Consensus of the Elite

Ah climate change. Each time I write about it here, I feel like I'm giving a dead horse a few more kicks. I suppose it's apt to keep bringing it up, especially when it's an issue that refuses to go away. For the first time in 86 years, it snowed in metropolitan London today. Such an October snowfall is rare in southern Canada and even rarer still in normally dreary London. It is a twist of irony as the UK Parliament discusses a major climate bill. The bill introduced and quickly forced through promised that the United Kingdom would cut its current carbon emissions by 80% by the year 2050. Britain's Labour government has already pushed through radical and aggressive anti-anthropogenic global warming reforms. The bill was passed into law with a vote of 653 to 5. That's rather unusual for a bill of this nature.

Part of the new law put strict carbon limits on aviation and ocean shipping. This has Northern Ireland worried. Belfast is of course one of the country's major shipping centres. Sammy Wilson of the Democratic Unionist Party said that it threatened to make Northern Ireland uncompetitive since the Republic of Ireland does not have such climate laws. As shipping costs increases in the UK, companies will turn to its western neighbour as the new shipping hub. With industry closing up within the UK, the country is having to rely more and more on imports. Increasing shipping costs would threaten to sharply rise the price of everything. This is what Britons have come to know as fuel poverty. These are households that are now having to spend more than 10% of their income on fuel. The vast majority of fuel poverty comes from rising global energy costs but increasingly aggressive anti-AGW programs in the UK have also contributed significantly to the the increased costs. Rising costs that can at least partially be attributed to aggressive climate action are threatening to lower the standard of living for many. While many North American left wing politicians point to Europe as a shining beacon of how to combat climate change, the UK example has shown how if unchecked, climate action can be disastrous to a state's economy. Some sceptics have described this as the "cooler but poorer" plan. It means that we must sacrifice our current standard of living for a lesser one in order to combat what is supposedly an immanent danger. Those who would be affected by this mantra disagree.

Consensus of the Elite

A recent survey showed that 60% of the British public now doubt that mankind is having an effect on climate change. Furthermore, most people think that global warming is not as bad as has been claimed. This is vary interesting since it shows that despite media carpet bombing and fear mongering on the subject, the sceptics are still in the vast majority. These numbers are also on the increase. This goes against what scientists in the IPCC have been saying that there is consensus in both the scientific community and the global community regarding the AGW crisis. The only consensus that exists in a consensus of the elite. Elitist politicians are those who wish to rule their subjects like a king with divine right. The survey shows to them that we are indeed ignorant fools who need to be told, and eventually forced to do what they think is right since only they know the right answer. This arrogant, conceited, holier than thou attitude is precisely why they have tried to stifle debate on the subject. Your typical climate elitist is someone like Al Gore or Stephane Dion. Gore would never get elected today due to this attitude, the same attitude that saw Dion loose the 2008 federal election. People do not like being told by politicians that they are wrong or ignorant. 60% of Britons don't support the climate theory yet 99% of the politicians do represents a huge disparity between parliament and public. It seems that British MPs are not responsibly representing their constituents' wishes.

Climate Colonialism

Foreign nations have also jumped on the bandwagon in a tactic I'm calling climate colonialism. The People's Republic of China has demanded that wealthy nations give the world's poor states money to combat climate change. I can't help but feel this is a bit tongue in cheek on their part. I have no love for the PRC's government. However, despite their atrocious human rights record, many developed nations just before the Olympics blasted them for environmental issues, notably Beijing's infamous smog. As nations struggle to develop, they are going to pollute more. The basic attitude is that if the West got to where they are by burning cheap fossil fuels, so will we and what are they to tell us otherwise. Therefore, if the West wants the developing world to "go green," they should pay for it. In a way, the treatment of developing nations in regards to global warming is a form of climate colonialism. Powerful nations trying to force their ideals on "less developed" ones in a paternal and hypocritical fashion. These are the same values they are trying to forcibly impose on their own citizens while at the same time living lavish, jet set lifestyles. Once again, Al Gores travel record (he flies in a private jet to all his conferences) clearly illustrates the hypocrisy that exists within the clique of climate elitists.

Is it responsible to even be discussing climate at a time like this. The global market is currently teetering on recession. At the same time, industries are being told they will be taxed more for carbon emissions, people are being told that energy is too cheap, jobs are being lost as factories go to more friendly locals. Right now, the government's priority should be on stabilizing the economy. Even thinking about climate change is highly irresponsible let alone wasting vast amounts of time in parliament on marathon debates that force legislation through without considering the economic consequences. The British law will probably not kill their economy but its not exactly helping it either.

Source: The Register , The Washington Post

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Another Conservative Minority, Garth Gets the Boot

Once again, I'm on a roll predicting election results. The Conservatives managed to not only obtain another minority government but also strengthened their standing from the previous parliament. It's not the result that conservative supporters wanted but the election worked out extremely well in their favour. The Harper Conservatives gained 19 seats from the previous election, just missing a majority by 12 seats. They hold 143 seats in parliament. According to the popular vote, the Conservatives lead the Liberals by eleven points holding at 37%. NDP leader Jack Layton also has a lot to be happy about. The New Democrats increased their number of seats by eight and now hold 37. Despite this, their popularity in terms of the popular vote is only up slightly.

The Liberals, however, don't have much to celebrate. As predicted, Stephane Dion pulled a John Tory with his highly controversial Green Shift. As I had said before, people are totally willing to care about the environment until it starts to inconvenience them. This likely swayed a number of people away from the Liberal party. During tough economic times, people do not want to hear they'll be paying more for something that will give them little to no personal dividends. Liberal support has plummeted. The Liberals lost 27 seats. While the other parties have held steady popular support, the Liberals dropped an astounding 4% in the polls. This just proves that the pre-election polls are not reliable as they had indicated we would see a vary close race. In reality, it was far from it. My guess would be that the Greens had been stealing a lot of Liberal votes. It's not surprising since both party platforms were almost identical. Elizabeth May has nothing to be happy about either, loosing the one seat they had illegitimately held in Parliament before the election. Their popular vote is up a mildly impressive 2.47%. Even without a Liberal candidate running against her, May was still unable to gain her own seat.
Voter turnout for the election, according to Elections Canada, was quite low. Only 59.1% of Canadians voted. There are approximately 23 million registered to vote. The low turnout could also have contributed to the Liberals drop with people simply not voting, or spoiling their ballot.

Another thing worth noting is that the saga of Garth Turner finally has ended. The rouge MP who betrayed his voters by crossing the floor of Parliament after promising he would not is no more. Garth took a pounding in his home riding of Halton, loosing out to handpicked Conservative candidate Lias Raitt. Garth lost by over 7000 votes, trailing Raitt by 12%. Halton riding had a voter turnout of 60%. Turner had become extremely arrogant during his term in office and in my opinion had done little for Halton other than embarrass us. This represents a major defeat for him. Other recent turncoats such as Wajid Khan (Streetsville) and Blair Wilson (West Vancouver) were also handed defeats. Khan lost to Liberal candidate Bonnie Crombie by 10%, or 7000 votes. Voter turnout in Streetsville was well below the national average at 53%. Recent Green party hero Wilson, who gave the Greens their first seat in Parliament by crossing the floor from the Liberals, was also given the boot. I think it's fair to say Wilson had his butt handed to him. Wilson lost by an incredible 14,000 votes to Conservative candidate John Wetson. Wetson beat out Wilson by a whopping 30 percent. Wilson did manage to narrowly beat out NDP candidate Bill Forst by 0.1%. Turnout in Vancouver West was higher than the national average at 63%. Not one of the recent floor crossers managed to retain their seat. (Belinda Stronach did not run in this election) I think this shows that Canadians have become vary intolerant of this act and the election results prove it. I believe it to be an affront to democracy. This process should be banned.

The next big question after this election is what will happen to Dion. The Toronto Sun is raising this question. Tom Axworthy, former principal secretary to Pierre Trudeau and chair of the Centre for the Study of Democracy at Queen’s University, said: “The Liberal party has always given its leaders two chances. It never has not.” However, no Liberal predicted that they would loose so many seats, let alone suffer a huge drop in the popular vote. I am still predicting a leadership race within the Liberal Party in the near future, despite Axworthy's comments. Dion has proven himself not to be the right leader of the party. He hasn't exactly instilled a lot of confidence with Canadians. Dion is basically the Federal government's John Tory. He goofed with a hugely unpopular campaign promise combined with weak leadership and it dragged him down. The Liberals have far better candidates they could field as leader so it's a mystery why they choose Dion.

You can get the full official 2008 Election results on the Elections Canada website.

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Judge Blames Woman for Ex-Boyfriend's Abuse

Yet another Ontario judge is in hot water over a highly questionable ruling. Gregory Pockele is in trouble for telling a domestic abuse victim that she should have "walked out" of that relationship. Melodie White of London ON said the relationship had been plagued with constant arguments but it was only towards the end where her ex got violent. White's ex assaulted her enough to leave bruises on her. The transcripts from the court seem to indicate that Judge Pockele believed that White's ex had beat her, yet he dismissed all charges anyway. The police had laid four charges against the boyfriend citing assualt, uttering death threats, threatening animal cruelty, and mischief. The judge dismissed the charges on the grounds that modern woment are "not weak and disadvantaged" and that White should have been "gone in a flash".

According to court transcripts, Pockele said the following. "Thirty years ago . . . there were all sorts of women in houses where men had beaten them, husbands had beaten them regularly, and they could not get out, They did not have jobs to go to and they had kids, and they were trapped. There was no way to stand up and get out, and we were trying to help the weak and the disadvantaged, but modern women are not weak and disadvantaged . . ."

Furthermore, Judge Pockele ordered White not to call police should she ever have an incident with this man again. White said she felt shocked and embarrassed by the ruling. "So what? I didn't get beaten enough?" White asked. "All he did was throw me to the ground that time? That's not enough?" White is taking her case to Ontario's judicial watchdog. The case has also outraged womens' advocacy groups. "Suddenly, he's saying women are able to walk out the doors into the sunset. He is closing his eyes to the number of women who have been killed trying to walk out the door," said Megan Walker, head of the London Abused Women's Centre.

This story is interesting since I think it really perfectly displays the current attitude of Canadian courts to marginalize victims of crime. So what, if I look at some guy the wrong way and he shoots me dead, this guy is going to get off because I shouldn't have even been in the same area as him? It's the same thing. Now as a man, I admit I find it odd as to why women would stay with abusive partners for so long and not seek help. I guess they honestly do fear they will be killed. Modern women may be more empowered than ever. However, there is one simple biological fact. Men in general are physically stronger than women. For the judge to deny this woman justice in light of the fact that he believes the man is guilty beyond reasonable doubt is a gross case of negligence. Judge Pockele deserves to be removed from the bench. I do agree with womens groups that our court system does not take cases of domestic abuse seriously enough. This is just another nail in the coffin for our disgraced justice system.

Source: CNEWS

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