Does Professor Garnaut Know What He's Talking About?
July 6th 2008 01:44
Does Ross Garnaut really know what he's talking about? I merely ask the question, I have no reason to think otherwise. I've spent enough time in academic and political circles, though, to know that the most appalling tripe can be passed off as mature, state-of-the-art deep thought. (I leave aside my exposure to religious discussion - that's a whole nother thing). All those who stand against it are condemned as out of touch with New Thinking. They need to be brought into the twenty-first century. When the New Thinking is revealed to be deep lunacy, it's as though it never even existed. It is as one with body-shirts, wide ties, afros and bell-bottom trousers. Unmentionable. Unthinkable.
I don't believe I've met Prof. Garnaut (that is no guarantee I haven't, especially if he drinks at the Wenty Hotel) and have no reason to doubt his bona fides or academic credentials. It's just that the changes he calls for are so sweeping and so life-altering for all Australians that acting on mere academic fad could be an expensive catastrophe for those least able to afford it. Is he a wise prognosticator or merely Toad of Toad Hall with a silken bonnet? What Prof Garnaut is advocating is a bigger risk than floating the dollar, levying the GST and initiating the Superannuation system all rolled into one. It is yet to be proved beyond the level of doubt required that we need to do it
I once saw a documentary on Discovery Channel - when I was confined because doctors were inexpertly hacking up my foot - that detailed the financial transactions of a man who was selling bits of lunar real estate. He'd made his fortune selling something that very bored people wanted to buy - a bit of the Moon. His title to the Moon was, of course, as good as anyone's. His wealth was, at least, honestly acquired and not the result of an Act of Parliament enforced by the Australian Taxation Office.
Carbon trading seems just as intangible to me and will make some people very rich and others very poor. The point is that no one has to buy a backyard on the Moon. Everyone will need to be involved willy-nilly in Carbon Trading. We have seen enough of Government privatisations and shady deals to know that there is too much money going begging for the unscrupulous not to become involved.
Political corruption is as certain as night follows day. Will we live to see senior politicians retire and be awarded lucrative posts with major financial firms- the latter day version of a peerage? It is amazing how sincere and convincing some people can seem when they see a few trillion dollars at the other side of a pack of lies. Or are there even bigger bunyips in the carbon trading billabong that we are yet to become acquainted with?
What is scarier is that there are secularist polticians with a clearly religious agenda. The theological tone of much of the discussion - already remarked upon by others - doesn't fill me with confidence. The promise of plagues and flood at the hand of a vengeful Gaia if we refuse to amend our sinful lives and atone for our sins and the sins of our fathers is charming in its artless appropriation of biblical imagery. We seem to have escape sexual guilt only to be crushed by another kind of purity rhetoric that is even dopier and less amenable to reason.
And, as we have come to learn over and over again, by experience atter painful experience, the main reason for propagating sicko religious rhetoric is social control.
I don't believe I've met Prof. Garnaut (that is no guarantee I haven't, especially if he drinks at the Wenty Hotel) and have no reason to doubt his bona fides or academic credentials. It's just that the changes he calls for are so sweeping and so life-altering for all Australians that acting on mere academic fad could be an expensive catastrophe for those least able to afford it. Is he a wise prognosticator or merely Toad of Toad Hall with a silken bonnet? What Prof Garnaut is advocating is a bigger risk than floating the dollar, levying the GST and initiating the Superannuation system all rolled into one. It is yet to be proved beyond the level of doubt required that we need to do it
I once saw a documentary on Discovery Channel - when I was confined because doctors were inexpertly hacking up my foot - that detailed the financial transactions of a man who was selling bits of lunar real estate. He'd made his fortune selling something that very bored people wanted to buy - a bit of the Moon. His title to the Moon was, of course, as good as anyone's. His wealth was, at least, honestly acquired and not the result of an Act of Parliament enforced by the Australian Taxation Office.
Carbon trading seems just as intangible to me and will make some people very rich and others very poor. The point is that no one has to buy a backyard on the Moon. Everyone will need to be involved willy-nilly in Carbon Trading. We have seen enough of Government privatisations and shady deals to know that there is too much money going begging for the unscrupulous not to become involved.
Political corruption is as certain as night follows day. Will we live to see senior politicians retire and be awarded lucrative posts with major financial firms- the latter day version of a peerage? It is amazing how sincere and convincing some people can seem when they see a few trillion dollars at the other side of a pack of lies. Or are there even bigger bunyips in the carbon trading billabong that we are yet to become acquainted with?
What is scarier is that there are secularist polticians with a clearly religious agenda. The theological tone of much of the discussion - already remarked upon by others - doesn't fill me with confidence. The promise of plagues and flood at the hand of a vengeful Gaia if we refuse to amend our sinful lives and atone for our sins and the sins of our fathers is charming in its artless appropriation of biblical imagery. We seem to have escape sexual guilt only to be crushed by another kind of purity rhetoric that is even dopier and less amenable to reason.
And, as we have come to learn over and over again, by experience atter painful experience, the main reason for propagating sicko religious rhetoric is social control.
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Comment by Anonymous
What I think the Professor is doing is saying: 'If you believe all of the stuff that we have been told about climate change, and if you are serious about doing something about it, then this is what you have to do.'
The reason why his recommendations are so sweeping and dramatic is because for years we've been subjected to anti-social post-Socialist lunatics telling us how terrible industrial society is for the planet, and over-egging the pudding in order to drum up support for their case. At no time did they consider what it would cost to act on their recommendations. Well, now the bill for their rhetoric is coming in.
The high costs that Garnaut proposes are a direct consequence of green hysteria.
'Will we live to see senior politicians retire and be awarded lucrative posts with major financial firms- the latter day version of a peerage?' It's already happening - Bob Carr, anyone?
'What is scarier is that there are secularist polticians with a clearly religious agenda', etc. You are absolutely correct, I agree with your conclusions entirely. My comments to others, that I don't believe a word of the hysteria and am yet to be convinced of the truth and purported consequences of anthropogenic climate change, are often met with incredulity - as if I had told a 17th century person that I didn't believe in God.
Good on you.