Jennifer wants to bring us all back to "reason" and "reality".

Implicit in such a statement is that she (Jenniffer) and her right thinking clones at the IPA see things from a timeless universal non-biased point of view, free of any ideological bias or presumption.

In fact this sort of pretense is characteristic of right thinking propaganda hacks and think tanks altogether.

Whose "reason" and "reality"?

That defined by the one-dimensional clone factory the IPA?

That is the dismal soul-less, heartless and thus profoundly anti-human "reality" as defined by scientism----with a bit of old time archaic religion thrown in for consolation and to provide "religious authority" for the exercise in universal plunder being brought to one and all via capitalism.

Capitalism as part of "gods" plan for Humankind.

Old time state communism was of course worse, but both ideologies share the same dismal, ultimately destructive, presumptions about Humankind and the World Process.

What about Reality as a multi-dimensional quantum field of Indivisible Conscious Light in which everything is in one way or another inter-connected, and in which human beings are totally embedded and fully dependent on many processes of energy exchanges both gross and subtle----subtle in the sense that astrology is real and the subtle forces that Biodynamic gardening and agriculture harness, cultivate and use----and much much more besides.

1. http://www.dabase.org/broken.htm
2. http://www.fearnomorezoo.org

I used this reference in my last post but it sums up the anti-human world-view or ideology that (mis)-informs the IPA.
Man as separate from "creation",and "creation" being entirely "objective". ### see my last sentence below.

1. http://www.aboutadidam.org/readings/asana_of_science/index.html

Plus this reference and related website provide a shocking description of where the SEPARATIVE ideology of scientism, and the "culture" created in its image has brought the entire world.

1. http://ispeace723.org/realityhumanity2.html

The last (IsPeace) reference is all about the inevitable results of a "culture" wherin everything is "objectified.

“The environmental lobby doesn’t work from a set of principles that accord with liberal values; rather it is philosophically anti-development and anti-industry.”

What??

It is NOT philosophically anti-development or anti-industry!

Crikey Moses Jennifer!

The environment movement is all about a balance between the rampant continuous unending expansion of industry and all things human that fall under the fuzzy umbrella of ‘development’. So they are necessarily against some forms of development and industry. But to label them as philosophically anti-everything is just absurd.

Howard had his good environmental policies. But quite frankly, they were incidentally environmental, with the prime motive being economics.

He was just about as anti-environmental as you can get, because he worshipped rapid continuous growth and as absolutely loathe to do anything that might in any significant way reduce this growth.

So while he set out to remedy some of the symptoms of our atrocious abuse of this continent, he also made sure that the abuse would continue at a rapid pace by boosting immigration right up, increasing the baby bonus, talking about rapid growth as though it was an unquestioned basic necessity and in short, upholding the continuous-growth paradigm to the hilt.

In so doing, he continued to undermine advances made in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, improving efficiencies in all sorts of resource usage and waste production, and ultimately in us achieving a sustainable society.

In a couple of decades, we’ll look back at the Howard years and think that 1996 to 2007 was exactly the time when we really needed to change the way we lived and to wean ourselves off of the continuous growth ethic and onto a stable-population, dynamic steady-state economic basis, in harmony with our resource base and environment.

Was John Howard an environmentalist? Nope. Not in a fit.

Let's KISS and answer these simple questions.

In the reign of Howard:

How much Amazon rainforest was reclaimed?
How much Kalimantan rainforest was reclaimed?
What was the % drop in the purchases of ducted A/C, Plasma TVs and SUVs?
How many city commuters left their cars in the garage and took the train, bus, walked, ran or rode a pushbike?
How many airlines went bust due to falling patronage?
By how much did China reduce it's demand for coal from Australia?

You get the picture...

Jennifer, there were unfortunately a number of areas in which the Howard government failed to take a principled, evidence-based, public interest position, but took an ad hoc, vote-seeking approach, as with particular groups on environmental issues. My impression from meeting pre-PM Howard was that he had a good grasp of sound policy processes. Too often, however, he failed to adopt them in government; on balance, his "reign" was one of disappointing underachievement. He was prepared to stick to his guns on a few big issues (GST, Iraq), but too often sought short-term advantage. In part this reflected his view that the Australian people wouldn't accept much change and reform. That's probably a fair assessment, but change is inevitable, if we don't seize the day and use it to our advantage, we'll be steam-rollered by it. PMs need to take a leadership role in helping people to understand why certain changes are necessary and beneficial, but rarely do. Unfortunately, the determined changers included the very misguided Whitlam and Keating, which makes the pursuit of change harder for others. I thought at the time that PM Hawke was too much into consensus, but in retrospect he probably got the balance right, and was able to implement many changes with long-reaching positive impacts. Howard's achievements were modest compared to his opportunitites.

Howard failed because he tied the environment to the economy as in his $1 billion investment in 1996 being tied to the sale of Telstra. The basic question is how much public money went to R & D on sustainable energy and its implementation, the basic answer is not anywhere near enough.

Howard's first priority was his rich masters profit line, not the welfare of the Australian people as a whole, or humanity in general. He failed to realise the simplistic notion that if action was not taken Australia, indeed the planet would not have an economy, conservative thinking. We need progressive thinking, we can only hope Rudd is less conservative and more progressive than was Howard.

It is incorrect to say the EPBC Act was passed as "part of a deal to get the GST through the Senate." The GST and EPBC both passed through the Senate around the same period, but if anything the controversy over the decision of some Democrat Senators to support the GST made it harder for the EPBC to pass.

The strident attacks from the Greens and some environment groups made it politically damaging for the Democrats to pass the EPBC at that time. The party was already suffering from the perception of broken promises that accompanied Meg Lees' GST agreement.

I voted against the GST and would not have supported the EPBC, let alone carried the debate for the Democrats on the Bill through the Senate, were it not for the fact that the gain for the environment was too good to knock back, regardless of the extra political damage. The amendments the Democrats got to the EPBC made it far stronger than the law that previously existed.

Although some of the groups who attacked the laws (and the Democrats) most strongly subsequently used them to prevent destructive actions, the attacks no doubt contribute to why the EPBC is not recognised as an environmental achievement of the Howard government. However, there are other reasons, not least of which is that the government itself rarely used the strong new legal powers it was given by the Senate. The best wins through the EPBC have come about through court action undertaken by others. The government did not even provide the resources to allow some of the basic elements of the Act to be properly developed, let alone administered.

In any case, the main contributor to the EPBC Act from the Coalition was Robert Hill not John Howard. It is fair to surmise that the government would not have agreed to some of the strengthenings the Democrats achieved had it not been for the fact that Howard and others in the government were more preoccupied at that time with getting the GST passed and saving their political skins.

As for the large expansion in protected areas of the Great Barrier Reef, I think there is little doubt this is the greatest environmental achievement of the Howard years. I don't know who it is that is arguing "there has been no environmental benefit", but I doubt very much they could produce scientifically verified evidence to demonstrate this.

It is possible that some fishing effort has been transferred to parts of South-East Asia – although I’d like to see solid evidence of that too – but even if that was true, why should that be a reason to have let the Barrier Reef Marine Park continue to be damaged so severely, as it undoubtedly was.

WWF were pleading for more protection for the Reef and the Marine Park, against fishing and onshore impacts. It is a great tribute to them, and others who supported them such as the Queensland Tourism Industry, (which produces far more in jobs and dollars from the Reef than commercial fishing ever would), that they were able to convince the Coalition government to do this.

The fact that the compensation for commercial fishers blew out so much from the original amount is as much to do with the political clout of the fishers and the huge fuss they kicked up as it was to do with under-estimation of the economic value of the industry.

There are some other environmental positives from the Howard-era, most notably the funding program for the National Reserve System. If the Natural Heritage Trust had been run on a more scientific basis, and had not been so infected by day to day politics, ideology and pork-barrelling, it too could have produced enormous gains. As it is, its record is rather patchy. Undoubtedly it has done some good, but as with many other policy areas from the Howard era, there is just as much missed opportunity as lasting legacy.

Jennifer,

Thank you indeed, I enjoyed reading your most interesting and informative paper. It is important to acknowledge the support provided by the Howard Government to environmental maters.

We all live on this planet and therefore, we all should have an interest in our surroundings. Just as nineteenth century public health measures was based on sound science, so to should be our approach to environmental problems. Clearly the environment in which we live (standard of living) depends entirely on good economic management, plentiful supply of energy and a full use of the earth’s resources. I regard it is axiomatic that life to day for most people, even in the most poorest parts of the world, is better then it was one hundred years ago,

Kyoto and global warming (GW) are the issues of the day. Signing Kyoto was a symbolic act and nobody is one jolt better off for the signing. It can now be stated in view of a recent report to US Senate or the recent open letter to Ban Ki-moon that there is no consensus on GW. I believe that as time goes by there will be greater and greater divergence from climate predictions based on current computer models and actual (real) climate events.

I share with the previous Government an enthusiasm for nuclear energy. I do not base this on phoney GW theory. I am impressed with the health and safety record of nuclear power generation especial when compared to alternatives such as coal or hydro. [Refer to the Switkowski report].

I am not against wind or solar power generation, but I do regard them as being both expensive and intermittent sources for power generation

Thank you Jennifer for another sensible article.It has drawn some comments from the silly do-gooders once again.
As a farmer who killed my own animals for meat and whose wife and children raised some of their orphan lambs and calves on bottles,I can see no difference between killing them to eat and the Japanese and Norwegians killing whales to eat.
Some people say it is alright to kill sheep and cattle because they and unintelligent whereas whales are intelligent.How do they know?have they ever raised a whale on a bottle?
Other people say whales are wild creatures and therefore should not be killed whereas sheep and cattle have been raised to be killed,I wonder what they say about fish?

Yeah, well the world's fast running out of wild fish stocks. However, I agree with the comment about the relative sentience of domestic livestock and aquatic mammals. We have a few sheep and cattle and they are certainly individually intelligent, but I still eat meat. In their own way they are as beautiful as whales, dugongs and dolphins.

So long as animals aren't ecologically endangered and can be slaughtered humanely, I have no intrinsic problem with eating them.

That said, how does Marohasy's cynical attempt to elevate Howard retrospectively to the status of an environmentalist sit with other recent observations by those of her political persuasion that Hitler was also an environmentalist?

I think that Howard was an environmentalist in much the same way that Mohammed was a Christian.

The argument against killing whales is surely more to do with the cruel manner in which its done, and of course the fact that many species are endangered. We generally take care to kill our domestic meat animals quickly and painlessly, whereas whales are killed in a manner that is often anything but. Further, even from a utility argument, whale meat is NOT an essential part of anybody's diet (aside from some native Inuit and Sami tribes), whereas they clearly are a source of beauty of inspiration whose presence enriches human existence.
Of course the fact that many species of whale are known to be highly advanced cerebral and nervous systems that would indicate they are capable of levels of pain, fear and suffering similar to humans comes into the equation also. Fish, for instance, lack such "advanced" systems, and while some species may be capable of a sensation of pain (this is still a debateable point), there appears little evidence that they suffer particularly from most methods of catching.

Having said all that, it's clear that many environmentalists don't always have a lot of cold, hard logic to back up their positions. But I wonder should cold, hard logic always be necessary when talking about the preservation of beauty and avoidance of cruelty?
All animals engage in destructive behaviour of course, but none manage it to anything like the extent that humans do, and I don't see much wrong with trying our best to limit the extent of our destructive tendencies.

CJ Morgan,
You have hit the nail on the head mate, there were ways Howard resembled Hitler but environmentalist was not one of them.

Spot on about Howard, Ludwig. Reminds me so much about my wife scolding me out from Wubin-Buntine when after marrying a better educated person than my bushy self she told me she would clear off if I did not leave more salmon gums in the new-cleared paddocks.

When I answered - no worries, we can grow some more - she said. Yes, typical of men, always reckon they can fix things, better leave those splendid big gums or I'm leaving.

Same argument against Charlie Court when he headed the military patrol up to Nookenbah to prevent the natives stopping the oil-drilling.

Have faith in progress - was Charley's answer to the early WA Avant Garde who were mostly females.

Certainly Howard was more like Charley, all out for progress which has got us all now fully under the spell of pitstock plus quarry economics, still having us wondering whether it'll be the right way to go from now on?

Anyhow, Ludwig, Happy Christmas, my now-dead wife often telling me how the term Merry Christmas, only encourages men to do the same stupid things once again, whereas as a simple Happy Christmas makes Christmas sound more genuine, like most housewives would want.

Loads of Christmas Cheers, BB, WA

Agh! Bushbred were would any discussion be without your genuine pearls of wisdom. I enjoy anything you post.

Howard was an environmentalist in the same way as Rudd is now. The economy comes first.

Howard refused to sign up to Kyoto without the developing nations accepting cuts, Rudd signed up and used his vote to block any real targets without the developing nations.

The difference between Rudd and Howard environmentally is retoric not practise. Rudd wants to stay in power, so he "me too"s the policies with different packaging.

Howard's environmental status is adequately deonstrated by his choice of Wilson Tuckey as Minister for Forestry and Conservation at one time.
Out of many, that is one really rough patch for Jennifer to sweep under the carpet,

... and of Malcolm Turnbull for environment minister.

.
Bushbred, I lived in WA for the whole time that Charles Court was Premier. I recall his almost manic use of the word ‘progress’ and his complete lack of balance between anything he considered to constitute progress and conservation or environmentalism.

As a teenager in the 70s, my environmental passion was galvanised by the this message of ‘grow, expand and exploit to the hilt’, as projected in our TV news and newspapers with great frequency, while I was at the same time exploring the wheatbelt and realising just how ecologically devastated that whole vast area was… and how totally unremorseful our leaders were about it, and how much they were practicing just the same sort of philosophy of taking whatever could be taken, without any sense of balance coming into it.

Court’s push for progress was just so full-on that every time Howard, or many others, have mentioned the same sort of philosophy, I’ve thought of him. He has stayed fresh in my mind over all these years.

Anyway, may the sun shine a golden-pink off the branches of the salmon gums on news year’s morning. Cheers.

Ho ho ho

Scientiests - WHO?

Ludwig

I must profoundly disagree, I argue strongly in favour of science, technology and progress. I hold it as an article of faith that life to-day for the majority of people in all parts of the world is better by orders of magnitude then it was say a hundred or five hundred years ago.

This is true in spite of a massive population increases. In the seventeenth and eighteenth century Europe experienced several episodes of famine. Not so today, due to a variety of reasons; improved marketing and transport of foods, improved agriculture, the fixation of ammonia by Fritz Haber’s process (approximately in 1914), the green revolution and now genetic modified foods.
Climate too has improved – for we are fortunate to be alive in a more favourable phase of the natural climate cycle.

The famines in the 1930s in the Old Soviet Union can be related in part to Stalin adopting the genetic theories of Trofim Lysenko. Mendel' genetic theories did not resonate well with Marxism. It was labelled bourgeois science. Lamarck’s concept of inheritance of acquired characteristics appealed to the politically correct of the day.

Please note that I speak of the majority of people. Of course there are pockets of human misery to be found in every country.

To the well known story of the half empty glass I will add two other explanations. According to an engineer colleague the glass was over designed. My grandmother offered an even better explanation namely; always buy two sizes too big the child will grow into the garment. Which I think brings the argument back to the late Sir Charles Court and the imaginative Ord River scheme.

Anti-Green, have you ever stopped to think these days of the need to steady down about global progress, especially as much of the progress is based on thoughts mixed between the head and below the navel, rather than also from the heart regions as even Adam Smith, the father of Laizess-faire spoke about when he warned about the aggravations of capitalistic competition.

Anti-green, sorry but just what is it that you profoundly disagree with me over?

I also argue strongly for science, technology and progress, presumably with similar goals to you – to achieve a sustainable secure future, with a better quality of life, much better equality for humanity and a much better respect for the natural environment and rights of other organisms….or something like that. You get the general drift.

Balance is the essential element. This is what was so glaringly absent in Court’s push, and similarly with Howard….and with practically every local, state and federal government in this country and around the world.

Their brand of 'progress' took us away from a secure future, by increasing the effect of humanity on our environment, thus making it that much harder for us to achieve the essential balance.

These ‘growth-at-all-costs’ merchants used many of our scientific and technological advances against us. They used them to facilitate greater human pressure on our environment and resource base.

Let us simplify the discussion. On one one side we have thousands of the world's best and brightest scientists on the other is John Howard and conservatism. Who do you trust? I know where my money is, and it's not with old fashioned and outdated selfish conservatism.

anti-green,

No such thing as “Lysenko’s genetic theories” existed because genetics itself was a “pseudo-science”.

Although over-obsession with genetic is quite understandable in feudal society where inherited possessions include posts at the academia, even in the UK most recent research proves that training of thoroughbred horses rather than their genome is the most for achievements at races.

However, who cares today of Howard’s environmentalism?

Bushbred and Ludwig

Thank you both for your replies. I appreciate the point Ludwig, that you too favour science and development.

Our difference then is one of execution. We may differ on the “rate of introduction” of new technologies.

By and large I get very concerned about the routine blocking, delay and increased or unnecessary cost to industry, so as to placate the whim of greens and/or environmentalists.

Let me give some examples: opposition to building a high rise building, construction of a new road, construction of a new mine (especially one where uranium ore will be mined), a new de-salination plant. Only rarely do I think such objection can be sustained or justified.

Then there is the almost routine protests against new technologies or even the introduction of an established technology into a new area such as into WA. Examples include, genetic modified crops, nuclear energy. Food irradiation - in the interests of food preservation or prophylaxis against bacterial food poisoning. Then again there is routine agitation, by “special interest” groups against such established public health measures such as vaccination programs, supplementary fluoride being carefully added to water supplies. In the case of GM food and nuclear matters there seems to be an implicit distrust, in some minds of government regulatory organisations. I do not consider this lack of confidence in regulation to be justified.

I do not want to be too sweeping, if the anti groups have a good case then I will listen. Just for the record I am against smoking, binge drinking as opposed to “social” drinking and the pokies.

I do not think this is deviating too far from the nominated topic of
John Howard, environmentalist.

Anti-Green, actually the literary term Progess is simply to move forward - but not necessarily the best way in the circumstances as the concept of philosophical reasoning implies?

What worries me is that with our present nearly full reliance on quarry economics and with the associated pitstock politics so engaged, what is going to be left for our great grandkids when the underground wealth runs out?

Neither Charley Court nor John Howard used adequate reasoning to cover the above problem.

Only to have faith in your leader, like the wartime - yours is not to reason why-?

Therefore right now, with future global warming pretty well now proven a reality, should we not allay now a planning for a possibly illustrious future, and go into strategic defence mode against rising water tables, etc.

Should have suited a former successful military man like Charley Court down to the ground if still young - though don't know so much about Johnny Howard?

Bushbred

“What worries me is that with our present nearly full reliance on quarry economics and with the associated pitstock politics so engaged, what is going to be left for our great grandkids when the underground wealth runs out?”
_________________________________________________
Ever since the time of the Reverend Thomas Malthus (May be even earlier) people have speculated that the earth will run out of resources. Recall the famous wager between Paul Erlich and Julian Simon in 1980. The population biologist lost the world did not run out of food, oil and raw materials, in fact their prices dropped (1).

What about the case of “Peak Oil:” well oil production is controlled by a cartel. Further part of the block in production is due to limited refinery capacity.

Remember too vast areas of the earth have not yet been exploited such as the Artic, Antarctic, and the Ocean Depths. There is one understands a possible oilfield in the South Atlantic. Another thing the earths crust is about 40 km thick (varies from place to place), I believe the deepest mines are about 4-5 km below the surface.

Global Warming: Reference to such web sites as, such as Andrew Bolt’s Blog, Lavoisier Group, Science and Environment Policy Project, Jennifer Marohasy’s blog; all suggests that there is no consensus on anthropogenic global warming. There is also the open letter to Ban Ki- moon signed by over 100 leading academics. Again you may care to refer to a recent US Senate report on global warming (2).

1. Lomborg B. The Skeptical environmentalist.

2. http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Blogs&ContentRecord_id=f80a6386-802a-23ad-40c8-3c63dc2d02cb

I like it and have it on my bookshelf - Lomborg B. The Skeptical environmentalist.

It seems this dude made a hip of money mimicking “the worries” of paid-for-threatening-on-climate-change bureaucrats.

Of Howard, he improved his personal environment at own house on a taxpayer expense and it's good for him already. The same approach of comforting potentially useful fat cats’ personal interests had been flourishing during all his reign in so-called enviroareas, of which access to Australian natural resources was the most.

You apparently haven’t lived long enough, Anti-Green, to notice as well as feel the change that is on its way.
Probably not so precious to you, but one who has cleared wheatbelt land to see wild turkeys and mallee hens, fluttering over strange mini-kangaroos, to finish the last of their lives around saltlakes ever growing whiter and wider.

The point is that we have not overcome the above problems, only fenced them off and passed them by in a land of plenty, or was a land of plenty.

Here in Mandurah now as well as low-lying canal houses due to be swamped by rising tides, we have now seen the last of the unique tuart forests, the few trees left looking not so strong and stately, but ever so lonely.

Yep, reckon you’ve got a lot to learn Anti-Green, especially when you believe man has not done harm to this planet, and in any case stupidly believes he is quite capable of surviving on technology alone if the worst comes to the worst

Finally, it is so interesting that the feminine gender can sense the coming weather problems much more than their male counterparts. Happened in our Wubin-Buntine locality not long after WW2 when diesel replaced steam locos’, 13, 000 acres of catchment sloping into a railway dam was due to be put up for farm sales.

But the daughter of a local Scot family rallied the local wives in a protest which not only saved the Buntine dam going salt through the clearing of the mainly ti-tree catchment, but other women in other wheatbelt railway towns took up the protest as well not only saving the low-lying towns from going salt, but helped to start the West Australian Greenies.

That is why I feel proud to be called a Left Wing Loonie, Anti-Green, and please remember I had marksman printed in my paybook during WW2, and was not bad with the gloves, neither, yep, reckon most of your green is around the eyes and ears matey, cos’ you’ve still got a lot to learn.

Cheers - BB, WA.

Bushbred

Now I understand. I am 74 years so perhaps still junior to yourself. I hated boxing in my London school. I even served my national service in the RAF and thought it quite a waste of time.

One other thing I have lived all my life in cities.

I have some sympathy with William Congreve 1670-1729 (from: the Oxford book of quotations).

"I nauseate walking; 'tis a country diversion, I loathe the country."

No matter please accept my best wishes for 2008.

Interesting. I reckon things might be a lot better if anti-green and others of his ilk had taken a few decent walks through the Australian bush.

Of course, that would also apply to John Howard, Jennifer Marohasy and the other city-based folk at the IPA.

Jennifer, you state that:

"The environmental lobby doesn’t work from a set of principles that accord with liberal values; rather it is philosophically anti-development and anti-industry."

Implicit in your statement is
1) that liberalism is synonymous with capitalism,
2) that liberalism is synonymous with complete and unfettered freedom.

1) Liberalism is about access to freedom that goes beyond just freedom in the market sense, because life is more than just the market! Without good health, access to clean water and reliable healthy crops etc functioning freely in an everyday sense becomes difficult.
If you think that there is no evidence that GHGs matter, then I suggest you go outside the comfort zone of Australia and live in some of the world's most polluted cities for a while and wake in the morning sucking in that thick black smog. After you've done that for a while and your lungs start to hurt as mine and many of my colleagues who have lived overseas in such places have, then come and write an article about how industrial emissions don't matter blah blah.

2) By definition if we all had unfettered freedom, then it would, taken to its logical extreme, result in freedom for only some and tyranny for the rest. I am cringing that this is basic pol sci stuff that you dont seem to have thought about....

3) Liberalism necessarily pre-supposes certain healthy and sustainable conditions for that freedom. As an extension of this and point number two is the notion of freedom in multiple spheres not just for current but also for future generations.

4) the environmental lobby is not about being anti-development, it is about sustainable development and it pains me that I have to state the basics.

lia, Jennifer meant "Liberal" values, which have very little to do with "liberal" values ;-)

As understood this topic is a UK pensioners’ playground, overwhelmed with their superiority of an English person burden.

That is what Howard-crown-licker “environmentalism” is.