GREEN U-TURN

Australia's new green Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has suddenly done an about-face on cutting green house gas emissions. I love to see a leader with convictions. Just days after Rudd said Australia would back a 25-40% cut on 1990 emission levels by 2020, he has suddenly decided that it is unrealistic.

The electricity industry stepped up and warned that it wouldn't be able to meet growing consumer demand and comply with the target, causing huge rises in electricity prices. The Energy Supply Association of Australia found that cutting carbon emissions by 30% of 2000 levels by 2030 would push power costs up by 30%.

Perhaps Australia's new "green" top guy has figured out that this whole global warming thing is really a badly disguised attack by tired or communists and leftists castoffs against the industrialized world and the evil specter of capitalism.