Author: paulm100m

‘Cant Find My Way Home’

The heading for this post comes from one of the great compositions by Stevie Winwood and the UK band ‘Blind Faith’ in 1969.

It perhaps symbolises in 2024, the journey this human world is travelling and its likely future…

A world where pointless and savage wars in West Asia, Ukraine and Africa are spurred on by the quest for power and profit and where infantile ideologies predominate.

And a world where climate change continues its seemingly inexorable march towards a planet destroyed through the pure blind stupidity and ignorance of our ‘world leaders’.

Never before have we all been able to witness the savage brutality of a war of genocide in technicolour- never before have we seen Western media and politicians proselytising so blatantly for that inhumanity. An oh so stark reminder of the difference between Western weasel words about ‘freedom and democracy’ and their support of mass-murder when it profits them.

A reminder too that this has been the Western theme for 500 years of colonial exploitation of more vulnerable populations- that these centuries of exploitation are, in the immortal words in 2022 of EU’s blatantly racist and furiously stupid foreign policy chief Josep Borrell,  the reason why Europe and the West is a garden and the rest of the world (in his view), a jungle.

To support this meme, our Western mainstream media continues to idolise the fiction of Western supremacy in all things. As the evidence that this is no longer the case continues to pile up, Western media have resorted to ever greater contortions and lies to support that meme. The recent violence in Amsterdam between Israeli and Dutch football fans – characterised as ‘antisemitism’ is just one of many examples.

Time and time again we have seen European (and U.S. ) political leaders make decisions based on an outdated and irrelevant ideology which ignores all rationality and the reality of the situation.

The most telling, and likely deadly, example of this, is their farcical contortions to prove to their electorates that they doing something about climate change when they are in fact doing worse than nothing. There are no reductions in CO2 emissions, and the hype about the electrification of energy and transport is just that- electrification is not substituting for coal or oil, it comes as an addition to the continuing use of high rates of coal and oil burning.

Our ‘civilisation;’ is locked into endless ‘growth’ (an awful word given that economic ‘growth’ is the total opposite of true organic living growth) – a paradigm that is destroying the planet, but from which we apparently have no wish to escape from.

While climate and environmental scientists have long been steadily ratcheting up their estimations of the devastating impacts of global warming and biodiversity to the living fabric of our world, it is only now that economists from the ‘Network for Greening the Financial System’ are beginning to estimate the true fiscal costs to climate warming- something that could and should have been done 50 years ago, as it would have provided some leverage for real change in this money obsessed world. In the latest estimates economists estimate that global GDP will contract by 33% by 2100 from a 3C rise in global average surface temperatures. That 33% reduction in global GDP is almost certainly a huge underestimation of the real fiscal costs of global warming.

That ‘canary in the coalmine’ early warning system for economies, the cost of insurance, is already rising rapidly as a result of the rapidly increasing unpredictability of our climate systems.

We still do not know for certain what is going to happen to global sea currents and sea level rise as a result of ice melt , but early indications are that there will be a complete collapse of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) within a few decades. When that collapse occurs, not only will much of the Northern Hemisphere become much colder, but the Southern Hemisphere will warm much much faster.

If that’s not enough, the 1972 bestseller Limits to Growth (LtG) authors (70 years ago) concluded that, if global society kept pursuing economic growth, it would experience a decline in food production, industrial output, and ultimately population, within this century. Recent remodelling of that study indicate ‘a halt in welfare, food, and industrial production over the next decade or so, which puts into question the suitability of continuous economic growth as humanity’s goal in the twenty-first century.’

And then we can go to the annual farce of the COP global conferences: the pretence that global leaders are in fact doing something about climate change, when in fact they are doing less than nothing- actively promoting more oil and gas exploration and consumption because endless ‘growth’ on a finite planet is a logical and sensible thing to do -isn’t it?

To hold everything together, so that we don’t lose our trajectory and deviate from accelerating over the climate change cliff, our mainstream and social media incessantly promotes consumption and the vital importance of the constant expansion of each country’s mythical GDP.

Have we completely forgotten our way home?

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References

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/nov/08/climate-breakdown-will-hit-global-growth-by-a-third-say-central-banks

Click to access climate-emergency-final-report.pdf

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-39810-w

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/jiec.13084

https://www.independent.ie/opinion/editorial/editorial-cop29-climate-summit-is-indeed-like-a-dark-joke-given-the-lack-of-buy-in-from-world-leaders/a131893267.html

Sustainable Communities and Climate Change

As global  supply chains are increasingly threatened by  sea level rise and unpredictable weather,  insurance costs  will rise exponentially  and we will inevitably be forced to produce as much  food and essential  items locally as possible.

The sooner we begin  to develop sustainable  communities, the greater opportunity we have to mitigate those inevitable risks and keep  people and our environment protected. The strengthening of community  communication, connections and skills is a key aspect  of those changes.

While  communities will  gain  much from  greatly strengthened community and local  skills, we will  need to shed much of our current consumerist ‘growth’  mindset- a mindset  that  says our towns, businesses,  GDP and exploitation of the natural world, needs to  constantly increase. The  project  ‘Take the Jump’ provides excellent advice on reducing our footprint.

We know we live on  a finite planet  which is already exploited beyond its limits. As climate change accelerates, we will  be forced to get off the treadmill  of  ‘ growth’  and consumerism.

We need to  change the paradigm now from the god of ‘growth’,  to a respect  for all  living things-to  acknowledge that  we are inescapably  and thankfully part of nature and have to live within  its means.

Supporting the Vulnerable in New Zealand

Oranga Tamariki (New Zealand’s Ministry for Children), at this government’s behest to slash expenditure, has made a decision to  suddenly cut funding to 190 social  service community providers across the motu (country).

As someone who worked in suicide prevention for many years, I know the vital  role that local  social  service providers, accountable to  their  own communities, play in  supporting, protecting  and lifting up  those most vulnerable in  our communities.

A just and stable society is one which  respects and protects everyone , but most particularly, those who  are most vulnerable. This government’s strategic policy of bashing the most vulnerable  and enriching the rich reflects their simplistic understanding of what makes a good  society -it is most certainly not wealth  alone.

We need to  ensure that not only do  we individually all do our best to  respect  and protect  those around us who need that support, but that  we also have  a range of accountable  community  and state agencies who have the resources to  support the many and varied needs of our communities.

War with Iran?

It is almost 100% certain that Israel assassinated the head of Hamas’ political bureau and chief Hamas negotiator with Israel in Qatar, Ismail Haniyeh, in Tehran, on July 31 2024.

An attack on a guest of the Iranian state (for the new Iranian president’s inauguration) is an insult to Iran’s hospitality to a guest as well as an act of war . Iran has agreement from the UN that Iran has the right to respond to this act of aggression.

Many hypotheses have been put out there-particularly from US ‘Intelligence’ linked Western media like the New York Times to try and obvuscate who, how and why Haniyeh was murdered: a bomb planted in his Tehran apartment months ago, an Israeli F35 ‘stealth’ bomber (which would have needed US refuelling to get home again!) or perhaps an Israeli missile attack.

However the Iranians (who should know!) are saying that the attack was carried out using a short range missile. Meaning that the attack was launched from Iranian soil with weapons and targetting mechanisms brought in from a foreign country.

Iran, understandable so, not only accuses Israel, but also the US, of involvement in the attack. Both the US and UK attempts to portray this attack as an attack of self’defence’ by Israel, (a ridculous and patently untrue international law perspective) indicates the depth of their complicity in Israel’s brutal genocide in Palestine and its provocatons in the rest of the Middle East.

When looking at motive and opportunity, one should always look first at the historical actions of the key players . It is important to recall that the UK was instrumental in the founding of Israel and its decision to permit Zionists to expel and murder thousands upon thousands of Palestininans since 1918 and especially during and after the Nakba of 1948.

Since 1948 the US has played a key role in arming Israel to ensure it could attack and expand its borders into neighbouring countries and intensify its barbarity to Palestinians still living in what is now Israel and its concentration camps in the West Bank and Gaza. Without those US weapons, the savagery of the Zionist regime could not have continued. Perhaps Israel could have become a multi-ethnic peaceful country respected by its neigbours and the Arab world- but that is certainly not what the US and its Western allies have wanted.

Israel has been an effective bulwark against the expansion of anti-colonialism and an effective destabliser in the region to ensure middle eastern states do not become more independent and powerful in their own right. The major exception to that situation, is of course,Iran who was able to throw off the US installed ‘Shah’ and his brutal CIA trained Savak secret police in the revolution of 1979.

Since the brutal October 7 2023 attacks by Hamas from Gaza into Israel, the US and UK have unconditionally supported the mass-murder of many thousands of Gazans by Israeli “Defence’ forces. That support has consisted not only of the bombs and missiles needed to flatten the Gaza Strip and its health and education facilities, but also the targeting of civilians using the Five Eyes global surveillance system. Britan and the UK are unequivocally a party to Israel’s ongoing genocide in Palestine.

Should Israel be forced to sue for peace in a war against Iran and the Lebanese Hezbollah movement, as well as Hamas and the Iraqi Shiite groups; the UN’s International Court of Justice could then come calling on those who facilitated that genocide, once Israeli politicians and Israeli Defence Force military personnel have been indicted. It is vital then for Britain and the US to not only ensure their Israeli proxy remains intact, but also remains undefeated. Part of the process to ensure Israel is not weakened or defeated is to assist Israel in its wars against its neighbours; including its multiple assassinations.

The US is desperately trying to pretend that it is trying to negotiate a peace settlement between Hamas and Israel, but its support in the UN and elsewhere for the killing of the Hamas negotiator is a strong clue that they have absolutely no intent of ther ebeing any real negotiations that might result in a just peace and freedom for Palestinians in Gaza; just as the US has pretended for more than 50 years to be the ‘honest broker’ in negotiations between the Palestinians and Israel, whilst all along fervently supporting Israel’s murderous intent and continued expansion of its territories.

In addition, the current US administration headed by Joe Biden with Parkinsonian dementia who confesses to be a Zionist (particularly given that over $4 million has been donated to him in the last 30 years by the Zionist US AIPAC organisation to ensure his devotion to the Zionist cause) has been unconditional in its support for Israel’s barbarity, while making little public statements of its disapproval .. However his Secretary of State Anthony Blinken as an arch-zionist and neocon himself, has apparently no moral scruples about supporting mass-murder and has led the ongoing charge to ensure that Congress and the US administration continues to pour weapons into Israel.

It is more than likely that Vice President Kamala Harris will SAY things to try and appease those Democrats opposed to the Israeli genocide, but in reality keep up the funding and weapons supply to Israel, as has been the case for more than 50 years.

As noted previously- look at the history to understand the current intent of the West in the Middle East and the possible future.. So while alternative Western media are talking about Israel’s Netanyahu trying to draw the US into a war with Iran, the historical pattern indicates that the US has been involved in all these Israeli provocations from the start, while hiding behind the smokescreen of Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu’s foolish pomposity, psychopathy and bravado.

The 2009 US strategic document “Which Path to Persia” from the US Brookings Institute so-called ‘think-tank’, is the blueprint for the US’ attempt to once again take control of Iran and its oil.

Others have suggested the US plan is to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities so that it cannot make a nuclear bomb. Both Israel and the US, and most recently Anthony Blinken, have been predicting that Iran will have a nuclear bomb any minute now for the past two decades.

Netanyahu in 2012 to the UN

Iran clearly has the expertise, the scientists (despite repeated assassinations by Israelis over the past decade) and the capacity to produce a nuclear weapon, but has publicly chosen not to. Iran’s religious council and the Ayatollah has made it very clear that it views the possession of nuclear weapons as anathema to the Iranian muslim state, and a public fatwa has been issued. A fatwa by the Ayatollah is not something that can be disregarded by any Iranian. So the ‘de-nuclearise’ Iran meme is undoubtedly one more of the red herrings thrown out by the West for Iran’s power in the Middle East to be neutralised and its oil once again appropriated by the West.

Having said that Iran is unlikely to ever acquire nuclear weapons, Iran’s missile development and its capacity to wreak damage across the Middle East is now enormous. While Israel and the West played down the impact of Iran’s previous April 2024 strike on Israel after their earlier attack on Iran’s Damascus Embassy, the evidence suggest that (along with Iran’s tightly targeted previous strikes on US military bases in Iraq in 2020 after the US murder of Iran’s General Qasem Soleimani who had had the temerity to destroy the US resourced ISIS entity in Iraq and much of Syria), Iran has the missile numbers, range and targetting to do extensive damage to both Israel and the US fleet and its military camps in the Middle East.

Thus the US is increasingly concerned about Iran’s growing influence both regionally and internationally. China’s brokerage of a peace deal between Saudi Arabia and Iran in March 2023 has greatly limited US leverage in the region, as well potentially curtailing Saudi needs for lucrative US arms supply deals. In addition, Iran’s application to join the BRICS economic union, will susbtantially expand the Iranian economy and limit the enormous impact that US and European sanctions have had on Iran’s economy of the past few decades in their attempts to destabilise Iran so that they could once again take control of Iran’s resources.

To make matters worse for the West, the September 2023 security arrrangement between Iran and the Russian Federation has greatly strenthened Iran’s defence and offence opportunities. The reported (but not verified) plane loads of Russian military equipment being airlifted to Iran in the past few days are likely evidence of that security deal.

Will President Sisi in Egypt and the King of Jordan once again support the Israelis and the US by helping to shoot down Iranian missiles targetting Israel? One suspects that the Jordanian population ( a majority of whom are of Palestinian origin) will not treat their sycophantic king so kindly this time, and many in Egypt will question Sisi’s loyalty to the Arab cause of freedom for Palestinians.

As of 5th July, the world waits upon Iran’s response to the killing in Tehran. What unfolds from here is completely unpredictable.

It might be hoped that a response from Iran might be convincing enough for the Israelis to abandon both their genocidal war in Gaza and their ongoing attacks on their neighbours.

But while the West continues to enthusiastically support their barbaric and criminal actions, that appears a folorn hope-for now.

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Links

‘Unforgivable Killing’ – Millions Mourn Haniyeh around the World
For These Reasons Israel Assassinated Hamas’ Political Leader, Ismail Haniyeh
Patrick Lawrence: The Murder of Ismail Haniyeh

https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2024/08/02/730563/Criminal-Zionist-gang-to-be-punished-for-Haniyeh-killing–Iran-FM-tells-EU-s-Borrell

https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/haniyeh-eyewitness-assassination-projectile-bomb

‘Which Path to Persia?’Download

Netanyahu takes Israel to the brink of destruction

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_activities_in_Iran

The Ongoing Tragedy for Venezuela

The Venezuelan presidential elections of July 2024 have, not unexpectedly, created more controversy, violence, recriminations and threats.

The US attempt to destablise the Venezulan government through undermining the economy have persisted and intensifed progressively since 2014 . As noted by Alex in the youtube video below- sanctions almost completely destroyed the oil industry that Venezuela relied on for over 80% of its income. The pretence that ‘socialism’ and President Chavez and then President Maduro’s corruption destroyed Venezula rather than the sanctions is a constant repeated trope in Western mainstream media . As noted below Venezuela prior to Chavez was already a failed violent state.

The current constantly repeated trope in mainstream media is that a US funded election surveyer, Edison Research with strong links to the US government and intelligence services, had constructed an exit poll which showed the opposition presidential hopeful Gonzalez, winning by 65%. This sole exit poll has been repeated over and over in ALL Western media in the last few days as proof that the election was fixed by Maduro.

While it is possible that the Maduro government did fix the election, we need more information before we can make that accusation.

The West well knows that extreme external pressure on a nation-such as the Western sanctions and multiple US supported attempted coups that Venezuelans have endured for the past 10 years, can provoke a country to respond with ever tighter internal repression and brutality to control externally controlled dissident forces, and Venezula appears to be no exception to that rule; although the extent of that repression in Venezuela is of course amplified and exagerated by Western media. Current Western media reports of huge demonstrations against Madura in Vernezual’s capital Caracas and beyond appear to be vastly exaggerated.

The US, its Western allies, and those South American states in the Organisation of American States (OAS), despite their chorus of accusations, obviously have no way to know what really happened in the polls, without that information. As Mexico President AMLO states: “Before any results were known, the Organization of American States director had already recognized one of the candidates, with no evidence of ANYTHING… ENOUGH interventionism… they keep meddling from abroad!”

And given Western mainstream media’s historic and ongoing complicity in supporting US sponsored coups in Venezuela, one should take their accusations with a large grain of salt.

Perhaps the most ridiculous of those attempted coups and Western media support for it, was the attempt by an almost completely unknown Venezuelan member of Congress Juan Guido, with US backing, to pretend that he was in fact the rightful President of Venezuela. The fact that Western governments enthusiastically supported Guido’s outrageous claims despite any evidence, is proof positive of the anti-democratic attempts to once again control Venezuelan’s oil resources at any cost.

That the UK was prepared to compromise what remained of the Bank of England and the City of London’s integrity as a global financial centre by appropriating Venezuala’s gold on the excuse that the gold belonged to Guido’s pretend regime, indicates the extent to which every Western nation is prepared to do whatever the US requires them to.

Postscript

The announcement on 2nd August by the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken that there is ‘overwhelming evidence’ González beat Nicolás Maduro in the presidential election, without there actually being any ‘overwhelming evidence’ one way or the other at all at that stage, once again demonstrates how the US will go to any lengths to get ‘their’ person ‘elected’. (which obviously tells you a lot about the US’s own electoral process)

A great article by Counterpunch validating many of the arguments above

and

Systemic Disorder’s in depth assessment of the Venezuelan elections

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Links

https://www.thecanary.co/global/world-analysis/2024/07/30/venezuela-elections-propaganda

https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2024/07/29/us-government-edison-poll-venezuela-election/

https://hannity.com/media-room/poll-firm-that-provides-election-data-to-cnn-claims-error-yet-again/

https://edition.cnn.com/2022/07/29/world/venezuelan-leader-juan-guaido-sovereign-gold-dispute-intl-scli/index.html

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/4/25/venezuelan-opposition-leader-guaido-expelled-from-colombia–

The Making of Juan Guaidó: How the US regime change laboratory created Venezuela’s coup leader
Announcing ‘Corporate Coup: Venezuela and the End of US Empire’ by Anya Parampil

https://edition.cnn.com/2022/07/29/world/venezuelan-leader-juan-guaido-sovereign-gold-dispute-intl-scli/index.html

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/4/25/venezuelan-opposition-leader-guaido-expelled-from-colombia–

https://www.vox.com/2020/5/11/21249203/venezuela-coup-jordan-goudreau-maduro-guaido-explain

https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202407/1316986.shtml

https://www.reuters.com/world/china-venezuela-sign-agreements-economy-trade-tourism-2023-09-13/

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/7/29/stark-split-in-world-reactions-to-disputed-venezuela-election

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/02/12/world/us-venezuela-sanctions-alina-douhan-intl/index.html

https://www.ohchr.org/en/documents/country-reports/ahrc4859add2-visit-bolivarian-republic-venezuela-report-special

https://news.antiwar.com/2024/07/29/us-accuses-venezuela-of-election-manipulation-after-maduro-victory-threatens-sanctions/

https://www.telesurenglish.net/president-nicolas-maduro-denounces-violent-acts-perpetrated-by-the-far-right-in-venezuela/

https://daniellarison.substack.com/p/abandon-the-failed-venezuela-policy

A Timeline of US Sanctions on the Venezuelan Regime
Venezuela: As US Leaders Call Fraud, US Observers Endorse Results
https://cepr.net/press-release/report-finds-us-sanctions-on-venezuela-are-responsible-for-tens-of-thousands-of-deaths/

https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/aug/02/venezuela-election-us-edmundo-gonzalez-maduro-results-disputed

https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/08/12/media-coverage-of-venezuelas-presidential-election-normalizes-us-interference

U.S., opposition claims on Venezuela election fall apart under scrutiny

A Few Little Pieces of Gold and Silver

A Revised Letter to the Editor to a local New Zealand newspaper:

The current New Zealand government has, in  a  few short months, proposed a Fast Track  Bill to permit friendly quick-rich developers to effortlessly destroy  our natural  environment  which  we  all rely upon, not just for our wellbeing, but for our survival. 

Similarly  the proposed revisions to  the Resource Management Act  not only assist in this quick-rich process by stopping Councils from  designating  for at  least  3 years  Significant Natural  Areas, but also permit farmers to  resume ‘mud-farming’ and other farm process  that not only destroy water quality  but significantly impact on the wellbeing  of farm animals.

But perhaps the pinnacle of achievement of this government to date in putting cash before humanity, is its proposal  to  resume Livestock Export by Sea. Thousands of cattle spend weeks at sea in pens wading in their own faeces horrific and terrifying conditions – but it makes lots of money!

The mark of a good human being is one who  treats all other living beings with kindness, compassion and respect.I find it extraordinary  that supposedly educated government ministers put money that they  and their mates dont really need  more of, before our long term  survival and our humanity.

I would therefore respectfully suggest  that  Prime Minister Luxon  and his Cabinet  Ministers, spend a month  at  sea in a livestock  transport  ship  wallowing in  their faeces as a learning experience.

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Links

https://eds.org.nz/resources/documents/media-releases/2024/make-a-submission-on-the-fast-track-approvals-bill-using-edss-template/

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/514993/government-reveals-first-changes-to-resource-management-act

Mud farming
Live export trade in New Zealand

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/511689/government-drops-need-for-councils-to-comply-with-significant-natural-areas-provisions

https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO2407/S00001/live-exports-a-global-animal-welfare-crisis.htm

The Beginning of a Journey into the Unknown

The famous Chinese ‘Book of Changes’, the I Ching; which provides guidance on becoming a wise person, notes in Hexagram 56 “The Wanderer” that “We are all wanderers in the Unknown. Those who travel beside the Sage are unharmed’.

Increasingly for people in the West particularly, there is a strong sense of the uncertainties that lie ahead of us. What was solid before: our economies, our climate, our status in the world, our future in general -are no longer certainties. And increasingly it is made apparent that we are being led by the blind- our ‘leaders’ who choose not to see, to look beyond their own immediate needs and greed and who ignore all the impending warning signs of a very different world ahead, and who choose not to implement plans for that new world ahead.

Israel’s genocidal attack on the people of Gaza has been enthusiastically supported by parties on the ‘left’ and right in the Western world, and Western mainstream media has carefully followed that line while pretending to be impartial.

We now have the spectre of elections in both the U.K and US where the choices in each case are between political leaders who demonstrate no morality and even less intelligence and who display minimal differences in their unconditional support of the already rich and powerful and mesmerisingly stupid foreign policy decisions. And with the further spectre of the Ukraine war being inexorably won by Russia with the soft backing of China and the global south, these Western ‘leaders’ see their power and illgotten wealth slipping away: there is panic.

Once again (for the hundredth time over the past two centuries) the ridiculous argument that “The Russians are coming!” is being promoted in MSM media to scare the bejeesus out of naive Western populations. Not only do the politicians agree on their brain-dead racist assumptions about Russia and China and the Global South, but their advisors are also in lock-step! The quality of decision-making in the West has (hopefully) reached rock-bottom!

Much of Africa has taken the opportunity of the West’s dissaray to rid themselves of the incredible exploitation by the last of the African colonisers- the French. Now, once again the indigenous Kanaks of New Caledonia are rising up against their colonialist French masters- but President Macron is holding firm- there is too much money to be gained from the nickel mine in New Caledonia.

A recent Canadian piece of analysis characterised one of the major risks to its population is ‘disinformation’ (otherwise known as perspectives on the world that are not aligned to the official perspective). It had previously been accepted in the West that expressing alternative views on the world was a key element of democracy (provided that it didnt actually change the power structure!)-but no longer…Diversity of opinion and knowledge is one the key factors that can help ensure humans’ evolution does not come to a sticky and dead end sooner rather than later.

Now, young people who express their opposition to Israel’s appalling genocide can be arrested as agitators and ‘antisemites’ and those who oppose the West’s involvement in the Ukraine war are ‘Putin’s puppets’. Rational analytical thinking is not permitted.

That Canadian analysis also points to climate change as a major threat to Canada’s (and the world’s ) wellbeing , but nowhere in any state’s manifesto across the globe are we informed that one of the key rational ways to address climate change and loss of biodiversity is de-growth. Economic “Growth” (an oxymoron if ever there was one) is our true God. Everything is measured against the ‘God of Growth’ who knows nothing and cares for nobody.

The only little problem with the fiscal measurement process called GDP is that it cannot measure the health and living viability of the planet nor the wellbeing of the multitude of species who inhabit it, and on whom human beings are totally reliant upon for our survival.

In my own little part of the world, our new New Zealand coalition of right wing zealots have in a remarkably short time, slashed 5000 government jobs, (or ‘red tape’ as they prefer to call it!), made access to government welfare that much harder, attacked the core premises of Te Tiriti o Waitangi (our founding document), enhanced payments to rich landlords and promised tax breaks which will inevitably only benefit the wealthy. To add to the flavour they are currently working on a “Fast Track Act’ with their big business ‘colleagues’, to ensure that ‘development’ is not stifled or delayed by foolish issues such as environmental protection. Short term greed must always out-weigh long term human wellbeing and environmental protection.

Sadly New Zealand’s politicians , like so many Western politicians, seem to be progressively dumbing down to the point of becoming brain-dead zombies mesmerised by dollar signs, and where honesty, compassion and an understanding of the complexity and fragility of the living world and our total dependancy upon it, are things of the past..

And all the while, climate change pushes all living things on the planet ever more rapidly into a totally unrecognissable and unpredictable new world..

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Links

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/17/economic-damage-climate-change-report

Climate ‘poses systemic financial risks’ (theecologist.org)

https://www.aljazeera.com/features/longform/2024/5/18/refuge-of-the-last-dreamers-luang-prabang-a-city-suspended-in-time

https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/last-dance-at-the-vampire-ball-west

SOME THOUGHTS ON  FISCAL  IMPLICATIONS OF CLIMATE CHANGE AND BIODIVERSITY LOSS FOR NEW ZEALAND (and others)

SOME THOUGHTS ON  FISCAL  IMPLICATIONS OF CLIMATE CHANGE AND BIODIVERSITY LOSS FOR NEW ZEALAND (and others)

Climate change fiscal  costs are largely currently assessed as solely the impacts of major weather events and consequent  restoration costs. While restoration costs after extreme weather events are likely to  rise exponentially over the next  century  and  beyond, there are significant other fiscal  impacts that also need to  be factored into planning. Note also  that  damage to infrastructure from climate change will  steadily increase in  both intensity and frequency over the next  100  years and beyond.

Ignoring future planning for these certainties will  result in  even more damage to  New Zealand’s economy and its citizen’s livelihood   safety and wellbeing  than is necessary. The impacts of climate change will be disproportinately felt by  those with limited incomes.

The longer we delay  anticipating and responding to the impending fiscal risks from  climate change, the greater the impacts will be on New Zealanders.

Food security for all, but particularly those with limited or no  income, is a key issue in  maintaining the wellbeing of New Zealands’  human population.

As climate change increasingly impacts New Zealand,  food supply chains are likely to  become more and more disrupted, resulting in  increasing costs  and decreasing volumes for food and other supplies.

Supply chain  disruption will occur for  a number of  reasons:

  • More and more frequent intense  climate events will  result in more  frequent road/rail  washouts  and flooding of increasing magnitude both within  New Zealand and beyond.
  • Sea and airline cargo  will  be increasingly disrupted by  extreme  weather events  (including a significant rise in  flight turbulence)  and  intense oceanic storms,  resulting in increase  damage to  transport vehicles and food stocks, higher  insurance costs and resultant food price increases, as well  as disincentives for farmers to produce more produce as export costs rise.
  • Drought,  flood and increases in  temperature in New Zealand and overseas  will  result in  reductions in animal numbers  and plant based food.
  • Rising sea temperatures, along with  ongoing unsustainable  fisheries exploitation are likely to  mean  the large NZ fishing industry  will  collapse within  a few decades
  • The recent  expansion of the dairy ’industry’  into  areas of New Zealand which  are  totally reliant on  intensive irrigation, like the majority of the East  Coast of the South Island, means such  areas will  become completely unsustainable for water intensive crops and  animals. Already  high irrigation levels  in Canterbury,  as a result of drought, are resulting in  unsustainable levels of water being drained from  local  rivers and aquifiers as well  as nitrate and other pollution of potable water supplies
  • Rising sea levels will  increasingly impact  on  both sea and airport  infrastructure. Most of New Zealand’s major airports are built in  flood prone areas or  close to the sea,  and  rising tides will  impact  on port sea  walls,  wharves, cranes and  container storage areas. The cost of rebuilds and/or relocation of air and sea port infrastructure are very  significant.
  • Consequent reduced  food production for export  by  New Zealand food producers will result in  increasing balance of payment’s deficits which  will  likely  result in  fewer overseas food and other  imports, as well  as less government taxation, resulting in  less income to  finance climate change mitigation.
  • As climate instability increases, specific areas of New Zealand like Northland and the East  Coast  of the North Island are increasingly vulnerable to major ongoing  flood and slip  damage and  consequent food production losses. South Island East  Coast  and Nelson droughts are  also becoming more frequent, with similar consequences.

Climate Change is also not only impacting of food supply but is  also beginning to  significantly impact  on  overall  insurer costs for housing,  businesses and new ‘developments’. As insurance premiums rise, all  fiscal  transactions will  slow, as  fiscal risks to  suppliers and purchasers  increase. A slowing economy ( estimated  conservatively as  a reduction of at  least  20% in 30 years) will result in  job losses and further risks to  human wellbeing, unless forward planning and implementation occurs now

Disruptions to and increased risk in  air flights will also  inevitably  result in  progressive reductions  in  tourism  income into  New Zealand (currently 11.4% of GDP)

The recent  analysis of Civil  Defence responses to the Hawkes Bay weather event has demonstrated that  Civil  Defence is not sufficiently resourced to   respond adequately to  even the current level  of extreme events.   Two  cyclones within  a few weeks,  as a Vanuatu  has recently  experienced, would stretch CD to breaking point. Significant increases in central   and local CD resourcing are going to be essential. Similarly, Police and NZ Army will  need upgrades to  cope with  the increasing frequency and magnitude  of climate extreme events.

Energy Consumption

New Zealand’s increasing consumption of energy, particularly in  increased use of EVs and other machinery that is being transitioned to  electrification and also IT /AI/Cloud based impacts. While NZ currently has just  sufficient sources of renewable energy, if current electricity  demands continue to increase, considerable investment in  renewable energy production in  solar  and wind will  be required.  

Carbon Credit Offset  Costs

If we continue under this current government policies to  take less action on  local  carbon reduction, we will  need to  purchase increased offshore  carbon  credits in  the billions of dollars to  meet  our international  obligations. Additionally, failure to meet  our international  obligations will  impact  on  our capacity  to export our produce to many countries.

Biodiversity Loss

The loss of New Zealand’s indigenous biodiversity is  well  documented and acknowledged as a major ongoing concern. However biodiversity loss of both  indigenous and non-indigenous flora and fauna  is occurring at an  alarming rate in New Zealand.

 We do  not  fully understand the intricate interconnections that occur between all  species in Earth’s  soil  and air  and the risks to  inadvertently tripping ‘tipping-points’ resulting in extreme  and sudden biodiversity loss are  consequently high. There are also  significant  difficulties in  attempting to  measure the fiscal  implications of biodiversity loss. However the current trajectory  of biodiversity loss in New Zealand and across the world, has the potential to  not only severely contract  GDP globally,  but potentially to  extinguish  all  life on  earth.

Piwakawaka (NZ's fantail)

The fertility of our soil, increasingly contaminated with  artificial  fertilizers, pesticides and weedicides is rapidly  deteriorating, particularly as mycorrhizal fungi; essential  to soil fertility, cannot survive in toxic environments. New Zealand’s continued capacity to  produce high volumes of agricultural  exports will  therefore be compromised in  the medium  to long term. The loss of pollinators  through toxicity, loss of habitat  and  introduced viruses is also a  major risk

Population Impacts

In recent years  NZ  governments have  increasingly used  migrant labour as a  cost-effective  mechanism  to increase GDP, however without the consequent   necessary increased development of critical  infrastructure in housing,  health or education. Rapidly increased populations have also  put increasing pressure on  biodiversity as ‘developed’ urban areas have expanded exponentially, and factors like recreational  fishing and foraging by  ever  larger numbers of people , impact  on  species numbers.

Potential  Solutions

Forward planning is urgently required  to both proactively  reduce the inevitable adverse impacts of climate change and to  ensure sufficient funding and other resources are available to  local  and regional  government and local  communities. The human  and fiscal  costs  of not proactively planning  for the inevitable will  be exponentially larger unless work is begun  now.

 Every Local community  must  be encouraged  and resourced to become as self-sufficient as possible as supply chains are increasingly disrupted.

Local  versus National

It is clear that  local  governments will  not be able to  finance the continuous work  to  both  reduce  local  climate change impacts and to  respond to local   adverse events through rates increases. A  formalised collaborative practical  partnership  between local and national  funding bodies needs to be established specifically to  address climate change risks.

National Resourcing

National  systems are  becoming  increasingly financially pressured to  respond to  adverse event mitigation. It is therefore be essential  to  urgently establish  a national  funding body , likely based on  the ACC contribution model that  can   resource the immense amount of work  required.

Iwi

Local  Maori iwi have traditionally played an immensely valuable role in  supporting local  populations put at  risk  by  weather and other adverse  events . Because of their  strong local  knowledge of the environments and resources  and connections and their hugely  practical  responses to  events , iwi  need to be  fully resourced to  support ongoing emergencies. Further, local  iwi’s traditional  and Te Tiriti role of guardianship  (Kaitiaki) of their lands needs greater recognition and support.

_______________________________________________

References

https://www.oxfordeconomics.com/resource/the-global-economic-costs-of-climate-inaction

ashttps://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1002016023001388 

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-22/the-link-between-climate-change-and-turbulence/103877522

An obscure climate accounting decision with billion-dollar consequences
Piwakawaka (NZ's fantail)

The Striking Stupidity of Western Leaders

15/4/24

I am writing this blog post the day after Iran’s retaliatory attack on Israel after Israel’s missile attack on the Iranian legation in Damascus which killed several high-ranking IRGC officers. It is worth noting that one of rationales given by Iran for its subsequent attack on Israel was the fact that-despite the UK, France and the US knowing full well that Israel’s Damascus missile attack was a blatant and unique (at that point) breach of both the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations and the 1963 Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, they refused to endorse a UN Security Council resolution condemning the attacks. By doing so, the US, UK and France have acknowledged that they and their Israeli proxy do not choose to abide by the international rule of law or human decency.

While Israel and the West claims that most Iranian drones and missiles were shot down and that there was minimal damage; there are other reports from Iran, Hezbollah and military analysts that there was significant damage to two Israeli airforce bases and a command post in the Golan Heights– all of those Israeli military sites had been used in the Israeli Damascus attack.

Given that there appear to be no casualties from the Iranian attack, it would seem that Iran has taken some care to avoid deaths-in contrast to current and historical Israeli genocidal actions in Palestine and, to a lesser degree, Lebanon.

There are also unverified reports that Iran notified the US of its intentions before the attacks, which then allowed the US , the UK and the Jordanian Army to shoot down many of the Iranian drones before they reached Israel. However there are strong indications that Iranian high velocity/hypersonic missiles did get through and hit the 3 Israeli bases.

Washington reports that President Biden persuaded the Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu not to launch a further reprisal attack on Iran despite Netanyahu’s earleir threats to do so. That’s a possible reason for the current uncharacteristic restraint from Israel, but in my view the more likely reason is that Israel’s military advised Netanyahu that a further attack on Iran would be suicidal, given Iran’s capacity to break through Israel’s much vaunted ‘Iron Dome” anti missile shield.

In addition,Washington on both the Republican and Democrat wings, have been itching to attack Iran ever since the Iranian revolution in 1979 which threw out the US and UK intelligence agencies supporting the brutal Shah’s Savak secret police, invaded the US embassy in Iran and nationalised the Iranian oil industry. This most recent Iranian attack comes after Iran’s previous attack on America’s illegal military bases in Iraq in response to President Trump’s decision to murder General Solomeini, Iran’s chief commander coordinating the destruction of ISIS in Iraq and Syria. That previous precisely targetted Iranian attack- despite again giving the US fore-warning, resulted in some considerable destruction and injuries at several American air force bases in Iraq.

Washington is thus now well aware that Iran can and will respond to further aggression from the US or Israel. The US’s multiple military bases in the Middle East are highly vulnerable to Iranian missile attacks, as are its navy and its commercial shipping in the Gulf of Iran. Sky-rocketing oil prices caused by blazing oil tankers in the Gulf would not improve Joe Biden’s chances of re-election for one thing!

So, predictably the West will further sanction Iran for responding to Israel’s major breach of international conventions when it bombed Iran’s Damascus embassy.

All of this action comes on the back of 6 months of the most depraved genocidal attacks on the Palestinian population in Gaza by the Israeli ‘Defence’ Force. The accuracy of that genocidal description has been confirmed by both the International Court of Justice and the UN, despite the denials from Israel’s Western allies, who continue to pretend that Israel’s genocide is a war against terrorism- there is however too much money at stake for the West to back down from their collusion in genocide now. President Biden alone gets enormous ($5.2 million over 34 years) money personally from the Jewish American agency AIPAC, and most of Congress is likewise in the pocket of AIPAC.

And the EU will of course not sanction or condemn Israel for its ongoing murderous savagery in Gaza.

Western media (and particularly my own New Zealand media) works hand in glove to desperately support the illusion of rectitude by America and its allies and reject their complicity in Israel’s genocide . We cannot be informed about the Nakba of 1948 for instance, the international implications of destroying another country’s Embassy, and we are never admitted into the mystery as to how Gazans are somehow dying of starvation- (what could be causing that we wonder?), or why there are many thousands of Palestinian brutalised hostages in Israeli ‘jails’ who might be exchanged for Israeli hostages?

We are not to learn how really depraved and corrupt our Western politicians are..

In Britain there are clear indications that the Jewish lobby funnels huge amounts of money into both the Tory and Labour parties (as Craig Murray notes 40% of Labour’s shadow cabinet, at least, are financed by the zionist lobby)as well as what they bizarrely call the ‘House of Lords’ to ensure both parties unanimously support Israeli mass murder in Palestine, despite their government lawyers acknowledgment of that genocide. Ironically Keir Starmer, the current Labour leader who is likely to sweep to power in the next UK general election, despite his incompetence and corruption, was once a human rights lawyer, so is knowingly complicit in this murder. And let’s not forget their dear ex prime minister Boris Bojo Johnson, whose sabotage of a Ukraine/Russia peace deal in 2022 has now resulted in his having the blood of over 400,000 Ukrainian men on his hands and his non- existent conscience.

I am ever hopeful as the world moves away from this brutal Western ‘rule based order’ to a multipolar world, that these corrupt stooges in the West will be committed to the International Court of Justice and spend the rest of their lives behind bars. It remains a mystery to me how these Western ‘leaders’ can face the world (and the mirror), knowing they have no integrity, no honesty and no compassion. If it were not for their savagery, I would pity them.

And corruption further drives our environmental destruction- government subsidies for oil companies to produce more oil to produce more global heating from CO2 now total more 7 trillion dollars in 2023. Why would politicans do that, knowing full well that global CO2 levels have already passed the 1.5C degree maximum the world agreed on only a few years ago? Follow the money…’There are no pockets in a shroud’ as my grandma used to say…

Critical thinking is clearly not a strong point for a Western ( or any other)politician . The amazing level of simple blind prejudice of Russia for instance allowed the analysts and leaders of the West to assume (contrary to the actual pre-existing evidence) that Russia would collapse under the West’s sanctions , that the ‘brutal dictator Putin’ would fall and be replaced by someone eager to please the West, while Russia would be defeated in Ukraine because NATO’s Western weapons were so much better than Russian ones and their Western military geniuses so much smarter than Russians!

So it was quite ok to fund train and support neonazis and other nationalist crazies in Kiev who believed they were descended from the Nordic master race, whilst the inferior ‘asiatic’ Russian hordes only had outside toilets and stole washing machine chips for their weapons!

Even now the West simply can’t seem to get it into their heads that they are on the wrong side of history and the wrong side of humanity. The Global South wants no more of the West’s brutal exploitation and colonialism and flat-out lies. And for some strange reason the Global South wants a liveable world!

The evidence is unequivocal, our so-called civilisational ‘progress’ has been made on the backs of environmental destruction and ecocide. Politicians across the globe have consistently refused to acknowledge the real costs of energy consumption and human ‘development’ on our planet and ourselves. The charade of the COP meetings fools no-one

Those devastating costs are only now being made manifest and will continue to do so at an accelerating rate for the next 1000 years or more.

But hey!- whose counting?

Postscript

Israel supposedly DID send a few Sparrow small air to ground missiles into Iran in response, and their terrorist proxies in Iran, the MEK, supposedly also sent a few toy quadrocopter drones of Isfahan– so I kind of got my analysis wrong- but not really!

As a sidenote: ‘In 2017, the year before John Bolton became President Trump’s National Security Adviser, Bolton addressed members of the MEK and said that they would celebrate in Tehran before 2019.’-wikipedia

Don’t Buy This Product We’re Advertising!

Girl in a Natural World

Have you ever seen that kind of email header in your inbox? -hmmm-maybe not!

(Note: this post has been reproduced with the kind permission of changethatmind.com )

Our ‘modern’ society puts enormous pressure on all of us to consume and buy more; whether it’s the ads you see pop up on your smartphone as you scan the web, your social media accounts, your local newspaper or your TV, the billboards on your way to work or on  the public transport you use-the exhortation to buy, buy, buy is constant and ever more insistent.

And our politicians extol the virtues of an ever bigger GDP, of ever more ‘progress’.

And we are all the victims of this propaganda war; we can’t escape, and we all succumb to one degree or another. We feel the need to have something more modern, something better something bigger, something more ostentatious, or even just keeping up with our friends, family or colleagues to have something at least as good as theirs. Why is that, do you think?

We’ve all heard that stuff about there’s only one Earth, but we all act like we don’t believe it and keep consuming enough for at least two! Maybe you’ve noticed how every year there’s a little less greenery, a little more concrete, or even how there’s far fewer bugs that splatter on your car windscreen, or that you don’t hear the birds you used to hear and see when you were younger.

Do you ever wonder why almost all the things we buy are inanimate things? -made of plastic, metal or dead plants?

So as our human population increases more and more, and every one of us wants more and more on this lonely little planet- what’s going to give?

And what can we do instead of consuming more and more?

‘Take the Jump’ has some great suggestions on how to decrease your footprint in the world…

Take The Jump

What if we all reduced our consumption back to the level of what was being consumed in the 1950s in the West? How hard would that be?

The ‘de-growth’ strategists give us a realist’s views of what we need to do to save our planet, and live a fulfilled, joyful and connected life.

Below is CNBC’s take on what degrowth means…

And then there other parallel strategies that can also help reduce our footprint like reducing the stuff or ‘clutter’ in your home.  ‘Homes & Gardens’ have some great ideas on reducing clutter. And there can be a certain pleasure in letting others get some enjoyment from the things you no longer need; whether it’s donating them to a charity or recycling agency, or selling them on Ebay or whatever your country’s equivalent online trader happens to be.

There’s no doubt our world is changing, and humans.  inevitably, will have to change along with those changes- whether we choose to, or whether nature chooses for us.

Our making the choice for ourselves now is so much the better choice!

To a more fulfilled life and better world!

Paul at ChangeThatMind.com

Note that ChangeThatMind is not an affiliate of ANY of the agencies noted in this post; and thence does NOT receive any payment on any of the products not sold through this website!)

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