And to think we pay good money for this!

The Federal Member for Cowper, Luke Hartsuyker, who also parades as the Shadow Minister for Competition Policy and Consumer Affairs, rose in the House on Wednesday 24 September 2008 and asked this inane question:

My question is to the Assistant Treasurer. Is the minister aware that Google now offers a free petrol price tracker site which allows motorists to search for the cheapest petrol in a given area? In light of this development, will the government abandon its plans to spend over $20 million of public money on its much maligned Fuelwatch scheme?

The Assistant Treasurer, Chris Bowen, provided this response:

Fuelwatch provides information for motorists to get the cheapest possible petrol. The difference between the cheapest and the most expensive petrol in Sydney today is 22c a litre. I cannot tell you where to find the cheapest petrol and I cannot tell you where to find the most expensive because the private sector sites that the honourable member refers to have only a selection of petrol stations, not all of them. Lots of people understand that. The people of Western Australia understand that; Fuelwatch has been in operation there for eight years. Perhaps that is why the Liberal Party in Western Australia promised to keep Fuelwatch at the last election. Perhaps that is why Colin Barnett, the new Premier of Western Australia, has said, ‘I will not touch Fuelwatch; it works.’ We have the Western Australian Liberal Premier saying he will keep Fuelwatch and we have had the Leader of the Liberal Party in New South Wales promising Fuelwatch because Fuelwatch will work. If Fuelwatch is defeated in the Senate, the only people in Australia with the benefit of Fuelwatch will be the only people living under a Liberal government, the people of Western Australia. It shows what hypocrites honourable members opposite are.

Source: Hansard (24/9/2008,page 62)


Mr Hartsuyker obviously doesn't know that Google's price tracker site doesn't cover Coffs Harbour, the principal urban centre in his electorate.

US 08: The strain begins to show?

Two faces of Michelle Obama showing the changes

such a long presidential campaign can bring.

Images from Google and Obama for America

Janelle Saffin delivers bad driving message to minister

Janelle Saffin, Labor MP for Page continues to keep her word to the North Coast community that she will stay closely involved with local concerns.

The Northern Star article yesterday:

Ms Denny has serious concerns for the stretch of Pacific Highway between the NSW Mid-North Coast and Far North Coast.
Nine people have died on this section of highway since June this year, and Ms Denny would like it to be part of a pilot study on how effective the hotline could be in reducing deaths on the 18,000 kilometres of roads in NSW.
Federal Page MP Janelle Saffin has given her support to the hotline initiative. She has delivered Ms Denny's discussion paper to Federal Transport Minister Anthony Albanese.
"It's about improving safety on the roads; this targets our behaviour," she said.
Ballina MP Don Page has shown his support by writing to the Australian Transport Safety Bureau and the National Transport Commission.
"There is merit in the general concept of more eyes on the road," he said.

For all those travelling on NSW North Coast roads who find themselves concerned about the behaviour of some heavy vehicle traffic or fellow drivers, Ms. Denny's website is COASTtoCOAST100.

Now we know.............

The democrats did it!?

Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending

By STEVEN A. HOLMES

Published: September 30, 1999

In a move that could help increase home ownership rates among minorities and low-income consumers, the Fannie Mae Corporation is easing the credit requirements on loans that it will purchase from banks and other lenders.

The action, which will begin as a pilot program involving 24 banks in 15 markets -- including the New York metropolitan region -- will encourage those banks to extend home mortgages to individuals whose credit is generally not good enough to qualify for conventional loans. Fannie Mae officials say they hope to make it a nationwide program by next spring.

Fannie Mae, the nation's biggest underwriter of home mortgages, has been under increasing pressure from the Clinton Administration to expand mortgage loans among low and moderate income people and felt pressure from stock holders to maintain its phenomenal growth in profits.

In addition, banks, thrift institutions and mortgage companies have been pressing Fannie Mae to help them make more loans to so-called subprime borrowers. These borrowers whose incomes, credit ratings and savings are not good enough to qualify for conventional loans, can only get loans from finance companies that charge much higher interest rates -- anywhere from three to four percentage points higher than conventional loans.

Why Rudd really went to America this week?

George Dubbya is holding an intimate farewell get-together for teh Coalition of the Willing and Prime Minister Rudd is invited.

Although The Canberra Times and presumably his press office has presented it thus:
"KEVIN RUDD may believe the Iraq war to be the worst foreign policy disaster since Vietnam but tomorrow he will join the US President, George Bush, and other leaders of the so-called coalition of the willing nations to honour those who have died."

It'll be alright on the night?

Newly-elected Clarence Valley shire councillor, Karen Toms, took time out to assure us all via The Daily Examiner yesterday that having a lucrative contract to manage two of council's caravan parks would not result in any problems with conflict of interest during her term in office.

It's all easy-peasy, according to Karen.

Cansdell crows before a false dawn over Broadcast Operations

Chattering down the tin can all the way to The Big Smoke, I heard that Nationals MP for Clarence Steve Cansdell is walking around the corridors of power with a big grin on his face.

Apparently he thinks that he has pulled a swifty by blatantly interfering in the Clarence Valley local government election campaign and lobbying to have Richie Williamson made shire mayor next Tuesday.

I wonder what Bill Caralis of Broadcast Operations Group thinks of the Nationals plotting to have his 2GF breakfast radio jock made mayor.

Mr. Caralis is on the record with Media Watch as not exactly favouring his employees being directly involved with politics as shown by his response over the Lismore mayoral election.

...should Mr Marks be elected to Council his future tenure at the station will be reviewed by 2LM management.

— Email statement from Bill Caralis (Chairman, Richard River Broadcasters) to Media Watch, 1st September, 2008

Perhaps Stevo should introduce himself to Mr. Caralis and explain just how the perception that a 2GF employee is aligning against Country Labor will not fritter away the fragile value of his company's donations to NSW Labor and other unspecified political donations.

Photo of publicity shy Bill Caralis found in the 2SM radio archives.

State of the Blogosphere 2008 according to Technorati

Technorati has published a State of the Blogosphere 2008 which reports that it has indexed 133 million blogs since 2002 and tracked blogs in 81 languages in June 2008, and bloggers responded to our survey from 66 countries across six continents.

This was a survey from a random sample from more than 1.2 million bloggers who have registered with Technorati.

Here are some of the results of this survey.

Demographics	U.S. Bloggers (N=550)	European Bloggers (N=350)	Asian Bloggers (N=173)
Male	57%	73%	73%
Age
18-34 years old	42%	48%	73%
35+	58%	52%	27%
Single	26%	31%	57%
Employed full-time	56%	53%	45%
Household income >$75,000	51%	34%	9%
College graduate	74%	67%	69%
Average blogging tenure (months)	35	33	30
Median Annual Investment	$80	$15	$30
Median Annual Revenue	$200	$200	$120
% Blogs with advertising	52%	50%	60%
Average Monthly Unique Visitors	18,000	24,000	26,000

Methodology data found here.

Walk to Work Day, Friday 3 October 2008

Time to get out those trainers or other sensible shoes and become a walking class hero for the day.

Friday 3 October is Walk to Work Day.

Join in to free up the arteries, stretch those lungs, relieve the traffic congestion and take time to notice the streets you travel.

How to participate here.