Trevor Cook

The Herald Sun's readers really are a wacky lot

Last week, the Melbourne Herald Sun reported that ‘Police are appealing for a man to turn himself in after another man was bashed to death with an iron bar in Albert Park.’ So, that can happen now, I thought; you can be walking through Albert Park in the middle of the day and be bashed to death by a random bloke with an iron bar. But no, reading on, the superbly named Det Sen Sgt Ron Iddles said of the alleged attacker, ‘We know who he is’ and revealed that the man he, Iddles, was looking for was ‘a former roommate of the dead man’.

via thescrivenersfancy.com

I suppose given the popularity of the Bolt we shouldn't be surprised. But Tony Martin's account of a recent stream of rage on the Herald-Sun's site is so funny it reads like Evelyn Waugh at his best. As you read the quoted comments from this shining example of a modern internet 'conversation' hold in your mind the thought that each one of these people has a vote and helps to determine the outcome of the next election,

Comment rage

So why do people write really poisonous things to politicians in language so vicious and nasty they would never utter it to someone's face or probably wouldn't utter at all? Among the many Christmas cards I receive are a few which include really vicious sentiments handwritten eg "I hope you rot in hell you leftwing bastard." this around a typical printed Christmas greeting such as "May the Peace of Jesus fill your family with happiness"

via malcolmturnbull.com.au

It seems that one of the great benefits of the Internet is that provides many more opportunities for people to vent their rage against what? the world, their lives, their bosses? Something must drive all that anger.

Megalogenis has an eureka moment

The opposition is wary of reading too much good news into the worker swings because Labor didn't run in either seat, and many Labor voters appear to have cast informal ballots. But the numbers do provide a warning to Labor that its base, when confronted with a choice between Green and Liberal, will fracture.

via www.theaustralian.com.au

No kidding, George. Another one of those "You can't read anything into this, but ..." articles that journalists seem to find so compelling. I'm still bewildered about who exactly thought that Labor voters would all just switch to the Greens (after all, a leftie outpost)because Labor wasn't running. Many labor voters after all have much more in common with the Liberals (especially smart young candidates like Fletcher and O'Dwyer) than they do with Bob Brown and Christine Milne. Have these journalists never heard of working class conservatives? Labor is not a more moderate version of the Greens, it is a qualitatively different party. We've had a few decades of lamentations about the lack of choice between the two major parties, and now we express amazement that many voters simply alternate between the two, WTF?

Abbott's poor debut - what today's Newspoll really says

Abbott gave not only the worst debut result of any Opposition leader that has taken control of the party mid-term, but was also the second lowest Uncommitted result of any new Opposition leader (including those that took control immediately after an election defeat). Only Beazley Mk 2 had a lower level of uncommitteds, suggesting that Tony Abbott is a significantly known quantity in the electorate, meaning there isnt much fat in the figures.

via blogs.crikey.com.au

Wonderful to read a proper analysis - with context (gee Denis imagine that) - rather than the garbage spewed by the Australian and disappointingly copied by most other outlets

Tiger Woods and the marketing problem

Given how desperately we want to believe in a human god, it didn't take much peddling from Team Tiger for us to accept Woods as a modern deity. With every new tournament victory, every new product endorsement, his divinity grew. His marketers made him a symbol of tolerance and brotherhood, and his father, Earl Woods, spoke gibberish about his son being a creature of destiny. Getting married and having children only added to Woods' marketability. I'm divine and monogamous and the center of a happy nuclear family. And we ate it up.

So now that the "real" Woods has been revealed as a wild bone-daddy who behaves more like your out-of-work, alcoholic brother-in-law than an object of worship, we feel cheated. Aside from the hundreds of millions he's earned from golf tournaments and endorsements, turns out he's a lot like the rest of us. Our hunger for salacious news about him isn't necessarily about voyeurism. We're embarrassed by the gap between who we believed Woods to be and who he really is; and, having put Woods on that pedestal, we want to bring him down where he belongs—with the rest of us sinners. We're like the kid who, upon learning that there is no Santa Claus, conducts a wide-ranging investigation to determine how such a fraud was perpetrated on him. And we'll keep consuming Woods news until our picture of him more closely conforms with reality. We love to crown kings and cultivate messiahs. And then kill them.

"I'm human and I'm not perfect," Woods said in his post-crash communiqué to his public. "I am not without faults and I am far short of perfect," he reiterates in his second communiqué, published today, in which he confesses his "transgressions." Gee, Mr. Woods, where did we ever get the idea that you were perfect? Oh, from you!

via www.slate.com

So much of modern marketing is based around the creation of impossible, unattainable dreams. We are drawn to the images of perfection, just as powerfully we feel compelled to destroy them. It's a fascinating dilemma.

The climate change article Tony Abbott should read

On November 18, with the United Nations Global Warming Conference in Copenhagen fast approaching, U.S. Sen. James R. Inhofe (R–Okla.) took the floor of the Senate and proclaimed 2009 to be "The Year of the Skeptic." Had the senator's speech marked a new commitment to dispassionate, rational inquiry, a respect for scientific thought and a well-grounded doubt in ghosts, astrology, creationism and homeopathy, it might have been cause for cheer. But Inhofe had a more narrow definition of skeptic in mind: he meant "standing up and exposing the science, the costs and the hysteria behind global warming alarmism."

Within the community of scientists and others concerned about anthropogenic climate change, those whom Inhofe calls skeptics are more commonly termed contrarians, naysayers and denialists. Not everyone who questions climate change science fits that description, of course—some people are genuinely unaware of the facts or honestly disagree about their interpretation. What distinguishes the true naysayers is an unwavering dedication to denying the need for action on the problem, often with weak and long-disproved arguments about supposed weaknesses in the science behind global warming.

via www.scientificamerican.com

Minchin and Abetz are probably too fixed in their views to benefit, but the author's treatment of the seven main arguments of sceptics could prove useful to any Coalition representatives who still maintain an open mind on climate change.

What lies behind all this debate are some simple propositions, it seems to me, which often get lost.

Climate change will adversely affect many people, perhaps most of us. CO2 levels affect global temperatures. CO2 levels have increased sharply in the last two centuries. Human activity, particularly industrialisation, population growth, deforestation, is contributing to rising CO2 levels. The evidence for these propositions is pretty strong.

Taken together it all adds up to a compelling case for intervention to reduce our reliance on carbon-sourced energy.

It would be nice if our leaders would leave the rhetoric and hyperbole behind and just get on with it.

hey Galaxy where's the evidence?

Climate of caution surrounds Tony Abbott | The Daily Telegraph

Malcolm Farr's article is long on breathless interpretation, but there is no basic information on methodology (sample size, timing, interview method, error margin), perhaps they are concerned that this information might undercut Farr's bold conclusions

A week of two challenges

Alan Jones, radio broadcaster and failed political aspirant, loves Tony Abbott and Kristina Keneally. He even had a kind word for Joe Tripodi this morning (one of our best ever ports ministers). Jones loves to associate himself with winners. But he is in a small minority in finding much to admire in both the unlikely winners of this week's upheavals. 

The Liberals in Canberra provided us with a gripping struggle between personalities, policies and ideological positions. It was remarkable because the wrong man won the job, mostly because his opponents stuffed up their strategy and their campaign and because a few of their number were intimidated. 

Abbott's victory meant that the Liberals moved to join the Nationals on the far right of the ideological spectrum in Australia and in the process ended up with the least electable of the candidates on offer. They also ended up with a climate change position which owes a lot to talkback and RW columnist populism, inspired by anti-intellectualism and conspiracy theories, and leaves them with an impossible policy challenge - cost-free climate change action. This will end the same way the Liberals efforts in Opposition last time to 'reform' Medicare without adding to costs for individuals and taxpayers. In the end, in a famous media conference, Peter Shack the Liberal spokesperson threw in the towell and admitted 'we've never been good at health policy'. The Abbott climate change train is headed towards the same wreck, as it becomes increasingly clear that the Liberals' latest magic pudding is also dud.

Despite the weirdness of the federal liberal party's efforts, they are as nothing compared to the latest efforts by the NSW ALP. Nathan Rees has poisoned the Keneally's premiership from the start with his 'puppet' line, which simply focused attention on the bizarre inner workings of the Right faction, particularly those unappealing characters, Obeid and Tripodi. Rees' own term in the Premier's chair adds weight to the 'puppet' claim. He was the beneficiary of the numbers men of the Right, as an inexperienced left-winger he had no chance of getting elected without their support. But when he cut the cord at the recent ALP Conference and sacked Tripodi, the hard men of the backroom bit back fast and hard.

Can Keneally cut the cord and survive? Only time will tell.

She got off to a poor start. In her media appearances so far she has come across as a cartoon character, burbling about winning the trust of the NSW community and boasting about the ALP's achievements in health, education and transport. Memo to new Premier: the NSW 'community' reckons the joint is stuffed, you can't win their trust by telling them it is all fine and dandy. Della Bosca was on radio this morning saying she will "relate to the stakeholders", groan, and they wonder why no-one is listening anymore.

She will soon release new policies and new plans in these key areas. Just as Rees did and Iemma did and Carr did. Why will anyone believe that her plans are anymore credible than the piles of stuff that her predecessors have announced, abandoned and announced again over the last 14 years.

Well good luck to her. But this looks like another turn in the death spiral rather than a minutes to midnight comeback.

Turnbull rejects Abbott's claims of costless emissions scheme

On Tuesday 1 December, the Liberal Party abandoned its longstanding climate change policy involving the establishment of an emissions trading scheme (ETS). On Wednesday 2 December, the Senate voted to reject the ETS legislation and the new Leader Mr Tony Abbott said that he is now working on a new policy which, the media reports he says will involve cutting emissions but without any tax, ETS or increased electricity prices.

Many people have asked: is this possible? Is there a costless way to cut emissions?

While there are some energy efficiency measures which pay for themselves over the long term, the simple fact is that there is a cost of moving to a lower emission economy. That is because the cheapest form of generating energy in Australia is by burning fossil fuels which emit a lot of greenhouse gases. And the cheapest coal, brown coal, is the dirtiest.

via malcolmturnbull.com.au

Well, exactly. It's obvious to anyone with a rudimentary capacity for rational thought. Just as it is also obvious that nuclear energy is also flawed because it costs a lot more than coal-fired generation.

Good to see MT is not backing off.

Access Economics got it WRONG

A key economic forecast says Australia will definitely fall into recession this year and has described the Federal Budget as being "buggered".

The latest business outlook from Access Economics says that Australia's prosperity will unwind quickly because of the slowing Chinese economy and the Budget will fall into deficit.

It also says it expects house prices to fall by 5 to 8 per cent over the next year and that unemployment will be up to 7 per cent by next year

via www.abc.net.au

This is what Chris Richardson told ABC News radio in January this year. A boss I had once used to say that hindsight was for arseholes, neverless I think it's fair to say that Access Economics "buggered" its predictions.