I like to think that I believe in civil liberties, but I’ve been barely troubled by the long time that Mohammed Haneef has spent in jail for interrogation. It seems to me that terrorism is not like any other crime. Allowing a suspect to roam around while you work to find evidence on which to […]

The Flegg effect is far worse than recent Courier Mail reports led me to believe. Today’s release of Newspoll figures allows for a comprehensive analysis of just when Bruce Flegg started to affect federal voting intentions and just how far the rot has spread. Flegg became Liberal Party leader in August 2006. In April-June 2006 […]

The whole reason for having the ABC, and supporting it through taxpayer funds, is that it will be more objective than the commercial broadcasters and cover subjects that they won’t. Tonight Mark Scott’s ABC failed that test. I edit On Line Opinion, a journal which tries to be balanced. We publish many articles which I […]

John Howard is like Adolph Hitler – I wouldn’t have even run that line in the greenest of my school boy debating days. So why would Paul Keating? Paul is either (a) barking mad or (b) up to something. I’ll go for the latter. Howard’s ratings start to improve, so Labor needs a diversion, and […]

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 […]

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 […]

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 […]

It’s old news (yesterday’s) but I should note that the New South Wales Liberal Party yesterday suspended a former President for giving an interview to the media. Michael Osborne was president for three years between 1997 and 2000, but he’s been stripped of all rights for two years. His crime was to express “concern over […]

Spot the odd man ought – Dean Mighel, Joe McDonald, Graham Young. Not too difficult. The first two are union leaders who have been sprung threatening and standing-over employers, the second is Chief Editor and founder of innovative online journal On Line Opinion which last year was Australia’s most popular politics site. So where’s the […]

Imagine that the rampant paedophilia shown to exist in Aboriginal Communities had been found in, say, a set of church run private schools, what would the outcome be? Would we be talking about how to deal gently with the church organisation respecting its traditional ways and property rights? Would we sit on the report for […]