Excoriating Editorial Exposes Clark and her Government

When the president of a political party says one thing and does another, when a government department suppresses a report that is embarrassing to a senior public servant or when a state-owned enterprise associates itself with a company that uses questionable tactics, they do not just damage their own reputations. They damage confidence in institutions that rely upon public trust to function effectively,...

Today's Dominion Post.

Mike Williams Caught Lying

In exquisite television Guyon Espiner today has trapped Mike Williams LBW. Plumb. Blind Freddy would rule him out.

TV One's Agenda this morning - Espiner got Mike Williams saying he had not said to the Congress that using departmental brochures to push Labour and criticise National in electioneering was a "damn good idea". Espiner kept pushing and in several responses Williams denied (vehemently) he said anything of the sort. ...

Cut tonight to One News - there we have Mike Williams on a recording at the Congress session saying in response to a delegate's suggestion the Party should use departmental pamphlets in electioneering ... "...using the pamphlets is a damn good idea...."

Oh the pain - the exquisite pain to finally have a Labour party member caught dead cold. No question he said it. No amount of spin can change these facts. Actually caught lying. My cheeks are hurting so much.

What a great day for those who want the Government unceremoniously dumped....

Clark must be spinning.

She has to get rid of Williams - she cannot afford to get rid of him - he is the bag man. The only one able to raise money and organise.

What a great day for the believers. That hammering is a bag of nails being hammered into her (eco-)coffin.

Labour Dog Tucker

Tonight's One News Poll is all bad news for the Labour Government. Kim Jong elle has received no lift at all at a time some commentators said was a good period for the government. No lift from the disgraceful politicking with Auckland Airport or her Congress - once called a conference; seems there will be few shots left in the ready locker.

The Poll has National on 54% and with 60 seats - Labour steady on 35%... the Greens, NZ First and ACT are below 5% but Act of course has Rodney in a good position in Epsom.

Clark and Cullen Ignore Mikey's Advice

"Smile so you look like a winner. Talk about what Labour will do when the party is re-elected. And don't worry about the polls."

(John Armstrong reported today in the NZ Herald)

All we saw was Clark and Cullen talk about the incoming National/Key Government for the next two terms.

Cullen and Clark Conceded Defeat For at Least Two Terms

The really interesting thing about the predictable and damp squib attack on John Key by Clark and Cullen for eliminating state asset sales for the first term of his Government was the explicit acknowledgment by Clark and Cullen that the Key Government would proceed to a second term.

Here is the Witch:

"It's laughable, isn't it? The promise seems to be they'll spend the whole first term working on it and then really get down to business selling the family silver in the second."

No wonder they are panicking

Labour Polling Called By

UMR called me today with a poll - "we're not selling anything just want your opinion on issues in New Zealand". The TeleGopher seemed surprised when I said they were selling something - information; just I was not the customer. She didn't get it.

I assume Labour was their client. Witness this push polling...

TG: On Tax Cuts
Would you prefer either:
1. a small tax cut of $10-$15 per week with no cuts to public services and no borrowing or 2. a larger tax cut which meant cuts to public services and borrowing to fund them.

Too Right: That is wrong. You cannot ask those questions that way. These are different issues - this is push polling. There is a large surplus. By definition handing that back won't cut services. This survey is wrong...TG now genuinely perplexed with her respondent.

I said the bigger the cut the better. And for the record government expenditure needs to be reined in.

I finished by suggesting TG gets her supervisor to call as their poll strategy was wrong and the script given to the Gophers was wrong. I'll wait the call with pleasure.

Left's women are uglier

Berlusconi is onto something

Gore making Millions from Climate Change

Dr Newman's most interesting newsletter this week reveals the benefits to a privileged few of embracing global warming...

Former VP Al Bore's Generation Investment Management, which makes money from investing in “sustainable” businesses, now has $5 billion in funds under management.

Gore has declined to give details on the funds performance. It is understood the fund’s largest holding is the 7 percent of assets invested in Novo Nordisk, the world’s largest insulin maker, they have also invested in Nestlé, the world’s largest food company, and Johnson Controls, the largest maker of automotive seats and batteries. can't see how any of those are going to save the planet...just more sophistry from the Nobel thief.

Remember Gore launched the fund on the back of his judicially discredited ("science fiction") movie "An Inconvenient Truth"). The judgement made before Gore received his Nobel.

Prof Bob Carter fisks IPCC

Prof Carter and eminent climate scientist from James Cook University, Queensland has written that the alarmists at the IPCC are finally on the run. And not before time I say.

Prof Carter refers to to key events:

The first is a letter to the Secretary General of the United Nations, which was released at the UN’s Bali conference last December, supported by the signatures of 103 eminent professional persons.

The second is the Manhatten Declaration on Climate Change, the release of which coincided with the launch of the International Climate Science Coalition at a major climate rationalist conference in New York in early March.

The IPCC’s complex computer models are programmed to produce the desired result - it is therefore not surprising that they uniformly predict warming since 1990. Meanwhile, the real-world global average temperature has stubbornly refused to obey this stricture. As I have blogged regularly. There has been a "stubborn" resistance to warming since 1998 and indeed we may now be experiencing a global cooling phase.

However there is not let or hindrance to the global warn=ming band wagons by the camp followers.

Scientists who initially supported the notion of anthropogenic warming have now learnt political doublwe aspeak...

witness again Professor Carter's report:

That there is a mismatch between model prediction and 2007 climate reality is again unsurprising. For as IPCC senior scientist Kevin Trenberth noted recently: ". . . there are no (climate) predictions by IPCC at all. And there never have been"; instead there are only "what if" projections of future climate that correspond to certain emissions scenarios. Trenberth continues, "None of the models used by IPCC is initialized to the observed state and none of the climate states in the models corresponds even remotely to the current observed climate”.

Note - IPCC Scientist Kevin Trenberth is backing away fast from IPCC having previously made "predictions" - saying they only ever made projections based on scenarios. Well that may be true - semantic drivel that it is. If so, their crime (and it is a biggie) has been to stand aside watching the political operators (generally of the Left persuasion) beat the drum of anthropogenic warming and prepare national, regional and global responses that are economic lunacy - and worse will have not a jot of influence over the climate of what is at best a continuing variable world we live in, while consigning the poor to advanced penury for ever.

That is unforgiveable.

IPCC's Trenberth's continuing off handed-ness is even more galling:

"None of the models used by IPCC is initialized to the observed state and none of the climate states in the models corresponds even remotely to the current observed climate”.

Given the advanced paranoia - the sky is falling in - displayed by those shamed into 'green' responses and the billions extorted by the research community from guilt ridden governments how can Trenberth glibly state the models are not calibrated to a start point at the observed state or recalibrated to current observed states?

The reason of course is the calibration or recalibration cannot occur because the models are purely scenarios... they say what they say. It is not possible to calibrate them.

Again - the crime of the IPCC has been to allow the global politerati to use those models as statements of fact, and not pull them up short. This is corruption of thought, corruption of process and corruption of intellectual process.

We may have intercepted the barbarian's at the gate - Clark's carbon fancy needs to be exposed and National needs to get off the band wagon quickly - before the wheels fall off.

Brilliant - Robert Mugabe demands recount before results

Guess this is proof his rigging didn't come off.

However on a more worrying note - his playing for time can only mean pain and misery for Zimbabwe.

Spring Snow in central London - proof of global warming - not!

In yet another inconvenient truth heavy snow has fallen across the Midlands and briefly in central London. Reports and photos here. Disruptions due to snow occurred at Heathrow.

That global warming story is becoming hard to hold above water.

The great benefit of living in New Zealand is the expectation public policy has historically been determined on the basis of evidence and that our leaders do not use quasi-religious beliefs as the basis of policy.

We are now witnessing our worst fears being realised - extreme and unquestioned environmentalism is now at the forefront of Labour's public policy and incredibly the beneficiaries will not be the environment because there is poor evidence the changes will assist it and the costs will be born by the people with significant social and economic costs. This is lunacy and is only being attempted by the Clarkists bhecause she is convinced it is the path to electoral nirvana - stuff the economy this is remaining in power.

Most New Zealanders want a healthy and beautiful country (and for that matter planet) and to try to operate their lives in a sustainable way - being good stewards of all we have and preserve things for the future. That is good practice.

However we are now seeing in New Zealand an avowedly un-Christian and secular government (which has always been our expectation of those that rule - secularity = good) and the Labour Party approach the climate change debate with spittle flecked religious fervour.

The Climate Change Minister (is that ever a losing handle unless he is merely the reporter) - David Parker - is hellbent on introducing destructive policies to New Zealand.

Here is a partial list of shame:
1. Biofuels to be compulsorily added to the offer at the bowser.
Despite masses of evidence that the lemming run to biofuel production is causing vast tracts of rain forest to be felled and replaced with a crop, dairy prices are out of control due to Government subsidised ethanol production being more lucrative to farmers than milking cows, evidence it will take in excess of 400 crop cycles to eliminate the additional carbon added to create intensive biofuel crop production.

Parker's response is to accept that "there may be initial worse environmental outcomes" but in the end we will be better off- environmentally. His address to Parliament is here. Like someone is going replant the Amazon?

Note the religious tones in Parker's piece. A little pain for your sin now will see rewards later...

We have been here for before...check 2005,

Friends of the Earth Report, The Oil for Ape Scandal revealed between 1985 and 2000 the development of oil-palm plantations was responsible for an estimated 87 percent of deforestation in Malaysia. In Sumatra and Borneo, 4 million hectares of forests were lost to palm farms; and a further 6 m ha are scheduled for clearance in Malaysia and 16.5 m ha in Indonesia.

This has completely shagged the Orangutang. Nice one.

2. Emissions Trading Platform
New Zealand is planning the most comprehensive (read draconian) emissions trading regime that will see its primary production base destroyed.
According to Business New Zealand:
At a carbon price of $25, there will be a loss of 52,000 jobs, and further delivering a huge shrinkage of NZ industries, depending on the cost of carbon, up to:
Sheep farming -32%
Wool -28%
Dairy farming -28%
Dairy processing -14%
Metals -31%

This seems to be at variance with the government’s claim that the regime will have a negative impact of less than 1% of GDP.

As the eminent Biologist Jennifer Marohasy notes:

The problem with fundamentalist creeds is that they are driven by adherence to predetermined agendas and teachings.

Yep - right on that score
The fundamentalist’s position is rarely tolerant of new information and is generally dismissive of evidence.
Yep - again labour kicks the shit out of anyone disagreeing with the "consensus the climate is warming - witness the braying of David Parker when TVNZ pursued two National MP's on their personal views and Cullen's response.

Environmental fundamentalism is subversive in that it draws on science to give legitimacy to its beliefs—the same beliefs that, in many instances, have no basis in observation or tested theory - as Jennifer Marohasy so aptly put things.

Cunliffe the Government Sophistrist



Parliament's Health Select Committee meeting with the CEO of the Hawkes Bay DHB and the DHB's Commissioner, Sir John Anderson have been revealing.

Rather than being a shambolic DHB as Cunliffe said when sacking the previous DHB Board, Sir John Anderson has confirmed:

"(He said) the DHB's financial and information technology systems were good and were not responsible for the DHB's ballooning deficit."

Interesting I must say...seems the Board were on top of things.

and then he confirmed the

Board's financial woes were as a result of the nationwide settlements with nurses as the major reason for the financial deficit.

"He suggested recent wage settlements, particularly with nurses, were responsible for a large part of a projected $7 million deficit this financial year."

These settlements have created mayhem through out all DHB's - it made a nonsense of budgetting at the DHB level. No one could plan for it. In a pythonesque orgy Ministers are thumping powerless Board's and managers.

The Board's CEO conceded to the Committee he did not make a good fist of handling conflicts at the DHB and that he had not followed appropriate processes when letting contracts.

The CEO said:

"(Mr Clarke) acknowledged to the committee management had failed at times to handle tender and contracting processes appropriately and he took criticism for that "on the chin"."

This set of new information could make the Judicial Review into Cunliffe's decision to collapse the elected board very interesting. I am not sure whether Select Committee evidence is admissible in the courts - Standing Orders cover the select committee process. It will be interesting if Sir John is called to the High Court and cross-examined on his understanding of what was and is going on at the DHB - Given the select committee evidence is now part of the public record.

Chairman Rudd Resurrects Uranium Mining in Australia

Reports out of Australia reveal the duplicity of the new Labor Government. Rudd's mob have quietly resurrected the Howard government's industry plans to increase uranium mining. Clark will be having kittens.

It will make Rudd's advocacy of (NZ) Labour's climate change credentials at election time look very dodgey and open him up to criticism by the anti-nuclear lobby here.

While at one level this action by the Australian Labor government is incredibly duplicitous at another it is a picture of pragmatism and good sense. There is a global appreciation with informed people of the huge benefits afforded by nuclear power. Australia are looking to capitalise on that demand and interest. New Zealand's politicians are so stung by the nuclear bug they cannot countenance considering the nuclear option.

Rudd's approach will be watched with interest.