Feb 9 - 2010

The Front Page

The image of Julia Gillard crying in Parliament was a strange one. The last few years have portrayed Gillard has a wooden, emotionless individual, coolly calculating in everything she says. Her "wooden" handling of the recent flood crisis generated criticism from many areas. Then, suddenly she is weepy at the opening of Parliament. My cynical side says the whole thing is an act, carefully calculated as a political move. There is of course a chance that there were some honesty yesterday. Perhaps she had been bottling this kind of emotion for years. I find it very difficult to believe that this was a true side of Julia.

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Glad to see somebody exposing the costs of keeping asylum seekers, and this is a term that is used very loosely, in high-class accommodation including four and five-star hotels. Chartered aeroplanes and all of the costs of administration and up to a very expensive bottomline. At the same time nothing is being done to stem the flow of boats from Indonesia and Malaysia.

The treatment of Tony Abbott by the Seven Network shows just how low our leftist media has become. Having served in the military off-hand comments far worse than that tracked down by the reporters are made on a regular basis and understood for what they are. The really sad part about this story is that Abbott should start slamming into the media. I would have immediately asked the reporter if it ever served in the military and if he hadn't I would have ridiculed him making insinuations about things he knows nothing about. I note that the colonel wasn't interviewed or asked any questions simply because he would have backed up a version of the media networks didn't want to hear. As a sidenote the shaking was saw from Abbott was a combination of anger and adrenaline. The reporter was lucky he didn't cop one in the nose, he certainly deserved it. This kind of gutter journalism and media coverage is becoming sadly typical of our networks which is why I very rarely watch them any kind of news any more. What's the point.

So eating junk food before the age of four and lower IQ. In general feeding junk food to kids at a very early age intuitively sounds dumb anyway. The part of the report that will be glossed over his eating habits after the age of three appeared to make no difference to IQ.

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Even less surprises from the NBN installers. They lay cable down the middle of the street underground and then string a bunch of aboveground to the houses. When questioned about this by the residents nobody ever showed up to explain. The worst part of this story is the apparent inability of the installation company to confirm if that particular area have duplication of infrastructure. This is of course absurd and a manifest lie the plans will show this kind of thing quite clearly, that the plans are supposed to be for.

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The world in general has been very poor when it comes to the handling of Burma. Brawl of the human rights violations, and democratic violations the ruling junta has been involved in over the past decades but no real action.

The truth of the Lockerbie bomber is that he was handed over to live a free and clear life. Three months to live is turning into years and every day he remains alive is a slap in the face of the victims of that tragedy. The Labour government failed miserably over this one is certainly well within the consistency of a leftist ideology.

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Sorry Ziggy but the New Scientist is not a respected magazine in many circles. It consistently publishes unverified articles on global warming. The contention that the world can move to unreliable and non-baseload power supplies but at the same time increase population is of course absurd. Our current population levels are based on a ready supply of power if that is taken away a huge amount of pressure is then placed on the population. Yes technology evolves rapidly but there is always a danger in believing that the newest technology in the lab will ever reach public distribution will be feasible. Things always look so much better in a controlled lab environment than they do in the real-world. There are of course many exceptions to this but to bet the whole planet on as yet untested and unproven technologies is just silly.

Page 15 – Letters

Good short editorial on fires pose difficult questions.

Good to see so many people writing in about the expense and technologically backward, going forward, NBN project. Good letter by James Goding. Rubbish letter by Alan Cottrell. Standard ad hominem letter about Tony Abbott. Good point Chris Roylance the editor should cut out such letters, coincidentally including yours.

It is always fun to see the associations that people make between two things. Statisticians do this all the time even when there is no real relationship. Letter writers do it all the time because some people seem to lack the ability to process logic. Instead random things are tied together in their minds and the vitriol flows.

Adam Bent is a classical example of making associations between in this case weather and climate. He is yet another of those who have read none of the scientific materials and blindly believe everything the political arm of the IPCC has said in the past. I wonder if he knows how many senior contributors and reviewers of that group have long since changed their stance and their position on the issues. Perhaps if he did, and many others like him, the dots he is joining together would provide and demonstrate a completely different picture.

Sen Bob Brown on the other hand is simply an idiot. Who else would use a phrase like baseline solar power?

So, no research on GP services before super clinic sites were chosen. In other words the whole system was one big political flag. No surprises there.