Emperor's New Clothes

Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. but it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.

The first crack has appeared in the great big dam of alarmist, tax-raising, make-believe claptrap that is the New Religion of anthropogenic global warming.

The diggers, gawd bless 'em, have had a look at 'cap and trade' legislation (aka Bleed You Dry Whilst Scaring You Rigid) and told the Aussie government to boil their heads.

Delingpole exults here. One digger parliamentarian, Senator Fielding, decided to take a little time to reach his own conclusion on empirical evidence, rather than be pressganged into the fashionable 21st Century consensus. He said:

“Until recently I, like most Australians, simply accepted without question the notion that global warming was a result of increased carbon emissions. However, after speaking to a cross-section of noted scientists, including Ian Plimer… I quickly began to understand that the science on this issue was by no means conclusive….As a federal senator, I would be derelict in my duty to the Australian people if I did not even consider whether or not the scientific assumptions underpinning this debate were in fact correct.”

Another ocker Oz MP put it thus: "It is a dog of a plan".

Idle advanced the Plimer view last month. I am delighted he is being listened to by some of his countrymen.

It is too early to forecast an end to this pestilential mumbo-jumbo, but we can at least ask our politicians to acknowledge that there is some corner of the English-Speaking World that has dissented from the orthodoxy, and invite their comments.

Plucky little Oz! It's almost a pleasure to be making a gift of the Ashes to you.