Hysterical Greens says Federated Farmers President

Stuff reports that Federated Farmer’s President Charlie Pedersen has been laying into ecologists saying:
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“I say shame on the people who elevate environmentalism to a religious status, shame on you for your arrogance, shame on all of us for allowing the environmentalists' war against the human race to begin, and take hold,"
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Quite right. It is a war against the human race. What human beings create and consume is bad, whereas what nature creates and destroys is good. Most environmentalists think they are at tune with humanity, but the “it’s compulsory or banned” ethos of many of the Greens reveals this attitude that the Green’s interest in democracy and peace draws the line when the majority choose to buy what the Greens don’t like (e.g. cars), or grow what they don’t like (in which case peace is the last thing on the mind of ecologists).
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Unfortunately Charlie Pedersen hasn’t heard of the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement (VHEMT) otherwise he wouldn’t have said "I am yet to hear any environmentalist admit that rolling back agriculture's intensification would have to be matched by worldwide starvation or a matching reduction in population”. Because VHEMT believes that world population should reduce, not to 5 billion or 1 billion or even 1 million, but zero. These perverts think that which was created spontaneously by nature is beautiful, but the only creature on the planet that understands how it was made, how it works and can harness it to do things that defy nature (e.g. travel beyond the speed of sound, communicate vast distances showing images and sound) are bad. This is the natural endpoint to radical environmentalism - killing off humanity.
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The key difference between many ecologists and the likes of Pedersen (and myself) is that we don’t believe that preserving nature is, by itself, of inherently greater value than any other activity. After all, New Zealand would be a third world nature park if much of its land hadn’t been cleared for agricultural use. This is not a “pave the world” argument, it is moving from the extremism that says that (to borrow from Monty Python):
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every tree is sacred,
every bird is great,
if a dune is built on,
Greens get quite irate.
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every bush is wanted,

every swamp is good,

every bug is needed,

in your neighbourhood.
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To recognition that sometimes people value nature, millions like tramping, sightseeing, have their own gardens, visit parks in cities and national parks. Those are activities that (assuming those that value it pay for it) demonstrate that many people in the capitalist developed world value nature, enormously.
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Pedersen continued “Many ordinary citizens had bought into the environmental teachings that the world was on the road to ruin, and with it, mankind. They were adopting these teachings without proper scrutiny because of the "green" movement's momentum.” This is all true, the Greens have an Armageddon mentality. It is one that the media loves to use, because it sells papers and gets attention on broadcasts - in addition, most reporters aren't very bright. They take what lobby groups tell them and don't do any investigations themselves - this is why the word nuclear is a synonym for hysteria in New Zealand, but not France or Japan.

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The current fads for the "end of the planet" are peak oil and global warming, past ones being overpopulation, water “running out” and a new ice age. Now if human induced global warming is happening, it is NOT the end of the world, humanity wont die out – it doesn’t mean that roads will be empty because nobody will have a car, it doesn’t mean mass flooding and bad weather everywhere. It may be cheaper to do nothing about global warming that to undertake interventionist measures that reduce net welfare (e.g. focusing on expensive local production of goods rather than cheaper more efficient imports, which may exacerbate poverty in poorer countries). Technology already means that new cars today burn less fuel and burn it cleaner than ever before, and that power generation is equally more efficient and cleaner - in other words, economic efficiency can be parallel to environmental efficiency. However you can hardly plan it, like the Green obsession with trains.
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A key problem is the shrill loud voice of the irrational emotive environmental lobby. One of those is Cath Wallace, who is reported as describing Mr Pedersen's comments as "hysterical" and said he had missed the point of debate about sustainable development. Cath Wallace would know about hysterical – she waged a hysterical campaign against National’s relatively minor proposed tinkering of the RMA in the late 90s. Check out this quote from an article written by her:

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“We could aim to maintain and protect natural, cultural and social capital – and to be as vigilant about these as we are with public and private financial capital. This means that we would maintain the environment intact, with limits to protect natural processes, systems, places and ecosystems. Decision rules such as the precautionary principle that suggest that we avoid actions with significant irreversible adverse consequences or consequences which we cannot predict.”

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So you see she knows the value of natural capital or even cultural and social capital. Meaningless concepts being thrown about. Her advocacy of the precautionary principle would have seen aviation banned from the start because planes could fall out of the air and set some bushes on fire, or the electric light (who knows what damage that could do to plants photosynthesising at night) or antiseptic in hospitals (the disposal of antiseptic could damage all sorts of precious ecosystems). Avoiding actions with consequences which we cannot predict would stop almost everyone doing almost anything interesting - don't set up a business, don't meet new people, don't invent something new, don't develop a new drug - just be a sticky beak taxpayer tit sucking econazi telling people what not to do because of the "intrinsic" value you place on anything not produced by human being. Absolutely absurd.

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A more recent press release from her and one of her supporters commenting on the 2006 Budget says:

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“In stark contrast there is no major increase in public transport funding, yet this is urgently required. This does double harm. We will have more greenhouse gases, more lethal air pollution, higher future health costs from vehicle pollution and from the spread of infectious diseases as our climate becomes more mosquito friendly to spread diseases like Ross River Virus, dengue fever and other nasties."

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There is no evidence whatsoever that subsidising public transport reduces greenhouse gas emissions. None. There is evidence that building some road projects reduces greenhouse gas emissions, by easing congestion and eliminating bottlenecks. So because public transport isn't getting more subsidies, New Zealand might get dengue fever. A flyover on the Western Hutt Road gets built getting rid of two annoying sets of traffic lights on a 4-lane highway, and fuck me silly but the Tropic of Capricorn is now the Tropic of Milford and dengue fever is rife along the Manawatu River.

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What’s more hysterical than that?

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The education system has inculcated this guilt trip for a good generation now. This is why as Pedersen puts it:

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"They often give support to relieve themselves of any guilt about their lifestyle. Kiwis must understand that ill thought out environmental controls based on emotion rather than science will inevitably lead to a reduced standard of living."

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Indeed!

London 34 degrees celsius

Best place to be? Primrose Hill with a cool drink
Worst place to be? Bakerloo or Victoria tube lines

Why do tourists come here at this time? When it is this hot, there are plenty of nicer parts of England to go to, or rather nicer parts of Europe.

The recipe for reducing global poverty - Part One

Plenty of bloggers have talked about this (Not PC, Lindsay Mitchell, Writeups, Elliot Who) and they are right , Bob Geldof can just fuck off.

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His contribution to reducing world poverty is nothing compared to the efforts of others who, despite their mixed record, have achieved far far more than he ever could. Take Deng Xiaoping, who took the world’s most populous country and turned its back on policies that saw it stagnate and 60 million of its citizens starve. Mikhail Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan, who, by ending the Cold War, ended the proxy wars and backing of most of the mad socialist states in Africa and Asia. Democratic accountable government has the best chance in Africa that it has EVER had, but sadly Zimbabwe and South Africa are going in the opposite direction
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Poverty will never be history. There will always be people who through bad luck (disaster), or incompetence lose property and the means to make a living suddenly. There will also always be people who are the far left end of the bell curve – not through illness or disability, but through sheer stupidity. Those people often breed and produce children who, because the parents are incompetent and can’t teach them much, turn out stupid too. All that can be done is to ensure that those who have some competency are not prevented from using it, so that those with a lot of competency can hire them. Remember poverty is almost always relative. By any global measure, there is hardly poverty in New Zealand. Nobody starves to death, few are homeless and all get access to healthcare that everyone else pays for. It is remarkable how so many of the poor have reticulated water, electricity and telecommunications, and have appliances that would hardly ever be seen in an African village. One "answer" to global poverty would be a global welfare scheme - which almost everyone in New Zealand would be paying towards as almost everyone earns more per capita than the global average - of course that would bankrupt humanity.
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So what could dramatically reduce poverty around the world?
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No it is not being an undertalented rock “star” famous for one song (Sir Humphrey's has a marvellous reworking of that song's lyrics) and his (no doubt good intentioned) celebrity guilt mongering.
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No it is not about giving away lots of money to developing countries, it is about getting out of the way of them creating wealth and teaching good governance.

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The first step is freeing up global trade. If Bob wanted to make a difference he would shame the European Union, and France in particular, to making a bold move at the WTO negotiations. The US offered to end agricultural export subsidies, which would be a good step forward, but the EU refused because France says that the EU has “already reformed” its unsustainable and immoral Common Agricultural Policy. If the EU and the US together ended agricultural export subsidies and ended bans and quotas on agricultural imports this would pressure the likes of India and Brazil to open up their markets to more manufactured goods, and pressure Japan to liberalise its markets. This would all benefit developing countries which are more efficient producers of many goods, particularly agricultural commodities, than the EU and US. The most scandalous distortion at the moment is the EU, and while it is too much to hope for all EU agricultural protectionism to end, it is not too much to expect it to open its markets and stop subsidising exports to other markets.
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Secondly, support good government. That is government that has as its cornerstones the development of a clean and independent judiciary and police force. This also means laws to protect private property and enforce contracts. One of Latin America’s biggest problems has been corruption in the core functions of the state. People do not believe they can get justice, so either don’t complain or take matters into their own hands. Good government at its very basics requires:
- Transparent clear laws on real crimes (attacks on people and their property);
- A well paid and adequately equipped Police force which focuses solely on the enforcement of those crimes;
- An effective Police monitoring agency, independent of the Police, to root out corruption, Police malpractice and acts as the public’s watchdog;
- A well paid, politically independent court system. This will include an appeals process. Judges who cannot be bought mean judges paid well and provided adequate protection for verdicts against those who may threaten them.
- A well paid and managed prisons/corrections system. This requires particular monitoring to avoid corruption and abuse, but is more than just managing prisons. This also means the collection of fines and debts for lawsuits. This operation also must be well paid, but is critical to managing the credibility of the judicial system – most commercial infractions are not going to be enforced through prisons.
- Well defined property rights. This may include a land register for identification of land/buildings, or even registers for vehicles. This ensures that title and boundaries in property have certainty.
- Adequate contract and tort law. Agreements between citizens have to be able to be enforced as contracts. Citizens also must be able to sue for actions by individuals, that are not intentional which cause harm.
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Thirdly, support accountability in government. This accountability means not only liberal democracy, free speech and the rule of law, but having the powers of the state limiting itself. It means that governments can be taken to court and decisions overruled for being unconstitutional. It means that politicians are not above the law, and can be sued, charged and convicted when they act illegally.
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Beyond that there are economic policies that will work, and people can give aid voluntarily to support infrastructure development (e.g. clean water supplies, vaccination) which clearly works. The details of all that are for another time, because without government that works, government that can protect the rights of individuals to live and interact with each other voluntarily, everything else will be a struggle. People must have the right to own what they produce, to be able to call upon the state when their body or property is violated, and to not be pushed around by politicians who want to "plan" their lives, and in the meantime harm their livelihood.

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Economic independence requires the state to protect people from thieves, con-artists and the most artful example of those is politicians. There is little point giving a starving man food, if it can be stolen when you have gone. There is little point in helping fields be irrigated, if the state kicks the farmer off the field.

May Israel destroy Hizbullah

Israel's current campaign against Hizbullah has the most honourable and moral of objectives - to destroy a murderous organisation, which has as its goal the destruction of Israel.

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Israel has my complete support.

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Hizbullah launched its attack on Israel, abducting two soldiers and launching rocket attacks on Israeli cities and towns. It has been attacking Israel for decades, it supports and sympathises with Hamas and Islamic Jihad, and its suicide bombing attacks on Israel.

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Here are the facts:

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1. Hizbullah – a radical Islamic fundamentalist terrorist organisation has been using bases in Lebanon, including residential areas, to fire rockets into Israeli territory. ISRAELI territory, not the occupied West Bank or Gaza, but northern Israel.
2. Hizbullah abducted two Israeli soldiers in order to force Israel to surrender Hizbullah prisoners. Prisoners arrested because they are terrorists and planning attacks against Israel!
3. The government of Lebanon, through its own internal weakness, is completely incapable of controlling Hizbullah.
4. The Israeli government has a choice – either sit back and let its villages and houses of its citizens be bombed by terrorists lobbing rockets at them, or resist.
5. Hizbullah is backed by Iran and Syria, and has a stated goal of eradicating the state of Israel. Iran ships by air the weapons it supplies to Hizbullah. It aims indiscriminately at military and civilian targets, and shields behind civilians by locating its rocket firing operations in densely built up residential areas.
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So who is responsible for Lebanon being bombed? Would Lebanon be getting bombed had the Lebanese government fought against Hizbullah’s gang using the country as a base for attacking Israel? Would Lebanon be bombed if Hizbullah ceased attacks?
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There is your answer.
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You can choose to apologise for terrorists who would kill you in an instant, who want a UN member state wiped out, who want an Iranian style Islamist regime in Lebanon and Palestine. You know, the type of regime that sends kids to wars, that applies the death penalty for homosexual acts and adultery, that stones men, women and children for unIslamic behaviour. The type that simply does not tolerate atheism, Christianity, Judaism, women wearing what they want, or people writing or reading what they like. Or you can support a country defending its territory from attacks. What side are you on?
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Rape and little boys

Maia’s post about a friend’s little boy and this conversation between her and the friend has created a lot of reactions. Insolent Prick has provided an excellent response to the strange fear that your baby might become a rapist. However, first let’s get a flavour of the kind of thinking in this different “world view”:
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“we didn't know whether it was worse to raise a girl and be afraid that when she grew up she'd be raped, or a boy and be afriad that when he grew up he might rape someone.”
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Now we know that it is more likely that a girl will be raped than a boy, and more likely that a man will be convicted of a violent crime than a woman. This is a world where boys are not victims and girls are never violent, but let’s just pause for a moment to figure out where they are coming from.
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Imagine being that little boy or indeed a little girl around such adults, and taking in the message that “I am innately capable of hurting people” or “I am innately capable of being a victim”. Now both are true. Feminists who haven’t lost the plot completely acknowledge that all initiation of violence against people of any sex or age is wrong. Funnily enough, that’s what libertarians and objectivists think too. However, what thinking causes one to “fear” the victimhood of your daughter or the “latent violence” of your son?
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Psychosis. Transferring your own issues onto the child.
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Your children will become whoever they are due to many reasons. Your parenting will be the dominant influence, their genes will play an important part too. Their peers and other family members will influence them for better and for worse, and the older they get, the more responsible they are for their own behaviour. Adults are fully responsible, and the world doesn’t make them do things – assuming their brains are physically fully functional, adults decide whether they rape, beat up their kids or abandon them.

Take this “Right now he's amazing and beautiful.” The baby boy is amazing and beautiful because he is totally dependent, totally helpless and barely an individual. Imagine telling him in 13 years time that he “once was amazing and beautiful”, now he has an erection and thinks about girls all the time – better watch out, he might rape. Maybe, just maybe, if he is brought up respecting other people, their bodies and their property, he wont even think about using force to get his own way.
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After all, if you thought this, wouldn’t you simply not breed and turn yourself in for therapy about how scary the world is:
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“I'm so scared of what this world will turn him into. That's one of the things that the US soldeirs who have raped Iraqi women makes me think about. How our world in general, and the army more than anything, makes men into monsters. At the moment we can protect him from all that. I can sing him songs of hopes and struggle and there ain't nothing can harm him. But that only works so long.”
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Time for a reality check. The “world” doesn’t make anyone into anything. People become victims and people choose how they react to that. Who made Rachealle Namana or Tania Witika the evil abusive women they are? Well feminists might say they were abused too - much like how many male sexual abusers were also abused. How can that possibly excuse it?

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However, remember in a philosophical environment where you surround yourself with female victims and talk about the vile men who abused you, you can find the world a bit skewed. You probably don’t associate with female offenders and male victims. You may not even associate with women who have not been abused or men who don't abuse - after all you probably can't trust any man who says he has never raped, because so many get away with it (which is true, some men rape and get away with it, but many don't rape).
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It is a little as if someone was badly assaulted by a young Maori male, and suddenly fears all young Maori males (which is a natural instinctual, albeit irrational reaction).
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Now I don’t think Maia is a man hater “all men are rapists” feminist, and it is too easy to dismiss someone for such views. I read her posts to test my mind, and find she blames capitalism for all that is bad in the world, but has no alternative. It is like blaming planet earth for having tectonic plates that cause earthquakes and volcanoes, but not suggesting somewhere better to live.

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I don’t minimise rape, anymore than I minimise any form of severe violence. It is unconscionably evil, no matter who perpetrates it. It is revolting that in the not so distant past the Police wouldn’t believe the victims, and today the Police, depending where you are can either be helpful or make things worse. However, there are many many men who abhor rape, and abhor violence against women, children and men. You don’t need to have a vagina to feel that way. Men are as likely to be attacked in the street as women, because idiotic drunk louts are more likely to get aggro towards other men than women, for no reason at all. Most men have encountered them, but they are often so drunk they can be ignored or knocked over easily enough if they attack.
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The solution to rape, sexcrimes and violence is a culture that values being human, and what is great about being human. It respects people’s bodies and their property, and enjoys the joy that is life. It abhors the use of force as the tool of the barbarian, and instills the use of the mind as the driver of the heart and hands as being what is great about being human. It is not a culture of fear, but one of confidence and believe in oneself. It is not a culture of victimhood, but of strength – strength in mind and body. It is a culture that is benevolent towards those you love and towards your fellow human being. It is the kindness of strangers, not the guilt of unchosen obligation. It is a culture of honesty, friendship, good will and acknowledgment of excellence, effort and being creative.
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You wont find that culture in Islam or Christianity either.