The Rant-O-Matic

I like movies.  I enjoy going to the cinema, paying an exorbitant amount of money for some rapidly aerated corn, a watery soft-drink and a seat that wouldn’t be out of place in a chiropractors practice (with the uncomfortableness and the way they twist your back and whatnot).  There’s still something I find quite magical and special about seeing a big blockbuster film in a packed theatre.  It’s an event.  It’s something that I find enhances the movie watching experience and something that you can’t replicate at home – regardless of the size of your TV or how many subwoofers you’ve crammed into your lounge room.  So, just use that to put what I’m about to say in perspective.

The movie industry is the single most insidious, frighteningly manipulative and plainly evil thing in the world today; it needs to be stopped.

I can’t remember a time, ever, when a commercial body has taken steps that are so detrimental to every single person on the planet in order to protect their dying business model.  They are attempting to use the rule of law to protect their industry instead of looking to innovate in the way that they deliver their products to consumers.  It’s shameful, it’s appalling and no one in their right mind should stand aside and just let them have the run of the world.

What AFACT, and their overseas counterparts, are seeking to do is fundamentally change the way the internet is delivered to us at home.  They want to take control of something that should be inherently free and use it as a tool to help them continue their crusade against the technology and social change that is going to be the saviour of their business, rather than its destruction.  They continue to not see the internet for what it could provide, instead choosing to see it as the root of all evil.  They haven’t learned from the lessons of the last decade that the music industry has discovered.  Hell, even television is starting to embrace the digital landscape.  Yet, the movie industry continues to believe that a business model that worked in the 1950s is still current and still the best way of doing business some 60 years later.  Now, I’m sorry but your inability to notice the changes in the world is your problem, not mine.

What AFACT and their mafia-like international colleagues would love nothing more than is to turn your ISP into their private police force, justice system and correctional officer.  They want to act above any and all legal system as well as change the focus of the entire internet from the sharing of information to hunting for the small number of people that they deem to be doing them harm.  It’s more than just them not understanding the consequences of what they’re proposing to do, it’s a deliberate and calculated attack to stem the flow of information so that they can continue to try and save their failing businesses.

The really sad thing is that the solution to their problems is so fucking simple.  The problem that the movie industry is having with piracy basically stems from the fact that they make it so bloody hard to legitimately watch their content.  If you were to pop a DVD into your player you have to deal with 5 to 10 minutes of un-skippable “don’t pirate this disk” warnings; whereas on a pirated disk you can jump straight into the movie without any stuffing around at all.  It doesn’t make a hell of a lot of sense, really.  Why punish your customers for actually buying your products.  I can’t think of another industry anywhere where such a thing happens.

Then, of course, the way they offer films for viewing online is nothing short of joke.  This is the sort of thing that drives piracy as an option for those people that would otherwise be more than willing to part with some money to watch a film.  By severely limiting, and then crippling beyond belief, the available choices for consumers, AFACT and their cronies are basically creating the pirate movie industry themselves.  Consumers would love to be able to enjoy movies when, where and how they want; and would be more than willing to pay for it.  As it stands, however, that just isn’t possible.  AFACT needs to understand that they stand to make more money by providing choice to consumers.

It’s straight forward.  Provide me a way to buy a film online, then either watch it on my computer, or stream it to my TV, or put it on my phone so I can watch it while I’m travelling.  What I don’t want is to be forced into paying for this multiple times because I can’t simply just copy and paste due to the horrible DRM systems that this sort of thing is coated in.  So where does this leave me as a consumer?

Well it leaves me in a spot where I don’t want to commit to one content platform, nor do I wish to pay multiple times so that I have the flexibility to watch a film where, and on what device, I want.  So naturally, the easiest way to solve this problem is to procure an illegal copy of whatever it is I want to watch.

The idea of having a 100 megabit-per-second (mbps) fibre-optic broadband connection into my home is one that has me drooling with anticipation.  As an avid internet user, being able to move past the crummy 1.5mbps is something that can’t happen soon enough.  As the internet has developed and moved itself into being an increasingly important part of our lives, it’s become more and more apparent just how much Telstra and the previous government have ruined the telecommunications infrastructure that could have made us a technological powerhouse.

Our problems began in 1997 when the Howard government decided that they wanted to sell off Telstra to the public as they didn’t see a reason as to why a government should be running a phone company.  While you could argue that their logic does make some sense, sadly what they didn’t realise was that they were also signing a death-warrant on the development and improvement of the national copper POTS network.  By giving control of the network over to a company that was being run for profit the government basically gave up on regional and remote Australia as far as improving their lacklustre infrastructure was concerned.  They ensured there was never going to be any further development of any of the existing infrastructure and that any roll-out of new equipment was going to be done to a budget, rather than what would actually be the best for the community.

What the Howard government failed to do was recognise the difference between the phone company as a service provider and the company as the owner of the nation’s telephone network.  Control and maintenance of infrastructure like that should never be left in the hands of private industry, let alone to a monopoly.  Such things should be rolled out by government to ensure that basic utilities (and by 1997 I would think that a phone line and internet access are basic utilities) are available to everyone in the country, not just those that happen to live in areas where it’s profitable to build.  By selling control of the phone lines, John Howard left this country in a position where large portions of the country have totally inadequate service because it was not profitable for a private company to install the same quality of service that someone in a more populated, profitable area.  This initial mistake was compounded by the severe regulation that was imposed on Telstra as a result.  Telstra was forced to charge low access fees for other carriers to allow them access to the network.  It was a massive disincentive for them to improve their network; because they didn’t see why they should pay to improve something that’s they’re not going to have total control over and from a business standpoint it’s hard to argue against.

What the government should have done is only sold off the service provider arm of the company and kept control of the network in public hands.  That way, the improvement and maintenance of the network would be managed by a body that’s not driven by the desire to make a profit and meet the oft-insane expectations of the open market.  Infrastructure is about delivering basic utilities that provide adequate service to the population without real fear as to the profitability of the rollout.  It shouldn’t be driven by business interests and the end-of-year earnings statements.  Living in a regional or remote area shouldn’t mean that you miss about on the opportunity to gain access to what the rest of us take for granted.

Unfortunately, a change of government has not brought about a change in thinking with regards to telecommunications.  It would seem that with the implementation of the national broadband network that the Rudd government is shaping up to make a similar series of mistakes.  While the construction of the network is being done with public money, the current proposal looks to sell off (Telstra style) the company created to oversee and manage the network five years after the project is completed.  So again, the government is looking to put control of a critical piece of natural infrastructure back in the hands of shareholders, rather than hanging onto it itself.  A decision that given what we’ve seen happen with Telstra over the last 13 years I cannot fathom.

A better model would be to create an autonomous statutory body to manage and maintain the national broadband network.  To create a system that works in much the same way that the Hunter Water Corporation operates within the Newcastle/Hunter Valley area.  A system where the operating body doesn’t exist to maximise profits, but to maintain strengthen the entire network, regardless if the profitability of each particular exercise.  Of course, Hunter Water is a monopoly in the supply of water and sewer services in my region, but the basics of what they do can be translated across to the National Broadband Network.

That way, the controlling body of is capable of rolling out improvements to the network without having to worry about getting a return on investment that’s suitable enough for a group of greedy shareholders.  Utilities (and the National Broadband Network is a utility.  Internet access generally should be considered a utility) should not be constructed and controlled to meet a desirable bottom line and end-of-year profit statement.  They should be managed and controlled and improved in accordance with what is going to deliver the best results to everyone, not just those that happen to live in the cities.

Part current affairs satire, part investigative journalism, part sketch comedy, all graduate student self-importance.  Hungry Beast: It’s a little bit completely bullshit.

I don’t get this show.  I don’t understand what they’re supposed to be doing.  They try to be serious and intelligent, but come off as snooty and condescending with a real sense of superiority because they attended a couple of politics classes while completing their arts or media studies degree and landed a job on television.

I’ve had this show described to me as “The Chaser 2.0”, an opinion I find to be completely incorrect.  This is nothing like The Chaser.  The Election Chaser was sharp, topical and well written.  CNNN was a sublime parody of the over-the-top agenda pushing cable news networks (*cough* Fox News *cough*).  While the quality of the production fell away during The War on Everything, I still hold it higher regard to Hungry Beast.

The current mix of actual journalism, satire and absurdity combined their holier-than-thou attitude just leaves the program lacking focus and direction.

While I applaud the attempt, I think it needs a bit more work and a bit more of an idea of what they want to be.  It needs this because at the moment: it’s shit.

In a not totally unsurprising move given his track record, Broadband, Communications and Digital Economy Minister Senator Stephen Conroy has again put his foot in another steaming pile of shit by giving the commercial free-to-air TV networks a $250million discount on the licence fees they pay for the chunks of spectrum they broadcast on.  This comes ahead of the release of an amended anti-siphoning list for sports broadcasts and suggests that Senator Conroy is likely to side with the commercial broadcasters over pay-tv provider Foxtel when it comes to determining what can and can’t be broadcast on pay-tv.

Here’s the thing: much like Conroy’s “SAVE THE CHILDREN!” internet filter, fixing the television broadcast environment in this country isn’t going to take a lot of work.  The solution is straight forward.  It merely requires a little bit of though and understanding of what the switch to digital television broadcasting will allow the existing commercial broadcasters to provide.  Not surprisingly, Conroy doesn’t have a clue.

The first thing that he’s missing completely is that the switch from the existing analogue signal to a digital one will not be optional soon.  As ballsed up as the process has been, by 2013 all of Australia should be receiving a digital signal.  So, forcing measures to protect those that haven’t converted yet is a pointless measure as all you’re going to do is hold-back necessary change for people that will be forced into it within a small timeframe anyway.  And with the realisation that digital free-to-air broadcasting is the way forward, you then open the door to a whole raft of other possibilities for the networks to capitalise on.

Like multi-channelling.  The transition to digital television paves the way for the free-to-air networks to capitalise on their resources by offering multi-channelling.  Granted we’re already starting to see this with channels like OneHD; Go!; 7TWO (or as it’s known in my part of the world: 7TWOONPRIMEWTFROFLRTFMBBQ); SBSTwo; ABC2; ABC3 and all the high-definition channels.  But the problem at the moment, is that the networks are limited to what they can use their multiple channels for, because the anti-siphoning list requires them to show certain events on their analogue channel.  This means that instead of showing Sporting Event A live on their second digital-only channel, they hold onto it and show it delayed after Singing Contest B program because that will rate better and bring in better prime-time advertising dollars.

If Conroy were to remove the multi-channelling restrictions then this would give the free-to-air broadcasters much more flexibility in their programming schedules that would see more of the sports on the anti-siphoning list shown live.  Currently, being required to show these events on their analogue channel has resulted in the commercial networks holding the events back and showing them delayed in favour of better rating normal programming.  Given that the entire country is going to be forced onto digital television keeping the free-to-air broadcasters restricted as to which if their channels listed events are shown on is just a stupid idea.

The second thing Conroy could look at, is requiring that the free-to-air broadcasters commit to showing listed events live and in full.  If the government is going to use legislation to make sure that Foxtel can’t show a program, then the commercial networks need to be forced into providing adequate coverage of the programs they’re so desperate not to lose.  Having anti-siphoning legislation is pointless if we’re never going to see a listed event live.  Allowing the commercial networks to hoard event telecasts and show them at absurd hours of the morning does exactly the same damage that they’re trying to prevent.

Senator Conroy could also allow pay-tv to provide live coverage of listed events should a commercial network insist that they can’t show it live.  This then gives us the benefit of both worlds.  It will also highlight to consumers just how much contempt the commercial networks have for them; even though without viewers there would be no television industry at all.  The basis of the anti-siphoning list is that there are some sporting events that are deemed to be in the national interest and that as a result then these sports should be easily accessible to the entire population.  But, if the commercial networks decide that “in the national interest” means “after Australian Idol/Two and A Half Men/Whatever” then the option for the live broadcast should go to the pay-tv provider who will show it live.  That way, at least some of the population get to enjoy the spectacle.

Then we come to the matter of a $250million rebate to the networks on the licence fees they pay in order to broadcast over the airwaves.  In much the same way that the Rudd government handled the global financial crisis (drink!) last year their solution to an industry in trouble is to just throw money at it.  There’s been no thought about it, and the motivation behind the cut can only be called dubious as it was announced days after Senator Conroy had a conversation with head of the Seven Network, Kerry Stokes.  The reasoning further called into questions as Senator Conroy has also stated that the purpose of these rebates was to “protect Australian content”.  If that’s the case, why aren’t you providing that extension of funding to content producers directly?  Why give it to a broadcast medium that is slowly dying?  Surely, there could have been a $250million program to look at creating new, digital video and audio productions.  Why, if that was your reason, are you looking to protect the television industry, not the creative one behind it?  I would have thought that feeding the creative minds that produce content would bring about better protection of their industry than giving Mr Stokes and Mr Packer a bigger pay packet this year.

Sadly for us, the consumers and tax payers of this country, the whole idea works on the assumption that the government understands and wishes to promote the evolving technological world in which we live.  But, as Senator Conroy continues to demonstrate, they haven’t got a clue.  They’re holding themselves to the mercy of out of date and out of time businesses who are struggling themselves to find their place in an internet-based future.  Hopefully, eventually, without too much wasted time and effort, sensible heads will reign supreme and Australia will get both the content and delivery thereof that they want and deserve.

I really should be surprised by this.  The simple fact of the matter is that regional New South Wales is always ignored by our state government.  What the Premier (Princess KiKi herself, Kristina Keneally) announced as a “NSW Transport Blueprint” is nothing more a repeat of the last 10 years’ worth of plans for Sydney and a message to the rest of the state that all they’re going to see of it is the bill.  Once again, the vast majority of the state has been forgotten during the planning of the state’s transport expansion.

Now, I realise that Sydney is, by some margin, the largest city in the state and that their transport problems are numerous.  But to act as though it’s the only place that needs millions of dollars spent on improving the public transport system is just ludicrous.

While the state government are busy focusing on what’s important to the areas where they live (read: Sydney), the rest of New South Wales appears to have been largely forgotten.  What makes this worse, is that along with not getting anything out of the government, we’re still going to be lumped with the $30 car registration levy to pay for all the fucking around they’ve been doing in Sydney over the last decade.  That is just the ultimate slap in the face for the other few million people that don’t live in Sydney and wouldn’t have derived any benefit from the CBD Metro if it had been built.  It’s just shit.

This has been a problem with the NSW government for a long time now.  They seem to think of themselves as some sort of extended Sydney City Council, forgetting that there’s the rest of NSW that they’re also responsible for.  Hopefully, the next government will see things differently and act in the best interests of the entire state, not just the city where they live.

The proposed mandatory government internet filter has been under constant fire since it was first proposed – not just from me, but pretty much every other technically proficient, free and rational thinking person in the country.  The idea that there would be a secret, government controlled list of websites that couldn’t be accessed by anyone within our boarders was an idea so frightening and so Orwellian that you just have to question what the government was thinking when they decided that this was a good idea.  At best, this is another reactionary policy by a government that doesn’t understand how the internet works and at worst it’s a direct assault on an adult’s right to experience content of an adult nature.  While I agree whole-heartedly that child pornography is utterly abhorrent and that children need to be protected from material that isn’t suitable on them, it is not my opinion that such a broad-stroke measure is the best, or even an effective, way to do it.

The first place where the government filter falls down is the most important one: it doesn’t work in the area of actually stopping the distribution of illegal (so, RC content, in this case) content.  In its current form, the proposed mandatory filter would only block certain websites.  Now, as any good net denizen would know if you want something illegal you rarely head to a website to download it.  You use alternate, much more anonymous means.  Anyone who remembers where the whole illegal file trading thing start (jump in your ‘way-back machine’ if you have to, it was 1999 after all) it wasn’t by downloading music of a website, it was by trading it directly with other people on the internet; and guess what? Peer-to-peer file trading won’t be filtered under the government’s proposal.  So straight up, it’s going to miss the means through which the vast majority of illegal material is traded between those that partake in such things.

Secondly, just what does having a blacklist of sites do about stopping the original photographing and filming of child pornography?  Because, you know, this is what we’re protecting the children from.  I’ll tell you: absolutely nothing.  In fact (he says, turning on his talk-back radio voice), isn’t then logical to suggest that if you make the material harder to find online, that could drive these disgusting people out into society to molest more children there.  Hardly a suitable side-effect, you’d think? A black list isn’t going to cut down on the amount of child pornography on the internet, it’s not going to stop the sick fucks that make and enjoy it.  It’s not going to protect children from paedophiles.  It’s not going to help police track down these sick fucks.  Just how, exactly, is this saving the children?

Thirdly, even if, in some bizarre and hypothetical world, it did do all of the above: it’s piss-easy to bypass.  Anyone with anything more than basic brain-function is capable of easily finding a way around the filter and the using that knowledge to bypass it and access the content anyway.  Not to mention, that once the filter is in place, information about bypassing it will go from being of interest to the more techy of people straight into the mainstream as the public at large revolts at being intentionally blocked from accessing the entire internet.  I firmly believe this will happen regardless of the persons intentions (nefarious or otherwise) when bypassing the filter.

However (!!), having a program that can stop children stumbling across things those things that are not suitable for them to be viewing is, of course, a good thing.  Children shouldn’t be watching hard-core pornography; they should be viewing things that are extremely graphic and violent.  Such a policy is a no-brainer.  That said, parents (you know, those people that got together and brought a child into the world) are the ones that should be responsible for raising their children.  Not society at large.  What I do, in my home, that doesn’t affect anyone else, should not be restricted because it’s not suitable for a child.  That’s just absurd.

What’s most irritating about the proposed filter is that fixing it, and appeasing everyone, isn’t really that hard.  There are only a few simple things that need to change to make it a brilliant piece of governance rather than the stupid, “we really don’t know what we’re doing” one that it is currently.

Obviously, the best thing to do is change this policy from one that is mandatory to one that is optional.  Make it compulsory for ISPs to offer the filtering and an optional (opt-in) choice for consumers when they sign up for internet service.  This works in two ways.  First, it allows the parents of young children to subscribe to the filter and prohibit their children from accessing content that’s not for them.  Secondly, it allows people with no children (or parents that have a bit of a clue about what their children are doing online) to surf the internet unrestricted.

The other thing that would go a long way to at least alleviating some concerns about the content and scope of the filter would be to make the contents of it public knowledge.  In its current form, the contents of the black list are kept secret by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (the regulatory arm of Stephen Conroy’s Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy).  This is a problem on two fronts.  First; there’s no public accountability.  If your site ends up on the blacklist you probably won’t know it.  There’s no way to find out.  Secondly, it leaves a gaping wide hole open for abuse further down the track by either this government, or another one.  It’s not a stretch to imagine a government using a secret black list to censor free-speech by blocking critics or anyone they didn’t quite see eye-to-eye with.  In a free and democratic society that is just not acceptable.

If the list was open and available, not only would it allay concerns of abuse.  If anyone and everyone could see the list then mistakes and misclassifications would be quickly identified and remedied.  There’s no argument that this would improve the accuracy of, and the trust in, the list.  They say that the list will only contain material that has been refused classification (RC) by the Classification Review Board.  While everything else that is classified (or not) is announced and the reasons for the classification are publically available, the black list isn’t.  While the double standard is one thing, knowing what the Chinese government does in that country makes a secret internet list so much worse.  If you’re going to classify the internet  the same way you classify books, movies, television and magazines then you should do all of it the same: including disclosure.

Finally, where’s the plan to educate parents about the dangers of the internet and how best to make sure that their children practise safe online behaviour?  Parents should be the one’s looking after their children.  They should be the ones looking over their shoulder and protecting them from the nastier, more naked, side of the internet.  It shouldn’t fall on a blanket ban to make sure this is the case.  Parents should be educated and informed and taught how to protect their children and make sure that they’re raised to be safe citizens of the internet.

Protecting children isn’t hard.  Any fool should be able to see that the current government proposal fails across the board at what it’s supposedly sets out to do.  It doesn’t stop the people who want to access restricted content; it doesn’t stop children from being abused by paedophiles.  What it is, is easily by-passed, totally ineffective and a complete waste of money.  The filter is going to send Australia back into the technological dark ages and comes in a stark contrast to the governments other plan to run out a national fibre optic broadband network.  But the important message here (a message that doesn’t seem to be getting through to the government) is that the internet doesn’t molest children.  The internet doesn’t abuse children, it doesn’t ruin their lives.  People do.  It is people that commit these heinous acts.  The internet is a tool for this, not the cause of it.

What happened to Nodar Kumaritashvili on Saturday morning, before the opening ceremony, was nothing short of a tragedy.  Any young person losing their life is a tragedy.  Any person losing their life during an organised sporting tournament is a tragedy.  But using it to grandstand your amusement at the organisers struggling to cope with something so unforseen and so awful is just sick.

Greg Baum, I’m looking at you.

Your column in the Sydney Morning Herald is an insult to Kumaritashvili and a slap in the face of the Vancouver Olympic organisers.  To criticise them for making changes to the luge run, in spite of them saying they didn’t consider it “dangerous” is just stupid.  If they’d done nothing, I guarantee that you’d be near the top of the crowd clamouring for blood.

Can we just put into context just what this sport entails?  You do realise that sliding down an icy chute on a McDonald’s tray at over 100 miles per hour is, in itself, inherently dangerous?  Any activity that involves going fast (driving, catching an aeroplane, skiing, etc) has with it an chance that if it does go wrong then it could be fatal.

“…the track, although faster than expected, was no more dangerous than any other. Nonetheless, they had decided to start the men’s Olympic race from the women’s gate, lower down the mountain.

Officials also said that no amount of padding could guarantee the safety of a luger who flew off the course, but overnight they had the final corner remodelled and streamlined anyway.”

So, I take it by that you’re suggesting that in spite of having a fatal accident occur on the course that they should have done…nothing?  They should have left the track as it was?  You’re fucking kidding me.

They responded to a horrible situation the best they could.  They modified the area of the course where the crash occurred and moved the starting positions for both the men’s and women’s events one spot down the hill (the men started from the women’s spot, while the women start from the “junior” spot).

What else could that have done?  You can’t cancel the event because of one accident – albeit a fatal one – as such risks are part of the sport.  To suggest that the organisers are taking this lightly is just an insane suggestion.  To suggest that they have no respect for the lives of the athletes who participate in the sport is absurd.

Luge is dangerous, but so is driving your car, so is flying in a plane, so is power-boating.  Accidents happen.

I’ve said it before and unless things change I’ll probably say many, many times again before I die: The problem with young drivers isn’t just the drivers themselves.  There are also deep, concerning problems inside the licensing and driver education systems that are supposed to be training these people.

Currently, teenagers learning to drive are taught how to operate a car.  They’re not taught how to drive.  There is a difference between the two; a difference that the RTA, state government (shock!) and some sections of the media don’t seem to understand.

Instead they blame silly things.  They blame the cars, the roads, video games, society, other young drivers, the parents and how they’re even blaming evolution.  They blame everything except themselves.  They refuse to admit that there are serious, fundamental problems with how they approach driver training.

Last week, New South Wales police commissioner Andrew Scipione put forward the idea that violent video games are responsible for the latest spate of accidents on our roads.  I don’t think I need to even go into why that’s a completely stupid and unfounded thing to say.

Just today (Sunday, Feb 14), someone who should know better – Dr John Reid from Monash University – has suggested that young people going for their license should undergo a psychological evaluation to identify if they’re at risk of behaving irresponsibly behind the wheel.    Don’t know about you, if you’re going to identify teenagers that show signs of doing stupid things, then you’re going to catch pretty much every one of them.  This is another stupid, ill-conceived idea that isn’t going to solve the problem of young drivers not knowing how to handle a car when they (inevitably) lose control.

The failings of young drivers come from a system that doesn’t teach them the skills they need to safely drive a car.  While certain external influences may increase the chances of them being involved in an accident, this lack of skills is what is resulting the high number of deaths on Australian roads, especially this year.  The system needs to change.  Fast.

What’s worrying, is how all the people that are supposed to know what’s best for young drivers can’t see the solution that’s staring at them right in the their face.  The easiest thing to do is to make learning to drive part of the school curriculum for year 10 students (in NSW).  Just ensuring that every student gets the same, base learning before even getting behind the wheel would be a key component in ensuring that they have the best skills they could before they’re unleashed on the public roads.

Currently, all learner drivers are not required to undertake professional instruction before attempting their provisional license.  They only have to complete a prescribed amount of hours of supervised driving.  By not having learner drivers complete some sort of professional training they’re missing out on the change of eliminating the bad driving habits of their parents, that will be passed down to them.  Parents do not always make good teachers.  Given the deficiencies in the licensing system it’s not unreasonable to suggest that most parents aren’t fantastic drivers themselves.  Having them pass what they know onto their children on continues the loop of bad, unskilled drivers on the road.

Further to this, learner drivers aren’t taught how to handle a car when they do lose control.  This is probably the most vital skill that a young driver can learn.  It’s pretty much inevitable that at some point within the first years of unsupervised driving a driver will find themselves in a position where they’re not in complete control of their vehicle.  Having the ability to safely regain control or stop a vehicle could make the difference between giving someone a scare and them losing their life.  Having learner drivers complete a defensive driving course before being allowed to drive on our roads should be a complete no-brainer.  Such a program is already compulsory in many overseas nations.

Surely the government and the RTA realise that creating a system where learners are taught how to drive, not just how to operate the controls of a car, would save many more lives than their current, reactionary regulations and restrictions?  Surely.  I mean, how hard can it be?

Of course, no training system will stop certain people being morons.  But there’s nothing that can ever be done to stop people being stupid and making poor life choices.  However, equipping drivers with proper driving skills is save many, many lives that would be otherwise lost.

We’re in trouble.

And not the sort of trouble we can talk ourselves out of either.  We, as a country, are in deep, deep dog shit.  The trouble we’re in is that come the next federal election, regardless of who wins, we lose.  Neither of the two Prime Ministerial candidates, together with those that would form their government, are the people that should be running the country.  In fact, they’re about as far from ideal as you could get.

On one side, we’ve got the incumbent Labor government, led by the Mandarin speaking Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd.   A government that’s basically jumped from one bandwagon to the other for most of their policy, while those they have come up with on their own have been so poorly implemented it would have been better if they just hadn’t done anything at all.

In terms of bandwagon policy we’ve seen Mr Rudd jump on the Great Financial Crisis (drink!) and Climate Change bandwagons.  His policies in both these areas have been nothing short of rushed, short-sighted and reactionary.

Although the global financial crisis came about only months after Mr Rudd’s coming into office, but he jumped at the chance to show that he was an active Prime Minister, taking now time to start dishing out money left, right and centre to anyone who wanted some.  His rash spending accomplished nothing but to rapidly erode the significant budget surplus created over the previous 12 years by the Howard government.   The Labor economic package missed the point when it came to making sure that everyone in this country could be as financially safe as possible.

The financial credit crisis was just that a credit crisis.  What the government did was throw money at tax-payers – basically in an attempt to shore up their post-election popularity – and encouraged them to spend.  What they should have been doing was encouraging people to reduce their credit debt, not create a situation where they may potentially rack up more of it.  What they should have should have been doing was teaching people sound financial management – because I can tell you there isn’t a lot of that out in the world at the moment.  Teach people about saving, spending and getting the best out of what you have.  Teach them that credit cards and pretend money are bad – we’re still one of the nations with the highest amount of credit card debt in the world.  Throwing $900 at them and saying “go shopping! Have fun!” isn’t sound fiscal policy.  It’s a publicity stunt. It’s bad policy, it didn’t help then and all it’s going to do in the future is cause us worse problems (massive budget deficit anyone?).

As for climate change, well, what do I have to say?  Instead of tackling the problem, they decided some sort of bizarre tax/rebate/thing based around the idea of a carbon cap was the best idea. Nuh-uh.  What’s the point in taxing existing industry without providing them with any incentives to either improve their pollution output or research brand new technologies in an attempt to eliminate the problem all together?  Following The War Against Terror (Yeah, TWAT – fitting in more ways than one, really), the world decided that climate change and CO2 levels would be the next big issue.  Kevin happily jumped on that bandwagon as well, signing up to this-than-and-the-other treaties, making promises about carbon targets without so much as a hint as to how or what alternatives he would be proposing.  Again, this is simply poor, short sighted policy that’s dangerous not only now, but into the future.  What are you going to do, Kevin, when the cost of living rises because you’re taxing industry for merely existing? What?

Then we get to their original policies.  You know; the ones that they’ve apparently thought out.  Sadly, the highlights of these policies are the mismanaged National Broadband Network and the utterly idiotic internet filter.

So far the government has spent over $70million of the allocated $43billion and achieved absolutely nothing.  So multiplying that out…you get the point.  The government, though Minister for Communications, Broadband and the Digital Economy Stephen Conroy, has managed to take what should have been a brilliant idea and a great technological leap forward for this country and totally ruin it.  Building a national fibre-to-the-home network really shouldn’t have taken this much stuffing around.  Instead, the government wasted over half a year trying to get their flawed tendering process to yield results before dumping that idea and deciding that they were going to do it themselves.  So far, they’ve built exactly fuck-all of it and there’s no firm timetable for rolling out the rest of it any time soon.  I’m going to be old and grey before I get to use my 100mbps internet connection.

Then, our dear Senator Conroy announced that he wanted to censor the internet because in his mind parents are too irresponsible to monitor what their children do online and need government protection from all those nasty terrorphiles out there.  The plan is nothing short of a direct assault on the freedom I have as an adult to view content that isn’t suitable for young minds.  The fact that some parents aren’t capable/don’t want to know what their children are doing isn’t something that should concern me.  You should impinge on my freedoms because of the actions of others.  It’s not right.  This is without mentioning that EVERY SINGLE technically minded person not only knows that such legislation is pretty much unenforceable but could, without too much effort at all, find out how to bypass it.  Furthermore, this proposal won’t filter out the actual peer-to-peer channels where paedophiles trade their child pornography.  It’s just stupid.  It’s just another ill-conceived, short-sighted, reactionary policy.

The Rudd government, over the two and a half years since they came to office, haven’t made one solid, constructive policy decision that has the potential to actually advance our nation as we move into the future.  Instead they’ve been reactionary, bandwagon jumping, not-quite-thought-out-properly fools who really shouldn’t be at the helm any longer than is necessary.

Unfortunately for us, the alternate choice at the next election is the Liberal/National coalition led by the fundamentalist Christian, extreme right-wing, bigot Tony Abbott.  You can’t say that, on any level, you’d want him leading the country.  If there was any group of people who you’d never want to see in charge of entire country, it’s this lot.  Not only have they only recently emerged from a period of internal turmoil to rival that of the NSW state labor government but  they’ve managed to so successfully blur the line between church and state that I would be surprised if you had to be a confirmed catholic before you were allowed to be a member of parliament.

Following on from their defeat in the 20097 federal election, the Liberal party descended into complete and utter chaos.  It would appear that the iron fist of former Prime Minister John Howard was all that was keeping all the childish factions of the party toeing a single like:  his line.  After his defeat, and subsequent resignation, the party split along several factional lines.  After quite the debate about leadership, the party managed to install Brendan Nelson as their new leader.  This didn’t go so well as Nelson really lacked a lot of the bite required to really get stuck into a government that had just been swept to victory in such an emphatic way.  After a lot of back-room wheeling and dealing they had a leadership spill and put Malcolm Turnbull in charge.  Things then started to look for the Liberals.  Turnbull was smart, slick and really looked as though he would be able to make a decent charge for the 2010 election.  Sadly, this wasn’t to be. Turnbull committed political suicide during the “Ute-gate” scandal and was finally ousted in another leadership spill.

Their most recent leader is none other than former Howard crony, Tony Abbott.  The problem with Tony Abbott is that he’s possibly the single most hated politician currently sitting in parliament.  Abbott’s 1950s opinions of sex, marriage and religion are hideously out-dated.  Abbott is the single person inside parliament who is incapable of separating his personal beliefs from what a rational person would consider the social good.  He’d essentially erase the very important line separating religion and state.  A line that should be one of our closest held political beliefs, regardless of which side of the chamber you sit on.

The main problem for the party as a whole during their leadership struggles is that they have completely failed at their task of being an opposition to the government.  They haven’t been the counter-argument, alternate proposal that a good opposition should be.  Instead they’ve been a collection of whiney school children whose most effect form of rebuttal is to say “nah, you are!” and follow it up by blowing a raspberry and running away.  They’ve let the current government have free reign over the land without as much as a pothole to overcome.  How could you let a party that can’t even handle being critiquing someone else’s ideas come up with their own; let alone have them be good ones.

The one policy they did manage to eventually come up with – which was announced a week or two ago now – was their own ill-conceived climate change plan.  Although different to the governments in ways that I couldn’t be bothered remembering, it still failed to address the problem of increasing the costs of living through rising production costs as manufacturers are taxed for merely existing.  Like the government, the Liberals do not look to encourage development of new, cleaner technology; instead they look to just punish industry because they happen to exist.  This sort of policy, when compared to the government’s offering, is just a really weak alternative.  Both policies miss the same point and both policies will create the same problems.

So, where does that leave us as a country?

Well, in a bit of a bind.  With an inept sitting government and a bunch of lunatics as the alternative choice, the only option left to us is to vote into government one of the single issue minor parties.  That could never go well.  A party that doesn’t have a balanced policy portfolio is always going to struggle to get to grips with the running of a government.  They’d be worse than awful.  So, what do we do?

Sadly, while the idea is simple in theory, in practise it would prove much harder to implement effectively.  The best alternate is to launch a third multi-focus political party.  But, I fear such a thing may never happen.  The Australian political landscape has remained relatively unchanged since we were granted our independence from the British motherland in 1901.  The population is has grown someone comfortable with the binary choice presented to them every 3.x years.  The introduction of a third choice in government is an idea that would have to overcome over a century relative political stability as a result of the existing choices available.  You could understand why people wouldn’t want to upset the applecart by trying something untested and new.

So brace yourselves.  I fear the future, both in the lead up to and after the next election, is going to be more than a little rough.

Science isn’t perfect.  The very nature of experimentation leads to mistakes, possible misunderstanding and, as technology progresses, opportunity to revisit and re-evaluate a position as more accurate methods are created to test a hypothesis.  However, just because you can find fault in the logic of one argument, it doesn’t mean that you then have the right to then call into question every scientific principle that came before it.

This column, written by Guardian columnist Simon Jenkins is nothing more than complete fear mongering.  Posing the question that: if they’re wrong about climate change, what else could they be wrong about?

Well, sir, that is the nature of the beast.

Science is not infallible.  Much like the Pope, really.  It is not 100% correct and any decent scientist wouldn’t hesitate before admitting that a mistake has been made.  However, the complete paranoia and lack of knowledge regarding climate change and global warming has led to there being a lot of conflicting views and information being out there regarding this.  Of course some people are going to have different degrees of passion and discipline in putting your argument forward from both sides.

However, taking this situation and then applying it to all of science over all of history is just awful.

Here’s the thing with science: You prove your hypothesis by either experimentation or observation.  The thing about climate change is that you can’t experiment with nature on the scale the size of a planet.  So that leaves with having to draw a conclusion based off observation.  Now, until we figure out time travel, we’re going to have to wait and see what happens over the next 10, 20, 50 odd years.  We’re going to have to observe what happens in terms of average temperatures, rainfall and ice melting and creation at the South Pole.  We don’t know what’s going to happen.  A lot of what’s been put forward is based off evidence that, frankly, isn’t all that conclusive and taking it to extreme points of view, in both cases is utterly appalling.

Looking back into the past for the events that ended the last ice age, or caused the last global raise in temperatures only provide a small part of the story; because the human influence on the environment is either exceptionally small, or we weren’t there at all.  Not to mention, the climate really hasn’t changed all that much during the small period of time between the industrial revolution (where any noticeable effect on the environment would have started) and now.  To say with undying certainly that we, humans, have altered the environment through greenhouse gas emissions is just stupid.  Not only have we been pumping numerous other noxious chemicals into the atmosphere, we also spent large parts of the 19^th and 20^th centuries callously destroying large sections of forest so we could house our exponentially expanding population.  Don’t think that might have also had something do it with it?  Possibly more so than putting out chemicals, most of which are already there naturally?

Extending this uncertainty then to all branches of science is just ridiculous.  All Mr Jenkins is going here is fear mongering.  People are already uncertain of the science around climate change (look at the popularity of the scary, bug-eyed Lord Monckton) and making them question science generally is only going to lead to fear, uncertainty and doubt about other things.  Planting that seed of doubt is going to drive us backwards as a species.  The voodoo and religious zealots will be able to regain their foothold as the key influencers of the people.  This simply cannot be.  Questioning aspects of science is good thing.  Scepticism is part of the process and only enhances the strength of the arguments that have been questioned.  But to call all of science into question, based off your opinions of an admittedly questionable topic, is sheer lunacy.  It’s pathetic, it’s fear mongering and you, sir, are a moron.