Insiders today:
Milne from the Greens, insisting Ruddy Kev can wave a magic wand and save the nation and the world, totally ignoring the realities of real-politik and economics.
Field, the Independent, in total denial, and as politically canny as a Sunday school teacher.
These are the people who have the power to decide on legislation that will affect all our lives for years to come. We elected them. They put themselves up, and clearly stated their views, and won.
What have we done?
Is there a double-dissolution on our horizon, and how soon?
The Parties are wrecking our political freedom, making our desires irrelevant, yet these are the alternative?
What can we do

what can we do, Maximillion?

reform the Constitution to provide for a women's legislature to eliminate the quagmire of confusion over women's business and men's business which seems to incessantly outrage and amuse you.

Whistler, I've said all I intend to re' your obsession, and will no longer respond to it. If you post anything else, I'll treat you the same as any other poster, with as much respect as I can.
Any other, not obsession-related, thoughts on my questions or observations? Did you watch the show? It will be online if you're interested

You did ask for that Max with that opening post

Agronomist,
This person's answers the same regardless of the topic.I think Max has been incredibly controlled.

Max,
Refresh my aging memory which show?
Your observation are sort of right. We only knew of the the party views not the individual. Take my electorate (please..boom, boom):-)
The public voted for a Lib....but we didn't know of his Catholic "right to life-ism".

I'm not saying that he hasn't the right to his personal opinions bu he is supposed to represent the majority of the electorate which as it happens doesn't agree with him....But the majority of the electorate (by less than 200 votes) prefer the Liberals. The demographics show that the area has a disproportionate number of 68+. These are more interested in their maintaining their wealth and simply ignore the rest.

I strongly support a 3rd force in the senate to mitigate the extremes (un-voted for surprises...al la Howard's folly) from both sides but Field is not an independent (Fambly Ferst) and a single rep. He's simply a fool out of his medieval depth and force the same on us. (a good argument for the testing you raised before.)

The problem is not in having a few independents in office. The problem is having too few, in both houses.

The major parties have too many without the backbone to vote their electorate, their conscience, or even their own self-interest in the face of the parties that depend upon the patronage of sitting members for existence or relevance. In their desperation to *control* with no more consideration than you ascribe to independents, they refuse to let anybody else drive, ever, or even look at the map.

This lack of independence/independents results in logjams which none have the courage or humility to break. A few *more* independents could be grease to the process. How good is an idea if you *can't* convince a few indies? How good is a sytem that *can't* pass legislation without subjecting millions to the risible personal opinions of (say) Harradine?

In our system, I think democracy (of a crude sort) happens only at elections and Double Dissolution is just a way to have a little more.
Always painted as a disaster, it is an opportunity to legally chuck out a few dishonest, tired, lazy or otherwise undeserving whatevers a bit early, and boy don't they hate that...and all correct according to the constitution.

apologies to legitimate posters:

Whistler, if it has to be quick, your special interest group can probably have a toy parliament anytime, just like we had at school. Alternatively, given numbers, they could fight for representation on the only duly constituted one we have. This strategy has produced some success. Reconstituting the nation will take generations and your bland efforts steel me to resist the likely bland and ineffectual outcome.

Rustopher.

Maximillion, you and others deign to have open discussion about the machinations of the Parliament of Australia and pour unmitigated scorn on the provision of a women's legislature.
what is your problem?
misogyny perhaps.

Oh Ruralisticalisticisticalist, yes I did ask for responses, but the windy one is obsessive, one rant no matter whether it’s road-kill or painted toe-nails, bananas to the price of fish in Peru, it gets boring.
Testy One, the show was “Insiders”, Sun’ morn with Barry Cassidy, a jolly rollicking forum-style commentary, and well worth a watch.
As for your Lib blimp, much as I dislike the parties, if you had gone to him and asked, he would probably have told you the truth on that subject, and I’d be willing to bet it’s there in the electoral paper-work somewhere, buried of course, they’ve been at this for a while now, lol.
Oh Corroded Pain-pipe, by and large, I agree with all you posted, despite the confusions it might cause, and costs, more Independents = less Party power= better democracy’
Off-hand, as little as I understand the world, I reckon Oz must be one of the few places on the planet where we could actually vote out the entire existing power-structure, and make it stick!
In theory anyway, I think you’d need to kill television to actually make it happen, but the possibility is there, dormant, waiting, potent,… drool! &-)

Maximillion, i'll take that as affirmative,
so begins the healing.

Maximillion you should ignore whistler, I too fall for such posters but it is unwise.
If those who support that idea held a national meeting it could take place in a phone box.
With a nine piece band included.
The foolish fielding, well look and see how he first won his senate place.
We gave him our preferences, sooner he is gone the better, more independants? no way more trouble.

Goodness me some of you are being hard on Senator Fielding.
He at least is doing the job he is being paid for and not just
following the party line, under threat of deselection.

His question is fair and reasonable;
"Is it true the emperor has no clothes ?"

Anyone who thinks we should should just charge in on something as
important as this and not ask questions shouldn't be in parliament.

Bazz, while I agree in principle, to me it seems he’s making a dog’s breakfast of doing his job, it’s a question of ability.
While his question might seem reasonable, in this instance it’s being asked while the emperor’s in the shower, if you get my drift. I’m all for he and others asking questions, but it might prove more useful if he asked the right ones, of the right people.
Ruddy Kev might be a squirmy little bureaucratic weasel, but at least he’s “getting with the program”, however ineffectually. We as a nation are hardly “charging into “ anything, lol, and his plans won’t advance us too far either. I see little point asking him to explain the facts of the matter, “facts” is far too flexible a word for politicians.
Fields would do far better if he started focusing his political edge on achieving things for his electorate, and the nation, THAT is what he’s being paid for too.
In his shoes, I would’ve immediately reviewed the most successful Independents careers and tactics, just as a guide, he obviously didn’t. He may represent a “Party”, but he’s effectively an Indy, and should play the game accordingly.
JMHO

To make out Senator Fielding is in denial without any true science is hypocrisy. Fielding like millions of other fair minded Aussies have woken up to the false doctrine of man made climate change tightly adhered to by the Greens, Ms Wong and Peter Garrett. Even Mr Rudd now knows deep down that his electioneering was based upon crawling to the UN and 'popular' opinion. Man made climate change has millions of skeptics because it has been proven a fallacy. Why something so false needs to be proven shows the power of the left media. You would think with so many failed prophecies the likes of Mr Flannery and Mr Gore would hide their heads. No along comes the next lot of doom and gloom lies. THank God we have men like Senator Barnaby and Fielding who are willing to exercise their brain rather than rhetoric.

Just to prove I am not a one issue bod, I think its time to share some thoughts on green. Green like in the grass comes about when a plant gets a balanced diet. If a plant is starved of an essential element like Carbon Dioxide, it will not grow at all, so we don’t have to worry about that right now. The general consensus is we have plenty. However there are about thirty other minerals and elements essential to healthy plants and animals, and they all come out of the soil in various proportions to their presence there.

It is a fact of life that when a plant is denied a basic food, it starves. The Australian Gum Tree, a eucalypt, growing on an old and leached continent, where rains have washed the elements out into the sea over millennia, never lets a leaf drop naturally, with any minerals still in it. It take a great big bushfire before the minerals in gum leaves, can be recycled into the grass, for the kangaroos to eat. They have to be burned off, in a bushfire before the grass below can become nutritious. Without enough nitrogen, phosphate, potassium, sodium, iron, zinc , copper or boron a plant will go yellow and jaundiced looking. Without enough calcium it will simply not grow.

The thing is that food from starving plants, will not grow healthy humans. Children deprived of basic food elements in their first three years of life, will never develop their potential intellect. The UK, as cold and fertile islands, with a balanced food supply, produced a world conquering Empire. English cattle do not thrive on an unbalanced diet. Indian cattle, adapted to India, which like Australia is old and leached, were adapted to northern Australia.

Lets get back to Fielding. He is an engineer and an MBA. Despite his fifteen siblings, he got a balanced diet, and developed his intellect, enough to want to put a balanced view on climate change. Give him his due, he is doing his due diligence. Maybe he is an essential element in good government.

Runner, P’ the B’, and others…
I just don’t get it, with all the gross geological evidence staring you in the face, the shrinking poles, the retreating snowlines, coral bleaching, the disappearing glaciers, the wilder and more frequent “weather events”, you still think global warming is a MYTH?
What will it take to convince you?
Feilding is NOT “doing due diligence”, he’s shutting his eyes and mind, sticking his head in the sand, but the reality won’t go away. Man-made or otherwise, it’s happening NOW, and we’ll pay the price for his recalcitrance.
Mal’ T rather gave himself away today too, he claimed Ruddy Kev was doing it different than America, and then telling proclaimed..”Rudd isn’t keeping up with the rest of the world”. Given the yanks appalling record and corrupted system, it’s interesting that Turnbull ignores everything else on the planet, and wants us to go down their road! As usual.
The one consistency among the scientists now would appear to be them all saying it’s going far faster than any predictions, and accelerating, so we’ll all be in the muck sooner than you think, how clever are Fielding, Turnbull et. al. if we’re not prepared for it?
Far better we prepare for a disaster, whatever the severity, than we demand proof and do nothing, and pay the resulting price!

Max and others
I couldn't agree more. This has been my mantra for years.
Fielding is playing to 'his (ownership implied) believed' constituency i.e. Family First supporters. The nuance of our electoral system that he's a way down choice has missed his reasoning.
IMHO It is this way down choice that should signal to him that he is there by default and as such has a higher responsibility to remember the wishes for the "elected" policy (not necessarily the party his or in point of case Labor).In short the vote clearly indicated a responsibility to "keep the B*stards honest" as is the principle with all 3rd force candidates.

This also reflects the problem with the 'First past the post, or 'we won mentality' = an absolute mandate. Logically 55% isn't an absolute more a qualified 'you're marginally better that the other lot'.
The tragedy is egos being what they are logic and common sense doesn't transport well (car/ plane sick?)

How else does one explain how ordinary people are suddenly imbued with absolutism that ignores such a large portion of the populace?

Therefore how else does one explain 30 yrs of Dems? Fielding is simply looking for a justification for his antediluvian attitudes by doing the US skeptic thing. to confirm this one could look closer at his party's policies, his and their origins.

What gets up my nose is the abuse and accusations of stupidity and
even accusations of corruption that are heaped upon anyone who
questions the co2 theory.

I am sure that all the symptoms that Maxmillion & other quote have
happened at various times in the past. But that is not the point.
The real question is not whether the world is heating up but whether
it is caused by CO2.

What I have never seen is a convincing argument about the
logarithmic impact of CO2 on the greenhouse effect.
If the amount of CO2 was doubled there would only be a tiny effect on
the greenhouse effect.
That is because the curve has already rolled over a long way.
The effect has saturated.

I don't pretend to be a climate expert but when climate experts
disagree then where do you go.

I do know that I am very suspicious of long term computer climate
models. They seem like a modern day alchemist's lab.

It is a reasonable proposal to play it safe and go ahead as though all
questions on CO2 are agreed, but perhaps it might be cheaper to spend
the money on mitigation of the effects of global warming.
Then we would not have spent a lot of money on CO2 reduction if it
was not the cause anyway.

Especially as it seems very likely we cannot do anything to stop it anyway.

Bazz, you seem to be coming around to my point of view.
I agree, we can’t know for sure about Co2, yet it seems likely to me.
Add to that the still climbing effects of CFC’s and all the other nasties we scatter through the environment, we really are asking for it.
For instance, quite apart from the Co2, no-one really knows what the climatic effects are of the masses of particulate matter we now have floating around, from diesels and jets, power stations etc, mega-millions of tons of it, and more every single minute. As it settles it’s clogging our lungs and killing the oceans, god only knows what it does as part of the weather systems, but I can’t see it having NO effect.
Whatever you think of the causes, it really is happening, and we should be preparing for worse to follow, because the one question no-one can answer is, how bad is it going to get?
If it swings back and isn’t to extreme in the end, we can all laugh then, but I’d rather be ready than rooted, any day

I recently read a book called Deception Point. I think the whole Climate Change debate is deception to a point where it is no longer funny. It is part of the great and world wide attack on belief in Almighty God. Its not about climate change, it is about manipulating populations, so they serve big business, and disempowering the individual.

Maximilion asked what it would take to convince me. It would take an enormous amount of irrefutable evidence, that we as virtual fleas on a world dog, on a very small in the scheme of things island, with a very small population can make one iota of difference to the world result. I personally don’t think we can make one jot of difference. Either individually or collectively, we are a single flea on a dog dominated by a huge Chinese and Indian population, all consuming, all manufacturing, all burning fossil fuel, and all hoping to have the standard of living that we enjoy.

I have seen evidence in the form of maps that Antarctica was once ice free. I have read evidence of tree stumps from a vast forest there. The maps have been verified by electronic testing as accurate. We know there was an ice age. One bloke is convinced we face a methane disaster, and writes on OLO. I happen to believe Newton’s first law, that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. As CO2 increases plants will grow better, and absorb more. As population increases, so too will the food needed, absorbing more carbon.

It is easier to be a Christian, and trust in Almighty God. The belief that man can really make a difference, is an attack on belief. It is justification for displacing God, with science, and science has got it very wrong many times in my lifetime.

Give Senator Fielding his due. Give Miranda Devine her due as a journalist with the SMH. She has reported Steve’s efforts to inform himself, in a good article this week. I don’t really like to think God has abandoned us. Things will be okay

My concern is as I described more than Fielding's search for facts about CO2 albeit somewhat misguidedly.

Contrary to the view that (my) objection to him is solely because of his naive attempt to understand what he is clearly not competent to super guess. I would suggest his flaws as a legislator are deeper namely that of his party and his being out of his depth.

As a senator his job is to scrutinize and improve(ensure benefit for Aust and his state.)legislation not play GOD second guessing decisions clearly already made by the public. Conversely had the voted policy been (same ol same ol) reversed he would be IMHO there to scrutinize etc but pass the voted for policy.
All this "Is AGW real or phoney?" is irrelevant given the majority rules under democracy. This is a democracy not an oligarchy either way Fielding loses he's not that smart. I am not given to comments of fitness on political grounds in conversations like this. The decision of the people must be honoured if we are to avoid single person government that ISN'T democracy.

Fields of green is a good topic, because such fields in a natural setting would attract at least one bull. A bull in nature has two horns on his head, one left and one right. Nature is a lot like politics. There are in reality two major political parties, one is the left horn and one is the right. The English have a unicorn on their Coat of Arms, and a lion, and the unicorn, has only one horn, right in the middle.

Examinator says democracy is majority rule. He is wrong. Majority rule is tribalism. Majority rule is the absolute opposite of Christianity, which is why Steve is doing such a good job. He is one of those. Each and every individual under Christianity is valued. Men and women are equally valued, and none are expected to subsume their individuality to the rule of the mob. Apart from a very special relationship with Almighty God, no one man or woman is superior to another in God’s eyes.

The Unicorn in British Law, was in a position to skewer any unjust law, and the Lion, was there to protect the population from predators. Sitting on the top was a little lion with a Crown on his head. That was the Lion of Judah, that the British believed gave their Sovereign, divine power.

What power a Senator has. He can if he sees a contempt of Parliament stop the Senate absolutely while it debates the alleged contempt. He can be a Horatio and stand at the bridge. Parliament has been hijacked by the bulls. Sometimes the left and right horn combine, and that is a very dangerous animal indeed. The Unicorn was supposed to be the natural enemy of the Bull, stronger, faster, and with one well directed horn, capable of skewering a bull anytime.

It was not by chance, that the Royal Seal, was held higher than Parliament. In New South Wales the two horns of the bull, the bull**it artists, combined and when the Liberals abolished the Supreme Court, in 1970, Labor stood idly by

When a Left Horned Bull went rampaging through Australian society in 1972, there was no one to call him to account, because the Right Horned Bull, the Liberal Party, had abolished the Supreme Court two years earlier. Most people for the last forty years have not understood the value of true democracy. The only true democracy in the world today is the United States. Australia is pretending to be one, but we are taken hostage by a two horned bull. We are a house divided between left and right, Green and Conservatives, Labor and Liberal.

In a true democracy no individual was required to be the servant of another. All men were free. I nearly said all men and women were free, but that is only a very recent development. Women once had the free right to choose a man, but once chosen, she was stuck with him. Those days have gone along with the idea that education was wasted on women. Not before time.

In 1976, the Liberals created the Federal Court. It is not a Christian court. It is a pagan temple. It has not done the job of a Unicorn, and skewered the unjust laws of the bulls. It either blindly follows Statute Law or blithely ignores it, but it is not a court of justice. It is there to serve not the public, but the legal profession. It legislates its own laws, without reference to the Statutes of the Parliament, and in that it follows the lead of the High Court since 1953. Democracy bah humbug.

The US has constitutionally guaranteed jury trial, in all matters, but even there the Bulls, like Bush and Cheney, have got around that Constitutional guarantee, because there is a flaw in the United States Constitution. Their Supreme Court does not have original jurisdiction. Ours was given that power. The combined horns of politics, have felt compelled to emasculate that powerful force. By paying Judges, to preside in Courts a bribe, ( $6000-7000 a week) they have bought a licence to do whatever they like. A Court is not a court

The Framers of Australia’s Constitution, rejected an Aristocracy, and a House of Lords in Australia. This has been reversed without a referendum, and about one thousand Lords and Masters, have been created so that the green fields of freedom, can be made the pastures in which the bulls can graze.

We called the Police the Bulls. We also called them Wallopers, and one wag even painted out the Po on a Police sign outside a Station. The sergeant was not amused. They were generally totally respected in their communities, because they did not exercise absolute power, and were not originally absolutely corrupted. They were not corrupted because in every case, they had to take an accused before a court. That court was either two Justices of the Peace, sitting together, or a court with a Justice and a jury. No ifs, no buts, either or, and if property was involved, a Justice and a jury was the only court available. This was true democracy. We got it in 1900, but it is gone in 2009.

We have a media that goes on mad pogroms, against individuals who do not conform. We have absolute power vested in magistrates, single individuals, who exercise most power in the community, and almost universally back the bulls. The Parliament of the Commonwealth has legislated to make these individuals accountable. The Parliament of the Commonwealth, in 1995 made it a 25 years imprisonment offence, to exercise the power of a State over an individual. Every Judge and Magistrate in Australia is an offender. S 268:10 Criminal Code Act 1995 ( Cth).

What we really need is a Senator, prepared to stop the Parliament, until the laws they make in it, are respected. We need a Fielding or a Xenophon, who will sit on his dig, and say STOP. Do not proceed further, until you demonstrate that you are prepared to have the laws you have made, carried out. This is not something a member of either major party or the Greens, will do. The Covenant was enacted in 1986. We should us it or lose it

“Examinator says democracy is majority rule. He is wrong. Majority rule is tribalism.”
Now that’s a weird statement! I was under the impression that tribes were ruled by the “Big Man” system, hereditary or elected, and a system such as we have was called democracy, as a lot of nations now are. More or less anyway. Peter, you were doing fine, but have slipped back to grinding the same old axe, can’t be much of it left now?
As for Antarctica, you seem to have missed a couple of details, such as continental drift, and the shifting axis of the planet, not to mention the odd ice-age or three.
I agree Australia can’t make a huge difference, and given the fact that the super-nations and emerging economies won’t stop polluting, there’s little point in gutting ourselves.
We’d do better to start “storm-proofing” our essential services, supplies, and population centres, it’s going to be a big ‘un!
Your stance on God and your Christianity is all well and good, but it won’t feed us or save us.
“God helps those who help themselves” would seem to apply here, and your God has a nasty habit of bringing down “fire and brimstone”, so to speak, on sinners and saints alike, so I'll be damned if I’m going to rely on his moods!

Examinator;
You seem to be requiring Senator Fielding adopt the
labour party policy of if the party says jump you reply how high or
else you lose your nomination at the next election.

He said is aware of the risk that he could lose votes but he felt that
ha had to have more information before he votes.
A pity we don't have more like him.

He had a meeting with Senator Wong only to find that the government
has moved the goal posts.
They have changed the temperature measurements from global temperatures to ocean temperatures.
Has the IPCC made the same change and if so why ?

No wonder people like me can't get a handle on the subject.

It appears that the meeting with Senator Wong was anything but
enlightening.
It would seem that the Senator or her advisers were not really able to answer the questions.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,,25656849-17803,00.html

It seems that in these circumstances the whole ETS project should be
put on hold until they can get it sorted in their own mind at least.

It is one hell of a lot of money to spend on a "err well you see hmm

I have just come across an item about the IPCC projections.
From the item it appears that the IPCC computer model projections
are based on a business as usual, ie increasing fossil fuel use based
on growth projections of the past.

The writer suggests that if the real world estimations of coal oil and
gas are taken into account then if we do nothing at all about CO2
the increase in temperature will be less than the 2deg C that
everyone is worrying about.

Anyway here is the link so go and read it for yourself.

http://www.cambridgenetwork.co.uk/news/article/default.aspx?objid=60534
Whoops here is a tiny link,

http://tinyurl.com/nl4xrf