To paraphrase Mandy Rice Davies, “They would, wouldn’t they.” To demonstrate to yourself that the ABC is completely biased, in particular on climate change, all you need to do is go to the ABC web site here, get yourself a stiff drink (because believe me, you’ll need it) and watch the debate that followed the screening of the film “The Great Global Warming Swindle.” The audience was partisan and biased, just as alleged by Senator Eric Abetz:

Figures released by the ABC show 32% are Labor supporters, 24% support the coalition and a further 17% are in favour of The Greens.

All of which means, of course, given the Greens make Labor look positively right wing, that there was 24% for the Coalition and 49% against the Coalition. Seems pretty biased to me. The videos on the site don’t show the fact that Tony Jones felt it necessary to issue a “public health warning” prior to the showing of the main film:

I am bound to say The Great Global Warming Swindle does not represent the views of the ABC.

Why on earth would he be “bound” to say that? Should a public service broadcaster have such a blatant editorial agenda? And then, before the debate had even started, he took the opportunity to discredit the film and its director. Reeks of impartiality. You can find it on YouTube if you really want to.

If that’s not enough, check out the “Global Warming Links” (black mark for the ABC there, it should read “Climate Change Links” because, as any fule kno, there ain’t been no warming since 2001), all of which are parroting IPCC propaganda down to the letter.

“Award winning” science writer Bernie Hobbs (that’s the award for Most Patronising Pile of AGW Alarmist Claptrap, 2007)

But it is Bernie Hobbs’ article, entitled “The Great Warming Swindle Swindle” – oh witty title, Bernie – which is the worst piece of patronising BS. It just falls over itself in a desperate attempt to ridicule the film and its presenters. Puke Alert if you dare read it:

There’s nothing like an accurate, well researched documentary to help make sense of a complex issue like global warming. It’s a shame that The Great Global Warming Swindle isn’t one.

The Swindle is a one-sided anti-global warming argument put together by a film maker with a name for skewing the facts, and featuring greenhouse skeptics with media profiles that far exceed their scientific publishing records.

Are you seriously suggesting An Inconvenient Truth isn’t one-sided? Or that Al Gore isn’t the definitive AGW alarmist with a “media profile that far exceeds his scientific publishing record”? It isn’t difficult to exceed zero. She then insults viewers by spouting, in the most condescending fashion:

If you didn’t have access to the net, or a higher degree in climatology, it’d be all too easy to swallow the straight-forward graphs and expert evidence that The Great Global Warming Swindle bases its case on.

Where’s your higher degree in climatology? Nauseating and patronising. The rest of the article is filled with misrepresentations à la AIT, quoting Goddard Institute temperatures (i.e. James Hansen – AGW crackpot), claiming the climate models reflect reality (sorry, but where did the models predict nearly a decade of cooling?) and she tops it all off with this:

Balanced? No. Accurate? No. On the right track? Not even close. What this film’s really got going for it is an alarming number of variants on the scientist as balding white guy theme, and the fact that it’ll make a great teaching tool in documentary-making classes.

But don’t take my word for it – watch the film and then, more importantly, watch the panel discussion airing immediately after it. Only then will you be in a position to do what the film’s spruikers say – make up your own mind.

Yes that’s right, Bernie – watch the discussion afterwards, as that completely abandons any pretence of fairness or balance. And where in those links is any contrary view expressed? Nowhere – as would be expected from the ever impartial ABC.

With journalists like this on board, don’t insult my intelligence by saying the ABC isn’t biased when it comes to “climate change” – it’s like every other public service broadcaster (the BBC being another good example), with the science desk staffed with Left-wing, environmental extremists.

(Link dead)

Whilst climate change is the most obvious example of debate being restricted or stifled in order to advance a political agenda, it is by no means the only one. An article in the SMH today exposes the left-wing “radical orthodoxy” that pervades our institutions of higher learning, and which is insidiously indoctrinating our future generations.

Pick any controversial issue today – Work Choices, anti-terror laws, Israel-Palestine, or climate change – and in academia these issues have been decided. There is only one accepted view on each – no debate is allowed.
…
Heaven help anyone on campus, academic or student, who dares to question what [academic] Dr Mervyn Bendle calls a “radical orthodoxy”, characterised by “theories associated with neo-Marxism, postmodernism, feminism, radical environmentalism, anti-Americanism, anti-Christianity, and related ideologies”.
…
Many Australian educators are activists masquerading as academics, agitating for radical far-left causes well outside, and profoundly hostile to, the values of mainstream Australia.

Read it all here.

The Bureau of Meteorology is converting a number of weather stations to single-person or computerised operation, which seems a reasonable decision, given the fact that a considerable number of stations worldwide are now remotely monitored. However, it unfortunately gives the Community and Public Sector Union the opportunity to wheel out the “climate change” line:

“Climate change is arguably the biggest challenge the Federal Government and decision makers face,” the union’s national president, Louise Persse, said.

“The decisions our leaders make need to be evidence-based. Now is not the time to be cutting jobs and slashing funding in an area critical to meeting this massive challenge. What we need are the best people working with the best technology to ensure we achieve the best outcomes in the fight against climate change.”

Read it here.

As we knew it would be, given enough time. Peter Costello is right when he says:

“In November 2007 maybe climate change did look like the great economic issue of the age, but its not looking that way now.”

Read it here.

It had to happen (thanks to Tom Nelson). The UK Times Online reports:

Plans for binding European legislation by December were dropped as the EU watered down the carbon dioxide blueprint that it had announced with a fanfare 18 months ago.

The revolt by eight countries, led by Italy and Poland, left the EU’s self-proclaimed mission to shape a global, post-Kyoto agreement on greenhouse gases in disarray.

Italy has joined the “Iron Curtain Revolt” with Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi “furious” at the pressure being applied, saying that the targets would “crucify” Italian industry.

“Our businesses are in absolutely no position at the moment to absorb the costs of the regulations that have been proposed,” Mr Berlusconi said later.

Donald Tusk, the Polish Prime Minister, said: “We don’t say to the French that they have to close down their nuclear power industry and build windmills, and nobody can tell us the equivalent.”

So, Kevin Rudd and Penny Wong, where does this leave your blinkered desire to cripple the Australian economy with an emissions trading scheme? I won’t wait up for an answer.

Read it here.

P.S. I can’t, however, wait to see how the Moonbat Herald and The Age spin this tomorrow…

When I was a kid, I was fascinated by the weather (still am), and at school I was reading undergraduate meteorology textbooks during my O-levels. Some of my favourite books were in the Observers series, and the Observer’s Book of Weather, by Reginald Lester (see photo), was my favourite of all. It was a clear, concise introduction to the science of weather, and as a youngster I would pore over it for hours on end. There wasn’t a politically motivated sentence in it.

How different things are today. I have a copy of a modern book about weather, but it’s not just about weather, it’s about weather and climate change. It’s published by Usborne, who have a reputation for producing excellent books for children. However, this, like many books on the subject available today, is political propaganda aimed at young people, cloaked in the guise of impartial science.

It toes the IPCC line at every turn, and whilst devoting a double page to “Disagreement” humouring those who may not agree with the consensus, it goes on to brand them “sceptics”, and under the heading “So who’s right?” states:

“At the moment, most experts agree that global warming is happening and it’s largely due to humans. As research continues and climate models become more sophisticated, we might see more evidence that this isn’t the case.

But even if the sceptics are right and we’ve done no damage so far, we should still do everything we can to avoid causing any in the future.”

I’m sure there are many other books for children on this subject which are far worse than this. Indeed, a quick Amazon search revealed books, aimed specifically at young readers, entitled:

• “Why are the ice caps melting? The dangers of global warming”
• “This is my planet: The Kids’ Guide to Global Warming”
• “A Clean Sky: The Global Warming Story”

And I would bet a tidy sum that there aren’t any books for children that put the alternative view… But it’s still very sad that something as uniquely fascinating as the study of the weather has to be tainted by political propaganda.

The book in question is called “The Usborne Internet-Linked Introduction to Weather and Climate Change” – it can be found at Amazon.

It’s only anecdotal, but climate change news items appear to have dropped significantly over the past few days, with the number of stories in the news feeds today down by nearly 30% on last week.

This is intriguing, because you would have thought that if “climate change” was really the biggest challenge to mankind in all of human history, as Rudd, Wong, Garnaut etc. lead us to believe it is, the trifling matter of a temporary economic meltdown should have little or no effect on the media’s coverage of it. But the reality, however, is that even the mainstream media are finding it hard to justify taking up valuable column-inches on climate stories in the midst of the global financial crisis.

Let’s look out for even more desperate soundbites from Wong & Garnaut in the days ahead, as they struggle to keep their pet issue at the forefront!

Start here…

• Good News: tropical cyclones may be slowing global warming by washing large amounts of CO2-containing vegetation and soil into the sea
• Bad News: its effect is tiny and nowhere near enough to stop climate change, which as we all know, is caused by the evils of humanity spewing “carbon pollution” into the atmosphere (© IPCC and Al Gore)
• Good News: “carbon pollution”, as we all know, will cause more tropical cyclones (also © IPCC and Al Gore), so…

[Return to start and continue ad infinitum]

If you manage to escape from the clutches of the above infinite loop, you can read it here.

At least some countries have the sense not to waste valuable time and money attending yet more pointless climate gab-fests. There was head-scratching all around the table at the Samoan climate change conference when Fiji and PNG didn’t show. I wonder why? Maybe they have better things to do…

“He [the Director for the secretariat of the Pacific regional Environmental Program] said that they too have not been informed of why the two countries, the biggest in the Pacific Islands, have not turned up and he wouldn’t say whether he was disappointed or not, but certainly their absence from this meeting has been the talk of some delegates.”

Read it here.

Another few million bucks down the drain as Victorian scientists try to reduce cattle methane emissions by tinkering with their diet. This all started, you will no doubt recall, because of Ross Garnaut’s crazy suggestion that we all should abandon beef and lamb, and eat kangaroo instead, because they produce fewer emissions than sheep and cattle. The farming industry has been forced into self-preservation mode thanks to this nonsense, spending money to defend their industry that could have been much better spent elsewhere.

The DPI’s [Victorian Department of Primary Industries] Chris Grainger said in a trial, methane emissions were cut by 12 per cent, by feeding the cattle cotton seed.

“One of the most promising things that we can add to the diet seems to be fat or oil,” he said.

Read it here.