The Abbott Monologues: a shrill man falls foul of Shakespeare and history

Australian Opposition Leader Tony Abbott is nothing if not predictable – back with his great big new tax on everything mantra and a time wasting censure motion on the last parliamentary sitting day of the week which inevitably fails to get up.

This week's obviously rehearsed sound bite was; She has never seen a tax she did not like. She has never seen a tax she would not hike. Unfortunately the contrived nature of this utterance was exposed by the grinning backbencher sitting immediately him in the House clearly mouthing the words along with his leader.

Last Thursday’s very shrill effort during Question Time also saw the inevitable botching of detail as Abbott got carried away for the benefit of cameras and media.

Though this time one of the wonky details came from a surprising source. Waxing lyrical when speaking of Prime Minister Julia Gillard, he cried “Out, out foul spot” when supposedly quoting from Shakespeare’s play Lady Macbeth.

Of course Year 10 high school students would be able to tell him that the spot was not foul but damned and, although Lady Macbeth was a notorious sleepwalker she was not given to stuttering.

But then, at the beginning of this week Abbott obviously thought a form of modern government existed in New South Wales during the time William Bligh when he attempted a comparison with the Keneally Government. Bligh of course as a military governor of a British colony was virtually an absolute local ruler answerable only to the British Parliament. He had long left the colony by the time a legislature came into being. Abbott also appears to believe that it was definitely warmer when Jesus allegedly walked the earth than it is today.

Northern Rivers studies in browns

Penny Evans, The Swarm 2008 (top)
Ron Leonard, Cage One (centre)
Lae Oldmeadow, Canopy Sacred Seed 1 2008 (bottom)

Arts Northern Rivers

Sometimes a cartoon is all too accurate....

A small hint received from a friend.....

Clarence Valley's 'professional' contrarians are at it again

Mighty Clarence
Ed,
Over the years there has been a resistance to building a dam on the Clarence River – “Not One Drop – The Mighty Clarence”. This seems to be irrational and a case of NFromMBY. It’s not as though we use very much of the water. According to government figures < 1% of the water is being used with the other 99% going out to sea. And the new Shannon Creek Dam will provide our domestic water if necessary. So why should we reconsider? There have been two major floods in two years, (and there will be more). These have caused considerable hardship, disruption and cost in the valley and to the state’s transportation corridors. Current articles talk about the cane farmers being adversely affected for up to two years; prawn stocks being washed out to sea; fish kills due to deoxygenation; river events being cancelled; major infrastructure damage or destruction; people and trucks stranded for days; health alerts; sugar and fishing jobs threatened… Maybe it should be called “The Mighty Destructive Clarence”. We need a dam that can be used for flood mitigation, (which does not mean flood prevention) and provide water to the Murray Darling Basin. It would also provide a great fresh water recreation area for the Clarence Valley.
A plan put forward by the late Professor Lance Endersbee included five dams and multiple pipelines. A mini-Snowy Mountains scheme is not needed. The fallacy of his scheme is that lots of water needs to be stored. It doesn’t, because of the Clarence’s large catchment and the generally reliable, high rainfall. It needs only one dam on the eastern side of the range that would provide mitigation and MDB water.
The dam would be built after the major tributaries, such as the Timbarra and the Nymboida/Mann flowed into the Clarence. The best site for the dam would be in the Clarence River Gorge. From this dam the water would be pumped over the Great Divide, to a holding dam that would then release water into the Severn River and the existing Pindari Dam. From there it would flow through the Macintyre-Dumaresq-Barwon Rivers, and into the Darling. The 80km pipeline would be a straightforward project compared to say the Trans Alaska Pipeline, which I worked on for a number of years.
It is a dam that would be beneficial for the Clarence Valley and our inland neighbours, who provide much of the food WE eat and who will again, be subject to long, severe droughts. If the Mighty Clarence can’t offer a parched neighbour “ONE drop”, it does not deserve to be called mighty. The dam should not be damned. It deserves to be discussed in a no-parochial, unemotional manner. I would be happy to provide more information, to any interested parties.
John Ibbotson*
Gulmarrad
[The Clarence Valley Review, letter to the Editor,9 February 2011]

* Mr. Ibbotson describes himself variously as Metallurgist, Systems Analyst, Photographer, Author. His submission to Federal Paliament Water Proofing the Murray-Darling Basin contains the same arguments as those in his letter. Ibbotson is something of a conspiracy theorist and anthropomorphic global warming denialist.

Worth thinking about
Ed,
I found it a pleasure to read John Ibbotson’s easily understood and emotionally unbiased letter (CVR 9/2/11) on that perennial question that is too much of a hotcake for any local politician to pick up on.
Personally I agree with Mr. Ibbotson’s opinion.I further offer the following. Having studied a rather crude topographical map, a dam at the Gorge would probably require a construction and service road from Summerland Way to the site which in turn would require a second bridge across the Clarence River.
Worth thinking about?
And certainly worth further discussion
Thomas Macindoe *
Yamba
[The Clarence Valley Review, letter to the Editor, 23 February 2011]

* Mr. Macindoe is one of the Clarence Valley’s resident contrarians who in retirement will often take contradictory positions on given issues providing his stance runs counter to either expert opinion or public sentiment. One of his most endearing traits is his predictability.

The Bobbsy Twins Pell & Plimer get a dose of legitimate science

Finally! In the Senate Hansard, showing restraint and respect, Dr Greg Ayers exposes Cardinal George Pell for the foolish man that he is (subsequent to certain correspondence between the Australian Bureau of Meteorology and the prelate).

Despite a valiant attempt by Senator McDonald, to divert and over talk Ayers in order to protect this meddlesome priest and his pet climate change denier, the following went into the historical record as part of ENVIRONMENT AND COMMUNICATIONS LEGISLATION COMMITTEE ESTIMATES (Additional Estimates) MONDAY, 21 FEBRUARY 2011

Dr. Ayers full statement here - with interruptions and senatorial dummy spits removed.

What Julia Gillard really said about pricing carbon

Listening to Opposition Leader Tony Abbott lay into Prime Minister Gillard over the announcement that her government was moving towards setting an interim price on carbon from 1 July 2012 as a precursor to an national emissions trading scheme by 2017 and, then hearing knuckle-dragging radio ‘personality’ Alan Jones’ near hysterical rant on the same subject (full transcript here) one could be forgiven for thinking that Ms. Gillard had never let the Australian electorate know her thinking before the last federal election held on 21 August 2010.

Both of these gentleman forget the enduring convenience of Google when it comes to checking if one’s memory is correct or not.

Yes, she did say that there would not be a carbon tax and, despite Abbott and Jones trying to rewrite history, a stand alone, permanent carbon tax is not what is being planned for now.

However, Gillard did go to some pains to let us all know that carbon pricing was going to occur if Labor was re-elected.

In June 2010 The Australian reported:

Julia Gillard will pursue a carbon price if she wins the next election…

In July 2010 The Herald Sun also reported the Prime Minister’s position:

"We will have that price on carbon when we have a deep community consensus."
Today, Ms Gillard emphatically ruled out a price on carbon before 2012 as she prepares to release a new policy on climate change.
That means no ETS, no carbon tax and no interim carbon levy until then.

The Business Spectator in July 2010:

The federal government has agreed new policies on climate change, including a commitment to set an interim price on carbon, the Australian Financial Review reports.

On the day before we all went to the polls Gillard was reported at news.com.au:

Julia Gillard says she is prepared to legislate a carbon price in the next term as part of a bold series of reforms

In The Australian on the same day:

In an election-eve interview with The Australian, the Prime Minister revealed she would view victory tomorrow as a mandate for a carbon price, provided the community was ready for this step.

Even Tony Abbott was aware of Gillard’s commitment to pricing carbon. His own website contained this post almost two months before the last federal election:

If she is serious about putting a price on carbon she shouldn’t wait until after the election, she should sit down with Bob Brown now, come up with something, tell us now what she’s going to do rather than just fudge this until after the election. But it’s typical of the new Prime Minister that she wants to get credit for wanting to do something without getting the blame for actually doing something and this is a Prime Minister who will tell people what she thinks they want to hear but she won’t then put the policies in place to deliver on that.

We're white hot and angry? Quick, look in the mirror and check!

The very partisan and super aggressive Alan Jones over at 2GB this morning told the Prime Minister that there is white hot anger out there over the announcement of a framework to introduce a national carbon price.

This came as a great surprise in our house because yesterday we greeted that same announcement with sighs of relief that Australia was once more moving forward on climate change.

Anony-mice

Yamba

* GuestSpeak is a feature of North Coast Voices allowing Northern Rivers residents to make satirical or serious comment on issues that concern them. Posts of 250-300 words or less can be submitted to ncvguestspeak AT gmail.com.au for consideration.