Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

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I’ve a Facebook account and I’ve started posting information there that is not about the natural environment, but that I think is important.  A reader of this blog, Neville, sent me a link to a podcast of Alan Jones on 2GB talking this morning about Julia Gillard and her involvement with the AWU.   Alan Jones can go on a bit, but this morning he was unusually specific and focused.

You can hear the podcast at the 2GB website or via my Facebook page.  Following is a simple screenshot of the post at Facebook.  To link directly to my Facebook page look for the photograph of me on the RHS column of this blog home page and click on for the link.  Cheers,

After Gina Rhinehart Buys Fairfax

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‘The hilarious implication – and secret terror of every Melbourne hipster – is that Rinehart will turn Fairfax into some kind of 24-hour Mining Channel, with endless re-runs of Red Dog and Wake in Fright, interspersed with ads for blue singlets. You won’t be able to so much as pick up a copy of the Age without finding your hands stained red with dust, as you search in vain for a single article that isn’t about the Hancock family, while averting your eyes from the topless pictures of Andrew Bolt on page 3. 

I don’t know about you, but given the uniformly mindless dross scraped up, warmed over, rehashed and then served as ideological bubble-and-squeak on the ABC (even drizzled with its jus of self-righteousness and dark-green sea foam), I long for alternatives. In fact, I long for the much-anticipated sale of the ABC under the most enthusiastic sort of Liberal government, and dismantled by an equally enthusiastic Mark Latham. During the Renaissance, it was the independently filthy rich – the oligarchs, bankers and popes – who sponsored the finest artists of the age. Let a new Renaissance bloom at the touch of button 2 on the remote: I hope Rinehart buys the entire Fairfax group, and then casts hungry eyes on the ABC itself…

Read more here: http://www.quadrant.org.au/blogs/qed/2012/06/one-woman-army

From ‘One-woman Army’ by Philippa Martyr
Published at Quadrant Online on June 20, 2012

A Dingo Took Azaria: Coroner

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THE fourth inquest into the death of Azaria Chamberlain concluded today with the Coroner ruling the baby died as a result of being taken by a dingo.

Lindy Chamberlain, the mother condemned by the Australian public and wrongfully jailed for Azaria’s death, tells her story at her website:

‘The family was staying in the public campground at Ayers Rock (now Uluru). Before the night was over her daughter was to disappear from the tent where Ambien she was sleeping. Lindy had seen a dingo coming out of the tent, and when she checked on her daughter, found her gone. There were dingo prints leading into the cold desert night and blood in the tent. But by morning, people who had not been with Lindy comforting her, or searching on that night, were already spreading wild, untrue rumours. Of sacrifice, murder, dingoes not being capable, and of weird behaviour…

As you look at the contents of this website, just for curiosity, or for research, keep foremost in your mind that this is two stories, firstly about a young life cut short. But, it is also the story of a mother who fought for justice, while struggling to keep her family together.

Above all, in everything that you do with your life, keep an open mind…

Read more at:
http://www.lindychamberlain.com/content/home

Eulogy: Neville Kennard had Unconventional Wisdom

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AUSTRALIAN anarchist and sceptic, Neville Kennard, died last night (Sunday 3rd June) from secondary cancer from a melanoma. Many knew Kennard as one of the brothers who owned and managed Kennards Hire and Kennards Self Storage. Kennard was also one of the first financial supporters and the first Chairman of the Centre for Independent Studies. I knew Nev as an enthusiastic supporter of Socratic dialogue and unconventional wisdom.

The last time we met was at the Royal Sydney Yacht Club  in November last year. Kennard had invited a small group to dinner there to hear Hans Hermann-Hoppe speak about fiat money.  Fiat money is what Professor Hoppe refers to as irredeemable pieces of paper.  Hoppe talked about the history of money and our current banking system concluding that only a system of universal commodity money (gold), competitive banks (not the current system where monopolistic reserve banks set interest rates etcetera), and 100-percent-reserve deposit banking with a strict functional separation of loan and deposit banking can assure economic stability and present a genuine answer to the current “monetarist fiasco”.

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Deal with Climate Reality as it Unfolds: Bob Carter

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“OVER the last 18 months, policymakers in Canada, the U.S. and Japan have quietly abandoned the illusory goal of preventing global warming by reducing carbon dioxide emissions. Instead, an alternative view has emerged regarding the most cost-effective way in which to deal with the undoubted hazards of climate change.

“This view points toward setting a policy of preparation for, and adaptation to, climatic events and change as they occur, which is distinctly different from the former emphasis given by most Western parliaments to the mitigation of global warming by curbing carbon dioxide emissions.”

So begins an article by Bob Carter recently published in Canada’s Financial Post. The article is a summary of a public lecture Professor Carter will be giving in Ottowa, Toronto and Calgary over the next week. It continues…

“Ultimately, the rationale for choosing between policies of mitigation or adaptation must lie with an analysis of the underlying scientific evidence about climate change. Yet the vigorous public debate over possibly dangerous human-caused global warming is bedevilled by two things.

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Unable and Unwilling to Consider the Evidence: Our ABC

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SCIENCE was once about matching theory with reality. According to American physicist and historian Thomas Kuhn this perhaps more than anything else contributed to the phenomenal progress made by scientists over the last 400 years.

But many people appear to have a problem with understanding theory and considering it in the context of reality. Consider Anna Rose and her performance on the documentary ‘I Can Change Your Mind About Climate Change’ featured on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) this evening. Ms Rose was flown across Australia and around the world to talk with climate change sceptics but refused to engage constructively on issues of scientific evidence. Yet evidence is central to science and in particular determining whether theory and reality match.

Instead of listening to what Richard Linzen had to say about feedback mechanism and global climate she said he was not credible because of his views on passive smoking. When it came to Marc Morano, another person introduced to her as sceptical of anthropogenic global warming, Anna Rose point blank refused to talk with him because she said he was a liar. Clearly Mr Morano is influential, here was an opportunity for Anna Rose to apparently show him up as a liar, and she would not engage.

Nick Minchin, who travelled with Ms Rose and who had been specifically tasked with attempting to change Anna Rose’s mind, also tried with the evidence, but he didn’t see able to engage her either.

Jo Nova, David Evans, Richard Lindzen and Marc Morano all provided data that would suggest the theory as promoted by Anna Rose does not accord with reality, but she would not engage.

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