Fools rush in where wise men never go
One can understand that Labor is hesitant about climate change after the subject has been a dead runner for them in the past two elections. As things are shaping up, the Prime Minister will front other world leaders as a climate denier, prepared to lie to convince them that Australia is meeting its climate obligations.
And to watch Scott Morrison and other ministers doing their media rounds, they certainly sound convincing. Words fly from frequently moistened lips with the sting of dishonesty and an absence of explanation.
The blatancy of Morrison’s lying confuses this writer because Proverbs 6:12-13 says; “let me describe a worthless and wicked man; first, he is a constant liar.” Undoubtedly some of you, most of you, or all of you when you hear the words; “we are meeting and beating”, you may be as confused as I am. Given his Pentecostal brand of Christianity, which believes in a literal interpretation of scripture, does the word of God presuppose that he is both a liar and a hypocrite?
When Morrison uses the phrase “we are meeting all our obligations”, it is camouflaged with the uncertainty of lies but not backed with the truth of evidence, then he lies.
At this stage of these Clayton’s negotiations between a corrupt party and a smaller but equally defective one, the Coalition has left us with a commitment to net zero emissions by 2050. However, we are assured that Australia will not attempt to reduce emissions between now and 2030. We will be seen as laggards by an international community, increasing its targets and suffering international isolation. Our target should be more like 50%, not 30%.
Fools rush in where wise men never go.
Ask yourself this question: “Are they serious?” Do Scott Morrison and energy minister Angus Taylor want to have a much more ambitious emissions reduction policy? No, not on your nelly. They are not driven by the innate goodness of saving the planet but by the politics of power. It’s more about one party appeasing the other and working out a political plan between them. A balancing act between the Liberals, the Nationals and their ability to win the next election. Advance Australia fair. They can give no certainty on the as yet unproven technology they intend to use.
I want to get this absolutely right. So correct that there can be no ambiguity. Morrison and his cabinet members tell us “We are meeting all our obligations” at every opportunity, but they tell the most dreadful lies.
What they don’t say is important. They talk about a target set for emissions reductions at the Paris climate talks in 2015.
It’s not apples with apples, and what we are actually beating is the commitment we made to cut 26 to 28 per cent of our emissions compared to 2005. Similar countries to Australia committed to cuts of more than 50 per cent.
The meeting in Scotland will in the main focus on 2030 targets because they are more critical than 2050.
The Coalition insist that we have cut our emissions since 1990, when the fact is that they have risen.
“The truth is that electricity emissions have increased by around a third, and transport emissions have grown by more than half.” (The Climate Council, New Report: Australia ranks dead last on climate, 21/10/2021).
So, it’s only when you add in all the land clearing that impacts emissions that the figure starts to look genuine or at least healthy.
Call it what you like, dirty tricks, political skulduggery or creative accountancy, but that’s what we used at the Kyoto talks in 1997.
They talk about a “gas-led recovery”, the “technology roadmap“, but no policy work or legislation is involved, and it is only unproven science.
Here are some facts from Climate Action Tracker (CAT):
“The CAT rates Australia’s climate targets, policies and climate finance as “Highly insufficient”. The “Highly insufficient” rating indicates that Australia’s climate policies and commitments are not Paris Agreement Compatible. Australia’s 2030 domestic emissions reduction target is consistent with warming of 4°C if all other countries followed a similar level of ambition. Under Australia’s current policies, emissions will continue to rise and are consistent with more than 3°C warming. Australia needs to set a more ambitious target for emissions reductions, establish associated policies, and provide finance to support others to get a better rating.”
Last week Laura Tingle (7.30’s chief political correspondent) wrote:
“And, whatever the Government does do in terms of setting, goals, ambitions, or whatever terms of sophistry are employed to not appear to have adopted a target of net zero emissions by 2050, it is not expected to be legislated, lest it produce a humiliation on the floor of the Parliament as Nat’s cross the floor against it.
Can you think of a more abject failure of political leadership in living memory?”
The Australian Government has a dislike of accountability and transparency unequalled by any other. It has reduced the budget of the Auditor General’s office. After all, you don’t want people looking over your shoulder when you are doing naughty things with public money.
Instead of governing with an open mind as to the integrity of climate change, Tony Abbott sought to use it as a political tool to gain Government. Peta Credlin, his chief of staff, later admitted the climate change policy under Julia Gillard’s Labor government was never a ‘carbon tax’. Still, Tony Abbott used that label to stir up trouble continuously. If he did not, Australia would be a leader instead of a nation lagging behind almost every other.
In 2013 and 2014, when Labor’s ‘carbon tax’ was still operating, Australia was significantly ahead of the target for those years.
In 2019, Angus Taylor gave an interview on ABC’s Insiders. He said that when the Coalition came to power, it inherited a 755 million tonne emissions “deficit” needed to reach Australia’s second Kyoto target because Labor “hadn’t done the hard work”.
“We have turned that around by 1.1 billion tonnes,” Mr Taylor said.
“They [Labor] hadn’t got to the point where we were going to meet Kyoto. We will reach Kyoto in a canter.”
So, the question begging to be answered was through its own “hard work”? Has the Coalition turned around an emissions deficit inherited from Labor? And is it correct to suggest emissions are heading down, or have they gone up?
He also claimed that emissions are “coming down right now”. They say they are protecting jobs, but the only threat to coal jobs comes from countries that will eventually stop buying it from us.
Mr Taylor’s claim is misleading, said the ABCs Fact Check:
“When the Coalition came to power in September 2013, the most up-to-date projections available were from a Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency report almost a year earlier. The figures Mr Taylor cites are consistent with forecasts contained in that report and another released in December last year.
However, Mr Taylor’s characterisation is problematic.
First, the 2012 emissions data used by Mr Taylor was superseded by a new report three months after the Coalition came to power. It found that actual emissions under Labor in 2013 were significantly lower than had been anticipated a year earlier.
Its forecasts also factored in estimates of abatement to be achieved by Labor’s carbon tax.
For this reason, Fact Check considers the 2013 report provides a more accurate and less pessimistic snapshot of the situation that the Coalition “inherited” from Labor.
In addition, the 2013 report accounted for a significant “carry-over” of emissions credits from Australia’s over-achievement of the first Kyoto period, which ended in June 2012. The inclusion of the carry-over, which was not factored into the 2012 estimate cited by Mr Taylor, reflects an accounting assumption rather than any “hard work” on the part of the Coalition in reducing emissions.”
The COVID-19 pandemic has further reduced emissions by shutting down whole industries. But in reality, where has this decade long lust for power over principle left us?
Our Prime Minister will go to Scotland for the COP26 with an agreement to cut our emissions to net-zero by 2050. The deal is only valid if the terms reached don’t vary from those agreed to between Joyce and Morrison.
The substance of which has not been revealed, or the cost, nor are they likely to be. Or it might be on a need to know basis. No plans are available outlining how we will reach net zero by 2050, but even more importantly, the conference will want to hear about what we are doing to improve our 2030 targets.
Morrison will have to tell the truth, which is always a delicate proposition, and he will have to say we will do our best, but because our coalition partners don’t want a target, there is “nothing” much we can do. It’s just the way we govern in Australia.
Fools rush in where wise men never go.
My thought day
In terms of the environment, I wonder what price the people of tomorrow will pay for the stupidity of today.
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19 comments
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Terence Mills -
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GL -
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GL
Return to home page…..it is not expected to be legislated, lest it produce a humiliation on the floor of the Parliament as Nat’s cross the floor against it.
If the so called plan is not legislated then it is no more than a brain fart !
Nothing that ever comes out of Scott Morrison’s mouth can be believed. He is a devil serpent and speaks with a forked tongue.
We’ll do it the Australian way”…which in Scotty from marketing’s terms means lie,and do nothing.You can’t say he’s not consistent.I wonder how much more of this farce the Australian public will tolerate?
Terence
A huge brain fart.
In the background along with Brazil, Argentina, and Saudi Arabia; Australia has been trying to whittle down the goals which need to be set.
Morrison talks about the mutually exclusive view that fossil fuel industries can exist alongside goals to reach net zero in 2050. By the time 2050 comes the current Australian politicians will have retired. The other factor is that net zero hangs on an accounting system. In all honesty can it be believed that such a system will not be tampered with.
The current pledges and targets made by governments are projected to take temperature over 2.4C above pre-industrial times by the end of the century. The creation of new goal mines, extensions too mines and the development gas fields in Australia; along with destruction of Amazon forests bring projected temperature increase to already born young people.
The Federal government is making bet on our behave which is they believe that climate will remain reasonably stable; paleo-climatology shown through ice cores show how climate can abruptly change. Dramatic changes can happen within a decade ice cores exhibit.
https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20211025-climate-scientists-fear-tipping-points-maybe-you-should-too?fbclid=IwAR1x0aUkOr3req8FFQXn63hxYaRYLdcXG9Qo0nxShrHp43ji1xGk6iZOwLY
Scummo is spinning so fast that I’m surprised that he’s not surrounded by a growing tower of brown reeking substance. This months daily word from him and his gang is brought is “plan” and here is some lines, with apologies to Monty Python, for you to sing:
“Every plan is sacred,
Every plan is great.
If a plan is wasted,
Scott gets quite irate.”
“Lovely plan, wonderful plan.
Plan, plan, plan…”
The opposition leader, Anthony Albanese, said Morrison had outlined the “vibe” of a climate policy which had no new commitments.
“We haven’t seen the modelling, and we haven’t had the detail. Because there is net zero modelling, net zero legislation and net zero unity,” Albanese said.
“But in their own words, there is nothing new in this plan. The word plan doesn’t constitute a plan no matter how often he said and what form it’s printed. As always, with this prime minister, it is all about marketing. All about the spend, never about the substance.”
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/oct/26/scott-morrison-says-australia-2050-net-zero-emissions-plan-based-on-choices-not-mandates
Meanwhile the authoritarian Morrison government working hard to disenfranchise voters before the next Federal elections.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/oct/26/voter-identification-to-be-compulsory-under-morrison-government-proposal
Thanks, John.
It seems pretty clear that we need to take the power away from the government. We can vote them out, of course, but that would still leave the power in the hands of government, and as we know, government can change hands with very little notice, and there is no guarantee that a Labor government would be willing or even able to take the urgent measures that are required. Julia Gillard’s government tried, and to an extent succeeded, but was subjected to the most appalling crusade of lies and bullying, and eventually bundled out. Whatever progress had been made was instantly lost with that change of government.
Some of the banks and some branches of big business are already taking matters into their own hands by withdrawing support from investment in fossil fuels. Individuals are also doing this, with the move towards solar panels and smaller, dual fuel cars, for instance. In general, as a community, we are more aware of the plight of the planet than ever before. We’re using less plastic and recycling as much as we can.
So let’s step it up. As a great, big bunch of individuals, let’s get to that critical mass of effort that leaves governments, deniers and the ostriches among us with no other option but to get on with it, fast.
selamat pagi, lord, apa kabar.
Hari ini, lord, does that include the last 12 years?
I see you are still omitting but who cares about $120 billion to buy an election, using the fools who think labor has allies.
ps
Sadly BB, he has the market ripe for an election and if he sells in glasgow, he will shine in cup week and if not the horses will.
I don’t think so wam, IMO a majority of Australians are now completely fed up with Morrison’s NO PLAN hype & bullshit…
You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.
There won’t be an election till next year now, I’d suggest possibly March and even not till even May, Morrison’s time has run out, and by that time his “cultivated market bullshit fruit” will be well passed ripe and be rotting on the ground.
He will fail in Glasgow, he has no plan, just same old, same old empty promises, bs rhetoric, the usual L/NP obfuscation, lies.
“The Unep report found only half of countries had submitted new NDCs, with big emitters including China and India still to publish their plans, and several other governments – including Russia, Brazil, Australia and Mexico – had presented weak plans that were no improvement on their 2015 Paris pledges.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/oct/26/world-wasted-chance-build-back-better-covid-un
On current progress, we’ll close the 2030 emissions gap some time in the 2080s.
Morrison focusing on 2050 is simply rubbish. But then as he’ll be dead by then, he couldn’t give a rats arse..
So, the Persistent Moron, the Predatory Misfit, the Putrid Mongrel, will plan to have a plan one day, about planning.., and this chronic sickintheskull maniacal merdemouth believes that enough idiotic and bored nitwits will hear, believe and vote in support. There is NOTHING, no plan, legislation, honesty, decency, sense or commitment here. Unless legislation is passed, by agreement of all, to cut strongly by a deadline of 2030, we are bludging fools led by a rump of turdlets led by B Juiced up Joyce, the dung on the floor of the country party stalls. Australia is shamed, disgraced, humiliated and this will get worse. We deserve to be punished and will be, and one must reluctantly hope so, for the future and planet. Tariffs and barriers must be used on us if this conservative shitpot of political perverts continue. Cannot enough voters see the obvious, that we are led by liars, donor’s bumboys and joygirls fuelled by greed and stupidity??
John Lord….You have very accurately highlighted all the BS and spin that Scummo and his band of liars will repeat on and on until the elections, aided and abetted by Murdoch and the rest of corrupt media. But not one of the so-called average Australian voter will ever pick that up. Simply because the average Australian voter is very busy watching cricket, the Batchelorette, Master Chef, the Block…… dumb, braindead, brainwashed and ultimately brainless average Australian voters.
And they don’t even care about the environment, these average Australians. They wring their hands with worry about their children,s latest computer games but not about the millions of dead wild animals and loss of habitat, the degradation of the land and its resources. But hey, fatty from the west and that slick Forrest guy and his green hydrogen will save them. They’ll still be driving around in gas guzzling $60,000 utes.
Scummo and Murdoch and that hayseed in a hat are banking on the average Australian to return them to government.
Perhaps an accurate description of the individual occupying the position of Australian is a puppet manipulated by foreign owned international corporations helping themselves to Australian resources while paying no taxation for the profits. A self-serving, unChristian who hides behind the pretence of a Skyfairy while handing out largess to his church to buy his place in their heaven.
Australia voters have never been so badly served since Bill MacMahon was PM and rolled in 1972 by Gough Whitlam & the ALP. Indeed, you would have to return to the corruption of the late 19th century NSW Court system for an equal.
Whether a feral election is held in December 2021 or early 2022 is irrelevant ….. Australia cannot afford the now COALiiton proposed increases in GST and personal taxation so that Scummo may continue using taxpayer funds to buy favour with his corporate mates
I have had enough of this corrupt Liarbral Nazional$ misgovernment!!
Rupert’s mainstream media will not admit it but on current trends labor will comfortably win the next election. This coalition government are such dropkicks and fools Labor really doesn’t have to extend itself apart from a few carefully placed jabs every now and again.
As the 18th century German philosopher Johann Herder noted, “When fools have the word the wise will be silent”.
I’ve made a very profound decision today:
I’ve decided to run a marathon in 30 years time, I won’t start training until 28 years have elapsed. In 30 years time I’ll be over 100, though through modern technology it should be manageable with new body parts.
It seems, according to Taylor, Nationals demands have not been discussed by the cabinet yet.
It’s more a “gaslight “ recovery! 🤨
hope you are right BB. The market is ripe for a contrived, virtual or real war, a tampa, a caravan or anything that can be manufactured into crisis. the morning shows, sky, rupert’s media and facebook are all lined up to lie????
Aye, me too wam, lol…
I’d rather be an optimist than a pessimist.
Not forgetting it’s now been 3 terms, (8+ yrs), of L/NP lies, unaccountability, bullshit and Hawaiian Holidays…..
He’s already somewhat of a sad joke in the eyes of the world and now he seems to be heading into the realms of fantasy and psychosis and megalomania. Extra strength visions from Dog maybe?
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/morrison-to-lodge-bigger-2030-target-in-un-talks-in-glasgow-20211027-p593qe.html
Forgot to add that his narcissism and messianic tendencies seem to be getting stronger as well. Dog help us when they get back in power (pessimistic view, yep).