Tag Archives: Taxes

Aussie Chief Scientist: Renewable Energy Push Hurts the Poor

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Aussie Chief Scientist: Renewable Energy Push Hurts the Poor (2017-01-02). In which a mendacious idiot, Anthony Watts’ fellow-traveller Eric Worrall, falsely claims that Australia’s Chief Scientist is against renewable energy because it, somehow, hurts the poor. Rugged denialist free-marketers like Anthony and Eric spend their nights worrying about the poors, don’t you know?

Sez Eric the half-brain (that’s a Monty Python reference):

“Australia’s Chief Scientist Alan Finkel has strongly criticised the impact of renewable energy policies on the poor, working class people and migrants.”

etc.

Shorter Eric: The poors want coal, haven’t you read Dickens? Also, a water desalination plant somewhere didn’t work very well, so neither will renewables. I read it in a newspaper!

Sez Dr. Alan Finkel:

“It will be important to address the barriers to active engagement in the [renewable energy] transition underway, as experienced by vulnerable groups.”

I’ll summarize Dr. Finkel’s real position as this: renewables are the immediate future and Australia must ensure that renewables are integrated into the national grid so that everyone benefits, not just the wealthy who can, and are, taking care of themselves.

If you buy Eric’s crocodile sympathy, clean out your ears. Hotwhopper is the expert at unpacking Anthony Watts’ whoppers, you can read her more detailed response at her excellent website.

Aside: Sorry for the long absence here, I still roll my eyes at Anthony’s rabid stupidity but rarely have time to post about it.

A pointed question

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“A pointed question“ (2014-03-07). Anthony Watts asks a pointed question and proves that he has a pointy head.

“What is the perfect temperature of Earth?”

This is one of those “answer that!” questions that merely reveal the stupidity of the person asking it. I’m not even going to dip a toe into the cesspool of ignorance that drives it.

The concern of environmentalists is that the current, completely unprecedented, rate of climate change dramatically exceeds our civilization’s ability to cope and how that change is un-balancing our biosphere, which we depend upon to feed our human population.

That completely unprecedented rate of climate change is what the hated “The Hockey Stick” showed, and triggered the libertarian/denialist “you can’t tell me what to do!” reaction we’re now so hampered by.

Cue Anthony’s idiot followers declaring warming is better and muttering darkly about taxes. What a pack of pin-heads.

Demented thinking: Copenhagen didn’t work – but taxes will

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“Demented thinking: Copenhagen didn’t work – but taxes will“. Climate economist William Nordhaus says in the January 2011 issue of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists that carbon taxes are the best approach to achieve significant emissions reductions. Anthony Watts says “no way! Taxes are always bad!” and then posts the press release. Thus disproving Global Warming. Anthony’s readers supply the elaborate economic and political insights.

From the press release:

[William Nordhaus] says that it is necessary to raise the price of carbon to implement carbon policies so that they will have an impact on everyday human decisions, and on decision makers at every level in every nation and sector. At present, incentives and levels of involvement vary, and where some countries have implemented strong emission control measures, they only cover a limited part of national emissions. – Eureka Alert Press Release, Jan 5, 2011.

I really don’t know what the best political solution is for reducing our greenhouse gas emissions, but I’m willing to try anything that seems effective.

Funny, Anthony didn’t draw attention to this article from the same issue – Global warming: How skepticism became denial. Here’s the abstract:

The conversation on global warming started in 1896, when a physical chemist estimated that the mean global temperature would rise several degrees if the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was doubled. The topic eventually became one of the most passionate in the history of science. The author points out that climate experts were initially strongly skeptical of the theory of global warming; it took a variety of evidence to gradually convince them that warming due to human emissions was likely. The public, however, was guided away from this conclusion by a professional public relations effort, motivated by industrial and ideological concerns. Deniers of the scientific consensus avoided normal scientific discourse and resorted to ad hominem attacks that cast doubt on the entire scientific community—while disrupting the lives of some researchers. The author points out that scientists have failed to mount a concerted public relations campaign to defend their position. When trust is lost, he asserts, a determined effort is needed to restore it.

Kerry-(Graham)-Lieberman: a monstrous collection of payoffs to big business

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“Kerry-(Graham)-Lieberman: a monstrous collection of payoffs to big business“. Anthony Watts pastes in a post from the  right-wing Competitive Enterprise Institute’s house denialist Myron Ebell. He’s dismissing the proposed Kerry – Lieberman “American Power Act” as a tax grab while simultaneously being a “monstrous collection of payoffs to big business special interests”.

Nothing like some reflexive Republican hot air to inform the debate. Read other pundit’s responses at the New York Times website.