Global Political Shenanigans: Political (Climate) Change Propaganda in Australia

In my article “More Climate Change Propaganda in Australia .. ”on 15th April (Note 9) I talked about how Penny Wrong, the Australian Minister for Climate Change, Energy Efficiency and Water, used her political skills to push the UN-sponsored propaganda (Note 10) about catastrophic climate change from our use of fossil fuels. She did this with the whole-hearted support of Australian Premier Kevin Rudd who only five months earlier on 6th November had presented QUOTE: .. one of the strongest statements seen from a Head of Government of a ‘developed’ nation on climate change .. UNQUOTE (Note 1) to The Lowy Institute.

In this lead up to the UN’s COP15 fiasco in Copenhagen Rudd blustered QUOTE: My message to the climate change skeptics, to the big betters and the big risk takers is this:

- You are betting our children’s future and the future of our grandchildren.

- You are betting our jobs, our houses, our farms, our reefs, our economy and our future on an intuition - on a gut feeling; on a political prejudice you have about science.

- That is too big a risk, too radical a departure from the basic conservative principles of public policy.

- Malcolm, Barnaby, Andrew, Janet - stop gambling with our future.

- You’ve got to know when to fold ‘em - and for the skeptics, that time has come.

- The Government I lead will act.

UNQUOTE.

On 29th April, only five months later, following the damning revelations of Climategate and all of the subsequent IPCC-gates, the Brisbane Times reports (Note 2) of Penny Wong that QUOTE: .. the government would not try to legislate the ETS even by its new delayed start year of 2013 unless there is ‘‘credible action’’ by the end of 2012 from countries such as China, India and the US. .. ‘‘We will only [legislate] if there is sufficient international action,’’ ..

When the Coalition proposed the same ‘‘wait and see’’ policy, the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, described it as an ‘‘absolute failure of leadership’‘. Yesterday he said it was ‘‘a reasonable … and responsible course of action’’ in response to slower than expected progress at the United Nations Copenhagen talks UNQUOTE.

So what was then gambling with all aspects of our future now is a responsible course that the Australian Government, under the leadership of Kevin Rudd, will take. How’s that for a political about turn! Give me a used car salesman any day.

Rudd and his climate change team under Wong must be feeling extremely frustrated about the way the tide has turned since the Climategate scandal first broke as well as being very worried about their job security. This frustration was clearly evident from the reaction of Rudd’s chief advisor on climate sciences, Professor Barry Brook of Adelaide Uiversity (Note 3). Barry is a determined critic of his sceptical Adelaide University associate, Professor Ian Plimer (Note 4) and Plimer’s book “Heaven and Earth”. After being banned from his site in June for questioning him repeatedly about his comment QUOTE: .. There are a lot of uncertainties in science, and it is indeed likely that the current consensus on some points of climate science is wrong, or at least sufficiently uncertain that we don’t know anything much useful about processes or drivers. ..UNQUOTE (Note 5) I looked in again on 3rd March.

I was delighted to see that others had taken up the sceptical side of the debate with increased vigour, especially after “Climategate”. In the end Barry Brook (who had been unusually quiet) commented on 29th November QUOTE: .. Anyway, no more time on this thread for me. You’re nothing more than a conspiratorial looney, “John Berns”, so begone with you and the rest of the foetid trolls who have infested this thread. I edit morons, not data. Vangel, Berns, PeterW, JeffT, gianmarco, Wick: you’re all on moderation. UNQUOTE. Eventually Brook childishly resorted to QUOTE: Shorter Denis Maclaine: “Blah, di blah blah blah” UNQUOTE (13th December) and QUOTE: Bob Thomas: “Blah di blah blah blah. Go away, you conspiratorial crank. This blog is for serious discussion. UNQUOTE (18th Dec). Finally on 19th QUOTE: This thread has degenerated to the point where comments here are no longer serving any useful purpose. It has become infested by trolls and delusionists who are more interested in pushing ideology than discussing matters of science or evidence. Comments closed. UNQUOTE.

People like Rudd, Wong and Brook obviously welcome open and intelligent debate – just so long as it supports their own opinions. Anything that contradicts these is taboo. There are very good reasons why open debate is abhorred. “Climategate”, “Pacahurigate”, “Glaciergate”, Amazongate” and “Disastergate” (AKA “IPCCgate”) has exposed the UN-inspired propaganda about DAGW as a lie as potentially damaging to global democracy as were the lies of Hitler’s Third Reich.

Let’s now look at those to whom Rudd addressed his emphatic QUOTE: The Government I lead will act UNQUOTE. The Lowy Institute includes on its Board of Directors (Note 6) Mr Frank Lowy, Mr David H. Lowy, Mr Peter S. Lowy and Mr Steven M. Lowy. All of these are also on the Board of Directors of The Westfield Group (Note 7) QUOTE: .. which is the largest retail property group in the world by equity market capitalisation and one of the largest entities listed on the Australian Securities Exchange .. UNQUOTE. For someone looking no further than that there might appear to be no vested interest in climate change other than a natural concern for its impact upon human existence, but let’s look a little deeper.

More relevant to the UN’s climate change propaganda, QUOTE: Westfield also manages assets on behalf of institutional and other investors. This investment is undertaken .. with partners such as AMP Capital Investors, Australian Prime Property Fund (APPF), DEXUS Property Group, Forest City Enterprises, JP Morgan Asset Management Real Estate Investment Management, Morgan Stanley Real Estate Management, the Perron Group and Prudential Plc, or as an investor in other forms of property-owning vehicles such as limited partnership arrangements in the United Kingdom with the Possfund and BT Pension Scheme, which are managed by the Hermes Group UNQUOTE.

That is where the alarm bells should start to ring. What is it that those investors consider worth ploughing their money into in order to get the best return? Could it be anything to do with climate change – perhaps renewable energy generation (like wind turbines, solar mirrors, solar panels), distribution (like cable, towers and other “green” investments? Well, if the UN has anything to do with it – Yes.

Pension Funds Online said in 2008 in its “The Future of Pension Funds: Sustainable Investment” article (Note 8) QUOTE: The Board members of the United Nations-backed Principles for Responsible Investment Initiative (PRI) represent some of the world’s largest pension funds from five different continents including France’s Fonds de Réserve pour les Retraites, PREVI in Brazil and the UK’s BT Pension Scheme. They take a similar view. Donald MacDonald, Chair of the PRI Board, has said ““As clients and part owners of the financial institutions at the core of this crisis, institutional investors should accept some shared responsibility for the behaviours that led to the crisis.” and “We believe this current crisis could have a catalytic effect of shifting the mainstream investment sector towards more responsible investment practices.” UNQUOTE.

Now there is an interesting area of research for the UN and its supporters to put a little of those enormous funds they have available and I’m sure that the findings would be much more revealing than the research into global climate processes and drivers has been so far.