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Episode 375 - Book Review - The Carbon Club

In this episode we discuss:

The Carbon Club by Marian Wilkinson

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Transcript
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We need to talk about ideas, good ones and bad ones.

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We need to learn stuff about the world.

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We need an honest, intelligent, thought provoking and entertaining

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review of what the hell happened on this planet in the last seven days.

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We need to sit back and listen to the Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove.

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Well, we get the Iron Fist this time.

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No Velvet.

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Glove.

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You get Cho the tech guy.

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How are you Joe?

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I'm good.

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And we've got Paul, the Canberra guy.

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Paul from Canberra, greet from Country.

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There we go.

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So some of you'll be familiar with Paul already, who's grilled

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me over Indigenous matters.

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And tonight he's gonna apparently grill me over the book that we are

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doing as a review, which is The Carbon Club by Maryanne Wilkinson.

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So, so that's on the agenda for tonight.

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Something a bit different.

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I'm actually looking forward to seeing how this goes.

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And I think, Paul, you are keen not to just have me rabbit on about

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things, but rather chewing and froing and a a dialogue rather than

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a monologue, which is a good thing.

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So what, what's your plans for what we gonna do?

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Well, yeah, what's your plans here?

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What, how do you wanna approach this book, review, book club,

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whatever we're doing here.

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Well let me, let me ask you why that was on your book, your bookshelf or

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sort of to read list on the first place.

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A friend of mine, I was at a, funny enough, I go to dinner parties

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and it was at a dinner party.

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We're talking about stuff and he is, has worked in the environmental

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area and in the reef and stuff.

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He's recently retired but still does consulting work and.

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, we just talked about stuff and he said, oh, if you wanna know

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everything about Australia in terms of climate change and government

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policy, then read the Carbon Club.

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And so that's how I ended up getting it, was because of a

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recommendation from somebody deep in the industry who recommended it.

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Mm.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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And, and I guess I can see that, you know, people, especially sort of people in the

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political side, reading that book and just seeing all of the, sort of the backroom

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stuff that was going on, you know, why did, why did Tony Abbott suddenly do this?

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Why did Corey Bernardi suddenly appear with this, you know,

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host, that sort of stuff?

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Yeah.

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So my friend is a scientist, so he was looking at it from a scientist just.

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. And the book demonstrates how the ugly sausage is made, I guess, and yeah, yeah.

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Yeah.

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Mm-hmm.

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. Mm-hmm.

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. Curiously sorry, I just have to throw it a side note here.

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Because my partner so my partner works at the Museum of Australian

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Democracy, that old Parliament house.

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Right.

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And if you're, if you're, if you're ever down you know, drop in and, and say hi,

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and we might I'm sure we can arrange a vaccines back of, back of the house tour.

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But she was reading Judith Brett's book from the secret ballot

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to Democracy Sausage, right?

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Which is a history of how Australian democracy came to be.

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And she was reading, she was, she was reading this because , two

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chefs on SBS were interviewing her about democracy sausages.

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Oh, okay.

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Because that's a, because it's a cooking show and apparently that's like, yeah.

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Collecting the sausage on election day is Yes.

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So democracy, sausage.

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Mm-hmm.

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. Yeah.

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Yeah.

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And, and that, that prompted her to then buy a book titled in Part Democracy

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Sausage, which looks at the Oh, yeah.

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But she works at the Democracy Museum, you said?

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Yes.

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So, okay.

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So she'd have a keen interest anyway, when would've thought, yes.

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She knows most of the, you know, at least the history and the people and

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so forth that went into it, so, okay.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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That's need to know.

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We, on my, that's definitely on my reading list next, because I just

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read the first like three pages and it was really interesting.

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Mm-hmm.

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Well, let's return back to this book.

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So before we do, before we get into the meat of it a bit, I have to say

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Just reading a book as opposed to reading articles is really valuable.

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Dear listener.

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I have to admit, like I've read quite a lot of books in the last

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seven years, over a hundred of 'em, and just in the last month or two

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I've probably got outta the habit.

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Yeah, probably post Christmas.

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Really?

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And because of this book review, I was forced to, geez, I better finish

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this book and , I'm gonna talk about it, which forced me to knuckle down.

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But you know what, as soon as I finished it, I was like, okay,

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I'm ready for my next book now.

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And it's like a lot of things, I think painting is the same in terms

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of like artistic painting where you just gotta do it and get into the

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bit of the groove and you keep going.

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And so if dear listener, you haven't read a book for a long time and you've

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just been reading articles they're like fast food fairy floss, and.

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A good book is just a good solid three course meal, and it's so much more in it.

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So yeah, if you're out of the habit of reading a book, try and force

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yourself through some mental trick of some sort to get back into it, because

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I think it is a very valuable thing to, yeah, to read a book as such.

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Mm-hmm.

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. And, and I would also say the, you know, the, the way the chapters are laid out

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and the way I thought, the way that, you know, the topics were introduced and the

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people were introduced made it f like sort of, you could read a chapter and feel

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like you'd read an article and then you'd pick up the next chapter and go, okay,

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well now for the next three years, or, you know, now for a different take on that.

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So I was in interested, like, it's interesting that your, you found it More

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of a hard slog than reading an article.

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Yeah, it, it, it did take me a while to get into it because look, it is really a

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lot of facts of history running from John Howard through to Morrison of, of why

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the government and the opposition took the stances they did, and the policies

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they did and who were the players.

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And it really is a lot of names and a lot of people and a, and a timeline

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of, of people coming in and out.

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It's, there wasn't a lot of analysis of it, I guess.

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It was a case where you read all this and draw your own conclusions from it.

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And the stuff I've been reading usually has more of the author.

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Input of an opinion.

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Opinion.

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Yeah.

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And this was kind of really devoid of opinion.

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It was, here's the facts of what's happened and transpired and you'll

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draw your own conclusions from it.

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And so it was a bit different to what I would normally read in that sense, where

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people are trying to explain concepts more so than just running through history.

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And even the, the history books I read tend to try and put things in

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context and explain stuff a bit more.

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This was just a, a rundown, you know, at the end of the day, I'm not gonna say I

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would recommend this book to many people.

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I'd have to say . Yeah, because I was, I was gonna ask, did you find

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it just depressing to get through?

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Oh, it just brought up people like Howard and Abbott and Morrison, Corey Bernardi.

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Yeah.

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People that we've been able to just.

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Discard and not have to deal with.

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And it's, yeah, it was good to go.

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Oh, that's right.

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Not an asshole.

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Right.

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. So it, it wasn't, yeah, It was a little bit depressing, but a little bit, and

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still fascinating the, the way things go.

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So, so let's, well, dear listener.

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Yeah.

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It's, it, it starts with basically Howard in the Kyoto agreement and what Australia

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proposed to agree to and why, and then running through the different leaders of

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Kevin Rad, Julia Gillard, Rudd, again, Abbott, Turnbull Morrison, and just, and

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just how personalities and also lobby groups and relationships factored in,

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into into changing our, our position.

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So, well, it was also Brinksmanship and a lot of the early stuff.

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What do you mean by brinksmanship?

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So, so we've got an agreement and then Yeah.

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Everyone's ready to go in the next day and Australia goes, oh,

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actually we didn't mean that.

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Just, just the last minute.

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Oh, we, we need this much more to get it across the line and all the

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other countries going, what the fuck?

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Australia.

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All right, then just, just, yeah, you are inconsequential.

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Just have it, yeah.

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Yes.

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You wanna, should we start there?

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Should we start with Kyoto?

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Is that because that's where we're sort of Yeah, that's the beginning, isn't it?

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And it sets up really the rest of what happened because of the favors that

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Australia sort of got in that agreement.

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So, so sort of just briefly a ti allow me one tiny monologue

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or No, no, go right ahead.

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. Just to set things up, it's just, we are in 1997 and Howard's in

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charge and we've got you know, world leaders getting together in Kyoto.

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With the, with, you know, trying to strike a deal where everybody will at least make

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some commitments that we'll all agree to in order to reduce carbon emissions.

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And a lot of this stuff is, well, we'll only agree to X amount if we know that

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also the US and China and India are also gonna agree to these amounts.

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So people wouldn't just simply say, oh, no matter what happens,

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we'll reduce our emissions by 20%.

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Often was couched in, well, we'll agree to this amount, but of course if everybody

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else agrees to a larger amount, then we'll consider agreeing to that larger amount.

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So, it's not fair.

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Yeah, we don't wanna be left out and no.

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Well, and no one there was this real, especially with Australia, I

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feel there was this real view that, you know, we, but we can't be left.

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Worst off.

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Yes.

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Yeah.

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We, we can't be made, no one should be made to suffer for, you

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know, to decide to reduce carbon emissions or something like that.

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Yeah.

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So, so Kyoto was kind of the first where, where the countries got together.

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And when you look at the final agreement, most of the developed countries,

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the more wealthy countries agreed to reduce their emissions by around

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about 5% or 6% or something like that.

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That was a typical amount to reduce their emissions.

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So, this was from their 1990 levels.

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By 2012, they would limit their emissions.

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So that was a typical sort of, and each country is a little bit different, but

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Australia, Australia struck a deal that was extraordinarily generous to Australia,

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and it was a case of John Howard being, Quite obstinate about this and because he

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wasn't, he didn't call himself a climate change denier, but he certainly seemed

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to be skeptical to at some level and certainly just unwilling for Australia

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to, to pay any sort of economic price.

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So he didn't see it as the threat that other people did, or if he

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did, he, we didn't want Australia to pay sort of pay a share.

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He wonder how many of these religious types quite, yeah, except the

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science, but Jesus is coming back any day, so it doesn't matter.

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I'm not even sure if that matters to some people because like, it's

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not like the rapture needs to come.

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It's just that when I go, when I die, I'm going to go to heaven

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and then everything will be good.

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Yeah, I'm sure Scott Morrison would think that way.

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I don't know that.

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That John Howard was, was on the rapture sort of thinking when it comes

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to, I feel like Kevin Rogers more of a, a Christian than John Howard was.

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Yeah.

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In, in practice.

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So anyway, the way the deal worked was that Australia instead of decreasing

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our emissions from 1990 to 2012 by say 5%, we struck an agreement where we

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were allowed to increase them by 8%.

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Yeah.

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And we were able to take into account in the 1990 levels that we

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had done a, a massive amount of land clearing, which of course had emitted

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a massive amount of carbon in 1990.

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And so, . And in the few years following that, because Kyoto is in 97, so between

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1990 and 97, we actually hadn't done much land clearing because of drought

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and rain and, and other factors that sort of prevented us from land clearing.

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So, so we had this huge 1990 carbon emission that overstated what

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our emissions were at that time.

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And then we had a natural period where we weren't doing land clearing.

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So we, we, we had this twofold advantage.

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We were allowed an 8% increase where everyone else is decreasing by 5%.

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And we were allowed this land clearing bonus, which meant it was just dead

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easy for us to agree to a target in 2012 of only an 8% increase.

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And this was sort of thrown on at the last minute as Joe was indicating.

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at the conference, and, and by the time people woke up to what Australia was

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doing, they were sort of a bit outraged.

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But America helped shuffle through that because we had helped

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America in the negotiations.

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So there was a bit of mutual back scratching there.

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It seemed that Australia had had assisted the USA and, and that the deal making

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George Bush senior, no, no, junior.

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Junior.

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Yeah.

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97 would've been, no sorry.

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Yeah.

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No, that was George Bush Jr.

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Yeah.

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George W.

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Bush.

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Yeah.

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W was at least there for 2001.

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Yeah.

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2012 though was Julia Gillard and Barack Obama.

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Yes.

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So, yeah, so relationships through this have a lot to do with it.

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. So yeah, so John Howard with his wanting to basically just cozy up to America

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all the time you know, it comes through in, in the book that part of the reason

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of why he did things was because of, of the relationship with the usa.

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So you interrupt with a, with a question at any point or head of

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in direction you wanna go to Paul.

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So, this, this is, this is all good sort of background material.

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I think this Yeah.

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Good to set the scene for, for the listeners.

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Yeah.

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Sets the scene that we, we kick off with an incredibly generous, easy target, which

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is why you would've heard someone like Scott Morrison saying, oh, we're gonna

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meet our targets in, in a canto, right?

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Because they were ridiculous.

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A deal that nobody else got, which yeah.

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So that's, and and I really wondered at that point what other sort of

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opportunities or diplomatic problems we might have had, because basically

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we stepped on the rest of the world's toes by going through Kyoto that way.

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Mm-hmm.

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, you know, it, it's, it's obviously done it, it obviously did a huge

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amount of damage in the, the Pacific with the Pacific Islands.

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The not even, you know, Dutton and Angus Taylor and Morrison joking about,

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you know, the, them, you know, being underwater, the water, at least they don't

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have water lapping on their doorstep.

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Yeah.

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Just was just sort of the icing on the cake from what I can see.

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And then they wonder why, why these countries are willing to listen to China.

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But, you know, that's another matter.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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But, but in my, in my notes here, so in Kyoto, they, they're basically all agree,

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yeah, okay, there's what we're gonna do, but they then have to go back to their

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countries and pass legislation and get it through their different parliaments.

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So just reaching an agreement at Kyoto is one thing, but then getting it

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through their parliaments is another.

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So, what I have here in my notes is that in 2001 George Bush.

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So it's be junior, George W.

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Bush, I guess.

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Mm-hmm.

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. He says that the USA is gonna pull out of Kyoto and in order to not

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look bad, George Bush needs an ally.

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And who's the ally who's gonna help?

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He's the ally little.

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It's John Howard and John Howard.

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I thought Johnny Howard makes a captain call and says, yeah, well

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we won't ratify Kyoto either.

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Did he actually public call it a captain's call at the time?

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Do you, do you remember?

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He didn't.

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But the public servant who's been largely interviewed in this book,

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I think his name is David Kemp.

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No, not David Kemp.

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No, no.

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He was the he was the new minister.

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There's a, there's a Beal I think was the Roger Beal I think was the, the public

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servant who's obviously been interviewed a lot and was heavily involved.

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And he basically said, he said, you know, that's a decision that

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that didn't go through cabinet to decide not to ratify Kyoto.

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There was no process.

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It was just John Howard just said, oh, well we're not gonna do it either.

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Yeah.

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And just announced it.

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Yeah.

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So, yeah.

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Yeah.

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So this is the sort of where personalities and friendships and just

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have an enormous effect on, on policy.

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Hmm.

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I mean, what sort of democracy are we in when just one man makes these

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captains calls on such a vital thing?

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And well, also that's how it worked.

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And also one of the big things that I see in the background of like, yeah,

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that, that I think the carbon Club really reveals is Hugh Morgan and, and his role

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in basically bankrolling and making sure that other people bankrolled the whole.

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Climate denialism, climate skepticism, you know, the I p A, you know,

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all these people coming over.

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Did you, did you even know about Hugh Morgan before you read this?

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Yeah, I'd read it in sacred De Secular.

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He turns up a lot in that book as a Okay.

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As a player in religious stuff as well.

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, right?

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Yeah.

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So is he quite a religious man?

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He certainly was backing a lot of non-sec stuff at the time, so, okay.

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So he's a very conservative Yeah.

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Figure by the, by my reading then.

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Yeah, exactly.

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So, yeah, so Hugh Morgan and his sort of speechwriter mate, Ray Evans

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basically they're, they're outrage cuz he's, he's head of some mining company.

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I forget what the name of it was.

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And, and obviously yeah, against any sort of Emissions trading scheme.

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So they decide that they're going to work as hard as they can

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behind the scenes to, to, to get something like Kyoto not ratified.

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By the way, I guess the reason why Howard could make the captain's

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call was he knew that his government was full of people who didn't like

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the idea of Kyoto and that mm-hmm.

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his cabinet with it anyway.

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Yeah.

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They weren't gonna be kicking up too much of a stink.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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So I guess he was just also a good point.

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Yeah.

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He was just doing what he, what his cabinet probably would've done

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and saved the embarrassment of having to, to go through a process

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of, of justifying the decision.

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He just, he just did it as a mate of US president.

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Because, cuz I, the other thing that I see from the Howard

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years is I, it feels to me like.

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Like one of the things that the liberal party often said at the time is, oh,

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you know, the Austral, the Labor Party is full of factions and all that sort

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of stuff and, and you know, we are a broad church, but we all agree.

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And I actually wonder how much of that was John Howard Abs.

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You're basically having the Iron Fist behind, behind the scenes

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with really rigorous discipline on who was speaking, who was speaking

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out, who was allowed to say what.

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And like, you know, you could have some free reign, but you, none of

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those people ever crossed John Howard.

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Well, they'd got rid of the wets by that stage.

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They had the wets and the dries, and by the time John Howard took the reins, it

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didn't take long for basically them to drive out the so-called wets who were.

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, you sort of the moderates.

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Yeah, yeah.

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Moderate liberals.

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The sort of people who would be a teal candidate today

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is, is what was driven out.

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So the, the sort of parliament took on, or the party took on the mold

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that, that Howard was wanting there.

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So guys, like Peacock, for example, was a wet and Yeah, anybody who was a

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supporter of Peacock and when he fell over, then, you know, they'd all been

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identified as such how I knew her all they were, and yeah, in that battle.

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So he was able just to identify him and, and drive them out and Okay.

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They just didn't hang around anymore.

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So your, your take on that is, is is more that Howard just knew

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he had, like, everyone agreed.

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They were all in agreement.

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It wasn't, you know what, mostly coercion.

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Well, mostly in agreement.

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And you know what, it's, it's the ones who were the skeptics.

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Bit like, and they turn out to be all the Christians as well, don't they?

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In a sense, funnily enough.

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Yeah.

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And these, I, I I object to the word skeptic.

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I think denier is the correct term.

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Yeah.

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skeptics suggests they change their mind, shown evidence, true deniers.

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But these people are the ones who are so rabid, vicious in their politics

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that they will sink the ship they're on rather than give an inch, whereas

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the others are kind of more reasonable.

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What deal can we cut here or whatever yet when it comes to say, freedom of

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religion stuff or when it comes to climate policy, these other people will

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die on these hills and they'll take everybody down with them if they have to.

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And so, so while there might have been factions and, and certainly

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Turnbull probably had some supporters, they're never as loud or as vocal and

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as vicious and just as, as, as Yeah.

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As, as what these other guys are, they, they are, their power is, is

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in disproportion to their numbers.

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So noisy I think is part of it.

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So yeah, probably factions there still, but different commitment because I,

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because I think now one of the things is, certainly one of the things we saw

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in, you know, the, the Morrison era in my, in my take was the, that the

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liberal party just started splintering.

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You know, you had the, you had the rabid religious people, you had the.

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The people who were, you know, quite happily you know, capitalist but

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weren't particularly religious and, you know, all these cracks started

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appearing where you know, Dave Sharma is trying to keep Wentworth and he's

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being undermined by other people who are trying to stir up anti-gay sentiment,

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sorry, anti anti-Jewish sentiment.

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Which was just, you know, to watch, watch people actively undermining people

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in their own party was just unreal.

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So, yeah.

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So I'm just really sort of fascinated by how I feel like this really gives

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us that view into a very determined, well organized group of people.

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Yeah, certainly the, the book certainly identifies who the players were, who

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were the deniers and what they did.

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other than, and in the liberal party, the US influence, yes.

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Yeah.

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But, but, but within the Liberal National Party, it doesn't really deny,

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it doesn't really shine a light on many players who are actively pro Kyoto and

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pro doing something other than Turnbull, you know, name me one that comes to

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mind from the liberal nationals, who was a Turnbull supporter in all this.

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You know, I can't, who was backing them up?

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I can't think of any, and I can't remember the names very well.

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And I borrowed it from the library, so I don't actually have it here.

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It's, I can't refer to it.

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But there was the environment minister either under Howard or under, okay.

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There was Robert Hill.

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Robert Hill was initially under.

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Howard and he got replaced by David Kemp.

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And, and so Robert Hill was kind of middle of the road type.

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Yeah.

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Kemp was a denying skeptic.

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So I dunno, I, I didn't find too many names that I could think

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of that were working assiduously or anywhere near as hard as what

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the deniers were working Yeah.

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In, in the opposite way.

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It just seemed to be Turnbull on his own with a few quiet supporters

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who, who'd never really lifted the heads above the parapet that much.

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Yeah.

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Did you, do you feel like to Turnbull underestimated Tony Abbott then?

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Oh, I dunno.

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I mean, I, oh, Let's just, well, let's just make it a progression to get to

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Tony, to Turnbull then a little bit.

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Okay.

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So we just, we just sort of give a little bit more of a timeline where we've set up.

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Just interesting.

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So while while Howard said we are not going to ratify Kyoto, he did

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say, but we we're going to aim to meet our Kyoto target anyway, even

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though it won't be a binding thing.

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Yeah.

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We won't have it in legislation, but Yeah.

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But we're just gonna, why not?

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We're just, we're just gonna do it anyway, so.

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Yeah.

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And what, as long as it doesn't get in the way of making money.

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Yes, exactly.

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But the problem was there is a sense in the community of people

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wanting things to be done.

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So Howard is finding himself in a position where an Abbott.

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As well found himself in this position as well, where okay.

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Their cabinet was quite happy with their decision.

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It would be becoming increasingly apparent that the rest of the community

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wasn't, which was causing a, an issue at, at the, in the popularity polls.

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Hmm.

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And it was interesting also throughout the book, they took about, while Hugh

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Morgan and various other ones in the business council were, you know, climate

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deniers, there was a real split in the business community because some of the

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leaders from BP and from, well, BHP B.

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Can't Yeah.

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Different leaders of some of the other companies were saying, well, hang

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on a minute, this is a real thing.

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We've gotta do something about it.

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And Hmm, yeah.

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I mean, I think in the us I, one of the oil companies, their internal

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scientists had basically said back in the seventies, Hey guys, this is a problem.

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We need to do something about it.

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and then they spent the next 20 years, 30 years denying the science

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and their own internal people had said, we've gotta get outta this.

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Yeah.

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And and from what I can hear, yeah, they've been trying to move to green

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energy in the background and, and fobbing off their carbon heavy to other people.

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So they've been talking it up whilst trying to sell it off.

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Hey Joe, you might need to turn on your air conditioning or shut down

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another app or two cuz you froze a little bit just during all that.

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So yeah.

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So just give your computer a rest Right.

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In some way.

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But I, I also, we, we had to backtrack, you're mentioning Hugh Morgan and and

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their activities with lobbying and stuff.

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And they intentionally used the USA tactics.

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And the USA tactics were to find scientists that were seemingly

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well credentialed who were climate change deniers and to.

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Give those people opportunities to speak and, and whatnot, and to cast

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doubt in people's mind as to whether this was a con by this, by the

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community, this climate change thing.

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So that was, yeah.

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At the very least tactic at, at the very least to pretend that there

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is, you know, it's not settled.

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Mm-hmm.

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. Correct.

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And, and this is something I wish I could find it, but I, I saw many,

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many years ago, a brilliant the denialists deck of playing cards.

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And it goes through all of the strategies that the tobacco industry used to prevent

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any progress on banning smoking from, you know, just denying the science to

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finding alternate, you know, , scientists withheld alternate views to funding

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research that suited them to actually just attacking the scientists, literally

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going after them and dragging their names through the, you know, through the papers

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and, and hounding them and, you know, threatening, threatening them physically.

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You, there's a book on a documentary, all of these valid tactics, merchants

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of Doubt by Naomi Esque and Eric Conway.

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And it's all about the players in the denial of tobacco causing cancer.

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Hmm.

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And how a lot of these major players were rolled out again to deny climate change.

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Mm.

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It's the same people and they said yes.

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They're one, one of the key ones was I think nasa Second

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World War was a physicist.

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and, and basically he was very anti-communist.

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And anything that was the government interfering with people's personal

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liberty was communism and, and therefore shouldn't be allowed.

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Yeah.

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And, and it was, it was very much the, the politics of the person was

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leading their attitude to the science.

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They're libertarian ideology basically.

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Yeah.

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And we've seeing that all again with vaccines, aren't we?

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Mm-hmm.

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. Yeah, well, credentialed people.

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I don't know.

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Not so much like these guys are obviously paid by Hugh Morgan and others.

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You could see why from a financial point of view, they would be tempted.

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Although, although they were already in that camp.

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Absolutely.

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It's already crazy.

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I don't think these people are selling their souls for money.

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I think they honestly believe it.

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Yeah, and it's, well, I, where I, I think there's a midpoint between those

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two, which is that you might have some doubts and if someone comes along

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with the equivalent of 10, a 10 year ARC research grant to confirm your

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doubts and to conveniently go and, you know, get jetted around and give all

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these lovely talks and all that sort of stuff, then it's really easy to

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confirm what you already want to see.

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Mm-hmm.

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. Yep.

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And you end up hanging around with all these people all the time and you're

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in a little bubble, then it becomes very self confirming as to you're all

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on the same page cuz you're, you're in the same green rooms together.

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Go to conferences and talk and whatnot, so, yeah.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Actually I'll just read a little bit what an emissions trading scheme

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is, or often called a cap and trade and put simply works like this, the

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government sets a target or a cap on the amount of greenhouse gas emissions.

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It allows a company covered by the scheme to emit and then issues them with only

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enough permits to meet this target.

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And companies include, in the scheme, must either buy permits or get free

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ones issued by the government to cover their emissions each year.

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That's the sort of rough idea of a, and that seems to be what the

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current government has decided to do, where they've named a bunch of

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industries and given them a target.

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So, we'll get onto that.

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But where was I here?

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Just again, on the timeline, we get up to.

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2007 and Howard appoints Malcolm Turnbull as environment minister

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probably for the optics, I think in trying to say to the public, oh look,

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we are trying to do something about it.

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Yes.

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Because look, we've got Malcolm here and he clearly cares about the environment.

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And so he is a successful businessman.

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Yes.

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So, and Howard at that time, just before the election agrees to an

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emissions trading scheme, but Kevin Rudd sort of matched everything that

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Howard was then offering, and Rudd was saying, we'll sign Kyoto as well.

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And so, so yeah, we get to basically Rudd defeats Howard,

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and on the first day that he's.

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Elected in charge.

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He ratifies Kyoto.

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So, yep.

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That's where we're at in the timeline of, of, of Kyoto.

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It's done and dusted, kind of, finally ratified when Rudd's there.

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So really interesting to see the parallel between Rod in 2007 mm.

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Promising everything that liberals would promise and saying, we are gonna do,

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we're gonna fix the thing you care about.

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And then as soon as he comes in doing the, you know, the, the thing that he really

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wanted to get done, and Albanese basically doing exactly the same thing in 2020.

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And what was that, that Albanese did?

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First thing he did was a combination of every time that Morrison would

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promise you know, tax relief or a Oh, I see, you know, a concession

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or, you know, something like that.

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Rud, sorry.

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Albanese would just say, yep, we'll do that.

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True.

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Yes.

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I see what you're saying.

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Yep.

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Didn't provide any conflict point.

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Yep.

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Which frustrated the hell outta Morrison.

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Yeah, yeah.

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As well, because Albanese and Rad, I think were prepared to, to promise things that

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Morrison was, was definitely cagey about.

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Mm-hmm.

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Yep.

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And then as soon as Albanese comes in, like literally in

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the speech, he just goes, yep.

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And by the way, we're, we're going to push through.

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We're, we're going to get, you know, the work done on the

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Uluru statement from the heart.

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Mm-hmm.

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Which, which was like, . So completely not an election issue.

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It just never even featured in the Alps election campaign at all.

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Mm-hmm.

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, right.

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And suddenly here we are.

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Yeah.

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Oh, it's an easy one for I just, I just felt like there were a lot of,

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you didn't, didn't see those parallels.

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No, no.

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I didn't have to admit, but you're right.

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I do see the parallel now that you point out Yes.

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In that he was Rudd was, Rudd was really, I'm just John

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Howard, but a fresher version.

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And you're sick of Howard.

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But you really Yeah, that's what he was offering.

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And in terms of policy, yeah.

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Labor and Albanese didn't offer a lot.

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They were just saying obviously these guys are scammers and you're sick of

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them, and we're obviously nicer guys, but without a whole heap of policy difference.

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Not even gonna change the tax rates that these guys have agreed to.

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So yeah, there is a, I'll give you that, a similarity there.

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It's all yeah.

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So we then move into sort of in terms of the, the argument, the debate, the

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campaign because it turns then into a reef versus coal sort of debate arises where,

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you know, before it was all just pain.

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It was, let's, let's just make people pay more for carbon.

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Let's make life difficult and let's potentially cost jobs.

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But the reef argument provides a different argument where people say, we love the

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reef, we want the reef and it's a choice.

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Coal or reef, which one do we want?

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That was a.

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Good argument for the environmentalist to sort of bring up both factually,

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but also as a debating argument.

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It's an appealing one.

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And as well, I thought the big feature there was that you could

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point to just how many jobs are in the Queensland tourism industry mm-hmm.

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and say, you might say there's like 10,000 coal miners, but there's a

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hundred thousand people that are making their living directly and

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directly off tourism in Queensland.

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That would lose it.

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And, and we were ultimately placed or ideally placed to be

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a hub for green energy research.

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Yeah.

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Yes.

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Yeah.

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Had, had we got into solar, we could have been a leading research development

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place like California was and be selling the technology offshore and

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employing, God knows how many doing that.

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Hmm.

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Hmm.

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Rather being dinosaurs, digging up dinosaurs.

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Mm-hmm.

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It, and it's one of the sort of central conflicts, I think in this whole debate

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is the, in the whole sort of carbon club kind of thing is, is and is basically, you

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know, we could make money doing old things or we could make money doing new things.

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And I, I feel there's this very, where I really see this sort of divide happening

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is the people who already own the money, like the, the industries that

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are making the existing money are very much biased in keeping those going.

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And that's always the hard part.

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Yeah, sure.

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We could make.

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You know, billions out of fabricating solar panels or mm-hmm.

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You know, producing green hydrogen, but no one is doing that.

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And you know, and Hume Morgan isn't making any money out of it, and

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therefore he's absolutely against it.

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Yes.

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And that entrenched power in those traditional carbon emitting

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industries could only see downside from an emissions trading scheme.

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And, and that's the big problem is rather than the government going, all right,

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we're gonna have this migration here is funding for it, we're gonna increase

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the tax on digging a shit out of the ground, and we are going to subsidize

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new industry startups in green energy.

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There was too much vested interest controlling the political levers.

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Yeah.

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And, and you might think to yourself, well, okay, there's a

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split in the business council.

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There's all these other businesses that are wanting.

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To to recognize climate change and to do things about it.

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Why is a government so stubbornly choosing sides with, with the other guys?

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And one of the reasons is that Hugh, Hugh Morgan was in charge of the McCormack,

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I think it was McCormack Group, which was basically responsible for funding

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the liberal party MCC Voia group.

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No SIA was the group of skeptics that he organized, but That's right.

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It was let me just see here.

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He launched the La Laia group, but there's the Cormack Foundation.

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So Hugh Morgan was on the board of the Cormack Foundation, and it is

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a group that provides most of the money, I think, for the liberal party

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when it is running for an election.

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So, When Tony Abbott's gonna run for an election, it finds 3 million.

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When Malcolm Turnbull's gonna run for an election, it finds only 1.2 million.

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Yeah.

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And Malcolm Turnbull has to stump up his own 1.7, which incredible like that.

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That's one reason why the liberal party would side with them.

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And also there's a revolving door of staffers who work in those industries

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and then work in parliament and workers advisors and government and and outside.

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So they're quite, again, like the religious groups they're

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in, their tentacles are in there and they're more entrenched.

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Whereas I guess the solar farm people haven't had the chance to get their people

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so, Embedded into the halls of power as the older, traditional businesses have,

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I think is some of the explanation as to why they would choose that business

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group ahead of another business group, for example, which is where I think

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watching Twiggy Forest and Mike Cannon Brooks in various, you know, ventures

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has been really interesting because that is a, a, a meeting of the old and

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the new, and it's really hard to deny that Mike Cannon Brooks, you know,

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like is, it's probably worth more than people like Hugh Morgan now, you know?

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Mm-hmm.

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. Yep.

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So, so where are we up to here?

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The, the next conference that comes up is in Bali.

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And in Bali.

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They're talking about, 25 to 40% reductions by 2020.

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And that's a figure that's scaring Rudd.

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And he doesn't want to commit to that if he can help it, because he just doesn't

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think he can get that through politically.

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So while he was in, while he was in opposition, he's all talk now he's

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in power and he's at a conference in Bali and they're saying, oh, you

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know, it'd be a really good idea, like 25 to 40% reduction by 2020.

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And Rudd tried to say, oh, you know what, we'll make it 60%, but by 2050 knowing

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full well that by 2050 he'll be long gone.

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It won't be his problem.

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Absolutely no need to be there.

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Yeah.

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So he, he's trying to, you know, pull tricks like that.

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So barley, nothing was decided.

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And it's it's all a bit of a lead up.

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So, so Rudd then is trying to, fashion, some sort of emissions trading scheme.

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And Penny Wong is the minister.

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He doesn't wanna do a deal with the greens.

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He wants to do a deal with the liberals with Malcolm Turnbull.

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Hmm.

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As the opposition leader.

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And I think the reason he doesn't wanna do a deal with the greens is cause the

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greens would ask for too much and he would find he couldn't probably agree to it.

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He could feel he could get a more acceptable agreement

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with Malcolm Turnbull.

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Is that the feeling you had reading it?

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I got the feeling that rad felt much more under pressure from the big end of town.

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And, and it may have been as well, that the unions, the C F M E U and things

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like that, we, you know, were like, it, it, I, it's very hard to know.

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Who's, who's influenced by what unions in, in the Labor Party.

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But, you know, there's it, it wouldn't surprise me to, to learn at that point

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that the unions were, were strongly anti you know, resisting doing a lot

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of work, you know, work on things that would mean they'd lose jobs

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in coal mines and things like that.

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Yep.

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And power stations.

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Yeah.

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Mm-hmm.

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. Yeah.

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So if I, the impression that I got was just that Rod really wanted to see a

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sort of a consensus form where everyone came to him and said, Kevin, we want 22%.

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And he'd go, okay, that's the decision.

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And it just wasn't ne was never gonna happen that way.

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Mm.

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Because they were always gonna fight tooth and nail the, the interest

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that it was working against.

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So in all of the negotiations with this cap and trade stuff and these

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permits, it's the case of the, the, the brown coal power stations in Victoria

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were basically sort of threatening and saying, well, we'll just shut down

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and you'll have, you'll have power blackouts and that's not gonna look good.

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So they were really threatened with having to offer those power companies

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School toilets over again, isn't it?

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It is.

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School toilets again.

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It is, it's, it is, but a much more money.

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Good analogy.

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Good analogy.

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Joe.

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It's Mother Celeste and the Goldman toilet block all over again.

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Mm-hmm.

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saying, we'll just shut it down and, So the Rudd is having to fashion an

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agreement where he's basically gonna give these power stations a lot of

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money to help them out for the first few years, or a lot of permits to help

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them out, free permits to help them out for the first year, few years.

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And the real pain won't kick in for a few years and they're having to make

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these concessions to these groups and it's they're not enjoying it, but

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they're figuring we've just gotta get a deal done of some sort of emissions

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trading scheme and we can tweak it later.

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But if we can just get something through the parliament, then

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we can always improve it later.

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Doesn't matter how ugly it is, but it's something is better than nothing.

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And yeah, that's the sort of dilemma they were in.

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Meanwhile, while they're, while they're trying to appease some

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of these groups, , you've got an enormous backlash coming from, well,

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you mentioned Corey Bernardi mm-hmm.

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As a leader in the arguments against or was a leading climate denier.

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Did you, I'd like, there's a good line in there about, he was like a cross between

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a financial advisor and a preacher, and, and his wife said, his wife said, we were

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fortunate in our marriage that, that both of us were in love with the same man.

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Yeah.

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The classic line.

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That was a really good line.

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I hadn't heard that one before, but, yeah.

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So you got Corey Bernardi, who's been to America, done some training

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over there on the Tea Party style system of grassroots, rabble rousing.

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You've got the Institute of Public Affairs, you've got the Murdoch papers,

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you've got a lot of vested interest with a lot of money and a lot of entrenched

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power and a lot of reach in the media.

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Just kicking up a shit storm of suggesting that it's gonna cost us an enormous

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amount of money that the science has not settled and really making it difficult.

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Um hmm.

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But life wasn't meant to be easy.

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Yeah.

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So, yeah.

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Thoughts on the media's role in all this gentleman with Alan Jones?

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Murdoch.

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Andrew Bolt, usual suspects.

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Yeah.

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Well that, that was the strange that, and Hugh Morgan felt like the strange

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constant throughout all of this.

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Mm-hmm.

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. Yes.

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Do you know the other constant?

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The other one who pops up in this, dear listener, the other name that pops up

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as supporting Corey Bernardi and Tony Abbott and all these people in their

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climate change denying Is George fucking Pell was also making, making speeches.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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He was a invited to this stuff.

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Yes, it's the Catholic church as well.

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Mm-hmm.

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. Very interesting.

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That was very interesting.

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I found that fascinating.

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Yeah.

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I was reading that about the time of Pell's funeral and I was like, wow, that

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was , that was an interesting coincidence.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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So, so they're always looking towards what's the next goddamn

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meeting of the UN on climate change?

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And the next one is gonna be in Copenhagen.

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And so you've gotta try and figure out in advance what you

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can agree to at that meeting.

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And so Rudd was basically going to offer a 25% reduction, provided the USA

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and China agreed to something similar.

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And he, and he had to, Obama was now in, yes.

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Obama came in 2008.

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Yes.

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and he had to do that because China and India had basically told the rich

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countries, if you don't, guys don't agree to something like 25%, then when we are

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doing nothing, I'm not gonna do anything.

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So China and India have virtually forced countries like Australia to

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put up a, a proper reduction figure.

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Otherwise, Copenhagen was gonna be, nothing was gonna happen.

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So if Rudd wanted something, they're more or less told by China and

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India, what would be a starting point before they would begin negotiations.

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So that was interesting.

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Which, which was also like, you know, the, the other side of what

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you said there is important that they were saying, we will sign on, but

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you guys have to sign, sign it too.

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We're, we are not going.

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Sign up and let Australia still slack off on nothing.

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Yeah.

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Because we've seen him do it before at Kyoto.

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Enough form.

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Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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The other part about all this of course is, you know, and I strike this, I can

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remember with right wing Tony, I think I had this argument was you know, the

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developing world has an argument when they say, well, we're making all of your stuff

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here in our factories, and you want us to have emissions at your level where you

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are now developed serviced industry based economies where the manufacturing economy,

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you guys had all the benefits of cranking out carbon to create where you are now and

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you want to deny us the chance to do it.

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You're not gonna recognize the value you got from your previous

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carbon emissions and, and Mm.

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And our chance to do that.

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and also the fact that we are doing your burning on your behalf because Right.

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We're making all this shit and it's so disingenuous.

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Yeah.

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When people on the west say, oh, well, you know, whatever we do,

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China needs to do exactly the same.

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Like, not when they're doing the world's manufacturing.

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I don't think that's a reasonable approach.

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Well, and, and I think the, this is where the, that idea of this, you know, scope

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one, two, and three emissions really comes in because at that point, it's not good

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enough for a company to say, you know, the only thing we, you know, expanded

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in the t in, in having this t-shirt is the energy that we put in in our office.

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it's gotta include where the, you know, where that cotton came from,

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how it was processed, how all of that in, all of the energy and all

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of the fuel that went into that.

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I, you know, where, where, I guess I see where I'm really interested

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in your sort of view on this is that it's kind of come, to, come

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back to that China and India point.

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All of this has, has to do with everyone has to take action in their

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own way and whether or not China is doing the same amount as Australia.

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Same percentage, same.

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You know, how some, you know, every, everyone's gonna have a different

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metric of how, how they measure.

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But no one gets to say, oh yeah, it's great that you are all

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doing that because we are not.

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Mm-hmm.

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. Yes.

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Yep.

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So you are also, your video is just pausing temporarily

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there, Paul, hopefully.

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Okay.

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You, I'm sure you've got super internet in Canberra there, so I'm watching

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the output, like the, and you're okay.

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Receive and send and it's well within.

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Okay, no worries.

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It might be just restrained, so, but we got you there.

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So that's all good.

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So just in the timeline, turn, Turnbull makes a trip to London,

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comes back really wanting to do a deal, really keen on climate.

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You might remember he came back from London all going home.

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He wanted to do a deal with Rudd and he was particularly worried

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about a double dissolution.

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He thought that would be a bad result for them.

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But in any event, he was very keen on doing something and his liberal

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party colleagues in the parliament were terrified at the prospect of it.

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So Tony Abbott took over, rolled Turnbull.

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And so essentially Turnbull really lost his leadership at that

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point because of climate change, cause of his keenness for it.

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That's essentially what cost him his job as opposition leader at that time.

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There was one other thing that I thought was left, actually left

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out of the book at that point.

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Mm-hmm.

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. And that was that I recall hearing a a something about I think it was when

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one of the Yeah, it's a podcast anyway.

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That Rod, at some point in that lead up to the 20 20, 20 10 election had been really

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hammering Turnbull and really embarrassing him for not wanting to commit and not, you

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know, not being willing to, to, you know, accept what, you know, labor wanted to do.

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And Turnbull was already suffering a little bit of, you know, in the,

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of, in the in the polls negative popular, less popular in the polls.

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And that at particular Attack by Rad led to Tony Abbott challenging, but

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there was a particular circumstance where there were like five people that

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needed to be there that would've backed Turnbull that happened to be away.

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Okay.

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During the ballot.

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Yeah.

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And it challenge, yeah, like there was some question, I can't remember

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how it played out, but it was, it was something like, you know,

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it was, he only lost by one vote.

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Tony Abbott, basically Shanghai, those, those people and kept them away

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from the vote or something, you know?

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Ah, I think I might have read something like that.

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Like took him out and got 'em drunk somewhere or something.

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Maybe.

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Or, I dunno.

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Yeah.

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I can't remember that.

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It was, that does sound vaguely familiar.

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Something like that.

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Yeah.

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And it, and it was, it was not just that.

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To, like Tony Abbott wasn't particularly popular either.

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Yeah.

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But you're, you are right in, in on that particular issue.

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The, the conservatives were very afraid of Turnbull.

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Mm-hmm.

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. Yeah.

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They, if they, they maybe should have gone a bit easier on Turnbull, the Labor

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party in order to get something done, because he was clearly gonna be the most

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amenable, much easier deal with Yeah.

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Than any other potential leader that might have cropped up.

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So, so Abbott's in charge.

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There's a Copenhagen meeting, which is a dud.

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Nothing happens.

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It's a disaster.

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It's all about then trying to get some sort of agreement

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at the next one in Paris.

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Meanwhile, in Australia Rudd's facing Abbott, Abbott and Barnaby

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Joyce are just calling this great big tax, which is getting very

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good traction in the media and.

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His popularity is, is plummeting as well.

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He's dispirited, he drops the whole plan for emissions,

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trading scheme gives up on it.

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And that and that then triggers Gillard as making her challenge.

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So again, partly Rudd lost his leadership, partly because he dropped

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the ball when it came to pursuing this and kind of gave up on it.

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He was so dispirited.

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So Gillard comes in.

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That's one of many reasons cuz he was also an asshole and everyone

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hated him, but part of it as well.

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And that's where I guess I was interested because I, I felt there was a similarity

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in the way that Rudd and Turnbull.

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Seem that they're both business people.

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They've come from running small to medium sized businesses where the board

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can get around the table and agree and they know that the job is to agree.

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And so they get on and do things and then they come into politics and

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they expect things to work that way.

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And they're surprised when there's disagreement and you just have to say,

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okay, no, we are just going to go with 12% that, you know, yes, majority says this.

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Yeah.

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Did you sort of, did you feel that there was a sort of similarity in

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the way that both Turnbull and Rod were sort of flailing around looking

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for options there towards the end of their, you know, campaigns?

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Cer certainly just really, Turnbull was just.

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on this particular issue, just in the wrong party.

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Like he's just, he was just surrounded by people in his own party who just wanted

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nothing, didn't want any of this stuff.

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So they're happy to have him on other issues, but this one was just poisonous.

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So, you know, he came in from the, had he paid enough dues in the liberal party to

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really understand politics, probably not.

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Ru Rudd had spent a lot of time in the state Labor party.

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He worked for Wayne Goss, he'd been in, in and around the traps

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and knew how politics worked.

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So he had the experience.

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He probably was just, he should have known that.

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So full of arrogance.

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You know, we'll talk another time about, I've been.

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I just read this little excerpt again about China.

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Everything comes back to China, China, China.

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But , it, it, it was talking about what you have to do to get to the top of the

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tree in China, and it includes all of the leadership that's current and fast,

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is start at the bottom in charge of a little community, get to the top, become

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mayor of a town, run it successfully, then become in charge of a province,

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run it successfully, score goals, then get into the next level in charge of

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some industry, sector or other thing.

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Kick goals, get stuff done.

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By the time you reach the top, you are such a seasoned veteran of working

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a system and getting shit done.

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Whereas in say, the US system, a Donald Trump can just fly in from nowhere with

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zero political experience and . just an advantage again that the Chinese system

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basically creates some experts in, in dealing in government, cuz they've got a

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lot of experience by the time they've got to the top, which they may not necessarily

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have in the case of a Donald Trump.

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Although someone like Biden has obviously been in politics all of his

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life, so it's not always the case.

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But someone like Turnbull kind of parachuted in from the side.

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Someone like Boris Johnson was a journalist and whatnot.

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I mean, in the periphery and all while, and he was mayor.

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He was mayor of London.

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Yeah, maybe.

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So some of that is in there.

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So anyway, sort of Yeah, yeah.

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I'm, I'm with you on that general idea.

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Mm-hmm.

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. I've heard another view of how, sort of, how the system works in China which

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is kind of like charts the same course.

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But involves basically knowing enough dirt on other people that if something

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looks like it's gonna go sour, you can backstab them before they backstab you.

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Right?

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And you just keep on doing that and basically saying, look, you might think

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you've got a bit of dirt on me, but I know much worse about you, and so we are going

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to get in just fine, aren't we partner?

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That's maybe a, an exaggerated take, but, you know.

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Yeah, that's, that's his since I got, yeah.

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So we've got Gillard has taken over and you, I did get like in a tough

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Parliament where she was having to work with the Crossbenches.

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She did get stuff done and she did get a, an scheme through and a deal was done.

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Ah, where carbon was gonna be $23 a ton.

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Now I mentioned before those brown coal power generators who are kicking up a

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fuss and saying, we'll all be ruined if we have to pay this sort of money.

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So initially the thought was well, we'll give was, was when there's a permit

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system, we will, we will give them some free permits for the first few years

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in order to get them through until they can make the necessary changes.

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So under the Gillard agreement though, in order to get it done, they basically

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gave cash upfront to these brown coal power generators in Victoria, like

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two years worth of cash upfront and give to them to say, here you are.

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Put that at the bank cuz you're gonna be spending money at $23 a ton

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in the submission trading scheme.

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Hmm.

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Well guess what?

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Gillard gets rolled at the election.

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Abbott wins first thing he does.

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Cancels the emissions trading scheme, and they get accused why they, and they

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get, and they get to keep the money and nobody asks them to return it.

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Mm-hmm.

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That's the part that, that's, that's how good the, the liberal party are

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at managing finances and transferring money outta the pockets of the

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taxpayers and into the pockets of Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Well, both of them labor in the first place handed the money over.

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Mm-hmm.

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, I mean, at that point it says in the book that the executives were just amazed that

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they'd been given the money in advance.

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So labor at fault for actually giving them the money in advance rather

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than giving them the tax credit.

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And then the liberals in a kind of a practice run for what happened with the

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with the COVID 19 you know, arrangements then just refused to, didn't even ask.

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For the money back and said, well, you're not paying this.

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We'll have that money back.

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Thanks very much.

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And again, the executives were amazed that they weren't even asked to refund it.

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But, but like I I, I assume to recall at that point as well, the coal executives

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knew that at that point they were going to roll out a massive attack campaign mm-hmm.

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even though they'd just taken the money.

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Right?

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Yes.

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Did that Well, is that my, my memory?

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Remember that in the book?

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That sounds all right.

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Because Or was it for something else?

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No.

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Cuz Kevin got rolled because of the mining tax, but it wasn't cold tax.

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Hmm.

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Dunno.

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So, I don't remember what Gillard was, but obviously Abbott was

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complaining about the $400 roast Sunday roast or whatever it was.

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. Yeah.

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AB Abbott.

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Abbott.

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And you know, and you can see that real score from Corey be Bernardi of, keep

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your slogans simple and direct mm-hmm.

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and make it all about fear, you know?

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Mm-hmm.

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. Yep.

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I'm, I ne I never got the whole, well, yeah.

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If you carry on using electricity like you currently do, you're

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gonna end up paying more money.

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Mm-hmm.

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, that's the whole point of the carbon tax is to make you use less

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electricity, but, but the whole point of politics is to be able to say

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to certain groups, except for you,

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Well, that's true.

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Yeah.

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And, and the other thing that always strikes me is sort of odd there is

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that that's also how capitalism works.

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Or that's, sorry, that's how markets work.

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No, absolutely.

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Prices.

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If something goes up in price, someone decides to make more of it or supply an

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alternative so that, They can make money.

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Right.

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And that cap, cap and trade is a, the, the price comes down again, cap.

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Cap and trade is the market way of regulation.

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Yeah.

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Yes.

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It, it's, it, it's the it's the right wing way of introducing it.

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You, you don't tax you cap and trade and, and that way you are not as a

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government dictating what people do.

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You're letting the market decide.

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Mm sure.

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So, yeah.

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Interesting.

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You say it's not a tax because Gillard got in trouble cuz she said there'll

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be no carbon tax under my government.

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Oh, absolutely.

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And then, and then later on she said, well, I don't care

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if you call it a tax or not.

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And then they argued, well, a tax is something that you have to

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pay whether you like it or not.

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Whereas with this, if you rearrange the way you conduct things,

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you won't have to pay this fee.

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So anyway, that caused her political problems and we end up with a, and it was

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set up to be able to trade with Europe.

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So the whole point was that yes, Australian farmers who were

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creating carbon credits could sell 'em on a European market and

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get huge amounts of cash for it.

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Yes.

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Yep.

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Yes.

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Yep.

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Which nationals would be all for.

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Yeah.

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Nationals are not for farmers.

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They're for miners, aren't they?

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It looks like it.

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Yes.

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And again, there's this relationship between them.

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Yeah.

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I, I, I tend to see the, the farmers as being more just pure

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conservative in that, you know, we don't want to change anything.

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We don't want to learn anything new.

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We just want things the way they used to be.

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And, you know, that suits farming because, You know, the theory is

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you just keep on doing what you, you've always been doing, right?

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

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Anyway, I think farmers would disagree, but anyway, yeah.

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You know, I'm, I'm, I also think that that's where the National Party

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and the farmers partway, right?

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Mm-hmm.

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. Yeah.

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I, I heard a story from somebody who was deeply involved in media dealing with

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farmers on a national program, and was often disgusted in how, how uninterested

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farmers were actually in new technology.

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And they kind of did, but it just, a majority of 'em, a lot

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of them, way too many of them just wanted to keep doing things.

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The white.

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But we'd digressed a little bit.

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So now we're at a position where we've got we've got gillard's

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let me just lost the election.

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Lost the election, right?

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Tony Abbott's come in.

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Tony Abbott's come in and is eating onions.

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. Yes.

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And remembering Australia's, I think it's absolutely worse in that video, is the

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way he's staring while he does it anyway.

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Yeah.

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And we've got basically where we had sort of John Howard and George Bush

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of the same mind, and that was great.

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And where Abbott was dealing with George Bush of the same mind.

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Great.

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But in comes Obama who clearly has a different climate change agenda.

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So from Abbott's point of view, it was, oh shit.

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Like now we're actually, rather than feeding off and helping each other

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USA and Australia in terms of battling against climate action, he now had

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Obama who on the face of it was.

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not gonna be helpful for what Abbott was wanting to do.

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And Obama ends up in Australia at an APEC conference and starts making noises about

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needing things to be done for climate change because they've got a, a bit of

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an eye towards Paris, which is looming and trying to work out what can the

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world agree to at the Paris Conference.

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And so, Abbott was basically told by his advisors that he could agree to a 26 20 8%

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reduction by 2030 from the 2005 baseline, and it wouldn't be too difficult.

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Okay, so he is basically told a 26 to 28% reduction.

Speaker:

by 2030 from the 2005 baseline, which sounds like a reasonable figure of

Speaker:

reduction and you sort of figure why would that not really be difficult?

Speaker:

It sounds like it would be difficult.

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And the reason was that we had such a good deal from Kyoto.

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Remember, dear listener, in the first part of the conversation here, we described

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what a crazily good deal it was that we end up with meeting that Kyoto deal easily

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and exceeding it, thereby earning credits, which we could then apply the 2020 target

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that would make it easy to achieve.

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So that's why Abbott could do the sums and go, yep, well, because of such an

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easy Kyoto agreement, leftover credits.

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meant that that this figure for for Paris potentially was

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not gonna be too difficult.

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Mm.

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And and that's kind of what they entered in, you know, in the leading into Paris.

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They were sort of prepared to do that sort of figure, but for that

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sort of reason, coming back to that original crazily good Kyoto agreement.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

Yeah.

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Interesting.

Speaker:

Yeah, and interesting to see as well the, the fact that both I seem to recall the

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newly minted Xing Ping was came to the G 20, was it the G 20 summit in Brisbane?

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Yeah, I think so.

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Obama and.

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She basically got up and said, well, we are doing something about climate

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change and here's, here's our proposals.

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And Abbott, who was hoping to be able to say we are not going to do anything about

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climate change because it's all fine.

Speaker:

Thanks very much was forced to actually do something.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

Yep.

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And so he is forced to do something and then he was given the figures

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that said, well, we can get this, we can do this because it's actually

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not gonna be that hard for us because of a previously generous agreement.

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So, although I did read about the number of coal fired power stations that

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China has built in the last two years.

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Right.

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And I think it's something like five times the number that Australia

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is running at the moment they just built in the last two years.

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Yes.

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I'd heard.

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Slightly different take on that.

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In that it, that number basically included a whole bunch of things, like

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things, plants that have been approved but haven't actually started work.

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Plants that have been built but have no coal you know, things that

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aren't even connected to the grid.

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So I'm still, I dunno how much of that is actually burning coal and producing power.

Speaker:

Right?

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

But it's still, it's still worrying, right?

Speaker:

Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker:

Yeah.

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And my notes just get a little bit shaky for the end part here.

Speaker:

But basically Tony Abbott made the mistake of losing 30 poles in a row

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and deciding to Knight Prince Charles.

Speaker:

No, it was, it prince Phillip wasn't it?

Speaker:

Phil Greek.

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I mean, and that was enough for everyone to go, oh my goodness sake.

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So Turnbull comes back in.

Speaker:

That's why I was, I was wondering because, because of that very specific

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language of captain's call that Abbott used there I wondered if that was like

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some internal liberal party jargon.

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Yeah.

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Might have became the jargon in since then when the Prime Minister was things.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

I mean, yeah.

Speaker:

I mean it's incredible.

Speaker:

What is a captain's call going to war is really almost is a captain's call.

Speaker:

Yeah.

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It's just crazy.

Speaker:

So, tur came back in but didn't last long at the end of the day cuz he just ran into

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the same party full of climate skeptics.

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And even though he thought he had agreement from the from the party room

Speaker:

Bernardi and others just worked in the background and knocked him off.

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And Morrison of course, who had gone into parliament holding a lump of coal

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and saying, don't be scared of this.

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Ended up being prime Minister in his place.

Speaker:

And we also had the whole thing with the Galilee Basin in Queensland and

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Clive Palmer getting involved and Clive Palmer spending a shitload of money

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and directing preferences in Morrison's direction, which helped him get in.

Speaker:

And obviously Clive Palmer owned a big coal potential coal

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area in that Galilee basin.

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And I didn't, I forgot to mention in the whole mix of that, that Gina Reinhardt of

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course got involved in it, in it as well.

Speaker:

So, so the book is The Carbon Club and it's definitely a clubby atmosphere

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of entrenched old school money in fossil fuel industries with deep

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tentacles in the liberal party.

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Really directing the liberal party and just people in the liberal party by their

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nature being determined to favor that industry cuz that's the one they knew and

Speaker:

loved and they didn't know and love the new solar industry that might crop up.

Speaker:

They didn't know one loved the new tourism ventures that might come up.

Speaker:

You wonder how Scotty felt with the solar panels on Carelli house?

Speaker:

Well, yes, because Malcolm, Malcolm actually put solar panels on, didn't he?

Speaker:

Right.

Speaker:

The the, and the thing to remember and, and was a great comfort to me through a

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lot of that was that the a c t government.

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Has for a long time.

Speaker:

Well, you know, I think it was before Turnbull even has done deals power

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purchasing agreements so that the a c t, all of the power going into

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the a c t is from renewable energy.

Speaker:

Even when Joe Hockey was complaining about, you know, wind farms near Lake

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George, you know how ugly they were.

Speaker:

It was like, well Joe, you can turn off your lights then because your office

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and everything that you do here in Canberra is powered by renewable energy.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

Yep.

Speaker:

Speaking of solar panels on Jimmy Carter, I don't think has passed

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away yet, but he's in his final days it seems, and he had solar panels.

Speaker:

Installed on the White House.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

and Ronald Reagan, late seventies.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

He, he got 'em installed because as soon as he got into power,

Speaker:

Ronald Reagan hadn't taken off.

Speaker:

Right.

Speaker:

Yep.

Speaker:

As you as, because there's nothing like the Republican Party for spite mm-hmm.

Speaker:

. That's it.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

Interesting.

Speaker:

So, so that's a run, that's, you know, now we can talk more generally or, you know.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

But that's kind of the basics of the story of the book is a forensic rundown

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of that history in, in all of its detail.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

She doesn't spend a lot of time analyzing it.

Speaker:

It's up to us to sort of draw all that out as conclusions from the facts.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

. Yeah.

Speaker:

And I, I guess, I think I'm interested to know whether you feel like that was.

Speaker:

A good tactic to take when this, when the book was written, when it was still 2021,

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I think because the book doesn't cover it, it talks mentions very briefly that

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the, there's an election in 2022 for the federal government, but it doesn't make

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any real sort of attempt at speculation or look at policies of the upcoming labor.

Speaker:

No, it doesn't government at that point.

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So do you think it, it, the book is actually trying to

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avoid controversy by doing that?

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No, I think, I think just the nature of this style of book, it

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sort of, she brought it right up to the present time of when it was,

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when she was and finished there.

Speaker:

And yeah, because it wasn't a book that with any analysis really in that sense.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

I, I guess that's sort of what I'm overall wondering if, if you think it's good for a

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book like this, especially if it's trying to appeal to more than just, you know,

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the, the rabid climate change agrees.

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That to, to not pass judgment on some of these things to not deliberately

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criticize or, you know, because it's still possible to, I think, to read

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the, the book and come to the conclusion that these people are denying climate

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change and they, they're wrong.

Speaker:

The science is out, is is in, and you know, they've been proven wrong.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

She doesn't spend any time on that.

Speaker:

I mean, it's fine.

Speaker:

I think she just achieved what she wanted to achieve in it and.

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You can't be all things to all people.

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That was the style of book she set out to do.

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I think she just set out to put on the record and account of what happened.

Speaker:

And then people can argue about how do we avoid that or what should we do in future?

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But I think that's a fair enough objective that she achieved.

Speaker:

The scientists have always said their job is not to set policy.

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Their job is to say, this is what's happening.

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This is our evidence for it.

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And you know, effectively this is what we need to do, reduce the

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amount of carbon we're emitting.

Speaker:

How you go about reducing the amount of carbon is a policy decision,

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whether you tax it, whether you, I like I feel it's still a science

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decision because there's no point.

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Like you can't say, you know, pass a law that stops anyone

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from, you know, Emitting carbon.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

, you know, that's . Well, no, no.

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Can't disobey the law of physics.

Speaker:

Right.

Speaker:

You, you can pass a law that says it's a fineable or a jailable offense

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to emit carbon more than through standard respiration or whatever.

Speaker:

Or that, you know, you, you can't burn fossil fuel.

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Sure, sure.

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So it's not for a scientist to say nuclear is better than solar, for instance.

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They can go, these are the costs of each.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

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But at the end of the day, it stands at the government to

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go, we're gonna implement this.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

The thing that, from this book, the thing that strikes me is so much of this was

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that politics outweighing good policy.

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It wasn't mm-hmm.

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, it was always, what can we get away with?

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What can the other people allow us to do?

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We want to get to this point, but what.

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with all the other competing interests against us, what can

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we get away with successfully in juggling competing interests?

Speaker:

Hmm.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

It, it was also always about short-term gain.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

It, it's not, you know, for the, we're gonna Yeah.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

We we're gonna fuck over the reef and long term this is gonna

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hurt Australia in a major way.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

If, if we can just kick this can down the road, we will.

Speaker:

Yeah, exactly.

Speaker:

And then things would crop up and say, well, no, you can't.

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Like, and things have been saying, you know, 82% change at the beginning of

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this would've been relatively painless.

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And now we've left it so long, we're gonna have to do a 80%

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change in a five year period.

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And the longer we leave it, the more painful the change.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

. . Yeah.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

And it really strikes me that the, like the no, no one worse off policy that

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Howard started where, you know, they wouldn't agree to anything, which would

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mean that any company would lose money or be fined or, you know, taxpayers would

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be worse off because they were having to pay higher prices or anything like that.

Speaker:

Yep.

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And I guess I'm, one thing I'm wondering is, do you think that

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is still alive in politics today?

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I, I think so.

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I mean, realistically in terms of building standards building

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standards here are laugh.

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com compared to Europe.

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You go to a house in Europe and you see how they build.

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Compared to here, we're building huge drafty houses, and then we

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are sticking great big fucking air conditioning units on it to cool it

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down in summer and heat it up in winter.

Speaker:

Hmm.

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Rather than building sensible houses to the climate as, as someone who has

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a double glazed house retrofitted.

Speaker:

I'm completely with you on that, . There you go.

Speaker:

Yeah.

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But yeah.

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As soon as there is a, you, you wanna run a new law that's going

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to apply negatively to some group.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

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, you gotta be prepared to sell the story.

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Like Bill Shorten couldn't do it when it came to dividends.

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Negative minor group of, minor group of elderly pensioners who might have

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lost something in share was just crazy.

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That whole argument.

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And we've, we've seen, although successfully with the

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superannuation for people with amounts over 3 million, 2 million.

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Yeah.

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Where the government is successfully Oh, they're streaming now.

Speaker:

Yes, but they're not succeeding, I think.

Speaker:

Oh, I don't know.

Speaker:

Yeah, because this is gonna affect up to 50% of taxpayers if, if

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it's not index linked by Yeah.

Speaker:

Yes.

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2,500.

Speaker:

That's right.

Speaker:

That is, you're right.

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Like Yeah, they're saying by 20, by 20, 50, 10% of people,

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it'll be affected by this.

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Like, say, and, and of course nobody between now and then

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will have the opportunity to index it if we don't do it now.

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You're right.

Speaker:

Yes.

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I mean, they're howling like Banes, but and, and I, and I.

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, if I, if the news story that you're talking about is the one

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I've seen the assumption about the rate of tax, of, of wage rise.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

for ordinary Australians is just heroic , right?

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Yeah.

Speaker:

So, yeah, it's not easy to pass a law that will negatively affect a particular

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segment of the community because the people on the opposition party will adopt

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that group as their own and just run a scare campaign and, and beat it up.

Speaker:

So that's politics, isn't it?

Speaker:

So, well, and, and, or, or will.

Speaker:

Yeah.

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You will pretend that these new taxes, these new laws will impact the, the

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average person when generally they don't.

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They're aimed at a very specific sector of society.

Speaker:

Who do rather nicely.

Speaker:

Thank you very much.

Speaker:

Out of the taxpayers.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

And, and another parallel that I saw with the two superannuation arguments,

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back to some of the stuff that, you know, people like Corey, Ben Bernardi

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or Tony Abbott with the $400 roasts were saying is that, you know, I remember

Speaker:

very clearly in the 2019 election where, or the, the liberal party were suddenly

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experts on Labor party policy and they were telling people that the Labor

Speaker:

Party was gonna introduce a death tax.

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Yes.

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And it was complete fabrication, like a utterly untrue, again, an inheritance tax

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is the norm in most parts of the world.

Speaker:

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker:

That and, and I, and they succeeded there.

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And, you know, you can see them trying now to say, you know, what's next?

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Taxing your own, you know, the, your home for superannuation which

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is again, completely made up.

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Not a labor policy at all.

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But, so I'm really, I'm really wondering where are we ever going to see a, a, a

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move in any sort of federal government or state government that, that does

Speaker:

more than effect, like 0.05 of, or, you know, 0.5 of a percent of people?

Speaker:

Well, there's such a gutless mob in charge.

Speaker:

I dunno that we will, I mean, they really have to take the view that,

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look, why are we worried that we're jumping through all these hoops

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not to offend this small group.

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Because even if we jump through these hoops, the Murdoch press will still.

Speaker:

Just make absolutely a complete lie to say that we've done outrageous things,

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so we might as well do some things because they'll make it up anyway.

Speaker:

So, so let's at least get something done.

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I, I think the R r t though had them running scared Mr.

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The what?

Speaker:

The, the minerals resource Rent tax, yes.

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Yes.

Speaker:

So the mining tax, yeah.

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Yeah.

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Which rolled Kevin Rudd.

Speaker:

Yes.

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The reason.

Speaker:

Yeah.

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And, and unless the average person was not impacted in, in any way, shape, or form,

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why the hell were the voters going, oh, we're really worried about the mining tax.

Speaker:

Hmm.

Speaker:

Well, there, I think, and again, it's interesting to see how, you know,

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things like the, the boss of B H P changing sides on this in, in the book

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has really influenced some of this, the, the, the Mineral Minerals Council.

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I think was the big player in the, the, the tax there and sorry,

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in the attack on the M O R T.

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And the thing that I recall strongly there was basically something that

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came out of that was that they basically said we are going to pass

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this on to every single supplier.

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We are not going to pay it out of our PO pockets.

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We are going to make sure our profits stay the same and we are

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just gonna pass that down the line.

Speaker:

In other words, blackmail.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

Yep.

Speaker:

Yep.

Speaker:

So I'm, what else you got?

Speaker:

What else you got on your list there of questions?

Speaker:

Sure.

Speaker:

You need to think about wrapping this up and bring it back to this book.

Speaker:

Yep.

Speaker:

What are the, the compelling ones?

Speaker:

So do you think that people like Corey Ban Bernardi are still big players?

Speaker:

Has he lost his seat or is he still in, out there somewhere?

Speaker:

I think he lost his seat.

Speaker:

Corey Bernardi.

Speaker:

Yeah, I think he's out because he left the, he actually left the liberal party.

Speaker:

He set up because it wasn't right wing enough for him.

Speaker:

Conservative party, didn't he?

Speaker:

Or the Yes.

Speaker:

Yeah, he left the liberals, you're right.

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Created his own conservative party.

Speaker:

So, but, but had he stayed in the liberal party, it, it would just becoming

Speaker:

more and more comfortable for him.

Speaker:

I mean, there was only an article former the other day, just the other day about

Speaker:

Christian group telling Christians to hurry up and get into the liberal party

Speaker:

so we could get more of us in here.

Speaker:

So, so if he was still there he would be even more comfortable given the nature

Speaker:

of the way the liberal party's changing.

Speaker:

So it, there's no relationship to what it needs to be in terms of climate change.

Speaker:

They're just going harder to climate denial.

Speaker:

It's not shifting them.

Speaker:

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker:

Which I'm, I'm waiting for that to collide at some point with the

Speaker:

idea that they're actually supposed to be speaking for the forgotten

Speaker:

Australians, you know, whoever they are.

Speaker:

But, you know, he, he sold a quote with Mr.

Speaker:

Potato asking how one of the teals run for Prime ministership was, to which he

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replied, I'll be there before you are.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

, Monique Ryan.

Speaker:

Some, somebody is selling t-shirts of that, right?

Speaker:

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker:

I have, I have my sit down Buffhead Al Anthony Albanese mug Rocky.

Speaker:

There you go.

Speaker:

Right.

Speaker:

I'm, I'm, I'm debating getting that Monique Ryan t-shirt for me.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

Because of course he's my local member.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

So I, I, I figured I could turn up to various events in the neighborhood.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

Wearing it.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

See you.

Speaker:

That case.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

What else is on your list there, Paul?

Speaker:

Any other?

Speaker:

Sure.

Speaker:

So the, do you think Kevin Rudd did the right thing or the wrong

Speaker:

thing by trying to compromise?

Speaker:

Should he have appease the greens or the liberals?

Speaker:

He, I don't understand why he didn't keep going.

Speaker:

I mean, he, I think he should've, I think he should've run it, but

Speaker:

I, I don't, I don't understand that with the, with the greens.

Speaker:

I dunno why I, I think he, I think he should've, I just dunno why.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

I, like, I, I got the impression suddenly I remember this in, you know, 2010 that.

Speaker:

He, he was desperately looking for something to make him popular and

Speaker:

Tony Abbott was running the anti, you know, the, the Dump Kyoto line.

Speaker:

So I better do that too.

Speaker:

It was a, it was a failed project.

Speaker:

But yeah, it, it's, it's interesting to sort of think of that sort of alternate

Speaker:

reality in which rad had supported Turnbull in and Turnbull had felt like he

Speaker:

could back rad with signing onto Kyoto.

Speaker:

The Greens go, well, you know, we are unhappy that it's not enough,

Speaker:

but okay, well now it's law will try to change it or improve it.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

You know, . Yeah, I dunno.

Speaker:

I mean, it's easy.

Speaker:

He was just, you know, you have to say there's so much

Speaker:

traction by those lobby groups.

Speaker:

that was basically casting doubt in the public's mind and he couldn't sell it.

Speaker:

So, he, he, I think it's gen, you know, he lost a lot of poles, so,

Speaker:

the polls were shot before him, so I guess he looked at it and if you're

Speaker:

outta power, you can't do anything.

Speaker:

So.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

It's not, wasn't he, I mean, not easy.

Speaker:

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker:

And speaking of sort of polls and that sort of thing and, you know,

Speaker:

the media, you know, working against him cuz you know, the Australian

Speaker:

was absolutely against Kevin, Kevin Rudd right from the start.

Speaker:

I guess one of the big things that I think, you know, from the very title

Speaker:

that you get that aspect of this being a club that is very exclusive and does not

Speaker:

tell anyone about what it's doing it's.

Speaker:

And, and did that sort of, did it surprise you to see how many people were involved

Speaker:

in these things behind the scenes?

Speaker:

No, it just reminds me of Christians.

Speaker:

It honestly just reminds me Yes.

Speaker:

Of Christians.

Speaker:

It's so similar vested interest.

Speaker:

Yep.

Speaker:

And just the, and the speakers extreme motivation and the willingness

Speaker:

to just blow up the party if they don't get what they want.

Speaker:

Reminds me entirely of that.

Speaker:

And while they might have slight differences of opinion, they will come

Speaker:

together on an issue and, and yeah.

Speaker:

So no, doesn't surprise me.

Speaker:

Reminds me a lot of what, where do you see the Carbon Club still being around?

Speaker:

Oh, it will, in terms of the parliamentary guys, they're not going anywhere.

Speaker:

Let's think about it.

Speaker:

A new, a new Pentecostal guy is pre-selected in somewhere in a suburb.

Speaker:

And for the liberal party or for the nationals, he's, he's just gonna be in

Speaker:

a soup that says, well, in our group we are cl climate change deniers,

Speaker:

and we are pro coal and pro business.

Speaker:

And he's just going to maintain that line.

Speaker:

So I think the new ones who get pre-selected will, will, and, and you

Speaker:

look at it and you go, well, that's not gonna help you win a, an election.

Speaker:

And it won't.

Speaker:

And they will form some rump of some crazy thing.

Speaker:

And I'm convinced that the teals and people like them will end up having to

Speaker:

form some new type of liberal party.

Speaker:

These, these crazy Christian climate change deniers will end up in a poisoned,

Speaker:

leftover section of, of a liberal party.

Speaker:

So yeah, it's doomed to fail ultimately, but that's the direction

Speaker:

not gonna change, I don't think.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

But what, just as a sort of interesting bit of speculation, and maybe my last

Speaker:

question what do you think the alternate reality in that whole timeline, if,

Speaker:

if one thing had changed, what do you think would be the most likely thing

Speaker:

that could actually have ended up with a completely different future?

Speaker:

Well, you know, it's hard to get, it's hard to get beyond these

Speaker:

powerful interests and this, this powerful money and Murdoch.

Speaker:

Working together, a different reality would've happened if Rupert Murdoch

Speaker:

died of a heart attack in in 1980.

Speaker:

When was in, when was, yeah.

Speaker:

Don't, yeah, when can we, there's, there's a different reality.

Speaker:

That would be before he had kids, he's 96, how, you know, Rupert Murdoch

Speaker:

died, dies then, then there's a chance.

Speaker:

But while he's still alive and working with these other people really hard,

Speaker:

now that we've got the experience, now we've dealt with, like in those days

Speaker:

you had these scientists who are from James Cook University or whatever, saying

Speaker:

the reef's fine or whatever, and you go, well, gee, if a scientist says that

Speaker:

maybe there is something going on here.

Speaker:

Like, but now we've seen this often enough with tobacco, with

Speaker:

climate change, with vaccines.

Speaker:

We are now experienced enough with that trick, with living.

Speaker:

We just.

Speaker:

We just go, I'm smelling bullshit from some crackpot scientists here.

Speaker:

I don't care that you seem to have decent credentials.

Speaker:

You are one of them.

Speaker:

So that, that maybe we've been through that often enough that if the same

Speaker:

situation arise now we as a public could be smarter to identify it.

Speaker:

But back then we were still babes when it came to, I, I wonder with

Speaker:

Maggie, cuz Maggie understood and accepted human cause climate change.

Speaker:

I wonder if she'd pushed harder, if she pushed Reagan harder.

Speaker:

Whether, whether there would've been some movement, whether there would've

Speaker:

been a conservative, market driven approach to migration away from

Speaker:

carbon and onto other forms of energy.

Speaker:

If she'd introduced a carbon tax in the, in the eighties.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker:

If, if she pushed heavily for nuclear.

Speaker:

as opposed to let's stop digging.

Speaker:

I mean, she hated the coal miners.

Speaker:

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker:

You know, I've heard conspiracy theories that climate change was all about

Speaker:

Maggie trying to kill the coal miners.

Speaker:

Right.

Speaker:

and, and I feel like that whole determination, you know, her solution

Speaker:

to that was just to break up the unions.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

And force them to work under the conditions that she wanted

Speaker:

to them to, not to say, we are just gonna make you invalid.

Speaker:

You know, useless.

Speaker:

Because we are going to fund, you know, wind, solar, you know, other,

Speaker:

you know, nuclear, other power sources and put you outta business.

Speaker:

Your other alternative rally might have been tax on them if

Speaker:

Al Gore had won that election.

Speaker:

Yeah, there's another alternative reality where maybe that might have

Speaker:

led us down a different path as well.

Speaker:

Well, not that some people claim that he did win the election.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

and Florida was handed to him by a Supreme Court.

Speaker:

That was if only he'd been declared by his and by his brother, Jeb Bush, who

Speaker:

happened to run the voting comp voting machine company that happened to deliver

Speaker:

the hanging chads or whatever they were.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

This is not gonna be another dominion, is it?

Speaker:

, yeah's not hidden that way because that, that thing is proving to be an absolute

Speaker:

goldmine of, oh, of the emails from Fox.

Speaker:

Probably bad the route to Fox News people are mm-hmm.

Speaker:

, I, I, I think that really is the smoking gun.

Speaker:

Those emails that.

Speaker:

saying, yeah, she's a complete crack pot, but we have to have her on,

Speaker:

otherwise, o a n will have her on and then we'll lose market share.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

And we'll say, we'll agree with everything she says.

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

I mean, that was the other point, not, you know, that you can have

Speaker:

them on and still disagree with them.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

, but yeah.

Speaker:

You're, you're taking that view.

Speaker:

Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker:

No, I hadn't, hadn't thought of those, those, those points in the timeline.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

I, I reckon for me it would be if Rudd had kept Turnbull in as

Speaker:

opposition leader hadn't opposed him.

Speaker:

So, so determinedly such that his own party, you know,

Speaker:

voted in abandoned though.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

Mm-hmm.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

Yes, but good thought experiment, so good question.

Speaker:

Alright, well we're at it's been a while.

Speaker:

We're, we're only coming up two hours an hour.

Speaker:

50 minutes.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

So, alright, well I reckon So Shark, thanks.

Speaker:

Closed back again.

Speaker:

Yeah.

Speaker:

This Shay's Landon Hardbottom.

Speaker:

I mean, I dunno why we associate with him.

Speaker:

He's, he's clearly a dangerous man.

Speaker:

He's a hard man.

Speaker:

A Hardbottom, so.

Speaker:

Alright, well, well you gotta do this again.

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You'll have to look through the Good Reads list there Paul, and pick another book

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saying, well, I was gonna suggest mm-hmm.

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the from the secret ballot to the democracy sausage.

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If you wanna take on that.

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It's not a big, it sounds a little bit too close to what we've just done.

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Okay, well, fair enough.

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That's fine.

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Through, for something different.

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Email me and we'll pick a, I still think gamer mates.

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A game of mates.

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Again, that's gonna be a little, that is about property development and,

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and it's still That's interesting.

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Government.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Again, a little bit too close to the topic we've just done now, like something

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completely different would be good.

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I'll talk to Paul about it.

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We'll do it again in four weeks or five weeks or something like that.

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Cause that was fun to do.

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So yeah.

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Hope you enjoyed that.

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I did, I did enjoy that.

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Yeah.

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All dear listener, hope you enjoyed it.

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Hope you got your money's worth.

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Think I can hear the snoring from here.

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. No, there's still seven people with us.

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Weren't at times.

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Look at your podcast app.

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There's a link there for Patreon.

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If you wanna become a patron of the podcast, that's a good thing to do.

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Paul's won and he's never regretted it for a minute and consider

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the best value he is ever spent.

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, are you putting his brother Murray his mouth there?

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Yeah.

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And alright, well it's all very good.

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Thank you for listening.

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We'll be with you again next week with a wrap up of what's happened in the

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previous 14 days by the time we get there.

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So we'll talk to you then.

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Bye for now.

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Have a good one.

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The Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove
News, political events, culture, ethics and the transformations taking place in our society.

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