Bishop Hill Building a crony capitalist society
Feb 23, 2015 Energy: other Greens A few days ago I noted the comments of the UNFCCC's Christiana Figueres about the UN's desire to transform the basis of daily economic life:
This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for the, at least, 150 years, since the industrial revolution.
I couldn't help but think of this when considering a couple of developments on the underground coal gasification front over the weekend. Firstly was the news that a successful UCG pilot plant in Queensland is to be closed down after legislators decided that they didn't want to deal with the flak from environmentalists. The second is the vigorous attempts by greens to prevent UCG getting off the ground in Scotland, with enormous pressure being applied to Holyrood politicians to slam on the brakes.
This is very much a transformation of the economic development model that has been reigning for 150 years. For most of that time, if you wanted to start a new industrial business you started it. Now it is necessary to suck up to politicians and to buy off the environmentalists first. Free markets are replaced by crony capitalism and protection rackets.
You can see why UN bureaucrats would be in favour.
Reader Comments (50)
Just checked and neither the Scotsman nor the Glasgow Herald have run with the story of Pachauri even though he's shortly coming to Scotland to meet the minister of jelly fish or whatever.
The whole Scottish establishment are corrupt!! CORRUPT! CORRUPT!
About a week ago someone mentioned a "fast response" group. I'd like to kick around a few ideas like that.
"This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for the, at least, 150 years, since the industrial revolution."
I rather think communism and probably a whole other number of isms tried and failed before now. Consumerism has been used with good results since prehistoric times. Things go badly when our 'betters' disrupt it for no good reason.
So on planet Figueres presumably we'll still be able to have some freedom of speech. But not freedom to actually do anything her and her mates say we shouldn't. At least she's open about it.
She does around 250000 air miles a year as far as I can tell. Does anyone have any idea which governments mandated the UN "...to change the economic development model that has been reigning for the, at least, 150 years, since the industrial revolution."
Here we go. Back to the agrarian economy, so that Charlie W. and his (international) mates can have their feudal system back. They always hated people making a living without their permission. But then it always was a protection racket, at least until the 19th century.
How does Ms Figueres and these largely unelected officials intend feeding the 9 billion people on this planet by 2050? Hydrocarbons do far more than fuelling the private diplomatic jets.
I wonder if Cast Iron Dave is in favour of an undemocratic communist world Government? Which other party leaders are? Ed and Nick would be, so LibLab are. We know that Green Natalie is. Nigel is the only one not in favour of an undemocratic communist world Government.
Crony Capitalism? Never
Al Gore with his condo by the see, his mansion and cruise ship are well deserved for saving the planet.
Jim Hansen and Wife plus the Hollywood celebrities flying first class to stop everyone travelling by evil fossil fueled planes. Only those saving the planet should be allowed to fly!
The BBC using public money to promulgate the CAGW message and demanding more for their gold-plated pensions. Sending hundreds of represenattives to the Climate Change conference is a price the BBC is willing to make - after all the public pay the £3,500 M each year by law.
Increasing fuel poverty and people dying of the cold is a price the middle class greens are willing to make. We are saving the planet so if a few poor people die so what, think of the children!
"the economic development model that has been reigning for 150 years"
Has she stopped to consider why that might be?
That's be UNFair Climate Crony Communisim then ... UNFCCC.
The UNFCCC is just a bunch of professional liars whose dishonesty is endorsed by the United Nations. It was established because Maurice Strong pushed hard for the conference, as he did with the 1972 Stockholm Summit that resulted in the establishment of the UNEP, with himself as its first director.
Following the UNEP's creation it engaged the ICSU to undertake climate work and it was Bert Bolin who led most of that work, perhaps selected because since 1958 he'd been claiming that CO2 would cause dangerous warming. The ICSU's reports to the UNEP weren't reviewed by any external experts prior to handing them to the UNEP, so methinks the reports told the UNEP what it wanted to hear, and that led to the establishement of the IPCC with the UNEP as co-sponsor and Bert Bolin as first IPCC chairman..
If the reports are correct, when Maurice Strong pushed for the establishment of the UNFCCC at the Rio conference of 1992 he wanted it answerable to the UNEP, which at that time had Mostafa Tolba in charge, but the UNFCCC was made to be answerable to the UN Secretariat.
UN climate work has been rotten to the core since 1972 and Figueres continues that pattern.
"...the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task..."
One it tempted to channel Tonto again: "Who is this "we", white man?"
The tumbrils await, I hope...
"How does Ms Figueres and these largely unelected officials intend feeding the 9 billion people on this planet by 2050?"
Feb 23, 2015 at 9:30 AM | Trefor Jones
She doesn't. Most of them will have to go (to provide a blood sacrifice, a popular practice before the enlightenment). In any case, under the system they want, we are just their property, to dispose of as they wish. Back to the future! They probably hate Adam Smith.
The Luddites have taken over.
Scotland is a perfect destination for Pachauri.
Look up SACL, Scotland Against Crooked Lawyers.
The evidence shows that Cameron was at the heart of these new UN plans and has rushed to show his major attribute (leading the world over the nearest cliff) by immediately signing a deal with Cloggs and Millipede to find the nearest cliff as an urgent priority whichever party/parties are governing after the election.
I have read through the responsibilities of a UK Prime Minister and they do not include saving the planet or doing the bidding of the UN or the EU; he is way outside his job description.
Scotland is a perfect destination for Pachauri.
Look up SACL, Scotland Against Crooked Lawyers.
Feb 23, 2015 at 11:02 AM | Unregistered CommenterSwiss Bob
Bad as Scotland is, the 1.2 square miles central to policy is manifold superior
http://www.newstatesman.com/economy/2011/02/london-corporation-city
Reality is not going to change. The recent BP, ExxonMobile and last year's IEA World Energy Outlook 2014 reports makes it clear that Gas, Oil & Coal are growing significantly in production and will be with us well into the second part of this century. l don't see this changing even if something more practical comes along.
Leftist rantings are not going to change reality. Only countries that choose economic suicide and energy poverty need do so.
At least she is overt about it - she wants to change an economic model that has underpinned an increase in life expectancy from 31 years in 1900 to 67 in 2010, to go back to one that saw no increase in two millennia.
Another indication that we're entering the pre-chaos phase of the West's move into totalitarian government. The long history of the struggle for freedom has mostly been lost. Just trying to count the number of pages the Western governments have produced, much less "Executive Orders" is a daunting task. Think about that next time you see the windmills not spinning.
Christiana Figueres on Bloomberg TV a year ago, on the advantages of not being very democratic:
https://sites.google.com/site/mytranscriptbox/home/20140113_cf
The lady used to work with Lord Stern and had her own version of economic development:
http://www.ideacarbon.com/download.cfm/docid/8196BB40-945E-4B64-A4674983EDC6A69E
The Carbon Rating Agency (CRA) was conceived by Shandi Modi in 2007.
"The Carbon Rating Agency enlisted Lord Stern as an advisor, Ian Johnson (then VP of sustainable development at the World Bank) as co founder and Christiana Figueres as Vice Chair (now head of UNFCCC), and recruited Nitin Desai from India, Paul Ezekiel (former hear of Carbon trading at Credit Suisse), Mr. Neil Eckert (Former CEO of Climate Exchange Plc). This group has guided the development of a set of products and services which are necessary for climate finance to scale up and become mainstream."
The links and associations described at the SPPI link below were correct at the time of writing, but some may have changed, eg I think Lord Stern has distanced himself from Idea Carbon, but probably still advises HSBC. Ian Johnson is a senior figure in Globe International, of which Gummer/Deben is president. Johnson is also former General Secretary to the Club of Rome, http://www.clubofrome.org/?p=946
There is more detail of Figueres background, including her boast that she was trained by Al Gore to deliver his "Inconvenient truth".
http://sppiblog.org/news/a-nest-of-carbon-vipers
Just say no -- en masse and often. And I'm telling you seriously, damn it.
Politicians have to meddle. That is their sole raison d'être.
Dennis
"trained by Al Gore"
In which case, I almost feel sorry for her...
Appeal to save Malthusian Theory
For years, Malthusians have forecast the destruction of mankind , through increased population densities. Wars, famine, drought, disease and inadequate medical aid have helped postpone the inevitable outcome, but most frustrating of all, has been mankinds ingenuity, in inreasing life expectancy.
This must end now, to save the credibility of Malthusians.
Send your support to the United Nations, via the IPCC, now.
We can all make a start now by raising infant mortality rates, to those of 150 years ago. Remember, a death in time, saves nine deaths later.
As a citizen of former east-european socialist country, I feel an urge to point out that we have already thoroughly tested the economic model UN is trying to establish. So UN is definitely not the first in this field.
The test was 40 years long and in the end, our leading party has given up its power voluntarily to allow economy to find its own way out of the misery where it ended up thanks to 40 years of centrally planned development. And 25 years since then we're still recovering and trying to catch up with "western" world.
The one thing I must admit is that while we were neck-deep in the communist sludge, many of us didn't realize how bad things are. Only those few who were allowed to travel to more successful countries were able to compare. If whole world throws itself there again, there will be nobody to compare with.
"Only those saving the planet should be allowed to fly!" Feb 23, 2015 at 9:35 AM | CharmingQuark
Exactly so, like John Prescott for example.....
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2720903/Prescott-flies-40-000-miles-s-nearly-twice-world-five-months-lecture-climate-change.html
Or the man of the moment:
http://www.ipcc.ch/meetings/session29/doc7-add1.pdf
Dr Rajendra Pachauri flew at least 443,243 miles on IPCC business in a 19 month period.
He met with many Heads of State and AGW luminaries including such as Sir Crispin Tickell, Professor Stephen Schneider, Lord Stern, Professor John Schellnhuber, Ban Ki Moon, Kofi Annan, Tony Blair, Al Gore, Nancy Pelosi and Prince Charles amongst many. He attended presentations and honorary degree ceremonies and his own book launch, (funded by BP). He liked to attend Clinton Global Initative meetings, Rockefeller Foundation and Brookings Institute events.
The Cricketer:
"So strong is his love for cricket that his colleagues recall the time the Nobel winner took a break during a seminar in New York and flew in to Delhi over the weekend to attend a practice session for a match before flying back. Again, he flew in for a day, just to play that match."
http://archive.indianexpress.com/news/heat-on-cricket-pitch-warms-this-climate-change-laureate/231802/0
Bishop Hill wrote:
I don't see the connection. What Figueres is talking about is not cronyism and crony capitalists will exist so long as there are politicians with power to wield and a price they will accept to wield it.
In Figueres' economy there would be no sucking up to politicians nor buying off environmentalists. The tithe to the green religion would be baked into every economic transaction. Figueres is talking about the social cost of carbon, natural capital, ecosystem services stuff. Bureaucrats putting an arbitrary price on human existence and the riches of the natural world, which they have no authority or expertise to do.
Handily for these progressive itching to reshape how the global economy works, all that would provide tax revenues and the distribution of wealth they crave (so they can skim a comfortable living and reputation off it).
as Kasuha (Feb 23, 2015 at 2:22 PM) points out, Figueres is speaking to and for the Old Western World ...
the whole of SE Asia, plus India are laughing at such idiocy ... but they will "go along" as long as it does not do them any economic, and thus social damage ...
they have been too poor and too hungry for too long, and they know better ...
we, on the other hand, have to undergo these Big Green nitwits for (imho) at least another 10 to 15 years longer ...
Gareth
"they have no authority or expertise to do."
The same applies to Cameron! He chaired the High Level UN Panel which decided the new targets after the RIO targets expired.
Cameron has no more idea than my Grandmother what factors influence climate (and my grandmother is unfortunately long gone). Not only that but he is going against the oaths he swore as an MP. All his decisions must be in the best interests of the country and its population. In addition he should not be influenced by organisations external to the UK.
Did it not occur to Cameron that chairing such a Committee was just a little odd? It certainly must have occurred to the UN that Cameron was a green follower, was kept on message by his wife, was a very influential world leader and was desperate to be seen to lead the world (in any direction as long as he was leading).
It's all part of the slow inexorable decline of the West. If globalisation is to be about crony capitalism, clearly the despots and tyrants will be far better at it than the flabby liberals we tend to elect. Though I have to admit if there's a free market in kissing legislative *rse to get a raise or a grant, we are global leaders.
This morning (9 am, 23 February, Calgary, Alberta) I listened to a Canadian Broadcast Corporation (CBC) talk programme on which carbon sequestration was discussed. There is a large plant in Saskatchewan that is touted world-wide for using a commercially successful technology to pull CO2 out of coal-powered powerplant emissions. A spokesperson for the Sierra Club was on and roundly criticized the operation. His objection was that the CO2 was being reinjected into the old oilfields (Weyburn) as a way to recover more oil, part of an enhanced recovery scheme. And he was right. He agreed the operation was good, but objected because the CO2 was going to, ultimately, stay in the ground, was not important as it was being used to increase or at least continue oil production.
The Green objection will be forever against anything that encourages, condones or extends the use of fossil fuel. Emission control is not the Green target but the de-carbonization of our society, the de-capital-market-ization of our economy and the de-consumption mentality of our population. (And the de-population of our population, actually.) Everything else is a distraction from their focus, a detail that is irrelevant in the larger picture.
Truth is, CO2 capture and "storage" anywhere that does not use the energy of (compressed) CO2 to make profits elsewhere will suffer huge economic problems. CCS is a money-maker if it can be accessed and used at a cost less than the profit realized from increased oil production. You watch what the UK will be doing: grabbing CO2 and injecting it into the North Sea oil fields. Those fields are declining some 8% per year, year after year. CO2 injection will not only stop the decline but reverse it.
Look to CO2 capture from coal burning plants proximal to pipelines to offshore production or LNG equivalent compression and transport facilities. All the CO2 capture will be subsidized, the end-product will be sold to the oil companies at a "fair market price" that ignores the extra costs of CO2 capture, and then injected into the old fields. Additional revenue from the oil - including reduced trade deficits via oil purchases from abroad - will then "pay for" the subsidies. Of course the subsidies won't be stopped, but in theory the net result will be positive for the consumer ... while in reality they will be positive only for the investor in the oil firms.
Thus it goes.
The greenies I know , an awfully large number of ostensibly harmless, well-meaning (if not deep-thinking) folk, were condemning CCS from the minute they heard of it, for the reasons Doug gave.
I thought, well maybe it will involve some drilling ...
While scanning comments at WUWT
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Leo Smith February 23, 2015 at 1:59 am
” In one of Castenada’s novels there is a story about a young man who left his poor village in Mexico and went to the city to get an education.
On his return to the village years later he found that the villagers were in thrall to a man who had a book, out of which he read long passages. This book it appeared contained all they needed to solve their problems. However the young man noticed that the man was holding the book upside down.
“Your hero is a fraud: He cannot read” he declared “And I can prove it, he is holding the book upside down!”
“What difference does it make, to a man who can read, which way up the book is? ” retorted the man, and the villagers cheered…
The problem is, that when people reject all of science already, a scientific refutation of global warming is (politically) meaningless.
I too have been appalled by the standards of debate over this, and other, issues. I have come to a terrifying conclusion.
Perhaps less than 10% of the population understands science at all, and of that 10% probably less than 10% actually understand the mathematical principles involved in the AGW proposition. And most of those are not in climate science.
This is ultimately both something that has always been the case with science and indeed rational thought, and something that is deeply worrying right now, because we are in a deep crisis as a society and need better understanding than that.
Humanity en masse proceeds along more or less bigoted lines according to the fashionable prejudices of the age. The AGW protagonists understand this: their business is to move the fashionable bigotry along to suit their agenda.
If we step back a minute and regard the implications of what I propose to be the case, they are these: The vast majority of humanity is incapable for one reason or another of understanding the science and technology that forms the backdrop to their lives. And in a democracy that means they are more or less unfit to vote on matters that affect it.
A small minority of ‘movers and shakers’ – and these days they are (to borrow Jilly Coopers terminology) the ‘Tellystocracy’ , the media luvvies and those who use mass media to ‘inform’ public debate – are the ones who count. They are the new elite, the new lords and masters of the brave new world, and it is this group that has been so thoroughly targeted and infiltrated by all and any group with a political or commercial axe to grind. It doesn’t matter what some obscure group of scientists believe, or what the mass of people believe, what matters is what this group do in terms of forming (rather than informing) public opinion.
This group then are by and large the group that actually carries out political change. They are in charge of the fashionable bigotry that comprises what we have come to know and love as political correctness. That vast and loosely affiliated propaganda machine that tells us what to think about, and what to think about it.
What we need to do if we are to introduce truth into this tissue of lies and deceit, is to make the case to the media/political luvvies that in fact their particular brand of bigotry is deeply dangerous to themselves as a class.
In the case of AGW we have two main avenues through which this is happening.
First of all the man in the street is getting fed up with falling standards of living, and his winters seeming just as cold wet and miserable as the summers are, despite claims it was the warmest year on record.
Secondly the more astute members of the tellystocracy are becoming aware that infrastructure is for everyone, and that includes them. Victorian sewers were to protect the elite of the day from disease, by eliminating it from the great unwashed. This is a potent line of attack – Wind turbines and solar panels become not source of individual profit, but a disaster for all including those that profit from them.
Ultimately the game is this: Science in its broadest terms is nothing more and nothing less than a means of predicting the future. Science says if we do this or that, the other will happen. The complex mathematical laws we deduce, infer or discover (according to your metaphysical picture of what Laws are) have no justification beyond the fact that they work, and what they say will come to pass, comes to pass, mostly.
Science that fails to predict anything is untestable, and if it fails to produce the result that reality provides, it’s junk science or no science at all. You can summarise this by saying that in the long term reality trumps bullshit.
Ultimately AGW either produces correct predictions or its junk, It’s looking to be junk. However that doesn’t stop people believing in it because it’s fashionable bigotry. But here we invoke Darwin. Societies that fail to realise what reality is, and cling to fashionable bigotry, will suffer accordingly. There are signs that the whole West will in fact ultimately collapse in an orgy of self destructive mutual deception and liberal angst. Or perhaps it will wake up and smell the coffee.
And in the end, that is the conundrum. It is true to say that people are reasonably easily led, and that even those that lead them, are themselves subject to fashionable bigotry. That is a fact of life that we have to deal with. In the end we have only one yardstick that works to dispel the fog of Belief In Bullshit and that is Reality herself, and Reality is a hard mistress. If She needs to destroy entire societies that are so infected with irrational bullshit that they can no longer support themselves at all, She will.
I don’t like to get political here, but this is to me the great argument for not having the sort of monolithic world government that the cultural Marxists of the UN and the ‘liberal and social’ democracies seem to espouse. that and we all go down together. Whereas having political islands of national ideologies at least allows for some diversity of political thought, and if the West becomes so decadent not because of Capitalism, but because of Marxism and its descendants itself, that it is in danger of falling to a stronger culture, maybe one of those political islands will have the tools and the strength to resist and prove to have the next line of fashionable bigotry to deal with the new reality.
From my perspective there are two completely different dimensions in play here, and it helps not to confuse them.
There is the technical and scientific reality of the data: that the world ain’t warming any more, never warmed very much, and windmills and solar panels are a complete waste of time and money, and destructive to boot, and if we want to stay alive in the absence of fossil fuel the logical alternative is nuclear power.
That these things are provably and demonstrably true is, however, irrelevant to the second dimension, which is what people think.
Or can be induced to believe. And here there is in fact a world war in progress, World War III. Its not being fought with weapons (much) that kill, directly, but with weapons that corrupt thinking. It is a war of propaganda and competing ideologies, none of which have a particularly strong basis in Reality, because Reality is pretty damned complicated, and its easier to get people to believe in simple stuff. ‘Four legs good – two legs bad’ sort of stuff.
I have to say that I have more or less given up on the science: The jury is in for people to understand the maths and the physics and how real science works. AGW is a crock of shit, and that’s that.
The real game is the war for hearts and minds. And that is a game of psychology, propaganda, money, power, politics, greed, fear, uncertainty and doubt. If we can’t win it, it will in the end destroy Western civilisation, and so it should. If we have no answer for lies, we don’t deserve to make it.
Once we had a system that worked. The brightest and best, and a few of the rich, got excellent educations and were indoctrinated with a culture of care for those less fortunate, and a sense of duty towards the masses. They did what they considered to be right, after duly listening to the problems.
Today that is destroyed by egalitarianism, which ensures that no one at all gets a good education that everyone cannot afford. Except for a very very few – too few – people who espouse state education but manage to avoid it in the case of their children. Worse, they dont educate them into the actualities of science and technology even then, they educate them into the practical techniques of propaganda. We have in short a generation of peole who are highly skilled in the manipulation of public opinion, but no idea how a smart phone works. People ideally placed to control and dominate a society, and take from it all its riches, but without actually having even the most basic understanding of how those riches are created.
Such a situation is dynamically unstable. We, the technologists, are not screaming out for recognition ‘because its unfair’ or ‘because its morally indefensible’. No, we have a much quieter but devastatingly powerful message. “If you don’t take at least some notice of Reality, you will in fact die of ignorance, and likely take us with you”.
*shrug* If they don’t listen, it’s Goodnight Vienna. We wont be the first culture to commit racial suicide in pursuit of idiotic beliefs.”
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dbstealey February 23, 2015 at 2:56 am
Leo Smith, You’re one in a million! Thanks for posting that, I’m in complete agreement. The problem isn’t science; that is 100% on the side of skeptics of MMGW. The problem is human nature. Some people/groups have that figured out, and that’s bad news for the rest of us.
A.D. Everard February 23,2015 at 4:30 am
Leo, your comment should be a post in itself. It should be widely read. This is so much what needs to be understood. Thank you.
George Tetley February 23,2015 at 12:49 am
WOW !!!
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I would like to add my own WOW We have untill December 2015 folks
Spot the difference, the message is continuous and unrelenting.
Gro Harlem Brundtland (Brundtland Report, Agenda 21)
Speaking to the XIX Congress of the Socialist International - “Social Democracy in a Changing World”, 15 -17 September 1992
"At the Rio Conference on Environment and Development (1992) it was made clear that we are heading towards a crisis of uncontrollable dimensions unless we change course.
Securing peace, sustainable development and democracy requires that nations, in their common interest, establish an effective system of global governance and security.
To pursue social justice, freedom and democracy will require that we pool our collective experiences and national sovereignties.
There is no alternative to obligatory coordination of financial and monetary policies."
Lisa Jackson, US EPA Administrator - 20th January 2012
Speaking at the US National Council for Science and the Environment, “National Conference on Environment and Security”
"We have reached a point in human history where everyday activities – from our commerce to our transportation to our recreation – are affecting the health of our entire planet.
As Rio+20, the 20th anniversary of the 1992 Earth Summit, approaches in June, we have a chance to learn lessons, build partnerships and put in place innovative strategies that can reshape the economic and environmental future of our entire planet.
It is the rarest of opportunities to truly change the world, and make a difference that will benefit billions of people.
It means working together to strengthen the effectiveness of environmental governance."
Ban Ki Moon, UN Secretary-General
Speaking to the KPMG Summit:“Business Perspective for Sustainable Growth” - 14 February 2012
"Most of the world’s ecosystems are in decline. We are nearing the point of no return on climate change. You all understand the high stakes -- for jobs, for social justice, for the Millennium Development Goals, for the health of the planet.
Only with your strong support and leadership we can change and shape the world we want and we can make this world better for all."
Christiana Figueres, Chief Executive UNFCCC, February 2015
Speaking to the press
“This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves, which is to intentionally transform the economic development model, for the first time in human history.This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years--since the industrial revolution."
Can anyone answer this:
Why does the world think that there is any value in the opinions of those opposed to all use of "fossil fuels" when it comes to extraction methods of said fuels?
We don't ask Morrissey how to grill a steak.
I have not seen much comment on the proposal that "the total amount of greenhouse gases, expressed in carbon dioxide equivalent, emitted by a Party to the Convention since 1750 A.D. shall be added and divided by the current population of that Party."
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/02/18/the-un-climate-end-game/
The choice of 1750 was surely made specifically with Britain in mind.
Why is it that reading things these ladies say, along with many male bureaucrats, I am reminded of Marie Antoinette and King Louis XVI, especially regarding how they communicate with/to us peasants.
Who are the "we" mentioned in the quotation above? I don't recall any politician in Britain canvassing voters to ask them if they wanted the economic system that has existed since the industrial revolution and which, for all its faults, has brought prosperity to large parts of the world, should be changed?
Doesn't Christiana Figueres believe in democracy? Who on earth gave UNFCCC, whoever they are, the authority to act in such a manner? "Gaia" perhaps?
Philip Neal @6.59: "1750 was surely made specifically with Britain in mind". No - we just happened to be first - the target is all the "old" industrialised nations. This demand obfuscates the fact that those nations emission totals are stabilising and that the "one trillion tons of CO2" (see the 3 NUMBERS on BBC4 next Monday) will only be exceeded by the policies of the developing nations, specifically China and India. The targets have already rejected it. It is a negotiating ploy - a demand to be sacrificed in exchange for e.g. an acceptance of their unlimited emissions to 2025 (which Obama has already agreed!). It remind me of the "Life of Brian" when the Palestine Liberation Front demanded a 9ft tall statue of Caesar with his dick hanging out. Such is the level of the upcoming comedy. Perhaps a revival with "Carry on Climate Change".
Might one request anybody who can see the way to the new socio-economic model which will work better than the current ( and localised) one to show us a working example first? Precautionary principle, doncha know.
Philip Neal (Feb 23, 2015 at 6:59 PM), I'm sure you're right that they had Britain in mind.
Moreover, I suspect this may have been inspired by British politicians, based upon this insight on what some of Cameron’s advisers were thinking just before the last election, which is taken from Levitt and Dubner’s latest book ‘Think Like a Freak’ (p.12-13).
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One gentleman, a once and future cabinet minister, was significantly more senior. He took the floor and told us that, upon election, the Cameron administration would fight global warming tooth and nail. If it were up to him, he said, Britain would become a zero-carbon society overnight. It was, he said, “a matter of the highest moral obligation”.
This made our ears prick up. One thing we’ve learned is that when people, especially politicians, start making decisions based on a reading of their moral compass, facts tend to be amongst the first casualties. We asked the minister what he meant by “moral obligation”.
“If it weren’t for England,” he continued, “the world wouldn’t be in the state it’s in. None of this would have happened.” He gestured upward and outward. The “this,” he implied, meant this room, this building, the city of London, all civilization.
We must have looked puzzled, for he explained further. England, he said, having started the Industrial Revolution, led the rest of the world down the path towards pollution, environmental degradation, and global warming. It was therefore England’s obligation to take the lead in undoing the damage.
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Behind the scenes "fixing". Of course an institutionally corrupt organisation, such as the U.N., loves it.
Bish, you should not let yourself fall into the trap of using Newspeak terminology. Doing so merely serves the needs of those that are forcing this change upon us. "Crony capitaliam" is the Newspeak phrase for fascism. They cannot refer to their collectivist scheme truthfully (because few think fascism is a good thing), so they tar capitalism to throw everyone off the trail. They make it seem as though their failures are really a back-door weakness of capitalism. It is an insidious tactic, but one we are all used to (climate change, anyone?).
Mark
José L. Duarte does not mince words. Will Lewandowsky respond?
http://www.joseduarte.com/blog
Lewandowsky said this:
"NASA Faked the Moon Landing—Therefore (Climate) Science Is a Hoax: An Anatomy of the Motivated Rejection of Science"
...when only three participants out of 1145 in his blog-posted web survey held those two beliefs.
He also said:
"Endorsement of free markets also predicted the rejection of other established scientific findings, such as the facts that HIV causes AIDS and that smoking causes lung cancer."
...when 95% and 96% of free market endorsers agreed that HIV causes AIDS, and that smoking causes lung cancer, respectively.
I think that's going to have to be fraud any day of the week.
‘Who on earth gave UNFCCC, whoever they are, the authority to act in such a manner? "Gaia" perhaps?’.
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It’s easy to forget that the UN was formed just after the end of WW2 with the sole purpose of preventing a repeat performance.
Talk about mission creep.
In her ‘Anthemesque’ dystopia no doubt Sra. Figueres sees herself as a leading member of the nomenklatura.
"We don't ask Morrissey how to grill a steak."
Well perhaps not; but there are people who take seriously the opinions and ranting of creatures like Russell Brand.
So anything is possible, especially when such people gain real power, as it seems they have.
An excellent take on the political depth of Russell Brand and his ilk.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mIL8F53V4yY
@Will Janoschka
Thank you so much for posting the WUWT comment. I think it hits the nail on the head - this is not now about science, it is about politics. Those with a gentlemanly regard for the truth and process of science will be overwhelmed by a tsunami of ignorance, pushed by self-interest and propagated through political ruthlessness worthy of Stalin. Unless they clever-up and fight fire with fire. Speaking Truth to Power only works if Power is already tamed and civilised. The kind of power we are up against is morally decrepit, and psychopathically ambitious. Time to turn Alinsky on his head - why should the Devil have all the best tunes?