I hate the term Climate Change when I think about the simple fact that the climate is going to change towards the warmer and more volatile. It feels like an attempt to sugar coat the unpalatable, a bit like Milo Minderbinder's attempt to sell chocolate coated cotton in 'Catch-22'. For heaven's sake it's Global freaking Warming and pretending that the climate is merely going change like the timetable for the public transport system is part of the idiotic nonsense that allows a certain breed of conservative politician to flat out deny it's even going on, or that it's man made.
But you've heard that from me well enough so I'm just here to plonk this bit of further evidence on to the immense pile.
Within the next couple of weeks, a remote part of north-western Tasmania is likely to grab headlines around the world as a major climate change marker is passed.
The aptly named Cape Grim monitoring site jointly run by CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology will witness the first baseline reading of 400 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, researchers predict.
"Once it's over [400 ppm], it won't go back," said Paul Fraser, dubbed by CSIRO as the Air Man of Cape Grim, and now a retired CSIRO fellow. "It could be within 10 days."
The most recent reading on May 6 was 399.9 ppm, according to readings compiled by the CSIRO team led by Paul Krummel that strip out influences from land, including cities such as Melbourne to the north. (See chart below, with the red line showing the baseline CO2.)
I mean, just look at that line going up. So for all this talk of emissions control and Kyoto protocol and what have you, we just keep adding on to the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Even the deal in Paris was non-binding so there's really no evidence we're going to help one another or even ourselves. We wasted a valuable 20 years under the Kyoto protocols not doing enough, and Paris will promise not much more.
What's genuinely frightening is that we've managed to do absolutely sweet fuck all to halt this calamitous progression. Extraordinary things are going as we speak:
And that's just the beginning. Google says there are another 235,000 news items to do with Global Warming.
Sydney's had a mild autumn really. It should be winter at this point in the year but the forecast for this week tells me its sunny and 22-24degrees right down to Sunday. Sydney weather's always been nice, but not this nice this late into May. It's downright creepy.
...but what do you do? It would certainly help to vote out these clowns.
...but what do you do? It would certainly help to vote out these clowns.
The Crappiest Election In Memory
Here's a piece from David Marr who thinks we don't have much going in terms of choice. He's probably right.
Australians want action. Polls year after year have shown we believe climate change is real. We know Australia isn’t doing enough. We are more uneasy than ever that it’s Australian coal destroying the atmosphere.
But the political system can’t deliver a solution.
So we head into yet another election campaign – and this the longest anyone can remember – arguing over familiar problems with little hope that the next election will be any more use than the last in solving them.
Education standards sag; life grows steadily worse in remote Indigenous communities; marriage remains beyond the reach of the LGBTI; multinational corporations operate largely untaxed; and budget deficits deepen year after year.
We do executions better than solutions. Turnbull is Australia’s fourth prime minister in five years. Australians want this leadership churn to end. They crave continuity. But victory no longer guarantees survival.
It's enough to make you want to cry. Australia doesn't have to be so captive to this kind of politics. I don't know how it happened but the electorate is far more progressive than the politics of the place seems capable of being. It's as if the whole electorate has to wait for the stupid kids to catch up to the notion that this Global Warming thing might be a bad thing for them and them in particular. Instead we keep missing the moment, distracted by issues that are equally 'worthy' but on the whole far less significant in terms of how are lives are materially lived.
The bleeding irony is that Malcolm Turnbull once stood for doing something about Climate Change. You'd look at him now and you know he's totally captive to the stupid Right Wing denialists. Bill Shorten isn't exactly the scintillating alternative given his history surrounding the climate change policy wrangling in the ALP government. Even with a 5% swing, an ALP government isn't going to do anything too radical. The problem is, of course, that the situation is demanding something radical be done.
What do you do? I say we start by voting out these bastards.
Just Who Are The Aussie Tax Dodgers?
The Panama Papers point to a coterie of Australians. Some are companies, some are individuals, but they clearly weave a complicated web of money intrigue. It's interesting the SMH focuses on this bit first before going into the companies.
Just Who Are The Aussie Tax Dodgers?
The Panama Papers point to a coterie of Australians. Some are companies, some are individuals, but they clearly weave a complicated web of money intrigue. It's interesting the SMH focuses on this bit first before going into the companies.
Australia's fifth-richest man, chairman of Hong Kong-listed Shimao Property Holdings Hui Wing Mau, who boasts a wealth of $6.9 billion, is on the list. He's among a number of Chinese billionaires listed.
The company is listed as an officer for Mossack Fonseca client Vicking International, which in turn is a subsidiary of Shimao Property Holdings, according to the company's annual report.
Shimao Property Holdings is also listed as a client of Mossack Fonseca. Shimao purchased a Sydney office tower in late 2014 and last year launched its Ashmore apartment development in the Sydney suburb of Erskenville.
Mr Hui, whose current fortune trails behind Gina Rinehart, Anthony Pratt, Harry Triguboff and Franky Lowy, debuted on the BRW Rich 200 list in 2013.
He went to university in South Australia in the 1990s and was described by BRW as being "private and elusive about his business dealings".
Shimao and Mr Hui did not respond to inquiries.
All up, the ICIJ's database links to people and companies in more than 200 countries and territories.
Is it just me that detects nascent racism in going for the Asian Australians first before going for the big boys? Because the more famous names are just as intriguing, and probably a bit more vexing:
Australia's biggest company BHP Billiton, shopping centre behemoth Westfield, Rio Tinto subsidiary Alcan Corporation and ANZ Bank and National Australia Bank have all had either the head company or subsidiaries named in the Panama Papers and Offshore Leaks.
Many of the subsidiaries severed their relationship with Mossack Fonseca years ago, according to the database.
BHP Billiton, which has been named previously in reports on the Panama Papers, declined to comment.
Alcan's relationship with Mossack Fonseca ended in the mid 1990s. A spokesman for Rio Tinto said: "The period in question pre-dates Rio Tinto's ownership of Alcan, and as a result we are unable to comment."
NAB, which is listed as an intermediary, did have a branch in Labuan in Malaysia, which was closed in 2005.
A NAB spokeswoman told Fairfax Media: "NAB can confirm it does not have any current controlled entities registered in Labuan in Malaysia."
Another intermediary named is accounting firm Grant Thornton, which acted for Canyon Commercial SA, listed in the jurisdiction of the British Virgin Islands.
PwC in Australia is listed in connection with officer Roman Wolfgang Berg in the United States.
And former Reserve Bank board member Robert Gerard is listed as the sole shareholder of Mayfair Land Management, a BVI company he acquired from Gerard Corporation in May 2010.
BHP Billiton, Westfield, Rio Tinto and NAB aren't just any old companies - they're some of the top 10 firms Senator Sam Dastrayi charged as running Australian policy formation, some months ago. It stands to reason that these companies would be behind lobby attempts to defund and disempower ASIC and the ATO. It certainly passes the cui bono test, because nobody else could possibly benefit from those Coalition moves but these tax dodging companies.
It's kind of sickening that the same companies would have been directly influential in forming the recent Coalition policy of cutting company tax - especially because they've already been minimising their tax through tax havens, all the while letting revenues for the Government shrink, and pushing for cuts to health, education and welfare. Can there be any less stench of corruption to the links between the big end of town and the Liberal and National parties? How is this materially different to the links between the unions and the ALP, that they have to go and put in the ABCC but not a Federal ICAC? If anything, the Panama Papers pertaining to Australia reveal the depth of corruption inherent in the relationship between the Liberal and National Parties, big business and organs like the IPA who keep coming up with Thatcherite Trickle-down agendas to suit these big companies the most and damn the rest of Australia.
Frankly I'm surprised there isn't more general outrage in the wider community. It's like we're all Stockholm Syndrome sufferers when it comes to how the big end of town and the conservatives gang up and beat us around. I guess there's plenty of outrage already with Kelly O'Dwyer sticking her foot in her mouth on Q&A, but still it never seems enough and the pundits still talk about this government like they're somehow sensible people when they're clearly no such animal.
but...
What do you do? Vote out these fuckers.