Google Trends: Obama outranks God in 2008

A little bit of weekend silliness courtesy of Google Trends.
From Washington to Raleigh, English-speaking American internet users were more interested in Barack Obama than looking for God.
Whereas God did John McCain down every time.
Has Google predicted the outcome of the 2008 US presidential race?

*Obama *God

A Sunday smile from the blogosphere

Popped up at Speak Media

Who's taking who for a ride?

Last month I went by cab from Ryde to Mascot domestic terminal, cost $72. My fare from Mascot to Coffs Harbour was $69 with Virgin Blue Airlines.

Now we find that our incompetent governments are allowing our taxi companies to increase their fares as a result of an increase in fuel prices.

Most of the cabs run on gas, my question is, "with all of our huge gas reserves who's taking who for a ride?"

Appsie
Clarence Valley

Guest Speak is a North Coast Voices segment allowing serious or satirical comment from NSW Northern Rivers residents.
Email ncvguestpeak at live dot com dot au to submit comment for consideration.

Another skirmish in the war against bloggers

Excellent post on the Associated Press (AP) move to charge bloggers fees for what appears to be legitimate fair use quotes:
Lauredhel at Larvatus Prodeo.

Of course when the mainstream media takes a breaking news story straight from a blog and syndication has it turning up on multiple newspaper sites (eg., a North Coast Voices blog entry posted at 00.15am AEST on 12 June 2008 about Trujillo's legal letter to Wikipedia) one doesn't actually see them jumping up and down with glee at getting a story for only the effort of rewording the original post and making the odd 'phone call, but I'm sure that editors love such low-cost articles.

The majority of Australian blogs at least acknowledge where their information is sourced from and, for the most part, try not to breach any copyright which might be thought to exist.
I agree with Lauredhel - AP is trawling for increased revenue.

Bucket rating for Associated Press:





Postscript
AP has a history of asserting an incredibly broad definition of copyright.
In 2003 it sent a Cease and Desist letter (found at Chilling Effects) which read in part:
Therefore, any use of AP content on your Internet site, whether verbatim, rewritten or simply as a source for information contained in another story, can infringe AP's copyright, and other legal rights....
AP demands that you remove any and all AP content from your Internet site, including any archives, as well as from any site that mirrors or caches your site, that you cease and desist all use of AP copy -- whether verbatim or rewritten -- as well as all use of the facts contained in AP material, and that you confirm for me that you have done so within fifteen days from the date of this letter.

Pull the other one, Nicola - it has bells on its tip

Graphic from The Age.

Minister for Health Nicola Roxon has rather breathlessly endorsed the fat bomb thrown by the Baker IDI
Heart and Diabetes Institute into the middle of the Federal Government's Inquiry into Obesity.
Is there nothing that Our Nic doesn't think is the end of the world for Orstralya as we know it?
More people are likely to die from the effects of social isolation, poor medical services outside the big cities and a lack of access to public dental services, than will turn up their toes because of a bit of a belly and a double chin.
If 4 million Aussies spend a lifetime being seriously obese that may turn into a public health problem, but it is much lower down the average voters list of health fears and immediate problems.
Out here in rural and regional Australia we're just as likely to die because of a lack of highly trained doctors and adequate health services.

US08: Will the real Barack Obama please stand up?

Yesterday Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama was quoted on his approach to the misnamed US War on Terror and Osama Bin Laden.

"What would be important would be for us to do it in a way that allows the entire world to understand the murderous acts that he's engaged in and not to make him into a martyr, and to assure that the United States government is abiding by basic conventions that would strengthen our hand in the broader battle against terrorism," Obama said.
Obama was questioned about bin Laden after he met with a new team of national security advisers. The meeting came after rival John McCain's campaign said Obama had a pre-9/11 mind-set for promoting criminal trials for terrorists.
"I refuse to be lectured on national security by people who are responsible for the most disastrous set of foreign policy decisions in the recent history of the United States," Obama said in opening remarks that in part referred to the Iraq war. He was standing before 17 American flags and a sign that said "Judgment to Lead." He was surrounded by national security experts who had formerly served in Congress and the Clinton administration and will be advising his campaign — an effort to bring foreign policy experience to a candidate who has served just three years in Congress. [my emphasis]

This aforementioned quote is supposedly Obama now.
The excerpt below was Obama quoted in the New York Post less than a year ago.

Presidential candidate Barack Obama warned yesterday that he would use American forces to invade U.S. ally Pakistan if its leaders weren't doing enough to catch terrorists on their soil.
"Let me make this clear. There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered 3,000 Americans," Obama said.
"They are plotting to strike again . . . If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President [Pervez] Musharraf won't act, we will."
The stunning call to arms against a U.S. friend comes less than two weeks after Obama publicly agreed to meet -- without any preconditions - with the dictators of dangerous rogue nations such as Iran and North Korea.
Fleshed out in yesterday's speech, Obama's foreign policy is shaping up to be a "talk to your enemies, invade your friends" approach to American relations abroad.
Analysts say U.S. military action could risk destabilizing Pakistan, breeding more militancy and undermining Musharraf. [my emphasis]

When the real Barack Obama finally reveals himself will he actually represent any difference from George Bush and John McCain, in matters of foreign policy and international affairs?

Clarence Coast whistles in the dark over climate change

The Daily Examiner yesterday assured the world that coastal sand erosion caused by king tides and big swells was a case of "relax, it's nature in action".

The combination of king tides and big swells this year have stripped sand from beaches, exposing rocks that have been buried for decades, and eroded sand dunes.
Affected beaches include the Angourie and Brooms Head back beaches and Spookys....
At Spookys Beach a large rock shelf has been exposed for the second time this year, revealing hundreds of rocks that would usually be covered in metres of sand.
John's mother, Dianne Webber, said in 27 years she had only seen the rock shelf as exposed as it was in January a handful of times.
"The sand did come back a couple of months ago, but now it's gone again," she said.
Mrs Webber said the sand was always shifting and she had faith it would return.
Further down the coast at Brooms Head, Daphne Giese has also witnessed decades of sand movement and erosion.
Mrs Giese said the back beach had a lot of sand on it and other parts of the main beach continued to be eroded.
She said 40 years ago they used to take their kids camping between the Caretaker's Cottage and the Bluff.
"You can't even camp there now because it's gone," Mrs Giese said.
"With the weather being so unpredictable you never know what the future could bring.
"But right now it looks beautiful out there," she said looking out her window at the ocean.

Meanwhile The Sydney Morning Herald told us yesterday that:

OCEANS have heated up much more rapidly in the past four decades from global warming than scientists had thought.
An Australian and American research team found that between 1961 and 2003 the rate of warming of the upper ocean layers was about 50 per cent higher than was estimated in last year's report by the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
A CSIRO scientist, Catia Domingues, of the Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research, said her team's finding helped solve a big problem for climate researchers.
They had been unable to fully explain why sea levels had risen so rapidly in this period, but this could now be largely attributed to the expansion of the warming oceans. "For the first time we can provide a reasonable account of the processes causing the rate of global sea-level rise over the past four decades," Dr Domingues said.
Sea levels rose about 1.6 millimetres a year between 1961 and 2003.

It doesn't take a genius to see that although Clarence Coast ocean processes are 'natural', it doesn't rule out the possibility that an increase in the number and strength of very high tides and change in wave action due to climate change may have begun to be felt.