The first Roy Morgan face-to-face poll to catch the full force of the OzCar aftermath shows Labor’s two-party lead up from 55-45 to 58-42. Conducted over the past two weekends from a sample of 1190 (smaller than usual from a poll covering two weeks), it has Labor up 0.5 per cent on the primary vote to 46.5 per cent and the Coalition down a sharp four points to 35 per cent. The slack has been taken up by the Greens, up 3.5 per cent to 11.5 per cent.
Here’s an incomplete sampling of the past week’s action. This site’s normal energy levels will resume in about a week or so.
• Monday’s weekly Essential Research survey had Labor’s two-party lead up from 58-42 to 59-41. Supplementary questions showed a spike in confidence in the economy, but a somewhat paradoxical increase in concern about employment; Joe Hockey favoured over Malcolm Turnbull as Liberal leader by 17 per cent to 13 per cent; and the Labor Party viewed more favourably than the Liberals on 11 separate measures.
• The South Australian Liberals have a new leader in Heysen MP Isobel Redmond. Redmond succeeds Waite MP Martin Hamilton-Smith, who was mortally wounded after accusing the government of doing favours for an organisation linked to the Church of Scientology using what proved to be faked emails. Hamilton-Smith called an initial spill last Friday after Mackillop MP Mitch Williams quit the shadow ministry, which was universally interpreted as an attempt to undermine Hamilton-Smith ahead of a future pitch for his job. However, Williams declined to put his name forward at the ensuing spill, at which the sole rival nominee was deputy leader and Bragg MP Vickie Chapman. After inital expectations he would comfortably survive, Hamilton-Smith emerged from the vote without the support of a party room majority: while he won the vote 11 to 10, one member had abstained. Hamilton-Smith called another spill to clear the air, but when Redmond (who had been newly elected in place of Chapman as deputy) said she would put her name forward he announced he would stand aside. The result was a three-way tussle between Redmond, Chapman and Williams, in which Redmond defeated Chapman by 13 votes to nine after Williams was excluded in the first round. Goyder MP Steven Griffiths won the vote for deputy ahead of Williams by eight votes to six (since only lower house MPs get to vote for the deputy, whereas members from both houses have a vote for the leadership).
• Antony Green crunches some electoral numbers to conclude that, contrary to widespread belief, Labor’s position in the Senate would be better if the next election were for half the chamber in the normal fashion, rather than a double dissolution.
• Against his better judgement, Peter Brent at Mumble enters the world of blogdom. He’s also written a piece on Inside Story which delivers on what I emptily promised a few weeks back, namely to review the report of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters report into the 2007 election.
681 Comments
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Congrats Dario! the bloke who came 3rd Will Power has a good name for motor racing
GG you will be no doubt be proved right again amigo.
Psephos 434
That is quite false; read Mike Young’s material at the website I linked to. Evaporation alone can’t possibly explain what happens in the Murray now. Deniliquin is just one (huge) example. In total the irrigation allocations in NSW and Vic far outweigh evaporation losses. They also far outweigh Adelaide’s drinking supply, which was my point.
Can someone briefly explain how to copy text so that it appears in italics?
Psephos
“The state the Lower Lakes is in is SA, and if SA wants to have nice lakes, it should stop taking water out of the Murray. Shutting down irrigation up stream won’t make much difference, because most of the water in the northern tributaries evaporates long before it reaches SA. Australia has one of the highest river evaporation rates in the world – which was why the Murray never had a proper estuary in the first place. ”
I think perhaps you should think more deeply about this.
Shutting down irrigation will make an enormous difference as typically in most hydrological systems transpiration represents the biggest loss of water to the atmosphere. The evaporation from the surface of a river is actually quite small in comparison. You also need to consider the groundwater system, as it is far bigger than simply the surface flows. As you draw more from the river, you end up drawing more out of the groundwater (the river is simply the intersection of the local topography and the water table). By progressively drawing from the water table you lower it and then begin to dry nearby lakes out – causing acidification. This is due to irrigation and use of water by plants. It is not true to say that the water would just evaporate anyway.
The Estuary is a different point. Being an estuary means it is tide dominated, so seawater will move in as freshwater lowers, this was the case originally. The apparent failure of the Murray River to have a ‘proper’ estuary is more to do with sediment transport. To stay healthy the estuary doesn’t need to be underwater, it just needs to not dry out. Once it dries out the sediments move from a reducing state to an oxidising state producing large quantities of sulphuric acid and potentially releasing large amounts of arsenic.
Socrates, do you mean:
italics
or
Psephos sometimes you make good comments.
Sometimes you don’t.
This is one that is not good.
“Water saved at Deniliquin will have mostly eveporated before it gets to the lower Murray”
You said a similar thing once before so it seems to be something stuck in your head.
It’s wrong Psephos.
Here’s why.
Evaporation occurs according to weather/climate conditions acting on the surface area of the river [including the associated wetlands normally, but we can ignore them currently because they essentially no longer exist.]
So water lost by evaporation is a function of climate and surface area.
Add a quantity of water to the river and nearly all of it simply piles up on top of the previous increasing the depth but causing little increase in the area.
So the quantity evaporated is pretty close to the same as before.
Do you understand? I’m trying not to be condescending [probably failing at that] but it is a basic misunderstanding you seem to have.
Put it another way.
Get 2 identical buckets.
Half fill one with water. Say 100 litres.
Depending on the climate a certain amount will evaporate over a year. Let’s say half of that bucket.
That leaves 50 litres in that bucket of water.
The other bucket of water is full, say 200 litres, and is next to the first one.
The exposed surface area is the same.
Because the climate and the surface area and the time are the same it will lose the same amount as the previous bucket.
That’s 50 litres.
Leaving 150 litres.
OK its a bit more complex than that but simply put, most extra water put into the river will flow to the mouth [because it is taking up no extra evaporative area, or very little].
http://www.lakemokoan.com/CMOCMS/Newsletters/Docs/Fact%20Sheet%208.pdf
“The volume of water lost from a storage is obtained by multiplying the net evaporation by the storage’s surface area”
Pancreatic carcinoma is one of the worst to get. Steve Jobs and Patrick Swayze are reported to have it (although I’m not convinced about Jobs as you don’t have a liver transplant for it). Don Dunstan died of it.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25772077-601,00.html
Dario,
I’ve just watched the footage of Mark Webber winning in Germany…..his shouts of delight are too colourful to broadcast uncensored
I think this will be the first time Advance Australia Fair was played at an F1 event for a winner.
Last Australian winner in F1 was so long ago, God Save the Queen might have been played
From that Ross Gittin’s article:
http://business.smh.com.au/business/this-recession-isnt-looking-as-bad-as-we-feared-20090712-dhd2.html?page=-1
No wonder the Chinese are getting really pissed off with Australia. If they are filling our rice bowls here, why should they have to put up with the kind of china bashing that have been happening here lately:
* the overall anti Chinese investments here in Australia.
* The Australian Govt Defence White Paper that portrayed China as a potential military threaths to Australia
* the particular humiliation dished out to them by Rio and BHP
* the china bashing via the Fitzy affairs
* the ongoing bashing via the Tibet Shangri-La, especially the Parliamentary Team visit to the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala
* and now the bashing via the Hu affairs, especially the stupid Opposition hicks that still think China can be bullied and pushed around using the megaphone diplomacy or the gunboat diplomacy up the Yangtze.
Maybe the GFC made the Chinese Leadership to stop and think. It’s a question who needs who, who is going to blink first and what the Chinese are prepared to put up with.
Psephos
Further to my comments, from Mike Youngs paper, total evaporation and other losses from the entire MDB system are about 1800 GL/year. Median inflows are 9000 GL/year. Total water allocations in SA are 500 GL/year, of which less than 200 GL/year is for Adelaide. So pretty clearly, evaporationd oesn’t explain the problem. Overallocation to irrigated farms in NSW and Victoria IS the problem. The rest is trivial by comparison.
See
http://www.myoung.net.au/water/publications/A_future-proofed_Basin.pdf
and
http://www.murrayriver.com.au/about-the-murray/water-use-and-consumption/
Dario
tell me both, I am eager to learn, thanks
Brought a tear to my eye in the early hours this morning
Yes, it didn’t come in until 1984, so Alan Jones would certainly have had to suffer God Save The Queen when he won in 81
Ok Soc for italics you do the following:
<this is in italics>
and for a block quote you just surround the text you want to quote with the square brackets like this:
Sorry, italics was wrong, it should be this:
<i>italics</i>
Mr Squiggle
The last time was Alan Jones in 1981. Advance Australia Fair only became the national anthem in 1984 so today would be the first time for the “new” anthem.
Yes but none of the ‘bashing’ is coming from the government. It would be strange for them to punish us when it would be giving a leg up to the Opposition party of the day, who might then get in as a result and make things worse for them
#465, The Labor Govt has not done any bashing, but it has sent many a confusing signals about China.
Which are…?
Psephos (406),
The sentence is ungrammatical because it is missing an “and”. It should read:
“Ms Barlow has criticised the State Government’s plan to build a desalination plant and the weir near Wellington, and for not recycling more stormwater.”
The comma is arguable.
Socrates,
the answer is transpiration. Plants use enormous quantities of water – especially ones that produce food.
Finns, I think by confusing signals you mean a nuanced position which the opposition and the MSM simply cant fathom- its black or white to them
Speaking of Anthems ours really blows IMHO…
I think we could of created a much better Anthem based on the tune of Waltzing Matilda.
Our Anthem doesnt fire us up or make us proud of our country or want to make us fight to preserve and defend it, its really whimpy compared to others around the world.
BTW will Rudd bring in the Republic debate after he wins in 2010? I want to know when to vote against it
Dario
Thanks. So if I want to add emphasis I type Turnbull is an egomaniac whereas if I want to do a quote I say:
[Well, and you may well ask why I am personally named. A cynical observer might think I'm personally named in order to get a little bit more publicity for the claim and put a bit more pressure on Goldman Sachs. Does anyone imagine Goldman Sachs can't afford to meet any claim itself? You know, this is a - there's a bit of - there's - politics doesn't just occur in Parliament.] – Malcolm Turnbull to Lateline, 2006.
Love our ABC’s coverage though. This morning they were “mounting calls” and “increased pressure” to intervene, when the only evidence was the opposition having another round of their hysteria this morning.
Sound like their ABC has been on the horse again
when in fact the only outside opinions I have heard have cautioned against taking the oppositions approach. Maybe it should be “opposition faces mounting calls to be cautious” etc…
Astrobleme
The problem is more the amount of water we pour on plants that produce cotton. Pouring it on paddocks to produce rice in the SE Australian climate is also pretty stupid IMO.
I think our Government should intervene after exactly the same time it took for Howard to intervene over Hicks.
There are literally hundreds of Aussies locked up in much crappier countries than China and the faux hysteria from the MSM over a single executive from on of the MSM’s favourite companies joining them is nauseating.
Oh dear, how low can the Pommys go.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5juOwDYauhBraeNzPZsLdhbkbokLw
Not to mention the blatant time wasting by sending the trainer and the 12th man to the centre for doing nothing. Oh yes, the 12th man spilled the drink, so he has to go back there again.
Not to mention KP smacked a ball to Mitcho and Mitcho promised to smack him back to Pretoria.
Bring back Dunkirk!!!
Of course China is a potential military threat to Australia, as is Indonesia. Just because it is highly unlikely doesn’t make it impossible.
Maybe they should give them knighthoods. Honestly, they are a joke.
I didn’t see the cricket this morning but heard about it. Did the umpires try to stop the timewasting? That sounds like a fairly blatant rule breech.
At least the mightly Lions put the Geelong B team in their place on Saturday night
I have given up hoping to see the Lions on Free to Air TV in Adelaide though.
Has this been posted here before?
http://business.theage.com.au/business/how-we-got-china-so-wrong-20090712-dhfw.html
“WHEN Rio Tinto holds press events in China, its public relations firm sometimes hands out red envelopes of cash to Chinese journalists who are kind enough to turn up.”
The poms had been wasting time all game. As if the umpires were going to start cracking down on it then.
Dario
I see. So ball-tampering is naughtly but time wasting is OK?
Thanks for the Italics hints too. Can you se what I did wrong on the quote example at 473?
Dario,
That’s the problem with professional sport. The spirit of the game and sportsmansip are always secondary considerations to winning/not losing. If something is not specifically outlawed it is permissable.
Dario also remember when Swann got the trainers out when he kept closing his eyes and not playing the short deliveries from Siddle when he was getting Hit that wasted alot of time too.
How good was Hauritz a break out game for the lad he may even get a start at Lords
?
This is a copy of a post I tried to send in response to a piece by Madonna King in the Courier Mail on-line.
http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,25761603-27197,00.html
It won’t let me send it because it says it is too long, yet there are “NO” comments posted so far. It suggests I e-mail it to them. Wow, it will get the same treatment that all my previous ones got. Totally ignored!
Didn’t say it was ok, just that the umpires had been ignoring it all game
Missed most of last night’s action as I was watching the GP. Sounds like we will have the upper hand for the rest of the series should things continue in this way.
I reckon they’ll bring back Lee. Was just the type of performance he needed though.
Family First MP Dennis Hood wants to scrap compulsory voting
http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,25772711-2682,00.html
M. Johnson was woeful i wouldnt be surprised if we drop him for Lee.
What happened between SA and now?
Hear Hear Mr Hood
I love this bit…
That’s because OF compulsory voting! What an ignorant tool.
That’s because we force people to vote Bob1234…
Democracy is about choice…no body has the choice whether to vote or not…we are out of step with the rest of the world…
You use that argument only when it suits your agenda.
Everyone can choose not to vote if they so wish.
Really? I think they were playing Advance Oz Fair at the Olympics well before then.
Family First MP Dennis Hood wants to scrap compulsory voting
He probably wants to drop compulsory education too if he got his way. If he’s all for the ending of State paternalism then I trust he won’t mind ending tax exempt status for his churches too? Not to mention state funding of church schools.
bob1234 and Glen,
I’d like to know what “English-speaking” has got to do with it.
There are 32 countries in the world with compulsory voting. See:
http://www.aec.gov.au/pdf/voting/compulsory_voting.pdf
Most of the rest of the world is out of step with us. Just as we were first with the secret ballot and the rest of the world followed, we can hope that the rest of the world will follow with compulsory voting.
Democracy is more than choice. It is your duty as a citizen to vote.
No, we only force people to attend a polling booth and get their name crossed off the roll, once they get their ballot papers there is no compulsion to fill it in.
But then again if people want to waste their vote, then they hve NO right to complain about any Govt Desicion or to make representatrion to their local member.
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