What a laugh! Warmist "model" links drought in Australia with rising human emissions

In that case emissions must be falling because there has been an upsurge in rain in the Northern half of Australia in the last 2 years. Most dams in Queensland have been overflowing lately. It is true that S.E. Australia has not fared well but if emissions were the culprit, the rest of Australia would be affected too. Or have we given up on "global" warming and are now concentrating on local climate changes only? Otherwise a model that explains only one corner of Australia is not much of a model. Gaseous diffusion is strong and rapid so whatever CO2 is emitted should spread widely throughout the world and not stay stuck just in S.E. Australia!

DROUGHT experts have for the first time proven a link between rising levels of greenhouse gases and a decline in rainfall. A three-year collaboration between the Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO has confirmed that the drought is not just a natural dry stretch but a shift related to climate change.

Scientists working on the $7 million South Eastern Australian Climate Initiative said the rain had dropped away because the subtropical ridge - a band of high pressure systems that sits over the country's south - had strengthened over the past 13 years. Last year, using sophisticated computer climate models in the United States, the scientists ran simulations with only the ''natural'' influences on temperature, such as differing levels of solar activity. The model results showed no intensification of the subtropical ridge and no decline in rainfall. But when human influences on the atmosphere were added to the simulations - such as greenhouse gases, aerosols and ozone depletion - the models mimicked what has been observed in south-east Australia: strengthening high pressure systems and the significant loss of rain.

''It's reasonable to say that a lot of the current drought of the last 12 to 13 years is due to ongoing global warming,'' said the bureau's Bertrand Timbal. ''In the minds of a lot of people the rainfall we had in the 1950s, '60s and '70s was a benchmark. A lot of our [water and agriculture] planning was done during that time. But we are just not going to have that sort of good rain again as long as the system is warming up.''

Dr Timbal said that 80 per cent of the rain loss in south-east Australia could be attributed to the intensification of the subtropical ridge. The research program covers the Murray-Darling Basin, including parts of NSW, all of Victoria and parts of South Australia.

Monash University’s Neville Nicholls, a lead author on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change who has also published work on the subtropical ridge, said he believed the research program’s results were right. "We did think that the loss of rain was simply due to the [rain-bearing] storms shifting south, off the continent," Professor Nicholls said. "Now we know the reason they have slipped south is that the subtropical ridge has become more intense. It is getting bigger and stronger and that is pushing the rain storms further south." [Sorry, friend. The rain has actually moved NORTH. Don't you know anything?]

The scientific results have implications for many State Government water programs and drought funding, some of which factor in climate change and some of which do not. Projections for the water coming to Melbourne in the north-south pipe, for instance, are based on the assumption that Victoria will return to rainfall levels of last century.

The Victorian Farmers Federation new president, Andrew Broad, said he would not speculate about whether there was a connection between drought and climate change. "I have a healthy scepticism for scientists," he said. "But I will say that the doomsday people in climate change are robbing people of hope at a time when that’s all they’ve got left." Melbourne’s dams get roughly a third less water than they did before the drought began in October 1996.

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Negligent doctors and public hospital kill young mother

After all the publicity about swine flu, you would think that the doctors would take that possibility seriously from the outset. If the hospital had given her Tamiflu and admitted her for observation she would almost certainly be alive today. Instead they sent her home with just a household headache medication

A previously healthy 34-year-old mother-of-two who died from swine flu last week was seen by four separate doctors over four days before she was finally admitted to hospital. Her family say her deteriorating health – including difficulty walking – was mostly ignored as she was repeatedly sent home when seeking help for her illness.

Sheridan Wilson died in Brisbane's Prince Charles Hospital on Thursday. She had presented herself at Townsville Hospital's emergency department a week earlier, saying she was in extreme discomfort from flu-like symptoms. Doctors told Mrs Wilson to go home, take some Panadol and get some sleep, her family said. She had no underlying health conditions and was not immediately tested for swine flu. Nor was she given any of the anti-viral drug Tamiflu.

Mrs Wilson's distraught family yesterday pleaded with Queensland Health to stop treating potential swine flu victims like "lumps of meat" and start taking the pandemic seriously. They want Tamiflu offered to everyone with flu symptoms and not just those deemed by the department as being in the "at-risk" group which includes pregnant women, the elderly, the obese, indigenous people and those with other health problems.

Mrs Wilson's mother-in-law Marilyn broke down in tears yesterday as she told The Sunday Mail that Sheridan followed Queensland Health's official advice on swine flu to the letter. She first went to her GP, then later when symptoms worsened, went to the emergency room at Townsville Hospital. She was later transported to Brisbane, where she died. "Sheridan did everything right," Marilyn Wilson said. "She went to a GP first, who sent her home with hardly a second thought.

"Then I took her to the emergency department who put her on a drip for dehydration for two hours before sending her home and telling her to take some Panadol. "She was getting worse so she went to a GP the next morning (Friday), and then another GP on Saturday morning who told her 'wait a few hours and if it gets worse go to the hospital'." After seeing three GPs and a doctor at the hospital's emergency department, Mrs Wilson was finally admitted to Townsville Hospital's ICU last Saturday.

"Sheridan put her life in these people's hands and all the GPs did was take her money and kick her out," she said. "Our family will never be the same again."

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‘Progressive’ patriotism is a big ask

Australians should all rejoice that the Left isn’t interested in patriotism, writes Jeremy Sammut

By all accounts, the message of Tim Soutphommasane’s forthcoming book (Seizing the Sauce Bottle, ‘Australian Literary Review’, 5 August 2009) is commendably clear. The book lays out the reasons why so-called ‘progressives’ should take patriotism seriously, as a political concept at least.

It is surprising that anyone with an interest in politics needs to be convinced about the importance of patriotism, given that the nation (as in the national welfare or national good) lies at the centre of our political democracy. Because appeals to patriotic sentiment can unite otherwise diverse individuals into cohesive constituencies, patriotism remains one of the more vibrant colours in the political spectrum.

The problem is that much of what Soutphommasane says about the Left needing to reclaim patriotism for itself has been said before. Miriam Dixson’s 1999 book, The Imaginary Australian, also told the Left that if its political projects were to win mainstream support the core culture of the nation and ‘ordinary Australians’ genuine pride in and commitment to the nation’s traditions must be respected.

Here lies the rub. The more interesting question is why the Left is ideologically deaf to Dixson and now Soutphommasane’s message? This is a question only culture warriors can answer.

The short version is that the political project of the modern-day progressives is radically regenerative. The Left’s go isn’t patriotism – it’s the scorched-earth politics of moral embarrassment.

So irredeemable is the nation’s history, so the progressive’s political narrative goes, that the past must be junked entirely and the nation’s future reconstructed in the politically-correct image of the Left. This is the reason why comrades across a spectrum of disciplines have spent the last forty years telling their fellow Australians how racist, sexist, and unjust their country is.

Yet despite the attempt to deconstruct the nation’s history, Australia’s national traditions are one of few areas where the ‘long march of the Left’ through our cultural institutions has not succeeded. Anzac Day has re-emerged as our quasi national day, and our national heroes stubbornly remain (as John Hirst has put it) a cricketer, a bushranger, and a horse. [Don Bradman, Ned Kelly and Phar Lap]

The point is that those who call for the Left to annex patriotism to promote their ‘positive cultural vision’ are making a category error. Most of the Left would hear this as a call to continue to try to hollow out the nation’s traditions of their traditional meanings.

Thankfully, the Left is unlikely to want to have a bar of patriotism. Those who say it should aren’t seizing the sauce bottle - they're barking up the wrong tree.

The above is a press release from the Centre for Independent Studies, dated August 14th. Enquiries to cis@cis.org.au. Snail mail: PO Box 92, St Leonards, NSW, Australia 1590. Telephone ph: +61 2 9438 4377 or fax: +61 2 9439 7310





Barmaid's skimpy clothing erects dubious police interest

"Skimpy" barmaids are something of a tradition in Western Australia



A 29-year-old skimpy barmaid who is accused of showing too much flesh believes police could be doing "more important things out there" than catching underdressed skimpy barmaids. Megan Brooks appeared in Fremantle Magistrates Court today to face a charge of being immodestly dressed on licensed premises at the Market City Tavern in Canning Vale in November last year, but today, the magistrate gave a strong indication that the case could be dropped.

Her lawyer Terry Dobson said he could not ascertain what the criminal conduct was, and needed more information on the statement of facts before Ms Brooks' next court appearance. The court was told that the accused was wearing black lace French knickers with a buttock exposed, but Mr Dobson wanted to know which buttock was exposed as well as the extent of the exposure. It was also stated that Ms Brooks' nipples were erect, although Mr Dobson questioned whether that too was criminal conduct.

The court was told by the magistrate that as it stood there was no charge against the woman. The matter was adjourned until September 11.

Outside court Mr Dobson said he would fight to have the charges discontinued, whilst Ms Brooks said she was just doing her job. "We informed the court that once we got further and better particulars we intended seeking a discontinuance," he said. "The reason being is our position would be that this is not in the public interest. Even if Ms Brooks has dressed in a manner they described, in 2009, we would say that just isn't immodestly dressing.

"I'd have to think that having two police officers sitting in a tavern checking out my client seems to be a complete waste of police resources. "I would have thought that they could be in some of the entertainment precincts, (such as) Northbridge and Fremantle - they'd be doing a far better job."

Mr Dobson said the charges claimed Ms Brooks had acted in a way that contravened a particular section of the Liquor Licensing Act by dressing immodestly, "and given that she is a skimpy barmaid, I'd say straight away the alarm bells were going off". "Our instructions were that she wasn't immodestly dressed anyway and she wasn't even engaging in any conduct that would have or should have attracted the attention of the police," he said. "There seems to be no reason why Ms Brooks should have been charged."

Ms Brooks said she was "just shocked and disappointed" that it got to this stage. "I just felt like I was doing my job and I don't think that I was immodestly dressed," she said, adding she had a body suit on and had her nipples covered at the time.

At the time of the incident, Ms Brooks said she went up to the officer and asked if he wanted a drink, and "he flashed his badge and said 'no'" before asking to speak to her elsewhere. Ms Brooks - who also worked as a beauty therapist - was still working in the barmaid industry. "There's more important things out there (for police) than sort of sneaking around undercover hoping to catch skimpy barmaids wearing not very much clothing," she said.

Mr Dobson said a discontinuance of the case would serve everyone's best interests and save the police time and energy from having to prepare a brief. "The courts have got far better things to deal with than things like this." he added. The penalty for the charge was "significant" the defence lawyer said, but he maintained Ms Brooks was behaving entirely properly.

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