Issues* and the Māori Party to stand up in this House and put on record in Parliament what the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi are. If we are to have Parliament giving effect to something, then I think it is quite reasonable to ask what we are giving to effect to in this Parliament. We are not giving effect to the Treaty—actually, if we were giving effect to the Treaty, then we would not be having an emissions trading scheme—but we are giving effect to the principles of the Treaty. I would remind the great National Party, our support party, of National’s position in 2005. It is our job to be remind National of its principles, its position, its philosophy, and its policy. Its policy in 2005 was that the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi were to be expunged from all legislation. Why? Because, according to Dr Don Brash, who was the National leader at the time, the principles of the Treaty were undefined and unnecessary. Here is what Don Brash said in 2005, an election year: “This process”—that is, the process of inserting the principles of the Treaty every which way—“is becoming deeply corrupt, with some requirements for consultation resulting in substantial payments in a system that looks like nothing other than stand-over tactics.” I am sorry to say this, but the National Government, the Prime Minister, and the Minister for Climate Change Issues have allowed themselves to sell out* their voters and their supporters, to insert in legislation the principles of the Treaty that they were opposed to, and to cobble together this deal in the last few minutes before going public. They are ramming through under urgency, with no parliamentary scrutiny or public input, a deal for consultation for the principles to be given effect to and for regulations down the track to be passed. I say that Don Brash was right when he said that this process is becoming deeply corrupt, with some requirements for consultation resulting in substantial payments in a system that looks like nothing other than stand-over tactics.
Rodney Hide should be given the order of New Zealand for that speech. I personally am disgusted by the ramming through of this legisaltion, especially in light of the growing controversy surrounding the manipulation by scientists of data, the lies and obfuscations of leading scientists and the sheer gall of Nick Smith. My straw poll of National MPs suggests that most are deeply uncomfortable with this bill, the process and even the now the science that this bill is supposed to address.
So Luc – Any citations back to any report, model or data from CRU? What about GISTEMP? Any citation back to any report, model or data from anyone that has used either of these data sets in their reports or their reports reports?
The answer begins with Y.
Both data sets are, it appears, flawed enough to be ‘completely useless’. ( that’s in the EXACT words of the guy who spent 3 years (06 – 09) trying to sort out their data and models)
So who are we going to listen to? Luc Hansen and the IPCC or DR Ian Harris (CRU)
You don’t seem to quite understand – so I will lay it out in language that even a “denier” like you can get –
ALL the data that this whole (AGW) thing is built on is fatally flawed, they made things up to fit their models. Then they tried to hide it.
EVERYTHING downstream from their data is fatally flawed ( thats every IPCC report and pretty much 90% of any research done in the field )
I know it’s a bit confusing for you and Pete cause you really want to believe and all that but, mate, you need to get with the program.
Language just like that. No, I won’t be getting on the absolute Chicken’s program. Who’s program are you following? It does seem like you have been programmed to recite.
How do you arrive at 90% of field research being fatally flawed? Is it just what you really want to believe?
side show bob – “Malcolm, fuck the men in suits!!!. If Fonterra needs cash there are ways they can do it without selling the silverware. I have no wish to work seven days a week for some smarmy smooth talking townie gits. Why is Fonterra so valuable, because we actually produce something other then bits of paper promising all the world but usually delivering sweet fuck all. As long as I have shares in Fonterra I will always vote for farmer control and I suspect so will 95% of my farming mates. Like you state we have a very deep suspicion of the suits, long may it remain.”
Outstanding! It’s good to hear you guys won’t be getting conned by the snakeoil salesmen who only know how to leech off the backs of people who actually provide something of value. Their world is crumbling around them and they are scrambling around trying to find something tangible to suck off. Hence the price of gold going ballistic at the moment. The only thing keeping the Mickey Mouse financial world afloat currently is the amount of taxpayers money that has been thrown in to the pit for them to play with. The Fed has a plan and it is working, devaluing the US dollar is the only way they can reduce their debt. India is now buying up gold at a rate of knots. China have been quietly accumulating it for a while now using their reserves of US dollars. Hedging against the Fed’s plan.
The second dip in the “W” shaped recession is well on it’s way but the second dip will be a lot lower than the first.
Sorry for the rant, it is just great to hear someone with commonsense not being sucked in by the bullshitters. Go the farmers.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:02 am
I suppose the appearance of the GD means that DPF has escaped from Ankara.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:07 am
A Maori walked into WINZ, marched straight up to the counter and said ‘Hi, I’m looking for a job’.
The man behind the counter replied ‘Your timing is amazing.We’ve just got one in from a very wealthy man who wants a chauffeur/bodyguard for his nymphomaniac twin daughters.
You’ll have to drive around in a big black Mercedes and wear the uniform provided.
The hours are a bit long but the meals are provided. You also have to escort the young ladies on their overseas holidays. The salary package is $200,000 a year’.
The Maori said ‘You’re bullshitting me!’
The man behind the counter said ‘Well you started it!’
November 25th, 2009 at 8:12 am
Not nice D4J.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:14 am
For those who haven’t caught on yet, and who want to get in 5 minutes what the New Zealand public is not allowed to know: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evx9D19gmtE&feature=player_embedded
November 25th, 2009 at 8:14 am
Are win a state of something that resembles brown steamy stuff?
With the whole Hone racist behaviour and John Key pretty much ignoring it.
The Mowree party as whole just taking it lightly and basically accepting and agreeing with Hone’s disgusting comments
And now John Key pretty much letting this whole ETS scheme, which is BS through legislation….
John Key, I have been very accepting of the fact you have changed your mind set, have accepted this as the global economic situation has dictated things, but you my friend of late are loosing myself as a voter, and am sure a great many more National voters… I am merely a hard working Kiwi, whom came back from overseas, which cost me financially to basically just a very aesthetically pleasing country. Well my friend, a country needs far more these days than to just be aesthetically pleasing……
Start listening to the people, it was the people after all whom put you in power!
November 25th, 2009 at 8:22 am
“Not nice D4J.”
I don’t like being called a white mother fucker by a politician and a Prime Minister who does nothing about the depraved words from a shit stirring idiot.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:24 am
http://davidbain.counterspin.co.nz/ – interesting, and can Karam shut it down as is suggested today?
If you follow this link please return to kiwiblog
November 25th, 2009 at 8:24 am
D4j – I thought you said you weren’t racist the other day? Appears you are.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:25 am
I think those celebrating the CRU email release like it was a win in Lotto with Powerball are a bit premature. It is more like winning a Strike bonus line for next week.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:25 am
Do we live in some parrallel universe…the CRU emails could possibly expose be one of the greatest frauds ever and our MSM are completely ignoring it? WTF?
November 25th, 2009 at 8:26 am
As a *former* National voter I am disgusted with John Key.
Helen KKKlarKKK was right ‘You can’t trust John Key’.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:28 am
Should some of the other politicians learn from the Maori Party model? Have hui and keep meeting with the people to gauge what they want?
November 25th, 2009 at 8:29 am
So Phil Goff believes that the polluters should pay the cost under the ETS not the taxpayer…I won’t even bother to explain, as I’ve lost the will to live!
November 25th, 2009 at 8:30 am
It would have been funny if Billy T had said it Rufus.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:33 am
dimmocrazy – thank you
It’s a must see
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evx9D19gmtE&feature=player_embedded
November 25th, 2009 at 8:35 am
Pita Phill Goff has NO issue with the ammount of money we’re going to be hit up for, hes just bitching about who gets it first. By labeling our farm industry as “polluters” he’s shown he’s happy to just smear one sector that never votes for him in the hope it will make the others like him.
The reality is that if we want to eat we WILL get the bill. Does he really think that our farmers are sittting on 110 billion dollars? Costs get passed on to the consumer. Eating isn’t a luxury… unless you’re Kate Moss.
We’re getting the bill people, is your desire to feel rightous worth $92,000?
November 25th, 2009 at 8:35 am
Still waiting for Ian Wishart to address Argument No 3
Ian?
Anyone else here an Intelligent Design adherent?
Be my guest.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:38 am
Does anyone else think that the release of alarming information about climate change and resource consumption has just cranked up a couple of notches and every statement has a comment embedded attributing it to carbon, greenhouse gases or manmade Global Warming. It seems liked Plan B has gone into gear. (or am I being a bit too charitable by thinking that this is all being manipulated somewhere?
In just the last 24 hours we have been told that the earth is now consuming 2.5 planets worth of resources to keep mankind alive and well, the East Antarctic Ice sheet is going to raise sea levels by about 5 metre and AGW is responsible for all the “extreme weather events” on the planet.
Is this a response to the challenge coming out of the emails from Anglia? A sort of “If you challenge my small lies I’ll trot out some REALLY REALLY big ones to frighten you and that’ll shut you up”?
November 25th, 2009 at 8:39 am
dimmocrazy, Dream Ticket: Palin/Beck
Some of the comments are pure gold, better reading than the article itself.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:40 am
david – I’ve noticed the same thing. Plan B indeed.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:41 am
“Should some of the other politicians learn from the Maori Party model? Have hui and keep meeting with the people to gauge what they want?”
Titiwhai, on Radio Live both yesterday morning and in the JT Willie talkback afternoon, says they haven’t consulted. See what she tells Hone to do.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:41 am
Two interesting articles from The Times today:
British Police may be arresting people simply to get DNA samples, with up to 75% of black British young men on the database.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article6929017.ece
and is this what we will see with bulk funding of legal aid, as Minister of Justice Power wants to bring in? Note as well that in the last 8 years the numbers of solicitors undertaking legal aid in Britain has almost halved.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/law/article6929839.ece
November 25th, 2009 at 8:41 am
Ian Wishart answers to you now does he Luc?
November 25th, 2009 at 8:45 am
Stuff yells: “Big rise in kids being raised on benefits”
which is naterally interpreted as an in increase, ie not a good thing.
Later in the story it says: It shows the number of children reliant on a benefit recipient has fallen since 2000 but is likely to rise in the near future
So what’s the truth? Perhaps stuff are playing the climate scientists ‘trick’ and using different period start/end dates to show a trend. Or perhaps they’re just being alarmist. Or both.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:47 am
David, getstaffed, don’t you think it is more likely just Plan C(openhagen) – this was always likely to be to focal point for pro and anti information and propaganda. Expect more over the next couple of weeks.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:50 am
This is a Man bites Dog story surely:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/23/monbiot-issues-an-unprecedented-apology/#more-13129
Extract:
Even George Monbiot, one of the fiercest media propagandists of the warming faith, admits he should have been more sceptical and says the science now needs to be rechecked:
“It’s no use pretending that this isn’t a major blow. The emails extracted by a hacker from the climatic research unit at the University of East Anglia could scarcely be more damaging. I am now convinced that they are genuine, and I’m dismayed and deeply shaken by them.
Yes, the messages were obtained illegally. Yes, all of us say things in emails that would be excruciating if made public. Yes, some of the comments have been taken out of context. But there are some messages that require no spin to make them look bad. There appears to be evidence here of attempts to prevent scientific data from being released, and even to destroy material that was subject to a freedom of information request.
Worse still, some of the emails suggest efforts to prevent the publication of work by climate sceptics, or to keep it out of a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. I believe that the head of the unit, Phil Jones, should now resign. Some of the data discussed in the emails should be re-analysed.”
Sure, Monbiot claims the fudging of what he extremely optimistically puts as just “three or four” scientists doesn’t knock over the whole global warming edifice, yet…
If even Monbiot, an extremist, can say that much, why cannot the Liberals say far more? And will now the legion of warmist journalists in our own media dare say as Monbiot has so belatedly:
I apologise. I was too trusting of some of those who provided the evidence I championed. I would have been a better journalist if I had investigated their claims more closely.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:50 am
But, Pita, they are not ignoring it… they are actively running a counter programme of global warming related stories this week, for example the one last night about the disintegrating Antarctic ice shelf, complete with 12 year old reporter standing ankle-deep in Otago Harbour claiming that it will be up to her waist if we do not watch out!
November 25th, 2009 at 8:51 am
“When a brigade of Greenpeace activists stormed a nuclear power plant on the shores of the North Sea a few years ago, scrawling “danger” on its reactor, Tindale was their commander. Then head of the group’s British office, he remembers, he stood outside the plant just east of London telling TV crews all the reasons “why nuclear power was evil.” ”
“It really is a question about the greater evil — nuclear waste or climate change,” Tindale said. “But there is no contest anymore. Climate change is the bigger threat, and nuclear is part of the answer.”
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34121998/ns/world_news-washington_post/
November 25th, 2009 at 8:53 am
FFS!
It is not even 9.00am and the angry racist D4J is at again.
D4J is using Harawira’s outburst to express his own blatantly racist opinions, it is no coincidence that he lives in Christchurch.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:54 am
F E Smith
Good morning;
“British Police may be arresting people simply to get DNA samples”
I fail to see anything wrong with that, IMHO we should have our DNA on a police database.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:55 am
Climate change sceptics have seized on the combative, conspiratorial tone of some the correspondence as evidence of a plot among academics to mask the truth about global temperature changes.
But the scientific establishment remains united in the view that the documents reveal no smoking gun to manipulate data, and point out that the figures produced by the unit tally with two other major international studies.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/conservation/6642790/Climate-change-emails-plot-or-damp-squib.html
Some of one group’s methods have been discredited a bit, but as with the vast majority of climate data their results are still are in line with other studies.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:56 am
Oh look it’s big blouse in with another attack. Time will fix you girlyman. You are wrong again I am not angry nor a racist but that does not matter to a coward like you eh blouse. You are a disgrace to kiwi’s, how about that meeting? Haha yeah right. Have a good day backstabbing me just like yesterday and the day before that. What a fruit cake fill of venom.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:59 am
D4J
Pointing out that you are a racist idiot is hardly an ‘attack’, it is a statement of fact.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:00 am
You are scum big blouse. How about a meeting? Your opinion of me cannot be allowed to go unchecked as I am sick of your nasty rhetoric towards me. Fairs fair, say it to my face? Your beef is sickening.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:05 am
Have you ever read animal farm Pete George?
You’ld be one of the sheep there is no doubt about that at all
November 25th, 2009 at 9:07 am
@ dad4j and big bruv – can you guys take your beef outside and sort it out? This is the third day of name calling and counter-accusations, and frankly, it all gets a bit repetitive
November 25th, 2009 at 9:08 am
Whereas you’re one of the sheep here andrei, while PG doesn’t go along with this flock.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:10 am
bruv / D4J – can I respectfully ask that you guys take it elsewhere. Neither of you is going to win blogosphere-points carrying on like this.
edit: IV2 – great minds
November 25th, 2009 at 9:11 am
Why don’t you go & tell that joke to Hone Harawira’s face? Might as well break the news you don’t like being called a white mofo. I’m sure you’ll both have a robust debate.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:12 am
Aaah … I think I’ll be giving the GD a wide berth today.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:13 am
But getstaffed – you must admit that D4J’s rants are just so nuts that there is some humour in them. These rants and tirades against our hell bent judiciary are all he ever offers. Let him vent a little more…
November 25th, 2009 at 9:14 am
DNA on Police database? No, it’s just the slippery path to all fingerprints, retinal scans, then electronic surveilence, etc etc.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:14 am
I don’t think so Andrei, I’m prepared to question both sides of the argument. It just happens that one side seems to keep saying they are completely right while the other side admits to a lot of uncertainties and possibilities/probabilities, which is more in line with scientific process. The evangelical naysayers only want to listen to their own sermons, they are more like ostriches.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:24 am
The reason why i posted that Pete was this
What other studies? That is a hollow talking point.
Understand this
The claims over the past few years have been
(1) the planet is undergoing unprecedented warming over the past century
(2) the consensus of scientists is that CO2 released by humans is the cause
This scandal cuts to the quick of both these claims because we now have proof the historical record has been fudged to make the past both cooler and more stable than it really was
and
the proof of the shutting out of scientists who tried to publish papers contradicting the first point.
Now a serious question why are the emissions of a dairy cow more harmful to the planet than those of a hippopotamus or a blue whale?
November 25th, 2009 at 9:24 am
Let me get this right.
Many of you are rightly outraged at the racist comment of John Harawira, yet these same people are prepared to overlook D4J’s racist outburst and his call for a race war.
If you are one of these people then please take your faux outrage and shove it where the sun does not shine, you have no right at all to get all hot under he collar about Harawira when you let what D4J has to say slide.
Racism cuts both ways guys.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:32 am
y’know all that ‘reds under the bed’/white-supremicist stuff from the likes of redbaiter/d4j..and the rest..?
did you know it is all to do with their personal sexual insecurities..?
that those attitudes are ‘welded to sex’..?
(who knew..?..)
http://whoar.co.nz/2009/white-supremacyanxiety-anticommunism-and-sex/
that makes it easier for us to ‘understand’ them..eh..?
even to feel some sympathy/sorrow for them..?
(poor luvvies..!
nightmares about rampaging black men..and all that
November 25th, 2009 at 9:35 am
BB, while what you call the “race war” comment yesterday was over the line, I think most people are prepared to accept that there is a place for race based humour, I’d laugh at a good joke that targeted pakeha stereotypes.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:38 am
big bruv – dad4j’s outburst the other night was indeed racist, and you called him on it – quite rightly IMHO. You’ve now both made your positions clear – you think dad4j is a “racist idiot”, and he wants to deal to you. I doubt that either of you is going to back down, so can’t you just agree to disagree?
November 25th, 2009 at 9:39 am
Articles like that wsay more about the writer than about the people they are trying to comment on. I think it is called projection, or something like that.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:40 am
Bruv
If Honi was merely a commentator on a blog, I’d call him on his racism the one time and then leave it at that.
As it is, Honi is an MP, and one with quite a significant public profile and followers, and there is a cold-blooded rationality to what he says – at least in it’s intended purpose. People who support and oppose his words take them seriously: his words simply carry more weight than those of D4J.
And there’s always RIP, which is why I’ve not had to follow this thread within a thread.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:40 am
I have never considered that before. Apart from the fact that we breed and farm a lot more cows (on land cleared of forest) than we do the hippopotamus or a blue whale. And hippopotamus and blue whale numbers have reduced substantially. Maybe they are a part of natures balance. Maybe they don’t fart as much methane. Maybe some of their emissions are sequestered by the water they are in.
I’m actually uncertain about the cow problem, don’t know enough about it. I would have thought that grass growing balances cow farting but I have heard that the conversion to methane, which is worse as a greenhouse gas than CO2, is a major reason.
Maybe possums are worse than blue whales and we should increase the 1080 drops. But that will reduce bovine TB so more cows will survive, maybe it’s not such a good idea.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:40 am
Race-based humour will always be with us. But like all humour aimed at a particular target group, it tends to be taken too far by some: http://www.stuff.co.nz/world/americas/3094997/Redheads-assaulted-in-Facebook-stunt
November 25th, 2009 at 9:49 am
Pete George – I believe that the buffalo hunters in 19th C America were actually enlightened environmentalists. Imagine how bad the planet would have been if there were another 70 million buffalo farting.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:55 am
Pete,
Perhaps we should declare cows to be a pest, legislate some protection against their eradication and then merrily exclude them from the ETS. Shame also that sheep numbers hit a record low about the same time as the emissions baseline was drawn.
The real nonsense is that for some reason a Brahman bull in India is different from a Bison Bison in North America is different from a Holstein Friesan in New Zealand is different from a gnu in Africa is different from a Holstein Friesan in Holland is different from ……..
November 25th, 2009 at 9:57 am
Ha, yes Brian, and the Maori should get carbon credits for the moa? Pol Pot, Stalin? No, better not go there.
David, in India they sequester cow emissions by plastering their walls with dung, here we just flush it down the nearest stream.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:57 am
I wouldn’t use the RIP thingy, it sounds like a system people can use to insulate themselves not just from dross comments, but also from opinions and facts that don’t suit them.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:58 am
@Andrei 9:24am
re: The Blue Whale conundrum.
Perhaps it has something to do with the fishy smell of the farts (Omega3 anyone?)
November 25th, 2009 at 10:00 am
Bearhunter
Is it true that all redhead jokes originated after comedians reversed the first 3 letters of “ginger” for effect?
November 25th, 2009 at 10:00 am
Andrew – given the commentary over the last couple of days I think you’ll find it’s being primarily targeted at philu, mainly because he uses so much screen space to say so very little, and say it nastily.
D4J is at least short – but not sweet.
November 25th, 2009 at 10:04 am
(1) Did you know Pete that there is more forest in both Europe and North America today than there was is 1900 – do you realize that this is a function of the wealth that technology and the use of fossil fuels brings and that deforestation is something that occurs in poor societies.
(2) Did you know that the original name for methane was marsh gas because of the volumes emitted by swamps – enough at times to spontaneously combust giving rise to the will o’ the wisp. It is almost certain that New Zealand’s wetlands emit far more methane (by many orders of magnitude) than New Zealand’s dairy herds. I cannot quantify this because of course nobody is interested in giving me or anybody else grant money to try and quantify natural methane emitters.
On the other hand grant money has been given to try and quantify that emitted from dairy herds.
Why do you suppose that is?
If methane is truly the environmental threat the screechers say it is it matters not one wit whether is comes from a swamp or the arse of a dairy cow to the planet.
Couldn’t we reduce atmospheric methane by draining wetlands? Yes we could.
Do you get a sense of how utterly stupid this whole thing ETS thing is?
November 25th, 2009 at 10:04 am
Just checking to see if I was on the RIP list
November 25th, 2009 at 10:05 am
Pete, is that how the saying “Holy shit batman” got coined?
November 25th, 2009 at 10:21 am
Since poor old Cha is still heavily into mockery of right-wingers – Sarah Palin in particular – I’m sure that the following will be appreciated.
It seems that somebody at the wonderfully progressive magazine Slate, posted up an excerpt from Palin’s book on their reader forum, The Fray:
As Cha would say, the responses are Comedy Gold. Some choice bits:
You get the picture -abusive, disdainful, sneering, mocking, “Cha-rish”
The whole thing rather comes to a grinding halt when it is revealed that the sentence actually comes from the first paragraph of Dreams From My Father, by Barack Obama.
Well, actually it does not come to a halt – they actually keep going!!!
Truly – parody and satire are redundant nowadays.
November 25th, 2009 at 10:22 am
Re: wild animals versus cows. The answer is simply that because nobody knows how to calculate to GHG emissions of wild animals, they’re not counted. That means say, the increasing number of white-deer in the US as a consequence of less predation (not enough wolves/big cats) is not counted towards global emissions.
Methane is a curious GHG because its effect is more intense than CO2, but it does not persist in the atmosphere for very long. Ruminants tend to produce more methane than other animals btw. (I just have to find me a cheap source of crocodile meat in NZ).
Re: the RIP thingy. I try to read everybody’s contributions when I can, and occasionally post responses to a wide cross-section of posters. I think it is important to realise that a lot more people read KB than comment on it. (These viewpoints are more varied than might be divined by just reading what’s on the surface). The exception is one frequent poster whose posts I tend not to read, and RIP appears to be a good tool in just side-stepping that problem. I believe that most people using RIP are very selective as to who they ignore, hence are not using it as a general filter of unpalatable facts and opinions.
November 25th, 2009 at 10:23 am
Interesting – can we have some sources for that please?
And yes we do. I’d quite like to see some figures for how much wetland remains & how much methane it produces compared to dairying.
November 25th, 2009 at 10:27 am
I thought the consensus was Nicky Hager was a scum sucking bottom dweller for using hacked emails from Don Brash?
But now it’s all o.k. to do so if it gives ammo to fight AGM.
Using hacked emails (maybe out of context) is wrong IMHO and is a slipper slope on which to mount an argument.
Or do we have no standards anymore?
Is the paradigm set by the loony left now acceptable to the mainstream?
November 25th, 2009 at 10:32 am
Sure – its buried in the UN report – Global Environment Outlook 4
Available on-line here
Warning this is a very large document
November 25th, 2009 at 10:33 am
A good indicator.
November 25th, 2009 at 10:33 am
dad4justce.
you racist piece of shit.
November 25th, 2009 at 10:37 am
So not surprisingly research is being funded.
November 25th, 2009 at 10:38 am
Note in Kyoto-land, only the farmed cows emit “greenhouse gases”. All those cows lounging around in India dont.
November 25th, 2009 at 10:40 am
# unaha-closp (622) Vote: Add rating 0 Subtract rating 0 Says:
November 25th, 2009 at 10:00 am
Bearhunter
Is it true that all redhead jokes originated after comedians reversed the first 3 letters of “ginger” for effect?
No idea, although it has occurred to me before how strange it is that two of the most popular derogatory epithets are anagrams of each other.
November 25th, 2009 at 10:40 am
this is getting interesting..
http://whoar.co.nz/2009/maori-party-revolt-threatens-ets/
November 25th, 2009 at 10:42 am
dad4j there is often a price to pay for idiotic racism, one idiot in Christchurch of middle age thought it was good form to call my wife a nigger lover after I had left her outside the shops.
He was bloody lucky it was my younger lad who grabbed him by the throat giving my wife time to intercede and who my younger lad will still listen to.
If it had been me or my older lad he would have had the shit beaten out of him for good reason
November 25th, 2009 at 10:43 am
Reposted from the ets thread -
The Wegman Report highlights a group of 42 scientists (including all the main players at CRU) who “peer reviewed” each others work, collaborated on various projects and looked after each others backs. I’m fairly sure all of the have been “lead authors” for IPCC reports.
This is not 4 or 5 scientists who have had a bad light cast on them. Those 42 must have their claims investigated. Anyone who worked with those 42 needs to have their claims investigated. Do you see how big this could be? All their data must be investigated. The methodologies they used need to be held up to independent peer review?
It’s becoming obvious that CRU’s master data set was a complete mess and that when they tried to recreate stuff they had done in the past and couldn’t make it work they made stuff up or ‘massaged’ other data to get the same result.
These people need to be subjected to a rigorous investigation into their methods and data now.
————————————————————————————————————–
India has around 283,000,000 cows – how many in NZ?
November 25th, 2009 at 10:47 am
Oh dear, oh dear, should the US go back to having education tests for voting ? look at this video and decide.
Liberals, clear a space, you may hurt yourself while rolling on the floor with laughter.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKKKgua7wQk
November 25th, 2009 at 10:49 am
So how much “greenhouse” gas is created by farting, belching, coughing, breathing people?
November 25th, 2009 at 10:59 am
chicken little – not sure about the cow number on NZ farms, but there is a HUGE number in the BeeHive
November 25th, 2009 at 11:06 am
Respiration and decomposition produce CO2 as a natural event.
Generally though,these physiological processes won’t generate emissions in the same order of magnitude as modern lifestyles.
The emissions problem is that rather a lot of ‘carbon’ has been stored as fossil fuels (coal, oil, natural gas) and a lot has been stored as forests. We have a giant atmospheric experiment running whereby lots of that stored carbon has been abruptly released into the atmosphere. This is going to cause CO2 levels to overshoot historical levels. Despite the fact that I do not agree with Al Gore or Greenpeace, I can’t see that we can assume that this overshoot will be a good thing.
In comparison, farming isn’t a process whereby stored carbon is released. It’s a cycle where GHG are released and reabsorbed back into the same system. This isn’t a matter of science or the like, this is a policy issue. Should burning fossil fuels be treated the same way as grazing cows? Why are we treating current carbon-cycles as the same ‘problem’ as releasing stored carbon?
November 25th, 2009 at 11:08 am
Maori Party Revolt threatens ETS
It’s wrong of me, but I can’t help taking a certain amount of enjoyment out of watching this fiasco..
(next on the agenda: will Big Bruv and cohorts stand up in support of the Maori Party?)
November 25th, 2009 at 11:09 am
Don’t go there Tinman
Greenies are already discussing population control and limiting couples the right to bear offspring.
Search Frogblog archives!!
November 25th, 2009 at 11:10 am
Fair enough Chthoniid. Shouldn’t we be more concerned about the release of stored methane in thawing permafrost areas?
November 25th, 2009 at 11:13 am
Any chance we could just light a match?
November 25th, 2009 at 11:17 am
Repton – If someone you detest saves you from being flattened by a bus would you complain? As much as I detest the racial-based policies of the Maori party, if they do something right and halt the ETS then I’ll be 1st in line to offer my thanks.
November 25th, 2009 at 11:22 am
A good call from Family First:
But it is a public attitude as much as anything.
It’s White Ribbon Day, which is aiming to raise awareness of men’s violence against women. Worth supporting.
November 25th, 2009 at 11:37 am
Pete,
Did you not laugh at the domestic-violence scene in Family Guy?
November 25th, 2009 at 11:42 am
I don’t ever watch Family Guy, don’t like it. I doubt I would have laughed at family violence. I don’t see it as a joking matter. Too many people end up crying. If they survive.
November 25th, 2009 at 11:46 am
@ Chthonniid “In comparison, farming isn’t a process whereby stored carbon is released. It’s a cycle where GHG are released and reabsorbed back into the same system. This isn’t a matter of science or the like, this is a policy issue. Should burning fossil fuels be treated the same way as grazing cows? Why are we treating current carbon-cycles as the same ‘problem’ as releasing stored carbon?”
I asked the same question. I’m told that, although in carbon terms its clearly a closed loop (grass absorbs CO2, cows eat grass and emit), the “problem” is the cow emissions are really bad “greenhouse gases”, methane benig 7x (or some number) worse than CO2.
November 25th, 2009 at 11:50 am
Of course NZ accounts for something like 3% of global dairy production (and declining) and none of the major producers (India, China, US) are signatories to Kyoto but that shouldnt stop us bulleting our dairy industry.
November 25th, 2009 at 11:54 am
‘Believer’ or ‘Denier’
If you are truly interested in what these guys were doing and the integrity of the information we were using to not only pass our own ETS, but also that which has been used to justify Kyoto and Hoaxenhagen (yup, I haven’t called it a hoax before but this file just shows fraud on an unbelievable scale). HARRY_READ_ME is going to become the most famous computer file of all time.
Read it and weep
November 25th, 2009 at 11:55 am
Ignoramus question here
Methane is a complex molecule with high energy bonds right?
Therefore won’t it happily break up under UV bombardment?
If it didn’t wouldn’t there be ridiculously high levels of the stuff in our atmosphere from millennia of natural build up from farting dinosaurs and such… just waiting for one almighty boom?
November 25th, 2009 at 11:55 am
Just to put this racism accusation against me in perspective. I have a father from Zimbabwe staying with me and he expressed outrage that a politician in New Zealand would use the WMF smear, because he said he would expect to hear that from his President back in his sad homeland.
November 25th, 2009 at 11:57 am
CH4 has an estimated 58x the ‘warming potential’ of CO2 but an atmospheric life of 10 years, not 120.
Fwiw, N20 is even worse with estimates of warming factor (206x CO2) and atmospheric life of 150.
But I’m not an atmospheric scientist so don’t hold me to the figures
I think the methane issue becomes a problem because we are only looking at the end-point of this cycle. If we are looking at the whole chain- where the source is, what its used for, where it ends up, then it’s not so clear. I haven’t been convinced that burning fossil fuels is the equivalent problem of pastoral farming.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:03 pm
What is it with lefty dropkicks and cow farts. Can some climate change religious zealot please explain to a simple dairy farmer why a cow in NZ must be taxed but a cow in the US or India is not counted as producing gas emissions that contribute to climate change. It is said that over 50% of our emissions come from agriculture and so we must be made to pay. 28% of the US greenhouse gases come from agriculture but these are deemed irrelevant. If cow farts don’t count in any other country in the world then why should they count here. I believe we have been sold out by our self serving governments, both the stinking socialists and the National socialists, because it’s the only way they could steal real money when all other avenues of revenue generation were drying up. I have lost any faith I once had in NZ politicians , they are wankers of the highest order.
PhilU I pray the shit hits the fan and the National traitors get dealt to.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
This out of the BLUE:
The European Dairy Management Committee last week decided to reduce the level of export subsidy refunds on butter and butter oil to zero. This means that export refunds for all dairy products are now set at zero.
http://www.ausfoodnews.com.au/2009/11/23/end-of-european-dairy-export-subsidies-welcomed-by-government.html
It only mentions butter, but seems to mean ‘all dairy’ for some reason.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
The IPCC have released today report The Copenhagen Diagnosis. The report is a summary of the science, the projections and the recommended actions to avoid the worst case scenarios, all of which are already in the public domain.
Real Climate have kindly summarised the main points and provided a discussion forum. Real Climate do not claim independence as three of their members took part in writing the report.
It would be great to see Kiwiblog posters actually engage with the scientists involved with the report and openly express any scientific disagreement with the science presented in the report.
It’s a one stop shop for all with concerns who can string together sentences with valid science, but without ad hominem rants, and enter into genuine debate with specialists.
It would also be great if DPF started a separate thread on this report. Posters who communicated with Real Climate could post the interaction in this thread to save us sifting through what will undoubtedly become a huge forum.
I would suggest it’s a good opportunity for real names only to be used. And it’s a good opportunity for DPF to change the tone of the debate, at least on this site.
I look forward to you support.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
I have a serious problem with agricultural emissions being a threat, I really do.
I can see that burning lots of coal is bad as I have seen the appalling results of acid rain and pollution it causes.
Enormously powerful private cars are pumping out huge amounts of crap into the air we breathe from non renewable energy sources, especially around urban centres.. and it sucks.
But cows and sheep.. seriously, this is a joke right? The methane from each animal must be a small % of the gas emitted or it would kill them. Haven’t noticed any spontaneously combusting balls of fire running around the paddocks recently.
I suspect this is a ploy by the really really really big polluters to take the heat off themselves. New Zealand, now that’s a bloody easy target… oh look everyone, it’s them, it’s their fault. Evil wicked kiwis, how dare you ruin our atmosphere… bastards.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
@Lance
Gases released into the atmosphere either get reabsorbed back or broken up. It takes time. Hence, we like to describe things as cycles.
The theory is by digging up and drilling for lots of stored carbon, and by suddenly deciding that tropical rainforests look better flattened, we’ve released billions of carbon (and related gases) into the atmosphere. Hence, the cycle is being abruptly ‘front-loaded’ with the new emissions. So, while we wait for this stuff to be reabsorbed back into sinks and forests, we will ‘overshoot’ historical atmospheric conditions. Nobody is exactly sure what the overshoot will mean, but its enough to make a lot of people nervous.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
@side show bob:
In a “climate change religious zealot’s” ideal world, the US and India would be signatories to Kyoto (or something similar). In that world, cows anywhere would be the same, and it would be up to the countries to decide how to manage it. e.g. the US could decide not to include dairy farms in its ETS, which would mean the US Government would have to buy carbon credits on the international market to cover the shortfall (either that, or make bigger cuts elsewhere to balance it out).
@Luc: DPF won’t read that, so if you want him to do anything, you need to send him an email.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:25 pm
Some do this.
Others prefer to remain anonymous.
But someone here claims to be posting under their own name, while hiding behind a pseudonym and abuses others who do choose anonymity.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:27 pm
During his last years, the late Aaron Wildavsky, then Dean of the School of Public Policy at UC Berkeley, became more and more interested in the role of group ‘culture’ in shaping social behaviour. One of his observations was that the more the individual is incorporated into bonded unit, the more individual choice is subject to group determination.
Aaron was generally regarded as ‘the father of Public Policy’ and in this group of books and papers he was challenging the ‘rational man’ model of decision-making. He was not denying the importance of reason and scientific method, but was emphasising that human behaviour is also modified by strongly held beliefs and traditions, and in particular, by group loyalties.
I suspect if Aaron was still alive he would be setting a bunch of his graduate students onto this episode of the leaked Climate Research Unit emails as a textbook example of how a ‘culture of group belief’ can impact on the behaviour of the supposedly rational and impartial people who are presumed to occupy the scientific community.
These emails may be an early demonstration of one of the downsides of the internet, and of email in particular.
The rapid and prolific communication enabled by email certainly promotes the free and widespread sharing of information and knowhow.
But the same ease of communication may well promote the development of inward-looking and intolerant tribal culture which can seriously undermine the established disciplines and traditions of the scientific method.
Scientists have always been passionate about their theories. Dawkins, Teller, Feynman, Pinker, Gould and Gliek are hardly famous for their lack of commitment to their beleifs.
But prior to the internet such scientists have tended to be passionate individuals working at their desks within their own studies, and sharing their ideas with suitably sceptical colleagues and graduate students.
Fifteen years ago I presented a paper to the Quest organisation’s 1995 AGM in Florida, on how the internet would promote Tribal Marketing.
The release of the CRU emails suggests suggest that sadly the internet has promoted the development of Tribal Science.
Certainly the key players, as revealed in this collection of leaked emails, have been behaving like members of a fervent and passionate tribe – defending their territory, shaping evidence to support their beliefs and waging war on outsiders.
Wildavsky would be the first to point out that there is no need to call on conspiracy theory, or financial incentives, to explain this tribal behaviour; just the power of the culture of the group.
The CRU team and their internet colleagues had taken on the intolerant behaviour and inemperate language of the fervent tribes that build up around extremist blogs on the Internet.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:32 pm
@Chthoniid
I accept what you are saying but (with less tongue in cheek this time from me) but this looks like a slick half arsed ’smoke screen’ to reduce the culpability of the non- renewable carbon emitters, this is universally the big boys who have the power to blame us while adjusting their own halo, and we have to eat it or lose our trade status. Misdirection and bullying.
We have 70% renewable power, this is however meaningless in the grand scheme.
Don’t it suck.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:33 pm
“I would suggest it’s a good opportunity for real names only to be used”, yeah I bet you would. My real name is Bob Smith, don’t believe me, prove otherwise. Won’t work. “And it’s a good opportunity for DPF to change the tone of the debate”, why, and who sets the “tone”, you Luc. No thanks, you are the one that is not happy with the “tone”. Why don’t you preach over at the sub standard, they would probably give you cult status over there given you unblinking belief in AGW, preaching to the converted, much more satisfying.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Chicken Little – “India has around 283,000,000 cows – how many in NZ?”
The world cattle population is estimated to be about 1.3 billion head. India is the nation with the largest number of cattle, about 281,700,000 or 28.29% of the world cattle population. The United States has 96,669,000 cattle, 34.32% of India’s total, 9.71% of world cattle population. New Zealand is included among “other countries”: 49,756,000 5.00%. [New Zealand's entire emissions - everything - is 2% of the world total]
This was in relation to India calling on the West to stop eating meat and therefore eliminate cattle farming and the gases and water wastage in that, while their sacred cows [three times the number of those in the USA] probably live longer and may be, I guess then cremated, instead of barbequed.
Such are GW arguements . . .
November 25th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
As for their lack of independence, you forgot to mention that Mike Mann (the hockey-stick fraud man) is donkey deep in all this, yet considers RealClimate his/their own, managed voice:
So anyone who takes RealClimate to be a source of balanced views is only slightly more stuipd than anyone who suggests it.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:48 pm
There’s also this from the New York Times (yes, really).
The link pertains more to the media coverage of scientific issues than how the debates proceed inside the scientific community – but I think it provides a valuable insight into how society is dealing (or not) with AGW.
The article deals with the subject of how a mistaken ‘consensus’ can be arrived at and explains how this is quite a common phenomenon that social scientists call ‘cascade theory’.
But the thrust of the article is the real-life example of how such a cascade occurred over a period of 30 years with the whole issue of diet, fat and heart disease.
But I don’t think we’re seeing anything quite as accidental in the case of the CRU.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:48 pm
getstaffed, this attack on me using my actual name is just a projection of your own insecurities and obsessional tendencies. It’s not my fault that your sleuthing talents are so abysmal that you can’t overcome an unlisted telephone number.
Why don’t you hire a PI and find me, if you are that interested? Or save yourself some money and just send me an email (via my blog) with your number and I’ll call you.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:49 pm
getstaffed, be gentle on Luc his world is crumbling before him.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:56 pm
@getstaffed 12.41pm posted an extract from an email:
Mike: “Anyway, I wanted you guys to know that you’re free to use RC [RealClimate] in any way you think would be helpful. Gavin and I are going to be careful about what comments we screen through, and we’ll be very careful to answer any questions that come up to any extent we can. On the other hand, you might want to visit the thread and post replies yourself. We can hold comments up in the queue and contact you about whether or not you think they should be screened through or not, and if so, any comments you’d like us to include.”
Real Climate were challenged on this email in their forum and explain:
[Response: This is a moderated site, and always has been. We do screen out a lot of the random squawk of the blogosphere and the baseless accusations of malfeasance that are commonplace on open forums. We do that unapologetically in order to maximise the signal-to-noise ratio in threads. When there are technical issues that we aren't qualified to judge, we often ask people more involved to comment - and these comments appear inline with the questions so that the answers are not lost and are provided at the same time as the question appears. This leaves a record for later readers that is much easier to follow. We don't screen out comments just because they disagree with us (as is evident in any comment thread). - gavin]
November 25th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
legalise cannabis.
The story i hear about people that own houses from trading in it with its false value created from the law against piss me of.
Not only that, half the people i know should also be in jail for life had the cops been as efficiant as we aim for them to be, because they would of all been arrested hundreds and thousands of times.
November 25th, 2009 at 12:58 pm
I agree with menace.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
Sounds like a load of horseshit luc.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:01 pm
Quite apart from the validity of GW, why is Key and Smith pushing through the current ETS? Is it just to have something to replace Labour’s effort before the start of the year, or is there some other obligation or motive?
November 25th, 2009 at 1:02 pm
Menace. You can start by dobbing them in so that we can confiscate said properties through the proceeds of crime act.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:03 pm
Luc, not the slightest bit interested in finding you. We both post anonymously and that’s our right and choice. I just think it’s a bit hypocritical for someone who posts using a pseudonym to call others on it. That’s all. I’m sorry you feel attacked. Perhaps you should get some help?
November 25th, 2009 at 1:06 pm
senzafine, just stories i heard mate.
although i advocate them having half or a quarter of them as that would reflect the value of the stuff should it be decriminalized.
also i wont be starting anything against anybody on a basis that cannabis is alegal, besides those that support this status of course.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:06 pm
I’ve just been to a lunchtime concert for White Ribbon Day, wanted to show support for those against violence towards women. There weren’t a lot of people there, but Maori influence was strong – there are people who want to make a difference and encourage changes.
Most people seem to prefer to grizzle about lowering standards of morality, grizzle about increasing levels of violent crime, but don’t think of what might help improve both apart from saying it is someone else’s problem.
Does anyone here support the White Ribbon cause?
November 25th, 2009 at 1:08 pm
Leave it out then, getstaffed. Again, it’s not my fault that you don’t have the balls to use your real name. Now stop being childish.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:08 pm
Yvette- I think that the motivations are to duck the price increases that would otherwise occur in early 2010, and also so that they can go to Copenhagen and play the good global citizen card. If Rudd can’t even get a watered-down scheme in Australia, there should be some political capital heading into the next election from Key playing the we tried harder than most gambit.
What I really want to know, is that if Copenhagen turns to custard, whether the ETS will continue or whether something else will be adopted.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
Because if we don’t wear the right ribbon and pay all the right people and tell everyone about it we don’t really care Pete?
November 25th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
‘Does anyone here support the White Ribbon cause?’
No I bloody do not!
Violence of any sort is almost always unacceptable, however this is not what ‘white ribbon day’ is all about.
White ribbon day is another in the long line of subtle reminders that having a penis is a crime in this country.
No mention is made of wimin on man violence, no mention is made of the high rate of verbal and psychological abuse many men cop from their partners, the real message is “it is wrong to be a man”
November 25th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
Does anyone here support the White Ribbon cause?
Seems to me this could be rephrased as ‘is everyone here against giving women the bash’?
November 25th, 2009 at 1:15 pm
Perhaps the solutions could be to provide all the farmers with unlimited weed to smoke there brains out with then they couldn’t even be fucked growing there gas makers and we wouldnt have to pay all these bs taxs.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:15 pm
the real message is “it is wrong to be a man”
Obviously.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:16 pm
And most people make sweeping generalisations. FFS Pete, how do you know what any of us ‘do’ about anything other than post comments here?
Good on you for attending though. I have donated to this in the past, support a trust that helps with zero-interest loans to struggling solo parents, am a trustee of two other community-focused chaitable trusts and help pay living expenses for a youth worker who works with ‘at risk’ kids in years 7-8
November 25th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
I don’t support it either, nor the “Women reclaim the night” marches. Why should I be made to feel guilty or apologise for actions that I would never countenance doing myself?
In the meantime the perpetrators of this violence don’t give a fuck about your ribbon and probably aren’t even aware of the day (or much else).
And, to cap it all off, these women will still withdraw any charges, go back to the guy, and say he’s just a big teddy bear and/or a rough diamond.
EDIT to add: It’s not like these guys don’t have “THUG” written all over them in the first place (probably literally). No sympathy at all.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
That sounds like a cop out bb. The message from men running the show I’ve just been to were saying it’s a shit thing for men to be violent. They weren’t saying “poor us, we won’t do anything about it until everyone stops picking on us”.
Would it be too radical for men to lead by example?
November 25th, 2009 at 1:19 pm
I do not feel defensive about the White Ribbon Campaign. It doesn’t seem to me to be an attack on me.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:25 pm
Based on the fact that there is a lot of grizzling here about declining standards (and some poor standards demonstrated on posts), and little support for trying to make a difference.
It’s a hard thing to do to stand up against what is blighting our society. It’s a lot easier to just keep on bashing (literally and figuratively).
November 25th, 2009 at 1:26 pm
“What is it with lefty dropkicks and cow farts”
Actually it’s their burps as I understand it. But they are dropkicks….
@ Yvette – agree with you but its 0.2% of global emissions I think, not 2%. Just makes the points stronger.
.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
Can’t resist can you? Caught red handed and you squirm. Look Luc, it’s about choice to comment anonymously (which we both have) and hypocrisy about that choice (which you’ve unapologetically demonstrated). Like I said, if you feel attacked then get some help. Or apologise. Or both.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
Car park operators are already very unpopular. How do we make them even more hated then?
These new trains had better be cost effective too.
Oh, and I still hate James Coe, the tosser, and his shit lefty blog.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:56 pm
Trains? Cost effective? Mate. Your dreaming.
Though i do look forward to the day when there is an effective and viable transport solution that connects Wellington and the Horowhenua. I look forward to the day that we have decent trains and infrastructure, i look forward to the day we have a shiny new expressway, I look forward to the day we have a viable commercial airport on the Kapiti Coast, and i look forward to the day that the area starts to thrive as a direct result.
I also am positively dribbling at the thought of 2010 local body elections and the resulting size 13 that is going to be inserted up the KCDC’s collective asses as a result.
November 25th, 2009 at 1:59 pm
@getstaffed I think this is called cyberstalking. Let’s get back on topic(s).
Menace, my attitude to cannabis is legalise and tax, just as with alcohol, tobacco etc. With a baby daughter, I’m more concerned about these so-called party pills and drinks with excessive sugar and caffeine.
Pete, white ribbon is great, but the fact is that affliction has largely worked its way through our society except for certain groups and these groups are the ones that require extra attention-elsewhere labeled “closing the gaps” or “affirmative action”.
Hurf, who’s James Coe and is there any left blogs you <b.don't hate? Just asking.
November 25th, 2009 at 2:02 pm
The short and incredibly happy life of Tolley…
November 25th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
Quite true. Talk to any cop. Almost all their domestic violence calls are within certain demographics based around race, income and education. But we are continually fed the ‘it happens everywhere’ line. I have seen heaps of women in Naenae and Taita (the area I live) with black eyes, but fuck all, if any, in Eastbourne or Woburn.
I asked the cop who was handing out white ribbons at Wellington railway station this morning if he was serious. I said he should be at Hillary Court handing them out and he shrugged – not his job to allocate Police resources.
November 25th, 2009 at 2:09 pm
Dzmn, I think my post collided with senzafine’s and disappeared! Never mind. Try again.
@getstaffed, I think your behaviour is called cyberstalking. Let’s get back on topic. Maybe do yourself a favour and RIP me
menace, my attitude to cannabis is to legalise and tax. Britain’s top government scientific advisor was sacked recently for telling the truth; that cannabis is less harmful than alcohol.
hurf, is there any left blog you don’t like?
November 25th, 2009 at 2:12 pm
Pete, “Would it be too radical for men to lead by example?”
Done. I’m leading.
November 25th, 2009 at 2:30 pm
Pete – I lead by example. I don’t hit women so don’t need a silly white ribbon to show that “I care”.
November 25th, 2009 at 2:32 pm
Hahahahahahaahah!
November 25th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
November 25th, 2009 at 2:44 pm
Well said Brian Smaller
November 25th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
Bruv, you stood up against someone here recently who seemed to be suggesting violence.
November 25th, 2009 at 3:01 pm
luc hanson. dead right.
only one problem with what you said,(not a problem actually)
decriminalize it and it would hold value of a quarter to half of its current value as it would still be an offence to grow it.
legalize it and it would become worthless and would therefore not be able to generate any tax.
anybody could be able to grow a couple in there back yard………….
Of course if its legalized then over 95 percent of associated costs would not exist so there would be no reason even to want tax from it.
I can say one thing that im very proud of my country about though, thats is our laws regarding home made alcohol, some friend and my self brew our own spirits, good clean stuff, especially if you let it rest for a year or more.
This costs us 2 dollars per 1 litre at 40 percent alcohol.
So if you have a huge night and get shit faced it ends up costing you less than 3 bucks by the time you buy your self a bottle of lemonade to mix with.
Theres a bit of a story there too, brewing your own spirits was illegal in nz up untill 1999. The authorities noticed it was costing to much to enforce the law so they looked at it and in the end just decided to simply allow it, one of the rare grants of freedom im aware of in this day and age.
good stuff
November 25th, 2009 at 3:06 pm
Pete George – most of us are against domestic violence. We just don’t need a white ribbon to prove it.
November 25th, 2009 at 3:16 pm
No, we don’t need a ribbon to prove it. But if enough men stand up and demonstrate they are against domestic violence then it might get through to some young people who have had shit upbringings that violence isn’t normal and acceptable. If we say nothing they go on thinking it is what everyone does.
November 25th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
Pete George
If you feel the need to wear a white ribbon to show the world you are not a wife basher then you go right ahead.
I don’t give my Mrs the bash, I don’t hit her, I don’t kick her and I don’t even give her a ‘hiding’ even though she costs me a small fortune, I do not need to wear a white ribbon to prove that, but most of all, I am not one of these blokes who is ashamed of being born a ‘bloke’
November 25th, 2009 at 3:23 pm
Brilliant, Dimmocrazy! Thanks for the link re: Climate change doubt.
If this is true and the climate change is a scam, then John Key will, in future, be nominated for Sainthood as he pretended to do something about it but didn’t have us go and “sell the house” as the Greens and Lucy Lawless would have us do!
November 25th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
The Copenhagen Diagnosis and the The executive summary of the report
November 25th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
Bugger!#@$#!~!
November 25th, 2009 at 3:34 pm
Banning mines would be bad for business.?
November 25th, 2009 at 3:41 pm
Does this just mean that the countries producing, trading or using mines, aren’t bothering to sign the convention?
Wouldn’t that kind of defeat the whole purpose of the convention?
November 25th, 2009 at 3:42 pm
NZ is the largest exporter of dairy products, by a long shot. Other countries produce more but none export as much as NZ. Which makes NZ more vulnerable to the perceptions about our production methods in other countries. Witness the attempts in the UK to brand NZ farm products as having a higher carbon-footprint that UK products (since shown to be a fallacy for butter at least).
Arguments against trying to reduce farm GHG emissions have a striking similarity to the arguments advanced by the Detroit Big Three when fuel economy standards were introduced via the CAFE system. They worked assiduously to avoid the intent of the rules (truck-based SUVs were exempt etc) yet ultimately their reluctance to embrace the change was to their detriment (amongst other things). They focused their diminishing resources on a very profitable niche and neglected cars and masked the underlying non-profitability of their enterprises. The Japanese and latterly the Koreans did the hard work and made cars to meet the standards and which people wanted to buy. The Big Three generally made crap small cars to sell to patriots who wouldn’t countenance the superior Japanese vehicles. When the oil price rose most recently the Big Three were left high and dry with few decent cars. This finished them off, after a long slide.
Toyota made the Prius and have the best auto manufacturing system in the world. And GM and Chrysler have gone bankrupt and Ford is on the edge. 50 years ago this situation would have been seemed preposterous.
Another good example is Honda pulling off the CVCC engine when everyone else said it couldn’t be done and you needed a catalytic converter and it would make small cars too expensive. That achievement pushed Honda to the top as designers and innovators of petrol engines and arguable they’ve kept that lead for the last 40+ years.
NZ has always been a leader in low-cost farming. Whether or not you believe climate change is a problem, it would be a good thing to develop breeds of cattle and sheep which produced less methane. There are bound to be spin-offs, the least of which would be to offset the perceived carbon-footprint of NZ produce in overseas markets. Perception is reality. Cf the premium paid for organic produce when the benefits are unproven and in some cases shown to be non-existent.
November 25th, 2009 at 3:51 pm
I think that’s par for the course, something similar recently with cluster bombs, and depleted uranium bombs? But I guess it’s worth highlighting who is responsible for all the lingering problems years after the hot wars.
November 25th, 2009 at 3:56 pm
“After having dug to a depth of 10 Meters last year, British scientists found traces of copper wire dating back 100 years and came to the conclusion that their ancestors already had a telephone network more than 200 years ago.
Australian scientists not to be outdone by the Poms, in the weeks that followed dug to a depth of 20 meters, and shortly after, headlines in the Aussie newspapers read: “Australian archaeologists have found traces of 250 year old copper wire and have concluded that their ancestors already had an advanced high-tech communications network 50 years earlier than the brits.”
One week later, Maori TV reported the following: “After digging as deep as 30 meters in his backyard in Patea, Hone Waiata Tane-Jones, a Taranaki Kaumatua, (ie: Elder) reported that he found absolutely nothing. Hone has therefore concluded that 300 years ago Maori had already gone wireless.”
November 25th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
dimmocrazy,
Thanks for that You-Tube link. I’ve put a post up on it on NZ Conservative.
November 25th, 2009 at 4:00 pm
Whafe
Funny
November 25th, 2009 at 4:14 pm
A George W Bush administration that refused to sign a land mine treaty would have caused outrage among the liberal media and Hollywood elite.
A B Hussein Messiah Obama administration that refuses to sign the same treaty will not cause a ripple among the same people.
November 25th, 2009 at 4:19 pm
like this?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/24/land-mine-treaty-wont-be_n_369658.html
November 25th, 2009 at 4:24 pm
I wonder how many additional billions the State will spend on the railways before common sense prevails and they realise a dreadful mistake has been made?
http://www.nightcitytrader.blogspot.com
November 25th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
I say DF start a General Climate Change thread each day, and all the crap spouted here can be relocated there.
November 25th, 2009 at 4:28 pm
IIRC the Bush admin also declined to sign the anti-mine convention and said they didn’t want to take any weapons off the table and made the point that effective weapons shorten wars and ultimately reduce causalities. Not a bad argument.
They also said that a ban on mines would prevent the development of better mines, including ones which degrade and become inert after a period of time or which can be disabled remotely. So in effect a mine ban could just leave us with the worst type of mines which stays active and cause problems for years and years.
November 25th, 2009 at 4:31 pm
transmogrifier, what is discussed in GD depends on what topics are introduced by posters, so go for it, come up with some good alternatives.
November 25th, 2009 at 4:32 pm
Well, you can’t argue with that. It’s like saying banning biological weapons prevents the development of vaccines against biological weapons. Sure is!
November 25th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
I saw John Minto on the bus today. A very sad looking man. I was waiting for the seat next to him to come free and I was going to ask if he thought there might be any downside to his idea about capping NZ salaries at 150k. He got off at the Hospital so I didn’t get a chance.
I was going to add him to my little list of conversations with throw-backs who have nutty ideas. After my Lambton Quay chat with Bob Crow of the UK RMT Union a few weeks back.
November 25th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
I reserve a special hatred for Coe, Luc. Not only is the Herald demonstratably left wing with its choice of commentators and world section slant, Coe and his repulsive friends seems to think that the Huruld would only be “unbiased” if it was more like Alternet. People like you build a deranged Marxist slant on the world based on what you see and your experiences. I’m fine with that. Coe has built his own little world where he genuinely believes that the Huruld is a right wing newspaper! Next he’ll say that the Gradiaun is centrist.
It’s good to see the “moderate centre left” continue to shill for its con too.
November 25th, 2009 at 4:38 pm
Hopefully when he was at the Hospital they informed him things are terminal and he will soon be dead….
http://www.nightcitytrader.blogspot.com
November 25th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
Yeah, it’s a good argument for the argument that you can come up with a good argument for anything.
November 25th, 2009 at 4:50 pm
I see the “Hockey Stick” has made a reappearance above, with an accusation against it of being fraudulent.
I suppose some know full well the truth of the old saying ‘throw enough mud…’
Those who want to know the facts can check out hockey stick myths and facts at http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/12/myths-vs-fact-regarding-the-hockey-stick/
Those who wish to stick with their fantasies may continue as they are
November 25th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
Would you find that cheering news Elijah?
November 25th, 2009 at 4:54 pm
New vid from Dan Hannan. Cutting, damning and inspiring, as per usual.
And here’s a real treat for the moderate centre left!
November 25th, 2009 at 4:55 pm
It was Wellington Hospital, Elijah.
I recall you stating that Wellington is of no consequence and of no interest to anyone, anywhere. Have you contradicted yourself?
November 25th, 2009 at 5:01 pm
I say DF start a General Climate Change thread each day, and all the crap spouted here can be relocated there.
Excuse me? The other day you complained about this and I said, fair enough, let’s discuss something else. But let’s face it, there is a bill being debated/passed under urgency right now – based on this science – that will have significant impacts on all of us over the next 30-40 years. And it’s just the start.
Most of us realise that we’re just layman compared to people with PhD’s in Atmospheric Thermodynamics and the like. But we’re also part of the ‘problem’ / ’solution’ – so we get a say in this. Moreover, history shows us that even less educated people can be right when they get stuck into the various assumptions being made – and the experts can be wrong.
I realise that you’re a teacher, but the appeal-to-authority approach, where one simply sits back and allows our betters to decide for us, really has been dumped from our society a long time ago.
November 25th, 2009 at 5:07 pm
Chthoniid :
“In comparison, farming isn’t a process whereby stored carbon is released. It’s a cycle where GHG are released and reabsorbed back into the same system. This isn’t a matter of science or the like, this is a policy issue. Should burning fossil fuels be treated the same way as grazing cows? Why are we treating current carbon-cycles as the same ‘problem’ as releasing stored carbon?”
Careful Spiderman. You’ll ruin the debate if you pose sensible questions. Please don’t fuck it up completely by asking how soil fertility affects that cycle. Nandor might get his hair in a knot.
November 25th, 2009 at 5:14 pm
I think I saw Minto once, crossing an intersection. Hunched forward, thin wiry hair, balding rapidly, stick-like liver spotted legs sticking out from worn blue shorts, cradling some books under his arm. He was very much the atypical depressed revolutionary, brooding of the lost chances, of the old days when he walked up Queen Street acting against Western interests. Sad, so sad.
In other news, British defence secretary confirms what I’ve been saying all along. Another tick in the Hurf Durf Was Right box please.
November 25th, 2009 at 5:23 pm
It might be consumers wont want our dairy products because we dont tax our farmers, in the same way we all refuse to buy chinese or US manufactured products because of all their industrial emissions but I’ve yet to see that. We are being asked to swallow real actual costs for unreal intangible “benefits” (or rather fear of losing benefits). Most of our dairy exports are commodity WMP, SMP, cheese and butter, sold at commodity prices. If there was some massive premium for NZ WMP (over say Australia’s) then you might, just might be able to start running this argument – but I would argue that you could then let farmers or Fonterra get their own “carbon neutral” certification and market accordingly (just like the so-called “organic” food trade does). But there isnt.
New Zealand is nowhere near as “low cost” a dairy producer as we like to think we are.
November 25th, 2009 at 5:40 pm
It’s certainly true that Fonterra have yet to become the Nestle of the South Seas that was envisaged. But they are moving in that direction (slowly). It would help if the farmers could overcome their not-unreasonable suspicion that they’ll be fleeced by men in suits if they float their co-operative.
Ultimately Fonterra will only prosper if it can break free of the farmers, but it’s them who have the most to lose. Kind of like a parent keeping their kid at home working on the farm and stifling their own future.
November 25th, 2009 at 5:50 pm
Ouch D4j
An old time classic joke truely fucked up by you.
The original joke referred to a Mongrel Mob member covered in tattoo’s and a patched jacket.
It made no reference to anyone Maori, Polynesesian, White nor indeed anyone under a protection order
November 25th, 2009 at 6:08 pm
Malcolm, fuck the men in suits!!!. If Fonterra needs cash there are ways they can do it without selling the silverware. I have no wish to work seven days a week for some smarmy smooth talking townie gits. Why is Fonterra so valuable, because we actually produce something other then bits of paper promising all the world but usually delivering sweet fuck all. As long as I have shares in Fonterra I will always vote for farmer control and I suspect so will 95% of my farming mates. Like you state we have a very deep suspicion of the suits, long may it remain.
November 25th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
Big Bruv:
“……… you have no right at all to get all hot under he collar about Harawira when you let what D4J has to say slide.”
The racist mongrel and the govt have given us a licence to say anything we like.
November 25th, 2009 at 6:14 pm
Love those RealClimate links Luc. The partisan mouthpiece of the disgraced CRU scientists and chums, who moderate comments that they’d rather not play – as per my 12:41 response to you.
In years to come RC will be held up as deceit/spin exemplars, in the same was as Enron management techniques are now presented in the ‘how not to’ sections of corporate ethics training.
November 25th, 2009 at 6:24 pm
getstaffed, the major scandal about the email hacks isn’t that a bunch of boffins are twirling their moustaches and colluding to enforce vegetarianism according to their Soviet overlords, it is, as Ace so succintly puts it:
November 25th, 2009 at 6:31 pm
Andrew w 4:53pm …yes, I would be delighted at such news; Minto is an evil, evil man who once caused actual and grave damage to our nation with his communist agenda.
Malcolm 4:55pm …not sure I understand your point; Wellington Hospital/Auckland Hospital/Greymouth Hospital – what difference does it make?
http://www.nightcitytrader.blogspot.com
November 25th, 2009 at 6:40 pm
Under this ETS, how much is petrol increasing?
And powerbills?
Not sure if the government has actually stated this. At least the newspapers have not really done any analysis on the end-user effects.
November 25th, 2009 at 6:49 pm
Hurf – kinda agree. The whole thing stinks to high heaven in my view.
Nations like NZ are lining up to trade in carbon, at a huge cost to industry, when the genesis of the justification (CO2 is harmful) come from these discredited scientists who were, to use a financial metaphor, cooking the books. The US is trading away, and there are already casualties. Unless you’re a ‘green investor’ like the great prophet Algore.
Any published scientist worth their salt should now be looking at their own research and ascertaining how many of their presuppositions can be traced back to the work of these guys. Any that are should be withdrawn. Papers that are withdrawn should invalidate other papers that cite them. And so on.
November 25th, 2009 at 6:50 pm
@Dirty Rat 5:50 pm
You’re not Anne Tolley perchance?
No, probably not. She’s a Tory rat.
November 25th, 2009 at 6:54 pm
Shit, no posts since 9:00 am! Is DPF being held in an Iranian prison for supporting the Great Satan?
November 25th, 2009 at 6:57 pm
Well, the ETS has now been passed into law officially by a 63 to 58 vote. Idiots.
And Nick Smith is twice an idiot. They just f_cked the country over. They couldn’t have done it without bribing the Maori Party; John has learned well from Helen.
November 25th, 2009 at 7:01 pm
I think all the National voters on Kiwiblog should be ashamed of themselves…
Hopefully none of the National voting dimwits will be shameless enough to defend their evil government any longer
http://www.nightcitytrader.blogspot.com
November 25th, 2009 at 7:08 pm
So what is the next hand out for mowree?
Just make a list, you can get whatever you want it seems
November 25th, 2009 at 7:12 pm
Wineberry,
I’m not ashamed of myself, I am ashamed of the people I vote for.
And I’m not the only one.
November 25th, 2009 at 7:13 pm
“I think all the National voters on Kiwiblog should be ashamed of themselves…”
Yeah, question is Elijah, what was a better choice?
ACT’s policy would see our ag exports isolated for brutal tariff treatment in major markets, in seconds. Liarbore’s policy is, as usual, insane.
Whether or not you believe in AGW, and I don’t, reality is, the world’s politicians
dopretend they do, and that’s what we HAVE to deal with.November 25th, 2009 at 7:14 pm
Just as well I voted Act last year.
November 25th, 2009 at 7:17 pm
Shit, no posts since 9:00 am! Is DPF being held in an Iranian prison for supporting the Great Satan?
Just as well he’s away National has just taken a giant dump on everyone showing for once and for all the only people they give a shit about are their fellow Wellington troughers.
November 25th, 2009 at 7:27 pm
DPF’s trip coincided with the disgraceful behaviour of the National Party and its selling out to the racists. Once again, the spineless Tories have shown their absolute lack of balls.
November 25th, 2009 at 7:31 pm
“Hopefully none of the National voting dimwits will be shameless enough to defend their evil government any longer”
Hold that thought. You can always count on Adolf, the ultimate cheerleader, the sycophant who believes Key walks on water. His gullibility knows no limit.
November 25th, 2009 at 7:34 pm
The thing is, is that there doesn’t seem to be anyone with any common sense in positions of power. The release of the hacked emails a few days ago made the normal person stop and think and even made some hardened warmers change their minds.
For some reason Government (be it ours or overseas) just seems to plod along as though nothing ever happened!
Wise people take everything into consideration before making choices and they use the most recent information available. People in parliament are just pig-headed, can’t admit they’re wrong, won’t change their plans even if the science goes against them; hell I bet that even if the emails had shown that the data and results had been TOTALLY made up, the folks in power wouldn’t have changed their minds.
It’s like a runaway train on a broken track or a ticker on a bomb that you can’t turn back (thanks Meatloaf). They make a decision to do one thing and like an unruly child who knows he’s wrong they just keep on because of pure spite (yes, I’m looking at you, Nick Smith). I bet Smith never even looked at the Hadley emails, or read about what informed people had to say about them.
Once people enter parliament they get infected with the “I know better than you” syndrome. I think shaking Obama’s hand has gone to JK’s head. I don’t care how big someone is, or if they like you or not, if you’re in power you better do the best damn thing for your country based on all the evidence you have, not on the advice of your Science Advisor, who’s field of expertise of peadiatrics.
November 25th, 2009 at 7:43 pm
Nick Smith will be on his arse for this
November 25th, 2009 at 7:44 pm
Same goes for ACC Nick, you don’t reply to emails. Why should you? you are above us peasants.
November 25th, 2009 at 7:50 pm
Ouch D4j
An old time classic joke truely fucked up by you.
The original joke referred to a Mongrel Mob member covered in tattoo’s and a patched jacket.
It made no reference to anyone Maori
wake up noddy..show me a white mongrel mobster…they are all black…the joke was great D4j
November 25th, 2009 at 7:56 pm
What do you expect from this warmonger president in the White House. He is authorising the murder of innocent women and children in Pakistan and Afghanistan by terror bombing villages and wedding ceremonies. When will this madness end?
November 25th, 2009 at 7:57 pm
Key fuck ups so far
1) backed Klark into the UN position
2) jobs for the boys…cullen the criminal gets cushy number where as he should be in prison
3) tax cuts gone in a puff of smoke
4) hopped into bed with maoris..showing special privilage to skin colour…more apartied..
5) ignored the wishes of most of the country re smacking referendum…dictator
…feel free to add to the list..
November 25th, 2009 at 8:01 pm
Betting time now, Brian: when are they gonna revoke his Nobel prize? I think never. That would require massive hubris from the leftists on the Nobel panel.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:16 pm
Man made global warming is an unproved theory that protectionists and greens are pushing to try and keep the status quo for them. Europe is going to use this as an excuse to keep other countries agricultural and horticultural products out. The real shame is that real debate and science is not occurring due to the mis-information campaign some global warming promoters are pushing. The fact is, we do not understand to what extent, if any, man is having on global warming. We do not understand what affect the current global warming combating schemes will even have on global warming, we only know that these schemes are going to make every country poorer… especially the poorer countries.
Perhaps the economic impact of these schemes will increase emissions… for example, with agriculture being exempt from these schemes in europe, but not in nz, nz agricultural products will become more exspensive making european products relatively cheaper, even though the unit cost to the environment for european agriculture is far greater, more european clients will be buying european agricultural products because of the cost, making the net affect to the environment worse.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:35 pm
It will never ever stop!!!!
Just keep paying!!!
Iwi leaders have thrown an olive branch to forestry owners left out of the Government’s amended Emissions Trading Scheme.
The deal struck between the National Party and the Maori Party this week allows five iwi whose Treaty of Waitangi settlements included pre-1990 forests to plant trees on Conservation Department (DoC) land and collect the carbon credits.
Willie Te Aho of the Climate Change Iwi Leadership Group says the next step is to provide a framework for other Maori landowners with pre-1990 forests to also plant on DoC land.
That could then be extended to other forest owners, he says.
Mr Te Aho says he has already spoken to the Forest Owners Association, which has called the iwi deal unjust, and he’ll be meeting its chairman again later in the week.
He says the deal is a great opportunity to offset the liabilities that owners of pre-1990 forestry land would have faced. The five iwi covered in the deal had been facing the prospect of their Treaty settlement forests plummeting in value.
Iwi leaders now have their eyes on 200,000 hectares of DoC land for afforestation. Mr Te Aho says DoC has been asked to identify suitable land with low conservation value, on top of the 35,000 hectares already earmarked for the five iwi.
November 25th, 2009 at 8:40 pm
starboard
you missed the rest of my quote, and obviosly the irony which flew miles and miles over your head
November 25th, 2009 at 8:44 pm
Don’t shoot me! but i think it is pointless to argue the facts as they are irrelevant.
Facts rely on trust, if you trust the people in positions of power to do the right thing then why would you doubt the facts they report and consider them lies? not everyone is a scientist or mathematician capable of analyzing data so most will trust the government and not give this ETS deal a passing thought as they probably rely on the government for their income and way of life.
That is the problem, complacency of the populace is making us boil like a frog.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:05 pm
hurf – don’t get me wrong – reality is I am all for Obama terror bombing AQ and Taliban villages as long as it kills them.
As far as his nobel prize – given the murderers and killers who have got them in the past, I see no reason to ever revoke Obama’s award.
November 25th, 2009 at 9:18 pm
@Hurf 4.54pm
What on earth is the “moderate centre left”? What’s your continuum?
Anyway, about AGW and all that, try this: (ps, sorry, it is not a comic)
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/05/hansens-1988-projections/
November 25th, 2009 at 9:42 pm
Re the Iwi bribe, a few predictions:-
1. The 5 Iwi will lease land to ‘other’ interests and start generating cash immediatly
2. Other Iwi will start to make noises about why they were not included, and at some stage later they’ll be tossed millions more to secure the Maori party vote on a subsequent bill
3. There will be no ETS cost/benefit analysis done, and any figures generated by Treasury or industry will be rejected as extreme by the government
November 25th, 2009 at 9:56 pm
Side show bob, I understand where you’re coming from re Fonterra and farmers getting dicked by merchant banks, brokers etc during a pubic share offer or subsequently by a takeover and/or poor management etc. However do you have any sympathy for the idea that Fonterra is being held back because it has to essentially cash-up each year? So while it’s maximising the payout to farmers, it’s not maximising the potential for adding value to the basic products.
It’ll be interesting to see what the take-up is with the extra shares option.
November 25th, 2009 at 10:24 pm
While David is holded up in a Turkish bath house wiping steam from his camera lense, enjoy dedicated debate on the ETS over at:
http://www.democracymum.co.nz
November 25th, 2009 at 10:42 pm
its still ok to beat women if you give them a safe word, right?
November 25th, 2009 at 10:45 pm
Findings of the Copenhagen Diagnosis Report (by The University of New South Wales Climate Research Centre) 2009
Surging greenhouse gas emissions: Global carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels in 2008 were nearly 40% higher than those in 1990. Even if global emission rates are stabilized at present –day levels, just 20 more years of emissions would give a 25% probability that warming exceeds 2ºC. Even with zero emissions after 2030. Every year of delayed action increase the chances of exceeding 2ºC warming.
Recent global temperatures demonstrate human-based warming: Over the past 25 years temperatures have
increased at a rate of 0.19ºC per decade, in every good agreement with predictions based on greenhouse gas increases. Even over the past ten years, despite a decrease in solar forcing, the trend continues to be one of warming. Natural, short- term fluctuations are occurring as usual but there have been no significant changes in the underlying warming trend.
Acceleration of melting of ice-sheets, glaciers and ice-caps: A wide array of satellite and ice measurements now demonstrate beyond doubt that both the Greenland and Antarctic ice-sheets are losing mass at an increasing rate. Melting of glaciers and ice-caps in other parts of the world has also accelerated since 1990.
Rapid Arctic sea-ice decline: Summer-time melting of Arctic sea-ice has accelerated far beyond the expectations of climate models. This area of sea-ice melt during 2007-2009 was about 40% greater than the average prediction from IPCC AR4 climate models.
Current sea-level rise underestimates: Satellites show great global average sea-level rise (3.4 mm/yr over the past 15 years) to be 80% above past IPCC predictions. This acceleration in sea-level rise is consistent with a doubling in contribution from melting of glaciers, ice caps and the Greenland and West-Antarctic ice-sheets.
Sea-level prediction revised: By 2100, global sea-level is likely to rise at least twice as much as projected by
Working Group 1 of the IPCC AR4, for unmitigated emissions it may well exceed 1 meter. The upper limit has been estimated as – 2 meters sea-level rise by 2100. Sea-level will continue to rise for centuries after global temperature have been stabilized and several meters of sea level rise must be expected over the next few centuries.
Delay in action risks irreversible damage: Several vulnerable elements in the climate system (e.g. continental icesheets.
Amazon rainforest, West African monsoon and others) could be pushed towards abrupt or irreversible change
if warming continues in a business-as-usual way throughout this century. The risk of transgressing critical thresholds
(“tipping points”) increase strongly with ongoing climate change. Thus waiting for higher levels of scientific certainty
could mean that some tipping points will be crossed before they are recognized.
The turning point must come soon: If global warming is to be limited to a maximum of 2ºC above pre-industrial
values, global emissions need to peak between 2015 and 2020 and then decline rapidly. To stabilize climate, a
decarbonized global society – with near-zero emissions of CO2 and other long-lived greenhouse gases – need to be
reached well within this century. More specifically, the average annual per-capita emissions will have to shrink to well
under 1 metric ton CO2 by 2050. This is 80-95% below the per-capita emissions in developed nations in 2000
Now according to Owen McShane, Chris de Freitas and Ian Wishart the above is all just not true.
Are you willing to risk believing them?
November 25th, 2009 at 10:47 pm
Correct Dimebag.
Our safety word is “bananas”
November 25th, 2009 at 11:24 pm
when you say “our” you mean you are your chick right?? not like dirty rats & dimes safe word?
im more of a traditionalist, orange and red. that way if its only orange, you dont have to break the romance
November 26th, 2009 at 4:40 am
Luc
There seems to be a lot of “if’s” and “mays” in that theoretical report.
November 26th, 2009 at 6:40 am
That’s the way it should be, it’s about probabilities, not certainties, with a lot of ongoing research that keeps adding to the picture.
Those with an agenda and those with no understanding of the science talk in absolutes.
November 26th, 2009 at 6:51 am
http://whaleoil.gotcha.co.nz/2009/11/25/a-man-of-principle/
This is Rodney Hide’s speech on the CLIMATE CHANGE RESPONSE (MODERATED EMISSIONS TRADING) AMENDMENT BILL Second Reading, the bold parts are my edits
Hon RODNEY HIDE (Leader—ACT): Let me be clear about a number of things. First up we have a very, very good Government. Certainly, we have an excellent Government compared with* the Government that we had for the previous 9 years. But even a very good Government can make bad policy. Even a good Government can make bad policy, and with this Climate Change Response (Moderated Emissions Trading) Amendment Bill, we have a very good Government making atrocious policy. Not only do we have a very good Government making atrocious policy but also we have a good Government following an atrocious process. The Ministers of this Government who are voting for this bill and for this process have to accept that responsibility, and so does every member of Parliament who is voting for this legislation today and confirming the process that has been followed. Let me also make it plain that the ACT Party totally opposes having an emissions trading scheme for New Zealand. An emissions trading scheme for New Zealand will hike the costs to business, to farmers, and to hard-working New Zealanders right at the time when we can least afford it. There is no doubt about it, an emissions trading scheme will put up the cost of basic goods and services for ordinary New Zealand families. That is what this bill is doing to New Zealanders, that is what an emissions trading scheme will do, and that is why the ACT Party is the only party prepared to stand up in this House to oppose having an emissions trading scheme. Following the election we had a difficult situation with regard to the emissions trading scheme, because we had National committed to the emissions trading scheme and the ACT Party implacably opposed to it. We agreed to have a comprehensive review through a select committee. What we wanted, and what the select committee was supposed to do, was to do the rational thing for the country: to look at the options and to provide the costs and the benefits. It never happened. To this day this Parliament and the public of New Zealand still have no idea of the cost of this scheme. They have no idea of the cost of an alternative, such as a low-level carbon tax, or the cost of having a simple delay for a couple of years. They know nothing. Then we discovered that the Government had done a deal with the Māori Party in order to put through the select committee the changes that National wanted to make to Labour’s emissions trading scheme.
Charles Chauvel: Disgraceful.
Hon RODNEY HIDE: Well, that was not disgraceful; what was disgraceful was what happened next. That was the true disgrace. At that point, I said on behalf of the ACT Party to the Prime Minister and National that we understood that they did not have the Māori Party’s vote all the way through and that if there was any difficulty with the vote, then they should come and talk to the ACT Party. I said that we opposed the emissions trading scheme, but we were prepared to help the National Government for the good of the country and, indeed, we were prepared to swallow a dead rat. We were prepared to swallow a dead rat in order to get a better result for New Zealand. National never ever* came to the ACT Party in order to discuss the options for the reform or the delay of the emissions trading scheme. National made a decision to commit to the Māori Party and to lose any negotiating power that it might have had. I accept that it is the prerogative of Nick Smith and the Prime Minister to do that. They are the ones with the votes. They are the leaders of this Parliament and this Government, but I say that the result was bad policy. It was atrocious policy and an atrocious process, and New Zealanders were sold out. What have we discovered? We discovered that all of this had to be done in a great rush, ahead of the rest of the world, in order to be done before the talks in Copenhagen. We are ahead of every other country. We discovered today at question time that this deal with the Treaty clause in it was concluded, according to the Minister, only after 1 o’clock yesterday, which was a couple of hours before it was announced. We know from the Minister of Māori Affairs that the deal was concluded only at 12 minutes past 3—presumably, that was when he was told that it had been accepted at Cabinet—which was 18 minutes ahead of the deal being made public. The deal with these five iwi and with the Treaty clause will now be passed under urgency, with no proper parliamentary scrutiny and no public input. It was agreed to only yesterday and it will be passed into law today.
Hon Dr Nick Smit: Tomorrow.
Hon RODNEY HIDE: Oh well, it will be passed into law tomorrow, but I say to Dr Smith that we are in urgency thanks to him. I will read this Treaty clause to members: “In order to recognise and respect the Crown’s responsibility to give effect to the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi.” I challenge the Minister for Climate Change Issues* and the Māori Party to stand up in this House and put on record in Parliament what the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi are. If we are to have Parliament giving effect to something, then I think it is quite reasonable to ask what we are giving to effect to in this Parliament. We are not giving effect to the Treaty—actually, if we were giving effect to the Treaty, then we would not be having an emissions trading scheme—but we are giving effect to the principles of the Treaty. I would remind the great National Party, our support party, of National’s position in 2005. It is our job to be remind National of its principles, its position, its philosophy, and its policy. Its policy in 2005 was that the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi were to be expunged from all legislation. Why? Because, according to Dr Don Brash, who was the National leader at the time, the principles of the Treaty were undefined and unnecessary. Here is what Don Brash said in 2005, an election year: “This process”—that is, the process of inserting the principles of the Treaty every which way—“is becoming deeply corrupt, with some requirements for consultation resulting in substantial payments in a system that looks like nothing other than stand-over tactics.” I am sorry to say this, but the National Government, the Prime Minister, and the Minister for Climate Change Issues have allowed themselves to sell out* their voters and their supporters, to insert in legislation the principles of the Treaty that they were opposed to, and to cobble together this deal in the last few minutes before going public. They are ramming through under urgency, with no parliamentary scrutiny or public input, a deal for consultation for the principles to be given effect to and for regulations down the track to be passed. I say that Don Brash was right when he said that this process is becoming deeply corrupt, with some requirements for consultation resulting in substantial payments in a system that looks like nothing other than stand-over tactics.
Rodney Hide should be given the order of New Zealand for that speech. I personally am disgusted by the ramming through of this legisaltion, especially in light of the growing controversy surrounding the manipulation by scientists of data, the lies and obfuscations of leading scientists and the sheer gall of Nick Smith. My straw poll of National MPs suggests that most are deeply uncomfortable with this bill, the process and even the now the science that this bill is supposed to address.
November 26th, 2009 at 7:10 am
What’s the bet that today’s Genera Debate thread will magically appear at 08:00. Pre-posted on a timer by our gracious host.
November 26th, 2009 at 7:19 am
So Luc – Any citations back to any report, model or data from CRU? What about GISTEMP? Any citation back to any report, model or data from anyone that has used either of these data sets in their reports or their reports reports?
The answer begins with Y.
Both data sets are, it appears, flawed enough to be ‘completely useless’. ( that’s in the EXACT words of the guy who spent 3 years (06 – 09) trying to sort out their data and models)
So who are we going to listen to? Luc Hansen and the IPCC or DR Ian Harris (CRU)
You don’t seem to quite understand – so I will lay it out in language that even a “denier” like you can get –
ALL the data that this whole (AGW) thing is built on is fatally flawed, they made things up to fit their models. Then they tried to hide it.
EVERYTHING downstream from their data is fatally flawed ( thats every IPCC report and pretty much 90% of any research done in the field )
I know it’s a bit confusing for you and Pete cause you really want to believe and all that but, mate, you need to get with the program.
November 26th, 2009 at 7:27 am
Language just like that. No, I won’t be getting on the absolute Chicken’s program. Who’s program are you following? It does seem like you have been programmed to recite.
How do you arrive at 90% of field research being fatally flawed? Is it just what you really want to believe?
November 26th, 2009 at 7:39 am
Pete – 90% of the research uses the CRU and/or NASA data in some way or form.
November 26th, 2009 at 7:45 am
Fallen for any Nigerian Email scams recently Pete?
Yep you have. You just haven’t realized it yet.
November 26th, 2009 at 8:00 am
You didn’t answer that.
Are you Nigerian Andrei?
November 26th, 2009 at 8:01 am
The ETS scheme sounds like something the folk at Hasbro dreamed up.
To start, Nick Smith is a c*ck.
Heres a new ETS scheme that will last thousands of years, and they push it through under urgency in just a few months.
What a bunch of twats.
November 26th, 2009 at 8:01 am
Viking 2,
Rodders has certainly come back strong after his previous dismal display on travel perks. Excellent speech!
November 26th, 2009 at 8:24 am
side show bob – “Malcolm, fuck the men in suits!!!. If Fonterra needs cash there are ways they can do it without selling the silverware. I have no wish to work seven days a week for some smarmy smooth talking townie gits. Why is Fonterra so valuable, because we actually produce something other then bits of paper promising all the world but usually delivering sweet fuck all. As long as I have shares in Fonterra I will always vote for farmer control and I suspect so will 95% of my farming mates. Like you state we have a very deep suspicion of the suits, long may it remain.”
Outstanding! It’s good to hear you guys won’t be getting conned by the snakeoil salesmen who only know how to leech off the backs of people who actually provide something of value. Their world is crumbling around them and they are scrambling around trying to find something tangible to suck off. Hence the price of gold going ballistic at the moment. The only thing keeping the Mickey Mouse financial world afloat currently is the amount of taxpayers money that has been thrown in to the pit for them to play with. The Fed has a plan and it is working, devaluing the US dollar is the only way they can reduce their debt. India is now buying up gold at a rate of knots. China have been quietly accumulating it for a while now using their reserves of US dollars. Hedging against the Fed’s plan.
The second dip in the “W” shaped recession is well on it’s way but the second dip will be a lot lower than the first.
Sorry for the rant, it is just great to hear someone with commonsense not being sucked in by the bullshitters. Go the farmers.