![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Abortion and Democracy, Land Taxes, Neotopia, the New Zealand Option (Part III), Unitarian News, Tax
Cardinal Pell's recent comments represent an act of religious bigotry against Islam and an attack attack democratic right. He asks: Does democracy need a burgeoning billion-dollar pornography industry to be truly democratic? Does it need an abortion rate in the tens of millions?.
What Mr. Pell doesn't understand, because he has a theological perspective on such matters, that the right to engage in self-regarding acts, and the right to engage in consensual acts with other people is "dignity" is a democratic society. Universal rights are a good in themselves. On a related issues, despite the Prime Minister's assurances.
Cabinet to discuss abortion. Ho hum. Didn't see that coming did we?
First political change for me this week was joining Prosper Australia, a body which advocates the removal of taxes on production (income, company, GST etc) and
their replacement with resource rentals. It's a position which every economist from Karl Marx to Milton Friedman agrees with but politicians tends to avoid. Besides, there are some powerful vested interests even when it does work, as
Denmark once discovered.
Second big political change is neoptopia, an online political theory and "nation-building" excersise. A little bit like Jennifer Government: Nation-States, I suppose, but more rigorous.
Whilst the conservative partisanGerald Henderson can barely hide his glee that Julian Burnside hasn't hopped on the 'plane to New Zealand or Canada yet, has anyone noticed that Air New Zealand are offering discounted one way tickets? I wonder why. Further investigations have also lead me to discover that New Zealand has quite
a history of resource rents as a means of public funding. Good.
Next Sunday is the Melbourne Unitarian Church's one hundred and fifty-second anniversary, and the speaker will be Sister Brigid Arthur from the Brigidine Asylum Seekers Project. Yours truly will be conducting the service which is a great honour given both the time and the topic, although I'm still searching for an appropriate text for the reading.
Last Sunday's presentation was James Nevein (who is actually a Quaker), from the Uniting Church's Kildonan Child and Family Services speaking on Family Violence. He did a fairly good job, and especially managed to tie in family violence to economic circumstances which of course, is something that conventional wisdom often forgets. At the Church committee meeting afterwards, I was put forward as a delegate to the ANZUA conference in Christchurch (NZ) next year.
Financially, the past year has been absolutely appalling for me. My income has been at its lowest for several years at least, even lower than my volunteers allowance in East Timor. I'm not flat broke yet, but recently paying a $1 100 tax bill (all HECS) from two years ago, thanks to the poor administration at the Parliament of Victoria wasn't helpful. Fortunately, the business side of things is looking up. In the next two weeks I have no less three major web-development projects to carry out. It'll be a little while before the money comes in but there's light at the end of the tunnel.
Meanwhile, Red Friday Issue 4 has been produced and circulated with a special article encouraging community organizations and small businesses into networking and an article introducing networking technologies. The next issue's article is on "help desk horror stories" (the sort of thing that comes from alt.tech-support.recovery for example). Anyone have some silly tales out there?
Last week I promised to do a chart comparing state graduation rates with voting distribution. Well, I finished it and there's a slight difference. Pearson correlation coefficients do indicate that Democrat votes do more strongly correlate with Republican votes compared with graduation rates on a state-by-state basis.(Chart will be posted in four hours after this post - it's at work). OK, it's up now..
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
catbiscuit alerts me to
an apology. Whereasbegedel has found a 'blog in Iraq with something to say. Some harsh words (with more than a modicum of truth) from rilian; Fuck The South.
Finally,patchworkkid provides the disturbing news that electronic voting and exit polls don't mix. Explain this please (brainbreaker for the week):
"In several swing states, and EVERY STATE that has Electronic Voting (but no paper trails) they have an unexplained advantage for Bush of around +5% when comparing exit polls to actual results. In EVERY STATE that had paper audit trails on their Electronic Voting, the exit poll results match the actual results reported within the margin of error. So, we have MATCHING RESULTS
for exit polls vs. voting with audits vs. A 5% unexplained advantage for Bush without audits."
What Mr. Pell doesn't understand, because he has a theological perspective on such matters, that the right to engage in self-regarding acts, and the right to engage in consensual acts with other people is "dignity" is a democratic society. Universal rights are a good in themselves. On a related issues, despite the Prime Minister's assurances.
Cabinet to discuss abortion. Ho hum. Didn't see that coming did we?
First political change for me this week was joining Prosper Australia, a body which advocates the removal of taxes on production (income, company, GST etc) and
their replacement with resource rentals. It's a position which every economist from Karl Marx to Milton Friedman agrees with but politicians tends to avoid. Besides, there are some powerful vested interests even when it does work, as
Denmark once discovered.
Second big political change is neoptopia, an online political theory and "nation-building" excersise. A little bit like Jennifer Government: Nation-States, I suppose, but more rigorous.
Whilst the conservative partisanGerald Henderson can barely hide his glee that Julian Burnside hasn't hopped on the 'plane to New Zealand or Canada yet, has anyone noticed that Air New Zealand are offering discounted one way tickets? I wonder why. Further investigations have also lead me to discover that New Zealand has quite
a history of resource rents as a means of public funding. Good.
Next Sunday is the Melbourne Unitarian Church's one hundred and fifty-second anniversary, and the speaker will be Sister Brigid Arthur from the Brigidine Asylum Seekers Project. Yours truly will be conducting the service which is a great honour given both the time and the topic, although I'm still searching for an appropriate text for the reading.
Last Sunday's presentation was James Nevein (who is actually a Quaker), from the Uniting Church's Kildonan Child and Family Services speaking on Family Violence. He did a fairly good job, and especially managed to tie in family violence to economic circumstances which of course, is something that conventional wisdom often forgets. At the Church committee meeting afterwards, I was put forward as a delegate to the ANZUA conference in Christchurch (NZ) next year.
Financially, the past year has been absolutely appalling for me. My income has been at its lowest for several years at least, even lower than my volunteers allowance in East Timor. I'm not flat broke yet, but recently paying a $1 100 tax bill (all HECS) from two years ago, thanks to the poor administration at the Parliament of Victoria wasn't helpful. Fortunately, the business side of things is looking up. In the next two weeks I have no less three major web-development projects to carry out. It'll be a little while before the money comes in but there's light at the end of the tunnel.
Meanwhile, Red Friday Issue 4 has been produced and circulated with a special article encouraging community organizations and small businesses into networking and an article introducing networking technologies. The next issue's article is on "help desk horror stories" (the sort of thing that comes from alt.tech-support.recovery for example). Anyone have some silly tales out there?
Last week I promised to do a chart comparing state graduation rates with voting distribution. Well, I finished it and there's a slight difference. Pearson correlation coefficients do indicate that Democrat votes do more strongly correlate with Republican votes compared with graduation rates on a state-by-state basis.
catbiscuit alerts me to an apology. Whereas
begedel has found a 'blog in Iraq with something to say. Some harsh words (with more than a modicum of truth) from rilian; Fuck The South. Finally,
patchworkkid provides the disturbing news that electronic voting and exit polls don't mix. Explain this please (brainbreaker for the week):"In several swing states, and EVERY STATE that has Electronic Voting (but no paper trails) they have an unexplained advantage for Bush of around +5% when comparing exit polls to actual results. In EVERY STATE that had paper audit trails on their Electronic Voting, the exit poll results match the actual results reported within the margin of error. So, we have MATCHING RESULTS
for exit polls vs. voting with audits vs. A 5% unexplained advantage for Bush without audits."
no subject
Five percent sounds like a lot - until you compare it to the margin of error in the other states - three or four percent.
Also of note from that article is the following; Tuesday's exit polls were a major shift from several pre-election public polls that showed Bush with a small but definite lead over Kerry of 1 to 3 percentage points. That turned out to be right on the money, a victory for the pollsters' often-criticized art.
Also, from the same article - The Bush people saw major defeat: Preliminary numbers showed the president a staggering 20 points behind in Pennsylvania and losing in every other closely contested state. - both of which turned out not to be true.
no subject
The exit polls were, in general, terrible. However, when you have such a consistent correlation such s the one indicated in common dreams there's a problem - because it's not the relative accuracy of the polls themselves, but the relative accuracy of the correlation that's important.
no subject
Oh, and btw, the link for Fuck the South doesn't work properly.
no subject
Hey, no need to exclude relatives ;-)
the link for Fuck the South doesn't work properly.
Does know.. Left out the http prefix on the tag... Bleh.
no subject
Not at all!! I guess it will end up going back to being illegal then... great, just what I always wanted, to revisit (not that I was around the first time) the 50s!!!
And don't forget,they will be discussing industrial relations/dismissal regualtions as well. That should be fun. I love the idea of being in fear for my job all the time
no subject
*grumble*
no subject
no subject
I can certainly understand why people get angry when some wealthy middle-aged man points the finger at poor young women and says "No, it's morally wrong for you to terminate that pregnancy and I'm going to stop you."
Such an argument is almost reason for the implementation of post-natal abortion.
no subject
no subject
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated..
no subject
Depends on who you want to influence and what your politics are.
The Women's Electoral Lobby however are a good choice to start with. The Vic Representative is Jo-Anne Crawford. Her email address is: repvic@wel.org.au
Ho hum nothing!
If you don’t think this cacophony adds up to a determined political assault on women’s reproductive freedom then you are being very naïve. This is the breeding creed at full roar. And this is unprecedented.
We have never had a federal health Minister crusade against a legal medical procedure in this fashion before. We have never had a deputy Prime Minister and the Governor General jump in as well.
And are they being curbed? Hardly. A few women Liberal MPs have stood up for women’s right to choose, which is necessary and about time, but where are the male political heavyweights. I don’t find it all reassuring that the treasurer has jumped in merely to remind people that abortion law is a state matter. I hardly think this constitutes a rebuttal of what his colleagues are up to.
Re: Ho hum nothing!
Indeed. Anne Summers has managed to point of the issues very succinctly. I also suspect that the "tactical retreat" of the Prime Minister is just that. This was "merely testing the water". The issue will come up again - I suspect around the sale of Telstra or the next Federal election.
I guess some people think others just don't know how to manage their own bodies :/
Re: Ho hum nothing!
Re: Ho hum nothing!
Well, yes of course. It stands to reason that if one person is saying that "no, you can't do that" that there is a hierarchy of authority.
no subject
Yep, that will most certainly be their most important attack in the next few months. I suspect raising the abortion issue was simply a case of testing the waters.
The conservative agenda is really getting quite obvious. Traditional (i.e., church-dervied) morality along with pre-Keynesian economics.
Of course, they should have a look at the "success" of Australia's worst Prime Minister, Stanley Bruce, to see where that got us.
no subject
And seeing what they can get away with before the new year starts! It will not be a good or enjoyable experience to see just how conservative Australia will become over the next three years, I mean isn't already a fairly conservative country? There is definitely no need for it to retreat back a few decades.
Unfortunately (or fortunately) I have to admit my ignorance to Stanley Bruce's government. Was he the PM that came from Melbourne and lived in St Kilda??
The Worst Prime Minister of Australia
Born in St. Kilda, on Grey Street.
He ran a policy of "men, money and markets" during the 1920s. He dressed like a toff, spoke like a "proper Englishman" (i.e., not Australian), sneered like someone who knew his place in society (i.e., at the top), and drove around in a Rolls Royce. He loathes the poor in general and especially unions (nothing worse that organized workers.
During his term in office unemployment was always high, wages were always low, national production plummetted, loans were rare, but susidies were maintained for the big agricultural interests even as wheat and wool prices collapsed.
In 1929 he tried to abolish federal abritration and his backbenchers revolted. In the subsequent election he was so unpopular as Prime Minister he even lost his own seat.
He hated Australia, and Australian radicalism in particular. Although he regained his seat in Parliament in 1931, he resigned a couple of years later to take up the position of High Commissioner in London. He reportedly said that Australia had nothing to offer him. The contrary proposition apparently didn't enter his mind.
One positive: he did establish the CSIRO.
Re: The Worst Prime Minister of Australia
Why is it that I can see that this is exactly what will happen again under the Howard Govt?? Everyone will be in fear of their jobs if the dismissal laws change, thus leading to them accepting the low wages, increased hours etc
Caseopaya thinks she might run away
Re: The Worst Prime Minister of Australia
The similarity between Howard and Bruce has not gone unnoticed. Except Howard is smarter.
no subject
fuck the south starts out so historically inaccurate as to be worthless in my book -- New England was not the powerhouse of the "founding fathers" -- Virginia was!
no subject
Virginia was!
*nods* Jefferson. Although I suspect as a "founding" state the author may even include Virginia as part of the team (even tho' they're a "red state"). Hmmm "Red State" used to mean something quite different.
I wonder what the world would look like if Napolean didn't sell off such huge tracts of land to fund his European adventures?
no subject
4 of the first 5 presidents, principal author of the constitution (James Madison)
It is hard to argue that Virginia is anything except southern -- seceded and was the seat of the confederacy for a time;
You raise an interesting point about the makeup and influence of the US absent the louisiana purchase.
Also: I had a little trouble (as a not statistician type) figuring out what your chart represented?
As to election results, I think the county map is far more telling than the state map -- The blue areas are major urban centers, and the red is more rural.
no subject
I wrote it in response to those IQ versus voter charts that have been floating about.
OK, the primary columns are percentage of vote for Presidential candidates and percentage of graduates from each state. The weighted values multiply the percentage for each candidate by the electoral votes (which I assume are at least somewhat proportional to population).
The Pearson correlation coefficient is between that weighted value and the state graduation rate. The result indicates that there is a stronger (iirc about 30%) correlation between high school graduation and voting for Kerry, compared to high school graduation and voting for Bush.
It's far from perfect of course. I would have preferred to use a county-by-county test and use direct population figures rather than weighted from electoral college votes. So the results are merely indicitive.
The best study of course would be to record how each person votes and compare that to their graduation record. However, I suspect some may object to that. ;-)
I think the most interesting discovery (for me, anyway) is that the north central states have such high rates of high school graduation and are so solidly Republican.
I think the county map is far more telling than the state map -- The blue areas are major urban centers, and the red is more rural.
*nods* Very important. The most significant correlation of them all.
Unitarian church Sunday
jemima_petal@yahoo.com.au
looking at Church of Euthanasia stuff. They have their heads on straight, by all accounts.
Thankyou