National and climate change

Written By: - Date published: 5:20 pm, September 6th, 2007 - 14 comments
Categories: climate change, national - Tags: ,

english-fart-tax.jpg

Greenpeace seems strangely surprised at John Key’s statement that George Bush and John Howard are “going in the right direction” on climate change and his refusal to criticise them for not signing up to Kyoto.

Here’s Greenpeace executive director Bunny McDiarmid:

John Key’s support for John Howard and George Bush’s stance on climate change is nothing short of frightening… These are the two leaders who are doing their best to derail the Kyoto process at APEC, in order to avoid taking real action on climate change.

Bush and Howard first denied climate change was even an issue, and have since fought tooth and nail to avoid taking any responsibility for it. To say they are heading in the right direction is just wrong.

For John Key to support this stance makes a complete mockery of his previous claim that his party takes climate change very seriously.

Bunny’s mistake is to assume that National ever took climate change seriously. Surely he’d remember it was National who led the idiotic campaign against the so-called ‘fart tax’, and it was National who campaigned against Kyoto in the 2005 election.

Even the newly repackaged John Key said climate change was a hoax before he realised this would hurt his electoral chances:

“This a complete and utter hoax, if I may say so. The impact of the Kyoto Protocol, even if one believes in global warming and – I am somewhat suspicious of it – is that we will see billions and billions of dollars poured into fixing something that we are not even sure is a problem.”

One thing is clear: When John Key says National is serious about climate change, he’s just telling you whatever it takes to get elected. As yesterday’s comments show, his real views lie a lot closer to those of his ideological brethren, John Howard and George Bush. So why does anyone take him or his party seriously?

Image: Scoop.co.nz

14 comments on “National and climate change ”

  • Comments are now closed

  1. thomas 1
    6 September 2007 at 5:35 pm

    At last a blog I can read
    cheers guys
    thomas

  2. all_your_base 2
    6 September 2007 at 5:56 pm

    for just one moment
    i thought we might have our first
    comment as haiku

  3. tom-tom 3
    6 September 2007 at 8:07 pm

    Keep this photograph in circulation please – it’s a good reminder of the idiocy that English and his hot-headed Fed-friendly gnats indulged in over the ‘fart-tax’ farce. When the Feds and farmers call now for ‘more money for research into emmissions from pasture and animals’,that is the time to remind them of their past stupidities and wave this image in front of them. Not very polite, Mr English.

  4. sweetd 4
    7 September 2007 at 12:56 am

    Hmmm tom-tom, your science for climate change is looking more dodgy day by day. Care to respond to the revisit on the climate change data bg NASA?

    I think you should keep the photograph as well, as it shows where most of NZ’s wealth comes from; the farm.

  5. tom-tom 5
    7 September 2007 at 10:56 am

    sweetd – farmers are under pressure from their markets to demonstrate clean production or risk a diminished market. Farmers are well aware of this and are looking to mitigate the emissions their farms create through nutrient budgeting, nitrification inhibitors etc. They need money for research. They would have had all they needed through the initiative they stupidly rebranded the ‘fart-tax’. They may have no belief in climate change at all, but it doesn’t matter now, the markets are king. As to the photograph – it is not showing ‘where most of New Zealand’s wealth comes from; the farm.’ it is taken at the Beehive and shows a senior Nat politician slagging off.

  6. Sam Dixon 6
    7 September 2007 at 11:29 am

    climate change, another National ‘innoculation’.. they haven’t changed or seen the light, they want us to forget who they are and what they really stnad for… exactly the same reason they will never talk aobut wat their own policies are.

    sweetd-
    climate change is so last century. In fact, its about 20 years out of date. Most of the world’s governments, incluidng the US, Europe, Australia, signed the Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1992 – and that only happened, of course, long after the scientific argument was settled.

    Only the scientifically illiterate and those who interests was at sake (ie National supporter types) oppose action against climate change with those pathetic arguments ‘its not real’, ‘its not man-made’, ‘it doesn’t matter’, ‘we can’t do anything about it’ – its hilarious to watch a denier be gradually forced back through them.

  7. Sam Dixon 7
    7 September 2007 at 12:16 pm

    The great thing about that ‘The Mad Cow Shouldn’t Have Signed’ poster is that it was Jenny Shipley who signed us on to Kyoto.

  8. AncientGeek 8
    7 September 2007 at 12:24 pm

    Basically the Nats are just scientifically illiterate, and very short-term thinkers (anyone who looks at NZ history can see that).

    The science behind climate change was clear when I was doing an earth science degree in the 1970’s. The puzzling problem was the lack of evidence at that time. At that time we were worried about cooling temperature in the northern hemisphere.

    Of course, eventually they managed to partially clean up the pollution in europe and america by putting cleaners in the smokestacks tossing dust up. The cloud cover reduced and the expected effect started to be visible.

    Meanwhile we’d managed to get reliable data from the southern hemisphere, and satellite tech improved for wide area scans. That showed a much clearer picture. We also managed to get better information about the buffers, like the acidification of the oceans from CO2 assimilation.

    The IPCC has been doing the conservative projections (as they should), and generally lagging the science by about a decade until each piece of evidence is unambiguous. Each release of their projections shows a fine-tuning, and in only one direction. The anticipated effect is bigger and earlier each time.

    The debate these days is about the scale of economic effect. This is effectively unknown because it depends on a number of unclear issues. For instance, exactly when we lose some of the icesheets (not if), causing sea level rise. Also exactly what some of the changes do to ocean circulation patterns, therefore impacting local climates – especially important to mid-term agriculture.

    In my opinion, the Nat’s (and most conservatives) seemed to have given up reading since their teens. They prefer to lag the IPCC in their opinions, which means that they are probably about 20 years behind the science.

    Of course this fits their usual pattern. Lets hope that the problems don’t occur in our lifetime. Its the kids problem, not ours.

    I think that we’re likely to see considerable effects in my lifetime (and I’m pretty ancient).

    Cheers

  9. Robinson 9
    7 September 2007 at 12:52 pm

    Y’know – when you meet Bill English in person his head is actually surprisingly cubic.

  10. tom-tom 10
    7 September 2007 at 1:12 pm

    English writes a regularly dull opinion piece for the local newspaper in one of his Clutha/Southland rural towns and uses it to ‘dog whistle’ to the true blue. In the latest column, he signals to the faithful that ‘his’ government will continue to mine and burn Southland’s lignite. ‘Renewable energy is great, but…’ Mr Bill English Western Star newspaper August 2007

  12. Nick 12
    7 September 2007 at 2:40 pm

    There’s no farmers on a dead planet sweetd.

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