Slight movement back to the Coalition on the BludgerTrack poll aggregate this week after a soft result for Labor from Essential Research, which together with a Queensland-only result from Galaxy was the only new federal poll this week. This causes a 0.3% cut in the Labor primary vote and two losses on the seat projection – one in New South Wales and one in Queensland. Essential also had leadership ratings this week, and while the weak result for Bill Shorten hasn’t made too much difference to the poll aggregate reading, the difference is sufficient to put Malcolm Turnbull back in the lead on net approval.
Good morning Dawn Patrollers.
Peter Martin on the view of economic nerds of the effect Trump will have,
http://www.smh.com.au/comment/what-if-the-nerds-are-reading-donald-trump-right-20170217-guf6fp.html
Peter FitzSimons’ weekend pot pouri.
http://www.smh.com.au/comment/theres-a-correct-response-to-hearing-fake-news-20170217-gufl8r.html
I simply can’t understand this set!
http://www.smh.com.au/victoria/more-than-20-drug-overdoses-at-melbourne-dance-party-many-critical-20170218-gug4vk.html
Trump further escalated his attacks on the news media Friday afternoon when he tweeted that outlets like the New York Times, NBC, ABC, CBS and CNN are not his enemy but are “the enemy of the American People.” The man has a problem – and it’s not the media!
http://www.smh.com.au/world/donald-trump-calls-the-media-the-enemy-of-the-american-people-20170218-gug3so.html
Lenore Taylor jumps on the preciousness of the Big Mining lobby. Worth a read.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/feb/18/john-mccain-savages-donald-trump-administration-inability-separate-truth-from-lies
A good article from Mark Kenny on the West’s blind support for Israel.
http://www.smh.com.au/comment/the-wests-blind-support-for-israel-has-done-it-no-favours-20170217-gufj41.html
Netanyahu insists that the Palestinians be kept stateless and, since Trump seems to believe whatever the last person he talked to alleged, likely Netanyahu will win out.
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/trump-plots-to-keep-palestinians-stateless-forever,10036
The Church of England in Britain – and the rest of the world – edges closer to same sex marriage. Slowly. Alan Austin reports.
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/the-church-of-england-in-britain-moves-closer-to-same-sex-marriage,10033
John McCain is fed up with Trump and his administration’s lies.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/feb/18/john-mccain-savages-donald-trump-administration-inability-separate-truth-from-lies
Twitter users hit back at Trump’s attack on the media and “fake news”.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/2017/02/18/twitter-users-show-donald-trump-exactly-why-the-media-is-notthe/?utm_hp_ref=au-homepage
Section 2 . . . with Cartoon Corner
The US Federal Bureau of Investigation is pursuing at least three separate probes relating to alleged Russian hacking of the U.S. presidential elections.
http://www.politicususa.com/2017/02/18/u-s-inquiries-russian-election-hacking-include-fbi-probes.html
John Howard’s rushed decision to commit us to the Joint Strike Fighter is still looking fraught.
http://www.canberratimes.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/joint-strike-fighter-head-defends-17bn-purchase-despite-software-delays-20170218-gufzrs.html
The NSW government has confirmed that it did not check whether Australian employees were suitable to fill 32 computer software jobs, which its contractor filled using overseas workers. Nice.
http://www.smh.com.au/business/workplace-relations/nsw-government-passes-the-buck-over-hiring-of-it-workers-on-457-visas-20170207-gu7hpk.html
This is what Trump is causing to happen.
http://www.smh.com.au/world/migrant-crisis/nobody-cares-about-us-family-flees-us-border-patrol-to-seek-asylum-in-canada-20170218-gufwjk.html
Turnbull said he has turned down an offer by his New Zealand counterpart to take 150 refugees from Australia’s offshore detention camps, opting to concentrate on its pending deal with the US. Mustn’t upset his right wing or PHON.
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/turnbull-rejects-new-zealands-refugee-offer-to-focus-on-us-deal-20170218-gug4r5.html
The mining industry spent $2.5 million pushing the case for “clean coal” in the run-up to last year’s election, electoral funding records have revealed. Who says we don’t need to tidy up the rules on political donations?
http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/mining-industry-tipped-millions-into-preelection-clean-coal-campaign-20170216-guf3x7.html
Mike Pence widens the US rift with Europe over NATO defence spending.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/18/mike-pence-widens-us-rift-with-europe-over-nato-defence-spending
Mark David and a Turnbull transformation.
Ron Tandberg and Trump’s wall.
Great work from Mark Knight and Trump’s reconfigured press conferences.
http://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/f87b985ad706b82d1235faa474e33a7b?width=1024
Malcolm is now attacking Labor for being ideologues. Pot and kettle, as usual.
http://www.theage.com.au/comment/malcolm-turnbull-ideologueinchief-20170216-guekmg.html
Question
Bravo! Although surfing wouldn’t be my choice. There was once optimism that technology would give us all more leisure time and shorter working hours. It was not expected that the employed would be working many more hours and there would be higher unemployment.
A R @ 11.07pm
“I too though it was strange that body-/slut-shaming Pam Anderson seems to be in-bounds. Particularly amongst a group that had an extended debate about whether or not it was okay to call a known drug-cheat a drug-cheat, on the basis that having the label (accurately) applied to them could cause psychological distress.”
Yes A R.
Tonight C@t, Confessions, and Zoomster once again were in accord to ward off any challenge to any one of them.
No-one here should be misogynous, they have argued for years ……regularly as clockwork when it comes up every 6 weeks or so.
I have no interest in them personally …. they are only pixels representing alphabetical shapes on my screen. But over the years of posting and lurking here I have developed an aversion to hypocrisy and will call it.
Nowadays I usually wait a day or so to allow time for those who have often strongly promoted a particular point of view, to point out when that point of view is again totally dissed. However I have discovered that whether or not there is a challenge depends on which poster has dissed the original point of view …. this hypocrisy I then point out.
The response is to attack me …. snark, troll, superiority complex, stalker etc, and to minimise the issue.
I will continue to challenge this. I look forward to the creative addition of more titles of abuse to describe me.
BTW as most posters and many lurkers know, my posting interests here are far wider than commenting on this type of issue. Like many others, I put time and thought into a number of substantive posts each week …. the most recent area being my descriptions of, and opinions about the child abuse RC.
And also as many lurkers and posters will have observed, I do not engage in personal abuse despite receiving it in generous proportions. Nevertheless I do sleep well each night.
Bemused
I you want to get cars off the rad Perth have got it wrong.
In Melbourne the commute takes less time by train; it is that simple.
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/324779/australian-pm-accused-of-'weasel-words'-on-kiwi-detentions
The reason? Peter Garrett called Pauline Hanson “ugly”.
The PHONy senator must spend a lot of time trying to think of ways to hit the headlines.
psyclaw
Racism exists; that does not make all comments about people from different races racist.
Racism exists; that does not make someone who calls out racism in one instance and then criticises someone from a different race the next a hypocrite.
I personally assume that when someone makes a misogynist/sexist/racist comment, they are doing so unknowingly – that they have expressed themselves clumsily, or I have misunderstood their point. In which case, pointing out that they’ve written something which can be interpreted as sexist or whatever gives them a chance to explain that no, that wasn’t their intention.
If someone then gets miffed, instead of clarifying their position, I can only assume that they were being sexist/misogynist/racist or whatever.
Reading your posts and bemused’s, I get the impression that you believe in misogyny in the abstract but have never actually come across a single example of it in real life. Which is something you should think about.
When Turnbull first rejected the New Zealand deal, I thought it was on the basis that ending up in NZ would be no deterrent for those contemplating hopping on a boat. Now that he has gone for the US deal – on the basis that it’s a one off, so hopping on a boat doesn’t mean you have a chance of ending up in the US – there’s no reason why he couldn’t take the NZ deal with the same provision.
lizzie
When my father was on the boat coming out to Australia in 1947, he thought that no one would work more than three days a week, and that the rest of the time would be spent in education/training, so that the workforce would be constantly upgrading its skills.
Good Morning
As I have continually asserted that it is affordable to go off grid today I thought I should post a link to some costs.
http://goingoffgridforlife.com.au/off-grid-cost-estimate-table/
As you can see from the full time use its about the same cost to set up as buying a car.
Therefore renewables are more commercially viable than a car as you don’t have the running cost of fuel.
I hope that eliminates assertions renewables are not commercially viable
Barnaby Joyce is not a happy camper going public telling Christensen not to resign.
How long before we get our next minority government? Days? Weeks?
BK
The Melbourne situation is drug deaths could have easily been prevented. If we had listened to doctors like we did with Hiv/Aids harm reduction would rule and pill testing and injecting rooms at the minimum would be in place all over Australia preventing deaths.
Monsieur BK
I thank you for your work with the Dawn Patrol.
Today’s rendition is only mildly depressing and I will now be able to look forward to the line of thunderstorms approaching from the (quickly finds his prismatic compass) west , with only a little anxiety.
I now attach “cow” emoji plus a couple of others for no particular reason; apart from demonstrating to Don that I sometimes get the numbers right without having to pay out additional staff with choccy frogs.
Cow
🐄
Bat & Ball
🏏
Guitar
🎸
Bye for now. :really big happy smile emoji : 🙂
Guytaur
Re going off grid.
I appreciate why people would like to go off grid, that it is now affordable and practical, and that the current high prices and market structure are driving this, but it is undesirable.
The grid is a major asset (flogged off by “superior economic managers” in some states) that is required if we are ever to have a truly democratic, efficient and equitable distributed energy market.
If a large number go off grid this leaves those such as renters, the poor, and any entity without adequate space or capital stranded in a high priced energy market.
The solution is feed in tariffs that reflect real wholesale market pricing and the ability to sell power to whoever wants it.
a lot of these numbers are raw numbers and as you know the statistical analysis system doesn’t work that way
Zoomster
My father had to be sponsored, so that he had a job and a home provided immediately.
Trog
I agree with you. However by highlighting the off grid cost and how affordable it is I think that destroys any argument about the commercial availability of renewables.
To keep the asset of the grid just let the person sell the power to the grid you get a lot of power sources all over the country feeding into the grid. This reduces the need to build any new power plants as homes become power producers.
So not only do you save on the power not being used in the house but that house exporting power to the grid adds to the available energy to the grid. I think its insane (my definition of the climate deniers) not to take advantage of that.
Its certain that if fair market prices were paid councils state governments would be installing at the very least to make some revenue. Sydney Council is not alone in seeing the economic benefits.
Greg Jericho analyses Turnbull’s latest show of weakness
https://www.theguardian.com/business/grogonomics/2017/feb/19/housing-affordability-off-the-agenda-again-as-turnbull-shirks-the-tax-challenge
lizzie @ #7 Sunday, February 19, 2017 at 8:00 am
Well she’s certainly not attractive in a physical sense but she is ugly in a philosophical sense.
Guytaur’s comment about off grid also raises another issue.
When governments in SA, Victoria and recently NSW sold off their power grids, or portions thereof, detailed contracts would have been put in place with the new owners re service levels and the new owners would also have sought guarantees re future revenue.
Tax payers need to understand the full nature of these commitments, the extent of future liabilities in dollar terms and the effects of these contracts on our required transition to a smart grid.
From last night …
cud chewer @ #1914 Saturday, February 18, 2017 at 11:21 pm
Oh, I think you will.
That’s fine. I will type slower for you in future.
Same argument you alt-lefties always use when someone uses actual figures – “that modelling is already out of date”. In this case, my source for cost data was all of two months old, and was originally presented by you alt-lefties to support your arguments, not mine. In fact, what it shows is that your solutions rely heavily on unproven technologies, and are also the most expensive.
As long as by “gradually” you mean within 15 years, then I can agree with this.
Don’t worry – Iron Man will save the day!
Or is it Tony Stark that is going to do it for us this time? I always get the two confused.
The “business as usual” type scenarios (by which I mean relying on twin mantras of “the market will save us” and “technology will save us”) will get us to 450 PPM C02 within 15 years and 500 a few decades after that. But hey – at least those few of us who survive will finally have a really neat energy grid!
Zoomster
“Reading your posts and bemused’s, I get the impression that you believe in misogyny in the abstract but have never actually come across a single example of it in real life. Which is something you should think about.”
I bow down to your omniscience. I will come to you for all further advice. Which is something you should think about.
P1
Read and learn.
http://www.smh.com.au/business/comment-and-analysis/australia-positioned-to-be-renewable-energy-superpower-20170216-guf55r.html
Psyclaw thinks their comment on the last thread so good they have put it up again.
However, Psyclaw, why don’t you, instead of blowing smoke up your own behind, and looking everywhere on the blog for reinforcing arguments that support your position, actually take the time to provide a balanced argument that takes ALL the evidence into account? As I have said recently, only poor prosecutors try to win cases based upon a distorted view of the facts.
Speaking of facts, you have just stated this:
Whereas, if you had considered everything that I said about the matter of Pamela Anderson you would have noticed that I issued a retraction of my original point of view about her and her looks based upon some research I did.
But you keep fighting the last war, that seems to be about the only speed you are capable of. Contemporary engagement in real time, not so much.
Finally, as zoomster said, you appear incapable of distinguishing between a gossip mag level of comment and true derogatory remarks. Maybe you need to go back to your Psychology textbooks and read up on these topics? It might stop you going off half-cocked next time. As I said, you are not June Dally-Watkins and you do not set the rules of engagement, especially over such a trivial issue which you think directly compares with other weightier examples.
And if you think you can haughtily parade around the names I append to your behaviour as an example that you are some sort of superior being on the blog in comparison to me, then I think that just makes you look incredibly thin-skinned, or pointlessly malicious in search of some sort of justification for your attitudes towards other posters here who were, at the end of the day, making the greater point about Assange. Which you appear conveniently to have overlooked completely.
And bravo to you for your ability to write more thoughtful, longer posts, especially about the Child Abuse Royal Commission. So do others, but they don’t seek to give themselves a medal for doing so. You really should get over yourself Psyclaw, because the impression I get is that you think you are so much better than many of the other posters here, as particularly evidenced by your nom which lets us know how qualified you are every single time you post.
You are, simply put, no better than anyone else. And your opinions are just, as you said in your snooty way about others, just pixels on a page.
Though, I will add, continue pointing out the ‘hypocrisy’ of others. As I will continue to point out you ignoring the mote in your own eye and your own inconsistencies. As I’m not going to be shamed into silence by someone who thinks they can be a censor.
Btw, Jenny Mikakos is doing a fantastic job. Hasn’t resigned. Has sorted out the problem, along with Premier Andrews. 🙂
cat
Those gossip mags are derogatory to woman a lot of the time. Those gossip magazines along with fashion magazines are responsible for creating images of beauty for woman that cause eating and other disorders.
I get where you are coming from. However I felt it important to point out the role of these magazines as they get excused too often.
Frydenberg is very smooth and I don’t trust a word he says.
Cassidy making good points here.
Frydenberg continues the denial.
It is reported in WA this morning that Turnbull will tell us later today that money for freeways cannot be diverted to rail if labor wins the state election.
We’ll see how that plays out.
Also reported that his activities here include a a $10,00 a head fundraiser for 20 guests
A man of the people our prime minister
Josh Frydenburg just admitted that power prices WILL go up if new Coal-fired power stations are built! Especially if they are the new Carbon Capture and Storage ‘Clean Coal’ type.
So the Coalition’s whole argument about Renewables pushing up power prices is bogus!
Cassidy much more argumentative than usual!
From BK’s links …
Anyone in the industry will tell you this has been going on on a significant scale for decades now. All the big consulting companies (I have worked for several) have been quietly slipping in cheaper overseas personnel to replace qualified local staff. There was no shortage of IT skills in Australia – but if there isn’t by now then there soon will be, as locals have been forced out of the industry in droves.
Lizzie,
Frydenberg is very smooth and I don’t trust a word he says.
He’s a strong performer for the government, to be sure. However, if you listen closely it can be unpicked. 🙂
For example, I’m going to look for news stories from the Labor years that stated that ‘Carbon Capture and Storage’ and ‘Clean Coal’ were a furphy.
Back to Insiders. 🙂
Another of BK’s links …
What a cracker!
I stop paying attention during most political interviews. Insiders is no different. This goes for all parties across the spectrum. We learn nothing and the interviewees just spew party lines.
They’ve missed that the economics has shifted decisively in favour of renewable energy, as Professor Ross Garnaut, of the University of Melbourne, pointed out at an energy summit in Adelaide last October.
C@Tmomma
Cassidy: But what about dealing with carbon’s effect on climate change?
Frydenberg: Carbon capture will deal with that.
Duh? What, all of it????
Lizzie, carbon capture and storage is a little like low tar cigarettes. We all know that that stopped smokers getting lung cancer!
Savva talking utter crap.
Thats about One Nation.
Exposing herself big time in credibility terms.
Savva not going well against the rest in defending Pauline.
Morning all. Thanks BK for today’s Dawn Patrol.
John McCain continues to attack Trump, this time over his attempts to shut down the media:
Even I don’t think The Greens are Extremists in the same way that One Nation are!
Anyway, Savva just belled the cat. It’s only because PHON are supporting government legislation that they are copping to PHON now.
ides of march @ #35 Sunday, February 19, 2017 at 9:26 am
Indeed.
You are clearly not alone, as so many are disillusioned by the representation in Canberra as shown in the polling.
Bludgertrack shows movement to the Coalition and further humiliation for Bill shorten in the PPM stakes.
How on earth is charlatan Malcolm Turnbull so much more preferred as PM ??
Not that I’m advocating for Albo, but how long before he or some other resigns from the ALP front bench and mounts a leadership challenge… ?
Talk about belling the cat
DaveNorgate: This notion that Labor policies are unfunded is ridiculous. Government has tripled the deficit. None of their policies are funded #insiders
“The danger of burning coal: 1912.
Rex :
Shorten lacks charisma and has shit delivery with some decent policy. Turnbull has charisma but better delivery with shit policies. I imagine he has better ratings for PM because a lot of people are still slightly hopeful he might show the old Malcolm. Shorten is not in danger of being replaced however. Labor is happy to sit quietly while the governments leadership falls apart.
Neither can I BK. I find myself asking more and more, why should we keep worrying about these idiots. They get more than enough warning about the dangers of what they are doing and still they persist. There’s only so much you can do to try and protect morons from themselves. You reach the stage where it is hard to find any sympathy for them.
When a tragedy inevitably strikes (as it may well do here) the people I feel for most are the bereaved loved ones who have to live the rest of their lives with an ache in their hearts that will never go away.
The problem isn’t that interviewees just spew party lines, but that we don’t seem to have many good interviewers in our media.
Darn
Well said.
What I object to as well, is the use of the word ‘overdose’, implying that there is a safe level of these drugs. Why do young people think that the only way to have a good time is to be drugged (or drunk)?
Well Mark Kenny gets it!
1. We don’t (MediCare Levy excepted) have hypothecated taxes.
2. Therefore, when a Govt runs a deficit, NOTHING can be said to be funded.
3. It is just nonsense to single out any single program, such as NDIS, and say it is unfunded and imply everything else is funded.
Above is my words but pretty much what Mark Kenny expressed.