A Panel Of One

From Q & A :

Here are the questions our panel faced this week.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was the sole guest.

He near effortlessly swivelled through his iBrain MP3 carousel to come up with tranquiliser-strength answers to most of the questions posed by an audience of 200 GenYers, already numbed into mild shock by the loss of their phones, they were sometimes seen furtively grasping their own fingers to stop them unconsciously air-texting.

Some of the occasional non-soft questions lobbed at the prime minister :

MATTHEW LAING asked: Prime Minster. Last week a series of newspapers ran stories noting the long list promises made at the last election by the ALP that remain unfulfilled after more than two years. Is it any wonder then why idealistic youth become cynical adults when it comes to politics?

LINNA WEI asked: The Australian Medical Association in Queensland has said that 100 lives a year could be saved if the legal drinking age was lifted to 21, the same as it is in the US. Teenagers start driving when they are 18; coincidentally this is also the legal drinking age in Australia. Mr Rudd, have you thought about lifting the minimum legal drinking age in Australia?

GEORGIA LOURADIS asked: The French government is currently moving to ban the wearing of the Burqa in public locations. Do you think it should be a core part of Western and Australian values: that woman should show their faces in public just like men?

PERKASH BATRA asked: Australian Universities are encouraging International Students TO STUDY in Australia, whereas Racism is increasing day by day, creating a big problem for International students. I have been victim myself. What are government plans to overcome this issue?

MOSES KENHOK GOI ADUOT asked: Why is Australia more than happy to receive president Barack Obama (a black man) when they are ashamed of their own black citizens, whether Aboriginals or African Australians?

BLAISE JOSEPH asked: Given the Climategate e-mails scandal. Given that the IPCC claims on Himalayan glaciers melting and Amazon rainforests disappearing were both fabricated. Given that the Dutch government is now reviewing all IPCC claims. Given all this: do you still have full confidence in the claims of the IPCC, and is it still necessary to rush ahead with your ETS?

One of Kevin Rudd's finest moments from the often snippy series of mini-lectures he responded with to many of the questions posed :

"...the question asked by this person over here was on the basis that they were not. I just wanted to be clear about the basis upon which that question was asked...."

Strong Coffee Required : The Q & A Transcript Is Here

Interestingly, when you scan through the questions, Rudd got asked a number of harder questions than usually posed to him by the news media.

Why did this Q & A need to be moderated by Tony Jones, or anyone, anyway? The youth would have sorted the prime minister out if he waffled for too long.

And what's so bad about hearing the prime minister shouted out and corrected and occasionally heckled by a roomful of kids?

That's the kind of PM Vs The Kids debate action we want to see.

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Now Much Easier To Ignore

The Daily Telegraph moves with the social networking times and replaces this blog click-thru box on its digital front page...



With this :



The TB Appreciation Society on Facebook has 21 members.



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Stories I'm Reading Instead Of Writing Blog Posts Here :

Tony Abbott Admits Howard Government Spent $1 Billion On Flu Pandemic "Precautions"

20 Million Americans Have Already Lost Their Homes, Another 18 Million Will Soon Lose Theirs

New York Times Tells Americans If They Owe More Than Their Home Is Worth, Just Walk Away

Seven Insane Ways That Music Affects The Human Body

AnimalLit - Biographies Of Quirky, Adventurous Pets - Push MiseryLit Off Bookstore Shelves

Since 2001, the US Dollar Has Lost Nearly 25% Of Its Value

Fox News Suddenly Realises Sarah PalmPrompter Palin Is Mocking The President During War-Time (Remember How Much They Used To Hate That?)

Russian President Signs New Military Doctrine For Preventative Nuclear Strikes Against Potential Aggressors

NATO "Surprised" That Russia Names Alliance As "Main Threat"

Online Obscurity, Why It's Better Than Digital Fame

A Philip K Dick Reality : The $7000 Multiple Personality SexBot

Stunning : Americans Spend More On Bank Overdraft Fees Than They Do On Fresh Vegetables

The Desperation Of NeoCons : Pathetic, Miserable WarPig Daniel Pipes Tells Obama He Can "Save His Presidency" By Bombing Iran, Now! Now! Now!

At Least 100 American SAS Have Been "Training" (Fighting) In Pakistan Since 2007

21st Century Operation MockingBird? - Why The CIA Should Outsource To Downsized Journalists

You Are A Virus....Well, At Least 50% Of You

Internet Uprising Overturns Online Censorship In Australia

On The Eve Of The Global Financial Crisis Part II, Australia's Political Elite Gather In Sydney With World's Central Bankers


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"Sorry Puppy, We're Putting You Down For Gaia"

By Darryl Mason

Opposition leader Tony "Treeple Skills" Abbott is continuing to push his eco-credentials in the confident hope that if he's interviewed in front of enough wilderness money shots, dappled in the sunlight breaking through canopies of palm fronds, then those who think The Greens are simply too gay to earn a real Christian's environmental vote will go for him.

And they probably will.

But how Green will Tony Abbott turn? Will he come up with that will out-eco even The Greens?

Some inspiration may be found in a report examining revolutionary society-transforming ways to allegedly halt rapid climate change :

Its State of the World 2010 report published this week outlines a blueprint for changing our entire way of life. "Preventing the collapse of human civilisation requires nothing less than a wholesale transformation of dominant cultural patterns. This transformation would reject consumerism... and establish in its place a new cultural framework centred on sustainability."

Surely a report like this would include a long list of things we should no longer do, or products and lifestyles we should no longer embrace? Oh, it surely does :

Get rid of the dog.

No bottled water.

No takeaway menus.

No fun cars.

Don't buy books or toys, borrow them from libraries.

Grow your own (food) in community gardens.

All products should be designed to last a lifetime.

Public transport only.

No plane-related holidays, or air-based trips at all.

Probably not much in there for Tony Abbott. Though it would be good to see him come out for community gardens and more public book & toy libaries. And the idea of any politician trying to rally local industry to go back to creating quality products that last (most of) a lifetime would be exciting indeed.

But Abbott won't go GreenXtreme, no matter how many new votes there might be in it.

He will stay the coure of the lo-fi greener, all the "What's Good For The Environment Is Good For Australia" pap, and leave alone any moves towards killing off the airline, publishing, pet, fast food and disposable product industries with a radical Fight Club-style anti-consumerist platform.

In Abbott's favour, when it comes to greening up, is the fact that he doesn't seem out of place tromping through a forest, where Kevin Rudd looks about as comfortable and competent amongst the trees as John Howard did on a cricket pitch.

"Oh Sanjay! You Make Me Melt Like A Himalayan Glacier!"

Of course he made some mistakes, he was distracted reliving the sexual adventures of his distant youth :

The UN's top climate official, who is at the heart of a controversy over incorrect global warming data, has written a racy novel which dishes up sex, reincarnation and a real-life Hollywood actress.

The book also weaves in lectures on the environment and the fate of Himalayan glaciers - the issue which has triggered calls for Pachauri's resignation.

This story doesn't make clear whether the lead character Sanjay actually lectures on glaciers and the environment while "overcome by a lust that he had never known before."

Is this the beginning of a new genre of enviro-erotic novels?

The Ecomance?

It's Got Nipples, Run It!

This is all you need to do in a Ukranian protest to make the pages of an allegedly esteemed Australian newspaper :

"Enough raping our democracy!'' shouted the protesters, who held signs with slogans such as "Help! Rape!'' and wore nothing except for jeans and strips of green electrical tape over their nipples.

Then again, if four male protestors walked into Joe Hockey's electorate office tomorrow and rested their scrotums on his desk, that'd probably make the papers in Eastern Europe, unless they ran away very fast.

(via @zombiemao)

Vote Liberal, Labor Or Greens, It Doesn't Matter, Australia Will Still Get A Carbon Tax

By Darryl Mason

Chris Ulhmann writes on ABC's The Drum that Opposition Leader Tony Abbott knows he has only one shot at becoming prime minister, so this is it, he's going in hard...or so it would
appear :

The Coalition is not going to win a war for the votes of climate change purists or the devotees of detail. What it wants is to set up a position that it can defend while it seeks to win a war of attrition against the Government's emissions trading scheme.

It is reminiscent of what has happened to United States in Iraq and Afghanistan. Given its domination of the sky, no conventional army can stop an America invasion. But as Machiavelli knew, taking a country and holding it are two very different things. The way to beat America is to get its soldiers out of their planes and tanks and into a prolonged street-by-street battle.

The Coalition doesn't want to engage in lofty debates that it knows almost no one understands. It wants hand-to-hand combat on the cost of living increases that come with putting a price on carbon.

Climate Change Minister Penny Wong was almost, almost, worn down by Tony Jones on Lateline last night, when he refused to stop asking her how much pricing carbon will eventually cost the average family. She avoided answering at least twelve questions on the subject. It was gruesome, like watching John Howard in late 2002 trying to deny we were about to go to War On Iraq, when Australian soldiers had already been deployed, knowing they were going there to fight.

The Rudd government for now has not much to counter the opposition's claims that the GBNT (Great Big New Tax) will cost everybody. It will.

But Abbott already appears suspicious is his mind-numbing repetitive use of "Great Big New Tax" by not calling the GBNT what it really is, will eventually become, was always going to be. A Carbon Tax.

Abbott is reluctant to call it a carbon tax because he knows that if he becomes prime minister, it will be all but impossible for Australia to function in the New Global Economy without one.

Labor and The Greens want a carbon tax, the Liberals will accept one, and Barnaby Joyce will be told to hold back from shouting about '"Carbon Tax!!" in public, too often. Entertaining his own dreams of one day becoming prime minister himself, Joyce will also, reluctantly, play along.

The Carbon Tax was always going to be the end result of either the introduction of an ETS, or the abandonment of an ETS. It doesn't matter which reality unfolds between now and election day. The introduction of a carbon tax was the mission from at least 2006 onwards for Labor, the Liberals and The Greens, irrespective of how oppposed they appeared to be of each other's plans.

To really whip up the growing tide of climate change skeptics in Australia, to get on side a new Liberal conservative base, Abbott needs to go to the election pledging 'No Carbon Tax!' if he really wants to win.

But he won't do it.

No matter how much he wants to win.

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Bizarre "Circular Discs" On BoM Radar Unexplained For Now

The Bureau of Meteorology notes on its National Loop site that there have been some extremely weird things appearing on BoM radar imagery of late :

Please note we are experiencing technical issues with the radar images resulting in circular disks appearing unexpectedly at times. We will endeavour to look at this problem as quickly as possible.

The BoM means these :









No-one from the BoM appears to have offered any explanation other than "technical difficulties."

But some who monitor or regularly check in on BoM radar, and have seen these "circular discs" are convinced the images are evidence of weather modification tests, or something much worse.

They certainly make for more entertaining explanations than boring old "technical difficulties."

From the Sydney Morning Herald, February 3.



They should have capitalised YOUR.

(thanks KCB)

It's Better For You If You Eat It



Here's a bit of Australian history you don't hear mentioned much :

''In the early 1800s, Australia was twice saved from famine by eating virtually nothing but hemp seed for protein and hemp leaves for roughage."

You can buy hemp seeds to feed your budgie in Australia, and to mix in with your dog's food, you can even buy them to use as fish bait, but, stunningly, they're still not legally available for human consumption.

That should change soon, once immature tabloid hysteria over all things hemp/cannabis finally fades away, and Australian politicians who know and have used the plant for any number of positive purposes can finally legislate calmly, and sanely.

Northern Australia has ideal conditions for massive hemp farms, as illegal cannabis growers already well know, that could and should be harvested for their miraculous food source, if for nothing else.

Hemp seed is a food source known to humans for tens of thousands of years, and yet somehow forgotten almost completely in the last eight decades.

"Hemp seeds are a real superfood.....23 per cent protein, and has more Omega 3 and Omega 6 than virtually any other source, including fish."

Australia could literally feed the world with one of the most concentrated sources of protein available, with the crops soaking up plenty of carbon at the same time, leaving behind plant waste that can be ploughed back in the earth, to renew the soil. Just for starters...

More Details On Australia's Burgeoning Hemp Industry

"I Know You're Really Not A Bad Dog.......AAAUUUUGGH!!!"

The intention was good, if misguided. However this still sounds like a Darwin Award nominee :

A doctor who won a four-year legal battle to save his three dogs from being put down for attacking humans has been mauled to death by the animals.

It could be worse. That Macqaurie banker could have been into German or Japanese niche porn.

That Commenter Is A Fake....But His Work Really Helps With The Comment Count

Paul Colgan reveals The Punch has readers who post dozens of comments under as many as 21 fake names. Colgan acknowledges one faker was allowed to keep posting comments at The Punch for at least two days after his japery was uncovered.

He thinks he knows who's responsible :

He’s bald, wears socks with sandals and lives with his mum. He surfs the internet from his bedroom, where on the wall is a pennant hung on an angle commemorating North Melbourne’s 1975 Grand Final win. He eats tinned asparagus and has a haphazard collection of Star Wars action figures in which the prize item is a Millennium Falcon but its radar dish broke off years ago.

The comment faker is, more likely, working out of a Melbourne PR office.

The Punch is certainly not the first News Limited blog to be infected by fake commenters pumping anti-green propaganda, or pro-war talking points.

At least one News Limited blog has even been known to publish comments by the girlfriend of the blogger, writing under an assumed identity, defending his opinions.

Another News Limited blog has knowingly allowed federal politicians to attack their enemies under fake names, and that blog has a particular blind spot for the fake comment work of staffers and advisors of Liberal and National Party politicians, particularly when they're in agreement with the blogger.

So far, no typing cats have yet claimed responsibility for recent comment faking at The Punch.


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John Birmingham on revelations from data-mining of the controversial My School website :

...underfunded, under-resourced and hugely unappreciated public school teachers are doing a much better job with what little they have than their colleagues in the fee factories.

It makes you wonder, doesn't it, what sort of results the taxpayer might get from the public school system, if it were showered with some of the treasure currently spent on elite private schools.

More Here

Don't Try And Lick The Screen

An Australian documentary on cane toads, in 3D no less, is getting some huge raves at the Sundance Film Festival :

Director Mark Lewis hopes his film -- "Cane Toads: The Conquest" -- will encourage the public to take a different view of the creatures, which are reviled as a pest and a threat to indigenous species in Australia.

It is the second time the Austalian film-maker has investigated the toads, which were introduced to the country in 1935 in a misguided attempt to control beetles ravaging sugar cane fields in the tropical northeast.

"For me, the 3D allowed us to get a point of view closer to the toads and to give a real perspective to the conquest," Lewis told AFP.

"In a way, it's my 'Ava-toads,'" he joked, referring to James Cameron's record-breaking science-fiction film "Avatar."

Avatoads! Brilliant. If those marketing this movie don't run hard with the Avatoads catch line, they're crazy.

What a stunning statistic of the ability of cane toads to infest a new environment - 12 cane toads were released in Australia 75 years ago. There are now estimated to be 1.5 billion.

The 3D doco's director, Mark Lewis, shares his thoughts on why cane toads are not a menace, here.

A reviewer from the LA Times :




I can't find a trailer for Cane Toads : The Conquest, or any footage online. Presumably there will be some soon.


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Cock Of The Walk

The Daily Telegraph isn't joking, this really is their top story :



The reason why you will never see Kevin Rudd parading down a public road in speedos is because he's hung like Matt Shirvington, and secret polls taken by his PR people have revealed that the majority of Australian males will never vote for a man endowed beyond the national average. One who has to kick, instead of tap.

True story.

Would I lie to you?



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Puzzle Man Liked By Elderly

Isn't it good to see the youth of today concerned about their future?

From the Sunshine Coast Daily, here are the tour promoters for world government conspiracy theorist Christopher Monckton's recent Australian romp :



It cost more than $120,000 to bring Monckton to Australia for a few media appearances and speaking dates. Well, he does call himself a Lord, after all.

Crikey claims Gina Rinehart helped pay the bills for Monckton's tour.

A mining heiress helped fund national tour by an anti-renewable industries activist....

What a coincidence!

Ten Global Warming Anti-Commandments


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Turnbull Disappears Thousands Of Comments From His Blog

Late last year, two weeks after he was Abbotted from the Liberal Party leadership, Malcolm Turnbull turned to his blog to get his message out about why he thought an ETS was vital, and why so many of his Liberal Party colleagues were fuckwits (obviously I'm summing up his opinions).

What was even more remarkable about very recent former leader of the Liberal Party venting on his blog was that he chose to leave the comments unmoderated. Visitors to his blog could, and did, say anything they wanted. For about six weeks. A few of his posts racked up more than 1000 comments each, probably an Australian personal blog comment record. There was plenty of support for Turnbull, but you rarely see a politician allow such a torrent of abuse at themselves to appear on their blog.

Recently, Turnbull cleaned house at his blog and deleted all the comments. Most of the comments from a post he wrote about climate change are still in Google Cache here.

This comment was up on Turnbull's blog for at least three weeks, read by tens of thousands of people :

Ben 12:23am :

The only reason Turnbull stuck to his guns in trying to ram through the ETS bill before the public had a chance to understand it was... Mal has vested interests.

As previous chairman of Goldman Sachs (who bank rolled Obama's Presidential campaign and will manage the global ETS scam), and with a 500 million dollar (including interest) joint law suit over Mal's head, in the wake of his dealings as GS adviser to FAI during the HIH scandal...

I'm sure you'll remember Goldman Sachs (under Turnbull's stewardship) cooked the books to make it look like FAI was worth millions when it was worth nothing? HIH subsequently bought FAI on the advise of Goldman Sachs and Turnbull for 300 mil.

Mal and his criminal mates, Larry Adler et al, (now banned from being company directors), brought on the collapse of HIH collapse and the downfall of many Australian businesses who depended on HIH for their insurance.

Goldman Sachs is due to settle this case against them very soon. Goldman's deal with Mal is that they will waive any claim on him of personal liability but his balls are owned by Goldman Sachs to the tune of hundreds of millions of $$$$$$$. But that’s chicken feed compared to the billions they’ll rake in from the management of the ETS scam.

THAT is why Turnbull was prepared to risk his political arse for the ETS. He could care less about the environment. He has no environmental scruples, demonstrated by his insistence on converting Tasmania's old growth forests into toilet paper with his GUNNS deal when he was environment minister.

This is all on public record, yet the details of this story haven't been exposed in any comprehensive way in the media. Why not?

Mal is a high powered corporate sleaze with his snout in the trough at the really big end of town.

The media has completely whitewashed this. I've never seen Turnbull questioned in relation to any of this. How does he manage to fly under the radar?

Because we reward criminals if they wear a nice smile and a suit.

Links:

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/hih-score-settled-for-malcolm/story-e6frg6no-1111119117953

http://www2.goldmansachs.com/services/advising/environmental-markets/business-initiatives/trading-and-cap-markets.html

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/malcolm-spared-a-grilling-in-hih-case/story-e6frg8zx-1111117525251"

It was good to see, if only for a few weeks, a prominent Australian politician so unfrightened of his past as to allow the above comment to be published at his blog, and read by tens of thousands of people.


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You're Either With Us, Or You're With The Greenhadists

By Darryl Mason

Moralising Hypocritical Pagan Watermelon Lefty Al Gore :

"This is a message to the whole world about those responsible for climate change and its repercussions - whether intentionally or unintentionally - and about the action we must take.

"Speaking about climate change is not a matter of intellectual luxury - the phenomenon is an actual fact."

"All the industrial states (are to blame for global warming), yet the majority of those states have signed the Kyoto Protocol and agreed to curb the emission of harmful gases."

"George Bush junior, preceded by [the US] congress, dismissed the agreement to placate giant corporations. And they are themselves standing behind speculation, monopoly and soaring living costs.

"They are also behind 'globalisation and its tragic implications'. And whenever the perpetrators are found guilty, the heads of state rush to rescue them using public money."

But wait! That wasn't Al Gore. It was that other famous global warmist hysterican Osama Bin Laden.

Wha-wha-wha-what?! I hear you say.

You heard me. Osama Bin Laden, or whoever makes those tapes, is reinventing himself as an anti-capitalist, anti-global warming green jihadist.

A Greenhadist, if you will.

Bin Laden hasn't finished with his greenhadist speeches. Oh, you know that's the truth. That was just an intro. This is going to be his Big New Thing.

I'd imagine we will soon hear 'him' delivering forth on how Islam demands respect for nature, and conservation of resources, and, presumably, he will deal away from demanding his followers strike civilian targets in the West and turn their attention instead to corporations. Corporations that cause climate change.

And, presumably, this will also mean that a lot of corporations that have been winding back their anti-terror security in the past year or two, because nobody much believes anymore Al Qaeda are going to charge in their lunch room, will now have to ramp it back up again, to deal with the heavily and seriously promoted new Greenhadist threat.

Laws to deal with eco-terrorism are already in place across most western nation, have been for years, so they'll be easily adapted to round up potential Greenhadists, with plenty of new prosecutions to pursue, and fresh hysteria for the old media and conservative blogs to whip up and froth over.

Put it this way, if you're a young Muslim male with a Naomi Klein-like anti-corporation bent, regularly attends a mosque, donates to Greenpeace, and owns copies of David Attenburrough, Bin Laden and Al Gore videos, you may soon be in a world of shit. Greenhadist!

Oh well, that should make things moderately more interesting for a short while.

Well, maybe. But it will play out like a written script, because some old media, and bloggers, and talback radio, and tabloidia, will not be able to resist, and anyway, they need the content.

The mind spins and surges with the myriad of ways Greenhadism will be devoured and promoted as the Great New Threat by the media, particularly those who adopt faux-conservative outrage because the base material to work from is so much more entertaining, plentiful. And no doubt Bin Laden will supply a steady 'Greenhadist Threat' stream of fresh content.

So, to save local fauxcons valuable brain time, here's some projected headlines and blog post themes for them to get started on. As if they could resist :

One Killer Faith Adopted By Another Even More Deadly

Islamic Greenism : Why Greenhadists Want To Destroy Your Coal Plants

Al Gore No Longer World's Biggest Green Terrorist

Islamic Extremists And Green Extremists Find More Common Ground

George Monbiot Doesn't Know Whether To Kick Bin Laden Or Kiss Him

Kevin Rudd And Bin Laden Agree : Green Terror Faith Must Destroy Our Industries And Your Jobs

The War On Whatever rolls on.



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1980s Prediction : Australia Will Become A World Power...When The Rest Of The Planet Has Been Nuked

This report, from the late 1980s, examines the expected immediate and long-term results of a full scale thermonuclear war.

Here's the local angle :

* Australia is hit by at least 12 warheads (from China and Russia)

* More than 3 million Australians, almost a quarter of the population, is killed.

* 5 out of 6 of all the nuclear weapons in the world are launched, or detonated.

A year after the attacks :

Surviving Japanese military forces have waged attacks as far as Australia in search of food sources.

Okay, so there's far north skirmishes over bananas and pineapples, but compared to the blasted, ash-blown, rat dinner hell hole much of the rest of the world has become, by 2040 things are definitely looking up down under :

Some of the surviving nations have emerged by now as major powers, including Australia...

Yeah.

The full report is a Dr Strangelovian nuke 'em all armageddon-soaked grimorama, occasionally sparkled with a dash of "Yeah, it's bad, but not everybody dies" optimism.

I'm not saying it's a fun read, but it is interesting, particularly as a relic of the Cold War.