as a skeptic who like many other skeptics advocates reducing pollution and toxins you fail to miss the point. CO2 is not a pollutant, doesnt cause warming and ETS is simply a tax on hot air – wed rather the money put into that be spent on real solutions like clean technologies, reafforestation etc where there will be real results

This is just the tip of the iceberg, however, with the especially lenient treatment of organizations that can “self-regulate” mistreatment of children and other vulnerable persons (e.g. Pell’s Mafia), flout electoral law (e.g. Exclusive Brethren), and automatically grant religious bodies the ability to define who gets statutory powers beyond the level or ordinary citizens (the ability to take statutory declarations, the ability to formalize marriages, etc). And then there are the cosy tax avoidance possibilities.

All these imply that religions, but not atheist/agnostic organizations, have, under laws and regulations, extraordinary privileges.

Just to revert for a mo’ from the far more stimulating musing of Messrs Gibbon and Procopius, re your post #5, I argued in psst #3 explicitly against a right to religion. And thus I certainly argue against a right from religion. I’m the litlle bear (or was it piggy) who thinks the current Australian ‘rights’ attitude to the matter is well covered by s.116 of the Constitution:

116. The Commonwealth shall not make any law for establishing any religion, or for imposing any religious observance, or for prohibiting the free exercise of any religion, and no religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth.

That is enough for me.

But, given that you accept climate change is anthrogenic, or even if you don’t, the consensus is also that the degree of climate change is dangerous, in which case (just as dangerously high body temperatures are treated with anti-pyretics, although low bloods levels of anti-pyretics are hardly the cause of fever) any mitigation, however unrelated to cause, becomes necessary.

Personally, I think the only action that will make the necessary difference is population reduction – and the choice is whether we manage it, or the four horsemen impose it upon us.

This is a loose statement the can mean all things to all people and nothing to the greenhouse gas debate.

Many surveys ask a simple question, is climate change anthropogenic?

My answer is yes.

However, this answer has nothing to do with greenhouse gases but relates to the impact of cities on recorded temperature in a location. Many studies have shown that thermal mass, particulate emissions etc have raised local temperatures by as much as 3 degrees C with no input from greenhouse gas. This is also anthropogenic climate change.

Thus using that claim as support for action is the reason many people become doubtful of the integrity of the debate or the knowledge of the participants.

The models used to make predictions of temperature changes are the best evidence available but have changed and are changing rapidly. They also have considerable difficulty explaining past climate change and the relationship between some historical CO2 levels and temperate changes.

This does not say their predictions are wrong but when we consider moving large amounts of the world resources into a limited range of mitigation measures (ie no nuclear power) we have to accept a large amount of questioning of the proposed policies.

In Australia we have just had the spectacle of the CSIRO a government research organization demanding that a paper accepted for publication in a scientific journal be withdrawn because it criticizes government policy on greenhouse gas control when several papers supporting government policy from scientists in the same organization have been published.

Nonsense! I would give my left nut to be known as the man who married the bear tamer’s daughter! :)

No doubt you’ve also read Procopius’ Secret History, which in English translation bears a remarkable stylistic similarity to Gibbon, n’est pas?

Putting aside the quality of historiography, I could read Gibbon all day. His style really does make one quiver!

Aha! Snap! I too adore Gibbon (and “powder room” is a placement of Vidal that would have been subtly accurate in more bigoted and judgemental times, but not today).

I’ve often said that if you can’t read Cicero in the original language (but modern typography), then read Gibbon, and you’ll know exactly what it feels like.

But in this less enlightened age, when Gibbon, as wondrous in English prose as any other, with subordinate clauses too deep and braided ideas too densely packed for the the highly graded yet untutored students of today, even a pale shadow of the cutting wit and style of the master, when applied to more recent events, is perhaps the best writing we can enjoy and expect.

However, one assessment on which I do sympathise with Gibbon is Charlemagne. I argue Europe as a cohesive geo-cultural entity was only sparked by Charlemagne in 800, when he integrated the Franks, Germans, Italians, Bavarians, the northern Spaniards, Saxons, Slavs (I can’t remember every darn one :) ) under the one Carolingian kingdom and empire.

The appellation of great has been often bestowed, and sometimes deserved; but Charlemagne is the only prince in whose favor the title has been indissolubly blended with the name. That name, with the addition of saint, is inserted in the Roman calendar; and the saint, by a rare felicity, is crowned with the praises of the historians and philosophers of an enlightened age.

And it was a Xian empire when the Pope anointed Charlemagne the very first “Holy Roman Emperor” in 800. This political integration was Charlemagne’s political legacy to Europe. This Holy Roman Empire was orthodox Roman Catholic.

While much of the greatness did not survive Charlie’s demise, some crucial elements that would give Europe its cohesive cultural identity did. I argue Charlemagne’s insistence that all Roman Catholic cathedrals build a school next door was Charlemagne’s great cultural legacy to Europe – arguably Europe’s “first Renaissance” as these led the slow recovery of Greek science, before the explosion of learning that accompanied the rush of university building in the 12/13th century -arguably Europe’s “second Renaissance”.

It is senseless to speak of ‘Europe’ without Xianity. In the particular case here, ee are talking about fucking Italy, FFS.

If this Finnish sheilah wants her child educated in a school environment that has had it cultural, spiritual, and ethical edifice bleached with the burnt offerings of “secular pluralism” and courts in Strasbourg, she could send her kid to a private school that indulges that faddish tripe.

Better still, why doesn’t she catch the next husky sleigh back to Helsinki, or Oulu? After all, Finnish schools have the highest performing students in the world on those standardised tests.

Those software vendors should be told to get out of the game and Microsoft shouldn’t have anything to do with anybody having such shonky code, let alone pander to them…

The golden handcuffs have served Microsoft very well so far.

Again, go back over my posts. Way before the election I said she’s make Margaret Thatcher look like Eva Cox. ;)

I have a few mates in the left labour movement. A strategy I advised – very cynical I know – is to calculatedly, publicly, and aggressively pit The Luvvies/Global Warming Theists against the unskilled/semi-skilled white/blue collar workers and very small business owners on the economic/job costs of satisfying The Luvvies/Global Warming Theists demands. Get Gillard out there saying:

The ALP is returning to its roots. Ordinary labourers, shearers, checkout workers, blah, blah, built Australia into what it is today, fighting the elites every step of the way. We have beaten the elites over and over again in the past in formulating and implementing the policies best for all Australians, not just the few. Today, I’d like to launch Labor’s “Workers Environnmental Policy for Jobs and Growth (or something less cheesy; get John Singleton onto it)

Let the outraged Luvvies/Global Warming Theists officially split from Labor and move to the Greens in screeching outrage and a huff. Let Giillard publicly say, “good riddance to abd rubbish”. If this part succeeds, Labor is free from having to satisfy that constituency that is over noisy and over-influential within the party, but strategically expendable IF “Labor’s Worker’s Approach to Green and Jobs” shifted enough lower class Lib/Independent voters back to committed Labor voters, and brought back any lower class Greens, once they get fed up with the meddling, selfish, theocractic, annoyingly dogmatic – and most importantly, prole-hating – Luvvies/Global Warming Theists.

If this strategy worked, what we’d basically have is a Labor Party that has a much greater loyalty among the largest part of the lower and lower-middle orders. The bourgeois would be split, with the mercantile bourgeois sticking with the Libs, or a saner Labor party, while The Luvvie/GWT bourgeoisie becomes the base for The Greens.

I guarantee Labor with a majority of 30 seats! ;)

JayJee@4 : Esp if you like Gibbon, Xtianity largely DESTROYED Europe (and Western civilization) for about a millenium from Constantine (or perhaps soon after Justinian) until well after the Jews in Cordoba helped us reclaim it by translating the bits of Greece and Rome that had been preserved in Arabic, and perhaps as recently as Napoleon’s Continental System. I think the upcoming film “Agora”, about the Matyrdom of Hypatia, often pinpointed as the day the dark ages (a.k.a. Xtianity triumphant) started. See "Hypatia makes NS most inspirational Woman scientist list" (2009-07-25), "Hypatia, Logos, Rise of Christianity etc" (2009-07-28) and the links in that second post… especially the comments section in "Athena, Hypatia, et al" (2008-03-08).

We aren’t in Oz even officially back to the 362 Tolerance Edict issued by one of my favorite emperors Julian the Apostate. Of course, the Xtians HATED the idea of religious tolerance enforced by law, not only because they couldn’t attack non-Xtians, but because they could attack each other. Mind you, one of Julian’s “persecutions” involved saying to Xtians “Hey, if you are a Xtian and reckon the your holy book is the word of your god and is so fantastic, then you can teach grammar and oratory out of IT and NOT use Homer or pagan authors, so there! (Well, maybe apart from my old tutor, because I owe him big time for teaching me the classics, even if he IS a bleeping Galilean)”

Jayjee@5 also asks “what is this myterious ‘centre-left’?”
It is the advertising slogan used to stop unions from shifting their funding to another party.

And on Jayjee@4 issues:
Yeah. HowRudd light… always a worry of mine too.
On Orstrayuns luvving the “bash a reffo terrist” tactic… see "Showing what we standard for: Oi! Oi! Oi!" (2009-11-04) which points to what matters to “True Blue Ozzies” (who are at best CUBs – Cashed Up Bogans)

And founding member of Deakin Uni ALP that I am, and going more and more left in recent decades… hardly rusted on ALP… Been (1) Democrat, (2) Green, (3) Slightly silly party, (4) ALP, (5) Lib, (6) Silly Party, (7) Monster raving loony party, (8) Fielding/Hanson for the last decade. Actually putting ALP BELOW Libs next Vic election because Joh Brumby is so corrupt. So much for “rusted on”

I think the only group that /can/ bring the ALP even back to the old centre is the union movement by threatening to withdraw financial support and give it to Greens (now the Dems are sadly gone).

When has Rudd EVER given any “centre-left” vibes? And what is this mysterious “centre-left”?

On the boat people issue, what most Luvvie-Left Greens/Labor types can never, ever get their heads around is that the government represents the people and that includes those people’s. A democratic elective government, and especially its Prime Minister does not sneer and lecture, as Keating did to his electoral defeat.

While Keating had long lost the love of much of Labor’s base, and so found the adulation of The Luvvies so intoxicating, electorally, The Luvvies are a much, much, smaller group than Labor’s base.

Personally, I think Howard’s “hit it hard and hit early” approach to the running away boat people problem satisfied most Australians, especially when One’s Nation’s vioce was silenced when its policies were explicitly incorporated into both Labor and Liberal official policy.

The Australian electorate has had a break from the boat people and “Muslim” issue more generally over the past few years, so is not so on tenterhooks. So perhaps Rudd is over-egging it unnecessarily. He is certainly alienating The Luvvies, who had such great delusions. But then again their number is not that large, and while sure they might throw a hissy-fit and vote Green, they will always preference Labor before the Coalition. The Luvvies are a Lock for Labor. True Blue Useful Idiots.