I got me a bull bar and I'm a racist git, hee hee hee

Sadly, this letter to the editor in The Daily Examiner on 19 November 2009 recounts an incident which demonstrates that racism is alive and well on the NSW North Coast.

Click on letter to enlarge

CPRS major beneficiaries: "rent-seekers, opportunists and blackmailers"

I'm utterly speechless after Kevin Rudd and Malcolm Turnbull showed me that I'm totally powerless and about to be 'penniless' in my unwilling support of the big greenhouse gas polluters.

Post title quote:Bernard Keane writing in Crikey about who benefits from the Rudd Government's amended Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme
Cartoon: Google Images


What the casual punters think according to The Australian tonight:

While Clarence Valley Council remains silent on latest climate change report, local newspaper spells it out

The Daily Examiner,24 November 2009

In the face of Clarence Valley Council's silence on the Rudd Government's recent report Climate Change Risks to Australia's Coasts, The Daily Examiner's Erin Brady lays the facts before Clarence Valley communities in Sea level rise threatens our homes:

IF sea levels rise 1.1 metres by 2100, large parts of the Clarence Valley could be under water and towns may have to be relocated.
It sounds like a doomsday prediction, but according to a report released this month by the Department of Climate Change titled Climate Change Risks to Australia’s Coast, this warning is based on credible science and is a scenario we should all be preparing for.
The report’s worst case scenario for the Clarence Valley is that up to 900 homes will be at risk of inundation from sea level rise by the end of the century.
At best, about 400 homes will be at risk and that is not including homes to be built in the future.
The report lays the cause of rising sea levels squarely on climate change.
It suggests extreme weather events will also be likely to become more intense, with larger and more damaging storm surges and the possible extension of cyclones further south.
“The current 1-in-100 year event could occur several times a year,” the national report said.
According to computerised modelling based on a 1.1 metre sea level rise, homes near the coast and in low-lying parts of the Valley could be under water or prone to inundation.
This includes large areas of west Yamba, islands in the Clarence River, west of Lawrence, Shark Creek, Lower Coldstream, Tucabia through to Sandy Crossing, Southgate, Ulmarra, Great Marlow and Alumy Creek.
Populated villages along the Clarence Coast would also be prone to inundation, including Iluka, Yamba, Brooms Head, Sandon and Wooli.......

Previous posts on North Coast Voices:

• Is this your house? Google Earth now plots predicted climate change sea level rises
• What do the latest Australian Government sea level rise projections mean for the Clarence Coast?
• NSW North Coast could lose in vicinity of 2,000 homes in latest climate change 'worst case' scenario

Even the ABC gets sloppy when it goes online

On November 18 ABC Radio's AM program online record for that morning ran with this headline "Australia still highest per capita carbon emitter".
However when you open the link what is actually said is; "MICHAEL RAUPACH: In the basket of developed countries we compare obviously with the US whose emissions are almost flat at the moment, countries like Canada, with the European Union. And in almost all of those cases we exceed the emissions rates of those countries."
So the ABC is insisting that Australia is still highest while one of the authors of the report in question is cleverly ducking giving a direct reply to the radio interviewer's incorrect statement by switching the focus to growth rates.
What is really happening here?
The interviewer is being told that Australia is not the highest carbon dioxide emitter in terms of growth rates, isn't the highest carbon dioxide emitter on a per capita basis and isn't the leading developed nation carbon dioxide emitter on the same per capita basis.
Everyone else seems to know that this country is very slowly falling down the ranks of carbon dioxide gas producers per head of population (now behind the United States if the very thorough International Energy Agency 2009 figures compute), so why on earth is the ABC indulging in sensationalist headlines that reek of The Telegraph's haphazard approach?
Why did Sarah Clarke insist that Australia's CO2 emissions were still rising according to the Carbon Budget 2008 when anyone reading this report and number sets can see that the nation's Co2 was down by 4,918 units last year.
Is the ABC making a bid to be accepted into the University of East Bumcrack School of Journalism?

Smart Aleck
Woolgoolga

These are the decade's 10 most influential moments on the Internet?

The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences thinks these are the moments that really mattered on the Internet. What do you think?

The Ten Most Influential Internet Moments of the Decade

Craigslist expands outside San Francisco (2000)
In 2000, the free classifieds site broadened its reach outside of San Francisco into nine additional U.S. cities, sending chills down the spines of newspaper publishers everywhere. Today Craigslist serves free listings in more than 500 cities in 50 countries, serving as a model for no-frills business and community success and the catalyst for countless jobs, apartments, and just about anything else you can think of.

Google AdWords launches (2000)
With the launch of AdWords in October 2000, Google turned advertising on its head. The self-service ad program opened up the marketplace to any business, no matter how big or small, and allowed advertisers to target their customers with laser-sharp precision.

Wikipedia launches (2001)
Containing 20,000 articles in 18 languages by the end of its first year online, Wikipedia today boasts more than 14 million articles in 271 different languages. The free open-source encyclopedia epitomizes the Internet's power to bring strangers from around the world together to collaborate on projects both big and small.

Napster Shut Down (2001)
Although Napster was shut down in 2001, it opened the file-sharing floodgates. Its demise sparked a wave of innovations that forever changed how we obtain and experience music and video - from Hulu to iTunes to Radiohead famously dropping its label and self-distributing their "In Rainbows" CD online for free.

Google IPO (2004)
Google's IPO, one of the largest in history, put the six year old search engine on the path to becoming the most dominant and influential company of the decade. From gmail and YouTube to Google Earth, Google Maps, and Google Android, the Internet giant and constant innovator is the engine that powers countless aspects of our everyday lives.

Online video revolution (2006)
In 2006, a perfect storm of faster bandwidth, cheaper camcorders, and the groundbreaking use of Adobe's Flash 9 video player by YouTube combined to launch the online video revolution. The trifecta led to a boom in homemade and professional content - the Diet Coke and Mentos guys, lonelygirl15, SNL's Lazy Sunday, and Senator George Allen's "macacagate" - that has reshaped everything from pop culture to politics.

Facebook opens to non-college students and Twitter takes off (2006)
In September 2006, a social networking site for college students changed its user qualifications to include anyone 13 and older with a valid e-mail address. Facebook struck an immediate chord -- and almost overnight, social media went mainstream. Less than a month later, the creators of Twitter acquired the company and its assets from its investors, paving the way for the service to take off in 2007. Both companies took social media mainstream, radically changing the way we connect, collaborate, and communicate with everyone from friends to colleagues to customers.

The iPhone debuts (2007)
The iPhone was released on June 29, 2007. By the end of the weekend, half a million had been sold, and smartphones had gone from a luxury item to a necessity. The iPhone inspired the development of operating systems like Google Android, as well as an app for just about every aspect of modern life. Over the next decade, it's estimated that a billion new users will come to the Internet for the first time through mobile devices.

U.S. Presidential Campaign (2008)
The Internet altered presidential politicking in 2008 much as television had forty years earlier during the Kennedy/Nixon race. From videos like "Obama Girl" and the Reverend Wright clip shaping the debate, to social media mobilizing voters, to record-breaking online fundraising from small donors, every facet of the way campaigns are run was permanently transformed.

Iranian election protests (2009)
When Iran's 2009 presidential election produced fishy results, the opposition took to the tweets -- and the "Twitter Revolution" was born. In fact, it was so vital to organizing demonstrations that the U.S. State Department asked the company to delay planned maintenance.. The protests also highlighted Twitter's key asset as a protest tool: Since most users don't access it through a central website, it's nearly impossible to censor.

Is this your house? Google Earth now plots predicted climate change sea level rises

Before and after a 1 metre sea level rise in one of the streets with building consents granted by NSW North Coast Clarence Valley Council in the thirty years since climate change has been an issue. Latest official 'worst case' predictions are for a 1.1 metre sea level rise in NSW coastal zones.
Click on images to enlarge.
Google Earth now has a sidebar function which allows the plotting of predicted sea levels rises due to climate change.
This is a chance to get a visual appreciation of just how your home may be affected in light of the Rudd Government's recent report Climate Change Risks to Australia's Coasts.

Treasury explains Australians to themselves in the latest tax reform report

This is the opening salvo in an Australian Treasury commissioned report Behavioural Economics and Complex Decision-Making: Implications for the Australian Tax and Transfer System:

Many aspects of observed human decision-making differ from the 'rational' behaviour assumed in economic models. For example:

1. People are much more concerned about possible losses than possible gains
2. People are inclined to stick with the status quo
3. People dislike uncertainty
4. People value fairness
5. People sharply discount the future compared to the present

For all but the simplest of decisions, people generally do not attempt to find the optimal solution, but rather apply simple decision-making strategies:

1. They stick with what they know
2. They follow others
3. They settle for something that is good enough, rather than searching for the best

The more complex the decision, the less well equipped people are to deal with it. As a result, people often make decisions which do not appear to be in their best interests:

1. They procrastinate, putting off things such as saving for retirement
2. They stick with the default option, even if it is not the best
3. If a decision is too complex they may avoid it altogether
4. People are readily confused, and prone to misleading advice

These issues tend to be particularly prevalent among the least well-off.

Full August 2009 CSIRO report here.