Saturday Post

Because the world does not stop spinning...


COP21 is the new Kyoto Accord: an unenforceable and totally useless agreement that got world leaders out of their parliament buildings for a few days and allowed them to discuss how to screw the little guy:

The so-called historic UN climate deal reached Saturday in Paris is a fraud. But don’t take my word for it.

Here’s what James Hansen, the ex-NASA climate scientist known as “the father of global warming” for first sounding the alarm about man-made climate change in the 1980s, said about it.

“It’s a fraud really, a fake,” he told the Guardian. “It’s just bull---- for them to say: ‘We’ll have a 2C warming target and then try to do a little better every five years.’ It’s just worthless words. There is no action, just promises. As long as fossil fuels appear to be the cheapest fuels out there, they will continue to be burned.”

What really happened at the United Nations’ COP21 (the 21st meeting of the Conference of the Parties) climate summit, was that to get all 196 nations on board for the first time, while keeping the U.S. and China from bolting, the UN watered down the agreement to the point of absurdity.

Despite the lofty rhetoric of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and his French hosts, despite Canadian Climate Change Minister Catherine McKenna tweeting “History is made. For our children” — the UN failed to achieve what it has always said is needed to reduce industrial greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions linked to climate change.

That is, a global treaty in which every nation has a binding, legally enforceable GHG reduction target, subject to sanctions if it fails to deliver.

There is nothing like that in the Paris agreement.

Misleading UN claims the treaty is “legally binding” refer to clauses about process, reporting mechanisms and supporting the goals of the 31-page treaty, not results.

The word “binding” is never used. “Voluntary” appears 14 times.

Climate scientists say the voluntary GHG reduction targets submitted to the UN by 187 countries, including Canada, will see global temperatures double what the treaty claims is the point of no return — 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.

It used to be 2C.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s UN emission reduction target — which used to be Stephen Harper’s — is a fantasy.

Canada’s pledge, at a minimum, is to reduce our GHG emissions to 30% below 2005 levels by 2030, 17% by 2020.

Trudeau’s 2030 target would require Canada to cut GHG emissions by 202 megatonnes (Mt) annually, the equivalent of shutting down our entire oil and gas sector (179 Mt) in 15 years, and still come up 23 Mt short.

Trudeau’s 2020 pledge requires a cut of 104 Mt, equivalent to closing 58% of Canada’s oil and gas sector in five years.

To underscore the absurdity of this, it’s estimated B.C.’s carbon tax will reduce Canada’s emissions by 3 Mt by 2020.

Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne’s cap-and-trade scheme doesn’t start until 2017 and won’t reduce emissions, if ever, until 2018.

Alberta Premier Rachel Notley doesn’t know if her new carbon tax will cut emissions, because the only sure thing about a carbon tax is that it raises government revenues, not that it cuts emissions.

Norway imposed a carbon tax in 1991 and concluded 13 years ago it was ineffective at reducing emissions....

What will happen is that the Trudeau government will fall further behind its reduction targets, but face no penalties for doing so, while carbon pricing will penalize Canadians by taking billions of dollars out of our pockets annually.

It will be the modern version of papal indulgences — the price we pay for the “sin” of using fossil fuels to live in a big, cold, northern, sparsely populated, resource-based country — while GHG emissions continue to rise.

Our federal and provincial governments will confiscate billions of dollars from us every year, claiming they are saving the planet, while never having to meet even their own made-up emission targets.

In other words, they’ve come up with the perfect scam.

Remember- voters believed this was a reality. They still will even after even more of their paycheques disappear into Trudeau's wallet.


Also:

Opposition MPPs blasted the provincial government and the Ontario Energy Board Wednesday after CBC News revealed that only seven per cent of eligible low-income households have applied for the energy rebate that goes into effect Jan. 1.

And since it takes between six and eight weeks for an application to be processed, those families may be hit with higher bills as the provincewide clean-energy rebate comes to an end on Dec. 31.

It's terrible that poor families will suffer because of the Liberals' deception and greed.

But, then again, they voted for them, so...

Nearly nine hundred people killed in Burundi:

Nearly 90 people were killed during Friday's clashes in the Burundian capital, the army said on Saturday, the worst outbreak of violence in Burundi since a failed coup in May.

Blasts and gunfire echoed around Bujumbura for most of Friday and residents said officials spent the day collecting bullet-riddled bodies from city streets.

There was no fighting overnight and the capital's streets were calm on Saturday.

The Taliban attack the Spanish embassy in Kabul:

Taliban fighters mounted a car bomb attack on a guest house near the Spanish embassy in Kabul on Friday, killing at least one security officer and further dimming any hopes of peace talks with moderate elements of the Islamist insurgent movement.

(Sidebar: if you're stupid enough to believe that you can reason with the Taliban or any Islamist group, you need to leave this planet. Now.)

Gunfire was reported immediately following the explosion, which the Taliban said targeted a guest house attached to the embassy near a heavily protected area of the capital close to many other foreign embassies, U.N. and government buildings.

A spokesman for the Spanish foreign ministry said there had been an explosion in the embassy, which is outside the fortified "green zone", but Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said later that the attack was not directed at the embassy itself but at the guest house. 

(Sidebar: well, that makes it all better.) 

To wit: the Liberals promised to cram Canada with these guys:

A Jordanian woman who came close to joining the Islamic State group described a sophisticated 14-month recruitment process by the extremists that she said landed her in a secret IS compound in Turkey with dozens of other women.

**

Women across Saudi Arabia marked a historic milestone on Saturday, both voting and running as candidates in government elections for the first time, but just outside polling stations they waited for male drivers — a reminder of the limitations still firmly in place.

Culture matters. 

China shields North Korea- again:

China and Russia “worked behind the scenes to block the debate.” They convinced Angola and Venezuela to join them in voting against holding the meeting, but they were outvoted 9 to 4, with two abstentions. Before the meeting, a Chinese Foreign Ministry mouthpiece said, “We have always opposed the involvement of the U.N. Security Council in a country’s human rights issues.” (Has anyone in Beijing read the U.N. Charter? One of its first stated purposes is “promoting and encouraging respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all.”)  …

Power also called on “UN Member States, and particularly members of this Council,” to “stop sending people who try to flee” back to North Korea, where “gruesome punishments” await them. Not much doubt about who she meant there.

In the end, China couldn’t shield North Korea from the bad publicity. Instead, it shared it.

(Sidebar: I'm stunned, too, that the Obama boot-licking Samantha Power came up with this but, hey- stopped clocks and so forth.) 

(Kamsahamnida)