On Climategate... And Chacha-in-Laputa

There are three important articles in the papers today, to which I would like to draw my reader’s attention.

The first two are on the climate-change wallahs. The first is by Jagdish Bhagwati and Arvind Panagariya, who decry the carbon tax in an excellent piece in the ToI titled “A thoughtless tax.” This para is crucial:

The administration of carbon tariffs is also a complex task that will raise hackles. For example, in today's interdependent world economy, most production involves importation of components and raw materials from several sources. Calculating the carbon content of a product is therefore as arbitrary as calculating the "local content" and source of origin in implementing preferential trade agreements and eligibility for cheaper market access; and, because it involves imposing tariffs rather than exemptions from tariffs, it will be more contentious and productive of disharmony.

Next on my list is a piece by Bret Stevens in Mint. He is talking street-sense – pointing to where the money is going. He says:

Consider the case of Phil Jones, the director of CRU and the man at the heart of climategate. According to one of the documents leaked from his centre, between 2000 and 2006, Jones was the recipient (or co-recipient) of some $19 million worth of research grants, a sixfold increase over what he’d been awarded in the 1990s.

Why did the money pour in so quickly? Because the climate alarm kept ringing so loudly: The louder the alarm, the greater the sums. And who better to ring it than people like Jones, one of its likeliest beneficiaries?

In other words, this climate change business is a huge hoax, designed to hoodwink the world, impose more taxes and tariffs, divert subsidies to clients – and, of course, fund friendly academics.

In this connection, the final piece I have is on Chacha Manmohan S Gandhi and how he and his MPs are busy bunking our glorious Parliament. The article titled "Losing touch with reality" is by Pankaj Vohra, political editor of the Hindustan Times. He says:

The winter session of Parliament will go down as one of several dubious distinctions. First, Parliament had to be adjourned during question hour last Monday due to lack of quorum and because most of the members whose questions were listed were absent. But, more important, for the second time in this session the Prime Minister chose to go on a foreign visit….

The Prime Minister was away for eight days to the US and the Caribbean in late November and will be in Russia on a three-day visit when the Liberhan Commission report is discussed in the Lok Sabha on Monday and Tuesday. And when he goes to Copenhagen for the climate change meet, this will be the third time he will be absent.

Is this really a “democracy”?

Or is this just a huge, ugly pretence? Just like the global warming / climate change hysteria?

Chacha off to Copenhagen to save the polar bear.

In the meantime, Maoists have blown up a school in Latehar.

And there is much talk of "urban chaos."

Yes, Pankaj Vohra is right - our great and glorious Chacha has "lost touch with reality." He lives in the cloudcuckooland of Laputa.