The Minister proves he has become a politician… and a good one. ‘Never put off until tomorrow what can be left till the day after’ is a good lesson for a politician, and one that Environment Minister Peter Garrett seems to have learned well. This Minister, with perhaps the most difficult job in government, is handling the issue of the northern Tasmanian pulp mill with consummate skill. Putting off a decision was the best way of reconciling the irreconcilable pressures to be both green and pro-development. With any luck, Minister Garrett will not have to deliver a final verdict until after the next election and he might even avoid the need to do so altogether. The financial pundits seem to think there is every chance that Gunns Limited will not be able to arrange finance for the project. Certainly it would be a brave financier who committed the necessary multi-millions while uncertainty remains about the impact of emissions from a mill in to Bass Strait.
An award winning example . Any doubters who wondered whether The Australian really deserved to beat the London Daily Telegraph and the Wall Street Journal for the Real Climate title of “the most consistently wrong media outlet” should have a quick read of this morning’s op ed piece “The warmaholics’ fantasy“.
Another hot one. The annual temperature figures for Australia show we had another hot year in 2008. Data collected by the Bureau of Meteorology indicate that, overall, Australia’s annual mean temperature for 2008 was 0.41°C above the standard 1961-90 average, making it the nation’s 14th warmest year since comparable records began in 1910.
Readers of The Australian, or course, will be able to ignore all that having been told an adjunct professor of virology that all the historical figures are nonsense. But back to the Bureau: Most regions recorded a warm year overall, apart from Queensland, northeast New South Wales and the Kimberley. Particularly high temperatures were recorded across inland Western Australia and the Northern Territory in January, as well as western Victoria and southern South Australia in March, with a record-breaking heatwave during the first half of the month. Conversely, cool temperatures were recorded in southeast Australia during February and again in April, across most of the country in August, and across the southwest during November.
When it came to rain the overall Australian mean rainfall total for 2008 was 466 mm, close to the long-term average of 472 mm.
Banging the deficit drum. Peter Costello, I notice, is banging on the evil deficits drum as if this Labor Government is going to undo all his good work by acting to try and stop the country going down a depressionary gurgler. The former Treasurer took a moment while speaking at the annual KPMG Couta Boat classic yacht race in Sorrento to say the Rudd Government was set for a “challenging year”. “I think the Government will find it’s much harder to build financial strength than it is to spend it,” he told the assembled corporate yachties.
Meanwhile in the United States, the recent recipient of the Nobel prize for economics was publishing something of a nightmare scenario in the New York Times where it takes Congress months to pass a stimulus plan, and the legislation that actually emerges is too cautious. “As a result,” wrote Krugman, “the economy plunges for most of 2009, and when the plan finally starts to kick in, it’s only enough to slow the descent, not stop it. Meanwhile, deflation is setting in, while businesses and consumers start to base their spending plans on the expectation of a permanently depressed economy — well, you can see where this is going. So this is our moment of truth. Will we in fact do what’s necessary to prevent Great Depression II?”
If politicians listen to the likes of Peter Costello and Malcolm Turnbull, with their continued desire to portray deficits as inherently evil things, then I guess the horror scenario might actually come to pass.
Check the microphone is off. New Year’s Eve took on a special flavour for watchers of CNN when comedian Kathy Griffin kept talking while the network went to an ad break.
You can catch it on YouTube here.
Actually I think some context is favourable to The Oz here. And I’m not their friend on this.
They ran a page 1 small low on the page story last week 1st of January in fact “Cool 2008 warms climate debate’. Okay so this was pathetic pandering to the sceptic readership on their day off. An indulgence with spill over on page 3 making it clear it was till pretty hot actually.
So then on the weekend we have their veteran reporter Mike Steketee, with balance his strong suit, in “Sceptics skip the long view”. This is a big balancer on 3-4 Jan of a good 2/3 page size cartoon and graphic of 1850 to present.
And today they do run redneck Jon Jenkins who from memory was the Outdoor Recreaction Party here in NSW (?). But it’s down the bottom grudgingly of the Op Ed page almost dismissed, and is offset by another strong story by Asa Wahlquist on page 3 about “La Nina’s cool can’t beet the heat” top of page 5 with angry red graphic, similar to Farmer above here. So actually The Oz are pulling their weighta again. Not before time folks!
That’s a pretty fair reportage of the issue and better than we have seen in the past from The Oz. Keep up the balance – for everyone’s survival I say. The reduction in global dimming is really quite scary as the GFC downturn removes the umbrella over India and China. God have mercy.
Staggering! Again I am dumbfounded by Richard Farmer’s charade as a journalist, he may have been a good adviser to three Labor leaders but he is still a monkey when it comes to be a journalist.
There is ample debate over the merits over the global warming and climate change craze that has the world in a tiz, and perhaps people like Farmer need to be open to alternative views instead of simple stepping on other thoughts. It is a typical approach of the left in politics – if you don’t agree then condemn.
Yes, we need to do more to protect the environment, there’s not a sane person alive who would disagree with that, but we also need to understand what is happening so we don’t rush blindly at stupid solutions that provide no real answers.
Jon Jenkins seems from the blyline to be pretty well credntially to analyse the stats, why does this make The Australian the most innacurate newspaper in the world? As long as Crikey rolls our crap from this blokes fingers without a bias or opinion disclaimer it must surely get close the title. It just doesn’t come out in print…
Nice broadside as Cossie too… pity every example in history of governments trying to buy an economy out of trouble have suffered dire consequense.
Err, and since I’ve hoist the ‘context’ petard above, in favour of the Oz I feel obliged to add now I have just reviewed The Oz edition of December 17 08 which was a real shocker on global warming. Front page banner “Industry revolt on green plan”, and Albrechtsen pushing her hopeless sophistry . I’m lawyer too Janet but I also did a science degree and you are so hopelessly out of your depth on that. But she gets it right on the politics – the ALP were never sincere, and she might have added it was all about the wedge of Libs and Nats.
(Mark Arbib took The Wedge out for another spin, like westie down at Bondi, last Sunday in his piece in the sister redneck paper the Sunday Telegraph. The same paper that gives serial boofhead Pell a free rein. Yet Pell is gagging a bit on the green Pope installing photo voltaic solar cells.)
Same page as Janet there is a laudatory piece by Paul ‘Every Sperm is Sacred DLP Man’ Kelly describing Rudd’s “genius” on ETS as a “huge fiscal churn” like Howard’s GST but with less impact.
This Dec 17 edition of The Oz alone – when the polity were still in session (though packing the beach towels), meaning high reach and influence – would justify the ‘worst media outlet on climate issues’ award, corroborating Farmer above.
You know what Paul, if you ever read this. I am grateful because you crystalise, just as Tony Abbott in The Oz again of course, has today also. That Rudd like Howard is a smart arse. I learnt from real local government politics in harness that the People don’t like smart arses. They like good faith. They like intelligence. They like honesty. And they like hard work. But actually they hate smart arses. Which is actually the underlying reason they voted Howard out. So when Kelly praises Rudd as Howard, that’s a losing formula for the ALP in time. And a winning formula for the Green Party who can only get more professional not less especially with critical mass now
Oh and for completeness on the Dec 17 Oz edition.
The editorial attacks everyone else in the quality media, such arrogance, over climate in “The Green Gospel/ Australia sinking – hold the front page”. It is woefully misconceived and poorly argued. For instance 30% of global emissions are from countries as small or smaller in share of the total as Australia at a mere 1.5% or so. All those countries will take an example from rich Australia on what to do. That’s a big impact for SME nation Australia. But the Oz editorial gives us a free pass despite very excessive per capita emissions. That’s ugly and irrational. Ironic they should lecture the rest of the media sector about “propaganda” in the last word of that editorial.
And if you doubt Australia’s influence on international diplomacy as Small to Medium Enterprise (SME) in today’s The Oz they run a feature op ed calling on Australia to act in concert with a handful of Europeans as “guarantor” of a civil new Palestinian state. But I thought Australia were geopolitically inconsequential? The Oz can’t have it both ways. Well they can as hypocrites.
I was reflecting on Malcolm Turnbull this morning. Am I wrong in thinking that he made a fortune as a merchant banker, especially with Macquarie Bank. At the moment the business plan used is highly on the nose Macquarie looks quite shakey. So why should anyone take any notice of what he says about finance.
I can say one nice thing about him – his teeth are lovely.