Labour supporter Jack Monroe defects to Green Party

[darmstadt]

There you have it, on the left, to be sure, but none of these nations would self-describe as socialist. Indeed,I am pretty sure that the socialist states as described by Dodgy exist only in his fevered imagination.

No, he's correct. Regardless of what anyone says, a right winger is always correct They're like religious fundamentalists in that no-one can criticise them, no-one has the right to say anything which might upset their carefully thought out dogma and as has been seen time and time again, if you do, not only will you get abuse and smeared but they'll declare the 'war to end all wars' on you albeit in the case of their own folk, they'll just denigrate those that they feel superior to, sad really...

[EternalOptimist]

What I don't get is why it's ok for wind farms to do this

(Plus , if any greenie thinks my cat could kill one of those Golden Eagles, they are even more of a fruit-loop than I ever thought)



but if there is an oil spill, the greenies are up in arms. Demanding billions in compensation and prosecutions.

One thing is clear, wind farms kill 40 times more birds and bats than oil spills do.
(13m vs .3m PA)

[darmstadt]

I have no real opinion regarding climate change but I remember years ago that the Greens were pushing wind power like there was no tomorrow but when they started going up they began to oppose it on grounds of 'blighting the landscape' and the noise.

[EternalOptimist]

I have no real opinion regarding climate change but I remember years ago that the Greens were pushing wind power like there was no tomorrow but when they started going up they began to oppose it on grounds of 'blighting the landscape' and the noise.

I think you neatly reveal the difference between Greenies and environmentalists.
Everyone that I know is passionate about having a good clean healthy and sustainable environment.
I also know a couple of political greenies.
The two are completely different and I can well see how a dogmatic greenie lobbyist would support wind, where a true environmentalist would object

[pjclarke]

*In schools they would rather we all had a sh*t education than a small percentage be allowed to move up the ladder through the grammar school system. Instead of making ALL schools as good as grammar schools they seek to get rid of them

Of course not. But the idea of deciding a kid's academic future on the basis of a single test administered on a single day is indeed repugnant. Cognitive development continues well after the age of 11.

And it doesn't work. As with the failed economic experiment we can examine, for example, the county of Kent which has retained selective schools. Ooops … 34% of them are National Challenge schools (hint:this is not a good thing, it means schools that don't meet the base level of 30% of students achieving at least 5 GCSE grades A*-C including English and Maths.) , Lincolnshire, also selective, has 29%, while next door Lancashire, fully comprehensive, has 0%.

A generation blighted by Right ideology.

[pjclarke]

One thing is clear, wind farms kill 40 times more birds and bats than oil spills do.
(13m vs .3m PA)

Whoop Whoop Whoop. Made-up number alert!

This article summarizes the threats that wind farms pose to birds before surveying the recent literature on avian mortality and summarizing common methodological problems with such studies. Based on operating performance in the United States and Europe, the paper then offers a preliminary calculation of the number of birds killed per kilowatt-hour kWh generated for wind electricity, fossil fuel, and nuclear power systems. The study estimates that wind farms and nuclear power stations are responsible each for between 0.3 and 0.4 fatalities per gigawatt-hour (GWh) of electricity while fossil fueled power stations are responsible for about 5.2 fatalities per GWh. Within the uncertainties of the data used, the estimate means that wind farms killed approximately 20,000 birds in the United States in 2009 but nuclear plants killed about 330,000 and fossil fueled power plants more than 14 million. The paper concludes that further study is needed, but also that fossil fueled power stations appear to pose a much greater threat to birds and avian wildlife than wind farms and nuclear power plants.

The avian benefits of wind energy: A 2009 update

*In their recent study, which has been accepted for publication in Marine Ecology Progress Series, the authors estimate that up to 800,000 coastal birds died as a direct result of the Deepwater Horizon spill. That number, as large as it is, is on the conservative side, says Audubon Director of Bird Conservation for the Gulf Coast and Mississippi Flyway, Melanie Driscoll. Once further studies are conducted, says Driscoll, the number will certainly exceed one million

From http://www.audubon.org/news/more-one...rizon-disaster

I'm curious. Why do you do it?

[pjclarke]

I have no real opinion regarding climate change but I remember years ago that the Greens were pushing wind power like there was no tomorrow but when they started going up they began to oppose it on grounds of 'blighting the landscape' and the noise.

Memory can play tricks. Example?

[EternalOptimist]

pj is correct of course. my figures were wrong because I took the lower estimate of the 13 -39 million killed by wind every year.

I wanted to be fair, rather than a propagandist or lobbyist who ignores all contrary evidence.

so it may not be 40 times more

pj is correct, wind may kill 118 times more than oil spills

(39m vs .3 m PA)

[Zero Liability]

Socialist countries may not borrow?

I don't know if you're playing dumb, but China is not socialist in anything but its ruling party's name - well, "communist". It is a tightly managed economy but I wouldn't say a well managed one. Although that may be changing. My point is that its growth figures, whilst impressive, are part illusion. They still haven't got over the old habit of managing by the numbers (by which I mean fabricating these where required), and they've also picked up the habit of financing bubbles in markets like property, which is a massive bubble in China at the moment, and one which is unravelling.

I think if you had said an "interventionist" economy, I'd agree more, as their government certainly does do that a lot, for the purpose of boosting GDP figures, but this is not unlike many OECD countries. It's not a particularly helpful example.

There you have it, on the left, to be sure, but none of these nations would self-describe as socialist. Indeed,I am pretty sure that the socialist states as described by Dodgy exist only in his fevered imagination.

If you compare NZ to the UK, guess which one will come out as looking more "socialist". It is definitely a bit daft to call these countries "socialist", as in some respects countries like Sweden are quite friendly to entrepreneurship and capital ownership; more so than the UK.

[darmstadt]

Memory can play tricks. Example?

Possibly not in the UK, but definitely here in Germany although interestingly enought they still back it, it seems to be a case of NIMBY for some:

Niederaulas Grüne gegen Windkraft | Breitenbach, Kirchheim, Niederaula & Oberaula

SPD, FREIE WÄHLER und GRÜNE klagen gemeinsam gegen Windkraft-Blockade-Gesetz - www.umwelt-kompass.com