91Èȱ¬

Blairites supported by New Labour represent the economic violence against us the working classes...

Poverty would be much reduced with the implementations of a department of ethical training to remove unsuitable middle classes ...

Real poverty is practically measured by us the public in several ways:
1) days of zero spending power per week month or year typically 200 per year...
2)or at work hours days weeks suffering underpay and economic pressures to submit to unpleasantness and dependency eg due to management
3) ability to change job i.e. money saved to risk job changes
4) hours of work per month required to pay the bills
5) inability to travel
6) suffering of facetious institutional crime such doctors refusal to support health requirements and police or social or cpn interference and beliefs
6) inability to pay council tax
7) inability to pay rent
8) inability to gain legal support to prosecute or defend in court
9) ability to maintain appearance and social life
10) products missed per month food cds books drinks clothes shows papers..

The rest of the nation acts quite unaccountably ..whilst we have to consider the consequences of our actions free from senses of self elevating deservence challenged only by the honesties of worthiness...

Money is squandered by semi educated middle class establishment who can't deliver effectively and their people act out vain fantasies of punishment for their own incompetence and inferiorities to the law and standards expected of all in the beliefs they don't have to bother and that they are more valuable for doing the opposite of what society paid for and works for...!

They force us down for outclassing their inferiorities in their bizarre beliefs that people should not be better than they are...

Poverty would be much reduced with the implementations of a department of ethical training to remove unsuitable middle classes ...

Blairites supported by New Labour represent the economic violence against us working class opportunists to make us broke and suffering...via women men police nurses social workers and drugs

The government is a duplicity of unconcerted thesies and waste of human life...!

We look towards a better socialism!!

'relative poverty' definition anyone?

the only 'relative poverty' i see here is that of impoverished expression, an insolvency of ideas, of bankrupt concepts, a phrase in destitution and distress?

With suitable dickensian handwringing a pauper is conjoured from an affluence of spin as a device for fundraising?

the word poverty is being abused?

A POVERTY CONERN FOR TENANTS ...THAT CAMERON HAS JEWISH BELIEFS? IE LANDLORD THINK WITH EPOC MARKING EVICTIONS OF SEVERAL MILLION RENT FAILURES TO CONCENTRATION CAMPS

Obviously there were only a few streets of Jewish per town...maybe 5 streets and a synagogue of 1200 in 80 towns across Europe..but as banker landlords they must have had about 4000 family homes per town = about 20,000 souls...which they had to move out for nazi warlords who then moved out the unsuitably châteaued Jewish too..about 1.6 million people...

So there was a holocaust of Jewish tenants ...but they weren't necessarily very Jewish ...even if they had their candle holders on the inventory...we imagine fortunately that few Jewish died at all ...only enfeebled sickened and criminal or linguistically inconvenient lower middle classes.... popularity must have turned against Israel which they had never left but had like India been supported in defence and marshalling by British who left for the usual reasons...

So Cameron's Jewish beliefs would seem to be peasant eviction and lying to make it look good for history and the economy!!! One anticipates the world knows that already!!??

I have a friend who has just moved into the area. She has moved heaven and earth to find work and finally succeeded. The only problem is that she will not receive her first pay slip until 14th April.
In the meantime she and her daughter are living on air. Her tax credits have been cut 'because she is earning' and today she was in tears from tiredness and worry. She had no money left and a call to the tax credit people made matter worse. She had told them she had found a job to avoid any problems so they took action - end of story, the fact that there is no money until the first month is completed means poverty.
Is this what is needed to lift children out of poverty?

How is child poverty calculated?

If people can't afford to have kids! they should not have them! and if they do it's their problem - not everyone else's. Let's face it these people who scrounge benefits spend it on beer and fags and contribute nothing to society, basically if these people are incapable of getting a job! then they are probaby incapable of raising their children OK some exceptions are inevitable!

Pensioners have to live on far less and they deserve some respect!

How can we apologise an mean it when we as a nation still practice slavery to generate our wealth! Slavery has not gone away. 200yrs ago we imported slaves to work in our industries and generate wealth Today we export the industry. What is the difference? Both are morally wrong .... very wrong and we will rue the day.

r.e. Abolition of slave trade.
Whilst I agree we should all, as human beings, reflect on our history and acknowlegde the horror of the slave trade, whilst educating our young plus doing our bit as a country to fight slavery that still exists throughout the world, I cannot agree with certain calls for an apoligy.
Who should apologise?
Who should recieve the apology?
As a white british male born in 1980 should I apologise should I apologise to my black british frielnd born of the same era? I do not consider any black man, woman or child that I see as a slave. Should any black person see me as a master?
The answer is no.
My mother was born in Dublin (many wrongs done to the poor irish communities by the british establishment many years ago) and my fathers name I believe to have come from Russia, so am I not as British as my black friends who were also born in this country?
The answer is yes.
Our my black friends ancestors not my ancestors? To me they are.
The man ranting at westminster today knows no more of the suffering those poor people endured centuries ago than I do, and if he thinks he has a right to rant in the way that he did because of the colour of his skin then hes is wrong and probably racist. And if he thinks that he can demand an apology from me, well he's not going to get one. I am proud to be British and proud to call any man of any skin colour my brother. And only as humans are we responsible for what all our human ancestors have done. This talk of apoligy by certain sectors of the commuinity only has the result of segregation and is a step backwards.

It is interesting to note that since the British left Africa slavery appears to have become widespread again.

I'm afraid that the kind of 'tabloidisation'that pervades contemporary British thinking is in full flow here. It is unfortunate that even people as knowledgeable as JP have reduced the whole debate in this anniversary week to black people requesting an apology or collective guilt from white people. This misconception makes white people ultra-defensive often referring to black involvement in the slave trade to absolve responsibility. There needs to be a distinction between slavery- an expression of socio-political domination that dates back to Roman times from which Africans were not excluded; and the slave trade- primarily a British phenomenon which was purely an economic strategy propargated, perpetuated by the institutions of monarchy, parliament, the Treasury,COE, the Aristocracy and big business. As prime benefactors of this atrocity (they fought abolition with every fibre of their beings and were handsomely rewarded for losing)with their descendants still enjoying the ill-gotten wealth, families that traded slaves should apologise for the sins of their forebearers, so should the Queen, the PM and the Archbishop of Cantebury for the involvement of Church and State. The public have nothing to apologise for as their forebearers perhaps knew not a lot of what was done in their name. Those who knew fought against the injustice of it all and their descendants are still fighting for social justice in the world today. Those people, along with slaves who fought for their liberation, should be celebrated for finally bringing this act of inhumanity to an end.

I am happy that this site offers the truthful information that it does in its' reports.

Maybe there would be some money left in the British coffers if Tony Blair didn't follow George W. Bush in lock-step into this violent and costly war in Iraq.

Maybe there would be money to help the children of the U.K. if the government of the U.K. hadn't been so generous to loan the United States over $200 BILLION DOLLARS so that Bush couldn't feed his ego by going to war in Iraq...and Cheney could complete his greedy efforts to make BILLIONS OF DOLLARS FOR HIMSELF AND HALLIBURTON off of
the dead bodies of hundreds of thousands of Innocent Iraqis and Allied Soldiers!!!

Now Halliburton is moving to the United Arab Emerits so that it can avoid prosecution for defying U.S. SANCTIONS AND CONTINUE TO DO BUSINESS WITH IRAN...BUILDING OIL RIGS AND REFINERIES AND DRILLING FOR OIL AND PROCESSING IT...NOW FOR SEVERAL YEARS ...SENDING THE ILLEGAL PROFITS TO OFF-SHORE ACCOUNTS IN THE CAYMAN ISLANDS TO AVOID DETECTION BY THE U.S. AND AVOID PAYING TAXES TO THE U.S. INTERNAL REVENUE SERVICE.

AS AN AMERICAN, BORN AND BRED, I MUST CONTINUE TO APOLOGIZE FOR THESE SOCIOPATHS ACTIVITIES...YES, BUSH AND CHENEY!!!

THEY HAVE RUINED EVERYTHING THAT AMERICA HAS HELD DEAR SINCE IT WAS ESTABLISHED. WE LEFT ENGLAND TO AVOID KING GEORGE...AND NOW WE HAVE HELL GOING ON IN THE U.S. WITH THE ECONOMY...MILLIONS OF HOMES ARE IN FORCLOSURE...BILLIONS OF JOBS HAVE BEEN SHIPPED OVERSEAS...MILLIONS ARE WITHOUT JOBS...NO HEALTH CARE FOR MILLIONS...GANGS IN THE STREETS...DRUGS ARE RAMPANT...AND THE RICH BUDDIES OF THIS "KING GEORGE (BUSH)" ARE GETTING RICHER AND OUR MIDDLE CLASS IS GETTING POORER AND THE POOR...WELL...GOD BLESS THEM...THEY ARE REALLY SUFFERING...AND THIS ADMINISTRATION AND ALL THEIR REPUBLICAN BUDDIES AND CORPORATE COHORTS DO NOT CARE ONE BIT!!!

GOD BLESS AMERICA!!!

DENIAL & REALITY … The Lie That was The Convention of Multiculturalism

Multiculturalism was fostered then forced onto British Society since 1960's. However, 2 significant events (broadly) have fatally broken it.

Event (1): the July Bombings & burgeoning Islamic radicalisation, extremism & terrorism in the UK & around the world, fatally cracked the lie that is the RIGHT ON & PC socially constricting nature of MULTICULTURALISM (and all the agenda & vested interests by the promotion of such by minority political & race relations pressure groups)

It allowed mainstream society to restart the debate openly, which the left & ultra liberal forces had successfully stifled, about the nature of society, communities & individuals within it (entitlement v responsibility).

Event (2): similarly, the increasing levels of violence, criminality & murderous activities of failed Black communities (a long time in the making) & failing of such sub cultures (breakdown of family units & parental responsibility) combined with the true history & nature of Slavery, then [1] & now [2a] [2b] completely & fatally breaks in two the lie that is Multiculturalism & in particular the way it is touted by such groups.

Human nature is part of all of us, society is made of communities, which are governed by behaviour & attitude of individuals & the culture of groups (acting by themselves & in unison).

The only thing further forced apologies by states, the further forced legitimisation of a higher form of 'victimisation' & any possible payouts would benefit, are the egos of self appointed race relations & political pressure groups to fund their self fulfilling repetitive spiral of race, victim & ever elusive 'solutions' (we need more excuses, control & funding etc).

You have to ask why the forces asking for further apologises & reparation payments, are so purposely the ignoring:

- PAST implicit collaboration of certain African nations, rulers & people in the Slave trade [1]
- CURRENT failings of Caribbean & African states
- CURRENT continuing SLAVE trade around the world [2a]
- CURRENT slavery in AFRICA, BLACK Africans being sold to other BLACK Africans [2b]

Did political & race relations pressure groups ever wonder why has India succeed & so many African & Caribbean nations failed, no matter how such 'freedoms' & emancipation were won (via protest, conflict, end of empire).

Until member of those Black communities in the UK face up to the failings in their communities & their responsibilities to themselves & their families, no amount of blank cheque funding or forced apology & increased victimisation due to past 'injustices', will lead to the change only they can make to their lives.

vikingar

SOURCES:

[1]
[2a]
[2b]

Of course slavery was, and is, abhorrent but who should apologise, and to whom?

My ancestors were peasants in Dorset who migrated to London when the rural economy collapsed following Waterloo.

Your vociferous guest is jumping on the bandwagon from a background very remote from the slave colonies of America or the Caribbean.

According to his biography, Mr. Adebayo is a Nigerian educated at a famous English Public school.

Since he has benefited from slavery at least as much - possibly more - than I, should I apologise to him or even take him seriously?

Really enjoyed tonight's NN diverse program: child poverty; artwork; Al Gore - climate change; Slavery debate. Though it was the last piece that drew my attention.

Pity JP did not have more time, but enabled a very enjoyable debate between two rational people.Believe they should be allowed to develop these views further in a program of their own, given the contradictory / opposing view of the subject matter & the sensitivity of such.

COLOUR, HISTORY & STATS:

If the debate by political & race relation groups is all about Black people, suffering, death & events of 'holocaust' proportions, why focus on the past you cannot change & forget today & the future, which you can.

PAST:

"Between 1450 and 1850 at least 12 million Africans were taken across the notorious Middle Passage of the Atlantic - mainly to colonies in North America, South America, and the West Indies" [1]

PRESENT:

For example ….

- War: "between 1998-2002 war 3.8 million people died in the Congo which drew in the armies of five other African nations. Fighters on all sides blocked trade routes, plundered food stores, and stopped farmers producing crops" [2]

Aids: "2+ million African deaths in 2006 alone" [3]

Let alone the challenges of famine, lack of drinking water, education, economic prospects, exploitation, prostitution, crime, drugs …. & modern day SLAVERY in AFRICA.

SUMMARY:

If I was a member of our Black communities, I would have to ask why those self appointed political & race relations groups, want to focus on the past (whilst ignoring actual history & culpability) & only want to pursue agenda suited to the maintenance of their causes, rather than assisting British people in Black Communities, let alone champion the challenges of Black nations around the world.

vikingar

SOURCES:

[1]
[2]
[3]

Some say there is spiritual poverty because of repressive blairism and its' economic violence....

No No No..every church now has a blairite preacher to give references to his criminalmilitias...

But people in church look modernised now...and his minder preachers like to mislead and instil beliefs to try to flaw confuse and reduce the morale of the church public...

And where there used to be awesome encouraging family and company cultures of ambitions and potentials now many people are punched in and demoralised...told they aren't worth it and they aren't gonna get it goes they can't defend themselves from surprising hostilities...

There is much expense skilling up with unpleasantness and behaviour...the invoices to the government would add to billions...

Their degenerating game has an effect on the visible economies...behaviourist obedience has been enforced by repressives...so that the playing for position, playing for companies for what is worthwhile and to show off beating culture that motivates every purchase and work effort... has dissipated ..into cheaper appetites, practical underpay, and repression of interested participation enthusiasm, disconfidentising the culture to take over duties with conscientiousness, control, mastery, achievement, perfectionism performance, negotiation thinking, and creative loving powers...

Throughout education his teachers have sought to prevent our sort of boys from achieving often with drugs and disbullying set ups..instituting victimising economic violent self belief privligentism...to gentrify society through putting people off their money...with violence and pride in killer instincts and bigotry

...and when going to a doctor or hospital you have to make them feel better by letting them disable you...as if betterment was the point rather than accelerated health recovery the objective

Blairites cannot distinguish between moralities we all have and criminalities they like to inflict to make themselves feel better...

Some have won economic playing power but they are changing all the games and have established an influence where making people broke is fun and justified by their hatreds and angers

Blair cynically plays for a future with easily winning words and media bribes of millions where his people get the money from the goodwill of the public whilst in practicality they fight the world that creates it...

The economy obviously works well but they trivialise our lives and the worth of humanity...which makes us want to beat them up for their criminalities! So we look forward to the law doing it for us and hope to make our money back before they get rid of it and us!!

Meantime they pay us a handsome allowance to understand if possible their criminal mental illnesses and we wonder if and when one of his pigs will simply get us beaten dead or drugged for dissenting against their disgusting perversities!

Those who deny know why!

In the discussions about the abolition of the slave trade, I am surprised no mention has been made of the economic basis for the trade, and the economic basis for its eventual decline. While not minimisisng the efforts of the abolitionists, these were only effective once slavery as asystem was no longer producing the profits in the West Indies. This has been exhaustively documented by the economic historian Eric Williams in his book Capitalism and Slavery, published as long ago as 1944 but more recently available in paperback.

What we have here is an illustration of what could be described as an
all too common absence of "Joined Up Government".

We've heard a lot about "Every Child Matters" and this government's
considerable investment in education so why does it keep failing to
reach its targets? Might it be because it doesn't sufficiently question its naive assumptions about the determinants of behaviour and learning?

Note that the advice clearly states that many of these Special
Educational Needs have a genetic component. Note that rather like
height, one can't do much about genetically determined abilities through 'interventions', they can however, be provided or catered for, i.e better 'managed'. This is not the same as raising standards.

We've had a major influx of immigrants over recent decades. Large numbers of these have been relatively 'unskilled' (a euphemism for lower than average cognitive ability rather like non-statemented SEN). At the same time, our indigenous fertility rate has continued to *fall*. We now
have a national average TFR of 1.71 which is well below replacement
level. Yet some of our S Asian sub-populations (Pakistani and
Bangladeshi Muslim, and some Black) still have higher than replacement
TFRs. It is not just an ethnic problem I hasten to add (but looking at it this way can help one see a larger problem). This surely presents a dilemma?

Whilst the statutory Registration of Births does not record ethnicity
(only country of mother's birth - and this country is well beyond second generation for some of these ethnic groups), over recent years we've seen reports which raise concerns about low birth weights as well as increases in child poverty.

Last night's Newsnight) and reports by the 91Èȱ¬ yesterday stated that
"the number of children below the official poverty line rose by 200,000 last year."

Whilst in another report, we read that "mothers of Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi origin had a high risk of having low birth-weight babies - their babies are on average 300g lighter than those of white mothers." and that "Low-birth weight is linked to an increased risk death and disability, and a range of long-term health problems, such as diabetes, heart disease, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and depression".Note that the report also says "These mothers also attended fewer antenatal appointments than other ethnic groups."

If our indigenous population is aging and failing to replace itself
(overall national TFR = 1.71), we clearly do need to encourage
immigration (or fertility) for economic reasons, but, how can this help in the longer term if the infux or birth rate is largely at the lower end of the distribution, and migrants come from lower skilled
immigration from countries which traditionally have rather high TFRs?

If one looks at population growth in Nigeria, Pakistan and Bangladesh
over the past 50 years or so, all three have risen from having
populations under that of the UK, to having populations today which
approach triple that of the UK. Are their economies booming? Are they
politically stable? These country's average cognitive ability levels are
not high, and there's a negative correlation between TFR and IQ (just as there is a positive one between SES and IQ and high heritability of
ability). Given that we know that there's still a significant difference in the TFRs between ethnic groups within the UK, and that there's a bulge at the low end of the BME population pyramid in the UK, surely we too have a problem brewing, especially if educational opportunity doesn't so much train, as merely provides for genetically determined ability?

(Somewhat rhetorical) Questions:

Why do those in poverty have so many children? (It would be rather
ironic if it primarily for the parents' security in their old age).

Why is this government's programme to eradicate child poverty failing?

How many in the general population consider the *conjunction* of the
messages in reports such as the two above, never mind in conjunction
with other messages about genetic determination of diversity, ability
and disability?

Why did the interviewees on Newsnight last night assert that more 'government' money (and implicitly the 'Every Child Matters' agenda) will address/correct any of these trends? Their policies seem to be creating the problem. The increase in crime rate is but one adverse
consequence surely?

How will any of their plans encourage smarter women to have more
children? I fear they will have the very opposite effect.

In conclusion, perhaps we need a KPI system like the following to hold
more MPs and Civil Servants to account? This is a democracy isn't it?

An excellent programme for once-why is it always feast or famine on Newsnight?
The sculptures of nature were outstanding,and I was glad to see that they had the coverage that they deserved, rather than being left in the often clumsy hands of the Review .Obviously there are issues of prestige surrounding a Tate exhibition but surely these works are best left in their own setting? After all,nobody would suggest transplanting something like the Taj Mahal stone by stone to put it on display ..

If as the Black Africans not in Africa believe as they seem to, that the Agreed Slave trade by the seller and the buyer dis-placed them.
Then surely it is only right that we should Re-Place them, ie. repatriate all back to their natural habitat.
Earlier in the Week a lady was on 91Èȱ¬ calling for reparations, even raising a new descriptive word 'Afro-Phobia' that the whole white population of the planet is collectively guilty of! What reparations, Andrew Neil sometime last year had the figures of Money and Aid which has been poured into Africa over the last 50 years or so - it amounted to more than has ever been minted in Britain. So how much does she want?

I can remember some 50 years ago the little brown envelope dropping through the letter box 'money for Africa' can anyone else?
The only difference is that, that little envelope has been constantly growing - when will it come to an end?

It is about time that the African in Africa and those of African origin start admitting to the reasons for their situation, and get rid of the excuse that the Slave trade has given over the years for their collective failures both in the lands of the whites and those of Sub Saharan Africa.
Otherwise, more and more will simply start suffering from African Fatigue, enough is enough.

Sort it themselves without trying to perpetuate guilt onto every generation of the whites from wherever, it's history and nothing to do with the young generations.

They could start by getting their reproduction culture under control, then they might be able to feed themselves - but that involves accepting responsibility for ones actions.

Agreed.

'Afro-phobia', Islamo-phobia' and 'homo-phobia' have opportunistically taken leaves out of classic Marxist texts which should be republished as "Political Activism for Dummies" (of which 'anti-Semitism' may be taken as the most successful archetype).

Not long ago, Newsnight covered the recent DfES publication of an internal report alleging 'unwitting' institutional racism within our schools (see comment 30 here:
/blogs/newsnight/2007/03/thursday_15_march_2007.html

where the jailed revolutionary Bernard Coard

was cited as a mentor.

Each of the above groups appear to campaign for privileged affirmative action whilst asserting that it is pursuing freedom from 'persecution' by 'unwitting' oppressors.

As we saw at the end of Newsnight last night this just doesn't wash anymore, or at least... it shouldn't.

Am I alone in thinking that the fact not one poster has commented on Al Bore's appearance on Newsnight is indicative that the whole anthropogenic GW issue is starting to implode. People are simply dulled by the apocalyptic prognostications and recent counter theories ( bravely given time by Newsnight) have placed the element of doubt that potential emperor Gore simply does not have any clothes.

Very good newsnight tonight, that good, my brain hurts.
Can watching newsnight for over 20yrs have an adverse effect on your mental health?
"hi my name is billybob and am a newsnight-holic" clap clap clap "welcome billybob, share your pain".
"ive lost my job, my wife, my kids, my friends, even my dog ignores me, and all because of my addiction to newsnight, come 25 past 10, i will drop anything that i am doing, put on the kettle and sit in front of the tele and await with baited excitment what indepth news reports will get my needed fix dealt with, i have on the rare occasion missed an edition of newsnight,and the next day will run around, phone people up, to get up to speed on what i missed, and i know a pumpkin grower from manchester who has gone cold turkey and has been off newswnight for 3 weeks, but i can see the pain in his eyes and the withdrawal symptons are bringing him out in cold sweats and he is compensating his withdrawals by smoking 60 a day, its bad, buts he's hanging in there".clap clap,"your in the right place billybob, keep coming back"...

(i had written something different for this comment page, but the moderators would have slung it firmly in the bin, to many hotspots maybe, or poor grammer, ah whatever)

REALITY CHECK (1)

"The institution of slavery had indeed been practiced from time immemorial. It existed in all the ancient civilizations of Asia, Africa, Europe, and pre-Columbian America. It had been accepted and even endorsed by Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, as well as other religions of the world" [1]

REALITY CHECK (2)

"Tribute: Slaves sometimes formed part of the tribute required from vassal states beyond the Islamic frontiers. The first such treaty ever made, that of the year 31 of the Hijra (= 652 A.D.), with the black king of Nubia, included an annual levy of slaves to be provided from Nubia" [1]

SUMMARY:

Now, could we ask the current crop of political & race relations groups, to go & badger other nations for an Slave Trade apology …... white, brown, black …. the colour doesn't matter … the point of inclusion is were they involved in the Slave Trade … esp as some still are :(

Or do they just want forced insincere & additional protestations & apologies from the first modern civilized nation (briefly engaged in Slavery) that brought an end to its general open practice as legitmate economic activity, in the wider world *

* whereas slavery has been continued in many parts of Africa & elsewhere [2a] [2b] [2c] [2d]

Interesting viewpoint ref Slavery from 'Edo speaking peoples' website [3a] & a Ghana newspaper [3b]

vikingar

SOURCES:

[1]
[2a]
[2b]
[2c]
[2d]
[3a]
[3b]

Peter - I agree with one bit of your post. It is hard to see how anyone can learn to tackle global warming from a Government that have increased carbon dioxide emissions while promising to cut them in three consecutive manifestoes. I however would be fascinated to learn how to spin your way into having a record like this but still being regarded as the best in the world at tackling global warming.

But to claim Al Gore simply said "my experts are better than yours" is to wifully misunderstand the situation. The C4 documentary that Newsnight gave coverage to has been shown to be flawed at the very heart of its argument. It built its argument around the theory that temperature was driven more by solar activity than by CO2 concentrations. But the graph showing an impressive match between the two was fraudulent.

It used old NASA data that has since been revised, and as one data set finished in the mid 1980's, simply stretched it to last into this century. When you plot the proper data on the right axis, the correlation the entire programme was built around isn't there. The Independent printed these graphs -you can them here:

The producer of the programme told the paper that the earlier lines were too wiggly and he wanted simpler ones. Speak for itself?

PS Given the way the GGWS has been undermined, do Newsnight have to keep featuring it? Not trying to stifle debate - just wondering if there is not a more reliable source of scepticism? Seems a tad lazy if you don;t mind me saying.

Ref Sarah #27

You gave a link to Friends of the Earth site [1a] & an article on it [1b]

Given the rather cut, paste & photocopy amateur nature of the 'evidence' can you provide a workable link to the section where this self titled 'independent_article' is please. Ref Channel 4 program 'The Great Conspiracy Swindle' their arguments & research are worth a look [2a] if nothing more than to 'discount' an opposing view.

OPINION:

- An FOE statements on this [3a]
- The Independent paper [3b]
- The Observer paper [3c]
- Contributor to the program, Carl Wunsch [3d] & his response to C4 [3e]
- Program makers response [3f]

PROGRAM:

Undoubtedly, the two issues the C4 program did convincingly convey is:

1) vested interests of nomadic political pressure groups use of issues as a vehicle for achieving agenda in this case the environment (big clue is opposition to nuclear energy)

2) highlight the somewhat dubious politics at work in the IPCC, which everyone is so keen to quote, regardless.

" ….the IPCC process is driven by politics rather than science" [4] *

* said one of the authors of IPPC report 2001 - Dr. Richard S. Lindzen, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and one of the world's leading atmospheric scientists

Criticism of the politics & economics & policy response of IPCC, commented on by Nigel Lawson (former UK Chancellor of the Exchequer) [5]

SUMMARY:

Personally believe: pollution is happening, consumption of non replaceable resources is happening, climate change is happening, global warming is happening. But not convinced on the nature v man percentages & liability arguments at present. I mean, surely its best to rely on as many credible sources as possible & the science than look to coerce people with pure passion (anyone involved with Change Management knows difficulty in behavioural/attitude of people based on dodgy rationale)

vikingar

SOURCES:

[1a]
[1b]
[2a]
[3a]
[3b]
[3c]
[3d]
[3e]
[3f]
[4]
[5]

Is it not the case that there's general agreement amongst the experts that up until industrialisation the main driver of global warming/cooling was the proximity of the sun and its activity, that CO2 lagged those cyclic changes so did not drive them, but since industrialisation, we are deemed (by the experts) to be 'highly likely' to have been making matters worse given that CO2 and other greenhouse gases amplify the problem? There are a few problems here though, one or two of which I irreverently allude to below.

The first below is the executive summary or summary of policy makers (in my experience, one should always be wary of executive summaries for policymakers, scientific abstracts are hazardous enough, but as the full 2007 report isn't available yet this must suffice I guess - it has stimulated the market so it has no doubt done its job whilst the authors finalise the report?). Although the graphics looks unnecessarily fuzzy, the link below provides one they did earlier (in 2001). I personally don't much like the temperature range (less than one degree), the standard errors, or the fact that the it only goes back as far as 1861 (although I guess that's hardly surprising given that we didn't have a scale for measuring temperature until the 1700s never mind thermometers or global measures, so historical measures are necessarily retro-dicted proxy measures, and proxies tend to have greater error margins than direct measures - these are smoothed time series.

Note that the exponential rise in recent CO2 ppm depicted on page 15 has another notorious correlate - our global population. People make babies as 'carbon footprints' producers, and as I've lamented
before, we certainly seem to very good at advancing global dimming.

Given that *we* are being held culpable I find it very odd that so little attention is being paid to *this* these days. No government but China (quite big isn't it at10x size of Russia in population, and it's very oil needy too because of its booming NEP economy). Is it not odd that this big boy isn't reviled as a member of "the evil empire", even though it's essentially Stalinist?. China is the only nation to have got a grip on the population issue (through positive and negative eugenics legislation) and yet our liberal politicians reckon they can manage us and our 'carbon footprints'?

The merit of the CH4 programme and Newsnight's coverage was that it stimulated healthy public skepticism. Not everyone's persuaded by Al Gore's enthusiasm or the ubiquitous executive summaries. What people want is reliable longitudinal data which puts the current figures into perspective.

What we need are more leaders like Canute I, and less advisors like Guido and Luigi Farabutto.

Do we get what we deserve? Are not these scare-mongering campaigns designed to a) encourage the silent majority to take more responsibility for their behaviour and so b) become more politically involved?