I've been a bit out of things this week so I haven't exactly followed the news or markets. I do want to point out that it's been 11 losing days out of 12 trading days this year so far, so everybody is getting their arses handed to them as Brent Crude hits US$28. Really, unthinkable sort of pricing.
Nobody with any familiarity with China believes in the GDP growth figures that come out of Beijing. There's going to be a big problem if we're counting on 7% or so GDP growth when in fact the likely number is mines 1%.
Pleiades sent in a Crikey article which is behind a paywall, but the gist of it is that our political class and bureaucrats missed the cue, and completely bungled the landing from the mining investment boom that overtook the entire Australian economy for a decade and a bit there. Among the things they failed to anticipate was how hard other nations would head towards renewable energy, even if our government under the Coalition sat in denial about climate change and resisted doing anything for as long as it could. Right now, the share markets are showing how and why we're going over the cliff.
Our Honey Is Poisonous
This is depressing.
Australian honeys are the most contaminated in the world with natural poisons linked to chronic disease including cancer, according to international researchers.
Pregnant and breastfeeding women in particular should be wary, experts say, with unborn and breastfed infants at higher risk of organ damage from such toxins.
The news affects varieties of honey sold by many leading brands and widely available on supermarket shelves. While the products do meet more relaxed Australian food safety standards, all but five Australian honeys tested had more contaminants than the European Food Safety Authority would consider safe or tolerable, the research published in the Food Additives and Contaminantsscientific journal shows.
The Australian Food Code bans the use of poisonous weeds such as Paterson's curse (also known as Salvation Jane) and Fireweed in human food. Their flowers are laced with chemicals called pyrrolizidine alkaloids that are considered the most common cause of poisoning in humans and livestock worldwide.
But Food Standards Australia and New Zealand (FSANZ) permits honey to be sourced from restricted plants, as long as it is blended with other honey to dilute it.
That's a worry. Of course, the article finishes with a line from the honey industry body about Australian consumers having nothing to fear. It's strangely reminiscent of what tobacco growers used to say about cigarettes. It's a bit of a giveaway that we ought to get very paranoid in a hurry.
The Impossibility Of Sensible Conversation
It's always surprising just how lunar-crazy the right are in this country. I guess the lunar left are also crazy but they've not been anywhere near the controls, or making policies for this country in a long time. The infighting breaking out in the Liberal ranks about the next Federal election.
Just look at the craziness here:"Our sovereignty has been signed away at the United Nations by Malcolm Turnbull, [Foreign Affairs Minister] Julie Bishop and [Defence Minister] Senator Marise Payne," he writes.
"Now UN laws override Australian laws thus dictating what countries our refugee and immigration intake come from."
"Former prime minister Tony Abbott agreed to take in 12,000 persecuted minority refugees, mostly being Christian. Malcolm Turnbull has already changed that to being 12,000 mostly Muslims, who clearly do not assimilate to the Australian way of life and our laws," he says.
(Mr Abbott denied Christians would be given preferential treatment, saying: "It's those who can never go back that we're focused on.")
Cr Cornish goes on to "strongly question the Liberal Party's direction in regard to conservative values".
"It currently shows little difference with the aims and objectives of the Labor Party, that being the removal of religion and replacing it with government founded [sic] tolerance of everything, climate control, over control of our everyday life and the erasing of our heritage and way of life through wanting to change our flag and changing our head of state to a corruptible president," he says.
Cr Cornish also attacks Lindsay MP Fiona Scott over last year's leadership change that saw Mr Turnbull become Prime Minister.
"Fiona Scott was only elected due to the hard work and support of Tony Abbott," he writes.
"His many campaign visits to Lindsay along with his 'sex appeal comment' got Fiona just over the line, only to have her stab him in the back for his hard work and party loyalty."
So one part of the Liberal Party strongly believes in this kind of divisive politics. They pine for the days of Tony Abbott as PM (even though it was clear Tony Abbott had been an utter failure), and they play this line of absolute fear for international commitments that this country has made. It's the same bunch of people who think nothing of locking up kids in detention centres or ignoring climate science, or complaining about political correctness. Basically, Malcolm Turnbull's job is to corral these crazies under the same party and somehow get to the election and win it. Even if he wins it, he's going to have to cajole these crazies to do what is required because these crazies are ideologically against it, and think there's some kind of principle at stake in their wrongness.
Whatever it is disaffected ALP voters thought Malcolm Turnbull might do that was so much better than Tony Abbott, you have to say the the likelihood of that happening is quite minimal.
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