Climate change largely irreversible for 1,000 years after excessive greenhouse emissions stop?

One of the distressing abstracts found online at the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America:

The severity of damaging human-induced climate change depends not only on the magnitude of the change but also on the potential for irreversibility. This paper shows that the climate change that takes place due to increases in carbon dioxide concentration is largely irreversible for 1,000 years after emissions stop. Following cessation of emissions, removal of atmospheric carbon dioxide decreases radiative forcing, but is largely compensated by slower loss of heat to the ocean, so that atmospheric temperatures do not drop significantly for at least 1,000 years. Among illustrative irreversible impacts that should be expected if atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations increase from current levels near 385 parts per million by volume (ppmv) to a peak of 450–600 ppmv over the coming century are irreversible dry-season rainfall reductions in several regions comparable to those of the “dust bowl” era and inexorable sea level rise. Thermal expansion of the warming ocean provides a conservative lower limit to irreversible global average sea level rise of at least 0.4–1.0 m if 21st century CO2 concentrations exceed 600 ppmv and 0.6–1.9 m for peak CO2 concentrations exceeding ≈1,000 ppmv. Additional contributions from glaciers and ice sheet contributions to future sea level rise are uncertain but may equal or exceed several meters over the next millennium or longer.

Full 2009 paper in PDF form here.

Political evolution NSW-style

I don't think anyone has missed the metamorphosis undergone in the media recently by one murder victim - from wealthy "property developer" to "loan shark and standover man" and worse.
But how many people have noticed that the person or persons allegedly named on that rumoured tape recording have now gone from the very vague "persons connected to NSW Labor" or somewhat vague "state government MPs" to the more specific "senior NSW politicians" or "NSW ministers"?
By yesterday the chatter mill had developed belt and braces, with bribed "senior NSW bureaucrat", "federal Labor politicians" and "police officer" thrown into the mix for good measure.
Seemingly without any print, radio or television journalists (or the NSW Opposition for that matter) having ever listened to this audio tape.
And I thought the local bowlo was good at gossip - the Aussie meeja leaves it for dead! One gossipy whiff and they're off like a Bondi tram.
Given the collective histories and conflicting stories of those non-journalists who have actually said that they heard the tape or knew details of the alleged recorded conversation; is it any wonder that I keep hearing the words 'hysterical beat-up' echoing in my head?

U.S. citizen and Islam convert Abdullah al-Kidd gets his day in court

U.S. President Barack Obama may wish it otherwise, but where government is slow or unwilling to address the former Bush administration's constitutional abuses then the courts are obviously prepared take on this challenge if people are willing to apply.
The quotes below are from a U.S. Court of Appeals opinion in Abdullah al-Kidd v John Ashcroft (former US Attorney General), filed 4th September 2009.

MILAN D. SMITH, JR., Circuit Judge:

According to the allegations of his first amended complaint, Plaintiff-Appellee Abdullah al-Kidd (al-Kidd), a United States citizen and a married man with two children, was arrested at a Dulles International Airport ticket counter. He was handcuffed, taken to the airport's police substation, and interrogated. Over the next sixteen days, he was confined in high security cells lit twenty-four hours a day in Virginia, Oklahoma, and then Idaho, during which he was strip searched on multiple occasions. Each time he was transferred to a different facility, al-Kidd was handcuffed and shackled about his wrists, legs, and waist. He was eventually released from custody by court order, on the conditions that he live with his wife and in-laws in Nevada, limit his travel to Nevada and three other states, surrender his travel documents, regularly report to a probation officer, and consent to home visits throughout the period of supervision. By the time al-Kidd's confinement and supervision ended, fifteen months after his arrest, al-Kidd had been fired from his job as an employee of a government contractor because he was denied a security clearance due to his arrest, and had separated from his wife. He has been unable to obtain steady employment since his arrest. Al-Kidd was not arrested and detained because he had allegedly committed a crime. He alleges that he was arrested and confined because former United States Attorney General John Ashcroft (Ashcroft), subordinates operating under policies promulgated by Ashcroft, and others within the United States Department of Justice (DOJ), unlawfully used the federal material witness statute, 18 U.S.C. § 3144, to investigate or preemptively detain him. Ashcroft asserts that he is entitled to absolute and qualified immunity against al-Kidd's claims. We hold that on the facts pled Ashcroft is not protected by either form of immunity, and we affirm in part and reverse in part the decision of the district court. (my emphasis)

In its conclusion the court quoted Blackstone:

"To bereave a man of life, or by violence to confiscate his estate, without accusation or trial, would be so gross and notorious an act of despotism, as must at once convey the alarm of tyranny throughout the whole kingdom. But confinement of the person, by secretly hurrying him to gaol, where his sufferings are unknown or forgotten; is a less public, a less striking, and therefore a more dangerous engine of arbitrary government."

WILLIAM BLACKSTONE, COMMENTARIES ON THE LAWS OF ENGLAND 131-32 (1765)

Mischief's bad utterances cost him a date with Max

It seems the Northern Territory is the place to be if one wants to meet a talking feline.


After the news about Mischief the talkative cat broke another NT cat's owner declared that her cat Max was also a talking cat.

Mischief, who featured previously on this site, was all set to meet and have a chat with Max. Well, that's what Mischief's owner Robert "RJ" Duncan thought was on the cards.

However, Max's owner Mrs Snowball put a stop on any dalliance involving Mischief and Max.

The Northern Territory News reports that Mrs Snowball declined Mr Duncan's invitation because she doesn't want her cat picking up Mischief's bad habit of swearing.

According to Mrs Snowball, her cat Max can pronounce all her family members' names. Clever Max can even pronounce names with double syllables.

Sadly, there are no pics of Max - he's camera shy.

pic of Mischief from NT News

The staff of life: one man's dissent against his government

On 13 September 2009 (with little advance fanfare) it becomes mandatory to add folic acid to Australian wheat flour product at source, excepting organic flour.

An 110 year-old family run South Australian flour mill is firmly refusing to comply and on 28 August issued this letter to all its customers.

Which by an old 1960s yard stick means that civil war has broken out in Australia.

NSW public hospitals once more becoming thought of as a place you go to die?

When I was a nipper a hospital was considered a place you went to die.
By the time I became an adult hospitals had become places where you went to be treated and maybe if you were lucky, cured.
Now as I get even older and read the growing litany of medical errors, I begin to wonder if perceptions are swinging back again and we're once more becoming afraid of hospitals?
Take this old man left on a bedpan for so long in a public hospital that he had to have surgery for the ulcers this disgusting neglect created.
NSW Health Care Commission media releases over the last twelve months don't instill a lot of confidence either. Neither does the growing list of doctors, nurses, pharmacists, psychologists etc. who are either reprimanded, suspended or deregistered in this state.
If you want a real scare - just read this May 2009 Medical Journal of Australia article which looked at the chances of survival if a baby is born in a public hospital:
"After adjusting for the same maternal variables, serious adverse neonatal outcomes showed similar differences between the two hospital groups.
Term babies born in public hospitals were more likely to require high levels of resuscitation, to have an Apgar score < 7 at 5 minutes, and to require admission to a neonatal intensive care facility or special care nursery (Box 3).
Perinatal death was twice as likely for babies born in public hospitals.
Even using a composite for adverse perinatal outcome (patients with at least one adverse outcome), the unadjusted OR was 1.30 (95% CI, 1.28–1.33) for public hospital deliveries.
When the adverse perinatal outcomes were compared individually by method of birth, the differences between public and private hospital sectors persisted for all the adverse outcomes studied (data not shown).
For example, for spontaneous vaginal births, the rate of Apgar score < 7 at 5 minutes was 0.9% in the public group compared with 0.6% in the private group.
The differences for forceps deliveries (1.6% v 1.1%), ventouse deliveries (2.1% v 1.4%), and caesarean sections (1.3% v 0.5%) showed a similar pattern.
The rates of perinatal death were similarly lower in private hospitals for each method of birth: spontaneous vaginal birth (0.2% v 0.1%); forceps delivery (0.5% v 0.2%); ventouse delivery (0.2% v 0.1%); and caesarean section (0.3% v 0.1%)...
Conclusion: For women delivering a single baby at term in Australia, the prevalence of adverse perinatal outcomes is higher in public hospitals than in private hospitals."

So Prime Minister Rudd - when are you going to fix this appalling state of affairs?

The one liner doing the rounds in the Emerald City

Events in Macquarie Street - and elsewhere - last week
produced this gem:

"The NSW Government is like IKEA - one loose screw and the whole cabinet falls apart."

Thanks goes to The Fitz Files in The Sun Herald for that ripper!