George Brandis: Let's legitimise stupidity!

The Age online has reported some comments from George Brandis about the climate change debate and free speech which I feel are worth responding to. Here they are...

 

http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/climate-change-proponents-using-mediaeval-tactics-george-brandis-20140418-zqwfc.html

George Brandis has compared himself to Voltaire and derided proponents of climate change action as "believers" who do not listen to opposing views and have reduced debate to a mediaeval and ignorant level.

I would have thought that the medieval people would be the people who didn't believe what the science tells them. That seems like the opposite of climate change proponents.

While he says he believes in man-made climate change, the Queensland senator tells the magazine he is shocked by the “authoritarianism” with which some proponents of climate change exclude alternative viewpoints, singling out Labor’s Penny Wong as “Australia’s high priestess of political correctness”.
He said it was “deplorable” that “one side [has] the orthodoxy on its side and delegitimises the views of those who disagree, rather than engaging with them intellectually and showing them why they are wrong”.

Yeh, it's so unfair that climate skeptics have no legitimacy. I am shocked that we would delegitimise people just because they are not legitimate. I think we should teach creationism in schools. I think we should hire Nazis to give speeches at universities so they can rile people up against minorities. I think we should hire whackos off the street to treat medical emergencies. I think we should hire schizophrenics with no driver's licence to drive public buses. Why the fuck not? Illegitimate people are legitimate now! Fucking brilliant!

As examples, he points to Senator Wong and former Prime Minister Julia Gillard, who he accuses of arguing “the science is settled” to shut down political debate on climate change.

Yes George, shutting down debate is what happens when a debate is OVER!
 http://thecontributor.com/why-climate-deniers-have-no-scientific-credibility-one-pie-chart
This article from The Contributer shoes that an analysis of 13,950 peer reviewed articles on climate change show that only 23 reject global warming or endorse a cause other than CO2.

Senator Brandis also defended comments he made in the Senate, where he argued for the right of Australians to be bigots as justification for changes to section 18C and 18D of the racial discrimination act.

Odd how Brandis doesn't claim to be a racist or a climate skeptic, but he thinks that's what we need more of. We need more legitimacy for people who are going to poison the debate. That's what this country is missing. Why can't we legitimise more stupid opinions? How is anyone going to vote Liberal if we don't legitimise stupid opinions? Boo hoo! Fuck you Brandis.

Andrew Bolt's dumb global warming talking point

Andrew Bolt keeps repeatedly claiming that the global warming stopped 16 years ago. Not a huge problem in and of itself. There HAS been a slow down of surface temperature rise. But he keeps framing it as though this is an excuse for inaction on climate change when this is not the case.

It is well-established via lab experiments, basic physics and documenting the earth's history that carbon dioxide can raise temperature and that it has raised the earth's overall temperature in earth's history (see video). Yet a few weeks ago Bolt was interviewed on ABC 24 where he said that he would say to people who think that global warming is a threat that 'there has been a lack of warming for the last 16 years, could you please explain that?' Or words to that effect.
Bolt's implication is that even though it is well established that carbon dioxide causes global warming, we can safely pump as much carbon dioxide into the atmosphere as we like because there is an unexplained 16 year lag. In other words, we're doing something that SHOULD be killing us, and we have no idea why it's not killing us, so let's continue doing it! Let's keep eating the poison ivy which is mysteriously not poisoning us, until we have a detailed scientific reason for why the poison hasn't taken effect yet!
By the way, the lag is NOT unexplained. The reason that surface temperatures have stopped is because the oceans have absorbed a lot of heat due to trade winds strengthening over the last two decades. The land air isn't as hot as predicted because all the heat is going into the ocean, so the ice caps are still melting. And these trade winds are not permanent. When the ocean releases all the heat it's absorbed the surface temperature will rise significantly.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/planet-oz/2014/feb/12/global-warming-fake-pause-hiatus-climate-change
You just have to google 'global warming has stopped' and every news site that isn't owned by Rupert Murdoch will confirm that the '16-year hiatus' in global warming is cherry-picked from all useful context. And even when edited from all useful context, Bolt still sounds like a moron to anyone with half a brain.
And Bolt also refers to the Greens and other non-climate skeptics as 'worshiping the religion of climate change,' when it's really him with the dogmatic refusal to accept reason.