Not the worst drought in a 1,000 years - posted by Graham

Research into hurricanes in the North Atlantic indirectly suggests that the last 100 years in Australia have been relatively wet. Forget about Greenhouse. Just the normal swings and roundabouts of the climate have the potential to be devastating. According to... More

Rudd gets serious about PM's position - posted by Graham

I didn't think it would happen, but Therese Rein has decided to sell her Australian business, thus more or less removing the conflict of interest that Rudd has. I say "more or less", because the value of the business is... More

"Sorry" isn't hard to say for a Queenslander - posted by Graham

Rudd's handled his "Reingate" fairly well because he's been prepared to say he was "sorry". It's exactly the way that Peter Beattie has managed to prosper in Queensland as he stumbles from one disaster to the next. Beattie is so... More

Reining Rudd in - posted by Graham

Therese Rein's businesses represent real ethical challenges to Kevin Rudd, but it is unlikely that the government will pursue them, for fear of incurring the wrath of Australian women. Today's Australian carries the story that Rein underpaid some workers. Rudd... More

Howard does a Debnam. - posted by Graham

If you like omens, the New South Wales "under dogs" just lost the first state of origin match to Queensland. Will Kevin Rudd or Wayne Swan rubb it in tomorrow when they face the New South Wales under-dog from Bennelong... More

Is Kyoto contributing to Greenhouse gas production? - posted by Graham

That's a possible conclusion that could be drawn from a new CSIRO report which says that the growth in the rate of CO2 emission in the atmosphere has risen from "1.1 per cent a year in the 1990s to a... More

Howard needs a by-election - posted by Graham

The Howard government is trying to get Australians to focus on the reality of a Rudd government, but no-one's paying attention. Howard has even admitted that the public is "considering a change of government", a necessary precondition to convincing the... More

Where would we be without the "Bastard Boys"? - posted by Graham

I don't know why anyone worries about Howard stacking the ABC board when Auntie can produce agitprop like "The Bastard Boys" in an election year. National Productivity and the inadequacy of our ports to handle the demand for exports have... More

Just how good is John Howard's personal vote - posted by Graham

Galaxy's latest poll in Bennelong has John Howard losing to Maxine McKew. As the PM says - no big surprise there. If it said anything else you'd say the sample was bad, because it would be completely out of line... More

Rudd's budget reply not enough - posted by Graham

Kevin Rudd's response to the budget is not good enough. He's claiming to be a visionary, but his promises are all variations on themes that the government has already made its own. A major theme under Labor is that John... More

Takes one to know one - posted by Graham

The standard Labor criticism of last night's budget is that it is a "clever" ploy by a government which will do and say anything to win the next election. As I noted in my last post, such "search and destroy"... More

Wedged on the budget - posted by Graham

The Queensland takeover of the federal ALP campaign is really starting to pay dividends. Consider the budget. My impressions of the media coverage is that whatever Costello and Howard deliver will be regarded as just a gambit to win the... More

I wish I'd written this - posted by Graham

I wish I had, but then, not being German, perhaps I couldn't have, written it, that is. I've just come upon this piece courtesy of a new service called StumbledUpon. "Evil Americans, Poor Mullahs" by Claus Christian Malzahn, Spiegel Online's... More

Paris in Griffith...or the South Pacific - posted by Graham

An example of when the "A" list should be given the "Big A" is this gem of an interview with the newly pre-selected Labor Candidate for Boothby, Nicole Cornes. When Mrs Cornes saw the photo of herself from the interview... More

No longer show business for ugly people - posted by Graham

The "enlist the 'A' list" trend in the ALP is proceeding apace with the decision to remove preselections from the hands of local branch members with the avowed intent of placing people like Greg Combet, George Newhouse, Colonel Mike Kelly... More