GhostWhoVotes relates that a ReachTEL poll, which I take to be its monthly poll for the Seven Network, has Labor’s lead unchanged on a month ago at 53-47, from primary votes of 40.3% for the Coalition, 39.2% for Labor and 10.5% for the Greens. The poll also finds Malcolm Turnbull to be favoured over Tony Abbott by 53.2% of respondents with only 27.7% opting for Abbott (and 19.1% for Joe Hockey), but this is down to a massive disparity between Coalition supporters, 58.6% of whom favour Abbott versus 27.6% for Turnbull and 13.8% for Hockey, and Labor supporters, of whom 76.5% favour Turnbull, 17.9% favour Hockey, and only 5.6% favour Abbott.
UPDATE: Essential Research has the Coalition up 51-49, reversing the result from last time. The Coalition is up two on the primary vote to 44%, with Labor and the Greens each down a point to 38% and 8%.
DTT – The Croatians seem to have faded away.
victoria
Yes opinion polls are heartening. Suggesting keeping this dismal government to one term may be possible.
[Possum Comitatus @Pollytics 10h
That be some serious polarisation of the electorate considering that sample had a ALP/LNP primary votes of roughly equal sizes]
On Abbott’s 5.6% polling of Labor voters.
@TomMcIlroy: Joe de Bruyn stepping down as shoppies supremo http://t.co/WVEplIdllu
[Jan Paul van Soest @janpaulvansoest 16m
These wind turbines really are ruining the landscape, aren’t they? (at Garzweiler Tagebau, Germany) pic.twitter.com/Bvp2XU08FU ]
confessions
Suggests that almost 100% of Labor voters cant stand Abbott
[South-west WA’s winter rainfall has plummeted more than anywhere else in Australia over the past 20 years and there are predictions it could plunge significantly further.]
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/wa/a/21806149/winter-rain-dries-up-south-west/
Article contains other notable facts in the CSIRO report about our changing climate.
victoria:
Indeed.
confessions
Btw what is going on with Troy Buswell??
I haven’t seen it elsewhere or in the MSM but I pointed out a little while ago that one of the negatives of Operation Sovereign Borders was wearing out our Navy before time.
News today in the Oz is that 6 out of the 14 patrol boat fleet has been confined to port following the discovery of major structural cracks.
These are the smaller boats.
It turns out that the design specs were for civilian rather than military boats and that the next gen will be better suited to being out at sea.
I would have thought that the absolutely basic function of a patrol boat is that it can patrol by being out at sea in all weathers.
Not mentioned is that the endless hooling around by the larger vessals is both very expensive and is also wearing them out at rates faster than planned for.
On the previous thread, Sustainable Future wrote:
[“We accept the science of climate change and are committed to action, but…” etc. etc. ]
It’s the New Deal for climate science deniers: they admit climate change is real, and that the science is valid, but then go on to knock down every example of climate change effects that’s put up to them.
It’s the disaster we’re having when we’re not having a disaster.
In a way it’s a positive step. Most of them have given up trying to outright deny the science and have resorted to the fall back position of claiming its findings have no consequences.
They realize you can’t really deny it anymore and at the same time claim to be a responsible politician.
Sure, the outcomes are much the same: climate science institutes defunded, climate change departments disbanded, greeen initiatives discontinued.
But at least we’re further over the hump than we were a couple of years back when outright, proud denial was all the rage.
Ctari
They were Germans actually. That is why I used the term NAZI with its FULL meaning.
The ruling of the International Court of Justice on the East Timor/Australia case makes interesting reading. The Court devised its own “provisional measures” rather than adopting or rejecting those requested by Timor. This still looks like a win for Timor, first because Australia was opposed to any order for provisional measures, and secondly because the Timorese representatives seem to be sounding much chirpier than the Australians in the aftermath of the ruling. The measures adopted were a good bit wider than were contemplated in the undertakings which Senator Brandeis had put forward in an attempt to satisfy the Court.
If, at the end of the day, this all turns to custard for Australia, there won’t be much doubt about who deserves the credit: Australia’s real legal representatives in the hearing seemed especially keen to put on the public record how deeply and directly the good Senator had been personally engaged with the case. This is the sort of thing which can happen when you have a provincial lawyer as Attorney-General.
Courtesy of latika
[PM Abbott on 9. ‘Labor wants to give #Qantas a subsidy, we want to give #Qantas a hand-up, they want to give #Qantas a hand-out.’
7:10am – 4 Mar 14]
victoria:
No idea. The only thing that I’ve seen reported is that he’s on personal leave.
confessions
In a related article poor old BOM in W.A. are having to battle the loons.
[The Weather Bureau in WA says it is increasingly having to defend itself against claims it is “cooking the books” as part of a conspiracy to prove the State’s weather is changing.
…the bureau said resources were being wasted as staff answered questions about the legitimacy of its record keeping.
Some of the claims being made against the Federal Government-controlled organisation were that it was deliberately moving gauges to areas where it rained less.]
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/wa/a/21781220/storm-over-weather-figures/
confessions
In a related article poor old BOM in W.A. are having to battle the loons.
[The Weather Bureau in WA says it is increasingly having to defend itself against claims it is “cooking the books” as part of a conspiracy to prove the State’s weather is changing.
…the bureau said resources were being wasted as staff answered questions about the legitimacy of its record keeping.
Some of the claims being made against the Federal Government-controlled organisation were that it was deliberately moving gauges to areas where it rained less.]
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/wa/a/21781220/storm-over-weather-figures/
pendant
As reported by fairfax
[The decision, is a major setback for Attorney General George Brandis who authorised the raid on East Timor’s Australia lawyer Bernard Collaery, where about a dozen agents swooped on his office and took reams of material, including legal documents, electronic files and a statement by a former Australian Secret Intelligence Service agent alleging an eavesdropping operation on the tiny half island nation by Australia.]
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/australia-ordered-to-cease-spying-on-east-timor-by-international-court-of-justice-20140304-hvfya.html#ixzz2uw8eI7Ke
confessions
It is being reported that Barnett is going to be acting treasurer whilst Buswell takes this leave, but wont say why etc.
Bw
[News today in the Oz is that 6 out of the 14 patrol boat fleet has been confined to port following the discovery of major structural cracks.]
As I’ve said before they have a limited ‘go-fast’ time. Not designed to dash repetitively.
These ones (Armidale) will not last until planned replacement.
The Navy needs to go early with these.
poroti:
You should see some of the quack comments and abuse that are left at the Perth Weather Live fb page from time to time. There are some seriously deranged freaks out there.
victoria:
Barnett is also going with Abbott to China apparently.
Graeme Smith retires
http://www.espncricinfo.com/south-africa-v-australia-2013-14/content/current/story/725109.html
Victoria @ 68: Ticking away in the background is the broader question of whether Senator Brandeis failed to anticipate, when approving ASIO’s raid, that East Timor might take action in the ICJ. I suspect that there may have been a fairly bad stuffup on that front. It’s certainly a bad look when you lose 15-1 in the ICJ on at least one issue, with the only opinion in your favour being that of ad hoc Judge Callinan!
[ Labor party complains government has run out of legislation to debate
‘I’ve never known a government that has so little legislation to debate,’ says manager of opposition business Tony Burke]
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/03/labor-complains-government-run-out-legislation
[Graeme Smith retires
http://www.espncricinfo.com/south-africa-v-australia-2013-14/content/current/story/725109.html ]
He knew the time was right. In his five innings in this series he only faced 68 balls!
For those interested Shorten is on 3aw now.
shellbell@73
He is only 33 as well…..
[ Smith’s decision to call time on his international career will have no bearing on his contract with Surrey, the county have announced. He signed a three-year deal with Surrey in November 2012 and was installed as captain at the Kia Oval. ]
http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2014/mar/03/graeme-smith-retiring-south-africa-australia
I know for a fact that every weather recording station in Russia has been deliberately sabatagued by the Russian Military who do not want the remote telemetry codes cracked by the US, that there has been a secret global campaign lasting for a century and a half to put weather stations as near as possible to the hottest spots, that BOM which is in cahoots with the Russians has been re-arranging Austrlaian weather stations to put them in the hottest spots it can find.
Finally, when BOM gets caught out fiddling with the locations, it secretly hides or changes relevant weather data to make everything look hotter than it is. When they get caught out by honest citizens, BOM lies about what it has been doing.
About the only thing you can trust these days is Cosmic Rays.
Shellbell
[Graeme Smith retires]
A class act.
BB
What the climate change denialists are doing is playing semantics.
They don’t believe that human beings have any impact on the climate, and they regard anything that’s happening that’s unusual as ‘part of the natural cycle’ and that there’ll be a bounce back in the other direction any time now.
Thus they’ve hijacked the term ‘climate change’ to basically mean ‘changes in weather’ or ‘natural cyclic weather patterns’.
Many of them are now confidently predicting a mini Ice Age (that one’s kind of cute; firstly, the scientists who have published the papers they rely on for this see their research as supporting the thesis that it should, in fact, be hotter than it is now and secondly, they predict a 10-20% chance of cooling — the same people who quote their work dismiss predictions made by the IPCC of over 60% certainty as a sign of weakness in the science).
The nice thing about arguing with idiots on climate change is that the whole issue has been studied so thoroughly from so many different angles that one knows the answer is out there (it’s just a matter of finding it..)
[daretotread
Posted Tuesday, March 4, 2014 at 8:54 am | Permalink
Ctari
They were Germans actually. That is why I used the term NAZI with its FULL meaning.]
I think that all the germans who perished in concentration camps for being anti-Nazi would probably have understood your point.
The Right does not have a monopoly on anti-semitism.
surely brandis should resign over this
http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/australia-ordered-to-cease-spying-on-east-timor-by-international-court-of-justice-20140304-hvfya.html
another royal commission post the 2016 election, going back to the Howard era and Downer’s spying during trade negotiations? This is a government that governs for a minority of wealthy miners and other lobbyists and takes the Richardson doctrine (I mean “whatever it takes” – not the latter richo doctrine of “whatever I can take/for sale to the highest bidder”, although that works for the libs) to extremes.
sustainable future @ 83: We should wait and see how the final ICJ case, and the arbitration with East Timor, turn out. If, however, Australia loses in the arbitration because of the spying activities of the past, there would seem to be an entirely reasonable case for an inquiry in the future “to ensure that the right lessons are learned”.
Some ALP or Greens senators should also be putting questions on notice about the total cost of running the ICJ case (including work done in Canberra, travel of senior lawyers to The Hague, fees for Professor Crawford etc, etc), to be followed up in the next Senate Estimates. It can’t have been cheap.
Brandis seems to have morphed from being a SC to becoming a QC. Is this due to Newman’s government reclassifying all Qld SCs to become QCs?
Was this move perhaps initiated by Brandis himself?
Can anyone please tell me if ReachTEL results are fed into Bludgertrack?
I regularly check denialist blogs and comments.
There are several main current lines supporting do-nothing:
1. Call AGW ‘Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming. This provides a general framework for creating strawmen which are demolished with relentless and ruthless efficiency. The general memes are that the the CAGW mob are doomsayers and that their views are extremist. (Naturally any previous failed prediction by anyone in the past two millenium is taken as evidence that the CAGW mob must be wrong. Attacks on the faulty nature of models, observations of isolated examples where things are getting better, on where it is cold here rather than hot, are the norm. Memes like ocean acidification are ignored.
(2) Engage in destructive personal politics with climate scientists, politicians, bloggers and columnists. This engagement serves the number one aim which is to create sufficient doubt amongst the populace to prevent strong support for climate action. All the contumely demonstrates that there is a ‘debate’.
(3) Feed the paranoids. BOM’s siting of weather stations, repairs to the data, emails, what someone in the IPCC said ten years ago are all examples of where CAGW is a vast global world-government conspiracy. The latest, most bizarre example, of this has been the accusations raging that the CAGW adherants are conflating ‘deniers’ with Holocaust Deniers. There is a strong fundamentalist religious, anti-communist strand to this meme.
(4) Sweat the small science stuff. Cherry pick something, erect a strawman, rejig some graphs and off you go.
(5) Keep the scientific ‘debate’ going. Generate alternative brain fart ‘explanations’ for climate change. These range from the hoary climate change has always happened and what we are seeing is natural variability to cosmic rays, thunderstorms, solar activity, volacanos and so on and so forth. The beauty of these is that they can be switched rapidly and that they do not actually have to pass the test of being complete explanations for climate phemena.
The unfortunate reality is that the Abbott Government climate development is being undertaken by a hand-picked clack of elderly white conservative men, including in particular Maurice Newman, who are devoted to any and all of the above.
Hunt is a tattered front.
[http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/wa/a/21806149/winter-rain-dries-up-south-west/
Article contains other notable facts in the CSIRO report about our changing climate.]
confessions
you’re being alarmist :). To paraphrase Tpny Abbott (and Graeme Lloyd from the Oz) “We accept the science of climate change and are committed to action, but there have always been dry summers and dry periods and the fact they are occurring more frequently doesn’t mean the science – which we accept, of course – is, you know, right or anything. There’s a grazier near Oonadatta who says he remembers a really dry spell in the 1950s and I’ll go with that rather than those pointy heads at CSIRO with all their measurements and stuff (Peta, haven’t we sold or shut them down yet?”)
“@coxdan: #ACCC announces it will oppose AGL’s proposed acquisition of Macquarie Generation because it’s likely to result in lessening of competition.”
Our local emergency management team at Council have been informed that there will be another ‘heat wave’ in SE/Central/Eastern Victoria in March with temperatures expected to hit 35+ for several days in a row. It is forecast to be 32 today in Melbourne with temps falling later this week but rising over the weekend and into next week.
I also admire some ‘skeptics’ ability to simultaneously (or in quick succession – Bolt’s articles do all of these from day to day) argue in effect:
1. there is no warming
2. CO2 is not a greenhouse gas
3. of course CO2 is a greenhouse gas, but it magically stops being a greenhouse gas above a certain concentration and there will be no further warming
4. nobody argues there is warming, but it’s natural
5. of course human emissions cause some warming, but it is minor compared to natural cycles /there is low sensitivity
6. any human caused warming will be good for us.
7. CO2 emissions will save us from a coming ice age
8. satellite measurements are the only reliable source of data (they argued this until the satellites clearly showed warming that is only consistent with the AGW hypothesis)
9. land based measurements are the only reliable source of data (they moved to this when they found they could manipulate data to show ‘stalled warming’ because most warming currently is occurring at the poles and in the oceans, and temperatures over land fluctuate greatly meaning it is harder to get statistical significant difference).
10. North american land based measurements are best (other areas are showing warming trends more strongly and there were some hot years in the US in the 1930s that can be used to claim no global warming).
as a scientist, these anti-science loons make me very cross whne they pretend to have considered the science and based their conclusion on this. I detest that they refuse to be corrected – they are akin to creationists arguing about the age of the universe.
CTaR1
They have been casting about desperately to find a ‘reason’ for building something when the last air warfare destroyer is completed.
I would not have thought that patrol boat replacement would fit the bill.
My guess would be a one-off fleet resupply vessel.
Mark Kenny’s opinion piece today has one thing the wrong way around in my opinion:
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/move-appears-more-political-strategy-than-a-practical-fix-20140303-340s8.html#ixzz2uwUEiN6J
[The implications for Qantas of Monday’s political manoeuvre are unknown.
The implications for the government politically are more easily read. It now has a story to tell to voters and a line to bash Labor over the head with.]
It is more likely that Shorten intends to bash Abbott on the head over letting foreigners take over Qantas and send jobs offshore. Qantas, despite its current woes, is still seen by many as an Australian icon and putting it into foreign hands would probably be quite unpopular.
There is an analogy with the NRL, AFL and Cricket Australia. Despite their various management and financial woes at different times, how many Australians would want the AFL etc to be controlled by foreigners, even though those foreigners might possibly bring better management skills and improved finances?
Shorten will play the ‘patriotic’ card over Qantas and, in the public mind, is likely to win the argument.
victoria + confessions
Re Troy Buswell. His , female, chief of staff is also on leave. Could be just taking the opportunity to take time off while the boss is on leave. However given Troy’s track record there will be some questioning looks.
Boerwar
Posted Tuesday, March 4, 2014 at 10:01 am | Permalink
What a hoot:
Brandis scrambling following the AFP imbroglio after Stokes spat the dummy, Famille Corby maintaining their rage against reality, and Ch 7 management waxing indignant at the AFP, and really, truly, Ch 7 is not doing anything wRONg with the classless clueless criminelle du jour according to the public lack of interest test.
Aussie lemmings in a mass shark jumping incident?
Meanwhile, back on your actual planet, the Indonesians are feeling a tad inclined to wacking the peccant pot miscreant back in the slammer for trampling all over Indonesian sensibilities.
poroti
Something to “sniff”?
“@political_alert: ACTU Secretary Dave Oliver will hold a press conference in Melbourne at 11.45am to discuss Qantas #auspol”
[It is more likely that Shorten intends to bash Abbott on the head over letting foreigners take over Qantas and send jobs offshore.]
Which is exactly what he did to great effect on 3aw this morning.
Bw
[My guess would be a one-off fleet resupply vessel.]
A good guess. ‘Tobruk’ was one and in the end was not all bad.
Made it most of the way.