Political correctness and child s-x abuse in indigenous communities:

Jeff Ash writes: I couldn’t agree more with Peter Faris’ sentiments regarding political correctness and its effect on the Aboriginal population. For so long so many of the less desirable elements of modern Aboriginal life have been ignored seemingly to assuage the collective guilt felt over the Stolen Generation. It has to stop if the situation is ever to improve. When someone with deep ties to the Aboriginal People like Peter Faris starts calling for children to be removed from damaging situations and positions of neglect then shouldn’t the rest of the population – starting with Kevin07 start taking notice?

Kyoto and greenhouse reductions:

Leon Arundell writes: Re. “Bali: A tight spot for Kevin” (yesterday, item 1). According to the available science we need to reduce the world’s annual greenhouse emissions to two tonnes per person, if Australia is to avoid the costs of dangerous global warming. We already pay some of these costs because higher temperatures and increased evaporation have made the drought more severe. By mid century these costs could accelerate to $5,000 for each Australian man, woman and child. For less than $750 each, Australians can reduce our emissions to two tonnes, or purchase equivalent emissions credits. This would set an example to the Chinese and Indians whose emissions are already below average, and who would suffer real hardship if they were forced to reduce their emissions. In an act of blinkered economics and environmental vandalism, Kevin Rudd has confirmed that for the next forty years Australians will emit more than double the recent world average. This entitles developing countries to reject any emissions target lower than ten tonnes per person. Not only that, but Rudd has announced that for the next six months Australians will continue to emit five times the world’s average, until his hand-picked Australian analyst inevitably confirms what the rest of the world already knows. Australian commentators hail Rudd as pro-environment because – as I observed during nine years in the Australian Greenhouse Office – the developed countries refuse to discuss targets. Instead, they have used the Kyoto Protocol to hijack the climate debate by speaking only of “reductions.” A 60% reduction is like limiting pedestrians to 2 km/h in school zones, while allowing owners of 200 km/h cars to speed through at 80 km/h. It addresses the problem, but disadvantages the people who are least responsible for it.

David Flint:

Peter Lloyd writes: Re. “Flint: Beware the carpetbaggers in the Kyoto debate” (yesterday, item 14). There seems to be a correlation between those who are obsessed about not addressing greenhouse emissions, and their age and income. Flinty will be long dead by the time the worst results of our current behaviour are upon us, a fact for which future generations might be grateful, in the unlikely event they recognise his name. He and his fellow travellers are about as likely to take responsibility for any disaster as a Howard minister. So just go back to the Republic old boy, you’re much better restricting your opinions to such little follies.

Holger Lubotzki writes: You guys are just sad these days… Flint writes “One of the qualities of good journalism, as of science, is a healthy degree of scepticism”…. Huh? Show me just one paragraph of Flint published by Crikey where he displayed anything close to “scepticism” where John Howard and his gaggle of pro-monarchist anti-progress Yes Men were concerned. Yeah… right! The only thing worse in a journalist than a lack of scepticism is a blind partisan double standard based on their own political ideology. And it’s sad that Crikey has joined the mainstream media in publishing self serving ideologically driven sycophants like the Flint…

Brendan Nelson’s new leadership:

Nicola Stainlay writes: Re. Yesterday’s editorial. Brendan Nelson’s new leadership needing to “… take the fight up to the Rudd government, a government filled with the confidence of a ringing mandate” Eh? What? I don’t think so, I’m sorry. Let’s not forget that just less than half of the electorate voted for this government! Hardly the ringing mandate you keep banging on about. My weekend catch-up reading today said that about 12,000 votes put Rudd over the line. Twelve thousand! Hardly a “ringing mandate”. You guys are so full of it!

Jenny Morris writes: I know I should be settling in to enjoy watching the next few years of “backbiting and recrimination” in the Liberal party, but frankly I’m bored already. So Paul Kelly thinks Comrade Nelson needs to be “bold” and “strong”. The Libs had the chance of that in Malcolm Turnbull, whatever else they might have thought of him, he’d have delivered those two things. Instead, I vote for a media blackout on the Liberal party for the next four years. I just don’t think I have the stomach for the petty bitchery.

Kirribilli:

Diana Simmonds writes: Jane Connor (yesterday, comments) wrote: “It is hilarious that you think it is okay to have a go at John and Janette for a) wanting to live in Kirribilli and b) failing to want to move out. Let’s not forget they made the ultimate sacrifice serving the country that they live in…” “Ultimate sacrifice?” What is Jane Connor on? John and Janette should have lived at The Lodge, not Kirribilli. The Lodge, Jane, The Lodge. And all that tosh in the first couple of years about not wanting to uproot the kids – oh please. In the deregulated, free market that John and Janette espoused and so slavishly served that’s exactly what workers at all levels are supposed to do. Ultimate sacrifice is generally accepted to mean death – all we’re asking is that the removalists be called in sooner rather than later.

Mikey Hughes writes: Jane Connor has a go at Crikey for suggesting John Howard is clinging on to Kirribilli a little too long. Jane claims that the PM’s residence there would cost but a trifle considering the place has to be maintained anyway. News flash Jane. Howard’s 11 years in K-land is estimated to have cost the taxpayer an additional 17 million dollars in upgrades, maintenance, $100,000+ wine cellars, expansions, not to mention additional trips on jets too and from Canberra. Ultimate sacrifice indeed.

Rodney Adler:

Jane Connor writes: Re. “A last word on Conrad Black … from Rodney Adler” (yesterday, item 26). Rodney Adler is the most pompous of all people. I am sure jail was unpleasant for him – quite honestly I am relieved to hear it. He broke the law – many, many, many innocent people suffered and are still suffering financially. Shareholders of HIH and policy holders alike…By asking what his thoughts are on Conrad Black (CB) you are only playing to his ego. Who cares what he thinks of CB or anyone else for that matter. Please, at the very least run a week minus any mention of Rodney Adler and his thoughts … a month would be a bonus; a year even better … a decade or even century would be sublime. I beg you. The man is a criminal – tried and tested by our legal system.

Antarctic flight:

Louise Crossley writes: Re. “The Hobart to Casey Antarctic flight is long overdue” (yesterday, item 20). John Boyd may have been involved with Antarctic air transport options in the 1970s and 1980s but he doesn’t know his early ANARE history very well. The DC3 he mentions was not “based at Mawson for some years”; it barely survived six months in 1960. Two Beaver aircraft were stationed at Mawson in 1956-57, housed in a specially built hanger which was still there when I spent a year at Mawson in 1991-2. Even if he has never been south, Boyd could have verified his facts from Tim Bowden’s excellent history of ANARE The Silence Calling.

Overington blog:

Mike Smith writes: Re. “Tips and rumours” (yesterday, item 8). Crikey published: “Yesterday, The Australian, which backed her so well at the start but has since gone quiet and apologised to readers for what they described as an “incident”, quietly removed her Blog.” Not quite. It is still there. However, the link to it from the blogs page has gone, so unless you bookmarked it, or do a Google on “Overington blog” you’ll have trouble finding it. Looks like the last blog she did was Nov 22. Curious timing, wot?

The republic:

John Bowyer writes: Lynn Petrie (yesterday, comments), please, show some backbone! If you are so confident of the republic then let’s hear what your idea is. I think the republic is an eminently sensible idea in principle but I am not going to give a blank cheque agreement on the basis that some little group of the intelligentsia will work something out for me. Put up or shut up!

Google:

Adam Schwab writes: Richard Stapley-Oh (yesterday, comments) is to be commended for his humorous, albeit not quite correct comment. First, I don’t currently have a shareholding in Google, which could make disclosure of such an interest a bit difficult. Second, the tagline “Corporate Lawyer” fell by the wayside about a couple of years ago (and it is a Crikey editorial decision anyway). Third, Richard managed to compose a 300-word criticism without making an actual point. Finally, Stapley-Oh claimed that the article was “grovelling corporate lapdoggery” which seemed a strange criticism, given that more than a third of the article was critical of Google.

Mungo:

Alan Kennedy writes: Unlike Norman Churcher (yesterday, comments) I find Mungo amusing. If Norm’s letter is anything to go by he seems to be a man lacking in wit or a sense of irony. Just a few things: the Hunter S Thompson of Byron Bay? Everyone who is anyone knows Mungo would not be seen dead in Byron unless it was at a book signing. He is the resident pundit at the Billy Nudgel pub which is stoutly resisting gentrification and the onslaught of the Conspicuously Affluent Bogans (CABs) who infest Byron these days. Mungo retired to the Billy Nudgel after the publican of the excellent Brunswick Heads pub banned his large nondescript dogs from the beer garden. This move was not supported by any thinking person and was just seen as yet another intrusion into people’s lives by the nanny state that says dogs are not allowed in places where people eat or drink. Having seen humans in beer gardens late at night I often think this rule was brought in to protect the doggies.

My Chemist:

Bob Peterson writes: Re. “My Chemist gets into the spirit with a “pervy” Santa promotion” (yesterday, item 21). Stephen Downes, get a life. Santa Claus is flashing nothing, he has his trousers on and the model’s eyes are surely averted. So you think they are naked and sporting a leering “p-rn look”? What? Hmmm… Well, that’s what you’re thinking. In fact, Santa is protecting us from those possibly potentially exhibitionist models… a plus for the family vote. I say, thanks Santa, on behalf of my family… but under that cotton wool beard, just between you and me… are you a woman model? Or are you a man?

Lobbying:

Ian Lowe, President, Australian Conservation Foundation, writes: I don’t have the time or energy to continue a game of verbal ping-pong with Mr Neil James of the Australian Defence Association (yesterday, comments), but I cannot let pass his claim that “For well over a decade or more the public stances of the ACF have overwhelmingly tended to favour one side of politics”. This may represent his Commonwealth-centred view, since ACF was often critical of the performance of the national government on environment issues during the last decade; how could any responsible environmental organisation not have been critical of the Howard government’s appalling record? But ACF has also been vociferously critical of the performance of the State governments, who have been predominantly ALP, for their failings in such areas as energy, water, transport, planning and lack of protection for natural values. ACF has been vigorous in its criticism of both the Coalition and the ALP for their recent flirtation with the uranium industry. And ACF is active at the moment in trying to ensure the new Rudd government does not cave in to the “greenhouse mafia” in the same way the Howard administration did. If Mr James’ criterion of a “genuine public-interest lobby” is “no-fear-or-favour criticism of the inevitable failures of all political parties”, he will have found exactly that in our assessment of the various political parties’ policies before the recent Commonwealth election.

Rundle v Albrechtsen:

Paul Massarotto writes: Re. “Rundle v Albrechtsen: Round 3” (yesterday, item 25). Guy Rundle is right on; The Oz is full of itself, many times over. The Murdochs should give them a dose of milk-of-magnesia! Their editorial and general content stance on climate change was the deep hole that buried them for me.

ABC Board:

David Havyatt writes: Re. “ABC Board: the nominations keep rolling in…” (Yesterday, item 24). Margaret Simons and her nomination contributors seem to think the ABC is merely a news organisation, rather than a national broadcaster that tells the nation’s story in drama, music, cultural criticism and comedy as well as news, current affairs and documentaries. They also seem to be under the same delusion as those who criticised the Howard Government’s appointments for their failure to “change the organisation’s culture”. The Board’s job isn’t to run the ABC that is the job of the Managing Director. It is to be hoped Board appointments come from a much broader section of the community than suggested so far.

North Melbourne:

John Macdonald writes: Re. “You’re out: The AFL makes North Melbourne pay” (yesterday, item 27). Again, I’m with you Adam Schwab. Move the Lions back to Melbourne. The AFL is full of types who don’t appreciate Melbourne’s divine rights, like Demetriou (he played for North but must have travelled outside Victoria at least occasionally) and Fitzpatrick (he definitely did, he played for Subiaco before Carlton, see). Victoria clearly contributes more than ten sixteenths of the nation’s game. Let’s get the figures out – how many of the players on AFL lists come from Victoria? Where do all the club members reside – Victoria? Registered juniors – Victorian all, surely. Then again, maybe some research is not such a good idea.

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