SCORCHER – Clive Hamilton’s (Affluenza my posts here and here) new book is just what it is titled – a scorcher.
If you ever wondered what goes on behind those press releases and confused politics and changes in federal environment ministers and refusals to ratify Kyoto protocol and so on, have a read of this!
John Quiggin (a social democratic blogger who comments on Australian and world events) reviewed the book. He said the story told by Scorcher is one of a series of tactical victories for the greenhouse mafia leading to what appears certain to be a massive strategic defeat. The end of the Bush Administration will almost certainly signal the abandonment of the policies of denial and delay for which the ‘skeptics’ have fought so hard. The adoption of some form of emissions trading is inevitable, and the resulting political dynamic will ensure the adoption of long-term targets requiring large reductions in emissions. The only outcome of a decade of delaying tactics will be to increase the costs of the inevitable adjustment.
With its early advocacy of market-based policy, the Howard government, and the political right in Australia, could now be challenging the lock on environmental issues held by the left. Instead, having painted themselves into a corner by denying the plain evidence of science, they now find themselves scrambling to regain credibility and relevance.
One blogger said of the book – The message, and the detail, is that Australians have been methodically and deliberately misled, that our government has purposefully sabotaged global action in the name of private interests, and that even now we are being blatantly lied to.
I for one think that the Howard government have it all over their face when it comes to dealing with environmental issues and in particular global warming. We are the world’s largest coal exporter, the highest per capita greenhouse emitters in the world, the developed country slowest to act on global warming…
Johny…time to walk!
Clive Hamilton, Scorcher: The Dirty Politics of Climate Change, Black Inc. Agenda, Melbourne 2007, 266+vi pp.
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