Centuries old celestial dust trails to produce Orionid meteors visible in both hemispheres 21-23 October 2009 [links to sky maps]

Orionid 2008 from NCDCR

In the International Year of Astronomy Australians will be able to see what is predicted to be a splendid celestial night show from 21 to 23 October 2009 peaking on Thursday night.

Radiating out across the sky from a point between the constellations Gemini and Orion and just below Betelgeuse (Orion's red star) will be meteors caused by ancient debris from Halley's Comet.

On average the Orionid shower produces 20 meteors every hour at its peak (less seen with the naked eye in Australia) and 2am to 4am looking east to north-east is probably the best time for viewing from the Southern Hemisphere.

NASA information page
Sydney Observatory night sky map for October 2009 This star chart shows the stars and constellations visible in the night sky for Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Canberra, Hobart, Adelaide and Perth for October 2009 at about 8.30 pm (summer time). For Darwin and similar locations the chart will still apply, but some stars will be lost off the southern edge while extra stars will be visible to the north. Stars down to a brightness or magnitude limit of 4.5 are shown on the star chart. To use this star chart, rotate the chart so that the direction you are facing (north, south, east or west) is shown at the bottom. The centre of the chart represents the point directly above your head, called the zenith point, and the outer circular edge represents the horizon.
Orionid Sky Map 1
Orionid Sky Map 2

Byron Lighthouse Run on Sunday 25 October 2009

Want to have a great time this weekend? Go to Byron Bay for the fun run.

Byron Lighthouse Run to benefit the NSW Cancer Council

25 October 2009 - Start time 7am

Choose between a 10k run or an 8 k walk.

To enter click here cost is $40

Entry from 24 October or on the day of the run is $70

To enter by mail the entry form and details is here

Team entry is possible. A team is 5 members entered and paid for in one transaction. Team members enter at $5 discount. The team leader needs to know each full name, address, phone number and date of birth of team members. To enter click here. Aged 17 and under entry fee is $15 per entry. To enter click here.

Major prizes include luxury accommodation packages in Byron Bay.

Further details at http://byronrun.com/

The twang of duelling banjos in Canberra on the weekend as all God's children met the flesh

Asked what evidence of Satan there was in Parliament, Mr Nalliah said: "The number of politicians who have serious marriage problems." [Google News quotes] Photo from Catch The Fire Ministries website

Catch the Fire Ministries is always good for a chuckle if one visits this religious group's website.

Last week the group was promoting its Sunday 17 October gathering on Mt. Ainslie in Canberra; which was held to exorcise Beelzebub and those pesky imps, whose evil spells are causing members of parliament to vote in a manner not approved of by certain right-wing Christians and bringing in their wake bushfires or other disasters.

The Australian Sex Party climbed the mountain in response to this threat to the well-being of Australian politicians and held a counter-demonstration, which according to unconfirmed Twitter reports drew a larger crowd.

A demonstration of religious-political warfare in action if, former Family First candidate and running mate of Steve Fielding, Pastor Nalliah's language is any indication.

Wonder who had the bigger sausage sizzle?

KRudd makes the Top 10 list of the world's most well-paid pollies and Oz pensioners are happy for him

According to The Times online Oz Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is the world's 10th highest paid political leader.

This fact is of course immensely pleasing to aged and disabled pensioners across the country - particularly those he promised to protect against the recent pension increase being eaten into by public housing rent rises.

Oh, he didn't keep that promise did he?

KRudd pic from News.com.au

Federal Coalition laboured to produce a Clayton's CPRS

Under the headline Coalition Plan to Save Jobs and Reduce Costs, yesterday the Liberal Party and Nationals Coalition produced a train wreck of an emissions trading scheme outline, with its published list of 'amendments' to the Rudd Government's proposed Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme.

Set out below is what Malcolm Turnbull (with the approval of his shadow cabinet/party room) wants to negotiate in allegedly good faith.

I particularly like the fact that, on the face of it, 90 per cent of carbon credit permits will apparently be free to major polluters virtually forever after - which leads to the inevitable question; "Why bother to implement an emissions trading scheme in the first place?".

Which would of course be the whole aim of this Coalition exercise in intransigent anti-global warming spin.

Trade Exposed Industries

• Amend the CPRS to provide a single level of assistance for emissions intensive trade exposed (EITE) industries at 94.5 per cent until 2015 and 90 per cent thereafter.
  
• Lower the threshold for assistance from the CPRS proposal of 1000 tonnes of CO2 per $1 million of revenue to 850 tonnes of CO2 per $1 million.
  
• Continue to provide assistance to Australian EITE industries at 90 per cent until 80 per cent of their international competitors have also implemented carbon abatement measures.
  
• Include primary food processing such as dairy and meat in the EITE scheme.
  
• Allow industries that include a series of sequential or parallel production processes to have these assessed as a single activity in determining assistance.

Agriculture

• Permanently exclude agricultural emissions from the CPRS.
  
• Obtain Government agreement to introduction of an agricultural offset scheme in line with similar offset schemes to be introduced in comparable economies such as the US and EU.

Coal Mine Emissions

• Exclude coal mine fugitive emissions from the CPRS.
  
• Provide the Minister with authority to use regulation to control fugitive emissions with the objective of achieving a 30 per cent reduction by 2025 as technology and international best practice allow.

Lower Electricity Prices

• The Coalition will continue to advocate an intensity-based cap-and-trade model for generators. This delivers the same emissions cuts as the CPRS but with a much smaller increase in electricity prices.
  
• This would greatly reduce the burden on small and mid-sized businesses, which receive no compensation for higher power bills under Labor's proposals.
  
• Under the CPRS retail electricity prices will rise by close to 20 per cent in the first two years. Under an intensity approach, retail electricity prices would rise by less than 5 per cent in the first two years.
  
• If the Government continues to refuse to consider the intensity model, the Coalition will negotiate for an alternative approach to cushion near-term electricity price increases for small businesses.

Compensation for Electricity Generators

• Coal-fired generators must be better compensated for loss of value they experience from the CPRS, to ensure security of electricity supply and enable them to transition to lower emission energy sources.
  
• The CPRS offers coal-fired generators 130 million permits over five years worth $3.6 billion. Yet three respected private sector analysts estimate their losses at $9–$11 billion.
  
• Assistance should be increased to 390 million permits over 15 years (or about $10 billion). Assistance should be allocated to all generators in proportion to the losses they suffer.
  
• In the absence of access to the Government's secret Morgan Stanley report, this represents the Coalition's best estimate of appropriate generator compensation given the available data.

Energy Efficiency and Voluntary Action

• The Coalition will negotiate for a national "white certificate" energy efficiency scheme so households and businesses earn credits for efficiency measures, and contribute to reducing national emissions.
  
• Likewise, the Coalition supports creation of a voluntary offset market in advance of the introduction of the CPRS, and amending the CPRS to ensure voluntary abatement leads to a lower national level of emissions.
  
  

If Malcolm Turnbull understands an ETS the way he knows his Shakespeare then Australia is in real trouble

I couldn't believe my ears on Sunday last, there was our fearless Leader of the Opposition Malcolm Turnbull holding forth on Shakespeare in an attempt to denigrate the upcoming Copenhagen international climate change talks.

He was foolishly repeating what he'd said to a gathering of foreign correspondents on Monday week; "And as another one of my companions noted it is worth remembering that Copenhagen was the home of Hamlet, famous principally for indecision. So that is a sombre reflection."

Uh, no, Malcolm. Hamlet is popularly supposed to be a tale played out in "Elsinore or Helsingør north of Copenhagen, on the place where Denmark is closest to Sweden - only 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) of water divides the two countries", (possibly in a castle which was erected around 1420) and on a nearby plain and in a generic churchyard.

Denmark's capital Copenhagen while situated close by is historically separate from the old port town of Helsingør.

Every final year highschool English student would be bound to know the difference.
I certainly hope that Turnbull has a better grasp of the principles of an emission trading scheme, than he does of geography and the Bard.

Horatio
Byron

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.

Ralph Lauren brand owner hits out at blogger for laughing at advertisement blunder and blogger hits back

PRL USA Holdings, owner of the brand Ralph Lauren, issued a DMCA notice on 2 October 2009 to the blog PsD: Photoshop Disasters, for laughing at a Blue Label advertisement of a super skinny model (with distorted dimensions) which is still being displayed in Google cache as I write.

PsD now has a second Lauren advert posted The hits keep coming with a photo allegedly taken in Sydney - proving once more that displaying a humour deficit can lead to more people finding out about your company's photoshop blunders than if you had originally just taken it on the chin.

Image from PsD post The hits keep coming, 14 October 2009