I'm getting a bit frustrated

While lots of commentators on the Liberal leadership mention climate change denial as a key factor in why Liberal conservatives could never tolerate Turnbull, I still feel that there is inadequate emphasis on this as the reason why the Liberals cannot continue to be an attempted coalition between climate change denialist/conspiracists and the moderates who believe science and the need for a policy to reduce emissions.

You see, this is typical of what Trump loving, alternative reality so-called Australian conservatives believe about climate change and energy policy:

We've all read the continual stream of climate change denialism from Bolt, Blair, Ackerman, lots of guest writers in the Australian, and in the posts and comments at Catallaxy for more than a decade, and one thing is clear:   nothing  will change their minds.    They are convinced by ageing fools who will never concede error, and argue in various combinations of bad faith, ideological blindness, and self interest.   

It has become a core belief aligned with nearly all social conservatives (and with most libertarians) that climate change is not real and/or is nothing to worry about.

Here's the thing:  IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO HAVE NEGOTIATIONS IN MUTUAL GOOD FAITH ON ENERGY POLICY WITH A SIDE WHICH DENIES THERE IS ANY NEED TO REDUCE EMISSIONS IN THE FIRST PLACE.  


It's that simple.


Remember in 2012 that show on the ABC where a young global warming advocate travelled around with Nick Minchin trying to convince him that his climate change "skepticism" was wrong?  I posted about it at the time.   At the end, there was a fake resolution in which Minchin said he would agree that it wasn't a bad thing to encourage renewables because fossil fuels were not going to last forever.

This was a disingenuous attempt to come up with some sort of "we can work this out" happy ending, but which didn't make sense for a denialist or realist - Australia could easily burn coal for hundreds of years if it kept it to itself and had no concerns about emissions.   And no climate change denying "conservatives" has ever agreed with Minchin, then or now.

So, yeah - as I say, it is that simple.

The Liberals are never going to be come up with an energy policy which will keep a significant chunk of their Federal members (and I do mean "members") or their apparently increasingly right wing "base" happy.

The party will be stuck in internal conflict about this forever, or at least - I would guess - another 10 to 20 years, while we wait for Rupert Murdoch and all of the handful of ageing contrarian scientists who keep the denialism alive to literally die off.

It needs to split, or it is going to be hobbled by that internal conflict for that long

Update:  On Insiders this morning, I saw an extract from Malcolm Turnbull's farewell press conference in which he said word to the effect that it seemed that for the Liberals there were some with ideological reasons preventing agreement on energy policy.

True, but it is not enough to just mildly say that on the way out.  They need to be called out as  simply wrong in their climate change denial and they need to get out of the party!