From Mungo MacCallum

My mother used to have a homely saying for it: “Tell me who your friends are, and I’ll tell you who you are.”

If this adage is to be applied to the events of last week, it would appear that Tony Abbott is raving ratbag, a ranting bigot whose ignorance of science is matched only by his lack of manners.

The howling mob who surrounded him at the mini-rally outside Parliament House last Wednesday undoubtedly included some who were genuinely concerned about the impact a carbon tax might have on their household budgets and the wider economy, but the ones making the noise – including the majority of the speakers – came straight from la-la land.

If Abbott really believes that this manifestation of his people's revolution represents a snap-shot of middle Australia, he has a truly bizarre picture of the nation he seeks to lead. Not many middle Australians seek to spend a working-day morning paying to be bussed to Canberra for a campaign supported by the shock-jock Chris Smith, a gibbering demagogue in the style of Alan Jones but without the couth.

And those who did would hardly have felt comfortable surrounded by the wild–eyed conspiracy-theorists of One Nation, The League of Rights, and the self-appointed Consumers and Taxpayers Association, to name but three of the right wing rent-a-crowds who leapt gratefully on board Chris Smith’s bandwagon. As another homily has it, a man is known by the company he keeps.

Abbott must have seen that the gathering was pretty much out of control before making an appearance. To have done so at all was crazy-brave, but to have done so with out taking the elementary precaution of moving the more offensive placards out of camera range was madness. After all, there is a precedent.

...

And if Abbott could not see the difference, a lot of his colleagues were uncomfortably aware of it. Most, including his deputy Julie Bishop, his treasury spokesman Joe Hockey and of course Malcolm Turnbull, had declined the invitation to show themselves. In the end his praetorian guard consisted of Eric Abetz, Barnaby Joyce, Bronwyn Bishop, Sophie Mirabella and Cory Bernardi – fringe dwellers all. In any situation it would not have been a good look; at that rally with those placards it was a public relations disaster.

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/45688.html

pease see picture at:http://www.yourdemocracy.net.au/drupal/node/12070

The UK has rejected proposals from the EU which call for a ban on petrol and diesel cars from city centres by 2050.

The European Commission said phasing out "conventionally fuelled" cars from urban areas would cut reliance on oil and help cut carbon emissions by 60%.

But UK Transport Minister Norman Baker said it should not be "involved" in individual cities' transport choices.

"We will not be banning cars from city centres anymore than we will be having rectangular bananas," he said.

......

Announcing a series of "challenging" targets, Mr Kallas said there should be a 50% reduction in conventionally-fuelled cars in city centres by 2030, disappearing altogether 20 years later.

The Commission also hopes to "move close" to eliminating deaths by road accidents by 2050, halving current fatality rates by 2020.

Other objectives would see all major "hub" airports connected by rail by 2050, freight vehicles in cities becoming "carbon-free" by 2030 while 30% of road freight travelling "medium distances" would move to rail or water-borne modes by that point.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-12879566

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Gus: these mighty targets are not thought off because climate change is a furphy... The reality of climate change is daunting. The European nations are doing as much as they can to soft-land drastic CO2 emission reductions. Here in Australia, the denialists and their midgets in Canberra just wave placards and spread the word that global warming is not happening since it's not in the bible...

The Chinese are preparing to do the same as the Europeans. But for the Americans and most Aussies, it's still business as usual: burn baby burn... Ugly.

Federal Independent MP Rob Oakeshott has conceded he still has to convince a lot of voters he made the right choice in backing Labor to form Government.

The Nationals say the huge New South Wales election swing against independent Peter Besseling, in the area represented federally by Mr Oakeshott, shows voters are preparing to dump him.

Mr Besseling, a friend of Mr Oakeshott's who succeeded him in the seat of Port Macquarie, was turfed out by voters on the back of a 33 per cent swing against him.

The Nationals say locals are angry Mr Oakeshott supported Labor and its planned carbon tax.

Mr Oakeshott says supporting Labor was the right decision, but he agrees it did have an impact on the state result.

"We did challenge our communities and I think some of that sentiment is being expressed at the ballot box on the weekend," he said.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/03/29/3176583.htm?section=justin

Some mountain glaciers are melting up to 100 times faster than at any time in the past 350 years.

The findings, based on a new ice loss calculation technique developed by studying the glaciers of Patagonia in South America, have worrying implications for crop irrigation and water supplies around the world. The quantity of ice lost from Patagonia is equivalent to a fifth more than the contents of Lake Erie, one of the Great Lakes of North America.

Scientists behind the discovery claim their findings show that the rate of melting at the start of the 20th century was much slower than previously calculated, but that over the past 30 years it has been significantly faster than suspected.

Using the spread of moraines – the debris left by glaciers and the trimlines on mountainsides where the vegetation starts (effectively the high-tide mark of glaciers), a team led by Professor Neil Glasser of Aberystwyth University was able to compile a complicated series of calculations to work out the volume of ice that has disappeared. Since the Little Ice Age ended in Patagonia 350 years ago – they concluded – the 270 glaciers that now cover an area of at least one square kilometre have lost 606 cubic kilometres of ice and perhaps another 123 cubic kilometres. It is the first time the historic volume of water lost from melting glaciers has been calculated accurately so far back in time. It relies on three-dimensional calculations of each glacier at its peak. The figures show the contribution to sea level rise is increasing, though still at a low level, but what alarmed the team most was that the rate of loss has sped up rapidly since 1980.

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/glaciers-melting-at-fastest-rate-in-350-years-study-finds-2261414.html

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Federal Opposition Leader Tony Abbott is urging West Australian Nationals MP Tony Crook to oppose Labor's planned carbon tax.

The WA Nationals considered a motion to support Labor's carbon price at the party's annual state conference at the weekend, but delegates agreed to delay the vote for 12 months.

Mr Crook says he is yet to make up his mind on whether to support the tax, putting him at odds with his federal counterparts who are against it.

He says while his final decision will be guided by his state branch, he is receiving feedback from his electorate which is heavily against the tax.

Mr Abbott says that is something Mr Crook cannot ignore.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/04/04/3181996.htm

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Mr Crook has only one choice to make  and it's to save the planet... From global warming and the ignoramuses Abbotts of this world.