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What the fuck is wrong with Tony Abbott

2011-10-26T07:58:00.005+10:00

I don't know really, the dude must have been dropped on his head... repeatedly, as a baby, the guy is honestly a social dropkick. I have to preface the following by saying that since leaving Australia, I've been able to contemplate the goings on over there with less personal investment, in a way, whatever happens doesn't really affect my day too much. Formerly, it was at times annoying to live in Australia, being under a steadier stream of more in depth news about what our government gets up to. In many ways, I used to feel a sense of shame when issues like the TAMPA, or our inaction on global warming popped up, I always thought, "geez, how do other countries view us?"

The answer is, most other countries don't care, I've become well aware of this now. But recently, right at the moments when Australia finally has been getting a few great and might I add LOGICAL ideas right, like a Carbon Tax, and restrictions on poker machines, a small minded group of Australians are starting to make waves, waves that are reaching me here in Germany, and making me uncomfortable. This small minded group call themselves the Liberal Party, and the clown leading them is literally Chauncey Gardner.

I mean what the fuck, he is going on about rescinding a carbon tax and rescinding reforms on poker machines. What the liberals don't seem to know, yet understand how well it sells to anyone dumb enough to vote for them, is that in today's media cycle, words really do speak louder than actions. They say, with crocodile tears in their eyes, that they want to do something to reduce carbon emissions, and then propose some total trash like voluntary restrictions. They say that they are serious about helping problem gamblers, but claim a system like choosing how much money you are willing to lose reeks a bit too much of the nanny state.

I mean, here it is nutbags... You want a voluntary solution to carbon emissions, how about this. The Australian people went to the polls last year and elected the two parties that volunteered to enact some kind of financial deterrent for releasing greenhouse gases. In a sense, the people demonstrated to the parliament their willingness to volunteer a modest amount of their income toward tackling greenhouse emissions. This is exactly what Labor and the Greens seem to be getting down to. I mean, who do the Liberals think they are, suggesting that corporations voluntarily reduce emissions is a contradiction in terms in a capitalist society, they know this though, and to some dullards, wanting to reduce emissions through some dimwitted voluntary scheme sounds like caring policy without the need for some kind of (heavily scientifically backed) authority, like say the government, needing to step in to ensure emissions actually do get reduced.

I mean, people far more educated than most anyone in the Liberal party, like Sir Nicholas Stern or Professor Ross Garnaut have already done all the thinking for them. When the science and the statistics and most importantly for the Liberals, THE ECONOMICS add up, you get behind the fucking movement 100%. The voters of Australia need to understand that the Liberal party do not have your interest, or Australia's interest or the planet's interest at heart, they need simply to jump off this bandwagon because they can't stand the people driving it, and they will tear as many other people off it as they can through the kind of nefarious tactics we are seeing.

Next theme, pokies. Yet another eminently prudent and once more LOGICAL piece of legislation the Liberal party are dead set against. I mean, it's like this. Gambling has literally ZERO benefit to society, in a way it infringes upon the freedom of each and every one of us. The cost to society to reform problem gamblers takes money away from say, improving public transport, impinging on your freedom of movement just a little bit, it takes money away from people with other mental diseases, impinging on their right to proper medical care. Does anyone want an example of a society that knows how to deal with gambling? MONACO, residents of Monaco are forbidden from gambling in the principality's one casino. The richest (per capita) country in the world knows where it is at, maybe we should consider doing the same, opening casinos only for foreigners, after all, most of the clientele in the casino in Brisbane didn't seem to have english as their first language.

Honestly Australia, get with the program, show you've got something between your ears and vote for any party that would not abolish the carbon tax or oppose poker machine reforms. And moreover, smack that idiot Abbott down for the second time in a row, it's the only way he'll learn.

Anything to declare? The nightmares of travel.

2011-08-13T01:31:00.004+10:00

Yes, I declare Belfast to be unworthy of visiting.

I have held off on talking about this for a few days, in order to calm down, and try to paint a more objective picture of the situation. So here we go. I was in Belfast from the 27th of July until the 3rd of August for the 2011 ICPEAC conference. I am not very keen on conferences, I just find that five days of mostly abstract foreign presentations and posters a little too much, Summer or Winter schools are usually much more informative than conferences ever will be.

Problem is, this was not just 5 days, but 5 workdays and 2 weekend days. This is really unusual for a conference, but I guess a rundown city like Belfast could have used the extra cash the conference delegates coughed up over the extra 2 days. Anyhow, here is how it all began. I left Heidelberg for Frankfurt airport on the 26th via the train. It was pretty hot on the day so I took my jacket off in the train, and left it there, with my British passport in the pocket. I have never done anything so dumb before, but even the best have their pitfalls.

Anyway, I realised this only 10 minutes after getting out of the train, but by then it was already too late to recover the lost jacket and passport. So I continued to the airport to begin the now much longer booking process. Although it took longer to check in, British Airways organised everything for me with immigration in Great Britain, and I got through without any troubles. I will add at this point that British Airways knew that my schedule was to Northern Ireland, and back to Germany, no one-way flight. I will also add at this point that I took no checked baggage, just my cross country bike as my checked baggage... remember these points.

Right, so on the plane without delays, not bad for forgetting one's passport I thought! We arrived in London and had about 4:30 between flights, so my counterpart Anton thought it would be a good idea to hop in the tube and check out London. He wouldn't have much time, but it can be done, the tube ride into London takes about 1 hour or so. Unfortunately Anton wanted to be certain that we would find each other easily when he returned, this did not need to be the case, but he didn't want to lose me I guess.

Anyway, suffice it to say, Anton did not get back in time for our flight, and it wasn't like I could just hop on the plane without him, because I was guarding his belongings. So we missed our connecting flight to Belfast... and spent the night in Heathrow, what a joy this was all turning out to be.

We were able to change our tickets without any problem though and catch the first flight the next morning to Belfast. We arrived in Belfast and I immediately went to the Youth Hostel, showered, unpacked my bike, screwed everything together and rode up to the university to take in the afternoon lectures. Later I went shopping, did the normal mundane things of life and went to bed.

Next day I noticed that my front brake pads were dangerously low, so I went to seek out a bicycle shop. It was at this time that I should have noticed, that I should have started taking more care in this town. It is actually extremely difficult to find a bicycle shop in Belfast, because there are perhaps three in total, all of which are somewhat out of town. I went into all three and only got my brake pads in the last one. I went back to the first shop to fit them because the guy there seemed nice and was willing to let me use his workshop. Austin was his name, and he was one of the nicer sides of Belfast I got to encounter.

So, pads fitted, off to the uni for day two of the conference. I locked the bike up in a very public place, on a bike rack, and after the afternoon session was finished, I returned to collect it. It was gone of course. Suddenly it made sense, there are so few bike shops in Belfast, and so few cyclists because everybody gets their bike stolen there. I went to the police, but they said that if they could find no CCTV footage, they would not pursue the matter any further, naturally they found none.

So that was that, my cross country bike, my most used of all my bikes, the bike that I train most often on, was gone. What's more, it had SPD pedals, what kind of crazy thief thinks he is going to look even moderately coordinated scarpering away on a bike with clip in pedals? He got away with it though I guess.

This pretty much ruined my mood for the remainder of the week. But things were about to get worse. The weekend was boring as shit, I wanted to go cycling but, yeah, no chance of that. I hung around the Hostel for a while but could not get any quiet to mope because outside the protestants were... protesting? marching? acting like idiots? All day Saturday and Sunday there was some kind of march going on were I was. Furthermore, it was pathetic, some people dress up fancier than the Queen, march down the street playing uncoordinated music, drinking themselves to death, and then when it's all over, piss all the grog out onto nearby buildings, the same applies of course to the onlookers as well. It's like it's a full on family activity as well, as there were literally all sorts there. Naturally, after not very long the streets were littered with rubbish, glass and cans. Belfast on a summer weekend is just not the place to be.

Anyway, that was about the last of the crappy things that happened to me in northern Ireland. On Wednesday morning we were due to leave, remember, my passport is at this time, sitting in Frankfurt station. I got on the plane successfully from Belfast to London, but the when I tried to get out of London back home, no way sir, you need a passport. Of course, nobody told me I would need a passport in order to get back to Germany, British Airways knew of my travel plans but never told me to bother about getting my passport sent to me while I was in Belfast.

So, I had to let my travel partner catch the plane without me, while I went in to the centre of London, to get an emergency passport. It is cool that it only took 4 hours after my passport application to get a new one, but on the other hand it is not cool to have to pay 125GBP for the privelige. Luckily, I got the new passport in time to get back to Heathrow, get another flight, at no cost (also decent of BA, although, they were the ones who screwed me over in the first place), and get back home.

I arrived back in my bed at 3am on Thursday morning and slept until 2pm. That was absolutely the worst week of my professional life. Hopefully I can avoid any sort of further disruptions next time I go to a conference.

Latest Update

2011-07-19T06:39:00.004+10:00

Sad really that I've not made the time to make a contribution here lately. There hasn't really been a series of events that has conspired to keep me away from writing an update, but somehow I just haven't bothered myself to really do anything here for a while.

I would also like to, but won't, use this post to make a commentary about a few current events, such as Rupert Murdoch's chickens coming home to roost, the hysteria surrounding Australia's laudable if imperfect Carbon Tax scheme, Julian Assange in his third appearance before a British court, Germany's decision to kill nuclear permanently, Italy's resoundingly awesome participation in beating down Berlusconi in the latest referendum, I don't know, the list goes on. I keep track of everything I've always been interested in, it's just that I'm adding my voice to the milieu less often these days.

Instead of any of that, I'll try to emulate an excuse as to why nothing has appeared here recently. First of all, I got published, this is now the third official, noteworthy scientific contribution I have made in my life. This also means I am somewhere between one third and one half finished with my PhD.

The content of that paper was entirely evaluated using Mathematica, and unfortunately, from now on I need to start doing my calculations in Fortran. I was kind of hoping that the last half of my PhD would be easy sailing, but the need to learn yet another programming language has scuppered those ambitions. Still, I have time on my side I guess.

Otherwise, I have been doing a lot of mountain biking. I guess the season kind of started in May at some stage with the Saarschleife Marathon, I placed 47th out of a huge field of ~300; I had a broken rib and breathing problems on that weekend yet managed a result with which I was supremely satisfied. Next stop was the Rookies Downhill Cup in Winterberg, 19th out of 80 in both heats, my name is now entered for eternity on the ixs downhill cup website for the 4 points (2*2 points in each heat) I gained from that effort. Then I went to some stupid xc race in Hessen and finished last, mainly because I decided that it would be ok to catch the train and ride the 15km through hilly windy landscape to the town hosting the race. I was completely out of energy after 500m and knew I would be rubbish; at least I finished the race and the track wasn't too boring. Next stop was Austria for the first ever Brenner Downhill in Steinach am Brenner. That was a cool one, I finished exactly in the middle of the field 44th/90 but still I was happy with my performance, a 4.2km downhill track is punishing, and to finish it in 7 minutes I believe is somewhat of a decent achievement, although catching the starter before me cost a little bit of time. After that I spanked 'em at the Rhens Marathon, 32 out of 300 and an awesome average speed of almost 23km/h, I was pretty stoked about that one. And the latest adventure in this series happened the weekend before last in Ilmenau for the German Downhill cup, unfortunately I injured myself pretty bad during Friday training and just took it easy for the rest of the weekend, I wanted to get my money's worth instead of risking a trip to the hospital. The next race is the Rookie's Downhill Cup in Steinach on the 8th of August, after I return from a conference in Northern Ireland.

Otherwise, I have been hosting a lot of couchsurfer's, all of whom were very cool to me, but I have to say I regret not having the time during the week to fully enjoy their company when they stay, I really am only providing a couch and a bit of short conversation for my surfers at the moment instead of a fuller experience.

Other than that, there really isn't too much interesting to report, oh, I am sick at the moment which sucks, I have a cough that is producing some really bad smelling lung muck that I wouldn't wish upon anyone. Suffice it to say, I'm currently hoeing through the breath mints like there's no tomorrow. Oh yeah, and my cousin Murray has been here quite a lot recently, he's moving through Europe in an attempt to find some work to finance his next ski season. He's had, let's be honest, zero success, but I don't think his expectations have been that high. Still, his lifestyle is enviable, couchsurfing everywhere, hitchhiking and ride sharing through Europe and meeting a bucketload of awesome folk.

Anyway, Flyingspaghettimonster speed, and good luck

About that Chaser Royal wedding prohibition

2011-04-30T05:11:00.005+10:00

I came to understand that the Royal wedding broadcast was not to be used for satire in any way shape or form. Well, that is not what I saw (for a limited time today) on spiegel online, it was pure satire and sarcasm from their commentators Martin Sonneborn and Matthias Matussek, both comedians, Sonneborn the chief editor of Titanic, a satirical magazine in Germany in a similar vein to what the Chaser newspaper used to be. It was a genuine piss take.

Both myself and my coworker were laughing ourselves silly at some of the commentary, for example: "Prinz Phillips Anzug mag ziemlich prächtig sein, aber hat nichts im Vergleich mit der Mainzerranzengarde." So, evidently, spiegel online must have signed on to the contract with the BBC promising not to take the piss, but then hired a couple of comedians and just went and did it anyway.

So tell me ABC, why didn't you just say, "sure, we'll treat the wedding with the dignity it deserves (wink wink)," and then just bring the Chaser boys in to spite our idiotic rulers???

A green government

2011-04-26T03:37:00.004+10:00

I pretty amazing thing happened a few weeks ago in the state in which I live. As far as I know, and as far as I've been told, I am now living under the first ever Green state government, right here in Baden Württemberg. One can see a pretty cool graphic of the results here.

The greens were the second strongest party in the end and, with the presumed coalition with the third placed social democrats, will be eligible to choose the state premier. Obviously what happened in Fukushima played a role in motivating people to vote, but I would argue that none of the parties have really radically changed their platform over the time in which I have been here, rather, the people have become more motivated about the issues that matter to them or have reassesed their priorities and changed their minds.

Of course, the crassness of the violence displayed by the police in the protests agains the Stuttgart 21 plans certainly gave people pause to think about what kind of disrespectful leaders were in charge of the government in the state, but to go out on a limb and cast this election off as an opportunity well exploited by the greens is really a bridge too far.

I for one an excited, but I'm keeping my expectations in check, I think it is good that the Greens have been given a slim majority in their coalition, it could well have all gone to their heads if they had received a resounding ultimatum from the voting public. I should think that under the circumstances we have here, a smooth transition from over 60 years of conservative government into a Green government can be made without leaving a bitter taste in the mouth of too many folks.

I do look forward to seeing how the greens, with this mandate will go about implementing the Green economy, the rest of the political issues here (nuclear of course is obvious) are still a little bit foreign to me, or at least I feel like I have little stakeholdership in them. Hence the excitement to see exactly what changes will occur.

An overview of the last few months

2011-03-27T21:57:00.003+10:00

I'll lay things out pretty simply, there are just a few things I want to cover here...

1) North Africa

2) Japan and nuclear power in general

3) Politics in general

First of all, North Africa. It was pretty damn cool to see the folk of Egypt and Tunisia rising up peacefully and effectively against their respective oppressive regimes. As someone who once was somewhat of a political rabble rouser, it was almost depressing to see how easily the people of these countries simply came together, without really any great organisation visible, and ditched their corrupt governments.

The fact is, these groupings of motivated, fed up and mostly young peoples simply decided they were sick of corruption and nepotism, and just grabbed democracy for themselves, unlike attempting to impose it in the way America have tried and continue to try to do. Time will tell in the end whether anything meaningful will come out of the amazing changes that have occurred Egypt and Tunisia (and now perhaps Yemen, Oman and Bahrain), but thus far things appear encouraging.

On the other hand, in its lust to prove that yes, freedom can arrive from the barrell of a gun, western nations have now gone down completely the wrong path with Libya. There are two reasons why what NATO are now doing in Libya is wrong. Nothing more than the words, "civilian casualties" needs to be said to show the lack of foresight in these actions, but for some sick people this argument simply doesn't suffice. The situation in Libya is markedly different from that which occurred in Tunisia or Egypt, what is happening there is definitely an armed revolution, not an extreme type of general strike as in the case of Egypt. Furthermore, do we even know who we are helping in Libya? Could these rebels actually be more extreme than Gaddhafi? The old saying goes, "better the devil you know than the devil you don't," right? Furthermore, what are these leaderless rebels going to do with Libya if they seize power? Some of them have already started persecuting Gaddhafi supporters in the same kind of manner that Gaddhafi pursued his political enemies, who is to say that Libya won't get a new face to an old system? And finally, if the Rebels win, since they consider themselves as fighting within a war, they are far more likely to view their potential assumption of power as a reward for the sacrifice of ousting Gaddhafi, question is though, how long will they reward themselves with the trappings of power in much the same way Gaddhafi has given himself a 40 year long reward for doing away with the dictator before him?

So, onto Japan. I am of course extremely concerned with the situation in Japan, my sister lives and works there so I have a greater interest in what happens in that country than most, fortunately she is far enough away from the disaster zone that I don't need to worry to much. It is a tragedy not so much that the disastrous earthquake struck, caused an epic Tsunami and killed thousands of people, rather the greater tragedy is the nuclear danger that has been left behind and the fact that the government in colluding with the nuclear industry, have endangered Japan's economy, people, environment and honour by foisting their filthy technology on their countrymen.

One of my first postings on this blog was actually in support of Thorium oriented nuclear reactors, due to the benefits of far less waste, greater abundance overall less danger than traditional Uranium reactors. I just wanted to get that out of the way, but I have always thought that in comparison to every other clean source of energy available, even this form of nuclear power is entirely unnecessary, unless you live in a place with no sun, no waves and no wind.

Japan's worsening nuclear problems have thankfully given the world the wake up call it needs with regard to nuclear power, except of course America, who probably aren't receiving any news of it at all. I mean, shit if the dumb-arse right wing tools that run America need any greater sign than the oil spill in the Gulf and now this to finally ditch all forms of filthy energy, then they ought to be sent to a hospital for a lack of heart and brain.

Finally, yesterday and today was/will be a pretty odd day for politics in Australia/Germany respectively. Labour got caned in NSW, and the Greens didn't come through as strongly as one could have expected there. On the other hand, the Greens in NSW are kind of different to the Greens everywhere else in Australia. It is good that NSW have finally given their corrupt Labour government the flick, but they are really going to get the government they deserve now that Fred Nile will be bargaining for a ban on abortions in return for cooperation with the government. The NSW voter was stuck between a rock and a hard place I guess.

Where I live, today voters in Baden-Württemberg seem likely to ditch the right wing CDU party that has ruled here since Germany was re-formed after the 2nd world war. The atmosphere is rather excitable at the moment, and given Germany's appreciable (but not over-) reliance on Nuclear power, the Greens and other left wing parties here are expected to create a bit of history. I certainly hope they can, the events of Stuttgart 21 (google it) and the blatant disrespect that Premier Mappus has shown over the last year or so should be enough to put them in opposition for at least the next four years.

Indeed, what all of this has shown (and in NSW I am sure will be proven) is that it's only when the situation gets really really bad when the reluctant among us finally show a bit of guts and do something. A situation that happens all to rarely in my opinion.

An important phone call?

2011-02-15T23:38:00.000+10:00

The toilets at the office can be a pretty funny place sometimes. We have had in the past some weird instructions like, "bitte im Sitzen kacken" which got translated as "Sit in the Shit," though it should have been "remain seated while shitting." Not only was the need for such an instruction funny, but the translation topped it right off. Nonetheless, today was the crowing moment of toilet hilarity. I was in a cubicle doing my business when one of the Chinese staff members came into the toilets, chatting on his mobile phone. It must have been a pretty important call, because he did not interrupt his conversation to whip his junk out, purge and zip back up again. If I could have managed to finish my toilet task before him, I would have shaken his hand (after he had washed it of course), because those kind of skills you can't learn, you have to be born with.

RATM New Album confirmed

2011-01-09T03:01:00.002+10:00

Read about it here

It's taken me over 3 weeks to find this piece of news, which is unusually slow for me when it concerns RAGE news. I only wish I knew about it sooner, that way I could have been acting like a nerd sooner among my circle of friends.

Hazaa, another victor for musical justice around the world, if there is some kind of line up for the Album here in Germany, I'll be there at midnight for it.

Ice skatering!

2010-11-28T02:01:00.002+10:00

Another new experience was had today, I did a training session on the outdoor, 400m long track. This was the first time I have ever worn long track skates, skated on ice outdoors and skated on a 400m track.

I have to say that after this morning, I can fully understand why the Dutch are so mad keen about skating, of course I love the short track skating that I do, but in spite of the cold temperatures, it was rather dream like to be outside, at 8:30am skating around, watching a very red sun rise.

That being said, it did take a little while to get used to long track skates, in comparison to short track skates, there is a distinct lack of side support in these shoes, typical engineering idiocy if you ask me though. Why typical? One needs of course a lot less side support in the shoes for long track skating, but it doesn't mean that just because one needs less of it that it wouldn't be nice to have it there anyway. Nonetheless, after adjusting my style for about 20 minutes, the rest of the session was pretty enjoyable.

One observation however does need to be made about long track speed skating. I'm the type of guy who keeps his eyes open all the time, it's always informative to observe which activities attract which personality types. Long track, like road-cycling, like golf, seems to have drawn in a larger than average number of older gentlemen. This is of course a great thing, I think it's fantastic that there was a 75 year old out there on the ice this morning mixing it with the best of them. But, on the other hand, any activity that attracts the older among us needs some closer scrutiny. If old people are tempted into doing something outdoorsy, what are the conditions that usually need to be met before the elderly are convinced to give this activity a burl. The answer is safety.

Despite some perceived instabilities at the beginning, I would have to say that for anyone with even a modicum of skating ability, it is impossible to fall over and do yourself serious harm with long track skating. No doubt I enjoyed what I did this morning, but let's face it, the fact that there is only one place within 100km I can really do this would ensure the shine of the novelty of skating outdoors would wear off sooner or later. Then what would be left? Basic, simple excercise, that in essence I could achieve by, well, riding a bike, plus it's safe! After a while I am certain that long track skating would tarnish the motivation I have for skating in general if I did it too much.

I already get all the technique training and adrenaline from short track, so I think that is where I'll stay for a while to come. But it's at least good to know there is something a little different that can be done every once in a while.

Wow, look at the cobwebs around here

2010-10-24T07:45:00.003+10:00

Jeebuz, it's definitely been a while since I wrote anything here. What's to say really? Well, in the meantime took a journey back to Australia to catch up with everyone, but more importantly soak up my friends Brad and Rosie's wedding.

I have to say it was pretty cool to see everyone again after nearly 2 years of being away, but, a piece of advice if you ever find yourself in my situation, that is, living and working a long way from home. Be prepared for when you return, everyone will want a piece of your time, although that is a damn good thing, it's no small amount of effort.

My housemate just got home and I asked her about an MMS I sent to her, we are planning to create some stencils for our newly renovated house, I sent her this pic...

I actually forgot that today, she and her boyfriend were at a burial service, and I sent, that, of all things to them while they were in attendance, how embarrassing.

Yeah, anyway, work is epic busy at the moment, we were just about to publish something to a physics journal before we discovered we need to make a series of alterations. Yeah, so the next few weeks I doubt I'll have any time to do any of the things that need doing around here. Plus on top of that I'm learning Dutch and as mentioned the renovations around here are sucking up a decent portion of time.

Unfortunately my camera has been broken for a while so there has been a total dearth of photos from my adventures. I'd would have been really cool to show some pics of some of the many downhill and cross country races I attended this year, but yeah, I'll get it fixed soon enough, or maybe buy a new one, we'll see.

By the way, anyone have any ideas why such a wave of racism has suddenly swept Germany, normally when Switzerland, France, Belgium and the Netherlands start acting like idiots with racism, Germany is pretty good at keeping its head, but not so at the moment.

I promise I'll write something a bit more structured and sensible here soon.

Another kick ass legalization video

2010-08-19T02:31:00.001+10:00

Distant thoughts on the election and preferences

2010-08-15T02:11:00.003+10:00

Unlike previous years, I've barely said a word about the upcoming Australian election. I don't have too much to say mainly because, from what one can see from so far away, this time it would appear like the Greens are getting a fairer run in the media, the campaign has otherwise been boring, and the idiotic, ill-framed debate about preferences and its accompanying shit came and went in the first week of the campaign.

I'm well aware that Mark Latham has played a stunning, but strange role in the campaign, Tony Abbott is surprisingly and disappointingly more popular than I thought he would be, and the electorate is more disengaged than ever with this election, but in spite of all of this, it is still preferences about which I'd like to focus.

Bob Brown was interviewed on Lateline about the fact that the Greens had managed to rather quickly arrive at a preference deal with Labor, subsequently he was criticized using the usual vein of attack, selling-out being a sop to the Labor party blah blah blah. Bob did a pretty good job defending himself, but he didn't quite hit the nail on the head.

What he really needed to say, was essentially rubbish the fact that questions like "why did you do a deal with Labor" are even asked. These questions are placed to candidates from the perspective that the Australian electoral system has somehow been bestowed upon us from a divine intellect, and that it is infallible in every way. So when people criticize the Greens for coming to preference deals with the other parties (The shit only hits the fan with Labor though, the media never mention that we would receive preferences from other parties before we get them from Labor), one has to respond by saying that the question is idiotic.

Preference negotiations must, stupidly if you ask me, be done. Senate elections REQUIRE every party to submit a preference sheet. This means that the Greens and every other party will have to play this stupid game of exhibiting a preference for some parties over others. I mean, let's look at it this way, there are basically 4 big parties in Australian politics, Green, Labor, Liberal and Family First. It doesn't matter in which order the Greens decide to allocate their preferences to the other 3 parties, criticism will be made.

The media need to get their head around the idea that our electoral system is imperfect, and instead of ever criticizing any party ever again for doing WHAT THEY ARE LEGALLY (but idiotically) COMPELLED TO DO, by doing preference swaps with other parties, they should come out in full force behind the Greens and relate to the Australian public what a great idea it is to reform our electoral system from the broken, and frankly distracting one that it is. I say distracting because there is usually a disproportionately large degree of debate about preferences when the debate could be about policy and ideas for the future.

I know that in the distant future, if I ever come back to Australia and stand as a candidate again and someone disses me about preferences, I'll do my best to contain my rage and attempt to enlighten them, but if it doesn't work out, there'll be a good degree of ear bashing and name-calling going on.

Marajuana Prohibition

2010-07-29T18:02:00.002+10:00

I'm not going to fill up too much space with words here, I figure this video does a good job of explaining the salient details, enjoy...

MegAvalanche

2010-07-17T02:37:00.003+10:00

One of the advantages of being settled in Europe is that, well, there is more opportunity to do more of whatever my interests are, I mean, there are approximately 500 million people within the same size as Australia, so the chances are that there is some event somewhere happening catering to whatever one's interests may be.

My current interests are, in winter, speed skating, and in summer, downhill mountain biking. So when the opportunity arose to take part in probably the biggest single mountain bike event in all of Europe, the MegAvalanche, I didn't require too much convincing.

Let's lay down the rules first up. There's 1800 participants in the men's version of the event. Of these 1800, we are all divided up during qualifying into one of five main races, the qualifying and main race are held on different tracks and of course with so many participants, time trialling is out of the question, it's mass start madness!

We arrived last week on Tuesday afternoon, and went immediately to the race tent to collect everything that we would need, race number, lift pass etc. Wednesday and Thursday were pure training, as a first timer, one needs this, the tracks are far longer than any downhill track you've ever seen.

Second thing to mention is that a lot of this race, unless you are a professional with a license, is actually down to luck. I know that sounds like a total excuse, but let me explain it. You see, the qualification runs determine in which of the 5 main races you will run. The starting order of the qualification runs depends on your number. The professionals recieve the numbers from 1-25, 200-225, 400-425 and so on in each group. These guys start on the front row of their qualification runs, and thus have a free run. The rest of us have our names put in a hat and, well, whatever happens happens. I had the fortune of getting startnumber 565. This meant that I started on the penultimate row, and for the entirety of my qualification run, I was in a queue.

Anyway, I managed to overtake just enough people to scrape into the 3rd main race, the Mega Amateurs, any worse and I would have been assigned to the rubbish class, but all things considered, the fact that I got into the Amateur class turned out to be a disadvantage, because I only just scraped in, I started from the very last row of that race. Much overtaking to be done, AGAIN!

So anyway, there was about 280 people in the Mega Amateurs race, and somehow, after overtaking probably about 200 people, I finished 90th. I was pretty chuffed, although it did take me 101 minutes to complete the course, but shit, that is what happens when you have the world's heaviest downhill bike underneath you.

My evaluation of the event can be summed up in one word, exhausting. This thing isn't your garden variety downhill race, I mean, I was pretty well prepped for it too, fit, bike in order, all the proper prerequisites, but man, it's a commitment, it is one week out of your life, where you will do nothing but ride your bike for 8 hours a day for some 6 days. I know that sounds like fun to some of you, but believe me I have never wanted to go home more than on Sunday afternoon. What's worse, is that I can't get the damn event out of my head, it was really a major milestone in my life. It's hard to concentrate at work, it's difficult to sleep at night. I dunno, I am not saying I want to undo the last 2 weeks of my life, no way, I'm just saying, if you wanna do the mega, get ready, it's not just the event, the aftertaste will do a good job of smacking you down too.

Sean.

Don't mention the war

2010-07-01T01:20:00.005+10:00

No you idiots, not that war, I mean, the war that is never actually mentioned. Although we all tend to think of ourselves as reasonably well clued in, some things inevitably slip under the radar. I would consider myself to be within the top 1% of clued-in-ers, so when it happens that I could miss something like this, a war with unprecedented brutality, for more than a decade, I have to say I feel pretty ashamed.

It says two things though, this feeling of shame is probably exactly what the larger commercial news media would want us to feel, in order to absolve themselves from any responsibility of bad reporting. After all, we live in a democracy where information and news is readily available whenever we want it if only we put the effort in to search for it, and if we discover something like this, about which we really all should be much more informed, we should rightly point the finger at ourselves first rather than shooting the messenger. But, in this instance, I just cannot accept it has taken me so long to hear anything from any major news outlet about this. And in this case, it really is the suckful commercial media which is to blame.

Go to "The Australian" website, type in "Great African war" and you won't see anything. Type in "Congo," and you'll be hit with how the board of an Australian mining company (Sundance) were killed in a plane crash, Ken Talbot was on board incidentally, he of Gordan Nuttall bribery fame. Not a word about a war that is easily the biggest since WWII. Apropos, I'm not quite finished on the mining aspect of this story, because as it turns out, it is mining that has been funding the war. What's worse, it is mining that has extracted exactly the kind of matériel for which I am able to write this post. Talk about your cases of depravity.

A lot of what I try to do here is to provide perspective. I've always considered myself reasonably broad minded, able to see things from countless angles. But the only way I can get perspective is by, well, reading other perspectives. And if there is no news coming out of a region for whatever reason, it won't be able to shape my perspective on other issues. Essentially, I am questioning exactly how "well rounded" I am if I am living in a world that doesn't report on a humanitarian disaster of such magnitude, how can my perspective on the world be well formed when I am being selectively fed my news from selectively chosen sources?

It may be difficult to grasp how reading the above articles has made me feel, the only thing that alleviates the outrage is that, well at least I joined up with Amnesty International a few weeks back and through that, have some limited amount of power to make some sort of change. But really, what I am feeling could probably best be described somewhat mathematically. We live in a 3D world, within this world there are the options of left, right, forward, back and up and down. The shadow of a 3D object is 2 dimensional, if shadows were sentient beings, they would probably be quite content with their 2 dimensional existence, never bothering to question how it is that they are projected on to their 2 dimensional plane, but we know what enables the shadow to exist. Today, I've realised that I too am a shadow.

That all kinda happened rather quickly

2010-06-27T16:34:00.005+10:00

So I go to bed on the 23rd of June 2010, comfortable (not really comfortable, more like accustomed) with the notion of having a robot as Australia's Prime Minister. I wake up the next day, and somewhat out of the blue, he's suddenly not the PM any more, rather, that title is now Julia Gillard's.

Now, when you are looking at things from afar, it's a lot easier to miss the print between the lines, and that is what has caught me off guard here. Kevin has ostensibly gone down because he kinda threw a few things into the too hard basket, like meaningful climate change reform, going back on his promise to curb government advertising. At least this is what I am seeing, I must admit, my news consumption from Australia these days is far more constrained.

But really, in my mind, trying to guage the kind of response from the Labor party's own members to the actions of its leader, and how the Australian public might take to what were Kevin Rudd's inevitable broken promises, I really would never have guessed that because of his recent dalliances he would go down so quickly. I guess I don't really fully understand the Labor party. The reason I couldn't see him biting the dust is because I thought that for all Kev's recent missteps, given his far greater preferability than that tool Tony Abbott, come election day, he would hose it in, probably at a small loss of seats, and definite control of the Senate.

But it seems there was more at play than that. What was obvious to me after a little while of Rudd's prime ministership, was his style of micromanaging everything at the top and imposing his will upon all of his subordinates was likely to eventually cause problems. I guess that while the ALP was strong in the polls, such conditions were tolerable for the underlings of the ALP, but really doesn't that sort of tell one exactly what the ALP are all about? They were happy to be shat upon, and let one man do all the thinking for them, and essentially be told that whatever skills they could bring to the better running of the nation would not be required, so long as, and most importantly, their butts were safe in whatever seat they were representing.

If they were really concerned about the direction the party was taking with its adminstrative practises and the effect that was having on Australia (because after all Julia Gillard did say that she took the reins because she believed the party had lost its way) then they would have done away with Kevin much sooner.

One thing I do want to observe however is the issue of the taxation on mining profits in Australia. I would just hope that this issue did not play too great a role in the ousting of kevin Rudd, because that was a damn good idea, mostly. The following articles at crikey are a great look at the economic landscape of mining in Australia, for all their belly-aching about how miners would loose their jobs should the mining enterprises be taxed at a higher rate, it turns out that in actual fact, there would be no loss of jobs, given the big queue of other multinational miners who would jump at the opertunity to mine in Australia (if they aren't already). The queue exists because mining is far more profitable in Australia than many other places in the world.

Now I am aware that Kev really was playing all the wrong moves on this issue, in attempting to sell it, but there are some inalienable basics at play here. The stuff in the ground in Australia belongs to everyone equally, mining companies remove that stuff, refine it and sell it at a profit under probably the most favourable economic conditions anywhere in the world. Their contribution to Australia in terms of jobs, and jobs created as an indirect result their enterprise is significant. But that is where the story ends, they make little to no other contribution to wider society, if I were a small inner city retailer, wondering why it is a business like mining receives the kind of tax breaks it does and I am left fully exposed to the forces of the free market, I'd begin to wonder if we were really working upon a flat economic landscape. And furthermore, the environmental damage that the mining and resource extraction sector do to Australia is yet another unvbelievable cost to the taxpayer.

I cannot imagine that the Australian people would view such a thing as unfavourable, but then again, they were stupid enought to elect and re-elect John Howard 4 times. The final word on all this is that the Ruddmeister has gone down, Gillard has the reins, and I really wouldn't expect too much to change. I just hope that this was the right decision for Labor, but more importantly, I hope that it makes people look at how distracted the politicians are in our 2 party system with maintaining power how badly they covet it, and how that, above all, is what has given Australia a series of terrible governments. Everything that has happened in the past week should serve as evidence that we as a nation have to move further away from our two-party tendencies.

Fuck Israel and moreover, Fuck America!

2010-06-02T06:45:00.004+10:00

There it is, I said it. The two worst countries on the planet. First the qualifiers, my deepest sympathies go to the residents of both those countries who actively work to denounce the heinous actions of their governments, my gripe is in no way with you, in fact I support you more than any other entity.

My gripe is with the monstrosities behind the curtain pulling the levers. It is difficult sometimes to comprehend that people like Benjamin Netanyahu, Barack Obama, Ehud Barak and Robert Gates are actually human, that by some wildly depressing stroke of luck, through all that has lead to the creation of our species, I share such a high percentage of my DNA with these bottom feeders.

I've babbled on here a tad without giving the background, but of course if you don't know what it is that Israel have done to elicit my disdain, you'll get everything you need to know here.

I dunno, there isn't really too much that can be said. Israel is fast becoming an Apartheid South Africa, which by the way has some relevance as Israel attempted to sell nuclear weapons to South Africa during the Apartheid years.

Really, what stinks most about this situation, and about all such similar instances which piss me off about international politics, is the hypocrisy. I mean, we in the west are worried about Iran, a country with no nuclear weapons, when we have a nation like Israel which is in the process of losing its collective shit? Some activists on board the ship that attempted to deliver aid to Palestine are labeled as terrorists while the Israeli commandos that violated international law and committed what was probably a war crime, what are they?

The solution to this problem is all the more complicated because of the insane degree of indoctrination to which the people of Israel are subjected, how can we ever expect to be able to reason with these people that, through no fault of their own, do not have the ability to see the situation through any other perspective than one which establishes that Israel is the one and only defender of Judaism and the threat the was once posed by Nazi Germany has not only diminished but has expanded and now dictates the policy of every nation on Earth that is not Israel.

There is at least one obvious course of action that must be taken. The logical step that should, but won't be taken, is for America to end its economic and military relationship with Israel, as has been well pointed out elsewhere, Israel is now more of a threat to America's other interests in the region than it is a benefit as a strategic regional ally. The other step has to be to get onto Egypt to keep the border to Gaza indefinitely open, and through that border, allow in the basic essentials. I think we have reached the stage of the debate where it is stupid and would cause a misleading train of thought to talk about this region of the world with a view to a permanent solution. What we have on our hands is a humanitarian crisis, that must be dealt with first of all, the people of Gaza need to be given a life before anything else can proceed. Once they have reasonable living conditions, then lets deal with any kind of further disputes. We just can't talk about the rights of Jews or Muslims in this region when there is such an enormous amount of suffering being almost completely irresistibly imposed by one side (Israel) on to the other.

The government of Israel needs to smoke a big spliff and calm the fuck down.

Free Mumia, sign the petition in honour of Mumia's 56th birthday

2010-04-29T16:55:00.003+10:00

Here's something worth signing: Yet another Free Mumia petition. The man turned 56 on the 24th of April, and once again his supporters, which could include you, should you sign the above, are trying to keep the light shined on the clearly flawed process that lead to his unbelievably long, unjust imprisonment.

Check out this little report from Russia Today:

The lack of proportionality in todays Politik

2010-04-16T05:11:00.013+10:00

It is, quite literally everywhere I go. I am talking about the way in which people, when considering the priorities of their country, weigh each issue, how and what should be done about the problems our global and local communities face and the propensity of very particular nodes of interest to arouse wildly disproportionate reactions.

To give you an idea of the direction this post will soon take, contemplate the kinds of reactions you here from people when the issues of, say, immigration, drug availability/drug use, and welfare are raised. These issues and their ilk are classified, usually without good reason, as "sensitive." For one reason or another, people seem to erupt in flames when certain topics are broached.

I want to observe firstly, why is it that people often tend to overreact to certain things. Secondly I'd like to lay out the effects of overreaction, and how oftentimes overreaction does more harm than good, against the instigators of the dispute, their targets and their opponents. And finally a little bit of advice on how the more reasonable and longsighted among us can effectively douse the flames of ignorance and petulance burning inside particular Uncles or Aunts at the next family get together.

For those unfortunate enough to be living in America, you would have to have been living under a rock for the last year to not have noticed the wildly unbalanced and shameful coverage of the tea-party movement. This pitiful band of rabble-rousers, some, but very few of which with honourable intentions at heart, who due to their decidedly loud yet sparsely populated events are easily the best example of what a mass overreaction to the difficulties of our time I, in my short life, have ever seen. What has brought these people to this pattern of behaviour, but not just them specifically, anyone who flies off the handle at the mention of drugs, taxes etc.?

Of course, it barely takes a genius to figure out that it is always either ignorance or prejudice or a combination of both that causes these situations. How is it then that people come to the point of improperly measuring the gravity of each issue? Why is it for instance when I tout the benefits solar panel tariffs, a naysayer will incorrectly observe that it takes more energy to create said panels than they will ever produce? We'll stick with the solar panel argument, because it is a good one, one with which I have had some experience. I was once, as a part of my role in the Queensland Greens, talking to a voter during an election campaign about the benefits of a solar panel tariff system, whereby homeowners buy the panels, and are paid for the excess electricity produced by them at much higher than market prices per kilowatt of electricity (the more people take up such a government induced offer, then the greater the repayment rate for excess electricity is lowered). I essentially had this chap wrapped around my little finger, he was after all a dyed in the wool Liberal party voter, who had never bothered exposing himself to any alternatives. Nevertheless, being a physicist with a Green streak, I essentially knew all the technicalities, both engineering-wise and economically behind a solar panel tariff program and was doing a pretty good job of punching and counter-punching every every point raised. However it came to the stage where he did manage to ask one question that I had not thought through, he was a renter, even if he wanted to participate in a solar panel tariff program, he would have to deal with the hassle of negotiating with his landlord, and then if he moved, would he then have to sell the panels to his landlord? Would it be easy to relocate the panels to his next residence? All I could do in response was say that the program is targeted at homeowners and thate despite tenants not being able to take up to foreseeably take on the offer, there were numerous other ways in which he could do more for our environment if he wanted.

Unfortunately, this was not good enough for him. After all that effort of explaining the system, progressively gaining his agreement and approval at every stage, when it came to a point where not everything slotted into his expectations, the whole thing fell to pieces. It was then that he started convincing himself that this idea was not worthy of his support. I did of course try to explain that neither other major party had anything like this idea or ones like them, that they were doing and would continue to do little to help him cut his bills or reduce Australia's need for oil, none of it was biting with him, and he quickly became irritated at any further discussion, seeming to prefer the idea of maintaining business as usual even though mainly the idea was sound, albeit unable to cater to tenants. The point here is not about the solar panels, the point here is, why did this man lose his taste for trying something different, why did he talk himself out of at least partially acknowledging a point of view he had previously dismissed without second thoughts?

The reasons naturally are many fold. But consider simply the forces behind the decision making progress. Input, critical thinking and analysis, and then the resultant output (in this chaps' case, the output behind his opinions and thoughts of the idea). The decision making input this man has had through his life could easily be applied to the majority of voters that choose either of the two major parties. His input would come from television and radio mostly, and if not there, then common news websites that are in reality an internet simulcast of what appears on television anyway. The problem with television and radio in a free market society is that like everything else, they need to compete. To compete effectively they need to broadcast the stories that garner the most attention, this is why we have seen so much attention paid to the non event of Tiger Woods' sex life, or Michael Jackson's death etc. Normally in a free market, competition is good, because it should create a better product. But in the case of the media, it is utterly terrible, it creates a product that gets perpetually worse and worse. Luckily in most countries media licenses are given according to the obligation of reporting to a certain level of decency, but these rules are usually pretty flexible in their language. The purpose of the media is to report important issues, and provide as much information behind them as possible. This just doesn't happen, the very fact that there is even an entertainment news sector belies this obligation. As a side note, I wonder what proportion of initially bright eyed journalists who had ideas of a hard hitting investigative journalism career become stuck in the useless news cycle of celebrity or sports news. Anyway, the fact is, capitalism is simply not conducive to producing a good product when it comes to journalism. News and media should be predominantly state funded through an independent body by means of a fee placed on the ownership of televisions and other devices capable of receiving news (true mostly in Europe, not in Australia).

So that is the first thing that failed this poor chap in his decision making process, a lack of exposure and information. But it didn't need to be so, in spite of the lacklustre status of media in our modern world, he could still have been receptive to my alternative message had he been given the proper tools in his education. This is where I get to put in my big kick for a massive expansion of scientific education in schools. What is most important for the functionality of society today is not so much the ability to count, multiply or do remedial level mathematics or chemistry, but more the ability to learn and apply the scientific method. I cringe every time I hear of opinion polls showing how parents want the education system to focus more on arithmetic and other basic trash. I wonder how many of these parents voice their support for an expansion of scientific education based on the desire to see their children learn more about the scientific method than learning times tables. When someone learns science, they are implicitly, and sometimes during their course of study, explicitly exposed to what the scientific method demands of how one thinks. Unfortunately, in this department, western society is going backwards. Public education in general is poorly funded, one need only look at the ever increasing fees University students must pay (it is the same in Germany!) even to attend university (especially when one considers that it used to be free) to understand how much import governments place on ensuring their populace is well informed. I would like to defend that point however from any potential attack, the common counter argument to the introduction of university fees is that there are now proportionally more students attending university than when it was free for all, but this is fallacy. A university education is necessary to achieve the same standard of living today as was achievable during the times of free higher education, furthermore, when governments so idiotically pursue the idea of ever increasing populations, it is no wonder that more and more people want to go to university. More people, more competition for good jobs, more demand for university, again, those who claim that university fees are in some way fair, simply aren't looking at the bigger more important problems, once again, an example within an example of the disproportional weighting of issues.

One can see the consequences of a lack of education about the scientific method. People often blithely say that the internet is such a wonderful resource that could really help better inform the world, but to be honest it can't. The internet has acted only as yet another forum for a mixture of both useful and useless information to come into existence, people without the proper scientific background can't be expected to exploit the internet to its fullest potential when it comes to finding out the right facts behind each issue. I have now essentially covered the issue of information input and decision making output. It is not too long a bow to pull to reason that when people are confronted with something they have never before encountered and do not have the scientific reasoning skills to calmly and humbly contemplate this new perspective they quickly over- or illogically react.

What now are the effects of an ill informed or unreasonable reaction? I'll aspire to answer this question with as global a view as possible. The ultimate example of an over the top reaction came a tad earlier in the year, with the reaction to the hacked emails of British climate researchers. None of the email exchanges actually does anything to refute the facts of the current situation we find ourselves in regarding the climate, but the tenuous link it presented to a potential pathway to discredit the entirety of other climate research done independently of those involved in the affair was jumped upon by the ill-informed skeptics of the world. To a greater extent it is these very same people, albeit the slicker among them that tend to appear in the form of lobbyists that did such a great job at derailing the Copenhagen conference. Truth be told it's not like the conference was actually hearing evidence from representatives of companies that profit from the destruction of mother earth, but they had already done enough to scratch the back of the political generals who call the shots as to how their conference negotiators should act.

When I said earlier that I would outline how exactly imbalanced or disproportionate reactions hurt not only the opponents of the ill informed accusers, but also the accusers themselves, the answer to the query of how may appear somewhat abstract. But in essence, it is not. When for instance, a company sends its minions out to demonize a local Ecuadorean populace (Google "Crude", or for another example, Bhopal) for demanding restitution for the hideous damage done to their land, of course it is obvious to realise that the corporation is acting counter to the physical evidence, and moral standards. However, when it comes to the preservation of profits, naturally corporations engage in such propaganda and intimidation. How then could I say that such an imbalanced and disproportionate reaction to such an urgent situation could be in any way damaging to the corporation? Fact is, short term, it isn't. But of course, corporations aren't people are they? What really matters are people, I'm thinking of the right-wing cheerleaders, themselves seemingly modest people, who seem to want to remove the agencies that are empowered to protect us from such catastrophes. Why is it these people, who seem to swallow all too easily the catchwords spewed out by corporate advertisements that any attempts to control the almightiness of modern, socialism for the rich, capitalism amounts to an assault on basic freedom? How many of the people who died in the wake of hurricane Katrina voted for the Government that removed any hint of preparations or protections for such a disaster because they cast their vote merely because, say, their candidate of choice said something like, "let's end stem cell research?" How many Belgian businesses will lose female Muslim employees because of that country's Hijab ban, but then still go out on election day and vote the buggers back in? My point is, often, when people become incensed about one issue, often that issue engulfs their entire perspective, making it difficult for them to discern and decide about what other, among the milieu of issues, is also of critical and greater importance. If all of my rambling is a tad too much just on this point, see here for a quick rejoinder.

So how do those of us, whether we have some expert education of the scientific method, or whether we implicitly subscribe to its ideals without ever having actually realised it, convince those among us who are prone to overreaction and limited perspective actually do something about it? My advice is, get in the argument. For far too many level-headed sorts, there seems to be an overwhelming temptation among our type, rather than to engage obvious fraudulence, is simply to disengage and simply believe, society, or the flying spaghetti monster will deliver to this person, their comeuppance. I can say with the sheerest of clarity, that will not happen. I have seen countless people, be it involved in debates amongst those of similar minds or with those from complete opposite poles, withdraw and agree to disagree, or whatever brings things to a expedient end. Or, otherwise, these people seem to feel that they do not have the skills to truly engage and dress down their rabbling opponents. My advice is this, never shy away from an argument, always be as dry and calm as Yoda himself, and add perspective at every step of the way. If some idiot wants to pipe up about how much money dole moochers are receiving, ask him how much your country is spending on Afghanistan, spending his/her taxes on murdering people? When someone counters your point that banking should be fundamentally nonprofit or at the least more competitive by saying that could lead to a slide into socialism, respond by asking if we aren't living in a society where although true ruthless capitalistic competition is required of the minions, the behemoths need not fight with each other, a socialistic system for the privileged. I don't want to advocate answering accusations with other questions, but usually, those on the other side don't have the perspective yet to receive a real answer. By opening doors for them, you are laying the path to eventually providing logical, scientific and satisfying answers to both you and your (now former) debater. This is why the Tea party movement in America can't be reasoned with, they just do not yet have perspective.

Final words? The other issue was of course confidence. In that case, my advice is start small, broach sensitive subjects with your friends at first and start teaching yourself how to debate. Of course, you need to have the interest in the first place to start doing something about putting a lid on the Fascist sectors of our society, but I can assume that by reading this post you have that already. Once you've got the confidence and taste for debating, join your favourite, nonprofit advocacy group, and get involved, deeply. Attend meetings, really prepare ahead of time and really try to add something. This kind of desire to want people to act logically in response to the issues of our time must definitely be turned into a call to action for those of us already at that level, to drag to this position, and it doesn't take any more effort than talking to people. As my little slogan here reads, the revolution is one to one, don't sit back whack indignation on the head as soon as possible, and start educating your fellow man.

Why I simply could never have my own children

2010-04-09T02:28:00.008+10:00

It has for a long while now been a cornerstone of my persona to strive to never have children of my own. Now, just to qualify everything, there are other cornerstones of my persona that could possibly discourage any woman from actually wanting to have children with me, but that is somewhat beside the point. I didn't really understand exactly how against the grain it is to be of such an opinion when I was still living in Australia, I assume that those to whom I spoke to about it understood quickly enough that given my environmentalist traits, it's an entirely logical ideology for me to subscribe to.

I've read 2 really good posts in recent days that elucidate further on the point and have spurred me to write this, one here and the other here. The other reason of course is that in the past year I've encountered a lot of people who quite naturally don't know a damn thing about me, and when the question of children arises, well I just say what I've always said, "there's too many people on the planet, why would I want to do something that would only work against all the environmental/armed conflict problems I've campaigned to solve? Those who know better should do better."

This argument, for one reason or another, seems not to have bitten in Europe, or at the very least the small part of it in which I live. Almost without fail, the response I get is that I am insane, in many ways that is probably true, but any potential insanity is not because I don't want my own children. Even those who are very educated in Europe seem not to have connected the dots between an ever increasing world population and the negating effect it has when it comes to food production, energy demands etc.

Of course, it is sad enough that almost every government on the planet encourages population growth, it's no secret that with more people, more stuff can be produced, and more money can be printed and so called "economic health" maintained. What drives governments to go as far as offering rewards and tax advantages to couples who have children? It's quite natural see, we live in a grow or die economy, if currency is not devalued, people have no incentive to spend (that is, if you're a Friedmanite/Greenspanite), currency is devalued by inflation through the printing of cash, this new cash is given by governments to the richest sectors of society first in the form of government contracts, who enjoy the benefits of being able to use the new cash to buy goods at prices which have not yet encountered the inflationary effects of the new cash and these companies feather the nest of parliamentary representatives to keep the whole process flowing. I'm reminded of what a great poet once said, "what we don't know keeps the contracts alive and movin', they don't gotta burn the books they just remove 'em." Anyway, this process of printing new cash is itself justified when GDP increases, and so long as population increases, so will GDP. Population growth is an essential part of our malformed economic system.

But what came first? In this case it was not the desire by governments to print cash to "drive" the world economy, that was just adding fuel to the fire, certainly our population has been on the rise well before the emergence of fiat currency. So what then do I propose be done about it? The solution is definitely two pronged, the ultimate solution cannot be realised without first enacting an intermediary solution. The intermediary solution is itself twofold, one is to encourage a large campaign, citizen funded (because at the moment no government would willingly get behind a population control campaign) to encourage people to be thoughtful and not have more than 1 or 2 children. It's an easy sell, the message only needs to revolve around how much money a household could potentially save by having fewer children, and how much better parents can provide for their children if there are less of the little buggers. The second part of the intermediary solution is to get behind left wing candidates for parliaments, and elect governments that are not driven by the blind pursuit of ever increasing GDP, but more by the increase in quality of life for all. If there should be a blind pursuit of some kind of economic measurement index, then that index should be the Gini index, the measurement of wealth distribution.

Once this is achieved, and the governmental coveting of an ever higher GDP is curbed, there is a far greater opportunity for the introduction of a 1 or 2 child per family policy. Further to that, there could be an increase in migrant intake for families from 3rd world countries with fewer than 3 children. And what would the results be? Comfort, plain and simple, but not just for me or you, but for the planet as an organism itself. Comfort to ride your bike with less people on the road, comfort for the farmer who is pestered less by overbearing demands by supermarket chains wanting ever more produce at less cost (and the associated temptation of the farmer to use poisonous chemicals in order to achieve that goal), comfort to know that your child will go to school and be placed in classes with a teacher student ratio of 1:15 or so, where are the disadvantages?

I do want to address one issue that I usually hear as a counterargument to all of this. That is that having children as an unselfish act, and while it's true that I am greatful that I exist and that my parents chose to have me, such an argument could not be more false. I am firmly of the belief that having children is indeed a selfish act. When scientists discovered that genetically, you and are are about as different as 2 eight-balls, that was the moment that should have dawned on everyone that there should be no rational difference between adopting a child and having your own. People, as far as I know, and as far as they have told me, say that they have children in order to pass on their experiences and wisdom to a little version of themselves. I fail to understand how this can be better achieved through having your own children, against adopting a child. The fact is, who someone is, is at least as much influenced by the experiences they have during their life, as it is by whom they were created, so there goes the argument against having one's own children. Do you really think that your own children will be better able to understand you when you need to teach them a lesson than the children that came out of another person? How many of us count our parents as our greatest influences anyway, there are people out there who are guided more by folk like Karl Marx or Margaret Thatcher than they are by the upbringing they received by their parents.

So what would being really unselfish look like when it comes to having children? The answer is pretty simple, the most unselfish thing that could be done when it comes to children is to put your name down on the adoption list for an orphan unfortunate enough to be born in one of the worlds poorer countries. The last thing I'll say on this is that I'm more than welcome to any feedback on this question, it is one of philosophy, and I'm curious to see if there are any counterarguments in existence that I have not yet seen.

Eugene Terre'blanche Murdered!

2010-04-05T00:23:00.003+10:00

Wow! Epic news, I don't know how many of you out there are familiar with the exploits of Terre'blanche, but essentially he was the leader of whatever might have remained of those who still cling to the notion of a separate Boer state for whiteys in South Africa.

I first caught wind of the man in one of Louis Theroux's wierd weekends episodes and honestly speaking the man was a fucking lunatic. I first saw the report on his death here (German) and to be honest everything that is reported therein regarding the possible ramifications of Terre'blanche's death seem quite plausible.

Though there appear to be fewer followers of Terre'blanche today than during his heyday, his death is definitely going to cause a stir, especially being so close to the football world cup. The man himself, from what I have seen and read about him, was a cur against the process of reconciliation in South Africa, and all of the subsequent societal structures that follow from a well integrated and co-operative populace. However his murder will only serve to further work against the upholding of a functional and interactive society. Racists and racism in general cannot be defeated by any means of physical retribution or dominance, it can only be conquered by intellectually outmaneuvering its proponents. The battle against Terre'blanche's politics had largely been won, unfortunately his murder might ignite what remains of his followers to exact revenge, which is exactly what a spokesperson spoke of in the article linked to above: "Wir werden entscheiden, wie wir den Tod von Mr. Terre'blanche rächen," (We will decide, how we will avenge the death of Mr. Terre'blanche)

I am certain this will only bring about more distrust between blacks and whites. 15 years ago, if such a thing happened, I'm sure chaos would reign, hopefully South Africa is mature enough today to handle this situation carefully and strategically.

WTF is wrong with Europe atm???

2010-02-27T05:56:00.005+10:00

France has kind of lost its way at the moment I would have to say...

And then of course Germany is kowtowing to America again but that is to be expected considering America has its boot on Germany's throat. This is what the war on terror has done to the world, either indirectly by lighting a fire under racists in France, or directly by compelling an occupied country (Germany) to support a crazy war. At least the government of The Netherlands has done the right thing and stepped back from committing more troops to Afghanistan, so that is one good thing.

And although they aren't directly involved (well, not directly involved in anything) Switzerland also recently decided to pass a crazy law banning the construction of Minarets. Even if you are a red-blooded racist, how does banning the construction of Minarets stop any apparent spread of "islamification" or whatever term they want to use to rationalize their racism.

The fundamental failure the folk in France and Switzerland have made in their thinking is that they believe they live in a country where religion means something, should mean something, or in some way will have bearing on how their society is governed. "Apparently," each of these countries have some sort of separation of religion from the state, so why worry if a Halal only restaurant opens up next door? It's not like you'll wake up tomorrow to discover that everyone in Sarkozy's cabinet has suddenly converted to Islam.

The only way I could tolerate such dumbassedness, (being that I am an athiest) is if there was a of campaign in France and Switzerland (and wherever else it may apply) to ditch not just Minarets and head scarves, but quite simply do away with religion altogether. I'd jump on that bandwagon in a flash. I'd take the journey and help with the campaign in Switzerland if the next plebiscite was to ban the construction of ANY church, or to ban the wearing of any symbol or article of clothing connected with any religion. Alas attempts to maintain some kind of equilibrium, or non-hypocritical approach to politics seems a long way off.

Finally I have got to say something about the insane almost blind selectivity of the American press in reporting the suicide flight of a tax protester into an IRS building. If we choose to accept how the word "terrorist" is applied these days, then that was by all accounts a "terrorist" attack. But it has not been characterised as such. I'd hope that this means that all future such events will receive the same kind of sympathetic recounting of the motive of the culprit. Maybe there'll even be a expose that attempts to justify bin Laden's philosophy next, at least one that receives the kind of widespread coverage this nutbags motivation got.

Has the penny finally dropped yet America?? I think the war on terror can be declared a loss when it comes to the point where your countrymen are trying to score an own goal. We can all only hope that they can hear the referees whistle and recognize that the time has well and truly come to quit while they're a long, LONG way behind.

Updated: The war on terror, an utter defeat for the US

2010-02-19T08:21:00.009+10:00

UPDATE: I mean, this is my point entirely, how does someone like Dick Cheney get a reception like this?? I would literally throw up uncontrollably if I were in the same room as this man, but yet such applause?? Do these idiots know not what he has done? How many lives he has ruined? How much money he has embezzled, bewildering!

In the following, I talk about the US Goverment in the most part when I refer to the US or America etc.

I got tired long ago spending time here writing about the war on terror, but now it would seem as though any remaining confirmation I needed that America has truly lost this imaginary but frightfully expensive war has been confirmed. I was reading this (warning German) the other day and it seems imminent that measures will be taken in the US captiol to do away with the notion of habeas corpus.

It's a rather simple conclusion to establish from here that (although not law yet), a country with elected representatives that seem willing to even consider the idea of introducing something like this to Parliament has in essence become it's own enemy, it has fallen all too easily into the ideological trap that powerful empires fall into when fighting (what they believe to be) a war. That is to say, what really makes the US different from the targets of the war on Terror? Who are the targets of the war on terror now? Certainly it is obvious that the target is the American populace, with fewer rights by the day, the US to my view is steadily slipping down the list of other world governments with which one could favourably compare. Currently I peg the US at not too far above Equatorial Guinea.

But it's much worse than simply losing the right to habeas corpus. The US is now really the deadweight of the world. I will not say that it does nothing useful, because there are without doubt people there who are attempting to make useful contributions to the global society, but when a government such as the US orients its spending priorities on supporting a war a 2 year old could see is Psychotically stupid and propping up the finance sector, one needn't draw too long a bow to understand that by empowering 1) a war machine and 2) usurers, there's a fair degree of certainty that quite a harm will be done, environmentally, economically and in terms of real casualties.

It disturbs me immensely, I wish I could stop taking notice of what America does and pretend that it will have no adverse affects on myself or more importantly others less fortunate, but I now firmly believe that we (the rest of the world) have to get out of this abusive relationship, because that is exactly what it is between the western countries and the US. They disappoint us at every step, they were a failure at Copenhagen, they have their boot on the throat of Germany with thousands of soldiers stationed here permanently, hence Germany's participation in the war in Afghanistan, or whatever you could more appropriately call that engagement, "war" is certainly not a befitting description, take a pick from Occupation/Fool's errand/Genocide. The US government can't do a thing right concerning health care, race issues, economic justice. The list doesn't end.

And it disturbs me because I am a citizen of 2 countries that are most strongly allied with the US, Australia and Great Britain. To take an abstract look at the situation, ask yourself if you have ever worked with someone who was so lazy, so self centred, opportunistic and exploitative that you and your co-workers had to make up for the work this lazy shit wasn't doing? This is the situation every country allied with the US is dealing with at the moment. What to do about it, either give them an arse kicking, or walk away. Yet routinely, Australia and Great Britain defend to the hilt their relationship with America, and it sickens me.

I want out, I want the US out of my life, and out of my countries' lives. Their banks park their fat arses wherever they want around the world, investing in Tar Sands in Canada or chemical plants in India, their Army rule the world. I've had enough, but what can one do about such a disappointing ally? I already do my best at boycotting American products, but who knows in what way they make money from the soy milk I buy or the DVD's I watch or the movies I enjoy?

But what is really the most disappointing thing is this. These representatives that will seek to implement laws waiving habeas corpus, what bothers me the most, is that they will get re-elected. Not to say this doesn't happen in other country's or my own, but really, to what extent must it go to before people in the US decide they need a better way of electing representatives? I just don't understand why there are not more riots in the streets, sit down strikes? Why do the people who work for Goldman Sachs or Citigroup (who aren't fortunate enough to be grossly overpaid executives) still go to work? Why don't they quit, or better yet, try to take as many paid days off as possible before being fired? It's not like they really need their jobs or money (no I'm serious) because most of them are swimming in debt already even with a job, why waste your life working when you're only going backwards overall, didn't Ghandi prove you can change the system and live a happy fulfilling life without material reward at the same time?

I just hope a few Americans stateside read this and perhaps inspire their neighbours and coworkers to actually do something about their lot. I really would like to feel proud that Australia has such a cosy relationship with America, but for that to happen, it's going to take some good 'ol fashioned grassroots Ghandi style civil disobedience from my American brothers and sisters. Here's hoping.

P2P Freedom under threat

2010-01-22T08:56:00.004+10:00

It has recently come to my attention that there are numerous rather dastardly legal firms running about in recent months slapping people with demands for cash for downloading copyright protected material via bitTorrent.

These legal firms apparently are representatives of mostly porn and computer game manufacturers, though how firm the connection between the solicitors and the manufacturers is remains yet to be seen. How are they doing it and what is the principle behind it? Essentially these rather cunning groups of Lawyers are engaging in what could be defined as "Speculative Invoicing." whereby one sends out a series of invoices to specific targets and any of these targets silly or frightened enough to pay up is what allows these firms to continue their extortionist operations.

Actually, there are reasonably good grounds to be frightened, but we'll get to that in a moment. What are these law firms actually doing? It's reasonably simple, they log on to a torrent that allows the sharing of a file created by a company they represent, they track the IP's sharing this file (anyone can do this btw), they then hunt down the ISP hosting the IP's and press them for details. Thus far ISP's have bent over backwards to hand out as much PRIVATE information as possible to these extortionists about the customer details behind the IP's, and once these details are in the grubby hands of the lawyers, the letters start coming.

What's in these letters, as I said, something worth being afraid of: being taking to civil court for violating copyright law. However, this shouldn't be something to be feared, all the evidence they have is that your IP committed the crime, often-times, people are receiving these letters without any clue as to how their private home network could possibly have done what they are being accused of. I mean, these pricks don't even have something as basic as a MAC address associated with the accused IP's!!!

Anyhow, the warning is out there now, and if you want to keep using torrents to take part in LEGAL filesharing activity, but don't want to run the risk of these ambulance chasers ruining the good times, download PEERBLOCK, these guys know how to keep the bastards at bay. If you are unfortunate enough to have already gotten one of these letters, the following sites should help...

BeingThreatend
TorrentFreak
GroupAgainst(P2P)InsaneCeaseAndDesistOrders (in German)

And to really kick it home, go here, select a member of the Euro parliament, and write to them to do something to prevent what is essentially strong-arm-squad extortionism

Tales of Monkey Island - MegaFanboy review

2010-01-10T09:23:00.005+10:00

For the last 4 or so months I have been occupying what little spare time I've had with playing each of the 5 episodes of the 5th installment of the Monkey Island series, it is of course entitled (appropriate for a game released in 5 stages) Tales of Monkey Island.

I don't think that I've ever really done a game review here before, but it's high time I started, because essentially if I don't bother to review this game, a game that is a part of a series I have grown up with and feels very much to me what a favourite book or favourite film feels like to others, then I really would be denying a part of my existence. To encapsulate my feelings better, if my relationship to games were like that of a normal a friend, if I didn't do this review I'd have to consider myself only as a "sunshine friend."

Now that we have my secret shame out of the way, I have to make a second disclaimer. You know how when before the prequel trilogy of Star Wars was released, if you were a fan, you knew that no matter how many trashy "expanded universe" novels were released, they could never tarnish from the core theme (the prequels changed all that of course) , and you'd even go out and buy the books and read them and love them regardless of how far into the wild they could tangentialize. Anyway, that is me with Monkey Island, I would have played this game and loved it no matter what.

So, finally, to the review stage. I won't review each episode, rather, I'll do an overview. Basically the game is filled with just the right amount of logically based puzzle solving, infuriating confusion, and oftentimes it also contains puzzle solving that is not in any way logical. The sequence in which one plays the game also lends itself to enjoyment. It would be difficult I reckon, as a storywriter, to revive a series like Monkey Island after 4 previous episodes to provide a captivating story, but MI5 does it well. I for one like finally being able to get along with Le Chuck, and it's not all that unreasonable that, in the opening sequences where the player smites Le Chuck, that this act does more than just disempowering the almighty demon pirate, but unleashes the "pox of Le Chuck" that you spend most of the rest of the game either falling victim to, or attempting to cure. Oh and by the way, the nature of slaying of Le Chuck in the opening episode naturally is botched by Guybrush's typical upfuckery, and henceforth Le Chuck is not killed but made human.

I think this part of the story is essential to adding life to the series, because let's face it, MI4 was not the best in the world (much as I loved it though) and adding the element of co-operating with Le Chuck rather than constantly trying to thwart him was a rewarding gaming experience. Nonetheless, all the characters are far and away better thought out than the last incarnation of MI, I especially like DeSinge and Morgan LeFlay (an appropriately named character if ever I heard one).

Best sub-episode of the 5 that were released in MI5 would have to be, without a shadow of a doubt, the third, where we finally re-encounter Murray. The banter between him and Guybrush when Guybrush is attempting to escape a Narwhal which he has become trapped inside is pure gold. I just cannot get enough of Murray, and no amount of him in the MI series is too much.

The same cannot be said this time out for Stan. Stan, for my way of thinking, is a lot like Old Gil in the Simpsons, the guy is a loser and he has to lose each and every time. Stan of course was the Lawyer in charge of prosecuting Guybrush for release the pox of Le Chuck in the first place, and during this sequence of events, Stan just has too many successes. When the player encounters Stan in the game, this is the time for some stress relief, a real, "kick the dog" kind of a moment. That never really came to fruition, Stan never really lost anything in the end anyway, because although (for the sake of continuability) Guybrush is exonerated in the trial, Stan is able to move on to the next subjects to be prosecuted for releasing the Pox (namely the voodoo lady and LeChuck himself). I really needed to see Stan lose again and I just didn't get that this time.

Finally we come to the last episode, in which Guybrush has to find his way through "The Crossroads" between the world of the living and the world of the dead. I gotta say, I found this episode probably the easiest of the lot. Again the banter is entertaining and witty as always, and although I enjoyed it, once the player finds the keys to getting out of the crossroads, possessing Guybrush's corpse (so he can accomplish physical tasks that spirits can't do), we arrive on LeChucks ship, crank the wheel (so to speak) and then bam, that it's, game's over. As I said, thoroughly enjoyable, but I was thinking I'd need more than one weekend to finish it.

Nonetheless, MI5 is a galloping success and I'd have to say that this is probably the way I'd like to play all my adventure games in the future (that is, in installments). All I can hope for now is that they do the same thing for an updated Grim Fandango!

The Copenhagen protests

2009-12-25T07:23:00.003+10:00

How did Copenhagen really go down. There was plenty of huff and puff surrounding the event, and from multiple perspectives; the island nations and the massive consequences they face should a weak agreement prevail, whether the Danish police would live up to their trigger happy reputation, how much of a spoiler role would Australia and Canada play.

I have become more dismissive about following the coverage on such global events, I could essentially rattle off a series off common talking points without seeing anything and probably give as good a brief over the negotiations and the protest reports as AP or BBC could. And to no great surprise, things essentially went as I'd expected.

No agreement was reached, the Danish police acted like idiots (at least they apologized) and the islanders have once more been left banging on the door of the rescue shuttle while the rich nations continue to set forth their plans to float away to a comfortable existence on the boat that corruption and paper currency built.

What was up to standard was the public response. I was at what I would think would have been the biggest of the protests that accompanied the 2 week long negotiation sessions. Some of the people I was talking to on the trains going to and around Copenhagen were saying that if the Iraq war protests could only pull 30000 people out of the Danish countryside, then there is little hope of exceeding that figure.

There were easily 50000 people there, if not 100000, and definitely one of (if not the) biggest protest action that Denmark has ever seen. The mood in that case is pretty clear, there is a big level of public suppport, from the richest countries in the world, to pay our share and start compensating the poorer nations that will in the future suffer from our luxury.

There were also some counter protesters, in years past I would have tried to talk to them, but I think the scientific evidence about climate change is so overwhelming now that it would be like trying to argue the exact value of 2+2 with someone who was certain it was 5. One of them did hold a funny sign that said "plants love CO2," perhaps I should have asked why they didn't carry another sign saying that plants also love a temperate climate and are not capable of adjusting to temperature increases beyond a very small range (certainly much less than is predicted).

I have become less optimistic about the planet's response to climate change since Copenhagen, in fact I'm fairly sure that the engineered economic crisis will, instead of being used as the auger for realigning the world to a greener future, will be used as the excuse to stop anything meaningful happening on the climate front. I'm still going to attend protests, donate money and continue being a vegetarian, but I'm also fully expecting a far different future.

In 2074 I will be 90 years old, I'm going to lay it on the line now, that after Copenhagen I predict that by that time, the global average temperature will be exactly 3 degrees celsius warmer than it is today. I think I'll start taking Finnish classes.

Capitalism

2009-10-17T07:49:00.003+10:00

The big event on my calender in the coming weeks will be heading to one of the local cinemas around Heidelberg and taking in Capitalism: A love Story.

I've been ranting and raving for a long time now on this soapbox about my disdain for what is modern capitalism, and this post is no exception. I've been reading an absolute truckload of stuff of late, perhaps to refuel my passion for taking on 'the man,' so to speak, but one argument I believe has slipped through the cracks when I read about how we must move to a post modern capitalistic society is the reminding of people of what capitalism really is, and why we don't live in a capitalistic society any more.

Corporatism is the economic world in which we now live, but it still gets called capitalism, and for a lot of people, when I or anyone else try to say that we must radically re-organise our corporatist society, they think I'm attacking their beloved capitalism. There are two problems with this misconception, the first being that the people who defend capitalism have mostly been raised on a diet of advertising and propaganda claiming that there is no better alternative to capitalism, or more accurately, that any alternative is some form of dictatorship. The second is that if we were to revert to what was once truly capitalism, I wouldn't have any problem with that whatsoever.

I'll briefly elaborate on both these points. Is there no alternative to capitalism? Of course this is a complete lie, you can look at almost any corner of Europe, mostly Scandinavian countries to realise that they are living in a society that is economically very different from American style modern capitalism, but I'd like to take a more extreme example. Cuba has, in spite of the mammoth efforts by America to decimate that country's economy, been quite successful in making the best of a difficult situation, and all in the name of Socialism. This doesn't mean I'd like to live under Castro's (that's Raul now by the way) regime, nor does it mean I think the world should use Cuba as an exact template for re-tooling our economies, it just means that there are working alternatives.

The other point is, what does real capitalism actually look like? Well, if you truly believe in capitalism, my view is that you have two options, as a government, for how you manage things. The recent global financial implosion provides a fantastic, and familiar example. The United States has for years done away with regulation. It's become like the bad set of parents, letting their kids run wild and allowing nature to teach the little brats a lesson. But there has to be a logical reaction to the situation when the milk turns sour. If your misbehaving child manages to get in trouble with the police for stealing something from the local shop, and you haven't been placing some kind of restriction on the child, then probably the most illogical thing you could do is, say, pay the shopkeeper for the stolen items, give the kid some candy and then go about things as though nothing ever happened. As far as I know, most people in that situation would berate their child till their head started spinning, and not let them out of the house for a good month.

But this isn't the way it works at the big end of town. No, when you're big enough, you can use your leverage over government, that you paid for with your lobbyists, to convince the administrators that you deserve a bailout, that the although you've misbehaved, the people who work for you need their jobs etc. etc. all the while you've probably been union busting and cutting benefits, but that's ok, that's what your employees are there for, to work like slaves when times are good, and to hang them out as cause for government sympathy when you've screwed up. And this is exactly what has happened.

Basically, the US government, doesn't want to have the sign 'Epic fail' written across many of that country's flagship corporations, so they've decided to bail them out, but as I've said, without any of the logical punishments that should come with such action. Of course the other way to prevent the companies going broke in the first place is proper regulation, it's really that simple, they might not make so much wild, casino like profits, but at least the people who depend on these large corporations for work and wellbeing, can have a guaranteed job and worthwhile wage, and the people at the top can make a tidy, but not exorbitant profit.

So basically, if we are going to stick to capitalism, we have two choices, either we continue to wind down the regulations, but in so doing, be willing to have massive companies fail and put thousands out of work (more on how these people can find work in a moment) and never dole a cent out of treasury again for companies that make dumbass decisions, or over-exploit the consumer. OR, we can properly regulate our economy, start making decisions on what is a fair amount of profit for the big players (not small business though, small business kicks ass!), what is a fair CEO's wage and what is useful and useless work (financial management is mostly useless, at least, considering the proportion of western GDP it constitutes) and live with a stable economy that doesn't grow, but where everyone gets their fair share.

If we do decide to turf the regulatory powers of government, and return to proper, cutthroat capitalism, and IF a bunch of major corporations find themselves being swallowed up in a typhoon of their own creation, then I would propose that government itself compete in the economy, with the philosophy being that if a corporation can do something better, and with greater benefit than the power of the collective, then so be it, benefits to all. But if the private sector can't work as efficiently as a publicly run initiative, then it will die, and the publicly run corporation should be the first in line to inherit the liquidated assets, and yes, I'm including the unfortunate former employees as assets (the most valuable of assets to wit!).

So that's it basically, 1) We don't live in a capatilistic society, so don't bitch back at anyone who proposes we move away from our current model. 2) We could keep going with capitalism, but its gotta be one way or the other, no regulation and no bailouts, or regulation and rescue when needed. And 3) we could start looking for a new way to design our economy from the ground up, and there are plenty of places we can start looking for advice.

Obama and the Nobel Prize

2009-10-10T04:27:00.003+10:00

Of all the candidates available for the choice of winner of the Nobel peace prize, I am absolutely stunned that President Obama has walked off with the trophy for this year. There are many obvious things that could be and will be said, like he is only 9 months into a presidency, he walks hand in hand with the Grim Reaper as the cluster bombs continues to plummet down on the utterly defenceless civilians of Iraq and Afghanistan or that he hasn't even bothered to lift a finger in dealing with America's rapacious economic foreign policies that indirectly create destitution from which wars and famine spawn.

Already I can feel myself skiing down the slope of an endless ramble about what an inappropriate choice he is for the award. Realistically though, what is this award going to do? Obama is vastly outqualified by almost anyone else you can think of. Even a simple thought experiment renders Obama as an incompatible choice in comparison with the spirit of the award. Take this example, a friend of yours decides one day to quit their job and go work with, I dunno, International Red Cross, or if they are a nurse or doctor, they choose to work with Doctors without borders, or any number of international organisations that are some way directly involved with countering the atrocities of war.

Every one of these people would do more in probably one month for a more peaceful world than Obama has ever done. The only way a politician can accomplish a more peaceful world is by finally getting elected to his or her country's highest office, and then spend their entire term in office focusing almost solely on making sure their nation's army is not involved in any external theatres of war, and then doing their utmost to support the work of as many peaceful organisations as possible. Obama is at the start of that process, and since he came to office earlier this year, he hasn't exactly been an examplar of the promotion of peace.

What I find particularly funny is the Nobel panel's claim that Obama's work to rid the world of nuclear weapons is particularly laudable. Do they really think that America will ever give up their nuclear stockpile in its entirety? Hardly. What else to say? Ah yes, of the Nobel commitee itself, since Kissinger got the same award nobody could honestly attach too much seriousness to its decisions, but this is blatantly political, and it's really quite embarrassing now that I live in Europe to see one of Europe's major international institutions pandering to the U.S. in this way. It's like we in Europe are saying to America, 'ye can do no wrong'. We'll be lucky in the extreme if Obama doesn't get a big head over this prize and start really turning the screws in Afghanistan by sending more troops there than he has already. One only has to think of what happens when you reward a dog for biting your grandma by giving it a treat, it's going to think there's nothing wrong with acting viciously.

If you've come to this post from a random google search, and are one of those despicable, illogical, short sighted fools who votes Republican, don't think I'm taking your side against Obama (I would've voted Nader!). He's certainly an infinitely better candidate than any Republican politician, but that doesn't say much, if it were a competition for 'funnest experience ever' Obama is like contracting Diarrhea while ANY Republican would be like contracting Meningicoccal.

Let's extrapolate a little bit here for a moment. Think about the amount of death and terror the United States rains down on the people of the world every year, not just through direct military action, but bullying economic tactics, aggressive foreign policy and strongarm extortion when it comes to ensuring the tentacles of America's corporatocracy infest every corner of the world. Basically, anyone who fights against that (If you've ever went to an anti-war protest, or attended an anti G8 summit, I'm talking about you!) has done more for peace than the person who sits atop such a hideous pyramid. I'd be happy to say that although their underlying philosophy is unpalatable, the Taliban are CURRENTLY (<--that's the qualifier here, CURRENTLY) doing more for world peace by weakening America's (and NATO's) army and draining hideous amounts of taxpayer dollars into the war in Afghanistan. Why not give them the award?

But let me wind this up, because I've already thought through a number of angles to the reasons for awarding Obama this prize. I can draw guidance for the reasons the committee came to its decision from a great movie I saw entitled, "Hero." It starred Jet Li as an assassin assigned the task of eliminating the most powerful emperor in China ca. sometime B.C. I can't remember exactly when. His task was ostensibly to deal with this tyrant in the hope of securing peace. Anyway, long story short, both Jet Li and one of the persons who hired him came to the realisation that killing the king wouldn't bring peace, it would only create a martyr or some other vehicle to further continue the war and would not bring the situation any closer to a permanent peaceful resolution. What was decided in the end was for the assassin to give the appearance of intending to assassinate the king, and come right to the point of doing so (which was achieved), but before completing the task, inform the king of the plot, and how close to and unavoidable the king's death would be, if the assassin chose to kill the king, and simply surrender. However, not before telling the king that he was the only real person with the power and unquestionable authority to bring peace to China.

Of course, the assassin having surrendered was killed almost instantly, the king had to maintain the subterfuge of having foiled an assassination plot, but he was from this point, having come so close to death, of the realisation that he could no longer guide his forces, and use his power in the same way as he had been doing previously. The point of this lengthy segue is to illustrate that although the opponents of the most powerful king in the land had every reason or justification to kill the king, they chose not to, and entrusted their hope that the king would, of his own volition, decide to change the course of history, but only an event as significant as a near death experience would have the power to enlighten the king to the bigger picture of a united and peaceful China. Great film, go rent it out if you can.

This is what I think the people of the Nobel committee must have been thinking in awarding the prize to Obama, that maybe, just maybe he is sensible enough to honestly attempt to earn the merits of the award ex post facto. Otherwise this will probably be, behind Kissinger's award, the most disappointing thing that could have been done with prize of such prestige.

What to talk about???

2009-09-10T06:06:00.003+10:00

There's not much really. At least in comparison to what I used to do, which is strange really because I keep myself quite well up to date with everything that is going on in the world, but I have no real lust any more to put it into words. I guess this is what happens when you no longer participate in the process in a group sense, or are not involved at the community level. Sad really.

Doesn't mean to say I'll close the blog down, but it is a part of my life, or more accurately, an outlet that once was big, but is no longer so. Nonetheless, work is coming along well, I have almost finished the main thrust of what I have come here to do, and now I must re-align myself to start some more in depth learning of my topic, really down to the nuts and bolts level, this is good, I could use a break from programming before I become too used to it.

Enough for now, stay tuned for a report from Berlin, to which I am going tomorrow!

Holidays and, what I think of Switzerland

2009-08-17T02:03:00.004+10:00

Over the last few weeks I've been taking some well earned holidays to England, Scotland and just returning this weekend from Switzerland, though between Scotland and Switzerland I did put in appearance at work for a week, a few photos adorn this post below.

Nothing too unusual to report, a good time was had all-round, visited Bath Spa, Salisbury, Edinburgh (again), Peebles (again) and Inverness, as well as Strasbourg and Paris on the way there, and today I spend the weekend in Gersau in Switzerland, and there, successfully climbed to Wissifluh, and slightly higher.

Two things I will say about my holidays, the first is, if you plan on doing a cycling holiday, as I did in the UK, PACK LIGHT and organise your train passes for your bike ahead of time. I was smart enough to only pack the bare essentials, but I think my colleauge struggled with an excess of gear. Oh and also, an inter-rail global pass kicks arse!

The second thing is a bit of a rant about Switzerland. First thing I must say is I loved every minute of it, it's beautiful. But it's too beautiful, it's so picture perfect it's annoying, and then there is the people, they are so carefree, which I love, but it annoys me. For example, in Heidelberg, there are political posters everywhere, and you can always talk to someone intensively about the issues of the day. In Switzerland, nothing, it seems the most people are bothered about is attending an outdoor concert in time, or seeing lake Lucerne.

Of course, I've thought about it and I know why Switzerland annoyed me, it's basically because I'm jealous. Who wouldn't want their lifestyle, but more than that, it's understandable why things are so carefree, it's a country with 4 official languages, and is extremely multicultural, it's absolutely not possible to satisfy all who live there by making outlandish propositions, you're bound to piss someone off. So instead of tackling the big issues, they just focus on having fun, leading a satisfying life etc. etc.

Anyway, enjoy some photos...

Pot-Kettle-Black anyone?

2009-07-11T15:26:00.004+10:00

Click here, Turkish citizens, admirably are on the streets howling "genocide" at the actions of the Chinese government in Xinjiang province.

Click here, or here or watch below, to understand how this is the most hypocritical thing you've ever heard of

How to cycle to Hockenheimring (successfully): and find the Jim Clark memorial

2009-07-06T05:59:00.009+10:00

Today I took an all to rare opportunity to actually be a tourist for just a little while. Actually I've managed to kill three birds with one stone today. First I've satisfied a long held fanboy urge to visit the site around which one of my favourite (and first ever) computer games is based, secondly I've kept my dad happy by visiting the memorial of his hero, and thirdly got some excercise/took a break etc.etc.

What I'm talking about is the Jim Clark memorial at Hockenheimring, which is about 10km from my current residence.By the way, I now have dreadlocks if I haven't mentioned it before, but if I have, here's a photo. So, the second accomplishment, the fanboy thing. When I was merely a boy, I used to spend far too much time on my family's 486 playing a game called 'Grand Prix' by Geoff Crammond. The story behind this game is pretty amazing given that Crammond basically designed it ALONE. Nonetheless, it was a great game, and one of my favourite tracks was of course, Hockenheim, and it felt great to actually be able to walk around a place I've only ever seen in digital form before.

But finally, the point of this post, how to successfully cycle there. Well, if you move to Germany, it's more than likely you will eschew a motor vehicle and use your bike for transport. If on the odd chance you want to visit Hockenheim and come from the direction of St. Ilgen-Sandhausen (there is an S-Bahn station here) or Leimen, where I live, then it would be handy to know of a way to get there that is relatively short compared to riding along the road.

Start at the St. Ilgen-Sandhausen bahnhof here

View Larger Map

At the end of this blue line, you'll be faced with the M5, oh by the way, you will have ridden alongside the causeway which you will now follow... under the bridge... of the M5 all the way to the track. Basically, that is all the advice you need. You can ride either side of the causeway, because there is a dirt track along most of the way, however at some points you will need to ride along the embankment. Eventually you will come to what is now a small dam, or more accurately, a dustbowl, it looks like this
This is what is left of the Clark chicane, and the view is looking back in the direction from which you have come. Basically you are now on what used to be Hockenheimring. Simply continue along the dirt path that lead you here, it will very shortly lead to a sealed road, turn left and follow it for about 1km (it will turn slightly right to again follow the original circuit) and then where the new hairpin is, on the left, bam there is the Clark memorial.

Don't do what I did which was to get lost at the intersection after the clark curve and turn right and head to Oftersheim, which was idiotic, because I must have wasted a whole hour in the wild around the place. But the track though is somewhat deflating, because it was a glorious monument to speed in it's day, three small chicanes was all there was stopping what was essentially a flat out circuit once you left the start-finish complex. Anyhow, as a green-head, it is better that they are allowing the unused parts of the circuit to be reclaimed by the local forest.

Hope this helps if you are a fan of Jim Clark and are in the area...

Media and reporting priorities, Iran or Michael Jackson, you do the math

2009-06-30T17:49:00.008+10:00

It really hit home over the weekend just how pathetic the media tend to be when it comes to what they choose to report, what snippets or their reporting stick in the minds of those who read it, and how the media don't just "report the news", but create a positive or negative feedback loop that either enlightens society to the ways of the world, or dumbs us down to the level of play dough.

Alternet have a great story on just this point this morning, but I will say a few things of my own. When Michael Jackson first burst onto the scene, the media hyped him, and the Jackson 5 up to the point of demi-gods. Naturally, this attracted a number of fawners to his side, who then inflated his ego, and ultimately created the strange entity that was the so called, "Prince of Pop."

The media fed on this and stoked the fire further, effectively what they did was created a musical icon that they could always turn to if they needed a story to report on a slow news day, never once thinking about how big a part they played in creating the story. I think the analogy is what you might call a self fulfilling prophecy.

Anyhow, my point here is that you can see the mental laziness oozing from the mainstream media websites and newspapers when people like Michael Jackson die, or do something otherwise spectacular. It's an amateurish way to describe it, but my High school physics teacher always said about quantum mechanics that when you measure the quantum system, you irreversibly change it. The media don't seem to bear this in mind when they report "celebrity news," or any news really, they just don't get that what they're doing is actually telling the public about how pathetic they are, and not telling the public how big a role they played in creating the story and thus how irrelevant it really is.

Because the facts are this. You have the biggest pro-democracy rally occuring anywhere in the world in Iran at the moment (G20 has nothing on Tehran), Zimbabwe is still a mess, Darfur, Burma, North Korea.... And what, of all of the world's news makes the internet crash?? Michael Jackson. If you know anyone studying journalism at university, or is about to enter the workforce as a journalist, in whatever form, please please please, beg them not to do anything in the field of celebrity news. Implore them to think of the long term, of how their readers will remember their work when they retire, will they be a journalist the world remembers for uncovering the next Iran-Contra scandal or will they be part of the paparazzi army that got the first pictures of TomKat's baby???

If you were a journalist, what would you rather be covering???

Are humans meant to eat meat?

2009-06-28T00:53:00.003+10:00

I strongly doubt it. In fact, what are we supposed to eat and why do we continue to consume meat given all the problems it causes. I'm not pretending to be an expert on human evolution, but I'm going to make a few assumptions based on some logical observations.

In the time when humans were not so populous, and food was a scarcely come-by thing, it's entirely understandable that we would shift our diet from that of our fellow primates, who would have eaten much as they do today, to animal products. This would have especially been the case when humans moved into Europe and other extreme climes where crops and other plant based foods can't survive. The humans that moved to these areas had little choice, they didn't select animals for consumption, it was a case of, "us or them."

As a vegetarian, it's commonplace for me to be asked if I'm certain if I'm getting all my daily vitamin and mineral requirements, I'm usually slightly annoyed to be asked such questions, but the fact remains that people believe that the human body is somehow symbiotically tied to the consumption of meat, and that without it we are putting ourselves at risk, though such a claim is certainly quite false. Nonetheless, even a dear friend of mine, in his attempt to rationalize the consumption of meat asked, "why else do we have incisors?"

The answer to that question is of course, "to better consume flesh." This however does not automically imply that the consumption of flesh is a necessity, all it means is that previous generations have steadily evolved teeth that do a better job at eating flesh, and in many evolutionary circumstances, meat was one of only a limited sources of nutrition available.

Now that non-meat based diets are readily available, why don't we immediately make the switch? Most people it seems are simply addicted to the taste, and in many cases, it does not take much to break that addiction. One tip I can give from personal experience is in taking a week camping trip. A friend of mine, who was a meat eater, asked my advice on what food she should bring. I simply said that the best foods are dried cereal based foods like meusli bars, dried fruit and nuts and pasta or noodles.

We had a great time all week, and barely even thought about the food we were eating, so much more focussed were we on the days activities. At the end of the week I reminded her that she was essentially a vegetarian for the past week, and asked if it is the kind of thing she could get used to, "absolutely," was the reply. As I mentioned earlier about how living in another country with a language barrier may force some people to change radically, the same situation can work for our food "addictions." Simply living one week in a situation where eating meat is prohibitive, expensive and inefficient (of course, for us, it meant far less cooking equipment) people can adapt and change very quickly to a far lower impact diet.

If you're looking for a good source of information at how corporatized and out of equilibrium with our environment the food system is, go here.

Travel, if you change after travel, why?

2009-06-27T21:39:00.002+10:00

It's becoming somewhat more frequent of late for some people to ask me, about my travels and choice to work away from the land of my upbringing, "have you changed?"

I think the answer for me is probably, "only slightly." Why is this though, what are the things that make people leave their homeland with a well established character and return some years later, apparently different? Well, my guess is twofold. First, if you emigrate to another country that speaks the same language as you already speak, you are unlikely to change too much at all. But, if like me you move to a completely foreign land, where you have to learn a new language, you may become a different person entirely.

Sounds strange to think that language barriers would make people change, but it enforces something upon you that you can't get in a country that speaks your tounge. What I'm talking about is it forces you to speak less, not because you would naturally speak less, but because either a) you don't know what to say or b) you are afraid you'll say the wrong thing.

People are in the vast majority, mostly very understanding of your attempts to speak their lingo, but nonetheless it is a source of embarresment if you can't say what you mean, or worse say the opposite of what you originally intended.

My personal experience so far is that I'm probably not too different from when I left, though perhaps time will tell. Of course, I have had to be more quieter than before, but I think I was a fairly quiet and observent chap before I left, so in this regard, I'm quite comfortable. However I was thinking yesterday over Michael Moore's previous film, Sicko. The scenes in that film when he visits Paris and speaks with the American migrants who live there. Though of course they were American, they were not like normal Americans and it was evident.

The world view of Americans is that they are loud and annoying. What better remedy that placing them in a situation where they just can't act like that any more. I do hope my travels make me a better observer, though I think that being a scientist should already have taken care of that, given that it is the profession of observation and measurement.

Anyhow, this is the first of three posts I want to make today over some subjects that have tickled my attention recently, next up, a few thoughts on vegetarianism.

So, what's been happening?

2009-06-02T00:05:00.004+10:00

It's been a month now, exactly, since I moved to Heidelberg. What have I got to say about the place and leaving 24 years of your life behind, flicking a switch and giving it a go in a foreign land? Well, not that much really, there are of course moments when your head spins, but I think I'm too logical a thinker to not be able to handle anything that comes my way.

Of course it's difficult to get to know people, not because people aren't welcoming, but not being able to introduce yourself in a non-amateur manner and speak and listen to people like it were second nature is annoying, but it's not like I didn't expect that, and I know that time will provide the solution to those problems.

I miss my racing of course, it hurts even more knowing that if I wanted to get back into it, it would require a good year before I find a van, a house with a shed and most importantly a bike, all of which costs money, and it's a sore point to know that all those things are back in Brisbane where it took a lot of time and pain to acquire them, grrrr!

What about my political feelings these days? I don't know if I can vote over here, but I doubt I can because I'm on a stipend and I don't think I'm paying tax, and as the saying go's, "no representation without taxation." There are a series of elections coming up this year though, there are the local council elections (kommunalwahl), then I think there are State elections, and then finally a Federal election at the end of the year.

All of that is beside the point though, because I don't really care too much any more about politics in general, and this is no real surprise given the situation. Of course I still have my opinions and I'll continue to voice them here as I have done throughout the past two years, but really, with no chance to actually involve myself in the local community (due my language deficit) why bother?? The most 'action' I can take is donating to Avaaz.org or something, because I couldn't even volunteer at a soup kitchen here.

Speaking of language, I have realised since I've been here that for a foreign person to do the reverse of what I have done, go to Australia to pursue their career, you'd be insane to do so without being quite proficient at English. Of course for most people in the scientific field, this is an absolute given, science is an English only domain these days, but in general, if you're seeking a new opportunity in Australia and can't speak English, forget it, because there is no such thing as a second language in Australia.

I don't like the way some in Australia, like John Howard did, complain about people not knowing English, but now I know what it's like to have the shoe on the other foot, I'm just very fortunate that most people here actually know English quite well, so they don't see it as much (if at all) of a burden to speak to you in English. My advice, let's start getting a few more languages compulsorily taught in school, starting in Grade 5 and going right through to grade 12. I learnt Japanese at school, but I probably only did it for a few hours per week for four years, I'm sure I could pick it up again, but it's basically gone now. I definitely think that German should be taught, because it is very similar to English, but also Spanish because it is widespread throughout North and South America.

Anyway, enough about the past, what can I say in one word to sum up my first month here on the continent proper.....

Normal. Entirely normal, I've done a few touristy things, I've found a group of chaps to go DH biking with, work is interesting, I'm a bit bored at night because I don't have any friends I can just hang with (and because my computer is mostly at work) and that's about it. Some people tend to define their life by their experiences, and I think that often-times overseas travel for work can get a bit overrated (overseas travel for holidays on the other hand are a different matter) when one looks back on their life. I'm not getting any more or less out of life here than in Brisbane except for the one major factor that I have a great opportunity for a stimulating PhD at one of the best institutions in the world (the offices are a bit drab though!) and that makes all the difference.

On the train to Hohenzollern the other day, I was asked why I chose to come to Heidelberg, the girl who asked expected the typical answer of "see the world" and all those hollywood cliches, but it was the work that drew me here. If there was a university in the middle of Siberia offering the same pay as here with an equally interesting topic, I would have gone there just as quickly as I came here.

I don't intend to project the idea that the reasoning behind my choice is the way we should all make such career decisions, it's an underlying philosophy that I must educate my mind to the fullest extent so I can have as big an influence on the world as possible, going somewhere for the scenery just won't cut the cheese in fulfilling that goal.

Tomorrow, my real 'career' begins

2009-04-29T23:31:00.002+10:00

Tomorrow I move to Heidelberg in Germany to begin my career as a research scientist. Though I guess it began in an unpaid sense when I started my Masters at the end of 2005, it is now kicking into top gear, as after some 6 or so years of university education, I now finally have a paid position in the field I have trained for.

Hopefully, I can perform competently enough in the first six months to prove to the decision makers at the university that I'm worthy of being accepted for a PhD, which has been made slightly easier this week by the decision from Applied Optics to publish a manuscript that I have long been waiting to see accepted.

Anyhow, I've left the blog unattended in the last few weeks because I've been intensely studying up on what I'll need to know for my position there, and I can't imagine I'll be all that focussed on it either in the next few weeks. So go find someone else to bother until I return to my normal blogging schedule.

The law compels you! Go vegetarian!

2009-04-08T20:53:00.002+10:00

Ponder for a moment, the philosophical implications of this story

Initially, before I thought to analyse a little deeper into this seemingly cut and dried tale of animal cruelty, I was shocked by the degree of misery these cattle would have been put through during their lives and, I'm hoping, quick merciful deaths. Another impulse reaction was that the owner of this farm should have the book thrown at him, and thankfully he will.

Then I thought a little deeper. How is it that this chap can be indicted for cruelty to animals causing their death, when society on a much broader, far more industrial scale commits the same supposed crime every day, every time we munch down on a piece of meat? How is it any less cruel to herd cattle onto a truck, in confusing and stressful situations, ship them across the country and send them to either an electrified or high pressure bolt through the head death?

If you've seen a documentary about how abattoirs function, it doesn't matter how humane the technique supposedly is, it is confronting and it's the kind of thing that makes you want to turn away.

What then to make of this circumstance? Sure this farmer needs locking away, but it's a case like this that must compel the rest of us to think about our interaction with our laws. On the one hand, our society has crafted animal cruelty laws, yet on the other, we consume meat like there's no tomorrow. The more into my vegetarianism I get, the more philosophical implications of it that I unearth.

How the West can stop Jobs (but not profits) from going overseas

2009-04-03T04:52:00.004+10:00

There is a pretty simple way out of this economic crisis at the moment, though none of the G20 leaders dared speak its name. Clearly people have stopped buying, consumers, who themselves make up most of the 'employee' section of society have found that they just don't want to pay for anything they don't need any more. The Bank of England, in it's attempts to make people get rid of their cash (before it devalues) have decided simply to print more money, like the idiots that they are.

An inflationary monetary system demands constant growth to repay debt. There being more debt than actual money in the world, any central bank and government that wants to participate in our current economic system must ensure that consumption perpetually increases and hence our demands on the planet's resources perpetually increase etc. etc.

As long as world leaders can accept that an economy that doesn't grow isn't a failed economy, but is itself a different type of economy with a different form of prosperity, the sooner we will drag ourselves out of recession. On the other hand, there wont be any more big bubbles, where a few people get very rich very quickly, but only scant few of us are lucky enough to ride those kind of waves, so we needn't worry if we never see another dotcom bubble.

To kick start the global economy, to stop jobs being exported to cheap or even slave labor, manufacturers in the UK and elsewhere need to recognise that the buyers of their product would be much more willing to re-up their pruchase orders if their products were cheaper.

DUH, I hear you say, but what are the ways in which products can be made cheaper? One is to lay off staff, so that a business owner can maintain a profit margin, whilst incurring fewer wage expenses, this is what we are seeing now. Solution two is to cut off profits altogether, make sure that the price a product is sold for is only enough to cover the labor and other expenses required to make it. The short of it is, no cream for the business owner (Or a solution somewhere between both).

How can this be accomplished? There are a lot of companies currently under administration. In the search for buyers, the first people the administrators should be turning to is the employees of the business itself, in order to form a co-operative. For a company that folds, laying off 200 employees, each of those employees could be handed the keys to the business, to produce their goods, not for profit.

Paying out the previous owner could be acheived either through the pooling of employee savings, or by entering a covenant such that a cut of the sale price returns to the previous owner for a certain period of time to cover the cost of purchasing the business, though you would expect that the employees would be getting a bargain once an administrator is in charge of selling it.

Now that it's running as a co-op, the profit margin disappears, the cost of the products falls, and hence the product is now more attractive to the consumer, spurring consumption down the line, creating jobs in the wider economy. If we don't make it easier for co-operatives to form, business owners WILL take their factories overseas where they can pay employees FAR less.

Ask your leaders what they want for society, profits for the multinats or jobs for all?

G20 Protests

2009-04-03T04:11:00.009+10:00

I've now been to two of the biggest protests that cycle around the world, APEC 2007 and now the G20 summit of 2009. I'll begin, as I did with APEC, with photos...

What surprised me about this protest is how peaceful it was, it was organised by the Stop the war coalition, which was part of a broader set of 4 protests on the same day. It was a nice little day out in London, I'd say though I've gone to less trouble getting to a protest before and had a more satisfying day of it.

On our route from the US embassy to Nelson's column, nothing got out of hand, and the police that were supervising our group were great, they were not intimidatory or as inciteful as some police groups (See this story too and this link for some good news about action on police intimidation).

Still, the crowd was concerned with a broad range of issues. Stopping regularly on the route to shout the usual slogans of "shame, shame, shame" at RBS branches, Tesco and McDonald's, as well as of course the main focus of the now unreported occupation of Palestine and Tibet.

Certainly there were some good speakers, and the RBS and Bank of England certainly received some cumuppence for their role in driving the global economic collapse. Stating the obvious though it is, the media do skew these stories making most of middle England concerned more with the minor aggression during the protests than the very excellent reasons for defacing the RBS.

I would have liked to have been at the banking district protests, but I was on a tight schedule with the train, maybe next time.

One day as a Lion - Wild international vid clip released

2009-03-25T08:10:00.005+10:00

I'm not much into keeping tabs on music, but when it comes to Rage, Zack de la Rocha or Tom Morello, I'm on it like a fly. Zack's concoction with Jon Theodore has culminated in the release of this music video for Wild International, released just the other day, check it...

A quick word on the Queensland Election

2009-03-25T03:10:00.002+10:00

I'm dissappointed. That's basically it really. When it comes down to it, this election has proved to me, given my investment in Queensland politics over the years (though thankfully not any more), that voters, and the public in general have probably become entirely numbed to any sense of taking action.

I would have to say that Queensland voters really are putty in the hands of those who wield political power, and not the other way around. Of course, a unicameral parliament and Optional Preferential voting has assisted this in many regards, but it's frightful to think of how un-enthused the public has become at demanding more from it's government.

The Bligh government has been on the nose for a while now, but voters have handed the ALP a slap on the wrist, losing only 6 (or so) seats. In a capitalist society, competition is supposed to produce good products. We, the consumer, by our lackluster approach to demanding decent government performance are ensuring that politics in Queensland will never produce a good product. Forget all the hogwash you may hear about the supposed instabilities of a hung parliament that could have resulted from this election, if there is one thing that it would have made Bligh or the Borg work harder and really compete to produce the goods for Queensland, it would have been a hung parliament.

I'm just glad I'm not involved in Queensland Politics any more...

And then it got really bad

2009-03-07T18:01:00.003+10:00

In case you missed it, here's what was making headlines in my part of the world this week. I am basically flabbergasted. If you are looking for a reason why, go here, download the whole thing, and flick to page 51 and start reading the section "The revenue of Government." The book I'm talking about is one I have mentioned previously, What has Government done to our Money, by Murray Rothbard.

Here's a quick summary, of what happens when government prints money. Her Majesty's government is foolishly trying to revive a patient, a modern capitalist economy, that died in theatre months ago, though when this patient was alive, it required of its organs (you and I) to compete ferociously with each other for the privilege of purchasing useless mass produced goods at a rate that would, in time, drive some of us into a debt spiral from which the only escape is the declaration of bankruptcy and the knock on effects that follow.

Clearly this patient couldn't have had an infinite life expectancy. In Australia's experience, though the government wasn't in debt, almost all of the growth in the past decade had been financed on borrowed money, the writing was on the wall years ago, it is something I spoke of when I ran for parliament in '06, it can't go on forever, eventually, the people who buy the products made from Australia's expanding (on loans) resource sector will run out of cash, and eventually build up debts that can't be repaid, and the growth will end. All the while the economists who crunch the numbers for the big corporations are certain that things will function as normal, China and India will order the same amount of material from one year to the next, and the world will continue to be reliably flooded with GAP t-shirts and bug eyed sunglasses.

Hence we have what we see today. Why then is inflating the money supply the worst thing that the Bank of England could possibly do, at least for you and I. The answer is simple, a responsible, slightly inflationary government (aiming at say 3% inflation per year) expands and contracts the money supply according to how GDP expands and contracts. If GDP drops, the rate at which money is printed SHOULD drop, or even reverse direction, if the situation warrants it.

Although inflation is well known as a silent and subtle tax in itself, it hurts the majority of the population, those on low incomes and fixed salaries because we are the ones who enjoy the use of the new money last. Rothbard says it best...

"As the new money spreads, it bids prices up—as we have seen, new money can only dilute the effectiveness of each dollar. But this dilution takes time and is therefore uneven; in the meantime, some people gain and other people lose. In short, the counterfeiters and their local retailers have found their incomes increased before any rise in the prices of the things they buy."

When and if this near death patient recovers, we may well have gotten over the problem of a lack of liquidity, but we will then face the altogether more daunting task of hyper-inflation.

There aren't words to describe how gob-smackingly stupid the collective response to this crisis of capitalism by Western governments has been. This to me is the latest and most greivous chapter.

A sad and quiet milestone passes - Peltier's jailtime reaches 33 years

2009-03-01T09:50:00.006+10:00

A few days ago, February 6 to be precise, a milestone passed for perhaps the United State's most unfortunate political prisoner. Leonard Peltier had the misfortune to celebrate 33 years behind bars for a crime he didn't commit. You can read the full story of his imprisonment here, to save me going into it.

A few things I'd like to point out about this anniversary is this, first is the utter lack of media coverage regarding his imprisonment. A quick search on Google news, which archives over 25000 sources returned only 38 reporting something to do with his recent bashing at a penitentiary or anniversary of his imprisonment.

The second subject to note is whether Obama will grant the man clemency, but it seems doubtful, I would say that it would have been easier for John McCain to commute Peltier's sentance than it is for Obama, lest Obama be accused of counter racism, or something equally as crazy.

Peltier's case shows how far the world needs to progress when it comes to dealing with indiginous peoples. The terror the FBI rained on the Oglala region in the years before the incident that lead to Peltier's incarceration is reminiscent, to me, of Palm Island, and the subsequent, and highly distasteful jailing of Lex Wotton.

All I can say is, we see injustice everywhere, especially at the moment with the global financial crisis, ESPECIALLY here in the UK with government takeovers of banks, AND ALLOWING THE IDIOT DIRECTORS TO LEAVE WITH GOLDEN HANDSHAKES. How bad to things have to get for us to change the way we react, to change the way we talk to our neighbours and friends about it, and hopefully change the way we vote?

If you're too lazy to write an email to your local MP about such issues, at least do something when it comes time to vote. There is nothing more depressing than hearing people say they want to vote for Ralph Nader, or The Greens, or anyone who will genuinely bring change simply because they feel it's a wasted vote. The true waste is not changing your vote, because that will more surely than anything else, entrench injustice.

A new (event) horizon

2009-02-12T04:28:00.007+10:00

I'll pick up where I left off on this post. As of the 31st of January I am no longer a resident of Australia. The reasons for my leaving I will explore shortly, but for now, I am living in Perranporth, Cornwall. This isn't permanent however, in about 6 weeks time I'll be leaving the cosy and very comfortable lodgings of my Godparents to take up what I hope will be a mega successful PhD in Heidelberg in Germany.

Why have I left though, who would want to leave all the sunshine, warm weather etc. etc? Well, to be honest, I've never felt like I'm an Australian citizen really, living in Australia was nice, but surely no more preferable than living anywhere else, except say a country currently engaged in civil war for example. It might seem strange to say that, but my home is Earth, and wherever I go on this planet is home.

I'm also confident about saying that living in Australia is no better than living anywhere else, because I guess I believe in the saying, "life is what you make it." If you're a sadsack, it wont matter if you lived in Buckingham palace, you'll find a reason to be sad.

What I've said so far just makes it sound like I've up and left for no other reason that to simply see the world, but this isn't the case. I had neither strong feelings to stay in Australia, or to travel, because essentially my career aspirations are to become a well rounded researcher in a considerably interesting field of physics. There was certainly the opportunity to do that in Australia, but somewhat predictably, the government of that country (yes I've taken to calling it 'that' country, think Bill Clinton and I did not have sex with 'that' woman) decided I was unworthy of any funding support. Not only that, but it also decided that the group I was going to do the research for was also unworthy of financial support, and it also decided to knock back a good friend of mine who had achieved the second highest grade in his honours year (I by the way hold a research Masters, which my two examiners passed with the highest and second highest scores).

About 95% of the other academic staff and students I spoke to about my chances of success for a scholarship were extremely confident, the other 5% were simply cautious. Everyone I spoke to about the research proposal put forward by my group for broader ARC funding was confident of success, so being beaten down like this is cause for dissolusionment with the entire approach that Australia takes to scientific research.

I wont go in to my PhD proposal or my groups ARC proposal, but they were both rock solid. It makes sense then to take a bit of assertive action when you get slapped across the face like that, and I have, hopefully, I'll never do another peice of research or pay another dollar in tax to the Australian Government ever again, screw em.

So for the moment, I'm on a six month probationary period at the University of Heidelberg, and after that, if I'm good enough, I'll be put on for another 3 years to complete my PhD.

Here's to me I say!

Enjoy some photos!

The evolution of parliamentary representation

2009-01-22T08:33:00.003+10:00

I was conversing with a great philosopher last night about a particular form of representation that could be adopted, as our society becomes more enlightened as to how to better govern itself as well as safeguarding its parliaments from excessive lobbying.

How does this sound for an idea? We abolish 1 half of the currently elected members of each house of parliament in Australia, and replace them with people appointed through a lottery system. This system though needs to more thorough than just dumping someone who is still very wet behind the ears into a lower house seat every time a new parliament takes office.

What would be instituted would be a tutelage system for those appointed. Let's use the Federal House of Representatives as the example. The appointee is chosen from the lottery a year before their term begins (Those appointed by lottery would have fixed terms, the other elected representatives would still face elections at the whim of the PM), if the appointee agrees to participate, in the same way you agree or refuse to participate in jury duty, they then undertake a year of study in how to be an effective member of parliament with the representative they are due to replace.

Once that year is up, they themselves become a full member of the House, who in turn train their replacement in their final year of membership. Also, the group of members appointed by lottery could have staggered terms, such that only 15 of them are replaced at a time, with an appropriate delay before the next group of 15 were appointed. If we were working on three year terms, and with 75 lottery appointees in the HoR, this would mean that a new group of 15 appointees would take their seats every 219 days.

As mentioned, the idea behind appointing members who have no connection to one another makes the parliament more impervious to lobbying, simply because with an ever changing base of randomly appointed members, it would be like herding cats to get them to all agree on legislation favourable to a particular lobby group. Furthermore, ministerial appointments, and the choice of prime minister would need the blessing of a (hopefully) representative cross section of the community, not just a rubber stamp from the party with the biggest numbers.

Sound good? I think this is the next evolutionary step after abolishing upper houses and electing lower houses on (a decent type of) proportional representation.

All that needs saying about the conflict in Gaza

2009-01-17T12:53:00.003+10:00

From Ralph Nader

In the long sixty-year tortured history of the Palestinian expulsion from their lands, Congress has maintained that it is always the Palestinians, the Palestinian Authority, and now Hamas who are to blame for all hostilities and their consequences with the Israeli government.

The latest illustration of this Washington puppet show, backed by the most modern weapons and billions of taxpayer dollars annually sent to Israel, was the grotesquely one-sided Resolutions whisked through the Senate and the House of Representatives.

While a massive bombing and invasion of Gaza was underway, the resolution blaming Hamas for all the civilian casualties and devastation—99% of it inflicted on Palestinians—zoomed through the Senate by voice vote and through the House by a vote of 390 to 5 with 22 legislators voting present.

There is more dissent against this destruction of Gaza among the Israeli people, the Knesset, the Israeli media, and Jewish-Americans than among the dittoheads on Capitol Hill.

The reasons for such near-unanimous support for Israeli actions—no matter how often they are condemned by peace advocates such as Bishop Desmond Tutu, United Nations resolutions, the World Court and leading human rights groups inside and outside of Israel, are numerous. The pro-Israeli government lobby, and the right-wing Christian evangelicals, lubricated by campaign money of many Political Action Committees (PACs) certainly are key.

There is also more than a little bigotry in Congress against Arabs and Muslims, reinforced by the mass media yahoos who set new records for biased reporting each time this conflict erupts. The bias is clear. It is always the Palestinians’ fault. Right-wingers who would never view the U.S. government as perfect see the Israeli government as never doing anything wrong. Liberals who do not hesitate to criticize the U.S. military view all Israeli military attacks, invasions and civilian devastation as heroic manifestations of Israeli defense.

The inversion of history and the scope of amnesia know no limits. What about the fact that the Israeli government drove Palestinians from their lands in 1947-48 with tens of thousands pushed into the Gaza strip. No problem to Congress. Then the fact that the Israeli government cruelly occupied, in violation of UN resolutions, the West Bank and Gaza in 1967 and only removed its soldiers and colonists from Gaza (1.5 million people in a tiny area twice the size of the District of Columbia) in 2005.

To Congress, the Palestinians deserved it. Then when Hamas was freely elected to run Gaza, the Israeli authorities cut off the tax revenues on imports that belonged to the Gaza government. This threw the Gazans into a fiscal crisis—they were unable to pay their civil servants and police.In 2006, the Israelis added to their unrelieved control of air, water and land around the open-air prison by establishing a blockade.

The natives became restless. Under international law, a blockade is an act of war. Primitive rockets, called by reporters “wildly inaccurate” were fired into Israel. During this same period, Israeli soldiers and artillery and missiles would go into Gaza at will and take far more lives and cause far more injuries than those incurred by those rockets. Civilians—especially children, the infirm and elderly—died or suffered week after week for lack of medicines, medical equipment, food, electricity, fuel and water which were embargoed by the Israelis.

Then the Israeli bombing followed by the invasion during the past three weeks with what prominent Israeli writer Gideon Levy called “a brutal and violent operation…far beyond what was needed for protecting the people in its south.” Mr. Levy observed what the president of the United Nations General Assembly, Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann called a war against “a helpless and defenseless imprisoned population.”

The horror of being trapped from fleeing the torrent of the most modern weapons of war from the land, air and seas is reflected in this passage from Amira Hass, writing in the leading Israeli newspaper Haaretz:“The earth shaking under your feet, clouds of choking smoke, explosions like a fireworks display, bombs bursting into all-consuming flames that cannot be extinguished with water, mushroom clouds of pinkish-red smoke, suffocating gas, harsh burns on the skin, extraordinary maimed live and dead bodies.”

Ms. Hass is pointing to the use of new anti-civilian weapons used on the Gazan people. So far there have been over 1100 fatalities, many thousands of injuries and the destruction of homes, schools, mosques, hospitals, pharmacies, granaries, farmer’s fields and many critical public facilities. The clearly marked UN headquarters and UN school were smashed, along with stored medicines and food supplies.

Why? The Congressional response: “Hamas terrorists” everywhere. Sure, defending their Palestinian families is called terrorism. The truth is there is no Hamas army, airforce and navy up against the fourth most powerful military in the world. As one Israeli gunner on an armored personnel carrier frankly said to The New York Times: “They are villagers with guns. They don’t even aim when they shoot.”

Injured Gazans are dying in damaged hospital corridors, bleeding to death because rescuers are not permitted to reach them or are endangered themselves. Thousands of units of blood donated by Jordanians are stopped by the Israeli blockade. Israel has kept the international press out of the Gazan killing fields. What is going on in Gaza is what Bill Moyers called it earlier this month – “state terrorism.”

Already about 400 children are known to have died. More will be added who are under the rubble.Since 2002, more than 50 Arab and Muslim nations have had a standing offer, repeated often, that if Israel obeys several UN resolutions and withdraws to the 1967 borders leaving 22 percent of the original Palestine for an independent Palestinian state, they will open full diplomatic relations and there will be peace.

Israel has declined to accept this offer.None of these and many other aspects of this conflict matter to the Congress. Its members do not want to hear even from the Israeli peace movement, composed of retired generals, security chiefs, mayors, former government ministers, and members of the Knesset.

In 60 years these savvy peace advocates have not been able to give one hour of testimony before a Congressional Committee.Maybe members of Congress may wish to weigh the words of the founder of Israel, David Ben-Gurion, years ago when he said:“There has been anti-Semitism the Nazis Hitler Auschwitz but was that their [the Palestinian’s] fault? They only see one thing: We have come here and stolen their country.”

Doesn’t that observation invite some compassion for the Palestinian people and their right to be free of Israeli occupation, land and water grabs and blockades in the 22 percent left of Palestine?

The Republic of Australia - What would the flag look like?

2009-01-16T15:45:00.003+10:00

There have been talks since Rudd's taking office of a Republic referendum coming back on the agenda, I'm hesitant to say that there seems to be a groundswell of support building behind the idea, the reason for this I believe is that most people expect it to happen at some stage within Rudd's first term, or that it will be on the ballot at the next Federal election.

Those of us in the Greens have been putting the pressure on though, but something occurred to me the other day as to what would the flag of the Republic of Australia look like? I'm certain some sort of competition would be launched, and I'm sure that it would need to take into account the original owners of the land (I'd be very comfortable with the Aboriginal flag becoming the flag of Australia actually, if that feeling was reciprocal amongst our indiginous brothers and sisters).

I get the feeling that most would probably want the Union Jack to disappear, and with good reason. Once we become a republic, it's continued presence reminds us of the worst of colonial policy especially toward indiginous Australians, White Australia, the stolen generation etc. But then again, would it be such a bad thing if it was left there? After all, the Germans didn't get rid of the concentration camps because they were ashamed of their history, they remain to serve as a reminder of what not to do.

There is precedent for leaving the Union Jack on the flag of a state after it has ceded from the Commonwealth, the flag of Hawaii is the example.

Food for thought.

Michael Phelps, Swimming, is it really such an achievement?

2009-01-16T15:35:00.002+10:00

Just some idle thoughts I was having about the so called enormity of Michael Phelps winning eight gold medals at last years Olympics. There is no way I could detract from the quality of the performances that the man put in, or how good a swimmer he is, no doubt he's the best the sport has ever seen. But there is simply no way you could ever say that he is the most successful olympian ever, at least one competing at a single olympics.

Why is this? Sure, he's one more gold at a single Olympics than anyone else, but look at the sport he's competing in. I'm not saying that I think that swimming shouldn't be an Olympic sport, but let's do a thought experiment to understand what I'm talking about here.

Let's imagine in athletics you have the 100m sprint, 100m hurdles, 100m running backwards, 100m egg and spoon race etc. etc. Each of these events gets a gold medal for the winner. Seems crazy doesn't it? But that is what swimmers get to do, it's basically the same amount of effort to swim a 100m freestyle as it is any of the other three strokes, why are they being rewarded for doing the same thing four different ways?

This is something we in Australia, with all the worshipping of our swimmers that is practised here should bear in mind at the next Olympics or World Championships or whatever.

Be up for tea in a minute honey... I'm just knocking up a motorcycle in the back shed

2009-01-09T09:37:00.002+10:00

I've known about John Britten for a while and his remarkable achievement in designing and constructing the race winning V1000. This guy is certainly another to be added to my list of personal heroes, check his story out...

The big Christmas, New Year wrap up

2009-01-06T13:12:00.006+10:00

Let's take a trip in the way back machine to the early hours of Saturday December 20th 2008. This is where my end of year whackiness begins. Welcome to the final few days of my employ as a newsagency information delivery technician, it was on this day that my (now former) boss and myself have our ritual bbq in the carpark at 1am. Every year, without fail, on the weekend before Christmas and Easter, he brings along his bbq, some beer and some milk crates, and we sit in the carpark like a pair of nutbags eating (in my case a lentil patty) sausages and seafood. The reason it is held on a weekend, rather than say Christmas eve is because we like to include John the truck driver, he is a source of constant hilarity, and my early Saturday mornings over the past 3 or so years would be a lot harder to have endured without him.

ANYWAY... Since this was my last ever ritual bbq event, I decided to make a thing of it, I wore a full three button suit to work, and did all my work in the thing for the entire morning. I can only imagine what the (mostly drunk) folk who wander the streets at that hour were thinking when they saw a couple of dudes, one in a suit, having a bbq at 1am out the front of the newsagency. So that was the start of my end of year frivolity.

Actually, I've got to the point in this post where I realise I've left out an important piece of information. I no longer deliver newspapers! That's right, my last day on the job was the morning of christmas eve. After 3 very good years, the time has come to move on, my thanks to my boss and good friend Phil for providing me with a great job and (mostly) good times all the while. By the way, I turned it on again for my final day at work. I decided to play on the anonimity of the job, by wearing a mask and cape to work. The strange thing about being a newspaper delivery driver is that almost no-one knows who you are or whether the job acutally gets done. Most people just walk down the steps each morning to pick up their daily paper without thinking about how it got there, almost all of my customers would never have seen me physically delivering their news.

So in that vein, I decided to come to work dressed like this...

Every time I threw a newspaper into a puddle of water in someone's front yard, I would grin wryly to myself and say, "the masked avenger strikes again." Given that, I thought this costume appropriate.

Next it was on to Straddie for three days at the family holiday house. My grandparents own a small joint at Amity Point, and I was there for a little while with my entire extended family on my mothers side. I don't think I really accomplished much whilst I was there on Christmas eve, I had after all just finished work, cycled from Birkdale to Cleveland, caught the ferry, and cycled from Dunwich to Amity Point, so I was mostly rooted. Funny thing about the ride from Dunwich to Amity, it's probably been all of about 8 years since I set foot on Straddie (nothing's changed by the way, except my memory of the place) and I guess my memory has been clouded in the time since I was last there, because all the way over I was looking forward to a nice leisurely ride from Dunwich to Amity, I had the impression it was only 5km or so. Turns out it's 18km from Dunwich to Amity, suffice to say I was sleeping almost as soon as the adrenaline wore off once I'd arrived.

I didn't really do much whilst I was there, you never really do. Played frisbee, went for a swim, watched the cricket, read a book (Designing the Green Economy actually) played scrabble, played tennis etc. etc.

It was actually just really satisfying for once to be able to GO ON A HOLIDAY! Working the newspapers is great, but it is not a job where you can afford to take a day off, the papers arrive every day except Christmas day and Easter Sunday, and for the other 363 days, they MUST be delivered, rain hail or shine. This means of course that unless you organise things perfectly, you can't leave town for anything more than a day trip. Before Stradbroke, and excepting Saturday nights, I hadn't slept continuously of an evening for more than 4 hours, it felt great to start doing this for more than one day in a row.

I left Straddie on the 26th, again, cycling back to Dunwich, the headwind was a killer by the way. Got home around 2pm and started packing for my next adventure, the Woodford Folk Festival. This was my first time at the festival for an entire week, I've gone for a single day once before, but I've been looking forward to this opportunity to unwind and be a total hippy for a week. I took my friend from the Royal Brisbane Hospital, Min Ji Koh. She's here for a year from Korea and I recommended that she see the festival to get an idea of some of South-East Queensland's barely visible culture.

The festival was great, I split my time between chilling watching bands and going to information sessions. The best bits were listening to ideas about Green economics, a Japanese drum group called Taikoz, two Tibetan singers, Soname Yangchen and Tenzin Choegyal, the debate about whether democracy can effectively combat climate change, with speakers like Ian Lowe and Sandy McKutcheon and a presentation on allergies by Dr. Carole Hungerford (more interesting than you may at first think).

I'm told it's quite typical to not want to leave Woodford after six days in such a Utopia, but things have to go back to normal, though what normal is for me will soon be turned on its head, as I will discuss soon. Anyway, that has been my new year. For the remainder of the month, I'll be somewhat busy, so I don't think I'll be able to post too much stuff, but I'll be back shortly with a rather large update to talk of.

Watch this space.

The best Facebook beat down yet?

2009-01-02T09:01:00.002+10:00

As an aside to everything else I do with my life, I like to spend a good fraction of my time letting everyone know how much I dislike facebook and myspace and the associated psuedo-social networking they apparently engender. I'm always on the lookout for funny tidbits slagging the site off, but I think I've found the best one yet.

Check this out.

Trent from punchy? Totally fake

2008-12-26T18:14:00.003+10:00

Check, this link out.

Yo Garnaut! Join the Greens!

2008-12-20T18:59:00.008+10:00

It was plastered all over the Sydney Morning Herald and The Australian this morning, Ross Garnaut, the man that the Rudd government commissioned to author this country's equivalent of the Stern review, has hammered the emissions trading scheme released earlier in the week.

Before dealing with the ramifications of this, and addressing the title of this post, let's take a look at the more interesting aspects of the reporting going on around the subject. Take this quote from The Australian report:

"(The) ACF is planning to join the ACTU and community and welfare groups to campaign against the Government's scheme in the new year."

Which sounds great, good to see this peak union body joining up with another prominent environmental foundation. Let's swing on over to the ABC's website, and it looks like the AWU are taking a different tack

"I always find it's ironic that you have bankers like Professor Garnaut lecturing the rest of the world on how to be model corporate citizens."

What? That was from the national secretary of the AWU, Paul Howes. Which way are the unions going with this? Garnaut is not a banker first off, he's an economics professor at ANU, he hasn't been a banker since 1995 when he was with BankWest. I've not been interested enough in Garnaut's history to understand whether he shares the kind of philosophy enacted by those who have brought the global economy to its knees, but I'm fairly certain it's not economists like him who are to blame for the global economic crises that Howes accuses him of.

Why then use those grounds to say that his criticism of the governments 5% emission reduction plan lacks a basic understanding, where was Paul Howes when Garnaut released his report? Was he on the bandwagon claiming the Garnaut review was impractical? Nothing on the AWU website press releases seem to say so, in fact in their position paper on an ETS, the AWU has this to say:

"The AWU supports the overall policy goal of reducing total greenhouse gas emissions by 60% by 2050."

How does the AWU think we're going to get to that target by starting off at 5% by 2020? But back to the point.

The best way Professor Garnaut can make good on his dissatisfaction with the Government, is join the Greens, and take his campaign to the ballot box. I'll admit, we were not entirely happy with the Garnaut review when it was initially released, but progress is made in this world when activists rally around what unites, rather than what divides.

Both the Greens, and Garnaut now appear united (along with every environmental group in the country) against the government's piecemeal and corrupt approach to doing something about the environment.

Can you imagine the attention that could be focussed should Garnaut say, run against Rudd in his own seat of Griffith, that would be priceless. But more than that, what better way to stand up to a government that has wasted his time, commissioning him to author a report, and then deeming it useless. How would you feel?

The reduction target, coal worker layoffs, the flow of materials

2008-12-16T23:09:00.004+10:00

Get ready for a long read, I've got a lot to say.

First off the bat, the emissions target, a piecemeal 5%. It just defies science. If I asked you, "do you believe the earth is round and orbits the sun? Do you believe that force equals mass times acceleration? Do you believe that two plus two is four?" the answer in each case is yes, why is it yes, because science and maths says so.

Yet when science and maths says we need to reduce our emissions by at least 40% by 2020 below 2000 levels, suddenly, nobody who pulls the levers of power believe that. So we're off to a bad start, we're denying science, I can't wait until they start teachin pre-copernican physics in high school if we're choosing to head down that path.

But what else, what about all the frustrating noise the minerals council or the ACCI is making that the target is too big? Surely we can all find a way to reduce or carbon emissions by 5%, every economic model says it will cost more in the future if we don't act now, and these fools have the hide to say that 5% is too much.

They can't even hide behind the cover of protecting jobs because, lo and behold, 545 coal workers in this state are going to lose their jobs for reasons completely unrelated to the emissions trading scheme. Just go's to show that markets will have far more of an effect on job security than will tackling climate change. Speaking about protecting jobs, what about the barrier reef? What about farmers attempting to work parched land? Do their jobs not count?

And I'm starting to wonder if a trading scheme is worth pursuing at all, it certainly will be hard to police, lets say the scheme demands that we release X tonnes of CO2 per year and the first year in we reach X tonnes by October, what then, are we just going to shut the country down for two months? Everybody, off to your summer hibernation caves ala Yogi bear! We should be seeking a carbon tax, it would achieve the same result, but it doesn't stick to the belief that everyone will work hard at reducing their emissions, I know for sure the Aluminium smelters wont bother doing a thing to cut back their emissions.

Then there's what are we going to do with the money that gets raised by the sale of the permits? Clean coal investment anyone? You got it, not only will we pay an ever increasing cost for the power that comes from coal, we'll also be paying to sequester the CO2 that it produces (if the technology ever actually gets off the ground, my bet is it wont).

There is one option that the money raised from the sale of the permits could be used for, and it answers a very annoying question I've been wondering about for a while. WHY THE FUCK CAN'T I BUY AN ELECTRIC CAR RIGHT NOW! Imagine if we invested the money attracting electrical auto makers to sell their wares in this country? That would be a great way to offset the sale of pollution permits. Or what about addressing the linear resource flows that are killing our environment? Why not make it cheap for people to retrofit their houses or cars with energy and carbon saving measures?

Here's an example of the foolish linear resource flows (out of the ground, into consumer hands for a couple of weeks, and into the bin) that I'm talking about. Why is it that when I break a part on my car, I can't go to the dealer and get an equivalent part from any model? If I run up a gutter and break a wheel, I have to get a wheel from the correct year and model, otherwise it wont fit. This is the razor and blades policy, you don't make money selling the car, you make the money by selling a poorly designed car that rerquires the owner to be constantly returning to the dealer to buy parts and pay for fitting. Maybe the money from carbon permits could be used to raise manufacturing standards to make sure this circumstance doesn't exist.

The whole idea of Green economics is that you tax most what we like the least, and tax least what we like the most. We want cold beer, not 1 star fridges. We want to get to work quickly and stresslessly, not sit in traffic for 5o minutes trying to get to work 5 kms down the road. Switching to a decarbonised economy shouldn't cost a cent, it should be nuetral, we pay money on the one hand, to build the infrastructure to save us cash on the other hand. Thanks to K-DUDD, what we will have is a carbon trading scheme that means coal mining companies can keep doing what they always do, and bankers will now have a new market to exploit and make the fat cats fatter.

Thanks Kevin Rudd, if I wanted this, I'd have just kept John Howard in the job.

YOU SUCK!

The Taser Myth: How Does a 'Non-Lethal Weapon' Kill 400 People

2008-12-14T00:17:00.003+10:00

Does anyone believe that Tasers are non-lethal in light the 400 people that have died from them? Let's just hope the trigger happy cops, especially in remote aboriginal areas in Queensland, aren't allowed to get their hands on these personal torture devices.

read more | digg story

Australian ISPs Reject Govt Plan to Censor the Internet

2008-12-12T12:10:00.002+10:00

The Government's plan to censor the internet is in tatters, with Australia's largest ISP saying it will not take part in live trials of the system and the second largest committing only to a scaled-back trial. The Australian government plans to introduce a two-tiered censorship system of filtering from the ISPs' end. Cop that K-Dudd

read more | digg story

Bush's Final F.U.

2008-12-12T11:30:00.002+10:00

Unbelieveable to think that there are actual human beings behind these regulatory changes, they sound more like the actions of the Galactic Empire of Star Wars fame.

read more | digg story

The Tobin tax, finally I fully appreciate its beauty

2008-12-04T21:46:00.002+10:00

Before the credit crises, and the education I've been giving myself since, I really only thought of the Tobin tax as a good idea on grounds that speculation on currency was just the most useless form of usury around, but now I know it is much more than that.

Usury of course is the practise of making money, from money, without making any tangible contribution to your fellow man or society, think bank fees, or any of the myriad of insane charges the banks are always trying to justify. Currency trading is really the worst of the worst, it punishes a country when it's currency go's bad, and steals its wealth when times are good. Currency traders are the truest definition of a fairweather friend if ever I heard of one.

But it didn't quite sink in as to how useless, and almost evil the practise is until I remember that there was once a time when all currency was simply an equivalent amount in metal, silver or gold usually. Back in those days, if you wanted British Pounds for your Mexican Peso's, all you were really doing was heading to the bank, cashing in your peso for a set amount of gold, take the gold to a British bank, and walk out with a set amount of British pound. No matter what time of day, month, year or decade, you would always get the same amount of British currency per unit of peso, or whatever.

So trading in currency got you nowhere. Now though, we live on fiat currency, money has no authority other than the laws behind it. A country that has little ability to force its citizens to use unbacked paper money to pay for debts, goods and services can unhappily sit back and watch their currency constantly devalue compared to countries with stronger regulatory environments. Though, when a farmer in this country finds oil on his land, the currency traders swoop to buy his country's worthless notes, to pay him off for pennys on the pound, seize the assets and walk away smugly.

And here the Tobin tax steps in. Although personally, I think it is a tax that aims to make an inherently unfair system fairer (why not just go back to a commodity backed currency?) it is a step in the right direction, and one that can go a long way to restoring economic equality. It's a policy I'm now more proud of than I was previously, that the Greens have adopted.

Chomsky: Is There Truth in Obama's Advertising?

2008-12-02T17:32:00.001+10:00

In a fascinating speech, Chomsky warns, "Changes and progress very rarely are gifts from above. They come out of struggles from below."

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Mr. McConnell goes to parliament

2008-11-25T18:58:00.007+10:00

Yesterday I spent my time attending the Queensland Parliament's Legal, Constitutional and Administrative review committee's inquiry into contemporary electoral matters. I happened, in conjunction with my fellow Green, Sam Clifford, to have made a submission on behalf of the party, I mention this in case you were wondering if attend these kinds of things for pure fun (which believe me they are not).

In any case, here's how it all went down. The first two witnesses were the parliamentary research officer and the electoral commissioner respectively. The parliamentary research officer didn't have much to say that really interested me too greatly, his opening statement was brief, the chair was surprised at just how brief, and he didn't say anything that really rocked the boat. Then the electoral commissioner stepped up, David Kerslake. What got me interested in what he had to say were two things, one was the inadequacy of the ECQ to enforce some of the election day rules, like distances party volunteers must maintain from a booth entrance, signage and the like and also an introduction of electronic voting.

Obviously electronic voting drew the most attention, but the commissioner made a strong case for rolling it out to assist disabled voters, to ensure that they are able to case a secure and secret ballot, as at present they need an assistant to cast their vote for them. In this case, I would support him, as the pros outweigh the cons. Now I can't remember with complete clarity whether he started banging the drum on a fully electronic election, but that is something that I would oppose, and something the Tim Nicholls was very concerned about. It's just too insecure, plus he made the amatuer comparison to the security of internet banking, however Antony Green astutely pointed out later on, that banks account for a certain amount of fraudulent activity to occur, such a risk is unnaceptable in a properly democratic election.

Although I was not asked to speak on behalf of my submission (hardly surprising given the committee was composed of members of the LNP and ALP), I was very happy that the committee decided to hear from John Pyke, the VP of the Proportional Representation Society of Australia. I can't say I was entirely convinced that the committee were happy to hear what John had to say, after all, a group of people who thrive in their present environment will always default to self preservation, any form of PR threatens that. Still, John gave a great account of himself, though his preferred form of PR is the single tranferable vote, the method that elects the Federal Senate, I prefer mixed member proportional.

After that there was a load of witnesses from disability groups and migrant groups, and even Mike Horan, who all lamented the intimidating practise of How to Vote cards that are thrust in the face of voters at election time. It might come as a surprise, but I hate foisting how to vote's in front of people, not to mention the idea that the voter needs to be told how to allocate their preferences.

Still, unless it is legislated into law, anyone who stops handing out the cards is at a competitive disadvantage. After the inquiry was done and dusted, we had lunch out on the balcony (for free, if ever you're after a feed, stroll along to a few inquiries). I got a hold of the chair, Dianne Reilly and let her know that there are alternatives to John's STV proposal. She was probably the most recalcitrant at the idea of STV elections, given that the size of her electorate would be expanded by quite a large degree, something that MMP is able to counteract, whilst still providing proportionality.

Overall, I'm not holding my breath, the committee wont report until early next year, and I wouldn't expect PR to get much of a mention. But at least after my chat with Dianne, she seemed much more open to the possibility than she did when John was at the witness table.

Here's hoping.

The CIA wont let Obama expand the war in Afghanistan

2008-11-18T10:48:00.004+10:00

It seems a dead certainty, given the campaign talk, that Obama will redouble the United State's efforts in the war in Afghanistan. You know when pressure groups are saying it's likely, there is not a great chance of stopping an expansion (it may even expand to encompass Pakistan and Iran). Why then do I believe that the war in Afghanistan will fail to see an expansion?

I'll answer that question in a moment, but you would have to think that any expansion would have as its aim, the capture and trial of Osama bin Laden. I'll give away the ending here and say that if the CIA is cowed into accepting Obama's desired expansion, bin Laden will never be brought to trial, he will die, so the official reports will say, in an inocuous manner on the battlefield.

But the CIA has had a wonderful knack of getting its way over the years, and it will likely rather see the war continue as a low intensity occupation, with American soldiers dying at steady intervals, rather than a focussed manhunt.

So we come back to my question, why would the CIA want this low intensity war, rather than a real effort to execute its purpose? Basically it is because an Osama bin Laden, that gets put on trial, will absolutely spill the beans about the United State's involvement in the whole sordid affair, Osama you see, has more probably than not been set up as either the fall guy by the CIA or his activity was sponsored within the framework of plausible deniability.

You have to first accept that the 9/11 attacks were an inside job, that the collapse of the buildings was scientifically impossible due to the heat created by the burning of jet fuel, and by the fact that the building was designed to withstand the impact of a jet. Further to that, despite the common myth, I challenge anyone out there to provide me with a bona fide confession of guilt from Osama bin Laden or Al Qaeda. Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 911 showed how the extended bin Laden family were whisked away in the days after 9/11, George H.W. Bush was in the same room as Salem bin Laden on the morning of the attacks. The 9/11 commission (at which Bush and Cheney simultaneously gave secret unpublished evidence) was chaired by Philip Zelikow, a confidant of Condoleeza Rice, and finally, no investigation was made as to how the money to train the "pilots" was ever conducted, it was funnelled through a Pakistani General by the name of Mahmoud Ahmad. But of course there is far more evidence than that presented here for this point of view.

Anyway, you would have to think that if bin Laden was caught and

He's genuinely just a fall guy and nothing more, then the whole war in Afghanistan would be pointless, and he would only be convicted of say, plotting to commit terrorist acts, rather than actually committing them (He probably would be convicted of the attack on the USS Cole, as far as I know).
He's not a fall guy, but an operative, functioning with the implicit support of the CIA, to create an atmosphere of international fear in the furtherance of the neo conservative political agenda. If this is the case, then bin Laden would know all the fine details of the abovementioned paragraph. And then you would have his trial drag on for months, with all sorts of FOI requests, high profile public servants testifying, offshoot cases of perjury, it would bring the US intelligence system into the spotlight it so desperately needs shined upon it. All assuming it would be an open trial.

You can't imagine that the CIA would want that. Come to think of it though, if Obama escalates the war in Afghanistan, with the intention of arraigning, as far as he knows, an unquestionably guilty bin Laden, and ends up opening the biggest can of worms you've ever seen, then that would be one heck of a good thing, so in that regard President elect Obama, go in with guns blazing.

But I personally would rather the reform of the US intelligence community happen a tad more subtly than through a trial, and the lives of America's youth spared any further horror on the battlefront in Afghanistan.

Nooooo Global Warming Destroys the Elfstedentocht!

2008-11-17T23:18:00.001+10:00

Nooooo Global Warming Destroys the Elfstedentocht!

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The 2008 Australian motorcycle Grand Prix - The Big Picture - Boston.com

2008-11-14T22:54:00.002+10:00

The 2008 Australian motorcycle Grand Prix - The Big Picture - Boston.com

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Recycling By the Numbers: The Truth About Recycling

2008-11-14T18:57:00.002+10:00

Americans haul 82 million tons of trash to recycling centers each year—but that’s still just 32.5 percent of what we throw out. Here’s how much energy recycling saves and how much that’s worth.

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What We Accomplished Together -- Ralph Nader for President in 2008

2008-11-14T10:55:00.002+10:00

What We Accomplished Together -- Ralph Nader for President in 2008

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Just a few words from one of the candidates you probably didn't hear during the USA election. It pretty much says all I'd want to say about the whole sham process too.

Fantastic rant about the credit crisis

2008-11-14T01:07:00.002+10:00

And what will Obama and the rest of the world leaders do about it?

Banking and the global monetary system

2008-11-13T13:30:00.006+10:00

*UPDATE* try watching this film for a bit of extra background on fiat currency

I finished reading an excellent book by the name of What has government done to our money? by the Austrian school of economics author Murray Rothbard. Most of us, not being economists will be able to read this book without any prejudice, and those of us who have more hardened views about economic systems should still be able to read it because it is just so damn readable and informative.

The main point of the book is really to simply explain the concept of money, and how our current fiat money system is inherently inflationary, and skewed, fraudulently in favour of banks and passive taxation. Before I continue it's necessary to clarify a few things.

Most of us don't really know what money actually is, but the correct definintion would be that money is a medium of exchange. Money is what greases the wheels between the wants, needs and purchases of society. It is important to remember that money can actually be anything. Rothbard shows that there have been numerous things used in the past as money, butter, iron ploughs, tobacco. But principally, the two most common forms of money for civilization has been gold and silver.

The thing that links these commodity monies, and what allows them to endure as a money, is that they are valuable beyond a mere medium of exchange. Gold and silver being soughtafter for jewellery, ornaments, electronics etc. The only thing that allows our current form of paper money to perpetuate as a medium of exchange is the law, our government requires us to use its bills to pay for goods and services.

The book then explains the emergence of banks, or warehouses for money. You deposit your gold, and the bank issues you a receipt for the weight of gold you deposited, the receipt was redeemable by whomever held it. The manner in which these money warehouse made its profits was the same way self storage facilities made a profit, they charged you rent for holding your gold. Of course, it didn't take long for people to start trading the receipts instead of going to their bank every time they wanted to make an exchange.

And this is where it gets a bit muddy. Rothbard was clearly against the idea of fractional reserve banking, where banks take your deposits as their own, and issue them out as loans (loans which they can use to create money from thin air to issue more loans) or use them to purchase securities, they in effect see their liability (that is, their obligation to you to pay out on your deposit when requested) as an asset of their own. The problem with a fractional reserve system is evident, if the banks customers all call upon the bank to make good on the receipts it has issued for its deposits, there will not be enough money in the bank to satisfy its obligation (often there is only about 10% in the bank for this task). The muddy part is this: When we deposit money into a bank, in full knowledge that it will be legally stolen from us and used as the bank sees fit, do we have a right to complain? This post outlines the kind of criticisms of Rothbard's perspective that I'm talking about.

Let us ask then, if a bank assumes our money as its own after we deposit it, what is a fair system of compensation? We should be granted a share of the profits made on the money when it is deposited, we shouldn't have to pay any bank fees and we should be garaunteed of being able to redraw our money in real terms (plus inflation). In Australia, none of these things happen. We are charged account keeping fees, big account keeping fees if you are a business, we receive no share of the profits on regular savings accounts, and our money does not inflate while in the bank. So clearly, we are not receiving a fair deal when we deposit our money in a bank.

The second perspective, and most relevant given the current financial crisis is, would we want a share of the profits of a bank that made stupid investment decisions with our deposits (in which case the profits would be negative, or losses)? We would be even worse off, we would have deposited our money, seen our bank spend it on say for example, sub prime mortgage loans, and then when we want to withdraw our cash, find that it's disappeared. The only way a fractional reserve system can work equitably is if there is the impossible garauntee that the bank will make sound investment decisions and return the benefits to its customers, or ensure that its customers deposits are insured against bad decisions (this was what the USA's FDIC was supposed to do, though that agency is probably the worlds biggest toothless tiger), otherwise what the banks are doing is called theft.

What is the solution? For me, there is one of two ways we could proceed (Rothbard clearly wants a return to the gold standard, though for the moment at least that seems like putting the horse before the cart). We could either have an independent commission that collects a fraction of all transactions made by a bank when using its customers money to buy securities or loan money, acting like the American FDIC (but hopefully with a bit more chest hair) or we could progressively mandate an increase in the fractional reserve. Currently the fractional reserve of most Australian banks is about 10%. This should be increased by say 10% per year for the next 20 years, which would mean that after such time, the fractional reserve would sit at a much healthier 67.2%.

I personally think that a return to the gold standard is ideal, though impractical, and you can see why if you manage to consume most of Rothbard's book. It's a system that protects against inflation, and keeps the banks honest. Anything else aimed at ensuring proper governance of the banks becomes a myriad of red tape, and the simplicity and proven track record of commodities as money makes it far more appealing, but unfortunately, like a dope addict, we need to wean ourselves off fiat currency gradually, because revaluing currency (and in most cases devaluing) to a gold standard would cause a speight of temporary and widespread chaos and misery.

But hopefully I'll live to see a fairer monetary system take root in place of fiat currency.

Public inquiry into contemporary electoral matters - QLD

2008-11-10T12:52:00.003+10:00

I've been kept busy of late with the writing of a submission, with my cohort Sam, to the abovementioned inquiry. Although, as you may have seen by clicking on the link, there is no specific mention in the media release of implementing some sort of change to the manner in which we elect our representatives, it was not explicitly forbidden should a member of the public choose to submit something to the committee.

And so, both myself and Sam made it our business, on behalf of the state party, to make a submission to the LCARC committee primarily agruing for a mixed member proportional system for electing members to the Legislative Assembly.

Further to that though, we also made our displeasure known on the issue of how to vote cards. It may come as somewhat of a surprise to know that yes, we who hand out those annoying bits of paper on election day are just as frustrated at having to do so as those who hate having them foisted in their face, not to mention the obscene paper waste they create.

The bigger problem with how to vote cards though is twofold. One, it assumes the general voter is stupid and does not know how to put a sequence of numbers in boxes according to their preference. Two, it conveys how the particular party handing out the cards wants their voters to allocate their preferences, which in turn implies some sort of preference deal has been done. When you have candidates and parties recommending preferences, you are inherently stealing a part of a voters say in the electoral process. By guiding their preferences, it removes part of the democraticity (if such a word exists) of the whole election. Voters should be able to direct preferences as they see fit, unencumbered by confusing, and sometimes intimidating how to vote cards.

Our proposal was to outlaw any recommendation of preferences, the handing out of how to vote cards and the replacement of such things with proper, ECQ supervised education about the mechanics of the electoral system, and with ECQ supervised pictures of candidates at each polling station.

Finally, we also talked about the need to abolish political donations from all non-individual entities. It's absurd that a non voting, unenrolled entity, like a corporation is permitted to make campaign donations, politicians are supposed to be answerable to individuals, not non-individuals.

You may view our submission by following this link, a warning though, it can be a bit of rough going if you are unfamiliar with certain aspects of proportional representation electoral systems.

Racing, this time, with moderate success

2008-11-04T20:35:00.002+10:00

The last two times I've filed a report on my motorcycle racing activities, I've regretably had to disclose news that was I suppose, less than favourable. But this time around, I can say my most recent event went quite well, the first criteria for quite well being that I managed to not fall off, as I'm prone to pushing too hard and watching my bike blaze a trail through the grass and dirt.

With that hurdle crossed, lets look at the results (I'm in the F400 category of group 7). Twas the weekend of the 25th and 26th of October at Warwick, and qualifying was none to flattering, 1min13 isn't exactly setting the world on fire around Morgan Park, but considering I decided to forego the use of my lap timer I guess I can say I didn't really know how hard (or as it turned out) soft I was pushing.

Nonetheless it was good enough for 8th on the grid, and with my startline skills, that usually means I'll be in 2nd or 3rd into the first corner, which was the case in each of the 3 races. Race 1 was all right, not great, I got gobbled up after a good start to finish 6th at the flag, that's about as much as can be said of Saturday's proceedings, boring as really. After setting up my tent and camping at the track (which was free, for once) and walking the hour into and out of Warwick (just for kicks, and some green chai tea bags) I awoke on Sunday morning refreshed and ready to go.

The first race was good, and I improved my pace by over one half of a second per lap, consistently in the 1min11's, again I got gobbled up a few places as the race proceeded, but gave a better account of myself, this time nabbing 5th. I have to mention that it was between the morning warm up, and the first of Sunday's races that Dad and I noticed that the exhaust pipe had somehow, inexplicably, disconnected itself from the headers, meaning the bike sounded like a stock car, it was hanging on by a single bolt, and we didn't have the time before the first race to get it fixed.

It must have sounded deafening for anyone behind me, but it survived the 10 laps, and Dad and myself quickly managed the required repairs before anyone else was any the wiser after the race. The next race was, I guess I'd have to say, one of my best. Got a gun start again, and was 2nd into the first two turns. I held second for 3 laps, set a best time of 1min10.5s, which is a PB and ended up in 4th, a great result.

Overall, I think I finished fourth for the event, out of a field of maybe 14? (larger field than the state championships). My lap times and final positions improved consistently throughout the weekend, I was a whole 3 seconds faster on Sunday afternoon than I was on Saturday morning, and I went from 6th to 5th to 4th in the races. For once, I'm satisfied with my performance!

From racism to Nimbyism - Greens at 13%

2008-10-14T21:20:00.002+10:00

Reading today's Australian, I nearly lost my balance, the newspoll on pg 2 has the Greens at 13%. The comments in the Australian were that these were the highest newspoll numbers for a third party since One Nation.

It's a moment of pride I suppose, that we have gone from having a large bloc of the voting populace, frothing at the mouth with racism, to a large (and growing) bloc of the electorate willing to give the Greens a go, and whom are hopefully, reflective of a more environmentally aware electorate than at any stage in our nations history.

The Airtrain - Gateway to expense

2008-10-12T20:29:00.002+10:00

I've had cause over the past few days to be visiting the airports of Brisbane. First to see off my godparents on their trip back to England, and second to welcome back my cousin Murray. On the first of these occasions, I was with my mother as we drove to the airport, the second occasion I rode my bicycle, I've been told I'm an idiot for riding from Coopers Plains to the Airport and back.

Anyhow, on both of these trips I've managed to avoid paying anything to get there. If however you don't have a compliant mother, or the fitness (or foolishness according to some) to ride your pushy out to the airport, then you are going to have to pay around about $20 or so to get there.

You'll either fork over $15 or so for parking plus petrol, or you'll hand out $17 to ride the airtrain. Cleary, if you are going to the airport alone, then the train wins by a couple of bucks, though if you are in a carpool, as most people usually are when going to the airport, then it is quicker and cheaper to burn the fossil fuels getting there.

This is INSANE!!! And I plan on making it my business to ensure that come the next state election, I do all I can to make sure that whatever portion of the airport link that is owned by the BAC is bought out by the state government, and the fees for travelling to the airport are brought in line with the fees for normal public transport travel.

Speaking of trains and the gateway, why the heck is the second Gateway bridge being built for cars. The biggest public transport black hole in Brisbane at the moment is the former rail system from Doomben station Eastwards, through the likes of Bunour and whatnot. If I were premier, I'd be using the new Gateway to link the Cleveland and Doomben lines, and putting the savings (given that there would be less bridge to build for two train lines compared to six car lanes) to re-open the rest of the train system beyond Doomben.

How did I come about this you ask? Next time you plan to visit Moreton Island sans car, or are corralled into not being able to use the car ferry for some reason, you'll see what I mean, there is no way one can access the Tangalooma flyer via public transport.

Keeping an eye on what the banks do with our cash

2008-10-10T16:13:00.002+10:00

Many of us understand that once we deposit money into our bank accounts, most of that cash is then used by the bank to dabble on the free market, often as the basis for share acquisitions, new loans, whatever is required to make that banks shareholders as rich as possible.

It may come as a surprise though to know that banks generally hold only 10% of the money that is actually deposited. So if everyone decided to withdraw their deposits at once, there wouldn't be enough paper money to go around. This situation works so long as we can be assured that the dalliances the banks partake in at least break even in real terms (ie: match inflation at the least).

What we've seen in America, and to a certain extent, or economy's susceptibility to what's happened in America is that some of our deposits have not been wisely invested. Most of the losses our economy has experienced over the past 2 weeks is due to the realisation that most of the investments weren't actually doing anything, they were simply complex monetary vehicles, derivative are mostly to blame, that don't actually produce any products, or contribute in any meaningful way to society.

It's not like banks were investing in factories that produced auto parts, and all of a sudden the factory's burnt down or lost all their blueprints. Most of the investments were in hard to value things like consiladated debts, or futures and options. Evidently, the value of these monetary vehicles is now clear to see, they are worthless.

To stop this in the future, or to at least provide a greater level of oversight, I propose the following. All deposits to commercial banks are sent straight to the publicly owned reserve bank, when you make a withdrawal, you are effectively withdrawing from the reserve, the commercial bank acts as the intermediary. If the bank wants to use some of the deposits held for it by the reserve for investment purposes, such as loans, share acquisitions and the like, they first have to run their desired investment past the reserve bank. If the commercial bank wanted to loan out money to someone whom the reserve does not belive is capable of paying back the loan, then the request isn't approved.

Furthermore, the reserve bank can easily pay for this by attaching a processing fee, a small percentage of the desired transaction can be sent back to the bank to pay for the extra level of oversight. And if we the people wanted, we could also start actively implementing an ethical qualification to each request put to the reserve. If a commercial banks desired investment isn't up to required ethical standards, it isn't approved.

The argument for laissez faire markets is dead in the water at the moment, capitalism, at least western capitalism, needs saving from itself. Sure there is an increased amount of state interference with cashflows, but dammit, most of it is our money anyway, why shouldn't we have more say with how it is spent. Furthermore, there will be those who will say that such moves may discourage foreign investment, this is completely misgiven. So long as there is something that we have that others need, then the foundation of our economy will be fine, and at the moment, those things that others need (unfortunately) are coal, livestock, food and various ores (though I'd much rather be selling new climate friendly technologies).

While we're at it, lets get a public bank back on its feet, how crazy is it that Wayne Swan is fretting on the sidelines of the reduction in interest rates, complaining that the commercial banks aren't passing on the benefits, when if we had a public bank, it could reduce its interest rates immediately, and provide the kind of competition against the cartel like behaivour that dominates Australia's banking sector.

Finally, with regard to how we have ended up in this hole we are in at the moment, we must first recognise that the banks in the US and UK that have failed or are failing, have been investing heavily in economic vehicles that were grossly overvalued and highly risky. If on the other hand, these banks had been investing in research and devolopment, and encouraging the technicians of this world to produce electric cars, solar panels, recycling, fast public transport, energy efficient housing, geothermal power, we wouldn't have just made some sound investment choices, we'd have created jobs were there were none before (and in the process poached engineers from destructive industries like coal and other mining) and done a lot to smack climate change across the face.

Instead, however, the money was gambled away, and banks decided to invest in what was nothing more than a strategy of printing money, all the while the owners of the US federal reserve (JP Morgan chase, Bank of America and Citigroup) will be laughing their heads off, at our expense.

Ronan Lee joins the Greens - lay off the Helium folks

2008-10-06T12:10:00.003+10:00

It's something like this that has the potential to cause some of us long suffering, stoic though we are, members of the Greens in QLD to get all starry eyed about the fact we now have a member of the QLD parliament.

I can't say though it's the way I would have done it, but hey, I'm not Ronan Lee and we're all different. It certainly takes guts to walk away from a party who you feel no longer represents you, and to know that you're job is now to take the fight up to the people whom you only so recently would have called colleagues. I'll be honest though, and say it's not the way I would have done it. I would have waited for the election to be called, resigned from the ALP, and contested the seat for the Greens then, or at least resign my seat and immediately re-contest it as a Green at the subsequent by-election.

But let's take a sober look at things. There were two answers to a particular question that were asked of Ronan yesterday at his press conference. The question being, what does he say to the people that elected him, in the seat of Indooroopilly, as a candidate for the ALP? The first response is to raise the question of fairness. What does Anna Bligh have to say to the 8% of Queenslanders who voted Green in 2006 who got no representatives? Are their voices irrelevant? Green voters deserve a voice, if only as a matter of fairness.

The second response is, above and beyond anything, the people who voted in Indooroopilly, didn't vote for the ALP, or Ronan Lee, or in fact anyone in particular. They voted for a representative, and the fact is, Ronan just feels like he is utterly unable to represent the people of Indooroopilly under the ALP banner. As the title suggests, lets not get light headed over this. The hard work begins now, because it is going to be extremely difficult for Ronan in the next state election, though not impossible, there are a number of defectors in Australian politics who have made it past their first electoral hurdle, Bob Katter and Tony Windsor to name a few.

Either way, I lamented the fact that no one in the Labor party in QLD has shown the guts to stand up to our off the rails premier. Finally we might see a bit of a sea change in this regard.

Oh, by the way, I had a speech at the Love Earth gathering on saturday about how awesome it is being a vegetarian. Ronan was supposed to come along too, but I guess this probably explains why he wasn't able to make the starting line.

Hardly worthy of being called "A NEW DEAL"

2008-09-30T15:48:00.002+10:00

The courier mail ran this story over the weekend. Unbelievably, they headlined it, "A New Deal."

When I think of the term "New Deal," my mind wanders to the reforms that FD Roosevelt undertook during his presidency, to crack down on the depression causing, casino like mentality of the corporate world, motivated surely by the groundbreaking revelations of retired general Smedley Butler.

What Roosevelt did was enact a series of policies, and create new (now completely toothless) government agencies to ensure that the people have a check on the excesses of the private sector. From my point of view, it was a way that the people could have greater assurance that the company they worked for, would be less likely to turf them out, or uproot and move to Mexico (or something).

To be calling a taxpayer funded FREE RIDE, that is the 700B dollar bailout a "New Deal" is frankly offensive. There's no doubt it's a difficult situation to be placed in for any administration facing massive foreclosures. But handing over money to, what in any well regulated society would be regarded as corporate criminals, to continue on their free wheeling ways, bludging off the hard work of those below, is itself criminal in my view.

This bailout, if there even needs to be a bailout, should be funded from the pockets of the directors who squandered the millions, but alas, this is the problem, that even Adam Smith identified in his biblical work, "The wealth of Nations." What problem? The problem of separating those who own a corporation, and those who administer it? Who should carry the burden when the corporation falls? The mum and pop investor? The board of directors? The corparation has become the perfect liability free zone.

But back to the 700B dollar question. Here's a better idea. Rather than just providing the cash with no strings attached, NATIONALIZE the corporations that have sunk or are sinking. That's right, let the state simply acquire them and their assets in full, run the corporations for a little while, keep their dependent employees in jobs, and when they are back in working order, sell them back to trustworthy investors, and install more scrupulous directors (at sharply reduced pay).

Further to that, let's take a look at the whol neo-liberal philosophy of capitalism. I am no dyed in the wool idealogue of any colour, I am, in short, a scientist. I look for what works, and trim away what doesn't. I'm not advocating socialism, I'm saying that no governmental/economic system can work when it relies solely on one philosophy. A robust economy borrows the best bits from each economic philosophy, and does away with the offal.

Clearly capitalism can't survive unless it is regulated from itself. Communism likewise was unable to keep the ball rolling either, the Soviet Union collapsed not because of Afghanistan or U.S. brikmanship, but because their economy was a house of cards. What we need is more democratic interaction with the largest players in our economy.

The first thing I would do were I U.S. president (apart from as mentioned, nationalizing the failures) would be to mandate that the 500 largest Wall st. corporations to have a representative from the Treasury sit on their boards, to give the people confidence that their government is watching, to ensure that the companies they work for are behaving with as much regard for the law as they do themselves.

The next thing I would do would be to re-adjust the minimum wage, and peg the maximum wage of any of the directors of these 500 corporations to a percentage of the yearly profits OR LOSSES. Meaning, if the corporation loses money, so too will the directors. This can work as both a carrot and stick.

But for any of these things to happen, we really need to make sure that the corparations who pay the lobbyists who buy our politicians (Brian Burke, Wooloongong council anyone?) are barred from access. This begins with reforming political donations to the individual level, as in, donations can only come from individuals, and can not exceed say $500. Furthermore, if you're a corporation or lobbyist looking for access to the PM's ear, take a number and join the cue like the rest of us.

The damage that has been done to the U.S. economy is directly affecting ours. Any politician, state or federal, with backbone in this country should act fast on these and similar proposals to ensure that mum and pop investers aren't left holding the bucket, like so many who were contemplating retirement, but are now wondering how much will be left in their super when they turn 65.

But ultimately, if you want good corporate governance, there is only one place to turn.

The curse of the QLD Championships - Morgan Park

2008-09-26T11:31:00.007+10:00

Results here

Wow, looks like I've been away for a while, allow me to explain. Last weekend, the 20th and 21st was the annual QLD motorcycle road-racing championships. It has been probably 15 months since I've thrown a leg over my bike to go racing, and I must say, despite the rest of this post, I am quite satisfied with how I performed taking that into consideration.

Let's begin. Friday was a practise day, I spent most of the day making a few small adjustments to the machine so that I could feel comfortable riding the bike. I managed to get my times down to the low 1min 12's, which although wouldn't really be good enough for podium spots, it is a lot closer to my best of 1min 10s than I thought I would be after only one day.

Saturday rolls around, and i guess you could say the problems begin. First I find out at scrutineering that my front brake caliper bolts needed to be wired to the frame, a safety measure that will have no impact on my safety or anyone else's, just an annoying thing that needed doing. Then some two hours later, qualifying for my group begins. I managed only a 1min 12.7s in qualifying, mainly because my plan was interrupted.

I had intended to do a short stint of 5 laps, which I did, come in have a quick drink and reasess things, then go back out for the remainder of the session and really see where I can push it. When I got back, my pit crew (Dad) wasn't there to hand me a drink or hold on to the bike whilst I refreshed myself, so it consequently overheated. Vapour lock ensued, and that was the end of my session. I'm sure I had another second in me.

Nonetheless, the first race began later that day and it proceeded reasonably well. I was circulating in 5th for most of the time, but dropped back to seventh after a mistake at the final turn.

Sunday rolls along and it's straight in to racing, apparently. Because there are 9 categories over the weekend, you have a long program to circulate through before you get to your event. My first race, amazingly I managed to miss, because I got distracted talking to one of dad's mates. It was a good conversation, but I just got totally lost in it and missed my race, how stupid did I feel!

Second race of the day I decided to really pull the pin, I wasn't going to take missing my first race lying down, further to that, because I lodged a DNS, it meant I had to start off the back of the grid. Anyway, race starts and I get and absolute bolter off the line, 4th into the first turn, 5th coming out of the second. I was holding 5th comfortably, and doing mid 1min 11's when the problems started to surface. I had loosened the rear spring between sessions and was feeling more confident in opening the throttle earlier in corners, but perhaps too confident. Coming out of the hairpin that is turn 7, I just barely saved a high side. It should have been an indicator that my tyres (being 15 months old) were probably not up to the task I was asking of them, because the next corner I lost the front and that was it.

I may have been able to repair the moderately minor damage to the bike, but I was in a foul mood (I didn't show it though) and decided to call it quits. When you miss half of qualifying, one whole race and crash in another, the weekend is against you, and you should get the message that it's probably best to come back another time.

Which I will, the next southern downs championship race is on in one month, and hopefully I'll be a lot better prepared to tackle that event. I call it the curse of the QLD championships because it was at this event last year that a very similar sequence of events lead to another crash.

Transapex tunnel lunacy screwing up the Busway

2008-09-12T22:27:00.003+10:00

Is anyone else annoyed at the fact that Newman's tunnel vision is ruining one of Brisbane's better peices of public transport infrastructure? The busway between Mater Hill and Buranda has been reduced to one lane.

This has created a really bad bottleneck, luckily I don't have to use that particular section of a morning, but I imagine it would be a nightmare, even when I did have to go through there last Saturday, the bus I was on was stationary for a good 5 minutes.

This would surely be throwing timetables out of whack, and causing some people to miss buses, and others to be left scratching their heads as to the whereabouts of their scheduled bus.

Bring on the Hale st bridge and Coro drive chaos hey?

The depressing state of QLD politics

2008-09-11T16:14:00.004+10:00

I'm waiting for the newspapers to arrive this morning, browsing through the Fin review, having a polite chuckle at the piece of investigative journalism by Paul Cleary, who has investigated some of the inadequacies of Peter Costello's treasury-ship, when I happened upon this piece, the headline says it all doesn't it? In fact it says it so well, I'm going to put it up here in large bold font...

Bligh wants free ride for Queensland coal

There it is, in all it's glory. The QLD government is too close to too many private interests, which is so sad, because they aren't even the coalition!!! The ALP was supposed to be the workers party, but now, what is it? It's the big business party, it's the sexual harrassment party, it's the party of Gordan Nuttal, or Milton Orkopolous, it's the party that would sell it's own mother just to enjoy the riches of fat donations from big coal, to keep it's members arses warm on the cushy seats of parliament.

I'd like to think that there are plenty in the ALP who wouldn't stand for this, let's not forget that I've only addressed the cosy relationship the Bligh government has with the private sector, I haven't even begun to talk about the environmental aspects of this story. Anyway, I'd like to think that there are those in the ALP who wont cop this lying down, but why do we never hear from them? Will it take a NSW style leadership bloodbath before any Labor backbencher stands up for the cause of accountability? My message to ALP backbenchers is this, start airing your dirty laundry, QLD needs a parliament with accountability.

Finally, the environmental aspects. Bligh, by her antics has pretty much outed herself as a climate change denier. Andrew Bartlett has a great peice on the lip service being paid to the actions taken on climate change by our respective governments, and this just adds to the weight of evidence stacking up. We can't give the big end of town a free ride, who will end up paying for it? The answer is we, the little folk. Just look across the pacific at what has happened in the American financial sector when government gives them a free ride on the regulation train, companies collapse, and the taxpayer foots the bill.

In this case though, it's a double whammy, the big corporation gets the free ride on the regulation train, and it sullys our atmosphere whilst doing so. We the people will have to pay not only for the cost involved in re-aligning our economy when the rest of the world decides that coal is no longer an option, but we'll have to pay again just to clean up the mess it has left behind, all the prominent economists agree, Garnaut and Stern to name a few.

What to say about the current QLD government? In the words of the comic book guy,

"WORST GOVERNMENT EVER!"

RATM at the RNC and DNC Protests

2008-09-08T11:55:00.004+10:00

There were some really big happenings regarding protest actions at the conventions of the two main parties last week, as well as my favourite, Ralph Nader launching his campaign at the same time as the Republicans launched their campaign, all of which sailed completely past the mainstream media, especially when many of their journalist brothers and sisters were unlawfully arrested at the RNC.

The best part though, is how evidently energized the reformed Rage against the Machine is. Check this video out

It just go's to show the bands committment to the cause, and it's something I would love to have been there to witness. Apparently, they even lead the subsequent march to the Minnesota Capitol building after their intended concert was shut down.

It's so sad though, that in these supposed liberal democracies, that we see the kind of heavy handed approach taken by authorities. We've had the examples in our own back yard with the APEC protests, and the huge shutdown that was required to host the event, and then again with World youth day.

It's clear for all to see that as Zack de la Rocha says in the above video, the authorities truly are afraid of the people, and it shows how powerful the actions and voices of a few determined activists can be.

The only question left is where is Australia's version of RATM?

Obama's first test of change worth believing in

2008-08-30T04:28:00.003+10:00

It has appeared to me that most of what Barack Obama has been banging on about this presidential campaign is that need for change, wow Sean, when did you figure that one out I hear you say. Well, disposing with the obvious, the fact is that yes America needs change, and I'm of the opinion that even though I hardly agree with much of Obama's policies, if he can significantly alter the way the U.S. treats politics, then that can only be a good thing, if not a vehicle through which Obama will ultimately hang himself with.

Anyhow, there's a couple of concrete tests of this call for change that Obama must meet. The first and most pressing is the opening up of the presidential debates. Bob Barr and Ralph Nader must be invited to the debates, and Obama can have a major impact on whether this is seen to. The first of the debates is on the 26th of September, my pessimistic bet is that he wont make a peep about it.

The second and arguably more important test will be once he gets elected. I say that because it seems fairly inevitable, barring any sort of meltdown, or indeed exposure for a third party candidate through the debates causing a massive shift in public opinion ala Jesse Ventura. Back to the point, the second test will be whether he changes the electoral system at all levels of government.

You may notice a new link to Serj Tankian's elect the dead website has appeared recently. It's something I wholeheartedly endorse, because the flaws of the electoral college gave the world big W in 2000 instead of the popular candidate Al Gore. Obama should institute some form of proportional representation for the House, and divest himself of some executive power and allow congress to assume control over certain government departments.

One thing I do like about our system of government here is that the people who head up government departments are elected representatives, and are able to be skewered on the floor of parliament if they do a crappy job. In America, well, we've seen how much Karl Rove respects the will of congress by ignoring subpoena's, not to mention Scooter Libby straight up lying to congress over the Plame-gate affair. If they were elected officials, they'd be copping it every day, and there would be fewer dark corners in which to turn to avoid scrutiny.

Will Obama enact these critical changes, time will tell, but more and more I'm getting the feeling the man is all talk.

The cost of being Green... (or stupid!)

2008-08-29T09:55:00.005+10:00

I love cycling. I love displacing otherwise wasteful, fossil fuel fuelled (I call them triple f's) transport with zero emission, healthy and rather quick pedal power. Sometimes though there are prices to be paid for such a choice, you might cop a flat, you wear down brake pads, wear out tyres, chains, cassettes, broken spokes etc.

Sometimes, the price is a little more, especially so when you throw in a side of stupidity. We'll skip straight to the aftermath, this is what happened to my helmet...

Notice the complete lack of a rear left section. Without doubt it's saved my life, and on top of that, I didn't even get a concussion. I did however have grazes on almost all my joints, only my right shoulder missed out, plus I had my laptop and iPod in my bag on my back, you guessed it, they copped it as well.

This all happened on Tuesday, I have contemplated whether to even report this, given the embarrassing nature of how it happened, but I thought I would share my story, because sharing is caring.

It was about 6:30pm, I was riding home from QUT, and it was at Annerley, on Ipswich road that I noticed a loud metallic clanging sound coming from my front brake disc. I never got the chance to find out what the problem was before before I crashed, but I'd guess that a stone had lodged in one of the holes that are drilled in the brake disc and was rubbing on the pads with every revolution.

It got to the point where I decided I wasn't going to ride with such an impediment any longer, and resolved to do something about it. Being a fan of multi-tasking, I decided to fix the problem whilst riding the bike, by unclipping my left boot, and kicking the front caliper. Sure enough, I missed it on the third go, and put my foot in the front spokes, sending me over the handlebars.

Oh well. Fortunately, my hand is now the only remaining sore part, plus I was wise enough to purchase insurance when I bought the laptop, so the Dell repairman came out on Friday and fixed the laptop, only the condition of the iPod remains to be determined. The iPod by the way contained the last 2 months worth of data from uni, again, oh well.

The moral of the story kids is this, don't let the idiot manueverings of some cyclists turn you off riding yourself, as long as you aren't stupid, you'll have a long and safe careers worth of two wheeled commuting ahead of you.

Meanwhile, I'm now a public transport guru until I get the bike fixed, and I have to say, the convenience of Translink's GO card is tempting enough to perhaps make me not cycle again, in saying that though, the fact that buses have to fight traffic to get to their destination and bicycles don't is the down-side, I'm sure a compromise will present itself...

Blaming the consumer for economic change

2008-08-29T09:22:00.003+10:00

I have been contemplating lately some of the arguments I have come across when talking about what would change in a green economy and how it would affect most peoples lives. Before diving into the subject, the fact that people are beginning to ask, "what would living under a Green government be like?" is heartening, as I suppose it means that we as a party are being taken seriously as an alternative.

It is important though that the message and the facts behind the green economy are communicated in such a way that the major party's arguments against it are tackled effectively, after all, the very fact that, especially here in QLD, there is a large weight of numbers stacked against the Greens in parliament, it will be difficult to give a green economic message the kind of legislative weight that comes with having it spoken from the mouth of a prominent parliamentary leader.

Although it may seem like the prime target of the detractors are the Greens, their real target is actually the everyday consumer. There has been nothing but uproar from the federal opposition this week, and even Kerry O'brien last night on the 7:30 report asking Kevin Rudd about the possibility of the economy stalling.

All of which is mostly frivolous sniping. I don't seek to defend the Rudd government's economic policies (in fact I think the attacks on the Howard government over interest rate rises were unfair), but we must maintain some perspective, governments are the instruments of long term economic change, they do not influence economies overnight. I think one of the most powerful economic tools government has at their disposal is encouraging its citizens to be diligent and more intelligent consumers, this is the point of my post.

You see, last March, when Bob Brown was mis-interpreted as saying we should shut down the coal industry, the first and biggest argument against the situation was, what the hell will happen to all those jobs? In fact, the same question could have been put to John Howard during the election last year when he announced the MRET's. Such a measure would have encouraged producers and consumers to source their power from non-traditional (traditional being coal) sources, what would have happened to those jobs then?

Picking up from last weeks' talk with Andrew Bartlett (still haven't got the video for that yet) I wonder what would happen if completely independently of government, people in Australia decided to half their red meat consumption, or if farmers decided to plant native vegetation and offset the emissions of a corporation based in a country that is already a part of an emissions trading scheme? Such action would go a long way to changing the face of our economy, none of which however would do anything hurt our quality of life, or for those more worried about the bottom line, our GDP.

It seems to me that those who argue about the so called, massive costs associated with shifting to a green economy steadfastly believe that consumption habits will stay the same no matter what a government does. For instance, they believe that since most people drive to work as single occupant drivers in a medium sized sedan now, that rolling out more public transport will do nothing to change that figure, and that consumers will steadfastly cling to their ever so convenient automobiles, as though the love donating their hard earned to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (the world's foremost producer of oil and terrorists).

Consumption habits can change, but if we are going to live in a green economy, it wont be enough for governments simply to roll out the infrastructure needed to encourage this change, it will need governments to be there, in peoples faces, telling them that there is a better way, making sure that people are educated about the choices they make and what impacts these choices have. Blaming a government for declines or growth in certain sectors of the economy is really a thinly veiled swipe at the consumer, "how dare they change their habits and decide that cotton from Cubbie station, one of my generous contributors, is no longer what they want to wear to work," I can hear Bruce Flegg for instance say.

For the Greens though, I think we are an optimistic party, that believes in the power of the consumer. For myself at least, I'm certain that changes in our economy over the next 50 years, will largely be consumer driven, unless the Greens are elected across the country in mass numbers, I don't really have the faith in governments to spur on the changes needed to slow climate change and ensure we maintain quality of life.

Nonetheless, the time has come to stop thinking of the consumer as an unthinking machine, whose only duty in life is to gobble up the trash that China produces (made from raw materials we export). The consumer, especially in Australia, is a sleeping beast, one which it's my goal in life, I would love to awaken, and spur into action.

Andrew Bartlett speaks

2008-08-22T16:00:00.001+10:00

On Wednesday night, as you might have known, I was lucky enough to have Andrew Bartlett speak at a little do I put on about vegetarianism, diet and agriculture. I won't say too much about it for now, because the event was filmed.

Once the group who filmed it have their video up, I'll post it here, so you can see what was discussed and how it all went down. Overall, it wasn't a large group, but it was passionate and we had some good questions and insights.

Stay tuned.

The Russian incursion into Georgia

2008-08-15T17:00:00.003+10:00

I can't profess to know too much about the motivations behind Georgia's attempt to assert some sort of authority over the breakaway (breakaway probably isn't the correct word, yet) region of Southern Ossetia, but one thing is for certain, the world that has been created by the Bush doctrine is now very reminiscent of the wild west.

The Financial review had a good, review (funny that) of the circumstances yesterday. It seems that Southern Ossetia is somewhat pro Moscow, and is seeking to break from Georgia. Earlier in the year, at a NATO conference, talk was made of allowing Georgia to join, much to the pleasure of both the U.S. and the U.S.'s client leadership in Georgia.

Somewhat foolishly though, the Georgian leadership has acted hastily, and used this stepping stone as indication that it had solid backing in taking on Russia over such a potentially confrontational issue. Big mistake, so big in fact that the situation is now the exact opposite to what Tbilisi desired.

The biggest problem though is, as always the United States. Forget the laughable circumstances regarding Bush being at the Olympics, ogling volloeyballers and hamming it up with Putin while Russian tanks were invading, there is absolutely no way Russia could possibly feel compelled to withdraw. Why you ask? Because of Iraq.

Georgia was a big supporter of the American invasion and illegal occupation of Iraq, to have Georgia squeling and the U.S. tsk tsk'ing about Russia invading looks alimightily weak. Most of the E.U. despite not joining the invasion of Iraq, still maintain strong non-military links with the U.S. so Russia wont be to inclined to listen to their pleas either.

What Bush has done, has shown other potential bully States, that might is right. This will be his legacy, and our legacy in Australia to international relations, one that will take a very long time to reverse.

Healthcare rantings

2008-08-04T17:50:00.002+10:00

I've been afk for a while, and the very fact that I've used the abbreviation afk (away from keyboard) is probably a hint as to what I've been occupying my time with. Alas, my new mega computer has sucked me into the world of multiplayer gaming.

But I digress, there are times when I need to drag myself away from the unrealities of first person shooters and actually interact with the real world, and this week was one of those weeks. Without mentioning the whole moving into a new house, I've noticed a strange pain finding its way into my mouth whenever I eat certain foods.

I'd be sure that a filling has probably worked its way loose, most of my fillings were done when I was 5-6, so I'm sure they are in need of a re-do. Anyway, I don't have healthcare, and because I'm in between being a Masters and PhD student (yes I have graduated from my Masters) I'm kind of in a social support no mans land.

I wanted to get the tooth looked at, so I decided to explore my public health options, of which I have none. I went to the Queensland Health's oral health website, which informed me that for treatment I would need some sort of health care card, issued by Centrelink. So I go to Centrelink's website to see if I qualify, sure enough, I'm earning about $50 too much per week.

Strangely though, if I earnt less, even for a little while, and then went back to my higher earning ways, I would still get to keep my health care card. So I feel a little bit hard done by. I then got to thinking, as any good Green-head with world changing aspirations would do, and thought that surely Centrelink could issue health care cards that entitle the bearer to progressively more expensive public treatment pegged to an increasing scale of weekly earnings?

Sure it could work something like this. Person A earns betwee 500 and 650 a week, this entitles them to treatment at 20% of the market cost for a certain procedure. Person B earns between 650 and 800 a week, and this entitles them to treatment at 35% of market cost for a procedure, and so on until you're rich enough to easily afford healthcare.

I don't get why I should be discriminated against in this instance, especially if I would be entitled to keep the damn card if I were to rort the system, and undereport my earnings for a little while, only to then go back to business as usual after the six week income test period.

Oh well, looks like my teeth are just gonna have to hold out until I'm fully enrolled in a PhD and am a student again before I can get anything done.

Sean's Laguna seca race review

2008-07-25T11:38:00.003+10:00

Reviewing motoGP races is not really my speciality (some would say complaining about the world is my speciality), but given the epic nature of last Sunday's race, I feel compelled to talk about it. I probably wasn't going to write anything, but this post from Dean Adams over at superbikeplanet.com has inspired me.

I'm probably going to put myself into hot water for this, but I DON'T LIKE VALENTINO ROSSI. I'm saying that straight up so if you're a blind Rossi lover who wont hear a bad word about the man, you can leave now. In saying that, I do admire and respect the mans talent, although I wont enter into the idiotic discussions about whether he's the best ever etc.

Nonetheless, Laguna Seca. It was a great race, but it was a race between a desperate man, and a man who had the confidence to walk on water. If Laguna had a decent front straight, Stoner would have passed Rossi and probably won by at least 10 seconds, but credit to Rossi, he had to ride like a maniac to win it, and his block and bully tactics at least stood a chance of being effective on a short, tight and twisty track.

There were multiple occassions that Stoner made it past Rossi, only to have Rossi throw his Yamaha with gay abandon up Stoner's inside line to reclaim the lead, riding off the front was the only way he could win. I mentioned the article by Dean Adams, and his pointing out of Rossi's hypocrisy when it came to overtaking.

Quite correctly, Rossi is a hypocrite, and in many ways I think he is only a more talented, human version of Max Biaggi (Biaggi being an emotional Robot), he can take abuse, but can't give it. I'll cite a few examples of Rossi's strange on track behaviour.

POINT. Jerez 2005. Rossi uses Sete Gibernau as a human brake, pushes him off the track and wins the Spanish GP. Gibernau was rightly upset, Rossi was typically nonchalant and unforgiving about the whole thing.
COUNTERPOINT. Qatar 2004. Rossi again used another rider as a human brake, this time it was Alex Barros, but strangely enough, Rossi raised his hand in immediate apology for the desperate move, something he declined to offer a few months later in Jerez.

It was probably these two moves that started to give observers like me a hint that not all of Rossi's armor was a shiny and chink free as it was once thought.

DOUBLE POINT. a) Jerez 2006. In what I felt was a case of poetic justice, Toni Elias takes out Rossi in the first corner of the race, setting back his title challenge and laying the platform for Nicky Hayden to nab the title. Rossi lambasted Elias for unsportinglike behaviour. b) After Jerez 2005, Rossi scoffs and the President of the FIM, Francesco Zerbi's plea for more sporting and considerate riding.
COUNTERPOINT. Phillip Island 2006. Rossi, during the race, overtook a rider under yellow. Rossi was not made aware of his incursion, which was supposed to inherit him a ride thru penalty. After the race, Rossi was made aware of the infraction, and rather unsportingly declared he deserved no penalty anyway.

These are a few examples of Rossi's attitude to sportsmanship on the track, he's sportinglike by convenience, but if it gets in the way of his success, it's out the window.

POINT. Istanbul 2007. Elias is again involved in laying down some tough moves on Rossi, after the race, in which Rossi finished a disappointing 10th, Rossi declared that those kind of moves don't have a place in MotoGP.
COUNTERPOINT. Laguna Seca 2008. Rossi makes a series of dangerous and desperate moves to get past Casey Stoner, as he did in Jerez '05, Rossi defaults to the, "these are the races" defence.

To me, this makes Valentino a lot like Michael Schumacher. But if there is one thing for sure, I think that this year, and for the next few years, so long as riders of Stoner's and Pedrosa's talent are competing, they will have the ability and the confidence to show Rossi up for this. It's happened with a greater frequency, recently, that is, Rossi being handed some kind of ironic punishment for his misdeeds.

Roll on Brno I say, and roll on another Stoner drubbing. And roll on a new, and more awesome Kawasaki ZXRR for Ant West to take to a few podiums!

Sowing the seeds of climate action

2008-07-24T22:02:00.002+10:00

I've mentioned on this blog previously how big a fan of Joel Bakan's "The Corporation" I am (I've listed it in my profile), not just the movie, but the book that accompanies it. I note this because in his wonderful piece of work, Bakan mentions that the greatest agent for change is government sponsored, both in positive and negative ways.

It's something I am inclined to agree with. This is not to say that NGO and activists do not have their place, and they should lobby hard for the implementation of their views, but ultimately, for the moment at least, governments still wield ultimate power, and no matter how much is ceded to private interests or otherwise, it's the state that makes the rules and calls the shots.

I guess that is one of the reasons I joined the Greens as opposed to doing all this voluntary work for some other similarly inclined organisation, the business of government and politics is where the big score is, and fracturing the major party's grip on power,dividing and diluting it in favour of the people (thankyou Peter Andren) will be a measure by which I gauge my success within Australian politics.

ANYHOW.... I just thought I'd mention the immense power for change that governments wield because we can see how effective the QLD governments target 140 campaign has been going in ensuring there is enough water for citizens of South-East Queensland to drink. It's a testament to how well Queenslander's are going, given our exploding population that we are so regularly coming under the 140L per person per day target.

All it has really taken is a small amount of encouragement by the government, with the vieled threat of increased rates for exceeding the limit, and hey presto, you've got everyone in SEQ talking and acting on water conservation.

Now, let's take a look at another Labor government's opportunity to respond to another more immediate environmental and economic threat, that of climate change and peak oil. Surely the lesson must be taken from the effectiveness of the Target 140 campaign for the federal government to institute a similar scheme.

Our federal government should be encourageing people to target their oil consumption, target their carbon emissions, and bring them down to a particular level. There should be a comprehensive audit system in place for people to understand exactly how well they are going. It's not even something that needs an emissions trading scheme either, nobody in SEQ kicked and screamed about the possibility of paying more for their water, they just stuck their heads down and got on with the job.

The government doesn't need to be gripped by the petro-political spin that Brendan Nelson is playing at the moment. All it needs to do is properly engage the people, and they will quickly and clearly understand how fruitless it would be to cut 5% (a measly amount by any stretch) off the fuel tax.

Perhaps this is a little naive to think that people would so easily respond to a call to reduce their impact simply because their government has asked them too, but the evidence in QLD is harrowing, I'm certain such a plan could work, after all, Occam's razor states that the simplest solution is usually the correct one.

Solutions to CC Tannoudji's Quantum Mechanics problems

2008-07-19T15:17:00.003+10:00

I've spent the better part of the first semester of the year sitting in on Dmitri Gramotnev's Advanced Quantum mechanics lectures. I decided, perhaps foolishly to go for the full experience, and do all the tutorials, examinations and assignments.

I suppose technically if you are not enrolled in a subject you shouldn't be allowed to do the assesment, but Dmitri plans to hold the marks over until first semester next year, and credit me with the results when I can formally enroll (once I start my PhD.)

Anyhow, certainly the most painful part of the process was completing the tutorial questions, which were entirely comprised of selected questions from Tannoudji et al's enduring text, Quantum Mechanics (I'll bet they were up all night thinking of a name for that).

What I plan to do with this thread, is to post the answers to the questions I completed, yes this is cheating, but by gum, nobody should have to go through the kind of pain I did in completing these damn questions, and the easier I can make it for the next generation, the better. I don't plan however just to give fully worked answers with little or no explanatory material, no I'm going to educate your arse. If you're looking for a cop-out, you wont find it here. I'm hoping I'll be able to provide a ''solutions manual'' of sorts that also functions as if you (the reader) were sitting in a class, listening to your lecturer go through the problem, explaining the tricks and traps along the way.

For now, this post is simply a precursor to bigger and better things, but expect it to get much larger. Hopefully, I'll be able to encourage other people to post their solutions to the problems I don't attempt, and to criticise and improve on the solutions I do present.

Watch this space.

Public meeting with Andrew Bartlett, updated

2008-07-16T12:39:00.002+10:00

After a slight debacle involving the actual date of this seminar, I've finally nailed it down to the 2oth of August. All the details on the flyer below, please feel free to distribute.

Library wireless

2008-07-10T22:23:00.002+10:00

I took my new laptop to our Yeerongpilly Greens branch meeting last night, held as ever at the Coopers Plains library. I brought the new lappy along so I could update the minutes live, without having to stuff around with them at some later date. Anyhow, on my way there, I kind of half expected that the library would double as a wireless internet hotspot.

My expectations were to be left just that, expectations and nothing more. But I think that having wireless internet zones around public libraries is a must. It's not something that is difficult to set up, and it would be a good way to connect to the internet for those who can't afford anything more than a basic connection, or for those who don't have any connections at all.

Something to think about though...

New features - What's On

2008-07-05T18:00:00.002+10:00

You may notice in the top right hand corner I have demoted my friends list to a new subscription service and a notice board. There is a lot of things I tend to mention on here, like events and what not that more than likely end up slipping away into the ether. I'll keep a what's on list available for these purposes.

One of the first things you'll notice in the list is that the BCC are holding an E-waste collection day on the weekend of the 26th and 27th of July. This is a great opportunity to recycle a lot of your old mobile phones, computers, printers etc. Most of these items contain some tremendously rare earth elements, and it is such a waste to simply chuck them in the garbage when they don't work anymore.

If there is a good response to this collection day, it would be good ammunition to encourage council to increase the number of days per fortnight that they collect ordinary recycling rubbish anyway. It's something we desperately need where I live at the moment, a once fortnightly recycled rubbish collection simply isn't frequent enough.

It is interesting to expand on this however. It's a basic tenet of the post-industrial/consumerist economy to have proper recycling, above and beyond paper and plastic in place, and to compel major manufacturers to be responsible for the full life cycle of the products they make. I think as well as a greater frequency to recycled rubbish collection, another dimension should be added to what is currently defined as 'recyclable.'

If we really want to get serious about recycling, council probably needs to roll out another load of recycle bins for people to recycle metals, like copper, iron, etc. and of course electronic waste also. The biggest contributor to our nations emissions is the mining sector. It's just crazy, given the amount of raw material that has been extracted from the earth, that we would need to extract any more to meet societies needs, surely if all the effort or even a quarter of the effort that went in to mining minerals out of the ground, went recycling already extracted minerals, Australia would markedly reduce its emissions and still maintain a robust export of raw materials.

But for now, just keep an eye on my what's on tag for this and turn that useless old 386 into something more than just a space filler in your garage on the 26th and 27th of this month.

MotoGP Musings - Kawasaki and the Screamer

2008-07-04T12:06:00.003+10:00

It's time to diverge from some of the heavier items that I normally deal with on this blog and focus a bit of energy on my addiction. The MotoGP season is nearly at the halfway stage, and a few things have stood out of late that has aroused my interest beyond general racing activities.

It's always interesting watching how the riders change their styles and techniques to wring the most out of their machines, but of equal importance is what the engineers back at HQ are dreaming up to make their rider's job easier. Certainly Ducati don't seem to be short of ideas, they are constantly, so it would seem, coming up with new and better ways to make their bike the fastest, so what if it only seems to work for Casey Stoner?

I've mentioned the use of bicycle technology here before but Ducati have taken it to the next level with a fully carbon fibre frame for their '09 bike, perhaps we'll see Cadel Evans riding a modified version of the GP9 to victory at Le Tour next year?

Anyway, Ducati's 'o9 bike hasn't been the thing getting me all excited in the pants department, after viewing this video:

I was really excited to see and hear it in action, but alas, Kawasaki haven't bothered to roll it out since the post Portugal test, so far as I know. But really, I don't understand why not. Did anyone else see the in race footage of Ant West at Jerez? He was sliding that rear tyre like a fiend, I can remember Nick Harris commenting specifically how crazy it looked. These however are the kind of sliding problems that Westy has been complaining about since the start of the year.

It was pretty useless to my way of thinking sending West to Japan, given that the first day of his test was in the rain, but moreso because I would have thought, for a rider with a flat track background, who can slide the bike at will, perhaps the solution to the problem is not attempting to find more grip and stop the tyre sliding, but just to provide more power, and let the bike slide as much as you like. Think the '03 Ducati MotoGP bike, Bayliss used to slide that thing everywhere, and he took it to 3 podiums that year (not to mention Capirossi winning at Catalunya).

The screamer engine that Kawasaki have developed would no doubt be more powerful than the big banger they are using now, just slap it in the frame and see how it goes? Now that Kawasaki have apparrently solved Anthony's sliding problem, they have created steering problems, shifting all that weight to the rear has obviously made the bike understeer on corner exit. That being said, he seemed to be riding quite well at Assen before losing the front, perhaps as a symptom of there being less weight on the front.

That is what I think Kawasaki should have done, and if they get the chance, they should switch back to their pre-Donington settings, bolt the screamer in, and tell Westy to slide the hell out of it, it would at the least be a bike that would qualify well, and if Bridgestone have the motivation, might be able to provide a tyre capable of being drifted around a racetrack for a full GP distance.

Seminar on vegetarianism/diet and agriculture - Andrew Bartlett

2008-07-04T05:07:00.003+10:00

I'll update this in the coming days, but as it stands at the moment, I've managed to get former leader of the Australian Democrats, Andrew Bartlett to speak at a public forum at the Coopers Plains library on the 20th of August at 6pm.

If you plan on going, drop me a line by commenting on this post, or emailing at s.mcconnell@qut.edu.au. As mentioned, I'll jazz this post up with some pretty images and a nice flyer shortly.

How to save money

2008-07-04T04:41:00.002+10:00

I was running through the final corrections to my thesis with my supervisor today when, during our perusal, the topic of open source software came up, given that we were half looking at my work on my old (and slow) uni computer and half on my new (and awesome) laptop. I've got a range of open source software currently installed on this baby, most notably openoffice.org and LaTeX.

He was lamenting how little he has embraced open source software. This is understandable, when you have worked in government funded institutions all your life, you are mostly working with the common old packages like word, excel and the like, mostly it's provided for you without you, the end user ever having to see the financial expenses involved in installing the software on your computer.

I guess that is the beauty of how insidious Microsoft based software has become, most of the people who use it, are completely unaware of how much it has cost their institution or business to install, and most are unaware that there are actually some really good alternatives. Now admittedly, I wasn't actually able to get Ubuntu (an open source O/S) installed on my new laptop, it couldn't handle the twin graphics cards I'm using, but this will only be a problem until October when a new release is made, but I did try.

But, we were thinking, imagine the kind of money that could be saved by installing as much open source software on government computers around the country. It's not like there is a shortage of hobbyists out there who wouldn't be willing to provide the kind of software support that would be needed of such a rollout, so I don't really see why it is not embraced. Turns out, I couldn't find a single word mentioned in either the QLD or federal budget regarding open source software, so it doesn't look like the major parties have clicked on to this idea yet.

Turns out that it's actually Green policy, to have government embrace open source software, I didn't even realise this! In fact, one of our fellow Greens across the ditch, Nandor Tanczos, has been onto this for years.

This is something I plan to follow up on, from here, I'll be asking the Treasurer, or some crony in treasury whether they have run the numbers as to exactly how much money the federal government could save if it didn't have to pay license fees to Microsoft for all their software.

To wrap this up, most of the people who visit this blog probably also get bombarded with crap from my emails as well, instead of continually doing that to you, I've decided on this occassion to post my latest semi-spam message here. Avaaz.org is again calling for action on Zimbabwe to encourage world leaders to reject Robert Mugabe's legitimacy. This is especially important in Australia, given the good relationship Kevin Rudd has with the Chinese, who are major trading partners with Zimbabwe (remember that ship full of guns that South African stevedores refused to unload?). We should be on Rudd's back about attending the Olympics given China's record with Tibet and Zimbabwe, here's your chance.

just to re-cap

2008-06-26T13:33:00.002+10:00

Haven't had as much time of late trying to get some voluntary assesment completed with uni, buying and setting up a new computer, which I'm using to write this post on, so all up my little soapbox here hasn't been getting the attention it used to.

And it's a real shame too, because there are a lot of very important issues I've just been letting slip by the wayside, least of all the situations in Burma, both environmental and governmental, Zimbabwe - what an appalling circumstance Mugabe's ZANU-PF has left that country in, the continuation of the intervention etc. etc.

I guess I'll start off with the dual issue of oppressive governance in both Burma and Zimbabwe. It would be easy of me to simply add my name to the chorus of voices condemning the administration of both of these nations, but an interesting topic piqued my interest during the week. Morgan Tsvangirai, since withdrawing from the presidential run-off, called for the African Union and the SADC to lead an interventionary force, with the backing of the security council and the UN. Read about it here

I've written before about when and where an external intervention is warranted, and it seems to me that in the case of Zimbabwe, an interventionary peacekeeping force could be warranted. I wonder then though, why it is there is no motivation for a similar force to enter Burma? After all that has happened in Burma, with their sham of a constitutional referundum and their lacklustre response in aiding victims of the cyclone, why not intervene?

I really can't see the difference to be honest? Is Zimbabwe a more glamourous country than Burma. I know for instance that people are more interested in saving dolphins and whales than they are of sharks, given their friendly and majestic appearance, but it's not like one is any more important than the other now is it?

Anyway, the other hot potato at the moment is the NT intervention, and the fed's decision to continue, or perhaps even, escalate proceedings. The response that really comes to mind, given the broad condemnation of the intervention... in fact, I'll just take a quick segue here to note that the whole intervening process was dreamed up in about 48hrs as a quick piece of political manuevering by the Howard government, given its ill conceived nature, it's pretty obvious that continuing the policy is strategically similar to the Liberal party's condemnation of One Nation policies, only to then adopt the vast bulk of the Hansonist agenda.

What's the proof of this claim you ask? Simple, the fact the Rudd has apologized to the stolen generation has bought him a lot of cover on the issue, he can appease both the rights lawyers and aboriginal activists and their supporters on the one hand, and still pander to the racist 'working families' of Camden on the other, it's a play straight out of the John Howard textbook of how to run a government.

Finally, a bit about my circumstances. I got my results from my thesis examination back yesterday, and the news is good. I've been recommended a pass from one of my examiners, with no corrections (the highest result possible) and a pass with minor corrections from another examiner (second highest result). I know that simply saying so may seem as though I'm trumpeting how good I am (and it is in a way I guess), but if you're wondering why I haven't been around so much lately, pin it on that.

Anyway, talk soon. Sean.

I've been meaning to nerd up this site for a while...

2008-06-16T18:45:00.019+10:00

And now I can, check this out

Although why they have come out so blurry is anyones guess, I'll see what I can come up with. Oddly enough, if you right click on the equation, and select view image, it comes up looking a million bucks, weirdness.

Update: Hmm, seems like a white background is the only way to get the most out of it, well that's cool I guess. Or any sort of lighter background as it would appear.

You want action on petrol?

2008-06-16T10:44:00.003+10:00

It's not often that I would come out against my fellow brothers and sisters here in Australia when it comes to most issues, although I suppose if there was polling done that revealed most Australians were racist or in favour of re-instating gun laws, I'd come out swinging. So in that vein, I just have to respond to stories like this citing polling like this.

It seems that my fellow citizens erroneously believe that by cutting the fuel tax, the government will be able to wave their magic wand and the fuel problem will just simply melt away. To those who believe that, and clearly there are a lot, I say, get some perspective, and get some education behind you. There is however, a certain degree of intervening that the federal government can do to arrest the rise in fuel prices, we'll come to that shortly.

Here's the deal. First up, if I were an oil company executive or a commodities trader, I would be licking my lips that the people of the planet are demanding the kind of fuel tax cut action that they are. I think it's great that there are people in Europe protesting at the price of fuel, it's just so unfortunate that instead of lobbying their governments to smack the oil companies over the head, they want their governments' simply to reduce their tax take.

Weird thing is, when a government taxes fuel, that money essentially belongs to the people anyway, I mean, our own government has promised tax cuts already, how much more do the people want? Cutting the fuel tax will do the exact opposite of fixing the problem. It will simply allow those who trade in oil greater latitude to fill the vacuum created when the price at the bowser is re-adjusted if the tax on fuel is removed.

Besides that, the fuel tax doesn't stop fuel from rising, the tax is adjusted every year according to how the price of fuel changes, not the other way around. Removing the fuel tax is the shortest of short term solutions that could possibly be resolved, it will simply delay the inevitable. And then what would happen in say a years time when the price of fuel reaches the same level? There literally wouldn't be anything that our government could do if they'd removed the tax the year before, would people then stand around scratching their heads, and come to the realisation that, hey, maybe like other consumer products, perhaps oil is influenced by market forces FAR more than the tax placed on it?

I mentioned earlier that there is something that the Rudd government can do about the price of fuel, that will guarantee that it gets sold at an equitable price. Nationalize our fuel supply. Instead of allowing the oil companies free reign to extract and import oil, allow a branch of the government to become the sole importer for oil, and then sell it to the petrol companies at a fair price. Furthermore, they can regulate how much the oil can be sold for in refined state, ensuring that fuel retailers make a fair profit, and that consumers pay a fair price.

This would receive a bucketload of noise from those in the petrol industry, but stuff them, I'm not about making their lives any easier. And it's not like they would readily up and leave Australia because the government has seized their market, there are far too many other interests for them in this land of great opportunity simply to uproot over such a thing.

But that's my solution, either that or you get the hell out of your car, catch a train or bus to work or dust off the old pushbike.

Guess who's in a good mood?

2008-06-07T16:31:00.004+10:00

THIS GUY! Yes people, I'm happy, really happy. I know I have a penchant for sarcasm on occasion, but this time I'm 100% genuine, I'm as high as a kite. I can't let myself get too carried away, because hey, usually when you solve one problem, others tend to unfold in front of you, but usually it's a good thing, because you couldn't have tackled the subsequent problems without first solving the initial (kind of like a good mathematics exam).

What the f*** am I on abouts? Well today was the day that my father and I finally got my racing bike working properly again. Yep, after months of toil, in mostly the wrong direction, we finally solved the problem. The bike, as I've mentioned was only functioning on 3 (or more probably 2) cylinders. Like the idiots we McConnell's mostly are, we refused to believe that it could be something as simple as routing the ignition cables to the wrong spark plugs, so we spent months scratching our heads, and other body parts, tending to other possible causes. But in the end, that's what it was.

I even started thinking it was the CDI (Capacitor Discharge Ignition), and went and purchased a new one. I guess this doesn't mean all doom and gloom, the bike is now A1, simply because we've run a fine tooth comb over every aspect of the thing, and I have a shiny de-restricted ignition timing system, which means I can rev the bike till the engine falls apart, yay more power for me!

It's difficult to describe how this feels, I guess it's the feeling that only people who undertake massive months long projects get to feel when they finally see it through to completion, I've felt this only once before, when I built my downhill bike over a period of three months.

I mentioned not getting too carried away. Now that the bike is running (and lemme tell you, it's really running well), I have to concern myself with making new fairings, and getting new leathers and other odds and ends, the results of this. Sadly, it's been almost a year since I tossed a leg over my bike in anger, and boy am I itchy.

Furthermore, I have to also renew my race license (about $300 these days), renew my club membership (about $150) and book in some track days, which are not as cheap as they used to be. All this whilst I'm trying to buy a laptop and finish up with some extra-curricular coursework here at uni. But hey, that's what life is about, cramming as much in as possible.

I guess the moral of this blog post is, if I've done you wrong in the last few months, now is the time to get favours out of me, I'm in such a good mood, all I want to do is spread the love. Seriously, just ask!

The biggest news story of the year?

2008-06-03T11:02:00.002+10:00

It's not often that you get a Hollywood style script play out in real life, but amazing as this sounds, the deputy director of the NSW Crime Commission was arrested yesterday on what will shape up to be one the most serious drug charges ever laid.

This kind of arrest is of Fitzgerald inquiry proportions, the kind of thing that radically restructures government departments, sees multiple heads roll, numerous inquiries or even Royal Commissions launched etc. etc. I for one am certainly finding it exciting, I just love a good bit of real life drama like this, and watching how it will play out with the NSW Labor government, and any potential embarrassment it will cause. Surely Morris Iemma will be praying that this investigation doesn't come into contact with anyone on the government side of the NSW parliament, after the Orkopolous and Wooloongong scandals (among others) it's the last thing he needs.

This is one well worth keeping your eye on.

The racist victory against an Islamic school in Camden

2008-06-01T08:37:00.004+10:00

For those of you who didn't quite catch the headlines during the week, this story has been standing out like dog's ba**s. It wasn't ever going to take long for me to put my two cents worth in on the issue, because it represents a confluence of issues, intolerance (although I hate that word, hmm, perhaps a lack of forbearance is more appropriate), religion, private schools and environmental causes, how could I resist.

I'll deal with each in the order given. Intolerance - This is pretty easy to deal with, how could people forget the images of the whooping white trash outside Camden council celebrating the rejection of the development proposal on the grounds that, "they're takin' over our country." The first thing I thought of was this, could I name even one Islamic member of ANY parliament in Australia? Could I name one prominent board member of a major ASX listed company? Could I name a single Islamic judge? The answer to all three was no, I can't think of one. I would hope that those of the Islamic community might hold more positions of power in our community than this, but to the best of my memory, I just can't think of one that is in a position of considerable influence.

So how then is it that they are taking over our country? And what about that old chestnut of, they're taking our jobs and welfare? Well, fact is, our economy, apparently, needs as many people working the huge excess of jobs as possible, and if there isn't enough home baked workers to fill the gaps, business is going to look overseas (although I would assume the cold logic of business wouldn't care one with whether their workforce is Islamic, Buddhist, anything). And stealing our welfare? Unlikely, it's so often the case that such things are based on no evidence whatsoever, they're just words, they've never got figures to back them up.

Secondly, Religion and private schools. It might seem weird, but in an odd way, perhaps Camden Council is filled with atheists. Perhaps the next development application from any religious school of any denomination will be rejected? I live in hope. I don't in any way see the necessity for private/religious schools to be given the kind of ground they are given in Australia. It kind of makes the idea of a "private" school seem pretty quaint considering the large sums of cash our state and federal governments give them, that's a real welfare problem I'd like to see tackled in Australia. With adequate funding, the public school system is all we would ever need, it would provide better education, and be less of a burden on the tax payer than a mix of public and private schools. I remember John Howard always used to say that we should thanks parents who send their children to private schools because they reduce the pressure on the public system, he said this of course at the same time he was de-funding public schools and fattening up the private ones.

Thirdly, environmental causes. It was the key to Camden Council's rejection, and a smart ploy. It would certainly serve to keep the hippy free loving NIMBY's quiet if you can play off their social justice aspirations against their environmental aspirations. I haven't been able to track it down, but I'd love to see what the EPA said about the appropriateness of the site for a school, and whether it was in contradiction to the Council's decision, or whether the EPA was even contacted for advice. Either way it's good cover, but it's not an all encompassing one, which meant the Council did have to concede that the Quranic society (the developers) were more than welcome to re-submit an application. I hope they do, and I hope their next site meets all the environmental stipulations, then we're sure to see a real bunfight!!!