[Coventrysucks]

Originally Posted by Matra et Alpine

The point is not that this is on the front page, but how many green and environment and weather issues are?

Yes, the "green issue" gets headlines, and that is the point - all of the big and bold green issues are underlined and emphasised - wind turbines, nuclear power stations, congestion charging.

A story about speed humps is not "on message" of either the government's agenda of "speed kills", or the green lobby's agenda of "bringing misery to motorists" - therefore, whilst everyone applauds them for saving the planet by adding another 5p tax on air fares, they can and will ignore it.

It is the same every other time these concerns have been raised; speed bumps cost lives by slowing the emergency services - you'd expect them to be abolished immediately, but no, the main agenda is "speed kills", so the story was ignored, faded away and nothing was done.

It is the same with speed cameras - the evidence to support their use is shaky, and more officers on the roads would be much more effective in improving safety as a whole - but "speed kills", so we need more cameras.

It is the same with wind turbines - they're rubbish, and need an equal amount of conventional power generation to ensure redundancy when the wind drops off, but simply because they are not directly burning "evil" coal and gas they are "green" and we must have thousands of them.

Ad infinitum.

It is embarrassing that so many problems in this country are reduced to black/white fundamentalisms with too little debate, digestion and discussion of the actual facts. And then anyone who does not obligingly swallow the official brand of "truth", however misguided that truth is, is ridiculed and ignored.