Apparently the Liberal Party did a poll of federal voting intentions in Queensland in which they asked about the standing of State Leader Bruce Flegg. Today’s Courier Mail reveals that Flegg has a net negative 30 something approval rating (calculated by sub-tracting those who disapprove from those who approve). Apparently in the same electorates the sitting federal members have positive ratings, for example Gary Hardgrave on plus 20.
This poll appears to be the basis for yesterday’s story where the National Party were calling for the Liberal Party to replace Flegg. The Courier Mail’s take on this is interesting.
Flegg is said to be pulling the Liberal Federal vote down.
That’s interesting, because in our poll, taken somewhere around the same time, neither Bruce Flegg nor Nationals state leader Jeff Seeney were even mentioned in any of the 1,000 or so responses we took from Queenslanders.
Which raises the question as to why you would poll for Flegg’s standing in a federal poll, and what other questions were asked that allowed the inference to be drawn that he was pulling the vote down. For example, did they specifically ask whether Flegg’s standing was affecting voting intentions? And if they did, what was the figure on that (given that merely asking the question would have disposed some punters to blame him one would also have to allow for some in-built bias)?
Did they do the same thing for other personnel who might have adversely affected the vote? What was Santoro’s rating? What was Seeney’s?
Flegg says that party officials deny that the research exists, but others claim that it has been discussed at federal campaign meetings. These are not mutually incompatible positions if you’re plotting a coup.
The Brisbane Line blog carries the line that the kerfuffle is about positioning the National Party in the new seat of Flynn. I’ve also heard the story, and it included Leichardt as well. But it doesn’t sound likely. The National Party attack relies on polling that they can only have courtesy of the Liberal Party organisation, and if there weren’t some degree of organisational connivance, sitrring the Libs up is hardly the way to get them to vacate a seat for you. The National Party is also tring to entice the Libs into a joint senate ticket. These manouevres, if unwelcome, wouldn’t help there either.
Another theory is that it is linked to the “Printer-gate” investigations, in which Hardgrave is implicated, and where Flegg is alleged to have been happy to co-operate with the police investigations.
The Prime Minister is reported to be staying clear. Why he would do that is unclear. I’m sure if Kevin Rudd were confronted with something like this in a state branch of the ALP he’d be keen to show leadership and exercise his muscle. And he’s ahead.

Who would have thought that the climate models used as the basis of IPCC greenhouse forecasts would violate 72 of 89 principles of forecasting. That’s the claim from forecastingprinciples.com a site run by J. Scott Armstrong,
Professor of Marketing at the Wharton Business School, University of Pennsylvania. He and Kesten C Green from Monash University have published an audit of the forecasts from the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report. (You can access the report from http://www.forecastingprinciples.com/Public_Policy/global_warming_audit.html). The auditors come to the view that while the scientists might know something about physics, they understand little about the science of forecasting.
This quote gives a flavour of the review:

9.3 Do not use fit to develop the model.

It is not clear to what extent the models produced by the IPCC are either based on, or have been tested against, sound empirical data. However, some statements were made about the ability of the models described in Chapter 8 to fit historical data, after tweaking of their parameters. Extensive research has shown that the ability of models to fit historical data has little relationship to forecast accuracy (See “Evaluating Methods” in Armstrong 2001.) It is well known that fit can be improved by making the model more complex. The consequence of increasing complexity to improve fit, however, is to decrease the accuracy of forecasts. The 12 authors of Chapter 8 appeared to be unaware of this principle.

In other words, by trying to make the models more accurate the scientists are doing the opposite.
It’s an entertaining read and reveals amongst other things that the opinions of experts are no better than the opinions of anyone else when it comes to forecasting. Worse, that the wrong opinions of experts can reinforce each other – an example of the law of group polarisation, and a fact which potentially undermines the validity of the refereed publishing process.
This report opens a new and important front in the CO2 wars. The lead author also runs an interesting site for those of us who are skeptical of all sorts of fortune telling.

Peter Beattie’s non-resignation is an interesting gambit. Tony Blair made himself a lame duck twelve or so months ago when he said he would resign in this term of the British Parliament. John Howard will obviously resign some time, unless of course he loses his seat, but he has a forumula which allows him to duck the question and stay anything but lame.
Beattie’s announcement falls between the two, but is much closer to Blair’s position. But Beattie is not Blair. Is this the reverse sell? “I’m going to leave, now tell me you love me”? Or has he been told he must go, as Bob Carr was, but is trying to change the dynamic of public opinion? If Beattie is going then the limelight shifts towards Anna Bligh. Will the public warm towards her, or will they be looking for alternatives. What will the caucus think?
If Beattie does resign, and isn’t just playing another game, then the Labor Party will need to make a clean break and take the Iemma option. That means electing someone as leader who is competent, but not a public face of the government. A leader who is not identified closely in the public mind with the existing leadership can win the next election for Labor. That leader is unlikely to be Bligh who will wear the likely failures of the government’s water policies, and is persistently identified in the public mind with the problems of asbestos in state schools. It probably won’t be Transport Minister Paul Lucas. But it could be John Mickel who, while Minister for State Development, Employment and Industrial Relations, has managed everything so smoothly that some back-benchers have a higher public profile.