DOWN TO THE DOCTOR’S: Control Freaks Have Their Say

Libertarianz  leader Dr Richard McGrath takes his regularly irreverent look at some of the past week’s headlines, and finds a world full of control freaks. 

1. “World Gets Warmer As Climate Talks Start” [NZ HERALD] – Just as the anti-capitalists gather in Copenhagen, some propaganda from an organization called the World Meteorolgical Organisation tells us that this year is the fifth warmest year since climate records began in the 1850s. Reading down, one finds that the president of the WMO’s agricultural division is, wait for it, disgraced warmist Jim Salinger. Oh dear.

At least the WMO admit that some of its temperature readings come from land-based stations, which are notoriously unreliable because of urban heat effect and other factors. One paragraph in the article suggests 190 nations are seeking a deal to control global warming. This should read: “Politicians from 190 nations are seeking a deal to tax, control and ultimately destroy industry internationally.”

The IPCC’s top propagandist pulled a 2 degree rise out of his hat – inevitable, he claims, unless industry is shackled and poor people driven toward starvation within five years. One alarming piece of information in this Herald article indicated that the United States Environmental Protection Agency can regulate gas emissions in the absence of legislation from Congress. In other words, the EPA is now a law unto itself, so watch out.

The most embarrassing paragraph came toward the end of the article with a Fijian climate campaigner reportedly sobbing as she called for action to save her homeland from rising sea levels. Where’s the evidence for this rise? And has she checked that it’s not small islands sinking, rather than sea levels rising, that may be fuelling her concerns, as has been the case in other countries?

No mention was made of the medieval warming period, where temperatures were much higher than currently; nor that global temperatures have failed to rise as predicted for the last 8-10 years. We are being fed selective information, and the ClimateGate revelations of data manipulation at the CRU, which throws the whole AGW hypothesis into question, have not been taken seriously.    

2. “Opening [Copenhagen] Speeches Unwavering On Warming Threat” [NZ HERALD] – I might be unwavering too, if I were confronting damaging evidence from the University of East Anglia that now threatens millions of dollars of my research funding. The IPCC’s chief shill, Rajendra Pachauri, as expected, attacked the whistleblowers who exposed the damning e-mails from the CRU without addressing the contents of these e-mails and the anti-scientific corruption of data from these researchers.

American warmist Jonathan Pershing, in gross denial, suggests that this new information merely “adds to the robustness of the science.”  Like hell it does!

Engineer Pachauri recycled the usual doom and gloom scenarios including droughts, floods, extinction of species, hurricanes, melting polar ice sheets and rising sea levels – based, of course, on those computer models which have been thoroughly discredited in the past but which these propagandists keep using to make predictions suited to their political end, which is: shackling industry and taxing everyone.

The one grain of truth in the mindset of these control freaks is the fact that some climate change is unavoidable. In fact, none of it is avoidable. Man makes so small a contribution to the climate that to even try to change it is akin to sitting in King Canute’s chair. Until humans manage to control volcanic eruptions and the activity of sunspots, we may as well adapt to the weather and enjoy the rise instead of trying to fight the inevitable.

3. “Labour, Green MPs Join PM In Copenhagen” [NZ HERALD] – For pity’s sake, won’t anyone think of the children? Isn’t it enough that Key has taken Green Party infiltrator Nick Smith with him - along with Tim Groser (who should know better) – but now Smith’s fellow travellers in spirit Jeanette Fitzsimons and Kennedy Graham are becoming fellow travellers on the flight to Scandinavia, along with the mincing, oleaginous Charles Chauvel. I’m hoping I didn’t have to help pay for these parasites to fly halfway around the world in business class, but have a horrible feeling we’ve all been dicked again.

Reminds me of Australian free-market man Ron Manners, who says he always flies economy class because it avoids the possibility of meeting politicians in mid-flight.

4. “Let Latta Be Last Word On Smacking Law” [NZ HERALD] – Good and bad things from this news item – but more of the latter than the former.

Having helped himself to taxpayer largesse as head of a review panel on the smacking law, Nigel Latta tells us that some smacking is permissible. That parents may lightly smack their children. But the law is quite clear: it says smacking is not permitted as a means of correction alone.

So much for Mr Latta’s knowledge of the law.

Can Dr Latta understand that even though the scales may have fallen from his eyes, many of us with children have not undergone the same epiphany? The law is confusing and parents will remain fearful of being seen disciplining their children in public. Dr Latta admits in this article that “the law change will make no difference to good parents or bad. He doubts its message will make much difference in the households Ms Bradford was hoping to reach.” Shouldn’t that be reason enough to question the necessity for this terrifying legislation? And what about the ‘review panel’ that effectively recommended by a vote of 87% to 13%, and at great expense, that the law be struck down?

The real kicker is the glib statement toward the end of the article that “the concerns of the majority can be laid to rest, and the whole subject can be left to the discretion of the police.” That’s a comforting thought, isn’t it. After all, there is no such things as police corruption and if you’re innocent, what do you have to fear, eh?

See y’all next week!
Doc McGrath