Every Monday morning during my radio show on community radio 4ZzZ FM, I chat with Peter Black, a constitutional lawyer, follower of social and political issues and obsessive user of social media. I don’t normally put links to those chats on this blog, but given that our talk this morning was all about the federal election, I thought it was worth putting a link to it on this occasion.
You can have a listen to it by clicking on this link.
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Given I am now running as a Greens candidate, I suppose it is no surprise that I am indicating my agreement with a comment that Bob Brown made today. But I would also say that it isn’t any secret that I haven’t agreed with every public comment that Bob has made, and I would agree with the following comment about the schoolyard level nonsense regarding another possible leaders debate even if it had been made by Steve Fielding:
“What we’re seeing now between the two leaders is an absolute farce and people everywhere are rolling their eyes at Tony Abbott and Julia Gillard not having the maturity to get together to agree to the series of debates which would have enlightened the electorate,“
It is a joke and a sad reflection on the optic and image driven nature of political media coverage in Australia. A couple of weeks ago, there was a three way debate at the National Press Club on important ICT issues such as internet filtering, broadband and wider communications policy. More... ()
A couple of years ago I wrote a blog post about mountaintop mining in the USA. All mining has some impact, but the sheer destructiveness of this type of mining is astonishing – and that’s before you take into account the greenhouse impact of the coal.
This article in the New York Times details the potential impact of a similar project in West Virginia. The significance of this proposal is that there is the possibility it may be stopped, or seriously curtailed, by the Obama administration, which would be a signal of a positive shift on this issue.
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Following are links to a couple of recent radio interviews I’ve done, plus an online one
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As I noted in my previous post, this week’s Newspoll saw the Greens register 16% support – the highest that party has ever achieved, comparable to the Democrats best Newspoll result of 17% back in 1990. History suggests it is unlikely that this peak will be maintained right through to election day (or even the next Newspoll) but it is part of a continuing trend of solid Greens results. I’ve written a piece expanding on this, and how the party might approach the challenges ahead, at The Drum/Unleashed on the ABC’s site – which you can read by clicking on this link.
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Contention over Queensland’s Wild Rivers legislation has been bubbling along for quite a while now. Unfortunately, as with many issues which become polarised, each “side” is focused on defending their position, which has meant that some important underlying issues are not getting the attention they deserve.
I’ve just had a piece on this topic published at The Drum on the ABC’s website. It’s fairly long, so they published it in two parts – the first part is at this link and the second part is at this one. I should emphasise that the article reflects my personal views, and is not a formal view of the Greens, nor of ANTaR Queensland, who I am also involved with.
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Hip hop fans in Brisbane might be interested in tuning in to my radio show on 4ZZZ FM this Monday morning around 7:30am. I’ll be talking with the Gold Coast based duo Choose Mics, who are launching their debut full length album Beggars Can’t Be Choosers at the Step Inn in the Valley this coming Friday night as part of what will be a big night for fans of hip-hop/rap/urban sounds, with Brisbane’s The Optimen also launching their second album “The Out of Money Experience” as part of the same event.
Even though there is a steady stream of musical offerings in Brisbane, a double album launch of this magnitude doesn’t come along every day of the week, so I’ll dedicate a half hour or so to exploring not just the words and sounds of Choose Mics, but getting a broader overview from them of the hip hop related scenes locally and nationally.
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7 Comments, Comment or Ping
dodgyville
Hi Andrew, given that you visited the site recently, do you think you had any impact on whether dam was built or not?
Jul 5th, 2006
ken
Maybe very clever of the QLD govt – talk up the first site – close it down when the heat is on but the issue is on the table and legitimised – then go to the preferred site anyway.
Jul 5th, 2006
Andrew Bartlett
I don’t think I can claim any credit Dodgy (although if I was any good at being a politician I probably would). The community deserves all the credit for fighting very very hard and doing so in a non-partisan, non-party political way.
Apart from obviously attempting to make myself more informed, my visit was aimed mainly at encouraging and supporting the community to keep fighting and to talk with them about how I could best assist them.
Other than that, my visit was just one in a whole range of different activities and events that helped keep some focus and pressure on the issue – none of which would have had an impact without the efforts and sacrificies of the community in and around Rathdowney.
Jul 5th, 2006
Graham Bell
ABC Radio National’s “Australia Talks Back” yeaterday at 6:05pm was on the dams ((Damn, I missed it!)). There will be another chance to contribute this afternoon at 6:05pm AEST on their Week In Review. I think their call-in phone number is 1300 22 55 76 or email them through their website at http://www.abc.net.au and follow the links ((sorry, I will not be able to listen today)).
Jul 7th, 2006
Lyndie Easton
We’ll give you some credit Andrew. We felt that the fact that we were able to highlight wider support (especially on the website) was an important part of our fight. It was a team effort from those within the town and wider support.
For those with the attitude “they weren’t going to do it anyway” it’s not the message we were getting but we’ll never know for sure. Even if they never built it, once they start resuming, we lose our community anyway.
Some really key residents were at the dam wall. They would go first.
I tell you the view from the trenches is a whole lot different from looking in.
We really do appreciate all those that made it their issue too rather than looking the other way.
Cheers from Rathdowney.
Jul 7th, 2006
Graham Bell
Lyndie Easton:
Good on you. The resistance of your community to bullying will force the authorities to start working on a smarter way of solving THEIR water problem …. after all, it’s the “Smart State” you are living in, isn’t it?
Jul 7th, 2006
Pamela Prince
They are building dams on the wrong river system.
Queensland is not just the south east corner.
Too much land has been resumed by governments. Too much tax payer funded properties and businesses i.e. Telstra, have been sold by irresponsible governments, and your land could be next.
Jul 12th, 2006