Kevin Rudd:

Alan Kennedy writes: Re. “It’s all your fault: killing the ETS was a team effort” (yesterday, item 1). Bernard Keane says Rudd is more like Bob Carr than Paul Keating. He’s wrong; Rudd is Carr. It is no accident  that Rudd is surrounded by Sussex Street’s finest for whom being in  office is all that is required. Just being there means they can get their hands on the levers and get on with whatever business they like. They created a puppet Government under Carr who thought it was enough to  turn up every day and do his impersonation of a premier.

Sadly the public bought it for ten years and as we watch the infrastructure crumble and the lack of planning over those years sentence us to purgatory, we get a glimpse of what it will be like if Rudd continues.

In NSW Sussex Street have created their ultimate  puppet premier a good looking sassy straight talking footy Mom, our very own Sarah Palin, who may save them a few votes. She was put there by all those stooges who now pose around her doing impersonations of Ministers of State a role played best by  Transport Minister Campbell.

But I note that while the polls show our Kristina is popular, they punters can’t wait to beat the crap out of the Labor mob. It will be an even bigger victory if Malcolm suddenly hears the call of Macquarie Street and swaps Wentworth for Vaucluse. If the Libs get in they will be in for quite some time.

Federally it is time for the boy and girls in the party to drop the curtain on Kev’s acting career and install someone with the ticker to do things otherwise, while they may win later in the year,  the inaction will see Labor wiped out at the next poll and in the wilderness for years. If you are going to be in Government you have to be prepared to die on your feet, fight for what you believe in. And by that I don’t mean a belief that just being in office is the object of the exercise.

Les Heimann writes: Re. Yesterday’s editorial. Is it really the case that our PM is clearing the decks for an election?

Is it the case that he has micro managed stuff to the point where it is so confused and complicated that is unsellable? Is it the case that our PM has simply become bored with a few things so made them go away? Is it the case that Mr Rudd is just another politician — and not such a good one? Is it the case that he will wimp on a double dissolution? Is he getting a little confused about himself? There are a lot of questions. A leader we don’t have, a fixer we don’t have — an accident is what we have!

I want a genuine reformist government run by a gutsy leader, not what we’ve got now. Don’t you just pine for a genuine man or woman at the helm?

David Lenihan writes: Michael Frame (yesterday, comments) joins other critics of Kevin Rudd, Liberals all, who keep pushing the ‘ he wants to head the UN ‘ line. Perhaps Mr Frame would care to advise what his source for this career move of the PM is? .I have never heard Mr Rudd ever make a suggestion along those lines.

Al Jazeera and Rupert:

David Menere writes: Re. “No demand for Al Jazeera on Foxtel, says Williams” (yesterday, item 17). Foxtel CEO Kim Williams says that Al Jazeera’s non-presence on Foxtel is a matter of pure commerce and audience demand. Maybe, but earlier this year, Rupert Murdoch entered into a cross-ownership deal with Saudi Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal, owner of the major Middle East TV giant Rotana Media.

Williams’ statement would look decidedly thin if a Rotana- sourced current affairs channel appeared soon on Foxtel. Perhaps Rupert’s foray into Middle East media will be more successful than his effort to enter the Chinese media market.

Rupert’s credibility in the Middle East is unlikely to have been helped by his statements at the outset of the Iraq war that, (if I recall accurately), the war would be a good thing because it would bring the price of oil down to USD20 per barrel.

Brett Stewart:

Anne Turner writes: Re. “NRL, News Ltd facing a nightmare of conflicts of interest” (yesterday, item 3). Please remind Michael Visontay that Brett Stewart is facing a trial in September and until proved guilty, then he is innocent, and no comments can be made about him that would damage his case. Therefore why would the NRL punish the whole of the Manly team because of a matter which remains unresolved and before the court.

Global warming:

Tamas Calderwood writes: Re. “It’s all your fault: killing the ETS was a team effort” (yesterday, item 1). Leading climate scientists admit the world hasn’t warmed for 15 years and the warming spurts from 1860-1880, 1910-1940 and 1975-1998 were statistically indistinguishable.

Copenhagen collapses, Germany abandons binding CO2 targets, France’s high court rejects a carbon tax, cap-and-trade is stalled in the US, China and India refuse to limit their emissions, two thirds of Americans now believe global warming is mostly natural, renewable energy scams abound in Europe and the dodgy “science” of the IPCC and other climate institutes has been exposed.

Yet in a gorgeous display of his blissful unawareness about all this, Bernard Keane awards much of the blame for Australia’s ETS debacle on The Australian, the ABC and “many other outlets” because they dared to report on all the above and look at the sceptical case.

Even better, he decries the “rubbish-in-rubbish-out” economic models used to discredit the ETS, which in turn was … ahhh …  based upon a bunch of rubbish-in-rubbish-out models that attempt to predict the weather in 100 years, even though they didn’t predict the cooling over the past 10.

Seems those wingnut, conspiracy theory denialists are having a few wins right now.  So instead of dismissing them and calling for censorship, maybe their arguments should be examined and this “settled science” reviewed.  Just a thought.