Something Rotten in the State of Denmark

It's that time again. We're getting bombarded with more climate change hysteria by "scientists" and activists as world leaders prepare to meet in Copenhagen. The goal of the meeting is to hash out a new deal to replace the largely failed Kyoto Protocol of 11 years ago. Arguably, there is a lot more debate now than there was, say five years ago. The problem is that the United Nations and powerful NGOs like GreenPeace have long entrenched themselves. Any argument that states that climate change may not be real, or a natural phenomenon, or that carbon reduction schemes would devastate the global economy usually falls on deaf ears. It doesn't matter how much evidence you have in favour of your argument, or how good it is. It's like trying to argue with a wall.

So far, the goal of Copenhagen seems to involve massive monetary transfers to developing countries in order to pay for them to limit emissions of carbon dioxide. This sounds an awful lot like a "social justice" wealth transfer scheme. It's not so much that I disagree with this idea, even though I do. Foreign aid has proven futile in solving poverty issues. What really bothers me is why not just call it what it is. It always amazes me that people are more moved by sad polar bears than AIDS riddled, starving African children. That is they're more willing to open their wallet if they think the "disaster" will affect them; as opposed to child poverty, which they can happily ignored without any direct influence on their own lives. I think it's a sad statement on ourselves as society, and a particularly large black mark on the "textbook" liberals.

So what should we do? Should we still push ahead with a climate agreement? Absolutely not. Rather, if you want to help developing countries, even in the name of stopping climate change, technology sharing and free trade are a far better solution for dealing with both. Money just ends up in the hands of corrupt officials. Give people something tangible.

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Hybrid Importance

I found this on Failblog. I think it speaks for itself.
Priorities Fail



I have actually witnessed this. A certain large furniture chain (let's just say they deal in cheap, DIY-assembled furniture) has their parking lot setup like this. Hybrid car parking is closer to the door than handicapped. I've always wondered why hybrid owners would get this special privilege to begin with. Then again, I own a Honda Civic which does have a hybrid model, even though mine's not. I could park in these spots. How would they know without looking under the hood?

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My Stew Tastes Like Bark

It wasn't that long ago that dog was a common sight on the menu in China. Today, most Chinese are repulsed by the idea of eating their pet. How regressive they've become!

Here's an interesting article from the BBC of course. Who else would publish this? The article advocates that eating your pets may not be a bad idea in terms of reducing carbon emissions. The article is written tongue-in-cheek obviously. It refers to a book written by Robert Vale titled "Time to Eat the Dog?", which argues that dogs and cats should be treated like pigs or chickens. They keep us company only later to be made a tasty meal. Supposedly it reduces carbon intensive ranching.

This just so typical of the climate change garbage that's published on their service weekly. So now owning a pet is being demonized as destroying the planet. Please. They're just getting even more ridiculous, as if that were possible. I guess more shocking/disturbing is that people actually buy into this rubbish.

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