Victorian bushliars
BY ROGER HANNEY
February 7, 2009. Black Saturday. The Victorian firestorm that left thousands homeless and hundreds dead.
Only Pentecostal Danny Nalliah, pastor of Catch The Fire Ministries, had the good sense to look past all the enraged finger-pointing and publicly blame Victoria’s frivolous abortion laws.
The comparably visionary Miranda Devine, writing from her comfortable Sydney mansion, preached that filthy murdering greenies with their climate agenda owe the families of the dead a personal apology.
Max Rheese, head of the pro-GMO/logging/nuclear, anti-climate-science, Don Burke-fronted Gunns-donation-receiving corporate think-tank, Australian Environment Foundation, wrote for Online Opinion to blame public land managers and governments. Although he conceded that the only reason they ignored awesome forest science established in 1939 (yes, really) was because of pressure from latte-sipping inner-city greens.
Even Germaine Greer ‘ usually worthwhile and at worst amusing ‘ announced to a dinner attended by the Queen that a lack of burning and clearing by Australian authorities, albeit in ignorance of blackfella wisdom, is to blame.
Similarly astute observations can be found all over The Australian’s letters pages. Even Fran Bailey, MP for the bulk of Victoria’s worst affected areas, is pushing an argument adored by nearly every woodchipping lobbyist and climate skeptic every time Australia burns.
It amounts to a claim that protecting areas managed as National Parks, limiting logging of native forests, and giving ecosystems a chance to function at all naturally is to guarantee fiery tragedy and ensure that fire crews can’t gain access when it occurs.
Basically, ‘man with bulldozer, chainsaw, and woodchip license knows best’.
But writing to the Environment East Gippsland newsgroup, one Victorian forest activist noted that ‘apart from Bunyip, I cannot think of any major fire this season that hasn’t been in a plantation or other heavily managed forestry area’.
According to his observations and initial reports, all fires – bar one ‘ started in plantations, logging coupes, grasslands and farms. Namely, areas already decimated and dehydrated by the very practices prescribed by the ignorant, remote, and spin-driven parasites happy to exploit yet another fatal catastrophe.
But at least this tragedy will end Australia’s inaction on climate
change…
