Barnaby Joyce

[Master Splinter]

I dunno, if I had an income similar to Cate's (#63 on the Forbes list) I wouldn't be bothered if I had to stump up an extra grand or two a year on electricity, I dare say she would drop that much on a dress and makeup for a Hollywood awards ceremony.

Anyway, her $10,000,000 North Shore house has solar panels, so she's probably getting the 60 cent per killowatt feed-in tarriff that non-solar NSW residents have to pay for, so she's really not worried by the increase.

Call me when she subdivides her 4,000 square meter block to make an affordable housing estate.

[Sebastiaan56]

Well the whole attack just shows what Barnaby thinks of those who dare to disagree with him. Free speech isnt treasured in Australia, at best it's tolerated. She has done well for herself, of course she is entitled to speak her mind. I just find it curious that the ads were interspersed with mining company ads last night.

What used to be dealt with by debate is now a matter of competing ads stripped of facts and heavily scripted feel good messages. It is the purvey of the shock jocks, the media barons and their lackies. The shameful campaign against establishing limits on pokie gambling is another great example.

[Gra]

Well the whole attack just shows what Barnaby thinks

I see a flaw in your argument.....

[artme]

Good result artme! The possum has been well and truly stirred!

[AlexS]

I see a flaw in your argument.....

[Sebastiaan56]

[Waldo]

Taking a side track here. The argument against the pokies isn't what it is trying to do, but the massive costs that will be incurred - even by the RSL club in Windor's electorate with only 15 pokies (which if you saw the Lateline episode with Wilkie, who hasn't got a clue as to the cost of the infrastructure required) they have to either retro fit as yet technology that doesn't exist or develop new pokie machines that also yet don't exist and all be wired up to a national framework - all so licence holders who have set their own bet limits can be monitored.

That's the problem.

Now back to our regular programming.

[damian]

I'm a big fan of B Joyce. I agree with most of what he says. As for how he delivers his message he's taken a leaf out of Katter's book.

Australia has a mostly left leaning media. In order for a conservative to get air time he has to put on a show. Yes they ridicule him, yes they pick out the sound bite that makes him look a clown, but given a choice between no air and that he's chosen the latter.

Unfortunatly the left leaning in our society have bought in to their dogma as fanatically as the worst religeous nutters. Deny the church of global warming and your a "sceptic" (as if that's a bad thing) or a "flat eather". They are rather worse than religeous fanatics because they believe they are superior, better educated, better informed. You often hear them refer to themselves as "progressive". Despite time and again the chicken littles being proven wrong they continue to bark panic and demand we submit to mad lefty schemes, afterall without fear what sway can they hold over us ?

The truely greatest logcal fail of all is that a bunch of inner city yuppies (the greens power base) who live as far from nature as they can get, presume to dictate to us who have gone out of our way to live close to it how we should deal with the enviroment. For some reason they assume people like me live in the bush only to clear fell and wreck all we love, but I suppose if your view of nature is one of rainbows and butterflys and cute furry animals skipping hand in hand among the flowers you wouldn't want it interrupted by the reality of terror, starvation, disease and slow painful death that is the real life of most wild animals. Just make yourself feel better by being enraged at other peoples percieved misdemeanours.

No doubt some of you will assume me a conservative. I'm not, I'm politically middle of the road. I react to the socialist propoganda because it has had such prevalence these last 15 years. If the conservative view ascended I'd question it just as vigorously. Extremism and fanaticism is always bad.

[Waldo]

Very well written.

[ColW]

terror, starvation, disease, death are the direct consequences of deforestation, introduced species, dimished gene pool and biodiversity loss within ecosystems disrupted by human activity, our environment doesn't need to be "dealt with" we are every bit a part of it, if we continue to destroy it we will suffer the same fate, and do everyday in less fortunate areas of the globe. There is no "being proven wrong" , on this the science is settled.

I doubt the National's leader of the senate ever has to struggle for media coverage, the position itself entitles such an assurance,

Barnaby Joyce is an accountant which means he's entrenched in mainstream economic theory and practice, problem is economists never factor in payment to the environment for services rendered, a carbon tax, ETS, price on carbon or however it's labelled is such a payment and as token as it may be, it's about a new language in economics that reduces profit and holds us accountable to our environment, that's why it's hated, end of story.

[Waldo]

As this argument intensifies, let me bring this in ABC The Drum - Harden up Greens, the game is changing

In particular I refer to the transcripts of the interview between Bob Brown and Chris Ullman..

BROWN: We are going to compensate households but Tony Abbott will not. He's going to put all the money in from households into the big polluters, estimate $720 per household by the end of this decade and - either that or reduce 100,000 jobs in the country or start closing hospital wards and schools to fund the big polluters.

We will not do that.

INTERVIEWER: That $11 billion that you're talking about is money that he would forego in the mining tax, and I noticed you started your budget and reply speech just there. How would you replace the $50 billion a year in export income which comes by way of coal - an industry that you'd shut down?

BROWN: Well, a lot of that money is bouncing straight back out to shareholders overseas. Now what we're...

INTERVIEWER: A lot of that money is circulating in the economy. It's creating job, Senator, it's bouncing through to our cities.

BROWN: Yes, Chris, and what we would do is take the advice of the Treasury of this nation and recoup the $145 billion over the next 10 years through a super profits tax. Tony Abbott says...

INTERVIEWER: But you can't recoup it if you shut the industry down.

BROWN: Treasury...

INTERVIEWER: If you shut the coal industry down there won't be that money...

BROWN: I'm sorry...

INTERVIEWER: ..available to you.

BROWN: I'm sorry, Chris, Treasury has no intention to shut the industry down. it tends to- it tends...

INTERVIEWER: No, but you do.

BROWN: No, I'm not.

INTERVIEWER: Didn't you say back in 2007 that we had to kick the coal habit?

BROWN: No, I did not. You're looking at the Murdoch press, where I said back in 2007 we should look at coal exports with a view to phasing them out down the line.

INTERVIEWER: It wasn't the Murdoch press, it was a comment piece that you wrote. So you want to phase out the coal industry?

BROWN: The world is going to do that because it is causing massive economic damage down the line through the impact of climate change.

INTERVIEWER: But the question-

BROWN: No, let me...

INTERVIEWER: The simple question is how do you replace $50 billion worth of export income?

BROWN: You go to renewables over the coming decades and you do that by exporting... Look, Germany did this. It's closed its coal mine. It's closing its nuclear power stations. It's gone into exporting renewables - including using Australian technology...

Imagine if Julia Gillard, Tony Abbott or Warren Truss had given this interview. None of them would have seen the mild exchange as anything unusual. (And, by the way, there was no indication Senator Brown himself was upset, it is the camp followers who are all bent out of shape).

Second all of the post-interview scrutiny would now be on the answers not the questions. When you ponder the answers, the implications are profound.

This is a tax with wider implications, and one that certain parties have absolutely no idea of the costs or damaging effects that will be borne as a result of it.

[nine fingers]

This debate reminds me of when all those ham actors were singing
" IT'S Time" When Whitlam stood for Prime Minister, you know what happened to him. NF.

[damian]

terror, starvation, disease, death are the direct consequences of deforestation, introduced species, dimished gene pool and biodiversity loss within ecosystems disrupted by human activity, our environment doesn't need to be "dealt with" we are every bit a part of it, if we continue to destroy it we will suffer the same fate, and do everyday in less fortunate areas of the globe. There is no "being proven wrong" , on this the science is settled..

Spoken like a true convert.

Science isn't settled, it can never be. The language of religeon is one of absolutes.

Animal suffering isn't necessarily about human intervention. Pick up any bandicoot and you'll almost certainly find a nest of ticks sucking it dry. Wander round my backyard and look at the dead possum with it's hairless tiny baby lying on the ground beside it, killed in territorial dispute by another possum. happens all the time and isn't related to food nor territory availability. They breed beyond the available space always and kill off the weaker individuals. Nature is about struggle, survival and death. happens all the time everywhere inlcuding where there aren't humans for 100's of miles.

But I guess that doesn't sit well with your fairytale view. Gotta get those bears dancing hand in hand...

I doubt the National's leader of the senate ever has to struggle for media coverage, the position itself entitles such an assurance,

Who is the current leader of the National Party in the parliment ? And don't google it.

Barnaby Joyce is an accountant which means he's entrenched in mainstream economic theory and practice, problem is economists never factor in payment to the environment for services rendered, a carbon tax, ETS, price on carbon or however it's labelled is such a payment and as token as it may be, it's about a new language in economics that reduces profit and holds us accountable to our environment, that's why it's hated, end of story.

So it's ok for Kate Blanchet to have her say but not an accountant elected by the people of Queensland, not once but twice, to represent their views ?

The carbon tax is hated because:

1. It will harm people less well off than I am, who will suffer in a very real way because of the increase in their cost of living.

2. It won't change anything apart from making you and people like you feel good about yourself.

3. All the catastrophic forecasts rely on positive feedback and carbondioxide as a driver of climate change. There is a very strong argument against positive feedback and the notion of CO2 as a driver is at the very least ambigious. ALL the disaster models written 10 years ago have been shown to be wildly wrong over this 10 year period. None of them are even remotely close to what's actually happened. I guess I'm old fashioned and out of touch, because throughout the signifigant part of my life that I did scientific research I trusted data over models every time.

Guess I'm just not progressive....

Note, again, that I am no advocate of pollution. If we were discussing measures to reduce pollution my position would be very different. The problem with this issue is it's religeous zealotry built on lies, and the result won't help the enviroment it'll just make "greenies" feel good about smiting the heritics and those sinnful polluters.

I don't want my country to become a socialist theocracy.

[Sebastiaan56]

Good to see all of the carefully considered entrenched positions are the same a couple of years after we began these kinds of deliberations.

Australia has a mostly left leaning media

I think you will need to justify this claim Damian. Between Murdoch, Fairfax and Macquarie Radio I think the right is well represented in the Sydney basin. We even get fed Andrew Bolt's revolting puke regularly here. If you mean the ABC it is hardly the dominant news and opinion force in Australia. Look at the ratings. I dont know what the media landscape is like where you are.

Interestingly, Tony Abbot pulled back somewhat from Barnaby's pronouncement today by saying that Cate Blanchet had a right to say what she wanted and that to introduce a carbon tax would require a mandate by election and therefore the Prime Minister should call and election post haste (and at about that speed BTW). What fascinates me about this is the attack dog role that Barnaby so obviously relishes. The tactic is as old as Parliment itself. The leader sends an attack via a high profile subordinate and gauges the reaction to the attack. If it is favourable he endorses it and carries on the rallying cry. If it is not favourable he softens the tone just as he has just done in this case. The interesting bit is that Tony was John Howard's attack dog for years. This is partly why he (Tony) is having such a hard time changing his image. Remember his attacks on Bernie Banton?

Here in NSW Barry O'Farrell blew it a couple of weeks age with his attempt to cut the Solar Feed in tariff's. He should have got one of his minions to canvas the idea first. It would have saved him a lot of face.

Waldo, (I cant resist a good aside either) you and I both know my comments were directed at the billboards about "unaustralian to need a license to gamble". Since when do The Club Associations and companies like Ainsworth decide what is Australian? But I have to agree that the bureaucracy will be formidable and the risk of unauthorised sharing of personal information alone should kill it the way its proposed.

[ColW]

Spoken like a true convert.

thanks for the compliment

Science isn't settled, it can never be. The language of religeon is one of absolutes.

irrelevant, Global Climate Science is not a religion, in general religion has no bearing on this at all.

Animal suffering isn't necessarily about human intervention. Pick up any bandicoot and you'll almost certainly find a nest of ticks sucking it dry. Wander round my backyard and look at the dead possum with it's hairless tiny baby lying on the ground beside it, killed in territorial dispute by another possum. happens all the time and isn't related to food nor territory availability.

turn over the soft belly of a carbon intensive industry eg mining and you'll find a proportionate amount of parasites present, and look at the many local supportive industries killed off in a battle of survival of the "fittest" financial leverage, eg WA miners seeking operational capital from China in return for dumping local supportive industries, (engineering etc) then declaring record profits after crying poor all over the media prior to the last election, the outcome, unemployment, increased cost of living, less resources for our descendants.

But I guess that doesn't sit well with your fairytale view. Gotta get those bears dancing hand in hand...

I have no illusions about the nature of Nature it's known as evolution, cruel, cold but very effective.

Who is the current leader of the National Party in the parliment ? And don't google it.

relevance?

So it's ok for Kate Blanchet to have her say but not an accountant elected by the people of Queensland, not once but twice, to represent their views ?

I'm sure Barnaby Joyce does a stand up job representing the views of his electorate in the state of QLD when he knows what they are. As the National's Senate Leader he represents the views of the National Party I'd be guessing but i'll say I doubt very much his views in this case actually represent the majority of the voting public in the State of Queensland

The carbon tax is hated because:

1. It will harm people less well off than I am, who will suffer in a very real way because of the increase in their cost of living.

prices are rising anyway because of increased expenditure on infrastructure
particularly in the case of power. the impact on food costs will be minimal in terms of a carbon tax, however transport cost will drive food prices up due to the eventual price rises in fuel as demand further reduces the global supply, we gotta get those lychees in Vic supermarkets after all right?

2. It won't change anything apart from making you and people like you feel good about yourself.

I'm a business owner, there have been times in the past decade where i have chosen to forgo profit in order to retain employees, being well aware that this would disadvantage my ability to live the most comfortable life possible in the future. This doesn't sit easy with me, it doesn't make me feel good about myself but i've done it nonetheless, problem is I don't see any other choice

3. All the catastrophic forecasts rely on positive feedback and carbondioxide as a driver of climate change. There is a very strong argument against positive feedback and the notion of CO2 as a driver is at the very least ambigious. ALL the disaster models written 10 years ago have been shown to be wildly wrong over this 10 year period. None of them are even remotely close to what's actually happened. I guess I'm old fashioned and out of touch, because throughout the signifigant part of my life that I did scientific research I trusted data over models every time.

there was a model written 100 years ago that has been proven to be wrong, significantly underestimating the impact of CO2 saturation in the atmosphere, it hadn't forecast the impact of deforestation, environment degradation, or the ability of the oceans/planet's ability to absorb CO2 at the rate we release it.

there is strong consensus amongst the majority of scientists in the field of climatology that our global temperature is trending upwards, that CO2 released into the atmosphere as a result of burning fossil fuels is driving that trend

The strong argument against CO2 contributing to warming is the result of a mostly (non-scientific) minority getting an equal representation in the media as the majority, an unlikely occurance without the help of self interested, powerful backers eg. exxon mobile.

Guess I'm just not progressive....

progressivism is a form of change through governmental action, it's roots come from reformers interested in helping people facing harsh conditions both domestically and in the workplace, a worthy aim by anyone's standards.

Idealogically it's the aim of anyone who enters politics including Barnaby Joyce


Note: As I said the carbon tax is a token, it won't fix our environmental problems, won't come anywhere near it, it may even destroy our global economy as we know it now, our descendants will be living in a completely different world and will need a new economical language that doesn't ignore the constraints of our environment, environmentalism has essentially failed,
the push for clean renewable energy is being stymied at every turn, (no money to be made there) if ever there was a time for a single global environmental monoculture it's right now.

P.S Cate Blanchet rocks!