Something that slipped under the news radar this week was that National Party Leader Aspirant, Judith ‘Crusher’ Collins, went full blown climate denier.
I’m not talking her normal red meat dog whistling, nod, wink, unsubtle playing to her National-Party-low-horizon-imagination-hate-the-greenies-and-can’t-accept-climate-change-rump-supporters, oh no.
I’m talking fill blown the earth-is-held-up-on-four-elephants-standing-on-a-space-turtle kind of climate denial.
Judith published an opinion piece on the fossil fuel paywall gated community that is ‘Carbon news‘ last week which argues against zero carbon, the Paris agreement and downplays the magnitude of what we are facing.
She is doing the classic ‘question the science’ tactic, which the tobacco industry used to argue there was no clear connection between cancer and smoking. She is also signalling to the deep pockets of the pollution industry that if she was leader they would have a much more benign environment to operate in.
Judith is also directly leading the climate denier electorate who refuse to point blank accept any of the science. Here is what science blog has had to say about Judith’s absurd claims…
The Zero Carbon Bill implements this agreement for New Zealand. It implements what the National-led government agreed to when they signed the Paris Agreement, which Judith Collins now states “is not justified by any scientific findings” – this after innumerable scientists and delegates, including those of the New Zealand government, pored over and agreed to every word. Since the Agreement was signed, the IPCC 1.5ºC report – “1.5 to Stay Alive” – has strengthened the case for 1.5ºC. There is a broad consensus, both in New Zealand and internationally, about what needs to be done. Contrary to what Collins claims, the NZ emission target does not have “almost zero chance of being achieved”; it is entirely feasible and will lead to health and economic benefits for all New Zealanders.
As for “there is no indication they [the costs of global warming] are insurmountable”, it partly depends on what value you place on mass extinction and the loss of treasures like the Great Barrier Reef, not to mention coastal cities. How can this be surmounted?
The existential risks are real if difficult to size up. Hans Schellnhuber, founder of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and climate advisor to the EU, Angela Merkel, and the Pope, said in 2018, “I think there is a very very big risk that we will just end our civilisation. The human species will survive somehow, but we will destroy almost everything we have built up over the last two thousand years. I think we have more than a five percent chance of [preventing this]. But it’s definitely less than 50% in my view.”
…in a very real sense, allowing climate denial to become an openly discussed policy plank of the largest political party in NZ is probably more dangerous than anything else that happened this week.
And yet it received almost no attention.
James Shaw said he refused to debate the arguments Judith raised, and that is a terrible mistake.
We are desperately needing to engage now and no one is.
Except us.
Pub Politics – Climate Crisis or Climate Hoax? November 11th
“We are desperately needing to engage now and no one is. – Except us.
Pub Politics – Climate Crisis or Climate Hoax? November 11th”
Well said Martyn.
Peter Williams like Collins has been turned into another “climate denier” also.
So we need these puppets to feel ‘mother natures’ anguish at these ignorant selfish human beings for killing her planet.
Perhaps this will come to pass soon as the weather becomes over-powering for our drainage systems, by sending a torrent of flood water through their homes and giving them a wake up call.
Nothing like a dose of reality is there to teach them of their wrongs?
Remember Noah.
Chloe Swarbrick needs to be given more of a voice. She has more dynamism than several of the rest of the Greens put together, imo.
Here’s a link to a what she wrote around the beginning of the month: Chloe Swarbrick – We Need More CC Protestors
Excerpts:
“The political status quo is unfit to confront the climate crisis. We need more of those who will take to the street for what they believe in, rather than sniffing out snide put-downs from air-conditioned television studios”
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“Politicians across the world have their hands on the wheel of a car that they are driving directly into a forest fire. They can see the fire. They have been, and are being, constantly warned about it as they drive. The heat and smoke is starting to make some of the car passengers uncomfortable, sick and coughing.
“Politicians have their hands on the wheel and their feet at the pedals. They can slow the car. They can stop it. They can choose a different path: one that doesn’t lead to destruction of the car, its passengers – ultimately of civilisation as a whole.”
————-
“[Some politicians] don’t talk about helping our farmers transition, but speak in divisive, binary, fanciful rhetoric. You can only have one, they assert: a liveable climate or regional development. They ignore the reality that farmers are already being hit with climate breakdown in ever-less predictable seasonality and increasing international standards on carbon transparency.
“And still, those politicians will do their best to divide us, and they will tell those who will listen that the young people and those who stood in solidarity with them to demand urgent climate action aren’t trying to ensure we’re all better off; these politicians will say these activists are trying to hurt you. The tactics are Trumpian: diminish trust in everyone and every source but those that reinforce your world view.”
—————
“Status quo politics cannot solve climate breakdown. It created it.
“Through generations of lobbying, unequal access, donations and manipulation, the political system has grown into a monolith bred to protect and conserve the way things are.
“So-called leaders dismiss young people terrified for their future on the basis of their age. They dismiss scientists for sounding the alarm about the urgency of action required. Nothing, it would seem, will sink in except reinforcement of cognitive biases. These politicians arm themselves with a deeply entrenched ideology, something they accuse everyone else of having.”
Chloe Swarbrick speaks to us all in this succinct video, “Climate Change is Happening”.
Here are some CC Links that may be helpful:
https://climate.nasa.gov/evidence/
NASA Articles Here
Extinction Rebellion Site
LiveScience Climate Section
The Guardian’s Climate Change Section
Climate News Section at Stuff
BBC Climate Change News
Just three weeks ago a report was released which said that “Unless climate action is swift and dramatic, future upheaval will be catastrophic.”
“Only swift and decisive governmental actions to dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions due to fossil fuel burning on a global scale will reduce the harm of this runaway climate catastrophe, according to the report, which is a compilation of data from nearly 7,000 studies and represents the work of 104 researchers from 36 nations.”
More at this link: livescience.com/ipcc-special-climate-report-oceans-ice.html
Some Nat MPs have decided they don’t want to be called ‘Climate Change Deniers’.
They’re going for ‘Climate Inquirers’ instead.
There’s a cartoon half way down this page that illustrates what they are doing. Loony Nat MPs
Excerpt:
[Matt King] “may think he’s challenging authority, holding this Government to account, and speaking for “the everyman”. In reality, he’s either wilfully spreading misinformation or is worryingly ignorant. Either way, King should leave Parliament at the next election.
“It’s people like him who give farmers a bad name. For every farmer who acknowledges the industry could do better, and does amazing work to protect the environment, you get a vocal voice like King who denies the issue.”
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