Open mike 30/07/2010

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, July 30th, 2010 - 18 comments
Categories: open mike - Tags:

Open mike is your post.

It’s open for discussing topics of interest, making announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose.

Comment on whatever takes your fancy.

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Step right up to the mike…

18 comments on “Open mike 30/07/2010 ”

  1. Chris Carter.

    Please shut the f up.

    • thespiritofd4j 1.1

      “Maybe Chris with spare time on his hands can go back to school and learn to read and write properly?
      Helen and Heather are fuming in the Big Bad Apple. What a rainbow of deceit and lies New Zealand politics is. Will we EVER be free of such low down fools?”

    • joe bloggs 1.2

      well – what a bunch of fucking backstabbers youse mob’s turned into, huh?

  2. joe90 2

    Some links.

    Climate change ‘undeniable’.

    The dead sea.

    Peter Sinclair in two parts.

    Crock 1.

    Crock 2.

  3. joe90 3

    More on Phytoplankton.

    A new study concludes that an old, fundamental and widely accepted theory of how and why phytoplankton bloom in the oceans is incorrect.

  4. jcuknz 4

    Considering the hundred thousand plus troops in Afghanistan .. what it cost for just 245 of them would provide enough money to educate every child in the country … and out of education comes progress.
    http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/29/opinion/29kristof.html?th&emc=th
    My innitial reaction was, without the troops how can the schools survive? But apparently that is not correct becuase already there are 300 schools operating without Taliban attention/destruction.
    This is a big question for America but if they cut back what will be the effect on demobed troops on the already gross unemployment in the country? Along with the cut back in the production of war materials leading to further redundancies … altogether a tragic situation for the American people with capitalism ruling the roost.

    • prism 4.1

      Perhaps the USA troops can go back to school, learn new trades, skills, how to run small businesses. After WW2 many men got university degrees, retraining, on peacetime scholarships. Then the pent-up energy and surge of people into the labour market could become part of the renewal of USA commerce.

      • Lanthanide 4.1.1

        Or it could just add to their already high unemployment.

        The military-industrial complex is primarily pushed by state senators as a way to provide employment in their states for ‘defense’ contracts.

        All of that money going into the military pays people and keeps them employed.

        This is the same reason why Peak Oil is going to be so disasterous – sure, people don’t need their cheap junk from China, their fancy cars, boats, clothes, perfumes, exotic foods, latest tech gadgets etc. But if you cut them out of society because they cost too much in a Peak Oil world, employment drops through the floor and along with it tax revenue and then the whole state falls over – say goodbye to pensions, healthcare and education.

        • Pascal's bookie 4.1.1.1

          I’m pretty sure that when the troops come home the pentagon will have a massive ‘lessons learned’ project.

          This will provide congress with multiple metric tonnage of paper explaining precisely how and where things went wrong, and exactly which type of trillion dollar research and development programme needs to be implemented forthwith to update the warfighting needs of the the republic, going forward, as she moves in the dangerous new environment.

          The old model has failed. The new model will not be as cheap.

      • eye saw 4.1.2

        I see the L.A. times is reporting that state run chinese media has been beating war drums over the US/korean exercises just been held.

  5. prism 5

    The Great Example to us all – California is continuing to go broke. That is after the people so smartly considered and voted for so many things in referenda. Hasn’t saved them from troubles.

    Now they have the idea of processing marijuana legally so they can tap this commerce with taxes. How could they even think this! The sky will fall if that happens. And when trying to nail an annoying crim a ‘plant’ of marijuana hidden somewhere for police to find won’t be the useful crime-fighting tool as in the past.

    • Lanthanide 5.1

      In the nothern California counties, marijuana is practically their primary industry. They haul in cash from the rest of California and Oregon, cash which is untaxed.

      If/when marijuana is de-criminalised/legalised, the prices will drop and these northern counties will have their economies wiped out. On the other hand, it might also weaken the drug cartels in Mexico.

      All actions have consequences.

  6. Draco T Bastard 6

    We need something like this.

    It’s not quite being at the controls of the Starship Enterprise. But it’s on the way there.

    As from today, you can sit at your laptop or your workstation and redesign UK energy policy for the next 40 years. That’s you. Yes, you.

    It’s simple. You do it using the software the British Government is using itself, and you can pick your own range of policies and measures that will keep the lights on, in the face of looming global threats to energy supply, while simultaneously cutting Britain’s emissions of carbon dioxide, the principal greenhouse gas, by 80 per cent as the Government has pledged.

    Throw in some online voting and we’ll be taking another step to that Open Government that Labour’s Clare Curran was talking about. It would actually make people feel involved in the running of their country and, IMO, we’d start to see an economy based around real resources rather than the delusional capitalist market.

    EDIT: Actually, something like that for the household so people can see what their decisions mean before they make them would be awesome as well. Choice between light bulbs (energy efficient or old style) shows the full costs in environmental damage and price.

  7. BLiP 7

    Where’s our “Friday Funny” – I could do with a good chuckle after this week!

    [lprent: let me see what I can do… Busy day.]

  8. Pascal's bookie 8

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LA-Wfa87jg4&feature=related

    Dunno about funny, but in my, err, faith tradition, friday has certain sacramental obligations.

    Old school redneck music, from the west virginia branch of redneckery, which is a whole ol diffrint kettle of mash from that sunburnt crop farming red clay cracker bidness.

  9. Herodotus 10

    Was Chris the first to jump ship, now another Chris has abandoned the Good Ship Labour, or at least moved from the left to the right !!
    Labour MP Chris Carter
    Right-wing political commentator Chris Trotter discusses the fallout over Labour MP Chris Carter’s suspension from caucus after he anonymously posted letters to press gallery reporters over friction within the Labour party – and then was found out for it.

    http://tvnz.co.nz/breakfast-news/breakfast-friday-july-30-3679113

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