Category Archives: Politics on the left

Climate policy as a means of distributing wealth

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Another Climate Alarmist Admits Real Motive Behind Warming Scare:

“One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. This has almost nothing to do with the environmental policy anymore, with problems such as deforestation or the ozone hole,” said Edenhofer, who co-chaired the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change working group on Mitigation of Climate Change from 2008 to 2015….

“We redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy,” said Edenhofer.

So what. It’s been an obvious scam from the start so why should anyone change their minds just because they are provided with some obvious facts about the cynicism and lies of the left?

The (Police) State of Victoria

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You would think we were in the most upbeat of times from the look of this front page. But more to the point, there is the letter sent out by John Roskam at the IPA. He begins:

This morning there was a headline to a story in The Australian that I don’t think qualifies as fake news – but at least half of it was wrong. It was by the journalist Cameron Stewart and it was ‘My Melbourne now resembles a poorly run police state’. It’s true Melbourne does resemble a police state (although it not so much resembles one as is one) and ‘police state’ is a term I and a number of other people used about Melbourne and Victoria back in May last year. I think the part that’s completely wrong, though, is the bit about ‘poorly run’. On the contrary – if your ambition was to run a police state then Victoria is a pretty good example of how you’d efficiently operate such a regime. You’d convert the police force from disinterested guardian of the peace to political operatives of the government, you’d co-opt the media to parrot your message, you’d intimidate civil society into silence, you’d ban public protests, you’d force your political opponents into acquiescence (that is if you’re not actually attempting to entirely subvert democracy itself, as the Andrews government did when it suspended the sitting of Parliament), and you’d give yourself the legal authority to govern by decree. That to me sums up the state of Victoria in May 2021 and that looks to me for all intents and purposes like a pretty well-run police state. If I’m wrong I’d like to know how. I know that I’ll probably get a few emails from IPA Members saying ‘John – I know it’s bad but aren’t you exaggerating just a little? – in Victoria the expression of political dissent is not actually against the law yet is it?’ And I’ll reply sadly it is – Zoe Buhler was arrested for a Facebook post that advertised a protest march. It’s true that in Victoria opposition political parties aren’t banned – but the Andrews government’s laws have crippled their capacity to raise funds. The title ‘the opposition’ implies they’ll oppose something – but the Coalition opposition in Victoria has meekly surrendered to the government and refuses to take a position on the lockdown.

The great discovery among the left is how easy it is to subdue a population. You don’t need actual gulags or torture or mass arrests. You need a bit of cancel culture and the fear of some disease from which no one is protected by anything done by governments, and weirdly, in Victoria, as in New York State which seems to have been Daniel Andrews’ template, it can even be the government that inflames the disaster but the population still falls into line. I also find the last bit of the quote particularly apt:

The title ‘the opposition’ implies they’ll oppose something – but the Coalition opposition in Victoria has meekly surrendered to the government and refuses to take a position on the lockdown.

We don’t even have to lock the opposition up. They do it by themselves without anybody having to lift a finger.

Does the government have a duty of care to ensure young people do not freeze in the dark?

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Sister Brigid Arthur, 86, and Anj Sharma, 16, are among a group who secured a judgment from the Australian federal court that found the government has a duty to protect young people from climate change.
Sister Brigid Arthur, 86, and Anj Sharma, 16, are among a group who secured a judgment from the Australian federal court that found the government has a duty to protect young people from climate change.

Australian court finds government has duty to protect young people from climate crisis.

The federal court of Australia has found the environment minister, Sussan Ley, has a duty of care to protect young people from the climate crisis in a judgment hailed by lawyers and teenagers who brought the case as a world first.

Eight teenagers and an octogenarian nun had sought an injunction to prevent Ley approving a proposal by Whitehaven Coal to expand the Vickery coalmine in northern New South Wales, arguing the minister had a common law duty of care to protect younger people against future harm from climate change.

Justice Mordecai Bromberg found the minister had a duty of care to not act in a way that would cause future harm to younger people. But he did not grant the injunction as he was not satisfied the minister would breach her duty of care.

Fear is in the air. A dozen new cases and no deaths.

Victoria in lockdown from midnight; over 40s now eligible for vaccine; CHO defends tracing
Acting Premier James Merlino has announced Victoria will be sent into a seven-day lockdown from midnight after the state recorded 12 new COVID cases in the past 24 hours.

The Acting Premier is even the Leader of the Opposition:

Snap lockdown will be ‘difficult’ for businesses: Merlino

As if they care.

Less an outrage than an omen

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Brett Stephens discusses Anti-Zionism Isn’t Anti-Semitism? Someone Didn’t Get the Memo. Here’s the conclusion.

Progressives will have to come to their own reckoning about what to do about the burgeoning anti-Semitism in their midst. As for Jews, they should take the events of the last few days less as an outrage than as an omen.

Oddly, though, one of the few protections Jews now have is that the vast majority still vote for parties of the left. When that eventually stops, you can only imagine how bad things will then become.

And since we’re here, might as well mention this by Melanie Phillips: Why western mobs are now sticking it to the Jews. This is how it starts:

Anyone who imagined that with the Gaza cease-fire the antisemitism that erupted around the west would correspondingly die down has been sorely mistaken.

It has not only continued to become ever more brazen and intimidatory but, astonishing this may seem, it has now morphed into something even more chilling. The toxic core of it, the Israel libel that fuels the onslaught, has become an axiomatic lie and a supposed marker of public conscience.

What some of us warned about the Labour party’s antisemitism under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership has now proved all too true.  This malignity was not confined to the hard-left. It reflected a terrible development that had poisoned the entire “progressive” world and was rippling out beyond even that.

Very depressing but worth reading right through long though it may be.

Absolutely believable

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Think of this: A Sample of 950 Military Ballots Were Recently Audited In Georgia and All Went for Joe Biden.

Both the left and the right know this is totally believable. The right because they can easily believe that the left would do this to steal the election, and the left because stealing the election is what they would wish to do if they were otherwise about to lose.

The only difference is that the left would never mention it, and if it is mentioned, would deny it could possibly have ever happened.

The accuracy of Covid tests

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Saw this as a comment here.

Bayesian conditional probability is being completely ignored. Let’s say a COVID-19 test is 90% accurate and 1 out of 100 people have COVID-19. You test positive for COVID-19, what’s the chance the test is correct? 100-1=99 people don’t have COVID-19 but 99×10%= ~10 will falsely test positive. The probability that you actually have COVID-19 is only 1/(1+10)= ~9%. ~90% of positive cases/deaths are FALSE!

Bayesian probability is, of course, the only way to validate such tests accurately. BTW read the whole article:

Nobel Prize Virologist Calls Current Policy Of Mass Vaccination “A Serious Mistake”…”Medical Error”

Wake me when it’s over

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Commercial programs like The Project have bought in to Woke big time. Picture: Ten

Commercial programs like The Project have bought into Woke big time.

I saw this article this morning – Woke is a genius brand, and a threat to our way of life – and was going to put it up but now they have put it on the front page of the online edition so it must have attracted a lot of readers besides myself. It really is exceptional. These are the elements identified of the woke brand but you need to go to the article to see these fleshed out.

You need to know your market
You need a brand promise.
You need a brand personality
You need a mission statement
You need a brand book that explains how the brand behaves in all circumstances and how it relates to the world
You need a brand strategy to dominate the competition
You need to identify what is known as the “customer journey” that maps the experience with the brand
You need “full funnel” marketing that builds awareness, consideration, and purchase
You need a social media strategy
You need point of sale
You need brand-specific DIY manuals with step-by-step instructions on how to buy in

He finishes with this:

Who owns this brand?

Everyone who wants a piece. It sells a grand narrative of achieving social justice through a collection of half thought out assertions. In reality, woke threatens to undermine the values of Western civilisation.

And who could he have in mind about this? Thousands of students join climate rally in Melbourne.

Protesters gather in Melbourne’s Treasury Gardens for a climate rally on Friday.

As we read: ‘Josie, 14, from Richmond High School said not enough adults were taking action so students had to do it now. “It’s such a big issue. We have to step up,” she said.’

Thank goodness for all of these visionary 14-year olds.

Feminist self-harm discussed

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Feminist Confesses: “I’m All For Feminism, But It’s Making It Hard to Date”

—Ace

You don’t say. You don’t say.

This was published by Bolde. I can’t find it on the site; maybe they’ve deleted it. There is a Jennifer Lee that writes there, so that checks out.

Or maybe it’s a spoof meant to look like it was published on Bolde. I dunno.

Let’s assume it’s real, provisionally.

Watch as very obvious dimes drop one by one.

I consider myself a feminist, but I can’t lie–I’m starting to notice its effects on my dating life. This doesn’t change my belief in equality, I just hope that men and women can eventually learn to date in harmony because it’s pretty messy right now.1. I’M HYPER AWARE OF EVERY SEXIST THING A GUY DOES NOW.

It doesn’t take much for me to overanalyze a guy’s intentions nowadays. I used to see a guy opening a door for me as nice and polite, but lately, gestures like this have been making me angry. I know the guys offering these acts of chivalry have no intention to make me feel small or lesser than, but now that my eyes have been opened to feminist theory, it’s all I’m able to think about.

Please save me from my cult.

2. GUYS ARE STARTED TO THINK WE DON’T NEED THEM ANYMORE.

Even though the feminist movement is pretty much the best thing to happen to this world since sliced bread, it’s taking its toll in the dating scene. The thing is, I’m starting to get a bit of a stand-offish vibe from guys, like they’re afraid to make a move, and I think it’s because they think that we don’t need them anymore….

You don’t say. I wonder where men would get the idea that women who say “a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle” would not need men anymore.

3. ONE LITTLE ANTI-FEMINIST COMMENT CAN COMPLETELY TURN ME OFF.When I’m out with a guy and he says one thing that’s even REMOTELY offensive towards women, I find it really hard to recover. I instantly write guys off if they aren’t “woke” to the current social mindset towards gender politics and can’t let it go. Let’s just say I’ve gone on A LOT of first dates that never go anywhere.

Cults train cultists to be alienated from normal non-cult society, so that they have no refuge, except the cult.

It’s what keeps them coming back.

4. IT’S LIKE GUYS ARE WALKING ON EGGSHELLS AROUND US.Guys are feeling the heat and we can all tell. They’re afraid to compliment us or relate to us in the way they were always taught to and trust me, this is a good thing. However, women still like to be pursued (at least I do) and it’s unfortunate that by finally standing up for our rights and demanding respect, we’re totally scaring men away. It’s so messed up and a total shame.

It’s almost as if she’s realized she’s been brainwashed.

5. I’VE BEEN BRAINWASHED TO ASSUME THE WORST IN MEN.

Oh, there you go.

All it takes is one quick scroll down my newsfeed and I have enough feminist rants to last me several winters. I think I’ve almost trained my brain to assume ALL men are here to try to put me down and dominate me when that’s far from the truth. I’ve made it kind of an automatic reflex at this point, though.

It’s almost as if feminists have trained themselves to be hostile, paranoid man-haters.

Almost.

I mean…

…8. IT’S MADE US MORE SEPARATE FROM EACH OTHER THAN EVER BEFORE.

Men and women ALREADY have so much trouble trying to understand each other, but feminism has turned our society into a bit of a battle of the sexes. I’m not on their side or anything, I’m just pointing out that we’re currently in a sort of “us against them” mentality and it’s gonna take a while until it all smooths out.

A “sort of us versus them mentality.”

Just sort of!, ..

10. I SWEAR GUYS ARE APPROACHING ME LESS.

Is it just me or are guys doing a lot more looking around than actually approaching? Times are a little weird right now and I guess guys are afraid that the way they approach women might offend us or give us the wrong impression.

Nah, you’re fine. Keep on doing what you’re doing.

This is so perfect that I’m afraid it might be a troll but YOLO, it’s still all true.

Addendum: Here is the Bolde link to the article: it’s real! [CBD]

From Ace of Spades, who for some reason leaves out this which is in some ways the best bit:

7. THE DEBATE ON WHO SHOULD PAY HAS NEVER BEEN MORE ALIVE.

I’m on the side that believes whoever does the asking should also do the paying. If I ask a guy out on a date, I would expect to pay, absolutely. If a guy asks me, I would expect that he shells out the money for the evening. It’s just the way it should be. However, due to the recent boost in feminism, a guy paying the bill could be seen as anti-feminist and no guy wants to be considered a misogynist in this day and age. The song and dance of who’s gonna pay has never been more awkward and it’s making dating that much more difficult to maneuver.

The Covid class divide

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Sounds a lot like Australia.

From a lefty source:

There’s a huge Covid class divide. The economy has not just bounded back for upper income Americans Australians; it’s given them higher housing values and lower interest rates. Meanwhile, 12 million service industry workers are still out of work. Small businesses are struggling. The affluent see Covid as a health problem, while for the working class it’s about economic survival. And liberals are doing the same thing they did with Trump: Clothing their class privilege as science and facts and morality. The politicians are even worse. Instead of coming up with a clean Covid bill, Democrats are now trying to pressure Biden into student loan forgiveness. Can you believe it? What kind of society thinks it’s ok to ask 12 million people who lost their jobs to Covid to foot the bill for the student loans of the top 40% of earners? Sure, maybe it will accidentally help someone in a food line who dropped out of college. But college-educated Americans are back at work. The Covid recession is over for them. Why are the Democrats designing legislation to help the people who need it least, in the belief that some of the benefits might trickle down to help those who need it most?

Oh, I think I know why

For all of those oh so concerned upper-middle-class lefties, helping “the poor and disadvantaged” comes right after helping themselves. You know, like all those public servants who never lost a day’s pay over the whole of the last year.

Via Instapundit.