In Historic Blow to Climate Hysteria, Australia Kills Carbon Tax Written by Alex Newman Friday, 18 July 2014 09:55
With final approval of the Senate on July 17,
Australia officially became the first developed nation to repeal its deeply
controversial tax on emissions of carbon dioxide, dealing a major
setback to proponents of increasingly
discredited man-made “global warming” theories. Climate
realists worldwide celebrated the historic development, while enraged
global-warming theorists furiously lashed out at Australian lawmakers. Analysts
also noted that the repeal, shepherded through by conservative Prime Minister
Tony Abbott, could be a foreshadowing of much bigger problems for the widely
criticized United Nations anti-CO2 crusade.
Of course, the new Australian leader actually rose
to power in a landslide last year by promising the public that he would repeal
the economy-crushing tax on CO2 emissions.
Despite opposition from climate alarmists in the Labour Party and other smaller
parties — extreme Greens Party boss Christine Milne even claimed Australia
would become a “global pariah” — Abbott was finally able to fulfill what
analysts said was his most important campaign pledge. Because his
conservative-leaning Liberal Party does not control the Senate, however, the
Australian prime minister relied on support of other parties to secure the
historic 39 to 32 victory.
The tax on CO2 emissions was originally
adopted by the Labour Party-led government in 2011, which broke its promise not
to impose it. After the scheme sparked soaring
costs of living and record business failures, the
Australian public turned overwhelmingly against it, with Abbott offering a
“pledge in blood” to kill the tax. Those promises led his party to a massive
victory in last year’s legislative elections. However, because the Senate was
not under conservative control, two previous efforts since then to ax the tax
had failed. On July 17, though, with support from three senators in businessman
Clive Palmer’s party, Abbott succeeded in pushing the measure through following
a successful vote in the House of Representatives last week.
“Today the tax that you voted to get rid of is finally
gone; a useless destructive tax which damaged jobs, which hurt families’ cost
of living and which didn't actually help the environment is finally gone,”
declared Abbott in a news conference after the historic Senate vote, drawing
praise from across Australia and around the world. Calling the carbon scheme a
“9 percent impost on power prices, a $9 billion handbrake on our economy,” the
prime minister estimated that the repeal would save Australian voters and
businesses more than $8 billion per year. That works out to over $500 for the
average household, he added.
If the tax had not been killed, it was set to increase
dramatically, dealing another major blow to embattled consumers and the
economy. In 2015, the anti-carbon plot was even supposed to become a
full-fledged cap-and-trade regime, where “permits” to emit CO2 could
be bought and sold in a “carbon market.” However, the entire idea behind the
plot is becoming increasingly controversial even among climate alarmists —
especially as horrifying atrocities
against poor people across Africa and Latin America linked to UN and World Bank
“carbon offset” schemes began making headlines in recent years.
At the global level, Australian authorities under
Abbott’s leadership have also bucked the UN and its sought-after carbon regime,
too. Last year, Canberra, the capital of Australia, even declared that the
nation would
not accept any more UN “socialism masquerading as environmentalism.”
That means, among other measures: no more funding for international climate
hysteria and no more taxes supposedly aimed at controlling alleged “global
warming,” officials said. Australian leaders also vowed not to accept any more
planetary “agreements” or wealth-redistribution schemes, though some officials
are reportedly wavering.
Opposition lawmakers were outraged by the decision to
rein in the taxpayer-funded climate hysteria and the devastating policies it
spawned. Some even essentially claimed that the sky would fall. “This is a
fundamental moment in Australia's history,” Labour Party Senator Lisa Singh warned
ahead of the vote. “We are about to devastate the future of this country.” It
was not immediately clear how removing a tax on what scientists call the “gas
of life” would “devastate” the country.
In fact, even if the man-made global-warming theories
were grounded in reality, human emissions of CO2 represent a
fraction of one percent of all greenhouse gases present naturally in the
atmosphere — and Australia’s contribution to that is negligible at best at
about one percent.
But in truth, the warming claims are dubious at best; 73
out of 73 UN “climate models” forecasting warming as CO2 increased
have been proven embarrassingly incorrect by the
observable evidence: No
rise in global temperatures for 18 years and counting, record levels of sea ice,
and much more. Virtually every alarmist prediction that could be disproven has
been.
Nonetheless, taxpayer- and crony-capitalist funded
global warmists whose jobs depend on keeping the hysteria alive were furious.
“We are taking a monumentally reckless backward leap even as other countries
are stepping up to climate action,” Climate Institute boss John Connor claimed
in an interview with the New
York Times. “Australia’s economy is much more carbon-intensive than
the U.S. economy.” Other alarmists made similar claims.
The emerging super-state regime in Brussels ruling
over the formerly sovereign nations of Europe also expressed its displeasure.
“The European Union regrets the repeal of Australia's carbon pricing mechanism
just as new carbon pricing initiatives are emerging all around the world,”
complained EU “climate” czar Connie Hedegaard in a statement. “The EU is
convinced that pricing carbon is not only the most cost-effective way to reduce
emissions, but also the tool to make the economic paradigm shift the world
needs.”
Another UN would-be climate controller Christiana
Figueres has previously
lashed out at self-government in the United States for
preventing what she claims to view as urgent measures to control alleged
“global warming.” Instead, she praised the brutal Communist Chinese regime’s
system, which she
said was “doing it right.” Of course, China is among the most polluted nations
on Earth — real pollution, not CO2, which is exhaled by humans and
essential to plant life — in addition to being ruled by one of the most
oppressive and murderous autocracies in human history.
Outside of extreme environmentalist groups and
power-hungry politicians, though, citizens and industry in Australia were more
than pleased with the death of the carbon tax. “Today's repeal of the carbon
pricing mechanism is significant as it removes a cost facing Australian LNG
(liquefied natural gas) exporters competing in global markets; one that does
not exist for our international competitors,” explained David Byers, chief of
the Australian Petroleum Production & Exploration Association. Mining
interests, small business, grocers, and more also celebrated the repeal, saying
it would help boost Australia’s economy and global competitiveness.
While Australia moves to restore sanity, the Obama
administration has gone radically in the other direction. When a
Democrat-controlled Congress refused to impose an unconstitutional,
economy-crushing carbon regime on the United States, the executive branch
simply imposed one by decree through the Environmental Protection Agency. Top
Obama officials have claimed that there is “zero” chance of Congress being able
to stop it, but state
governments and U.S. lawmakers are already fighting back against the plot.
Around the world, Canada and Japan have also both
attracted the ire of what critics refer to as the “climate cult” for refusing
to cooperate fully with UN carbon scheming. In Europe, however, the
increasingly power-hungry EU continues to operate an anti-CO2
regime. The UN, meanwhile, is hoping
to secure a draconian planetary carbon regime at a global-warming summit
scheduled for next year in Paris. However, critics
and experts have warned that the proposed plot would be devastating to humanity
— and especially the poor.
While the Obama administration and the UN continue
hyping their climate theories, the supposed
“science” underpinning them has literally melted. All over the
world, scientists
are jumping off the alarmist bandwagon, and now, it
appears that governments are, too. Still, the UN has expressed confidence in
securing a global climate regime to shackle humanity with next year. Americans
who believe in real science, national sovereignty, free markets, and liberty
must redouble their efforts to stop it.
Source: http://www.thenewamerican.com/world-news/australia/item/18729-in-historic-blow-to-climate-hysteria-australia-kills-carbon-tax?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_campaign=8aeb5f5c56-The_Editors_Top_Picks_3_12_143_12_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_8ca494f2d2-8aeb5f5c56-289799037
Alex Newman, a foreign correspondent for The
New American, is currently
based in Europe. He can be reached at anewman@thenewamerican.com . Follow him on
Twitter @ALEXNEWMAN_JOU.
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Comments
It’s time
for the U.S. to quit the U.N. It’s also
time for Georgia to pass Georgia Sovereignty laws and ban the EPA and other
federal agencies from abusing Georgia citizens with bogus federal
regulations. Georgia needs to repeal HB
1216 (2008) and HB 277 (2010) and repeal “Regionalism”, another UN Agenda 21
scheme.
Norb Leahy,
Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader
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