New Zealand Conservative

I absolutely believe in the importance of human kind living in a sustainable way. I buy into the concept that we are God's people on this Earth, to be stewards and custodians of the planet. It's a thought that is both practical and idealistic, and would be a win-win for us in terms of spiritual maturity and enjoying the fruits of the Earth. Oops, I mentioned God. Put me on the side of religion then. How will we get there though? To this end, I believe science is part of the answer. The other part is about our personal spirituality, so I'll leave that part off for another time. Science isn't just something that stands apart from human kind, it's more our approach to revealing the nature of the universe, to seeing it's patterns and understanding the intricacies in the inter-relationships. It's a rational method for looking into the mind of God. It's the fruit of our minds, and the fruits in turn feed our minds. So put me also on the side of scienc...

Ian Some points for your readers: First, regarding data - NIWA climate data are available to anyone who registers, through the Web. Also, we provided the homogenised NZ temperature time series for the 7 sites used in forming the NZ time series to a member of the NZ Climate Science Coalition in July 2006. This is presumably the data used in the paper collated by Richard Treadgold and released by the Climate Science Coalition earlier this week. Second, regarding information - We have written and published papers on data homogenization. We have written and published papers on NZ temperature trends. We have responded to internet blogs (Climate Audit), and newspaper letters, and to NZ Climate Science Coalition members at various times in the past regarding data homogenization, and in particular the Wellington temperatures. Then three years after we provided the data but one week before the Copenhagen climate meeting: Allegations are spread around the internet and through press releases that...

Not long till Christmas now! Just four more weeks. Amazing. I've had one hell of a year. It's been a mixture of sleep deprivation, head-down, full-on homeschooling and sports training for both children, illness and complete burn-out. And that just took me to the middle of the year. Now I have curtains that block out the light and a number of vitamins that I have to keep remembering to take. The kitten waking me up at 4 - 5am every morning is still a problem, though. Also, I haven't quite figured out what to do with the tom cat that comes around caterwauling at various hours of the night. Quite honestly, if I had a gun, I'd probably go out and shoot him. But as it is, I dream of an internally controlled water sprinkling system that takes no time at all to fire up and soak the bastard. Will probably have to get a dog to take care of that problem, though. I think all his amorous instincts will vanish if confronted by a dog every time he starts up. Though, how he ...

Al Gore won't debate him. Come on Al-baby, I'm waiting says Lord Christopher! But even for $300,000 Al is too scared to debate. LOL! This interview is in parts, so once each one is finished, have a look at the bottom of the You-Tube screen, running your mouse over each clip shown, look for the next part. All are numbered.

Makes our politicians look like toadies in comparison. Resignations from the Turnbull frontbench Tony Abbott - former Howard minister, opposition families, housing, community services and indigenous affairs portfolio. Nick Minchin - Liberal powerbroker and leader of the opposition in the Senate. Sophie Mirabella - early childhood education, childcare, women and youth portfolio. Stephen Parry - Chief Opposition Whip in the Senate. Eric Abetz - Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate. Michael Johnson - Opposition Whip in the House of Representatives. Tony Smith - Opposition assistant treasurer. Mathias Cormann - Opposition parliamentary secretary Mitch Fifield - Opposition parliamentary secretary Brett Mason - Opposition parliamentary secretary Related Links: Embattled Liberal leader Malcolm Turnbull still believes ETS will pass this week ~ How the Liberals snatched back their party ~ Andrew Bolt

Many people have been wondering on what basis NIWA took a whole bunch of temperature readings over time, and then adjusted the readings upwards as part of good scientific practice. Some people have called for the assumptions used in the calculations to be made public so they can understand science at work. The call for transparency is quite reasonable, but not required. I hacked into their computer system last night and extracted some emails that clear this whole confusing mess up, and it turns out the upward trends are all easily explained. Some of the emails are provided below, so please turn down the heat on NIWA and just cool it for a while: TO: Tom in Data Analysis FROM: NIWA Head Scientist -------------------------- You haven't added the standard deviation as set by international agreement for AGW. Throw in .6 degrees. FROM: Tom in Data Analysis TO: NIWA Head Scientist -------------------------- Yeah, done. Right next to the automatic increment based on CPI. TO: Tom in ...

NewsTalk ZB is going to talk about the NIWA fudging of climate data in order to show warming in NZ. On before 5pm on Larry Williams' show. ( listen live here - you might need to swap to Wellington using the drop down box.) ( UPDATE 4:46pm: Hmmm, maybe not before 5pm. Will update with a more accurate time once they say. UPDATE 2 5:29pm - It's coming shortly, turn your radios on.) Kudoes to Rodney Hide who brought it up in the House today. We have a politician with spine. And, apparently Nick Smith told Larry Williams privately yesterday that the ClimateGate emails were all a conspiracy theory. LOL! What an idiot. Meanwhile, here's more from Fox while you wait (Hattip: a commenter at Uh, oh – raw data in New Zealand tells a different story than the “official” one. ~ Watt's Up With That?)... [UPDATE 3] 7:06pm The Briefing Room has a very detailed post on this NIWA scandal , and Ian has recently updated his blog with the press release issued by NIWA, which was me...

There is incontrovertible proof is in this document for all to see. Yes man made global warming is indeed real and we are slowly beginning to learn the names of the men who made it.

Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., a guest on the Washington Times morning radio show, said he knew scientists were "cooking" information years ago. The e-mails, he said, were the proof, and now something needs to be done. A Washington Times editorial said the content of the e-mails "could end the academic careers of many prominent professors. Academics who have purposely hidden data, destroyed information and doctored their results have committed scientific fraud." "It is pretty serious," Inhofe said. "And since, you know, Barbara Boxer is the chairman and I'm the ranking member on Environment and Public Works, if nothing happens in the next seven days when we go back into session a week from today that would change this situation, I will call for an investigation. "This thing is serious," he continued. "You think about the literally millions of dollars that have been thrown away on some of this stuff that they came out with." Inhofe...

Hat Tip: bez in our comments. I wonder where our media is on this one as well. Yesterday when talking to Bill English on the consequences of the ETS on NewsTalk ZB after 6pm, Larry Williams mentioned it and then ... chickened out? or was told to can it? on questioning Bill on the consequences of stuffing up our economy when the whole climate change thing is based on lies, lies and more lies. The Dominion Post had an article early this week at the back of the A section rather than plastered all over the front page where it should have been. Politicians obstinately move forward with ETS despite the fact that the whole thing is built on lies. Bit of a mouthful, maybe someone clever could have come up with a better headline. But the fact remains, our media is reluctant to touch this. Why?

The lunatics are in charge of the asylum! Related Link: Controversial ETS bill passed in urgency [UPDATE] Meanwhile, Contra Celsum has a good post on the aftershocks of the great climate change email scandal that continues to unravel . Boy, are the National Government going to look like fools... [UPDATE 2] Unbelievable! Larry Williams on NewsTalk ZB just now (after 6pm) had Bill English in the hot seat. After talking about the financial implications of the ETS, Larry mentioned the documents revealed over the weekend (the emails) that they wouldn't have time to go into, before going on with another topic with Bill! Hello!!! It would have been really interesting to ask Bill why National passed an ETS when the science the whole thing is based on is revealed to be a scam. I am just flabbergasted.

While the NZ Government continues on with it's hell bent desire to pass a law under urgency that will in effect tax the air that we breathe in order "do our part" in order to stop "global warming", here is Fox News on the emails that show just what a scam global warming really is. I think we should pause for a moment of embarrassed silence for our gullible politicians. Hattip: dimmocrazy commenting on Kiwiblog .

Hide the Decline "A climate change survey of young New Zealanders has found a whopping 96 percent are in favour of some changes to the country's transport system, with the majority voting for substantial change. A delegation of young people will take the results to Copenhagen this week as part of New Zealand's contribution to the international climate change forum." From: Kiwis back transport changes via Crusader Rabbit

Hide the Decline Well well well; in breaking news the Government it has the numbers to pass the ETS under urgency after cutting a deal with the Maori party. Here are the key features A Treaty of Waitangi clause in the emissions trading legislation. The government paying for iwi representatives to travel to Copenhagen for world climate change talks next month. Agreement to continue funding the Enviro-schools programme A bigger allocation of carbon credits for the fishing industry and agreement that they will be paid to quota holders instead of fishing vessel owners. A number of iwi have large fishing quota. If there was any doubt in your mind that National was Labour lite that is now completely dispelled. They are as useless as tits on a bull pandering to special interests just like the other bunch. Why does this need to be passed under urgency? We all know why don't we. The Pseudo science upon which this legislation is predicated is collapsing, revealed to be what any scie...

Climate change - unscientific, freedom-destroying nonsense.

FRIDAY 9:45PM. Must be time to kick off the regular FNFFA session! Fashionably late, but fashion is so yesterday. Especially if you are commenting from England. Something to do with time zones perhaps. Drop by and leave a comment. Something that reflects the fashion of the week perhaps?

I came across a DRAFT UNFCCC document today (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change) and it makes interesting reading. Over the next few weeks I'll post bits and pieces I've come across within the document. Then we can all be prepared for Copenhagen and John's promises. The document is full of waffle, for example on page 28: "The framework shall be...flexible, bottom up, results-based and country driven, involving all relevant stakeholders..." and patronising: "including women, with a view to enhancing ownership..." , but nevertheless, it doesn't lose track of the need to establish multiple sources of funding: Page 43, Point 41: Providing financial support shall be additional to developed countries ODA targets. Mandatory contributions from Developed Countries ... shall include ... a. Assessed contributions of at least 0.7% of GDP. c. Levies on CO2 emissions g. Levies on international transactions h. Fines for non-complian...

Vision without execution is hallucination. -- Thomas Edison It seems to be human nature to dream, to have some kind of vision of how you would like your future to be. Thomas Edison sums it up for me though by pointing out if you don't have a plan to execute, then you are fooling yourself. It's a hallucination. I think that's so true on the personal level. Wider than that, is the ETS. I suppose there, the vision is to save the world from the effects of man-made pollution. The execution of that is Kyoto, Copenhagen and in NZ, right now, the ETS. But it doesn't gel. Edison may have had a saying for this situation. Perhaps it would have been something like: Executing on a hallucination will not achieve the vision. Dream on, dream on.

Go bikers! I think the effort put into protesting rising ACC levies admirable. An estimated 10,000 bikers fronted up to Parliament today to give the government a rev up. Unfortunately though, there are already signs that the Government is simply going to write this mass protest off as just another "Boobs on Bikes" parade. ACC Minister Nick Smith said the number of dead motorcyclists last year justifies fee increases to the survivors. Funny, for a moment I thought he was also going to acknowledge the government's failure to invest in safer roads. Obviously, it's safer to tax. "The stats are crap!" Declared Goff. "These levies are not fair, and they're not reasonable." Phil, being a petrol head, has memory lapses about Labour's glory years watching ACC on a collision course with a deficit bigger than a train wreck. That wasn't an accident though, so tax payers cannot claim any relief. Au contraire, this week bikers face a levy incre...

They say one is born every minute and they are right. And it is a crying shame when it is our Government who is being scammed or is it just that they are scamming us - its hard to know which it is for sure. But what is abundantly clear is that our "polluting" livestock are going to cost us dear if the Government persists with this ludicrous Emissions Trading scam scheme. Listen People have been herding livestock since biblical times. Abraham's vast herds did not mess up the planet. He in fact lived at a time when the planet was warmer than today but it isn't cooler now because of his sheep and goats. No its just a natural thing the planet has been both cooler and warmer since the days of the Patriarchs. Our forebears lived with it, survived and persisted to ultimately produce us. And we need meat, milk and wool - these are good things, they feed and cloth us with the surplus paying the bills for products we don't produce locally, such as the computer I am using...

A couple of weeks back (Thursday, October 29, 2009), The Dominion Post regurgitated a Washington Post article by David Gibson, keeping the original title, Is Pope Benedict a closet liberal? I just about choked on my breakfast when I saw that The Dominion Post had grabbed the offending piece, as I had read it online a couple of days prior, and had dismissed it as the rabid rantings of a Catholic who saw the Church only in political shades. Clearly, someone at The Dominion Post is in the category of extremely clueless when it comes to working out which articles are rubbish and which articles are worth republishing. However, I will give The Dominion Post a little credit for realising that the outreach to Anglicans is big news and worthy of more than a passing mention soon after it happened. But rather than putting up drivel by Gibson, why not ask to publish an article such as This offer was 400 years in the making by The (British) Catholic Herald? Years before Pope Pius V excommunicat...

A new Catholic blog that comments on politics as well has popped out of the woodwork. And All These Things... But I am disappointed that Hone Harawira is being loosely compared to French King Louis XVI . Hone Harawira it is ironic that in over spending you choose to go to France, the home of some great over spenders such as Louis XVI. He lost his head for his exuberance so consider yourself lucky that you will only lose your job ! Especially since Louis did not lose his head for overspending - regicide is generally far more complicated than that. Louis XVI was a Catholic monarch, killed during a period when not only were most of the French nobility killed, but open season was unleashed on Catholic priests and nuns. Louis XVI might even be recognised as a Saint (martyred for the Faith) in some future time. But apart from that minor faux pax which someone from NZ could be excused for, welcome to the blogosphere, newbies!

The recent condemnation by the European Court of Human Rights of crucifixes displayed in Italian public schools could result in all public Christian images being banned in the EU. Ironic, really, when Europe has been celebrating the fall of the Berlin Wall. In Poland, Communists banned crucifixes. Once the Communists were thrown out, the crucifixes came back. Now the oxymoronic "human rights" court wants to ban them again. The ECHR decision came last week in response to a single suit brought by an Italian citizen of Finnish origin who has been campaigning for eight years to have crucifixes removed from schools. The court ruled that the display of crucifixes in public schools restricted religious freedoms. "The compulsory display of a symbol of a given confession in premises used by the public authorities ... restricted the right of parents to educate their children in conformity with their convictions," the court said. While the ECHR, as a body of the Council of ...

I think it's definitely time for a glass of red.

Wow. An American Catholic Bishop is conducting a very public correction of one of the political members of his flock. How many times have we heard politicians use their Catholic identity as political capital, while not exactly adhering to what being Catholic actually means? NZ has a number of these types of politicians - people that I've been shocked to find quite happily describe themselves as Catholic while supporting Government policies that quite honestly no Catholic politician should support if they want to be faithful to what they are supposed to believe. Congressman, I’m not sure whether or not you fulfill the basic requirements of being a Catholic, so let me ask: Do you accept the teachings of the Church on essential matters of faith and morals, including our stance on abortion? Do you belong to a local Catholic community, a parish? Do you attend Mass on Sundays and receive the sacraments regularly? Do you support the Church, personally, publicly, spiritually and financi...

It's very easy to distort history if the version that is being sold is more exciting or seen to be more interesting than the standard version that while cool, doesn't enthral the general populace for reasons generally to do with what people want to believe rather than what is most likely true. A recent blog post here at NZ Conservative shows how such alternate histories can capture the imagination of people, much to the annoyance of researchers and archaeologists. This post is on the Knights Templar, themselves subject to people who would rewrite their history for their own ends. I've copied the forward to a book by French historian Régine Pernoud, where she attempts set the story straight on the Knights and I hope that rather than being swayed by the likes of fiction writer Dan Brown, you'll consider that the truth is far more worthwhile. Historical distortions are difficult to straighten out. A mistake about a chemical compound or an airline schedule will be expose...

I went down to the train station again the other day; I hadn't been there since I finished my course in June, but I was in the area and went to say hi one of the guards there I got to know a bit. I see now that the 'Park'n'Ride' parking which was previously free is now costing $2 a day and they've had the parking meters there for two weeks Sure, $2 a day doesn't sound that much, but for a student taking the train five days a week like I was, that's an extra $10 a week on top of your ticket costs. It all adds up; I'm glad I've finished. So, thanks Auckland City; that sure is Super...

Catherine Delahunty is drilling into the "right" to Dental Care. Apparently, Mobile Dental Units the Ministry of Health are investing in will not cater for disabled people. If ramps were to be fitted, they would apparently cost $70,000. She thinks a ramp would be $3,000 tops. Furthermore, because this is a breach of the United Nations Convention on Human Rights, the Greens are asking for a Disability Commission to be created. She thinks that would be $30 million tops. (Actually, I'm making that bit up. That's my guess for initiation and first year up and running.) I was going to turn this into a post, but I'll just cut and paste the first two comments I made on Frog Blog. Read the whole thing there if you would like to simulate a toothache. ZenTiger's Comment: On one hand we have the statement that “access to dental health” is a right, and on the other we have Catherine arguing that that right can ONLY be provided via a government paid Mobile Clinic ki...

[ADMIN: This post does not reflect the opinions of all the authors here at NZ Conservative.] I suppose this will cause a bit of controversy, but it's really quite interesting. Down my way, we get a free local magazine called Franklin eLocal and they have been publishing a series of articles that challenges the accepted lore that the Maori were the first inhabitants of New Zealand. One person who is investigating this is Northland researcher Noel Hilliam, who has been compiling evidence of this country’s earliest settlers since 1954 and is retired curator of Dargaville Museum. Academics from various universities in New Zealand who talk privately to veteran Northland researcher Noel Hilliam are astounded at his research material and indisputable evidence of habitation in early New Zealand. They encourage him to keep speaking out about the truth, but none will back him publicly. They are afraid to jeopardise their jobs and research funding by going against the relative...

Pita Sharples last month said : "Why are we fighting whakapapa against whakapapa? There's so much enemy that is not brown." Now Hone Capone's racist outburst . There have been other occasions. A disturbing indictment on the Maori Party. Maybe a race based party feeds off this stuff? PM of NZ: Nice One Hone Adolf at No Minister predicts the end of a promising career Crusader Rabbit doesn't tolerate racism . Lindsay Mitchell is being told to Grin and Bear It

Well the blogs are abuzz with Hone's Race Relations Statement. Perhaps to Hone, it's all about working the system. An important rule to understand moving into continuing discussions on the foreshore, seabed, land and sky ownership dispute. Maybe the Government can "return" to the Maori people the Carbon in the atmosphere. "Here, it's all yours. And here's a Carbon bill some-one expects you to pay." With ownership comes maintenance. If the Treaty was all about partnership, when do we share the bills? It's Friday. Have I been provocative enough to invite comments? Who am I kidding, the honour goes entirely to Hone.

Some of our readers may remember the furore a few months ago over Cadbury replacing cocoa with palm oil and the competition heating up with Whitakers and the subsequent back-down of Cadbury . What did they say? - Cadbury New Zealand managing director Matthew Oldham said he was "really sorry" and that the decision was in direct response to consumer feedback, including hundreds of letters and emails. "At the time, we genuinely believed we were making the right decision, for the right reasons. But we got it wrong,” he said. "Now we’re putting things right as soon as we possibly can, and hope Kiwis will forgive us. The change will be made within the next few weeks, he said. Ok, so that was in August, so yours truly has been to the supermarket to find out if anything has changed... The result? I don't think so. Looking at the back of both Cadbury and Whitakers, Cadbury still has the less cocoa (at 21%), while Whitakers is at 33%. So maybe this is old sto...

DimPost has penned a post that I think could fairly be categorized as "chardonnay socialism" at its best, especially when taking the comments into account. One thread muses about the potential theft of public money . Apparently, such theft occurs whenever a Government decides to lower taxes. I think this quote by StephenR sums up the position nicely: No-one is disputing that people should be able to spend “their” money on whatever they like. The question is, how much money should be “theirs” in the first place. I must say that it is novel to see the "tax is theft" mantra turned on it's head. With socialism, paying less tax to the government means you are keeping their money you earned. Another question might be, "And after disputing a person's earnings, why does it automatically become the governments to take?" Yes, I realise this is all really about people paying their "fair share" for their existence in this world, and that the wor...