Bishop Hill Shale Mili
Dec 30, 2012 Energy: gas Energy: wind David Miliband*, the Labour party's king in exile, has been given space in the Mail on Sunday (of all places) to take a look at the year ahead. He had some somewhat surprising things to say:
And if [the government] need inspiration they should look to the good news story of 2013: the recovery of our old ally, the U.S. It is a very lucky country.
Just when you think the price of oil is too high to sustain their standard of living, shale gas promises an energy boom. We’re not just talking cheaper prices; suddenly the U.S. is set to become the world’s largest energy exporter.
Strangely, he doesn't even mention the possibility of a similar shale boom in the UK, but reading between the lines this is surely what he means. I sense a big change in the offing.
This doesn't mean that the insanity of wind farms will stop of course. The big three political parties are wedded to the idea of expensive sops to green sentiment and will willingly squander billions to that end.
[sp. amended 8am, 31.12.12]
Reader Comments (87)
Vangel
don't see there's dramatically anything to criticize there - as long as the financing is clear cut - what works and what doesn't is a matter of public record by and large... If you can see that it's not paying (in some areas)- I'm sure your not alone. The debate at the moment seems to pivot on try it carefully / or ban it for a constantly changing barrage of specious ideological reasons which certainly does not make sense.
The geology predominantly determines recovery, techniques vary and are a moving target.
Another irresponsible lending bubble followed by another bout of socialising debt? I don't think the population will stand for another bailout binge party - heads on poles and all that..
Theo Goodwin (Dec 31, 2012 at 7:13 PM) asks an excellent question:
I suspect the answer is no, which is why we go back to examples like Galileo, where the church was making a last-ditch effort to defend its monopoly of truth, or Lysenko, where a crazed dictator tried to do the same.If it is a unique event, you have to look at the larger picture to find an explanation. The evident idiocy of individual politicians can’t explain everything.
For the first time, the West is looking at the probability of being overtaken economically by a rival civilisation. That alone is surely enough to provoke all sorts of irrational reactions. See Miliband’s imperialist remarks about China noted by Robert Thomson and Julian Flood above for another example.
Vangel
Given your view of the way fracking has gone in the USA and will go in the UK, why dont you take positive action?
Phone Mr Egan at Cuadrilla and explain patiently to him that he is about to waste a great deal of investors money on a project that will not make a profit. Once you have saved them from bankruptcy, I would imagine a seat on the board should be the least of your rewards.
It is quite possible to be critical of contemporary climate science whatever political views one holds. Sometimes it seems as though commentators on this site want to present criticism as part of a right wing package, which just plays into the hands of those who think critics must be right wing ideologues. As a Guardian reading Labour voting economist and global warming sceptic resent this. So I feel the need to correct some misconceptions above (not in the post, just the comments). Ralph Miliband was certainly a Marxist but was never a member of the Communist Party and from at least the late 1940s, if not earlier, was a critic of Stalinism not a propagandist for it. On recessions, there were UK recessions in 1974-75 (the first since the 1930s) and again in 1979-81. While there is always scope for arguing about causation the mainstream view is that this last recession was caused by some combination of tight monetary policy introduced under Thatcher and the rise in the exchange rate some of which may be attributed to the discovery of North Sea oil. So score that one for Thatcher. The 2008-09 recession was certainly led by the collapse of US banks under George W Bush's watch. Supervision policies n the UK may well have been too lax and the permanence of corporation tax receipts from finance overrated, but UK policies were not the trigger for the recession. North Sea oil and shale gas have their strongest effect on medium term growth not on whether or not the economy falls short of current potential ( a recession). I look forward to getting back to the discussions of such things as climate sensitivity which is what makes this site so worthwhile, and letting much of the political hot air go.
Why is our political class so committed to renewables when they clearly aren’t producing the hoped-for results (either in terms of energy produced or CO2 reduction) and are damaging the economy? Well, David Miliband appears to have the answer: he says that China, for example, has “taken us seriously up to now on the subject of tackling carbon emissions” because “we have been fulfilling our side of the bargain”. He refers, in particular, to technologies “that can get us off coal”. But he must know there’s no evidence to support his belief: see, for example, this chart.
So what’s the basis of such irrationality? Julian Flood suggests above that our politicians are still wedded to an Imperial attitude – the white man’s burden. I think he’s right. Here’s a comment by Oliver Letwin (Cabinet Office Minister) in 2011 (link):
But is there the remotest possibility that China (and India etc.) will say: “Oh look, the UK is adopting a “green” energy policy – we’d better follow suit, halt our economic development and keep millions of our people in continuing poverty”?
Er … no: this policy is irresponsible, foolish, arrogant, self-harming, neo-colonial nonsense.
mikep, much of what you say is true. Many of us do conflate a right-wing position with climate scepticism. Unfortunately, many who are on the CAGW side seem not to have over-considered the degree of truth in the science because they see it as enabling an agenda of central planning and control of the economy which rather suits them, because they are of that part of the left which goes for that sort of thing. Which as an LSE man I imagine Miliband R. would have been right in line with. Unless that is just my own prejudice speaking. For those of us on the right, the policy agenda is such anathema that we reject the AGW hypothesis on a visceral level. Then we seek to justify our reaction, then we find it only too easy to do so.
mikep
I hope and believe that none of the people "whooping it up for the right" meant anything against individuals such as yourself (and we do have a substantial number of left leaning regulars on BH). However it is impossible to ignore the politics because politicians are the ones who currently have their hands deep into taxpayers pockets to finance unworkable energy policies. Would you not agree that in broad terms left leaning politicians are the ones pushing those policies?
David Miliband made the following comment in his Mail article:
Only 15% of the CO2 emissions of countries will be covered by any Kyoto 2 but Miliband wants more wind turbines?
The Liberals signed Canada up for Kyoto and the Conservatives pulled out.
The Labour party in Australia signed up for Kyoto and at the next election the Conservatives look like pulling them out, In the US Democrats favour CO2 reduction but the Republicans put the economy first.
In the UK, Labour and the Lib Dems (plus David Cameron ^.^ ) are the ones pushing CO2 reductions and were it not a coalition government it is likely that we too would by now have pulled out.
Dung: do you really think that, if a Cameron-led Tory party had won the last election outright, we would have pulled out of Kyoto? I think not. The UK's policy on renewables extends across the political class, not least in the Tory party - see the Letwin comment I quote above and consider the likes of Yeo etc. Some may feel obliged to take up the White Man's Burden and others want to keep their noses in a well-filled trough. But the result is the same: more wind turbines.
That's just too good a windfall for the U.S. They need to crash and crash badly, in the hope its citizenry will wake up to the fact that its own government are parasites who have lured them into welfare, security and taxation, in exchange for constant warfare, an oligarch ruling class, a corrupt system of representative democracy and a worthless fiduciary currency.
Miliband is a little Murdoch rent boy. He has no beliefs or ideology.
Mikep
Well said on the irrelevance of political belief to CAGW. There’s still a place on this site and elsewhere for a debate about the politics though, since that’s where the decisions will be made. What’s the point of being right about the science if no politician or mainstream journalist is even aware of the existence of sceptical scientific debate?
Rhoda’s analysis says it all. Some of us on the left have been commenting on climate threads at leftwing sites, eg
http://www.newstatesman.com/sci-tech/sci-tech/2012/12/brian-cox-and-robin-ince-politicians-must-not-elevate-mere-opinion-over-sc
and
http://www.newleftproject.org/index.php/site/blog_comments/climate_change_and_the_left
GIven that they’ve nailed their colours to the CAGW mast, it’s astonishing how little people on the left know about it.
mikep - political affiliation doesn't completely align with ones view of AGW, after all I would say one of the early and most eloquent sceptics was Prof. Philip Stott and he has always been a person of the left as far as I am aware. Some folks may argue a political point on here, but all are welcome as far as I can see and The Bish ensures we remain respectful - well most of the time.
BUT - those who espouse the AGW and especially the CAGW mantra often have a left-wing political objective which only views climate scientists as useful idiots - there is of course a certain overlap in the two groups and this synergy leads to some rabid and often hugely inaccurate statements, as well as calls to have us sceptics put in prison etc. The same group were offering the same way forward during the 70's "next ice age is coming" saga. For them, it is not about the science at all.
As Mark Twain said - "if you don't read a newspaper you are ill-informed and if you do read a newspaper you are mis-informed" - the latter is certainly true about the Guardian's coverage of Climate.
On the subject of who did what to whom as far as recessions are concerned I bow to your greater knowledge of the economics of it - I'm only a scientist who lived through it all. I certainly didn't support all that Thatcher's government did, but I always laugh at the assertion, put out by many on the left that Thatcher ruined UK manufacturing. The people of the country, top to bottom and its politicians (both colours) had done for our manufacturing long before Mrs T. Her government made mistakes but largely bowed to the inevitable. I lived in the Midlands in the 70's and saw militant unionism and very poor management up close - all coupled to a lack of investment.
As far as the current recession is concerned - NuLab didn't trigger it they just left us so exposed financially as a country, and as a people that we may never recover. In 1997 we were governed by the unloved and boring Major government who were not spending enough on Education or the NHS, but they were running a country living within its means - a bit unfashionable now amongst politicians. From 2000 on NuLab had a rush of something smelly to the brain and believed it could go on for ever - it never has and it never will. The current recession is a direct result of NuLabs' overspending (50% increase above inflation in a decade), together with capital spending put on the PFI credit card with a large APR to be paid off by my grandchildren. It is also worth pointing out that 40% of manufacturing jobs were lost after 2000 because of the strength of pound ($2) - you can't just "break glass for manufacturing company" - hard to get back to where we were now the pound is at a more historically sensible level.
Don't get me started on the ConDems. What a nightmare!!!!
geoffchambers - Thank you for the links, especially to the New Statesman. Being a libertarian there is much in the NS that I can agree with, and some that I see as drivel, but that's my problem.
It does look a bit of an uphill struggle getting past the religious belief of some like "EricTheHalf" - lets not get into half of what. He seems to have a closed view and has no intention of using his head to examine the facts. The "science" is settled and anything can be done in the name of the cause seems to be his position.
Is this a change of heart by Prof. Cox? I am sure if you do a search here at BH and GWPF there is a report of a speech he made in the last 18 months where he tows the BBC line, praising "the Climate Wars" TV series which was unlucky to air just before Climategate, but criticising the Ch4 programme "The great GW swindle". There was much steer droppings in the former and only one scientific mistake in the latter.
I am given to quoting Richard Feynman has Prof. Cox does - but Feynman also said (paraphrase) that if you put a theory out there you should give other scientists ALL the data you base the theory on - AND you should give other scientists ALL the data you have that doesn't fit your theory. Surely he should make the point that Climate Science fails on both accounts, rather than ask us to accept what the science is telling us. Can you tell me is he that naive? - or has he not read any of the Climategate emails or The Bish's fine books on the subject?
I thought I had dropped a comment at your second link early on, probably after you pointed us all there, but it doesn't seem to have appeared. I don't think I said anything nasty, but seem to remember saying that too often to remain in any political club (left or right) and certainly any of the main green NGO's you were expected to disengage your brain and tow the party line. As far from the scientific method as you can get. Anyone who had doubts about bio-fuels and bio-mass in general was treated with derision in the FofE and Greenpeace - that is until they changed their mind after 10 years.
Thanks again for the links.
I would also like to align myself with rhoda's comments - absolutely spot on as usual.
Let me fling in my twopennyworth in support of mikep.
Since I was born and brought up on the fringes of the Northumberland coalfield and at least my father's side of the family were all what would be termed "working class" (as then defined!) I think I've got a reasonable perspective on the subject.
I doubt that the Labour party my grandfather voted for would have been suckered into the idea that 300 years of coal should be left in the ground simply because some middle-class intellectuals with, as he would have said, more money than sense fantasised about some Utopian world where nobody ever got their hands dirty.
We are talking about the philosophical descendants of Shaw, Stopes and the Webbs here — the Hampstead intellectual elite who have given birth to what we might call, since that is the subject of this thread, the 'Miliband Tendency'.
Labour they may be (at a stretch);control freaks they are for certain; left-wing they are not. In fact the traditional political labels have very little meaning even in politics these days. The divide is no longer between Labour on one side of the line (with various fringe mini-parties hanging off its left-hand side) and Conservatives on the other (also with its fringes) but between the inhabitants of the Westminster village and the inhabitants of the real world.
The UK has developed a political oligarchy where the progression is Oxbridge > internship > political adviser > Think Tank > safe seat. In this hot house of ideas (actually the same idea recycled since original thought is dangerous, at least before Think Tank stage) nobody would seriously consider the views of anyone outside the M25 any more than they would consider the views of one of London Zoo's penguins.
Just as the Fabians believed that their mission in life was to save the great unwashed from themselves so the current crop of the self-centred and self-satisfied bourgeoisie are unshakeable in their conviction that they are the chosen ones, their motto being "Don't worry your head about it; we'll look after everything for you."
We can sit here all year arguing about the science and the politics (which, as I have said, is always what is was all really about). They can't hear us because it is just not conceivable that we could be saying anything worth hearing.
But a Happy New Year to you all, anyway ☺
The idea that high spending is the cause of the recession is absurd. Recessions are caused by a fall in spending - in the 2008-09 case the fall in spending came from households and firms because of the credit crunch. Much of the rise in government net spending in this period was the result of the recession not its cause. Tax receipts fell and work- related benefits rose. Austerity policies by this government halted the modest recovery that was taking place in 2010. But I don't really want to argue about these issues here. Let's talk climate science and whether fracking makes good economic sense. I would also appreciate a moratorium on conspiracy theories of the right or left (world government, big oil) which add nothing substantial to the debate. Most people I know are sincere and well-intentioned,which does not mean they are right.
MikeP
Comments are moderated at New Left Review. Yours should appear if it wasn’t rude. Incidentally, the author of the article Alice Bell is not unknown hereabouts, and she refers to BishopHill in terms that might or might not be dismissive (not sure).
No, Cox hasn’t changed his mind since the infamous speech when he called Durkin’s “Great Global Warming Swindle” film “bollocks”. No analysis, no evidence, just a boyish smile and an insult. In the Statesman editorial he’s saying that politicians (and presumably others) who refuse to toe the official line on Climate Change will be “disenfranchised”. (Why? By whom?)
Mike Jackson
That’s why I’ve sent Moonbat back to WalesYour analysis is spot on too, as usual. How long can I go on calling myself a lefty if I’m continually in agreement with you and Rhoda?
http://geoffchambers.wordpress.com/2012/12/31/apocalypse-close-chapter-eight-george-gets-lucky/
I've a pretty muddled perspective on the political spectrum - mainly because the policies are muddled, inconsistent and frankly in many cases irrational. The enacted party policies have been as near identical as make little difference - barring some idiomatic tribal dialect changing a few words. As I think the eminent Sir Humphrey Appleby once pronounced "it doesn't matter which party gets in we're still the government". (happy to be corrected on that quote)
The abysmally low capabilities of our elected representatives and their tail wag dog
constipated bureaucracyexecutive are pretty much what's landed us in the present smorgasbord of assorted pickles that we're up to our armpits in. It takes more gumption than most of the present crop of MPs appear to possess to effect change from policy based evidence making to it's infinitely preferable opposite.To mangle Mark Twain our public servants are both ill-informed and mis-informed... and clearly many are not the sharpest knives in the drawer. To put not too fine a point on it there is a definitely a politically technicolor mob of ideologues who seek to maintain the volume of barracking in public discussion at a level where they feel they are in control. The fracking "debate" is a skirmish in a bigger campaign - tactical - not strategic.
Some confrontation is required - I think the trajectory of fracking channels in some ways the Icelandic volcano flying ban - and Willy Walsh as I understand it launched half the BA fleet at Heathrow in order to precipitate a climbdown by the incompetents.... I don't think David Miliband is foolish enough to misread all signs of the obvious.... is he?
tomo
Aristotle said that democracy inevitably leads to oligarchy, but I think you’ve expressed it better. They’re blinded by opinion polls and focus groups, unable to see that they themselves have determined the answers the polls give. Of course people are in favour of “renewable energy” or “green jobs”. They’ll also be in favour of “energy independence” and lower fuel bills if the politicians bother to explain the facts.The right might just do a U-turn on climate change, since they can dress it up as sound capitalist common sense and freedom from the iron hand of Brussels. The left’s problem is that their entire intellectual base is spellbound by the green message.
I can’t wait to see the responses to the D Miliband speech at Left Foot Forward and the New Statesman.
geoffchambers
Forgive the broad grin! To coin a phrase, some of my best friends are lefties.
I'd forget the label if I were you. I consider it a simple fact of life that the only way to make people better off is to create wealth which makes me a capitalist. This does not mean that I am in favour of unrestricted, unregulated business or markets. Just one example.
In fact most of the people I know are right on this, far right on that, moderately left on the other and a few are extremely left (or right) on most things because somewhere along the line they forgot to line up when critical faculties were handed out.
You can argue, if you like, that environmentalists tend to be "left" but then you have to explain Porritt and Goldsmith. True environmentalists, like true Socialists, actually tend to be puritans. They see Marx (Groucho)'s jibe "if you don't like my principles I have others" as something to be automatically shuddered at rather than laughed at. Those of us more tainted by what you might call cynicism but we call realism would simply argue that this is not Utopia and you live with the world as it is even as you try to improve it.
I would bet you and I would agree about more than we would disagree about.
The idea that high spending is the cause of the recession is absurd. Recessions are caused by a fall in spending - in the 2008-09 case the fall in spending came from households and firms because of the credit crunch.
What you are missing is the credit bubble that created the housing bubble in the first place. Recessions are caused when government institutions and government protected corporations are allowed to create purchasing power out of thin air. This misleads investors and causes them to invest in areas that never should have seen capital accumulation in the first place. And when the unsustainable trends in credit formation are no longer possible and reverse you have a crisis.
Much of the rise in government net spending in this period was the result of the recession not its cause.
This is not true. Governments have been spending too much for decades as they have robbed workers and investors of earnings honestly gained and diverted those revenues into unproductive uses.
Tax receipts fell and work- related benefits rose. Austerity policies by this government halted the modest recovery that was taking place in 2010.
What austerity policies? Most governments increased spending above previous levels and the only 'cuts' came from the imagined comparisons to baseline budgets that would have had spending increase even more.
But I don't really want to argue about these issues here.
But you should. It is clear that your understanding of economics is deficient because you are making the discredited Keynesian arguments that created the problems that we now face. If you want to see reality as it is and learn about real world economics you have to move away from the Keynesians and the neo-Keynesians and move on to the people that predicted everything that would happen and explained why it had to happen in the first place. Government is not the solution. It is the problem.
Let's talk climate science and whether fracking makes good economic sense. I would also appreciate a moratorium on conspiracy theories of the right or left (world government, big oil) which add nothing substantial to the debate. Most people I know are sincere and well-intentioned,which does not mean they are right.
By all means we should look at the actual science and the actual economics. The problem is that there is so much money at stake that the proponents of both AGW and shale drilling are not willing to discuss the issues as they are. While the environmentalists are clearly wrong about fracking the promoters are wrong about the economics of shale production. Both need a dose of reality.
@Dec 31, 2012 at 2:45 AM | shub
Miliband D, whilst Foreign Secretary, pissed off India, Russia, Israel & Sri Lanka. Whilst I knew Mandelson was sent to India, I didn't know he too was in effect kicked out. Miliband D's arrogance is legendary, and his Russian counterpart was so incensed that he used the word "fucking" in a phone call to him. A lot of Labour people say Miliband D is a great politician, but his record in office is appalling. The FCO shambles I recount above, but at DEFRA the last Foot & Mouth disease outbreak occurred, as he refused funds to improve the waste disposal system at the labs from which it escaped - in waste. He also failed to do anything about the Rural Payments (EU) scheme, which his predecessor Beckett so fucked up(resulting in the bankruptcy of some farmers and a couple of suicides I believe).But then, all country folk know that Labour don't give a flying duck about those who feed the country. We, in turn, loath them.
geoffchambers - I think it was me your reply was aimed at, well my ears were burning anyway.
I don't believe I was rude over at New Left Review but I guess I was off Alice's message. It is just another false "we are being open-minded construct. I just said (I think) that it was sad that in a political or scientific arena you couldn't express a view which you saw as helpful to the general discussion and get a well argued rebuttal back. The cause,left or right, sceptic or warmist - ( although the left and warmists seems worse at this - could be my prejudice though) decides what you can think and what you can say. And it doesn't like those who try to argue a point. You see it with EricTheHalf, and I found it with most of the AGW websites 10 years ago. The level of vitriol is amazing.
Thanks - I thought I was perhaps the only one who thought the pop star was an un-reconstructed member of the "I accept the consensus tendency". He is a great disappointment, but perhaps he is happy to take the money that he wouldn't get as a sceptic.
The fact that he quotes Feynman as support for his position is disgraceful IMHO.
mikep - perhaps it was your reply that made my ears burn. I know you say you are an economist, but your suggestion that recessions occur when spending falls is like saying people asphyxiate when the oxygen runs out. You economists pour scorn on the suggestion that running your family's finances are anything similar to running a country, but actually the similarities are in truth ( IMHO ) greater than the differences.
Of course you are right in what you say - re falling tax revenues etc. There is no doubt that half the deficit is made up of these factors, but they are just effect not really cause. The deficit was being funded by borrowing before the crunch - not exactly Keynsian is it?Y ou refer to the credit crunch - in other words we couldn't sustain the level of spending because we couldn't borrow the money. The banking crisis was not helpful, but you should know that much of the costs of that are off-balance sheet. Mrs Balls gave the game away early in the crisis when she told us without a trace of irony that the government was going to force banks to lend at 2006/7 levels. As Paxman asked her - isn't that level of lending part of the problem and of course it was. The whole boom was fed on borrowing, government and personal.
NuLab borrowed in the good years and that left little room for sensible borrowing when the "crunch" came. At least half the deficit is not sustainable. Also the fact that the citizenry had borrowed the extra 10% of their earnings taken off them by Gordon Brown leaves many people with huge debts - ask Citizens Advice Bureau.
We should all be Austrians now. - sorry I suppose that will make you unhappy mike.
I wish everyone a great 2013, although my much better half says I get more like Victor Meldrew everyday and she is rarely wrong.
Vangel - I agree entirely with your view of the real world economics. Your comments are much better stated than mine - thank you.
Jan 1, 2013 at 12:34 PM | geoffchambers
Thanks for mentioning Alice Bell's new (and "experimental") blog at the "New Left Project" - link. Interesting. You may be right that, despite having "nailed their colours to the CAGW mast", people on the left know little about it. But Alice's blog doesn't provide much evidence to support that. And that's not because the discussion has been well informed but because there's hardly been any discussion. Only 11 comments so far - and most of those from sceptics.
Who is Alice Bell?
jferguson: http://alicerosebell.wordpress.com/about/
Does anyone have an explanation for warmist blogs not seeing much action? Apart from the self congratulatory "because nobody really believes that stuff".
I have one suggestion; most people are just not interested but those who are interested soon read enough to convince them that CAGW is a scam.
Richard Drake
quote "He is thinking about the energy security angle..."
More likely thinking about his hip pocket. Though it could also be said that he senses a change in the wind. This would indicate some smarts about the man that he can at least see this as perhaps sensible, or opportunistic. I'm not sure which is taking precedence.
Who is Alice Bell? asks jferguson.
URL, responds Robin Guenier; and at that URL I read "How the refrigerator got its hum" and learned quite a bit about Alice through the looking glass she holds up there.
An interesting lady, and not one to be dismissed as she puzzles things for her readers.
Well, Roger, it seems she was the best candidate the New Left Project could find for its new climate change editor. Geoff Chambers may be right.
Alice Bell fans can hear her in full cry at the Guardian/Greenpeace debate at
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/25860873
For those who have difficulty keeping up with her delivery, it’s transcribed at
https://sites.google.com/site/mytranscriptbox/home/20121002_bf
sample:
From geoffchambers quote from Alice Bell: "Many in the field are defensive for very good reasons - email hacks, undercover cops, there's just a desire for everyone to go away and let you work on something on your own in some peace and quiet for a bit."
The problem is they will not go off on their own, Miss Alice.
My advice to you is to return to you blog and do more humming refrigerators and the like. There, you intrigued, interested, and made me think; whereas in the quote above you become just one of the boring many speaking in tongues; aka opening your mouth and self-applauding whatever comes out that gets a cheer of admiration.
I had asked about Alice and who she might be in the sense that she already was known to many of the other readers here, but not yet to some of us in the colonies. Maybe not.
She is clearly very bright, writes in wonderful way, and may be susceptible to doubt. If so, her gradual realization that our understanding of "the heating" is not the simple consensual belief she had accepted could be quite interesting to follow.
Her dip into these waters could be very helpful.
I was prepared to take Alice at the face value of her intro at New Left Project, having been pointed there by Geoff Chambers a few weeks back.
So Robin Guenier notes only 11 comments - how many did she delete? Perhaps only mine.
I suppose I was a naughty boy thinking back, because I flagged that I wasn't really "left". The point I made, as detailed in a previous comment above, was that if you were left, for example, you would have to see no wrong in the stupidity that was NuLab spending (borrowing) money we don't have (and even worse probably never will). I should have known from talking to Labour voting friends (yes I do have some) that this is sacrilege. Despite being vaguely libertarian right, I am quick to criticise the right for their stupidity, of which there has been much in recent times. It was the lack of open-mindedness that I saw as a problem. I judge on the merits (and usually facts) not on whether it is left or right.
I did go on to make a few short opening remarks about the lack of warming despite huge emissions of CO2 and how far from prediction current temperatures were etc etc..
So I think it is a blog for lefties to discuss climate change and I disqualified myself. sackcloth and ashes - head hung in shame David. There are plenty of good minds from the left on here and I will leave you guys to fight the good fight.
I would be hugely surprised if it turned out to be anything but a "see we are being open-minded" exercise. I don't think they expected lefties to turn up with a sceptical view. After all anyone who is left is automatically a good person and should believe in saving the planet. Us on the right have to work harder to prove we are not nasty people.
Perhaps I'm wrong - Mrs Retired says I often am.
Geoff/Roger/jferguson/Dave: in an attempt to get a "conversation" started, I've posted a lengthy comment on Alice's site.
@ Robin Guenier
Thank you for the link to Alice's site and your comments, Robin.
I applaud what you are doing, but will not join in.
Global Warmimng fatigue has set in, so I'll just stay with the Bishop and Watts Up.
I realize the USA's natural gas prices are likely to increase from current very low levels as the industry shakes out, increases LNG exports etc. but still..... there are signs of a variety of economic benefits to various steel, manufacturing, and chemical businesses etc. due to the opportunity to lock in long term energy deals now with low natural gas prices. So far the economies of UK/Europe seem to be ignoring and missing out on these kinds of opportunities!! Ignorant politicians and bureaucrats need to become better informed quickly:
Shale-gas revolution spurs wave of new U.S. steel plants