Mood:  irritated

Great Australian land clearing Hoax

Compiled by David Paull [Sept 2007]

02 68424940

·        Land clearing laws have not stopped Australian land clearing as all efforts at compliance have been ineffective.

·        Official satellite monitoring figures are suspect, as monitoring systems underestimate all vegetation clearing.

·        Official clearing approvals continue at rates similar to that before the introduction of new Native Vegetation legislation

·        Any real decrease in deforestation are more likely due to the fact that natural vegetation systems are fast disappearing and are becoming more endangered

·        This is all in the context of global warming.

Every year since 2002, the Federal Environment Minister has put out a press release to accompany the publication of the National Greenhouse Gas Inventory stating that Australia is “on track” to meet the target set under the Kyoto Protocol of an average of 108 per cent of 1990 emission levels over the period 2008-12.

Because of good agricultural conditions, the late 1980s and early 1990s happened to be bumper years for land clearing, particularly in Queensland. This raised Australia’s emissions in the Kyoto base year of 1990 by about 30 per cent, making the 108 per cent target far cheaper and easier to achieve. Due to the Australia clause, any reduction in land clearing could offset emission increases from burning fossil fuels.

This is precisely what has occurred. Between 1990 and 2004, emissions from most sectors have sky-rocketed. For example, stationary energy and transport emissions increased by 43 per cent and 23 per cent respectively. However, these increases have been offset by a 73 per cent decline in emissions from land use change, providing an apparently respectable 2.3 per cent increase in overall emissions.

But has land clearing really stopped?

Posted by editor at 1:59 PM NZT

Updated: Tuesday, 1 January 2008 6:33 PM EADT

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Mood:  special

We have been doing our best to catch up the press after the frenzy of political wonkiness during the APEC week earlier this month of Sept 07. Our fat file is in the high draw of the filing cabinet on top of another cabinet.

But we had to seek out and link these two unusual contributions, one by Phil Burgess a US expatriate high level Telstra executive with some embarrassing things to say about security protocols, at least apparently because we don't necessarily agree with second guessing the effectiveness of their covert ways. Did they already know it was Phil Burgess, a very distinctive chap in the first place. Here is his piece in The Australian main opinion page and its quite a lark:

Chaser cut to the charade Phil Burgess | September 10, 2007

The other whimsical article well worth clipping was poor Mr Paul O'Sullivan. Not just any citizen but chief of ASIO, possibly offline at page 9 Monday Sept 10 2007 by Sian Powell:

Osama gets in, but not the ASIO chief

"ASIO chief Paul O'Sullivan was refused entry into two venues during APEC leaders' week in Sydney, but an Osama bin Laden lookalike in a fake Canadian motorcade was waved through two police checkpoints.

APEC security was a bizarre combination of the laughably incompetent and the overzealous, critics say.

The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation said Mr O'Sullivan was not inconvenienced by the suspicious officers who blocked his entry into the venues. "It was a minor administrative detail, quickly worked out," a spokesman said yesterday."

We don't second guess effectiveness of what covert operational activities the security agencies are involved in, because we don't by definition know. But we note this book published with the help of our grandfather Eric McLoughlin as a senior journalist with the Sydney Morning Herald back in the mid 1950ies which according to the key spy who brought Petrov over from Stalin's Soviet was none too impressed with the ASIO forerunner called ASO back then.

Reading between the lines fluent Russian speaker Michael Bialoguski thought ASO were thick, culturally unsophisticated, arrogant pseudo Brits, and he was on the same side given demise of his Polish family under the communist heal in the 1940ies. On the ASO side they thought he was a double agent. Tricky stuff.

Posted by editor at 8:58 PM NZT

Updated: Wednesday, 26 September 2007 10:11 PM NZT

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Mood:  quizzical

The trouble with drought relief is that it props up unviable farms. The Australian recognises the terrible pressure a drought puts on individuals, families and communities, but drought assistance is a government intervention and as with any government intervention, it distorts the market. So long as farmers in marginal agricultural enterprises know that the Government will bail them out, they defer the difficult decision to cut their losses and leave the land. Whereas other unviable industries go to the wall in the face of changing conditions, there is an assumption that farmers should not be allowed to go broke, and if they do, they should be given assistance to exit the industry. When droughts break, as the always do, new entrants go in, enjoying the good times and then expecting a handout when the next drought hits.

Sadly, the lead up to a federal election is no time to expect rational economic decisions, but this is what is required. Handouts to unviable farms are a drain on the public purse and on scarce resources such as water, and by putting subsidised products in the market, they make it harder for viable farms to survive. [bold added]

Posted by editor at 8:15 PM NZT

Updated: Tuesday, 1 January 2008 5:22 PM EADT

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Mood:  incredulous

Picture: p1 Australian Financial Review 24th Sept 07. There go the civil liberties online?

It was surreal as dawn events often can be. Seven am Phillip St Sydney. 10th floor of the Supreme Court Building. Missing my sleep.  Lawyers badge on in case of wire cage barriers. Blinking at the sombre procession of barristers, protesters, media, the Beak, senior coppers. Far below on the steps we saw banners, face paint, police on bicycles, and plain clothes Australian Federal Police, one of whom gave me a card by way of sussing this community media practitioner out.

We gave the card to David Marr of the SMH later on that day as he nipped around gleaning here, gleaning there for his sketch pieces.

 It was early September and still cold.

So this was democracy.

And then there was Mr X. Quite chatty and enthusiastic He was an interested onlooker in the gallery sticky beaking at proceedings on the way to somewhere else in the Court building perhaps. Many people wanted to know if the Stop Bush Rally was going to be allowed during this super security conscious APEC week.

"What's your role in all this?" X asked. "Community media" I slouched. We got to chatting. He trusted me a bit. Gave me his card too. Then he shared this little gem as we moved away from Big Ears who gave me the other card:

Seems about 2 years ago AFP chief Mick Kelty had allegedly been at a conference of legal big wigs and gave a speech. He talked about the age of errorism and he let it out that he had been having informal chats with judges along the lines

- you don't understand, these people are capable of things you wouldn't believe

- you don't know what these people are really like

- you are going to have to adjust your thinking and make decisions appropriate to the times of much greater security.

At least that was the gist of it as I understood the allegation. Which is very interesting. Because if it is true it suggests an old boy/girl network of extra judicial lobbying outside the well worn processes of evidence in the legal system, complete with upcoming anti terrorism cases. To save the village by autocractically changing the village, openly or otherwise. The power behind the facade of the ballot box? The old Ken Livingstone book comes to mind: "If voting changed anything they'd abolish it"

It also resonates with some speeches the sainted Mick Kelty is reported today about yet more changes to our legal system needed to ensure (perfect?) security in what has always been an uncertain world:

Prevention is better than crime

Mick is a clever CEO all the same. While pushing the conservative buttons on the Coalition side, on the other hand he is spruiking the risks of climate change to security in the 21C which would be music to the ears of the ALP, as reported here on ABC AM this morning:

Police Commissioner enters climate change debate/ The Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty has labelled climate change the biggest security issue of the century and he's detailed the problems he sees caused by global warming.

Yep Kelty is a contemporary man, but is he too contemporary to stick to good legal process and norms of democracy? Is he indeed a very political figure in a police uniform playing both sides of the street, and was it ever thus anyway?

Posted by editor at 3:13 PM NZT

Updated: Tuesday, 25 September 2007 4:10 PM NZT

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Mood:  surprised

....Mr Abbott said the election campaign would be about Mr Rudd's political character, not his personal character, and that he was not interested in news that the Labor leader had had a heart valve replaced 14 years ago.

"It's his credibility, not his heart, that's the issue," he said.

"It's his political character that's in question, not his health."

The clash came after Sydney's The Sunday Telegraph newspaper reported that a Howard government minister was a homosexual who visited gay bath houses and was married to a woman as a front to hide his true sexuality.

Veteran Nine Network television reporter Laurie Oakes told The Sunday Program that he had heard the same claim, but from a Liberal Party source.

The source who last week told The Australian about Mr Rudd's heart operation 14 years ago has denied doing so as part of a political conspiracy to hobble Labor's election hopes.

The Queensland health professional - who passed information about Mr Rudd's medical history to one of this newspaper's journalists on Monday - yesterday admitted being a Liberal Party member, but denied acting at the behest of anyone else.

In particular, the source denied discussing the matter with any party official or MP - despite Opposition claims that the surfacing of the rumours in a Nine Network news bulletin was the work of a Liberal Party dirty tricks machine.

"There's no Liberal Party plot here as far as I'm aware," the source said yesterday. "It's an absolute nonsense."

.............

Postscript #1

We have just noticed this subdued headline the day before in The Australian at page 21 of the Saturday issue by Franklin's superior on the food chain there, Dennis Shanahan, which reveals similarly the real Liberal Party member fingerprint, but 'no conspiracy': "At the heart of a conspiracy theory" possibly offline.

Posted by editor at 2:46 PM NZT

Updated: Wednesday, 26 September 2007 8:57 PM NZT

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Mood:  lyrical

Marrickville film festival last weekend 14th and 15th September at Addison Rd Centre was a goer by the looks of things. We missed the Friday night event too tired after 7 hours solid digging, sawing, composting etc. The programme sheet indicates 18 movies about 5 min each. On the next night we noticed about 150 people for the outdoor screening of ‘They’re a Weird Mob’. Mmmm. We  recognised the large projector screen, if not mistaken, from a certain giant Qantas dumpster near Wolli Creek railway in late 2002 rescued by moi. That’s the spirit of The Composter alive and well.

Apparently the film nights reflect a WW2 tradition of out door screenings on the same grounds.

Posted by editor at 7:25 PM NZT

Updated: Monday, 24 September 2007 10:55 AM NZT

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Mood:  rushed

Why would Minister Nelson raise Pine Gap in a boring speech to cruel the scheduled 2pm question time of the last day of the last parliament before the election in 2007? To cruel the radio and web based ratings for the Opposition in their last attack perhaps, while the ABC tv perversely prefers senate question time? To symbolically show who's still boss? To try and wedge peace nik Peter Garrett MP again?

Nelson is fillerbustering as we speak, with a compulsory response by the Opposition Minister to confirm support for the Australia US alliance. More bleeding of listener numbers.

Picture: Peter Costello as PM heir apparent looks very worried about colleague Defence Minister Nelson crashing the scheduled start of the last question time of the last parliament of the Howard 2007 govt. He smells perhaps a very damaging final question time, which indeed has turned feral as we write.

In our press media catchup today we noticed some other startling political lurches in this "feral" last week of parliament as World Today's Eleanor Hall has called it today.

Notice Malcolm Turnbull getting a semi snub here from the sainted Al Gore, while Turnbull is outed by Miranda Devine seeking to display her inside knowledge of serious Liberal Party hierarchy, as Janet Albrechtsen was seen to do from her perch at The Australian recently by calling for Howard to stand down as PM.

We also noticed that this latest of several recent tub thumps by Piers Akerman in the Daily Telegaph today about the shredder in the Heiner affair from back in 1990 is about to become a whisper. A whisper? How so?

Meanwhile the big boys in the News Ltd broadsheet The Australian, yesterday noted a senior Liberal figure with high legal standing and the editorial both junked the Heiner scandal as in any way relevant to the suitability of Kevin Rudd as alternative PM. There goes that tactic in the Big Conservative press.

But Akerman runs it anyway next day in the sister Sydney Daily Telegraph desperate for an arrow to hit, while Gary Linnel formerly a 9 news chief, and other new chum to the SDT Steve Lewis but an old hand in the News Ltd stable has been sent downstairs from The Australian, to both do political reporting there. Get the picture? Akerman, Linnel, Lewis all in on the one national affairs bench at the SDT along with Malcolm Farr who regularly posts front page stories. 

That's too many fat *rses for one bench we suspect, well due for a generational change in the age of handover?

Methinks Akerman should assume the position and brace, as the wheels fall off his last pro Howard gambit on the old desperate Heiner matter, a tragedy no doubt but also long gone history.

And thus it seems wiser heads have realised a new attack on Rudd was needed, so switch to the health of Rudd's ticker as here?:

Rudd forced to defend his ticker

and

I had same heart op as Arnie: Rudd

10:55am | Kevin Rudd likens himself to Arnold Schwarzenegger, following revelations about a heart operation 14 years ago. 

Sure enough this govt on its last legs is fast expiring, are getting nasty and dangerously wild as per this confusion of Iraq war legal service and Nazi death camp guards:

AM - Labor seeks Phelps sacking for Nazi comment

Picture: Rudd makes his 'I have a ticker' speech with great vigour, rival Tony Abbott desperately tries 'relevance' points of order, as Rudd quotes the Phelps Nazi slur story above. The damaging question time Costello feared at the outset?

The cartoonists are noticing the strange factor too with a growing vivisection/mutant theme first Moir, now Leak here

Now Anthony Albanese as 'leader of Opposition business' has been named and evicted for 24 hours from the last question time after going for broke calling the chair "an embarrassment" for allowing another speech by PM Howard for 10 minutes in their question time, and thus 'reflecting on the chair' as the jargon goes. More precious question time lost but maybe running a little interference on the PM's choreography too.

And now John Howard PM has the floor virtually quoting chapter and verse the old Karl Rove Republican method of puting up a smear at your own guy (allegedly smear of Rudd over his heart operation by his own ALP) and then blaming Howard's side for dirty tactics. The allegation by Howard he's the victim of such a Karl Rove trick does sound a bit neurotic. It sounds like a bit of a projection of his own side being quite interested in such trickery. A complex confusing mind game well understood by wonks but not the general public.

Here is an example via google of presumably a right wing attempt to do 'a Karl Rove' on lefties at indymedia alleging Howard's old man was a Nazi who fought in WW2, which obviously he was not. For a start he fought in WW1:

The Truth about John Howards Dead father | Sydney Indymedia

The story has been 'hidden' by the editors but might be found (?) in their hidden archive? We posted on that story string before it was hidden, hence the memory of it, saying it had an iffy Rove like nature to it and factually totally baseless. The bare google listing can be found with search terms "howard father nazi indymedia" proving it did exist once.

It was posted on the 'IMC' from memory about the time Dr Peter Phelps got in deep doo doo for his desperate Nazi allusion directed at ALP candidate for Eden Monaro Mike Kelly at a public meeting. An attempt to run interference to save Phelps? To road test a 'Karl Rove' on the Left or ALP via indymedia in Sydney? Who really knows. These mind games are so vexatious.

And then it was all over, and the MP's were off to defend their seats at the election?

Posted by editor at 4:09 PM NZT

Updated: Thursday, 20 September 2007 7:43 PM NZT

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Mood:  chatty

It's becoming apparent how intense the electioneering has become with a seriously difficult battle for both sides. Rudd as ALP leader was impressive with his communication skills this morning, as Howard is but alot older, and thus less vigorous prospects.

We also got these electioneering materials recently from Anthony Albanese in the mail in Marrickville, and from the Green Party off a pile off a big print run by Cr Chris Harris, 'Deputy Lord Mayor' of City of Sydney:

Posted by editor at 11:56 AM NZT

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