Harper & Abbott - Bush Ten Years On, But In Duplicate
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Abbotts only real concern is protecting Australias world-topping coal industry, whose expansion plans would make it utterly impossible to bring climate change under control. You would think Abbott might have noticed this his continent is located closer than almost anyone elses to the Antarctic, where scientists last month offered definitive proof that melting glaciers have committed the planet to an extra three metres of sea level rise. But instead Abbotts travelling the world to try to stop international efforts to combat global warming. In Texas, he told his audience we must prevent the "ostracizing of any particular fuel", as if he were the global ambassador of coal, determined to prevent his favourite hydrocarbon from having to take a back seat to what his Treasurer recently referred to as "utterly offensive" wind turbines.
Stephen Harper, Abbotts Canadian counterpart, is just as dangerously single-minded. Harpers particular joy is not coal but tar-sands oil, perhaps the only fuel source thats just as foul. A former oil company executive, hes turned the countrys diplomatic corps into salesmen of the dirtiest petroleum on earth, and in general treated the rest of his great nation as if it were a grubby convenience store tacked on to his Alberta gas station. Its gotten so bad that hundreds of scientists in white lab coats marched on Ottawa recently to protest his attacks on environmental regulations and scientific monitoring.
Because Canada and Australia have mostly benign and productive histories on the international scene, it will take a while for most world citizens to catch up with their new status. But those who are paying attention know already. Last year, for instance, the staid and venerable journal Foreign Policy began its cover story on Canada noting that it was now a "reckless, rogue petrostate". Those radicals at The Economist called Harper a bully "intolerant of criticism and dissent". Australia and its obsessive effort to keep King Coal alive despite its key contribution to climate change is getting similar international attention with the likes of Deutsche Bank and HSBC announcing they would not invest in projects that would bring coal through the Great Barrier Reef as planned.
All of this matters mightily. These men are decades behind the science Abbott plans to combat climate change by planting trees, which would work better if his country was not by now battling constant drought and record heat and theyre trying to blow up international negotiations in Paris next year. Canada has already renounced its treaty commitments and Abbott promises no new commitments. That could be enough to derail any agreement. Both Canadas tar sands and Australias coal would then fill the atmosphere with enough carbon that it wouldnt matter what their successors did. This new Axis of Carbon is a great threat to all of us.
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http://www.smh.com.au/comment/tony-abbotts-climate-change-policy-makes-me-cringe-20140617-zsa7t.html