A prophet with honour (at last) as government throws money at Murray

Congratulations to Tim Flannery, 2007 Australian of the Year . He is a most deserving recipient of the honour. The National Australia Day Council website says: "Tim helps us understand the predicament we face, carefully laying out the science and showing us the likely effects of human-induced climate change. But he also offers us hope of a solution to stop and ultimately reverse this trend." I've not always agreed with everything he's said but usually find his arguments (including that in support of nuclear power as a means of countering global warming) cogent. I particularly admire his ability to convey his ideas lucidly both orally and in prose.

Tonight on The 7.30 Report he spoke which characteristic eloquence:

KERRY O'BRIEN: Tim Flannery, a former governor general once said he saw his job as holding up a mirror and reflecting the nation to itself. I wonder what you see in that mirror?

TIM FLANNERY, AUSTRALIAN OF THE YEAR: I suppose what I see in that mirror is a people who are coming to terms with the land that supports them and really defines them, who don't yet understand it particularly well and understand its sensitivities, and therefore are sort of like squatters. We're squatting on the country rather than being true ones who have a long term future here through a careful caring for our land.

KERRY O�BRIEN: If we've been slow learners in that, it would be in part at least, wouldn't it, because of the kind of iconic images that we've drawn for ourselves as being hardy pioneers of the land, and the land and our development of the land, working of the land, has been so much a part of the ethos.

TIM FLANNERY: That's right, and that grand illusion, if you want, came from a particular history where our ancestors came from an overcrowded and impoverished Europe into this, what seemed to be an open continent, that seemed so easy to exploit. You could put the sheep on the land, you didn't even need to knock down the trees and all of a sudden you were a wealthy landowner. And that pioneer phase is due to a naivete both on the part of the land about us and us about the land and what it can actually contain. It was as if we ate through the wealth of the continent in just a few decades rather than carefully shepherded it. And those images and icons made it harder to realise the reality of the situation for us and I think it's only now, as people look at the country with new eyes and see that it is limited, that we need to take care of it and that it will define our future, that we're starting to see a new reality.

KERRY O�BRIEN: You wrote an Australia Day article, as it happens, five years ago in which you talked about how Australians tend to define themselves culturally as opposed to how they should define themselves; can you remember your argument?

TIM FLANNERY: Yeah, I can, I remember thinking about it, why we imagine that meat pies and football and Holden cars are important when the true underpinnings, the one thing that we all share as Australians, is this land. It's what gives us our water and our food and our shelter and defines us as a nation. Why isn't that the basis of our common sentiment about what it means to be an Australian? The rest of it seems to me to be sort of randomly chosen bits of icons that we just happen to like.

If you'd like to read more of his work, I'd recommend The Weather Makers: The history and Future Impact of Climate Change (ISBN 1 920885 84 5), Country (ISBN 1 92088 544 7) or his shorter 2003 Quarterly Essay Beautiful Lies: Population and Environment in Australia (ISBN 1 86395 339 6).

Last year he also featured in a TV Documentary Two Men and a Tinnie about a trip down the Darling and Murray Rivers in a tinnie ( a small aluminium boat powered by an outboard motor normally used on sheltered waters such as rivers) . He drew attention to the environmental degradation of the system.

This brings me to today's other big environmental story, where the Prime Minister has pledged $10bn to solve the water crisis. Mr Howard will be using the big stick he'd promised a few months ago not to use to take away powers from the states. Admittedly the states haven't exercised their powers as effectively as they might have, but I'm not convinced that having Canberra dealing single-handed with the Murray-Darling basin problems is wise, despite Mr Rudd's support for a bi-partisan approach, which presumably includes support for taking away state powers.

The Murray-Darling basin covers a significant area of four states where there are a variety of activities competing for water. South Australia, especially Adelaide, depends on the system for its water. But how, if the PM and Mr Rudd's wishes are implemented in their most extreme form, will the voices of urban householders and small horticulturalists and viticulturalists be heard over those of the large agribusinesses upstream and the carpetbaggers everywhere who'll come flocking to see how much can make for themselves while professing to support "market forces"?

Tonight, also on the 7.30 Report Malcolm Turnbull, the newly appointed Minister for Environment and Water Resources, outlined some of his opinions, rather more circumspectly I thought than his party colleague (and PM's good friend)Senator Bill Heffernan on ABC Radio's PM.

Not surprisingly the state premiers aren't over enthusiastic about the proposal even though, according to the ABC,environmental groups and farmers are broadly supportive of it.

As with so many broad brush proposals the devil is in the detail, which we've yet to see.

ABC board member appears as commentator on ABC program

I'm surprised that yesterday's appearance on ABC RN's Breakfast program by Janet Albrechtsen (spelt "Albrechtson" on the program website) hasn't attracted more comment, given that Ms A is an ABC board member.

The program website describes her as "Columnist for The Australian Newspaper, Janet Albrechtson" (sic), but does not mention her ABC directorship. This raises several questions, including whether she was paid, what if any policies the ABC board has in place about its members appearing on the Corporation's programs (especially opinion ones) and why Ms A's board membership was not disclosed. Perhaps there's a job or two here for the ABC's new Director of Editorial Policies.

OARM (On a related matter) I think it's misleading to describe the Breakfast segment on which Ms A appeared as "Brekkie blog-spot". Many of the contributors, including her and Julian Burnside, who featured there today are not what I consider to be bloggers , as they do not maintain their own blogs. They do have platforms for their opinions Ms Albrechtsen has(apart from her seat on the ABC board) a column in The Australian was drawn, while Julian Burnside has a website which reflects many of his diverse range of interests.

Ascending Mt Lofty

Yesterday, when the temperature reached 18 or so, was too cool and wet to walk but today, which was sunny with only light winds and a 24 degree max on the plains, was much more suitable for my first ascent of Mt Lofty this year.

Having previously posted about the floods of November 2005in the area, I was keen to see if there had been anything like another 1-in-200 year "event", as the authorities had deemed the 2005 surge.

There hadn't. I may have been a day too late but there was little evidence of First Creek having been in spate, and none of any damage to the homes on Waterfall Gully Road (though I noticed that several of them are on the market) or in Cleland Conservation Park itself.

My ascent was a little slower than usual, as I hadn't done it for a couple of months and was not as fit as I'd imagined wished I was , as I needed to take several mini- and micro-breaks en route. I should be able to do Waterfall Gully - Mt Lofty in about an hour: 63 minutes today told me that I need to do some work on my fitness. Getting older is not sufficient excuse.

Kennett adds another Liberal voice in support of bringing Hicks back

The Age reports that former Victorian Premier Jeff Kennett has added his voice to those calling for a swift resolution to the David Hicks affair. The print edition also claims that Senator Marise Payne (Liberal NSW) has also reiterated her concerns about delays in bringing the case before a court.

Another story posted at smh.com.au suggests that there may be some flaws in the case against Hicks, as two of the US embassies he was alleged to have staked out were apparently abandoned at the time he was supposed to have done the staking )or staking out).

Australian political knights: a disappearing species

The funeral of Sir James Killen, a former Liberal defence minister, has produced several reminders, notably Gough Whitlam's eulogy, of a less adversial political world. Perhaps the occasion produced a softening of old antagonisms, but from the extract I saw on the TV news, Whitlam's tribute looked and sounded genuine enough. Perhaps time does heal all wounds at least for some people.

The records of the occasion include some good photos and video footage, especially a black and white photo by David Sproule on p3 of The Weekend Australian which unfortunately I can't find online. It's similar to one by Paul Harris published in The Age accompanying a piece by David Marr which, while characteristically acerbic for the most part, also acknowledges that the age of the Australian political knights is coming to an end.

BTW the Sproule photo reminds me of the famous David Moore one of a group of migrants arriving in Australia in the 1960s.

AFTERTHOUGHT later on Sunday: for another, less deferential, assessment of Sir James, see this letter from Tuesday's Australian . I shall add VB (vacuous blowhard) to my acronym list.

Black hole or vital tool? More on Guantanamo, Hicks etc

The question comes from a recent BBC report. A partial answer has been provided by today's report from a delegation of British goverment MPs

MPs who have visited Guantanamo Bay have called on Britain and the international community to do more to help the US close the camp.Seven Foreign Affairs Committee members visited the detention centre for "enemy combatants" in Cuba in September. In a report they were critical of the conditions there, but said many inmates posed a threat and the world needed to find a "longer term solution". Opposition MPs and human rights groups called the report "disappointing".

The chairman of the committee, Mike Gapes, told BBC News: "The problem is if you closed it straight away what do you do with the people that are there? Some of them no doubt could be released - sent back to their country of origin and be of no threat to anyone. But there are people there that are dangerous people...The international community as a whole needs to look at finding a longer-term solution."

The MPs spent only one day at the camp and had no direct access to detainees. Their report says food was plentiful, medical care good and the facilities broadly comparable with a British maximum security prison.But they said the camp did not meet UK guidelines for recreation and education facilities nor for access to the media, lawyers and the outside world.One area apparently was closed for repair after detainees had been found dismantling the plumbing to make weapons.Electric lighting was kept on 24 hours a day. Some detainees were reported to be clinically obese; two were being force-fed and 20% had some psychiatric condition (emphasis added).

The MPs said prisoner abuse had "almost certainly" happened there but the added that this was "unlikely to be taking place now".

And in Australia...The Age puts the report into an Australian context, following on from earlier statements that Foreign Minister Downer had relied upon a cursory assessment made by a US diplomat without medical expertise following a three minute or five minute visit (depending whether you read The Age or The Australian). Having weighed up the evidence thus obtained Mr Downer has expressed the opinion, as The Age states, that " there was no suggestion that David Hicks was suffering from mental illness".

Territory architecture

A contrasting yet complementary brace of reports from the NT over this weekend.

The first, from the Weekend Australian, relates how surplus to requirements transportable huts ("dongas" as they're known in the Territory ) have been transferred from Woomera detention centre to Alice Springs to provide emergency accommodation for homeless Aboriginal people.

The second, from Radio National's By Design program (in fact a repeat of a broadcast last year) has a segment about Beni Burnett, an architect who designed buildings in both Darwin and Alice Springs from the late 1930s on. The website has some photos which enhance the program, in fact give you a very good idea of Burnett's work and how he was able to adapt his principles to both the Top End and Centre environments. Those who've lived or visited both will know that they differ considerably.

A well earned award, but with a quibble about terminology

The Australian has announced its Australian of the Year " Join us in saluting the Aussie Digger"
says its front page article, accompanied by a photo of two soldiers in Afghanistan.

Alas, the paper isn't clear as to just who it's bestowing the award upon. On page one it defines "Digger" as "the men and women of the Australian Defence Force", while in its editorial on page 18 it ambiguously states:

Today we define the Digger more broadly than the Australian infantry on the Western Front in World War I, who took the name for themselves. Now the title is rightly taken by the men and women of the army, navy and air force. And this morning we honour the 2900 among them who are on active service, providing forward defence of our democracy against the threat of terror attack.

How far does this broader definition extend? Who are the recipients of the award: all members of the ADF or just those who are serving overseas? If the latter then this reopens one of the oldest sores in Australian military history, the distinction between those who in the two world wars served overseas and those who didn't. True, all present ADF members are volunteers, but not every member would have the same opportunity to serve overseas.

The Australian also acknowledges that the ADF consists of three arms: the front page story highlights the army, but there are separate items on p 8 about the Air Force and the Navy . How, for example, does the RAN with its rich traditions feel about being rebadged as "Diggers"? If the broader meaning of the term takes root this will amount to a dumbing down of Australian history.

None of this should be taken as a criticism of the award itself, only of the woollyish thinking which has created uncertainty when a simple statement that all members of the ADF are being honoured would clarify matters.

Does it go with the territory? Some unresolved matters from the NT

Another Australian piece reminds us of people other than Peter Falconio who've gone missing in the Northern Territory:

The father of Jamie Stephen Herdman, 26, who was last seen on November 30 at the small town of Daly Waters, flew into Darwin yesterday to talk to police about the case.Jamie Herdman, from Whakatane in New Zealand, had spent the previous 18 months working for a furniture-removal company at Broome in Western Australia, and was travelling to visit family friends at Roma, in Queensland, when he disappeared.Police discovered his abandoned van, containing his personal property, including mobile phone and cash, near the Highway Inn at Daly Waters, about 600km south of Darwin.

Stories such as these seem to be swept under the carpet until something horrendous happens. Much as I like the Territory for the friendliness of (most of) its people, the subtle changes in landscape on the Stuart Highway and the
Top End weather, I always try to travel sensibly, eg no night driving, stopping for large groups of people who seem to have broken down (I did this once last year and they only wanted a tow for 5km) or camping by main roads unless there are other people there.

There are also some positive stories like this one, which do something to redress the balance of perceptions.

"Bushwalkers forced to evacuate" in Tasmania...notes on the weather

When I first saw this headline on theNews.com.au website I thought that it probably referred to a typically authoritarian Greens directive about preserving the environment. I was wrong: the full text of the News story, corroborated bythe ABC , makes it clear that the subject is bushfires in Tasmania, not a proposal to implement Baden Powell's advice.

Since there's been a ring of fire around southern Australia for the last month or more this is hardly news, but it reminds me of when I visited Cradle Mountain in January several years ago. The peaks were covered in snow, but I don't recall hearing that the Overland Track was closed then .

Oh, and as I post it's raining in Adelaide. The long arm of the Top End monsoon, with its combination of preciptiation and humidity, has reached down here. Such is the Australian climate.

PS Today'sAustralian has a good story (and an even better photo which may not be online) illustrating the effects of the south-central Australian monsoon. On a slight tangent this piece by Nicholas Rothwell isn't monsoon-related but worth a look anyway to show that the paper does give a good run to the centre (even though the paper doesn't arrive there until - air schedules permitting - the middle of the day and costs twice as much as it does in the big smokes).

Disingenuousness still rules in the Foreign Minister's bailiwick

Just as I'd come to think that the Prime Minister and Attorney General Ruddock had taken over responsibility for public comment about David Hicks, Foreign Minister Downer comes out with all guns blazing:

ALEXANDER DOWNER: A visit took place just a few days ago and an informal meeting was arranged during that visit at short notice and apparently Mr Hicks agreed to the meeting. And the report of that meeting was that he was healthy.

PETA DONALD: And what of his mental state?

DOWNER: Yeah. There was no suggestion that he was suffering from mental illness, though no doubt he doesn't like being in Guantanamo Bay and, of course, so… but that wouldn't, I suppose, be a definition of mental illness. But there was no report of him suffering from mental illness. You know, in the conversation he had with this person, who is from another country who was visiting Guantanamo Bay at that time, he seemed quite healthy.

DONALD: And who was this person that you refer to?

DOWNER: Well, I don't want to betray any confidences, but he came from another country and he was visiting Guantanamo Bay and one of the people he did speak to was David Hicks. I don't want to make too much of it though, but only to say that he did talk to David Hicks and the report back is that he was healthy. Now we had a consular officer visit, and we've had 17 consular visits to David Hicks since he's been in Guantanamo Bay and we had a consular officer visit relatively recently and the report from that consular officer was that he was healthy as well.

DONALD: But you're wanting us to rely on this information that you've received in the last few days, but you won't say where it's come from?

DOWNER: I'm not asking you to rely on it or not rely on it. I'm just letting you know what observation was made and you can take it or leave it, listeners can take it or leave it. I just… it's just I thought an interesting observation. When I was asked about David Hicks yesterday, I passed on that piece of information. I mean…

DONALD: Now Minister, David Hicks can't be charged until the new regulations to govern his trial are put in place. The deadline for that was yesterday, so that's now come and gone.

DOWNER: I don't think it was a… when you say 'deadline', I'm not sure where you got that idea from. The expectation that we had had and I said this in a… to the media…

DONALD: Well, Mr Ruddock said that the 17th January was the deadline.

DOWNER: Well, it's the 17th today here in America. And our expectation is that the regulations will be promulgated in the next… next few days. I don't think, from what I've heard from Washington, the delay is likely to be of any particular significance. They're just finalising some details in relation to the regulations. Now that having been done, then our expectation, from what the Americans have said to us is, and we've lobbied the Americans very hard for this, is that new charges will be brought. As you know, there were charges against David Hicks. They were very grave charges. We had concerns about that. New charges will now have to be brought. We understand…

DONALD: And Minister, when is that going to happen? It's now five years that he has been detained, how soon until he's charged and then tried?

DOWNER: Can I just say, let's dispense with some of the myths. He was charged. In that five years, he did face charges and they were very grave charges, conspiracy to commit war crimes and attempted murder amongst them. Now let me just finish this. They are very serious charges. We have looked after our consular responsibilities, made sure he's had access to lawyers. We've spent $300,000 of taxpayers' money on legal representation for David Hicks. He's had access to, of course, the high profile Major Mori as a lawyer and he's been a very aggressive lawyer on his behalf. Now in the middle of last year, the US Supreme Court said that the Congress had to reconstitute the Military Commissions…

DONALD: Okay. So how soon until that happens and Mr Hicks is charged and then tried?

DOWNER: Well, so the charges that he was facing lapsed and the Military Commissions have now been reconstituted. When the regulations are promulgated, it will be possible to lay the charges again. The charges can't be laid before the regulations have been promulgated. So new charges are expected to be laid in the next few weeks. That's the commitment we have from the Americans.

This is disingenuous balderdash. It may be part of a wider move to discredit everyone involved with the defence of Guantanamo detainees, but a move in the US in this direction has backfired with a Pentagon official apologising to detainees' lawyers. Is it to much to expect Mr Downer to issue an apology? A correction would do.

PS Tim Dunlop at Blogocracy has kept this issue alive in the Australian blogosphere.

Judging a book by its cover price, and does Australia have its Lewis and Clark?

The Abe Books list of the most expensive books sold in 2006 bears no resemblance to the Forbes Magazine one. Perhaps we shouldn't be surprised by this as the Forbes people would have connections to the premium salerooms of the book world (I hesitate to say "trade") whereas Abe, by virtue of its online presence, has to deal with the book buying hoi-polloi.

What makes a book important enough to make the Forbes list?

"First, rarity," says Scott Brown, editor of the magazine Fine Books & Collections, the source for our list of highest-priced books for 2006. Since many valuable books end up in permanent museum collections, rarity is determined not just by the number of copies in existence, but by the number--usually much lower--that are still trading hands in the marketplace. "Only a handful of copies of most of these books are in private hands, and collectors know that when they come up for sale, it might be their only chance," he says.The second factor is cultural and historic importance. "Each of these books are among the most significant in their field," Brown says. For example, Christianae religionis institutio (Institutes of the Christian Religion) by theologian John Calvin, which sold last year for $720,000, "led to wars in Europe and drove Calvinists like the Puritans to the United States," says Brown. "It's easily one of the most influential books in history, yet until 2006, most collectors alive today have never even had a chance to own one."

The condition of the book and changing tastes in literature also play a role in a book's value, says Robert Reese, a rare-book dealer based in New Haven, Conn. Early editions of Ernest Hemingway are more popular than works by his contemporary Joseph Conrad, for instance, simply because Hemingway is more widely read today. British colonial author Rudyard Kipling, a "darling" among literary collectors in the 1920s, fell out of favor for many years, but now copies of his work are rising in price again.

The top 10 list for 2006 includes a surprising number of atlases--five, including three versions of works by Ptolemy. "The market in atlases, maps and cartography has been tremendously hot in the last 10 to 15 years," says Reese. "Values in that field have soared far higher than in some other areas of book collecting." That may be partly because people relate to maps on a personal level--often, for example, collecting maps of the area where they live. Also, Reese says, the rare-book market has seen a general trend toward the visual, with photography and books of illustration also growing in popularity. "I think the taste of modern times tends to be visual rather than literary," he says.

Forbes also reports

Last year also saw a record price set for an Australian book, with the sale of Journey of Discovery to Port Phillip, New South Wales, for $689,000", adding "A seminal work of exploration, the book plays a role in Australian history comparable to Lewis and Clark's History of the Expedition in the United States.

While Hume and Hovell's journey was significant in Australian history it is drawing a long bow to compare it to Lewis and Clark's crossing of North America. H and H travelled from Sydney to what is now Melbourne: if you're not familiar with Australia look at a map and see how how little ground their expedition covered relative to L & C (roughly 1000km as opposed to ?5,000 across North America). True, H @ H passed through (discovered?) a lot of fertile land and cleared the way for short term expansion into the eastern Australian hinterland, but they didn't answer the big questions such as whether there was an inland sea and how productive the land was.

I don't think it's appropriate to compare Hume and Hovell to Lewis and Clark. Nor do I believe that there are any other contenders for that title. Most of the explorers who came after Hume and Hovell were disillusioned by what they found: seeking an inland sea, they found desert. In other words they didn't really "open up" the continent as L & C did, but drew lines in the sand delineating the boundaries of feasible European settlement.

A reminder of the risks of outback travel

Today's Australian reports the death of two prominent Aboriginal people in the WA outback. The photo on the front page of the print edition showing their broken down and abandoned vehicle adds to the poignancy of the story. They were experienced bush travellers, yet they overlooked, as too many people confronted with such a situation do, some of the basic rules about outback travel, including not leaving your vehicle if it breaks down.

I offer my sympathy to the families of the deceased. I'll keep this story in mind next time I travel to remote areas and hope that I never have to make choices like they had to.

Jaywalkers look out... and hang on to your peppermints

The story about British Professor Felipe Fernandez-Armesto, who was allegedly overpowered by five US police officers, handcuffed and charged with jaywalking, has been widely reported in the world media. Apparently even his peppermints were confiscated.

The BBC report has a range of reader comments from around the world which reveal both the diversity of laws against (and, in a few instances, for) jaywalking and mixed views about their efficacy and desirability.

The Professor has struck back with an article in the Times and a YouTube video (which you can access via this link).

The Atlanta police have not remained silent, as a copy of the police report of the incident has, as such things are apt to do nowadays, made its way onto the web.

While I may not always be strict in my observance of the laws relating to pedestrians (whatever they may be), a friend of mine is an inveterate jaywalker. I'll bring this story to his notice in the hope that he'll reflect upon his own behaviour (and its effect upon others who walk with him).

Death from snake bite

It's sad to read of the death of a young man near Sydney from snakebite .

The media reports appear to have, unlike the incident about which I posted last week identified the snake correctly as an eastern brown. Unfortunately the identification didn't enable the doctors to save the man's life: after being bitten on the hand (I wonder how) he walked some distance through the bush and eventually came to a cricket ground from where he was transported to hospital.

The usual advice to people who've been bitten by a snake is, according to a toxologist quoted in the Sydney Morning Herald , to apply a broad bandage to the bitten area and remain completely still until treatment in a hospital with antivenom can be effected.

This is easier said than done, and I wonder whether there an alternative treatment suitable for for situations where it may not be feasible to wait for help to arrive. An older treatment used to be to suck the venom from the wound before it could get into the bloodstream. This is now discredited by orthodox medical opinion, but might it still be feasible in some circumstances?

100 minutes of history a week for years 8 to 10

According to News.com.austudents in years 8 to 10 will be taught history for 200 hours (at 100 minutes a week), if a recommendation from a panel of experts to Education Minister Julie Bishop is adopted.

As a former history teacher I'm not averse to the idea in principle but I'd like to see more detail, and perhaps to question the methodology which, in the hands of teachers who don't have a feel for the subject, may be counterproductive and cause students to switch off.

Is SBS in breach of its own advertising guidelines?

Tonight I began to watch "Race to the Pole", a program on SBS TV about the 1911 race between British and Norwegian expeditions to the South Pole . It looked and sounded reasonably interesting (despite being filmed in Greenland because dogs aren't allowed in Antarctica) though I was put off by the number of commercial breaks - three in the first half hour - which (1) disturbed the flow of the narrative and (2) seemed to take up an inordinate amount of time. I didn't time the breaks but my perception was that the SBS Advertising Guidelines were, if not not broken, stretched to the limit.

The Guidelines were introduced about six months ago when SBS effectively became almost a fully commercial network. The preamble to them states:

Section 45 of the Special Broadcasting Services Act, 1991 (SBS Act) provides that SBS may broadcast advertisements and sponsorship announcements before or after programs and during natural breaks and that run in total for not more than five minutes in any hour of broadcasting.

All decisions regarding commercial revenue are subject to the overriding principle that the integrity of the SBS Charter and SBS’s editorial independence are paramount and shall not be compromised in any way.

Decisions about the placement of advertisements in programs will be considered on a case-by-case basis and will have regard to program content and context. SBS will exercise sensitivity in the placement of advertisements. All advertisements will be clearly distinguished from SBS programming content.

The relevant sections state:

1.2 Natural breaks in documentaries and information programs

A break may be taken when:

(i) there is a change of topic, or

(ii) there is a change of method or treatment, or

(iii) recorded inserts occurring in live programs, or

(iv) new participants in a discussion program are introduced.

.....

2.1 Identification of breaks

SBS will assess programs to determine where, and if, there are natural breaks in content according to the definitions under section 1 of these Guidelines.

SBS will then decide which of these natural breaks will be used to carry advertising based on the five minute per hour limit and other considerations, including viewer experience.

2.2 Placement of breaks

Editorial considerations and the interests of viewer experience will be taken into account when considering the placement of breaks.

Within the definitions of natural breaks and the individual context of the program, the following schedule provides an indicative guide for the placement of internal breaks:

Scheduling Slot	Program Length	Parts/Breaks
Up to 10 minutes		No Break
30 minutes	25 minutes	3 Parts / 2 Breaks
45 minutes	40 minutes	3 Parts / 2 Breaks
60 minutes	52 minutes	4 Parts / 3 Breaks

Where the interests of viewers would be better served by a different format, for example to fit in with a particularly suitable interruption of continuity, there may be deviation from this guide. This will be assessed on a case-by-case basis applying these Guidelines in relation to natural breaks in accordance with the SBS Act.

How are "the interests of viewer experience" determined? By examining the entrails of a chicken? SBS is trying hard to sell its decision to increase advertising within programs : it's now prefacing some programs with an explanation along the lines of more ads, better programs, which is an indication that it's failed to convince viewers.

If it wants to "suceed" (as its on-screen announcement says) it should rethink its practices. Frequent breaks do have one advantage for viewers: they provide an opportunity to change channels or switch off, which is what I did tonight.

More controversy from the Sheik

According to The Age:

CONTROVERSIAL Muslim leader Sheikh Taj al-Din al-Hilali has savaged Australia in an interview on Egyptian television, claiming there is no freedom or democracy for Muslims and that English people are the most unjust and dishonest.

The Mufti of Australia said Muslims were more Australian than Anglo-Saxons because they came here voluntarily, that Australians played the "fear card" to keep Muslims down, and that racial prejudice was the reason for the 55-year sentence given to gang rapist Bilal Skaf.

"Anglo-Saxons came to Australia in chains, while we (Muslims) paid our way and came in freedom. We are more Australian than them. Australia is not an Anglo-Saxon country — Islam has deep roots in Australian soil that were there before the English arrived," Sheikh Hilali said.

Australia's most controversial cleric was talking on the Egyptian news program Cairo Today, shown in Australia on the Orbit satellite network on Tuesday morning.

The ABC reports:

[Islamic Friendship Association of Australia spokesman] Keysar Trad says says he apologises for the comments if they have caused offence, but says the Sheikh has been misinterpreted.

"I do understand that some people taking these comments without looking at the full video would take offence to them," he said.

"As an Australian Muslim... I do feel like apologising to these people and also appealing to them to understand the context, it would seem he was trying to explain away that controversy and put it behind him and there were a couple of slip-ups."

Mr Trad says the Sheikh's comments were not intended to be malicious.

"The question was put to him, before making that comment, is that if you're under the spotlight so much why live there, why not come back and live in the country of your birth, and he said we have every right to live there basically we're not shackled to be there, we don't choose to be there, we paid our own way, implying that he loves Australia and loves being in Australia," he said.

The Prime Minister, according to The Age report, has played a reasonably straight bat, though some South Australians and others who agree with his support for more Australian history teaching might be disappointed that he's made the point that SA was founded as a convict-free settlement

Mr Howard was asked about the sheikh's reference to convicts and replied: "I think it will bring a wry smile, if it's true, … to the face of many Australians who sort of don't actually feel the least bit offended that many of our ancestors came here as convicts.

A little straight talking about unemployment figures

The official measuring stick of unemployment in Australia - if a person over 15 works for an hour a week they are counted as "employed" - is preposterous, even though all governments of both political persuasions go along with it.

Fortunately there are a few voices offering a different view. Henry Thornton is one. The link is to his post today, which in turn links to other sources including the Roy Morgan Unemployment estimate (which estimates unemployment at 7.1%, not the official 4.6%), and two other posts from his own site: one last month from Marcus L'Estrange and another from Henry himself last July.

They are all worth reading closely. Each goes into considerable detail so it's hard to summarise them here, but I'll quote a little from L'Estrange:

The OECD reports that Australia is the third lowest spender in the developed world on training unemployed people (Melbourne Age, June 26, 2006).

Many things are wrong with the monthly, or headline, "Labour Force" figures. Some examples are that advanced countries such as Germany and Singapore only count a person as employed if he or she works 15 hours or more. In Australia, you are counted as being employed if you work for as little as an hour.

Currently 400,000 Australians work between 1-14 hours a week. They are counted as being "employed", but in many other countries would be counted as unemployed. The person who works an hour a week in Australia has the same status in the employment statistics as one who works 40 hours! Consequently, unemployment comparisons between countries are largely illusory.

While she doesn't concur with this view, Shadow Minister for (among other things) Workforce Participation Senator Penny Wong has, in a brief media release today, drawn attention to the numbers of Australians who are underemployed or who for whatever reason want to work but aren't included in the official unemployed figures.

It's hard to see any government changing the current flawed definition of "employed", but is it too much to hope that a future ALP government might offer a more varied range of programs aimed at encouraging greater workforce participation by the groups Senator Wong's mentioned? Perhaps someone will come up with an term (preferably one which can be reduced to a snazzy sounding acronym for them). Any ideas?

Is he any closer to being charged?

Recent developments on the David Hicks front.

Following yesterday's reply from Lex Lasry QC to (the Australian) Attorney General Ruddock's "Why he can't return" article The Age today has the case against him according to the chief prosecutor of the US Office of Military Commissions, Colonel Davis. DH's US lawyer Major Mori replies to this in a piece added to the paper's website this afternoon.

The gloves are off for the military lawyers. Col Davis has (1) asserted that DH "was a fully fledged al-Qaeda operative who took orders from Osama bin Laden, conducted surveillance on embassies and was armed to battle against coalition forces in Afghanistan after the September 11 attacks", and (2) attacked Major Mori "I'm concerned about the health of Australians because he [Mori] comes down there and he blows smoke, which can't be good for your health."

The Major has responded: "It is disappointing to hear Colonel Davis make derogatory comments attacking my integrity...When a prosecutor's case is weak, he or she often resorts to attacking the defence lawyer ...I am sure it was disappointing and shocking to Australian ministers to hear Colonel Davis say that he hoped David's five years at Guantanamo would not be taken into account if he is sentenced. "

I'd thought that this was one of the issues (another is no death penalty, but maybe even that needs to be checked) on which even the Australian government was firm.

Two ALP spokespeople, Joel Fitzgibbon (Defence) and Kelvin Thompson (Foreign Affairs) have
also increased the pressure to resolve the matter rapidly.

For his part Prime Minister Howard has stated today: "I discussed this matter with the President at some length yesterday when he spoke to me [about the revised US policy towards Iraq], and he's been left in no doubt as to the strength of feeling of the Australian Government" [that DH should be charged by the US as soon as possible].

If the Australian government is to be believed, then they and the US are increasingly at odds. In an opinion piece in today's Australian Leigh Sales, the ABC's national security correspondent, makes just this point:

Do not imagine the Government wants Hicks's repatriation. It does not. It wants him to stand trial at Guantanamo. But it is not prepared to accept more promises without results. When the FBI arrested Nazi secret agents in the US during World War II, their trials via military commission and subsequent executions took less than a month. From capture to execution, the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein spent two years and 17 days in custody. Hicks has now spent five years, one month and two days in prison, with no end in sight. The Pentagon must now act quickly and efficiently to fix that. It is said that the best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour. On that basis, the Australian Government must be terrified.

Mr Noodle

The recent death of Momofuko Ando (aka Mr Noodle) at the age of 96 has seen many tributes, including a very affectionate one from The New York Times :

Momofuku Ando, who died in Ikeda, near Osaka, at 96, was looking for cheap, decent food for the working class when he invented ramen noodles all by himself in 1958. His product — fried, dried and sold in little plastic-wrapped bricks or foam cups — turned the company he founded, Nissin Foods, into a global giant.

......

Ramen noodles... are a dish of effortless purity. Like the egg, or tea, they attain a state of grace through a marriage with nothing but hot water. After three minutes in a yellow bath, the noodles soften. The pebbly peas and carrot chips turn practically lifelike. A near-weightless assemblage of plastic and foam is transformed into something any college student will recognize as food, for as little as 20 cents a serving.

.....

Ramen noodles have earned Mr. Ando an eternal place in the pantheon of human progress. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime. Give him ramen noodles, and you don’t have to teach him anything.

Brewhaha

The debate about one of life's major minor questions - how to make a good cup of tea - has been refreshed by a report in The Times (and elsewhere) that adding milk to black tea is harmful to one's health.

I'm an occasional tea drinker: as I write I'm sipping a mug of tea, which I'd intended to make without milk but my automatic pilot intervened so I've ended up with my customary brew, without sugar but with milk.

Whenever I think about tea making advice I recall George Orwell's 1946 essay "A Nice Cup of Tea". Orwell was dogmatic about this, as he was about many other matters. He sets down 11 precepts, beginning with an instruction to use only Indian or Ceylonese [Sri Lankan] tea: "China tea has virtues which are not to be despised nowadays — it is economical, and one can drink it without milk — but there is not much stimulation in it. One does not feel wiser, braver or more optimistic after drinking it. Anyone who has used that comforting phrase 'a nice cup of tea' invariably means Indian tea."

If you accept this then you may not disagree with too much more of what he says, though you may not feel comfortable about giving the pot a good shake instead of a stir. (This is reminiscent of the traditional Australian tea-making practice of swinging the boiled billy several times to assist the infusion) .

Orwell didn't for a moment think that tea could should be drunk without milk, and came down, after a moment's hestitation, firmly in favour of milk second:"The milk-first school can bring forward some fairly strong arguments, but I maintain that my own argument is unanswerable. This is that, by putting the tea in first and stirring as one pours, one can exactly regulate the amount of milk whereas one is liable to put in too much milk if one does it the other way round."

His last precept was really a prohibition: no sugar. "I know very well that I am in a minority here. But still, how can you call yourself a true tea lover if you destroy the flavour of your tea by putting sugar in it? It would be equally reasonable to put in pepper or salt. Tea is meant to be bitter, just as beer is meant to be bitter. If you sweeten it, you are no longer tasting the tea, you are merely tasting the sugar; you could make a very similar drink by dissolving sugar in plain hot water."

Whereas for Orwell tea making was a ritual, for me it's a routine, made easier by the availability of tea bags, (though I sometimes make a pot of tea using leaf tea). I've googled to see what others have said about the art (or science, or call it what you will). Here's one site which lays down a different version of Orwell's precepts (it approves of Chinese teas) yet in similar fashion to him (it prescribes 8 steps) Despite this it is open minded enough to include a number of links to "bad advice from other people" (including Douglas Adams and Orwell).

As well as reporting the bad news about adding milk to tea, The Times, in another article and the BBC try to reassure the tea-drinking public by putting the German study into some sort of perspective. They quote a British cardiac nurse: "It is difficult to say from this small study the impact of adding a drop of milk to your tea can make. The tea break is a great British tradition which provides time to relax with a cuppa in hand. Leaving milk out of your tea is far less likely to help protect your heart health than other measures, such as taking regular exercise, avoiding smoking and eating a healthy balanced diet."

I'll bear this in mind as I try to turn off my automatic pilot and move to a black (Indian/Sri Lankan/Australian) tea drinking regimen. I'm not sure however whether I'll be able to stop using tea bags.

Flog that murse and you may be plutoed

The Age , the BBC , The Washington Post and many other media outlets report on the selection of the American Dialect Society's Word of the Year. The winner was "plutoed", which means a demotion or devaluing, such as happened to Pluto, which in 2006 was demoted from full planet to "dwarf planet" status.

The word even has its own blog.

Other people from around the world eg Goa have also tried to claim credit for inventing the word.

Despite all the excitement I don't think it's as memorable as the 2005 winner "truthiness", a word which suggests its own meaning and is therefore likely to remain in use for some time to come.

Snake closes playground near city

Adelaide Now reports that a large snake, identified as a king brown has been sighted in a playground in the parklands. I think that the snake in question is more likely to be an eastern brown snake, which is often sighted in and around Adelaide, though rarely as close to the CBD as in this instance.

The playground will remain closed until the snake is caught.

A program well worth listening to

I highly recommend ABC Radio National's Prisoners of War: Australians Under Nippon a radio documentary which is being broadcast each weekday morning until 20 January at 11 am. You can also listen to it online or download the audio.

It was first broadcast 20 years or so ago, when there were more survivors of Japanese captivity still alive, including several well known ones such as Russell Braddon (author of The Naked Island, IMO one of the classic accounts of Australian POWs. Each program draws heavily upon recorded interviews, linked by commentary by Tim Bowden.

A program such as this reminds us of what a public broadcaster can do to record important aspects of our history. The suffering of the POWs is not, as far as I'm aware, where there's a lot of 'history wars" style disputation, even though the fact that many of the deaths were caused by "friendly fire" (US submarines sinking ships transporting POWs to Japan) is, while not suppressed, not given as much attention as it might be.

The program also reminds us of the importance of recording the memories of the survivors of WW2 and other important (and less important) events. I'd assumed that there are very few ex Japanese POWs still living so I was pleasantly surprised last week to meet an ex-Royal Marine who lives in an aged care home near me, and who was a survivor of HMS Exeter, which was sunk off Java in 1942. I said that I was interested in hearing more about his experiences and hope to be able to talk further with him about them, provided he is not too disturbed by having his memories trawled.

The power of the "moral middle class"

Today the lead Weekend Australian editorial advocates bringing David Hicks to trial promptly.

It begins with a lot of huffing and puffing (eg " the clamour by some to claim Mr Hicks as a metaphoric indictment of everything wrong with the Howard Government, the Iraq war, George W. Bush and Australian society, is misguided.") but eventually gets to the heart of the matter, if not without some disingenuousness:

Some of the delay in bringing Mr Hicks to trial is a result of appeals by his defence team on the legitimacy of the process. The US Supreme Court has now acted to ensure any trial contains a minimum level of safeguards for Mr Hicks, including a presumption of innocence, a right to be present during the trial, a right to cross-examine prosecution witnesses, a ban on evidence obtained by torture, access to evidence and the provision of military defence counsel. He certainly could not ask for better advocacy than that offered by Major Mori.

These points noted, Mr Hicks deserves justice and he deserves it now. His day in court is long overdue. It is hard to imagine any circumstances under which it would be justified to hold a person in custody for five years without trial, even in a case as exceptional as this. Mr Howard, AFP Commissioner Mick Keelty [sic]and Australia's newly appointed director of military prosecutions, Brigadier Lyn McDade, have been right to call in recent days for Mr Hicks's prosecution to be accelerated.

While Mr Howard's "call" has been a fairly muted one, more in the nature of a whisper, at least he seems to be preparing for the possibility of shifting his ground.

The editorial concludes:

As long as his guilt remains unproven in a court of law, there will be those who will attempt to exploit his continued detention to push their own causes, clouding the real reasons why we are at war with terrorists. Mr Howard would also be mindful that in an election year, a case which has become a lightning rod for discontent among what we might call the moral middle class has the potential to backfire on his Government, particularly as it faces an opponent who has vowed to campaign on the issue of morality...The crimes that Mr Hicks has been accused of are indeed appalling, and offend our fundamental values. The magnitude of the alleged offences, however, should never outweigh the right to natural justice.

"The moral middle class". What an interesting term. Is it meant to be taken as an alternative, if a slightly less harsh sounding one, to pejorative terms such "chattering classes"? Or does it belatedly acknowledge that there are Australians who for years have felt genuinely appalled on moral grounds at our government's hypocrisy in calling for Hicks to be brought to trial in a system which is being made up on the run? I am more than willing to be counted among them.

Update 7 January


The Age website reports today that it will be at least six months before David Hicks is charged.

...Hicks' US defence lawyer, Major Michael Mori, attacked the integrity of the proposed new military commissions after the Federal Government was assured Hicks would be charged. Major Mori said he was troubled that the Government was being told Hicks would be charged, when the person who should decide that was yet to be appointed.

Federal Attorney-General Philip Ruddock said his US counterpart, Alberto Gonzales, had told him there was enough evidence to charge Hicks and he would be among the first Guantanamo detainees to be charged.

Major Mori said the assurances showed "the political fix was in" and that Hicks' case would not be independently evaluated and reviewed.

Mr Ruddock replied it was "not inappropriate to check on the progress of the matter and to receive advice as to the likely timetable for resolving issues relating to Mr Hicks".He said a trial timetable could be influenced by factors including detainees exercising their rights to challenge the process.

The website also has an an article by Mr Ruddock "Why he can't return" . It is probably as detailed a summary of the government's position as I've seen, but several flaws remain in the AG's reasoning, eg

# If the government has spent more than $300,000 on the case and there have been 17 consular visits (over five years) to Hicks, why isn't it able to confirm that his mental health is still sound?

# In attempting to distinguish between the situations of the British citizens who have been released from Guantanamo and Hicks he uses the terms "citizen" and "resident" as synonyms: he of all people given his former position as Minister for Immigration knows that this is misleading.

Seeking advice about stocks? You could do worse than ask a psychic

Today's Australian at p18 (not online) has a piece "Expert stock tips 2006: how they fared" reporting the results of its annual stock tipping challenge, in which several "experts" each chose 10 stocks which they believed would perform best over the year.

The competitors included six fund managers, the Oz's Business desk team and, for the first time, a psychic.

The results: everyone, unlike the previous year, achieved positive gains, ranging from 7.7% to 71.5%. And Mr Turnbull (the psychic)? 18.3% with a cautious selection of blue chip stocks (inc BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto, four major banks and News Corp).

There's plenty of scope for this to be used in other fields, eg horse racing and, with a federal election due later this year, politics. Had it been used for the Ashes series which concluded today there'd be some very red faces among cricket commentators.

Update 6 December

Today's Weekend Australian (at p32) has the tips for 2007, including predictions for the price of oil, gold and the value of the $A: $US.

"Abominable": senior Australian military lawyer's description of Hicks situation

Brigadier Lyn McDade, the first director of military prosecutions of the newly established Australian Military Court, has, as the Sydney Morning Herald reports, described David Hicks' continued detention as "abominable":

"Quite frankly, I think it's wrong. I don't care what he's done or alleged to have done. I think he's entitled to a trial and a fair one and he is entitled to be charged and dealt with as quickly as is possible. As is anybody."


In a report just posted on the SMH website Attorney -General somewhat surprisingly is quoted as supporting Brig McDade's opinion:

"It reflects the Government's position," Mr Ruddock said.

"The fact that a trial has not yet occurred frustrates us and we have been arguing very strongly with the United States that these issues need to be resolved quickly.

"We believe the delay is very unreasonable and inappropriate and that's why we've been arguing that it needs to be dealt with as quickly as possible."

Mr Ruddock is assuming that there will be no challenge to the second set of regulations establishing a US military commission. If there is such a challenge, what will he and Mr Howard do: keep sitting on their hands and wait until the matter is heard by the US courts, or say "enough is enough" and request Hicks's return to Australia? Their previous course of conduct suggests the former.

Update 3 January 6.15pm CST

The SMH website now has an updated report by Brendan Nicholson which contains much the same information as the earlier reports , though with something extra, a classic piece of doublespeak which sounds more Rumsfeldian than Ruddockian:

Asked whether he agreed with Brigadier McDade's view that the treatment of Mr Hicks had been abominable, Mr Ruddock said: "I agree with the Prime Minister, who frequently says numbers of people express themselves in different ways but have the same meaning and intention."

Tim Dunlop at Blogocracy also makes some pithy comments.

Some books and films which impressed me in 2006

Films:

Borat (V funny, not least for thumbing its nose at political correctness)

Capote (Philip Seymour Hoffman excellent but whole movie more than just a party piece for him)

Flags Of Our Fathers (Gritty depiction of war and some of the home front implications)

Hidden (Perplexing, though not as bloody as some of Haneke's other work: have bought DVD to scrutinise key scenes)

Kenny (Earthy homespun comedy)

Ten Canoes (Slice of traditional Aboriginal Australian life pre white contact)

Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada (Converging/ parallel plots on contemporary themes: similar to Amores Perros and 21 Grams, which were written by same writer)

The Squid and the Whale (Simply told tale of growing up in1980s New York)

Walk The Line (Well crafted and acted and surprisingly well sung - by the actors - country music biopic)


Novels (I didn't read many):

Theft: A love story (Peter Carey's recreation of the world he lives in and the world he has left; also notable for excellent depiction of two brothers)

Snow (Complex Orhan Pamuk exploration of aspects of late C20 Turkey)

Non-fiction books:

Frontier Justice (Eye opening depiction of how the northern Australian frontier was won: I've yet to read any criticism of the author's findings))

The Great War for Civilisation (Robert Fisk's weighty tome - in both senses of the word - which I've not yet finished).