Saturday, July 05, 2008

The failure of Garnaut by Piers Akerman

TAXPAYERS should ask Professor Ross Garnaut for their money back: his report is little more than a fearmongering document designed to bolster the age-old socialist agenda of wealth redistribution.

It fails from the basis of science and it fails from the basis of economics but it will, however, warm the hearts of the anti-capitalist doom merchants of Europe and inner-urban branches of the Labor Party with its prognostications.

Nostradamus would be proud.

Like all who have signed on to the view that humans are responsible for global warming, Professor Garnaut cites the IPCC’s (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) projections on the rate of climate change as coming from a scientifically based consensus.

This is complete rubbish.

The only consensus was between bureaucrats who wanted to agree to a number, the energy-rich Saudis wanted a low number, the energy-deficient Europeans wanted a low number, and they struck a deal which is the basis of Professor Garnaut’s consensus.

Starting with that humbug, he then segues to Australia and, with the arrogance of a Belinda Neal, proposes that Australia should be the global leader in a fight against climate change.

King Canute could teach him a thing or two about humility but, then again, Professor Garnaut was handpicked for his task by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, the master of agenda control.

The world is coming to an end, he says; Kakadu will be inundated, the Great Barrier Reef will die, the Murray-Darling river system will dry up unless we act now.

Oh, sure. But where does he conjure up this fantasy from when the IPCC’s own temperature projections are already falling over? Taken over the past 10 years, the trend line for temperature is flat.

If taken from 2001, the trend shows global temperatures falling.

It is as if he is suffering from some cognitive dissonance.

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