Category: Politics
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Climate conspiratology
Climate denialism has taken a turn for the worse. I say this with great trepidation, of course, because it was never an especially pretty sight to begin with. A substantial number of private emails from the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia have been retrieved and published online without permission*. One…
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Wilson Tuckey, supergenius
Kevin Rudd must secretly love Wilson Tuckey, in the way that one might value a psychopath who happens to inhabit the enemy bunker and can’t actually fire a weapon. In other words, Tuckey plays right into Rudd’s political message. Perhaps feeling a little defensive over all the condemnation of his [intlink id=”935″ type=”post”]boat terrorist hypothesis[/intlink],…
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It’s teh boat terrorists!
The existence of Wilson Tuckey is truly an unnecessary contribution to the heat death of the universe. Quite predictably, he suggests that terrorists are lurking among asylum seekers arriving by boat. Sayeth the Great Purveyor of Entropy, himself a convicted criminal: If you wanted to get into Australia and you have bad intentions what do…
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The Liberal war
Costello is quitting politics, Wilson Tuckey isn’t quitting politics, Peter Dutton (the shadow health minister) has had politics quit on him. Turnbull is the voice of (relative) sanity in the Liberal Party, but not many – either in the Party or in the wider population – seem inclined to listen to it. Some seem to…
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The American hypothesis
I have a hypothesis on politics – a somewhat unfortunate hypothesis given its implications. Roughly speaking, it’s this: the workability of democracy diminishes with large populations. I’m not talking about the logistics of holding elections, but about the ability of society to engage in meaningful debate. My reasoning goes like this. Insofar as I can…
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Asylum statistics
One of Amnesty International’s media releases reports on a survey of Australians’ knowledge and opinions on asylum seekers. However, the point of the media release is clearly to highlight some of the facts themselves, not just the extent to which people are aware of them. This seems reasonable, given that: The opinion poll also showed…
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Did you miss me?
Oh… I see. Well, same to you with extraneous attachments. Nevertheless, after a short and somewhat unintentional break, I’m now ready to inflict myself upon you once more, hapless reader. I shall commence by drawing your attention to the fine specimen that is federal MP Wilson Tuckey. (A fine specimen of what shall be left…
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Recycled drinking water
The recycled water issue has arisen here in WA, where our state water minister Graham Jacobs has come out as a proponent. There is nothing wrong with recycled drinking water. Surely all the water we drink has been through the digestive systems of a hundred million organisms over the history of the Earth anyway. Hence,…
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Even hypocrites can be right
Julie Bishop is making the case that Stern Hu – the Rio Tinto executive mysteriously detained in Shanghai – should be released after having been detained for 7 days without charge. This is just a bit rich, considering her party’s time in government saw: the excessive detention for months and even years of completely innocent…
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Same-sex marriage bill
Senator Sarah Hanson-Young of the Greens has introduced the Marriage Equality Amendment Bill 2009. It’s been referred to the a Senate committee, due to report on November 26. Plenty of time for a raft of both enlightening and cringeworthy commentary to materialise as public submissions. The bill isn’t going to get far, of course (though…