11 September 2007

Carbon Neutral Election Campaign

| BeyondThought
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Reading the post on the Sustainable Cities Forum I saw that Troy Williams, the Liberal dude in Fraser, announced that his campaign was to be carbon neutral. I checked online and can’t find a precident anywhere, is this a first?

I was surprised it was a Liberal and also that I haven’t read about it elsewhere.

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I would suggest that India’s relatively poor progress until recently has more to do with two things – their policy of “non-alignment” during the cold war; and their bitter internal divisions leading to the secession of Pakistan/Bangladesh – rather than the fact that they’re not whiteys.

ahh populous… they don’t make games like that anymore…

The key there is that it had a large populous of anglos of British origin.

It’s the ones left with largely ethnic populations that haven’t fared so well.

A little country called the USA eventually did OK for itself after kicking Britain out.

Indeed. Actually those countries functioned well when the Brits were running the shop.

If India hadn’t have kicked Britain out they would be as developed as us.

You must be quite disappointed that you weren’t around in the glory days of the Empire.

The geopolitical consequences are vastly different, jemmy. There’s a difference between a violent dictator, Saddam Hussein, with lots of oil, seeking to stir up a hornest nest in an already volatile part of the world. That has global ramifications. East Timor and West Papua don’t.

The main reason we get in and kicked the Indonesians out of East Timor is because we didn’t want these people clammering onto rickety boats and heading for Darwin.

Policy successful.

It is in our interests to placate the 250 million islamics north of Darwin. How would you like it if they had their own version of the Ayotollah running the shop?

Australia has no moral obligation to West Papua, it is an Indonesian province. The problems Indonesia are having with the natives in that province are for them to sort out, not us.

Personally I think we should be running East Timor, and taking all their oil revenues. If we were running the show they would have world class hospitals by now, schools, roads, sanitation.

That country is just floundering on its own.

Well, I applaude the guy for having the guts to stump up his own money to advertise about West Papua and Timor. At least you can’t accuse him of being hypocritical.

The point he’s making, which is true by the way, is that Howard supported invading a country to remove a genocidal dictator, yet the Australian Govt did nothing to prevent similar actions in our region to neighbours that historically we have very strong ties with and have a duty of care to. In fact, we actively tried to suppress publicity of it by refusing visas etc. Although it wasn’t Howard who was in power then, the link is that he won’t provide government support to pressure Indonesia. Diplomatically, our view is that it is better to let sleeping dogs lie and engage with Indonesia, presumably so that some of our superior whitey morality rubs of on them.

The thing that really takes the cake is that part of our engagement with Indonesia is that we are training the murderous Kopassas how to be even more efficient in their murdering.

The guy’s ad campaign is to highlight the hypocrisy of the Aust Govt intervening in one case, but not intervening in a regionally closer one when one could argue our moral obligation is greater. Of course the diplomatic cost would be much greater, and I suppose his argument is that moral obligation supersedes diplomatic cost. I’m not sure I agree, but there you are.

No, I am not a fan of Indonesia, and it’s unfortunate our geography requires us to have anything to do with them.

VYBerlinaV8 now_with_added grunt11:51 am 14 Sep 07

Curry with chilli and ginger, over wholemeal rice.

Yeah baby.

Gungahlin Al11:39 am 14 Sep 07

VY and Thumper – although cows do exhale CO2 as we all do, it is the methane (CH4) that they burp/fart that is why cows are of concern – weight for weight methane is 21 times more damaging than CO2, and cows do generate a hell of a lot of it…
BUT I’m sure our various partners would probably argue that our own methane generation would rival the average cow… 🙂

VYBerlinaV8 now_with_added grunt11:02 am 14 Sep 07

Most cows generate more carbon dioxide than most cars. I thinkwe should solve the problem by eating more cows.

Also, exercise, including cycling, should be banned, as burning body fat releases the stored carbon in the fat molecules into the atmosphere.

I have no problem with doing your bit to help, but please remember that by feeling warm and fuzzy about turning off a light, your are NOT saving the world.

Now, I’m off to do some burnouts…

barking toad10:09 am 13 Sep 07

Any candidate who spouts the “carbon-neutral” mantra deserves to be last X on the ballot paper. Or next last after any green candidate.

The whole concept is a great big tree hugging hippie piece of crap.

These self appointed life style managers could best demonstrate their commitment to their cause by ceasing to breathe.

Yeah I heard that garbage on 2CC the other day as well, claiming that George Bush and John Howard are terrorists or something, and Indonesia ra ra ra ra ra

Leftist pap.

I’ve drunk worse.

Common Survival knowledge dictates that a human without water can only survive for 2 weeks, but a human with Giardia, etc can survive indefinetly, albeit uncomfortably.

Although that’s not the point is it ?

The ACT Government is more than capable of treating the water, nor is it on record for ever requiring the population to drink any untreated water at all.

For the record, I’ve just returned from an overseas location where I was required to drink untreated water for a week and a half, and surprisingly, I still feel ok.

Beer makes me feel warm and fuzzy.

Well GreenTrees, I am happy that he will do exactly what I speculated he would But will he continue to do it once/if elected? These sorts of gimics during campaigns are cheap. If he pledges to offset his carbon emissions during his time in Parliament, then that would be something.

when i hear the words carbon neutral, i reach for my browning

I’ll agree with you Maelinar, but only after we sit down for a drink together… I’ll drink a cup of untreated water from Bendora, and you drink a cup of water from Lake Gininderra (or Lake Tuggers if you dare).

The reason for those all those lakes isn’t primarily “scenery and beauty”, it’s to catch and settle building runoff. Notice how they’re always created in an area right before it’s started to be developed?

again, canberra (er, and the rest of the nation) is still struggling for water. – what dimension are you on ?

I’ll give this one to you slowly.

I F C A N B E R R A H A D A N Y M O R E W A T E R I N I T, W E W O U L D A L L D R O W N.

Do you live and work in a cave ?

There is MASSES of water in Canberra. I can’t begin to count the amount of lakes we have for the sole purpose of scenery and beauty.

Anybody informing you that there is a water shortage in Canberra might want to look out a nearby window sometime.

The ACT Greens – proudly brought to you by the CFMEU for a greener Australia.

Re the forum on the weekend, the ACT Greens Climate friendly approach.

The ACT Greens are addressing the greenhouse gas impact of the ACT’s part of the federal election campaign through “Climate Friendly”.

Kerrie was not aware where we had got to on picking a scheme, but explained t she does personally. which incudes offsetting her own tarvel, catching busses and cyling… even in the campaign.

ACT Greens will offset carbon generation regarding all campaign activities of campaign staff, all four candidates, printed material, forums and events and will get the impact of our campaign audited.

The Australian Greens similarly cover national activities including travel costs relating to national meetings.

It is our view that offset schemes – when well directed -are worthwhile; but using recycled paper, sourcing renewable, low emission energy and minimising activity that generates high levels of emissions, would make a difference.

ROLAND

Just another religious ritual for superstitious greens.

Looks like Troy has been captured as well.

Send me money and I’ll offset all your evil carbon footprints.

josh, williams has good form on sustainability issues, including both global warming and water insofar as buildings are concerned. i went to the sustainable population forum on saturday and he wiped the floor, making lundy, tucker and the democrat (whose name i forget) look silly by mouthing their rehersed one-liners.

asp, i heard the radio interview and he is planning to do exactly all of what you said. it’s a lot more than anybody else has said they will, including the greens. he doesn’t need to “panic” about the election, he’s up against the alp’s mcmullen who could die and still win the seat and behaves like it too.

it looks as if he slipped in under the liberal’s radar and isn’t the typical tory git we are used to.

Mr Evil,

it’s about much more than that.. it’s about the fuzzy feeling you get, while still ruining so much more of the environment than just global warming.

again, canberra (er, and the rest of the nation) is still struggling for water. planes are still using leaded petrols. cars are still churning out all sorts of chemicals. but! the carbon is offset, so it’s happy days..!

it’s funny, though.. it’s like people bashing oprah for her charity work. we’re sitting here being grumpy that someone’s doing *something* good for once – they could just as easily do nothing at all.. you know?

“I was surprised it was a Liberal”

Not me. They’re panicing. They’re grand leader is old and unpopular and they face utter defeat in the election. This is just a desperate and quite meaningless stunt. What’s he going to do? Plant enough trees to offset the energy used by the print shop to make his stickers and brochures? More trees to offset his photocopying, computer and vehicle usage? If he means business, lets see him vow to make his time as an MP if elected, Carbon Neutral. With all the photocopying, computer usage and air/vehicle travel MPs do, that would make a difference and take long term commitment.

This whole carbon neutral thing is just another excuse to continue to contribute to the global warming problem, whilst getting a warm, fuzzy feeling that you aren’t part of the problem.

It’s akin to thinking it’s okay to waste paper, as long as you recycle it at the end.

Good on him. Taking responsibility for one’s own carbon load is akin to recognising that GLOBAL WARMING is a REAL THREAT. And from a Liberal ?

Tut-Tut. They’ll be signing up to Kyoto next.

So how is he going to counteract all of the hot air coming out of his month over the next few months. That’ll have a bigger global warming impact than anything else.

The TaMS staff are probably the ones posting the Union stickers – after they have removed the Troy Williams ones. 🙂

unlike the union stickers which still disgrace every pole in belconnen.

Gungahlin Al9:31 am 11 Sep 07

Wonder if it includes compensation for the TaMS staff going around everywhere cleaning Troy Williams stickers off the back of every street sign in Canberra?

because carbon neutrality is the most important issue to canberra, and all.

don’t worry at all about the dire need for more water in the dams at all, or (i’m nigh on certain of) all the paper (and thus chemicals in ink) wasted on flyers delivered to thousands of homes.

as long as the carbon is offset by planting some trees, we’ll all sleep a little easier at night.

(fyi, i’m quite opposed to the facade of carbon neutrality as any kinda of solution. it’s a start, sure, but it seems the easy option to divert any interest away from more current, short term issues)

imo, that is the exact reason it’s a liberal politician doing it. smoke and mirrors, ladies.

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