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Take a Deep Breath

On this subject of carbon trading and suggestions that the government is not doing enough. Well, I’m not convinced. Thing is there is a bunch of legislation already passed that deals with the obligations of organisations to publish data about the energy levels they are consuming, the energy they are producing, and the emissions they are generating as a by-product. That legislation has a significant impact on these bigger companies out there (and ok, it’s a smaller number of companies but it is the industries that matter when we do the numbers). So right now those big industries (including those constitutional companies that we don’t talk about much) are doing the stuff necessary to meet the legislative reporting requirements (and this is both a cost for those organisations and a economic stimulus for those other organisations providing the info-technology to support this).

So if we project out into the future a couple of years from now – we will be seeing the emergence of data coming from out from major industry players. For any one of these players chances are we are talking about hundreds of millions of dollars in potential liabilities (with or without an ETS). Factor into this equation the emergence of an ETS irrespective of targets (because the target is partially academic if we look at the end-game). What is more important is the putting in place of the mechanisms – because once you have the reporting mechanisms in place then, and only then can you start playing policy with the economic configuration (a.k.a. tweaking taxation dials and whatnot). With those mechanisms in place (and I can’t emphasise enough that the establishment of those reporting mechanisms is what is really important here) you turn a page of the management equation – only then can you actually start to manage the problem – and only then can we start to be responsible – companies (even the big polluters) will start to understand and factor into day to day decisions the economic consequences of operational decisions.

The reduction target does not matter (at least today) – because today – today we are just grappling with the problem of capturing the information about what we are doing. Two years from now and the federal government will start to see numbers that are meaningful (as in the Australian Federal Government will have the initial numbers of the flows of energy and the emissions from individual companies and those constitutional corporations at a level of granularity that will make your head spin). But that time-point is important but it’s not what we need – what we actually need is trend lines. We need a few years to get to the point of understanding the picture of what is happening in Australia. It is from this perspective that I think that less is more – because what Australia does in emissions production is not the issue, what is much more important is what Australia does in establishing the regulatory framework from which we can demonstrate a national comprehension and from that – grounded and concrete actions – based on national facts that are linked to national corporate entities – that implicate national employees – that change union policies – that generate informed local opinion.

Australia is not a global leader on this issue – but the Australian Federal Government is working on fundamentals that are critical for a responsible solution. Targets and levies are just numbers and dials – what is more important is establishing the machinery capable of responding to adjustments, and the machinery capable of returning accurate and reliable feedback on changes.

We are heading in the right direction.

And take a deep breath – because we still have a way to go.

774 replies on “Take a Deep Breath”

Well one thing for sure it is not April 1st.

Russian Military Analysts are reporting to Prime Minister Putin that US President Barack Obama has issued orders to his Northern Command’s (USNORTHCOM) top leader, US Air Force General Gene Renuart, to “begin immediately” increasing his military forces to 1 million troops by January 30, 2010, in what these reports warn is an expected outbreak of civil war within the United States before the end of winter.

According to these reports, Obama has had over these past weeks “numerous” meetings with his war council about how best to manage the expected implosion of his Nations banking system while at the same time attempting to keep the United States military hegemony over the World in what Russian Military Analysts state is a “last ditch gambit” whose success is “far from certain”.

http://www.eutimes.net/2009/11/obama-orders-1-million-us-troops-to-prepare-for-civil-war/

I couldn’t stand it! I haven’t been near a computer since last year! I was suffering from withdrawal symptoms!
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Happy new year everybody!
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Well a happy new decade to all you wretched ticsters who have kept me from honest toil for the last 2 years. :mrgreen:
Here’s a timely reminder that the TV doesn’t have to be full of boring arseholes, talking about how marvellous the Sydney harbour fireworks are simply the best ever.
Behold something as awful as the Eurovision song contest, from a century far far away……and then weep at what passes for “entertainment” in our current climate.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4M2hEXdnvs
Oh yes….and lest we forget……Fuck George W Bush, and Tony Blair, and that miserable bogan in the green and gold track suit, who mistook his wife for William Pitt the younger, and who’s greatest dream was to wear the baggy green cap 👿

And so say all of us,Paddy!
Happy New Year, ticsters, and a big thank you for the humour, sanity and toons 🙂

Paddy it still boggles my mind why the Irish call it River dance when they are on a solid stage. If they were dancing on a river…………….???????? :mrgreen:

Great New Year erryone.

715
EC
That is exactly what what Jen suggested that Danziger one. I did not think you would do it. :mrgreen:

The Playing Field
According to the very latest House race ratings, CQ Politics sees the midterm election playing field at 102 seats, of which 70 are currently held by Democrats and 32 are held by Republicans.

For comparison, the Rothenberg Political Report finds 61 competitive House seats in the country, including 47 Democratic seats and 14 Republican seats.

Similarly, the Cook Political Report says Democrats currently have 38 seats listed as Lean or Toss Up while Republicans have just 11 seats in those categories.
http://politicalwire.com
We’ll see how smart these guys are!

Turd blossom has ditched his missus or she has probably more than likely ditched him.
Speculation is rife that he can now start the new year with his new lover.

But maybe Turd Blossom’s luck is about to run out. We learn about discovery of the missing Bush e-mails on December 14. We learn about Rove’s divorce on December 29.

Curious timing.

Darby Hickson Rove is an Alabama girl. And we don’t grow no stupid girls down here in Alabama.

Could our gal Darby be thinking: “You know, it sounds like these new e-mails might be enough to send Tur . . . I mean my beloved husband . . . up the river to some pound-me-in-the-ass prison. (Tip of the hat to a film classic, Office Space.) I think it might be time to hit the exits, with a substantial sum of hush money in hand.”
The Web already is aflutter with speculation that the divorce could mean Rove will finally hook up with GOP gay hunk Jeff Gannon.
A Rove-Gannon connection certainly is titillating, and it recalls this classic piece of reporting from Dotty Lynch of CBS News.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/What-s-the-Real-Story-Behi-by-Roger-Shuler-091231-750.html

Avatar is getting great reviews via Facebook. I noticed an article somewhere (which I should have posted here) that the right wing media have attacked it. (Not surprising). I will be interested in seeing if people make the connection between Avatar and what the US does in other countries. I will be more interested in finding out what my right wing friends (yes that right, I have some), say about it. Not that I will pre empt them with info about it.

I am wondering what is taking Kevin Rudds broadband so long to get moving. I might ring around a few Liberal offices to see if they can tell me. At least that way, the Liberals might start asking questions about it. This may get things moving. 😈

gaffy at 716 you’re spot on, that theivin’ bloody Sep toon artist stole Jen’s enhanced codpiece idea! These people know no shame.

Btw, anyone who got off on James Ellroy’s American Tabloid, will dig his latest and last in the trilogy of American top-shelf thugs, fixers and history-changing events from the late fifties to 1974. He writes like “There Will Be Blood” played on the silver screen. Titled, “Blood’s a Rover”, it requires less of a mental effort to access than The Cold Six-Thousand, the second in his trilogy. As a longtime obsessive about AmPol, cinema, history and literature I find his writing riveting. The way Ellroy weaves his narrative, if he were writing about Uncle Sammy and Sepdom in the noughties, we’d have not only intimately been appraised of the pecadillos of the recent whackees in Kabul, hed tell us exactly how all the heroin makes it out of Afghanistan to market to market….

Jan 1:
http://news.yahoo.com/comics/matt-bors

Knicker-Odium: Numero Uno, Bay-Bee, in outsourced, compulsory entertainment!
http://editorialcartoonists.com/cartoon/display.cfm/80086

Stumblebum Spooks:

All Company personal were urged today to go the extra mile to help keep Americans safe from “homegrown” as well as global acts of terrorism.
“Why do they hate us?….because we’re free!!”, a Company talking-head said yesterday in a thousand thoughfully placed grabs on Fox Info-News….
http://editorialcartoonists.com/cartoon/display.cfm/80203

Have no illusions about it, the “under-the-rope” ka-boom in Kabul this week has been a monster blow to Company prestige. Company Strategists are still divided over”The Message” sent by the explosion. No one has yet suggested that that message might possibly be:

“We live here. We can bag you turkeys anytime we want to.”

fyeo; burn after reading

HOW TO SCREW BIG BANKS LEGIT: sorry, Mr. Chase Sachs-Fargo, yer money’s no good around here anymore.

Have Mega-Mammonists Scored a greed-driven, elimination own goal?

Sep-side, political movements are traditionally contained by Babel-heads, functionaries and factota of those with vested interests in the status quo.
Movement of money back to communities is a revolutionary act in these times of The Big D.C. Fix.
Very smart move this, from Huffy & Co. Only a matter of time before K Street’s MSM blurter-shills start calling Community banks, Commie Banks. 🙂

Like irony, little fish are sweet….. and as Platinum Stratos Dwellers are about to tumble to, an essential part of the bio-fiscal food chain.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Icqrx0OimSs&feature=player_embedded

Of course if significant global investors in “Greenbacks uber alles”, especially large oil and gas buyers pick up on the trend, the empire Sep will tumble a lot sooner than expected.
Why invest in Unobtainium anyway?

2010 Election Situation Grows More Difficult For Democrats.
An already difficult situation for Democrats in Congress is worsening as the 2010 political season opens.

To minimize expected losses in next fall’s election, President Barack Obama’s party is testing a line of attack that resurrects George W. Bush as a boogeyman and castigates Republicans as cozy with Wall Street.

Four House Democrats from swing districts have recently chosen not to seek re-election, bringing to 11 the number of retirements that could leave Democratic-held seats vulnerable to Republicans. More Democratic retirements are expected.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/02/2010-election-situation-g_n_409320.html
I notice there is someone in the comments backing up my theories. 😈

Way OT I know….But let’s all give the annual Whirlpool Internet survey a visit and record your likes/dislikes about the state of play in Oz on the intertubes.
It can’t do any harm, and who knows, that clunker Conroy might even pay attention.
(But I won’t be holding my breath!) :mrgreen:
http://whirlpool.net.au/survey/

Dec 28:
http://news.yahoo.com/comics/donna-barstow#id=/comics/uclickcomics/20091228/cx_dba_uc/dba20091228

Catroon as metaphor. Like Chris, I think the “surprise package” is the Mid-Terms. The Kid has blown off quite a bit of his political capital by pissing of the netrooters who guaranteed his success in Nov 2008. A lot of younguns and at least one old fool I know will not be so keen to crank into campaign support mode come the run up to the Mid-Terms.
http://editorialcartoonists.com/cartoon/display.cfm/80222

Crist begins decade fighting poll numbers.

Charlie Crist’s final year as governor begins like no other: with perilous poll numbers, his optimism worn thin and his shell of political Teflon deeply scratched.

After two years of governing Florida by shrewdly gauging the prevailing political winds, Crist strayed off course as the economy spiraled downward in 2009, his nice-guy image no longer effective as a balm for frustrated Floridians.

He miscalculated the danger of his “man hug” with President Barack Obama in support of the Democrats’ stimulus package. He signed a no-new-taxes pledge only to raise taxes weeks later to balance the state budget. And the biggest contributor in his campaign for U.S. Senate, Fort Lauderdale lawyer Scott Rothstein, was charged in a $1.2 billion Ponzi scheme.

By year’s end, his Republican Senate rival, Marco Rubio, had gained ground as a conservative alternative.

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics/florida/story/1407167.html

Wikus Van De Werve , “Relocation Meistre”, shows Seth Efricans live-to-air how to deal with a denant who gums the raw brawn.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjA6f2XLu8I&feature=related

Saw the trailer a few months back and passed on the film because I figured lead man Wickus one fuck-wit I could live without….. and I’d seen all the FX before.
Well gang, Ecky the Expert couldn’t have made a worse cinematic call.

Zo now ah’m delling yew id’s a gorker of a villum!

Dotally Youge.

This ex army elitist should renounce his Seppo citizenship and move to Australia where he would be an instant boon to TAbbots racist, bigoted, sad liberals and could make some coherent policy on boat arrivals. 😉
Where does Roo find these Pillar of knowledge bastards?
What a racist one eyed bastard. What about strip searching all the young women as well? :mrgreen:

On Fox News Saturday, guest Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney (retired) offered a radical solution for improving national security. “We have to use profiling,” he said, “And I mean be very serious and harsh about the profiling.” Then McInerney proposed the United States should strip search all 18-28 year old Muslim men at airports.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/03/fox-news-guest-strip-sear_n_409545.html

From the votemaster.
Happy Election Year!

If you think 2009 was a politically active and contentious year, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. While the midterm elections are never as exciting as presidential elections, there are so many hotly contested races coming up this year–starting as early as March (the Texas gubernatorial primary)–that there will be plenty of food for political junkies. At some point we will start updating the map with polling data, but it is much too early now. Case in point. In May 2009, Gov. Charlie Crist (R-FL) was leading former Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio 53% to 18%. A Rasmussen poll taken two weeks ago puts them in a tie at 43% each. By the August primary, who knows where things will be.

http://www.electoral-vote.com

EC, glad to see you’ve caught one good flick lately. District 9 is indeed a gorker of a villum.

Jen
No doubt you will be happy to hear that TAbbott has hit the streets running with a new blog to save Oz. He is pining for the roll out of the new NBN so it all happens faster for him. :mrgreen:

Most of the replies are big hugs for him but one is not.
At least one person tells it as he/she sees it. LOL.
He/She is a bit reserved by comparison.
Just can’t quite say Fuck Tony Abbott.

“The Coalition will have a strong and effective policy to cut emissions”

Yeah right, and SlaveChoices is dead and you’re not all set to go for the creaming redneck vote over asylum seekers………. Sorry Tony, but you have “form”

The Coalition can’t even work out what it thinks about the issue to start with.

You’re on record as saying “it’s crap” and Reichsfuhrer SS Minchin is on record as claiming it’s all a communist plot.

You’re talking insincere bullshit Tony and you know it and the knuckle draggers in your party know it. About the only Liberal telling the truth is Maalcolm Turnbull and look where that got him.

I look forwad to the Abbott led bloodbath in 2010 something like 20 metro seats alone that you’ll lose, and deservedly so.

There just aren’t enough ignorant gullible rednecks (core Liberal Party support base thanks to Howard) to save you this time Tony.

Adrian B (Reply)
Fri 11 Dec 09 (08:53am)

David.
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Rasmussen vs The Rest

I keep seeing Rasmussen polls cited in the usual Republican outlets. Maybe their selection bias really does represent the people likely to show up in next November’s mid-terms better than other polls. But the discrepancy between their findings and everyone else’s seems to be widening, as the GOP keeps up its campaign to bring down this presidency. Here’s Rasmussen’s Obama approval chart in the last half of 2009:

We have now established that two sources you quote are both Republican biased. Rasmussen and Real Clear. I am not suggesting a conspiracy here. 😈
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/12/rasmussen-vs-the-rest.html

Chris B,

Um, now. Your paranoia has perhaps established in your mind that they are all out to get you. I go by Nate Silver, who believes that Rasmussen are the best pollster – precisely because they talk to likely voters, while most of the other pollsters talk to any old shmuck.

Further, all polls have moved pretty much in step, showing a serious decline in Obama and general Democrat support. I hope that the Democrats are taking this decline seriously, and ignoring those like yourself who are saying it is all a product of rigged polling …

Chris B,

Yes, I did look at the evidence. I have actually spent the last half-hour examining the data statistically.

I looked at 15 different pollsters, having a look at the rate at which they show Obama’s approval rating decline.

The average rate of decline among those 15 pollsters over the last 12 months was 1.7 points per month. Rasmussen shows a 1.6 point decline per month in Obama’s approval rating.

In other words, Rasmussen shows Obama’s approval declining at a slower pace than the average pollster, showing no increase in gap between Rasmussen and other pollsters. The differences between the pollsters in fact has been maintained consistently.

The two polls furthest from the average were USA Today (showing a decline of 3.5 per month) and Democracy Corps (showing a decline of .8 per month). All pollsters except USA Today are well within two standard deviations of the mean, with most pollsters clustered around the average (12 of the pollsters lie between 1.4 per month and 1.8 per month).

There is no evidence of a problem with any pollster (on this particular metric) except USA Today.

Hey, I never said he wasn’t in decline. From where Obama was, the only way was down. Regardless of that, Rasmussen is a right wing pollster and Obama will win big in 2010, unless the Democrat Party is stupid. I doubt that very much. Using the Ronald Regan method of blame Jimmy Carter. The Jeff Kennett method of blame Joan Kirner the Malcom Fraser Method of blame Gough Whitlam, the Bob Hawk method of blame Malcolm Fraser (shall I go on)? In that style, Obama will have no trouble blaming the worst president ever. Also, I think each of those people would have had a drop in the polls before their big landslide second term wins.

Interestingly enough, the pollster used by DailyKos is showing a faster decline in Obama’s popularity than Rasmussen (not statistically different though.

Can you define what you mean when you say ‘Right wing pollster’? The implication that I am reading into that is that you think that they dodgy up the numbers in favour of the Republicans. There is zero evidence that they do so, so can you clarify what you mean?

By the way: the reason that I looked at rate of decline was the claim made in the post that you linked to that the difference between Rasmussen and other pollsters was increasing over time. If the rates of change of a pollster is the same as for another pollster, then the difference between them will remain constant. And the rates of change are statistically identical for all the pollsters I have examined (16 now), except for USA Today. So that claim is refuted.

So Mr Rasmussen is right-wing. I knew that. Everyone knows that – he does not hide it.

The question is: does Rasmussen fiddle their data in such a way as to show the Republicans doing better than they are?

Answer: there is no evidence to support such a hypothesis.

I would also question *why* any polling company that supported a particular party *would* fiddle the books. Despite popular misconceptions, there does not appear to be any benefit to doing so, the whole ‘narrative theory’ notwithstanding. I have seen no evidence that opinion polls alter opinions.

gaffhook@748
good for him. Mind you the shorthand version as you said puts is succinctly :mrgreen:
Possum has an interesting thread on religion and politics … Abbott may find even his God ain’t gonna get him over the line.

Also –
I am puzzled by Obama’s fall in the polls. Did anyone really think that one man could single-handedly end the wars , global warming and the financial crisis that he inherited- did not cause.
Surely reality must prevail here. His willingness to negoitiate while not giving the jihaadists free reign, negitiating with the intransigent middle eat, and trying to manage environmental armageddon while his country and the world is in a finacial basketcase requires juggling that means keeping all the balls in the air while standing ona 3 legged chair. So far he is managing this. Remember the altrenaitive approach. It’s what got us here in the first place.

Happy New Year ticsters

Cmon David, surely you aren’t arguing that polling companies aren’t politically aligned and indulge in agenda setting?

Of course Rasmussen is a Republican arm. Just like Essential Report is a Labour Party arm and Newspoll is a Liberal Party arm.

You only have to follow politics and campaigns to see the obvious.

The Zombies guy is working on a political book at the moment. Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter. 😈

Comments are closed.