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Kevin Hester's avatar

"The current trajectory is for politicians to try to muddle through in the hope they won’t be held accountable for the failure in the future to meet the emissions targets, or the more awful prospect of increasing transport costs by stealth and trying to regulate its way to new places to live."

The can has been kicked down the road and off the cliff and no one can face it, hence our total lack of preparation for the unfolding collapse.

Canadian environmentalist William Rees brilliantly summarised our predicament "The Scientifically Necessary is Politically unfeasible, the Politically Feasible is Scientifically Irrelevant".

https://kevinhester.live/2019/09/05/collapse-the-only-realistic-scenario/

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Nigel Parry's avatar

So many things we need to do are currently politically unpalatable (ie. electoral suicide) So the vital thing to do is to have the vision, determination and wisdom to start from the other end: make the things we need to do politically acceptable, if not politically necessary. That requires both informative persuasion, and doing subtle things that, added together, change enough people's minds to make a difference. One that springs to mind is ignoring the motor trade lobbyists and legislating that all vehicles must permanently display a 'pollution' sticker next to the WoF, with a simple visual scale like we get on fridges when we buy them. Another would be forcing IRD to enforce the rules on the tax preferential treatment for double cab utes - everybody knows they are actually a massive tax rort with many 'company' utes used for the school run and boat ramp and some 'signage' so subtle or small as to be imperceptible. It would start to chip away at the desirability if more people had to pay the full cost. There are plenty more.....

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