Lefty E says:
March 30, 2011 at 7:01 pm

Loved Garnaut’s comment today re the climate debate “we need to be a little less tolerant of bullshit… our airwaves are dominated by people who actually don’t know much about this. Thats a really big problem for out democratic polity”

source: http://larvatusprodeo.net/2011/03/27/minchins-junk-science/#comment-272867

comment 97

The point he is making is pretty simple, those who "champion" denialism are working from totally, discredited information, and they do so knowingly, and wilfully.

That is why I use the term denialist, rather than skeptic, as these people are not questioning the science, as they claim, they have no desire for further inquiry to illuminate the facts we already know, they are simply proffering a ridiculous alternate theory with less validity than the creationist nutcases.

They receive more attention than they deserve, and demand respect for regurgitating known lies, and while I strongly support any honest skepticism, I abhor this politically motivated, and rooted movement which seeks to demonise science and knowledge, in an almost inquisition like fashion.

chicken_lipsforme wrote on Mar 31^st, 2011 at 7:23am:



And, until recently, chairman of Lihir and Ok Tedi mines in PNG with their history of environmental vandalism of monumental proportions.

Very lucrative positions for Chairman Garnaut.

Gerard Jackson
Monday 21 March 2011

Professor Ross Garnaut’s call to cut income taxes by $5.75 billion for low and middle income earners is an indirect admission of the ghastly costs of Julia Gillard’s destructive carbon tax. It is also an admission of Garnaut’s commitment to the tax that should raise serious questions about his economic competence.

He wants what he calls a carbon price to be fixed at $20 to $40 a tonne, after which there would be a compound increase of 4 per cent a year. (carbon tax or carbon price: it is a distinction without a difference.) It is estimated that a tax of $26 would bring in about $11.5 billion in 2012-13. Not only does the tax raise more revenue for Labor politicians to feed on it also compensates the victims while raising the level of productivity. And it is able to do all of this even though, according to Garnaut, “the economic impact” will only be “moderate”. The only thing it doesn’t do, apparently, is turn stone into bread.

(What baffles me is how a professor of economics can seriously claim that a government can raise real wages for everyone, which is what rising productivity does, while implementing polices that reduce the size of the capital stock, which is what Garnaut’s precious carbon tax would do. Even more baffling is the fact that no  one else has point this out.)

But if the impact of the tax is moderate why would it cause, as Professor willingly Garnaut admits, a “large scale loss of livelihood as a result of” its implementation? And how does a tax policy that has such severe economic and social consequences create a situation where “middle income earners will be better off directly as a result of these arrangements”? The answer is simple: their forced sacrifice will save the planet for future generations. And I kid you not.

Those who support this economic insanity argue that tax cuts will cushion the effects of the carbon tax while providing funds for the development of solar energy and wind power. Now our Professor Garnout is something of a sly dog. Although he doesn’t mention solar or wind in his update paper he does say that he favours “short to medium term support for innovation in low-emissions technologies”. This is code for subsidies for solar energy and wind power, so-called alternatives he has praised elsewhere.

However, the insurmountable natural and economic obstacles to these alternatives make it impossible for them to replace centralised power stations. It’s true that he has suggested gas as an alternative to coal, but if he were serious he would never have recommended subsidies for the greens’ phony alternatives. My suspicions were confirmed by Combet’s statement that “Professor Garnaut’s paper supports” the Labour Government’s so-called “clean energy future”. One should never lose sight of the fact that the greens’ intermediate objective is the destruction of centralised power generation. This is why they oppose not only coal and nuclear but also gas and hydro. The green alternatives are so grossly inefficient that a so-called “clean energy future” would result in famine prices for energy. Unfortunately, both Gillard and Combet are too stupid to see it.

Many defenders of the tax appear fixated on compensation as a solution to its costs. They are deluded and Garnaut’s tax cut proposal is only feeding their delusion. While recognising that the aim of the tax is to reduce the output of Co2 (a nutrient and vital part of our existence that Professor Garnaut deliberately libels as a pollutant) they fail to see that revenue from the tax must eventually fall. This means that other taxes would have to rise if a revenue neutral regime was to be maintained.

In fact, the revenue neutral policy would have to be dropped in favour of increased government spending because the demand for social services would explode as the destructive effects of the tax made themselves felt throughout the economy. Expecting tax cuts or subsidies to compensate for an energy shortage created by closing down power plants makes as much sense as arguing that subsidies can cure a famine caused by the destruction of agriculture. In other words, if the means to produce the energy have been destroyed no amount of tax cuts can make them magically reappear.

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A most intelligent and comprehensive assessment nichy.
Unfortunately I fear those of a green hue and their ilk will struggle to comprehend!

BatteriesNotIncluded wrote on Mar 30^th, 2011 at 9:45pm:


Seems reasonable to me, and he does not appear to be targetting one side of the debate with this. The debate would be a lot farther along if people were less polite towards the idiots.