@ Ludwig,

You make some eminently sensible suggestions, as we have come to expect.
----“ It is just absurd, bizarre and ridiculous to blunder on in the same old ever-increasingly overconsumptive manner, [ TICK]
--- “we should still be doing our damnedest to wean ourselves off of fossil fuels… in the face of peak oil [ TICK]
And I would add reduce pollution and waste.

But we can have all of the above WITHOUT acceding to the leftwing lobbies that now campaign under
conservation and climate change “prevention” banners (or push their agendas on OLO) and whose initiatives have included:

--Saddling Australian industry –one of the cleanest in the world -with the worlds highest carbon tax, while many of its dirtier competitors carry on unimpeded.
--Proposing a massive fund to “compensate” underdeveloped nations for "climate change damage”. When the real issue is overpopulation and/or bad governance which has moved them to clear mangroves from deltas/flood-plains.
--Having an open door policy to anyone who whimpers “I’m a climate refugee”

..............
@ Bonmot

Come now Bonmot --despite all its gimmicky graphics -– your little 1973 to 2012 presentation is hardly “long term"!

This is a better long term perspective:
http://tinyurl.com/6og8amu

As is this:
http://tinyurl.com/7m9f5ce

And this:
http://www.longrangeweather.com/global_temperatures.htm

(sorry to spoil your puff piece)

SPQR,

Regarding your last link...is that meteorologist really named 'Randy Mann"?

: )

Don't build your hopes up,Poirot!
I'm sure he's spoken for.

SPQR, glad you agree with my assertions that we need to do take the sort of remedial measures necessary to address climate change regardless of whether it is real or not, in the interests of a sustainable society.

But I see the carbon tax quite differently to you.

You see it as the biggest tax of its kind in the world (is it really?) which is a big imposition on Australian business.

I see it as a very small step, in fact no more than a token effort, towards steering our society off of our fossil fuel addiction and onto a sustainable largely renewable energy platform.

It needs to be considerably stronger. And of course it needs to be part of a total sustainability agenda. Doing it in isolation, especially while we still have extremely high immigration, is absurd.

SPQR,

Do yer reckon?....drat it!

75 major temperature swings over 4500 years, wow ! With that indisputable evidence there's absolutely no doubt now that Australia's Carbon Tax will save Planet Earth. Hail Julia Gillard.