Archive for July 26th, 2011

The Australian misrepresents President Klaus

I’ll have more to say about President Klaus’ address to the National Press Club tonight after I have rewatched it, however I do need to set the record straight on The Australian’s first attempt at an article on the subject.

The majority of the story is accurate, however the end is quite misleading. The article ends thusly:

He was more upbeat about the merits of Coalition’s direct action policy.

“I would say that, in some respect, I would be in favour of direct action,” he said.

“Direct action is visible, understandable and probably people can more easily discuss the cost benefits of such measures.”

This, sadly, is a misrepresentation. Yes, it’s a direct quote, but the context is missing as President Klaus was not “upbeat” about the Coalition’s “Direct Action” policy, in face he went on to call it “crazy” and stated quite clearly that he is opposed to any of the current government or opposition policies on dealing with climate change. As noted elsewhere in the article, he stated that trying to fight the climate is futile, and adaptation is the better approach.

This first attempt was from Joe Kelly and with the exception of the noted problem, was a good article. I don’t know if Mr. Kelly was there or not, but I do know that Christian Kerr from The Australian was there and asked a couple pertinent questions, so I look forward to Mr. Kerr’s article which I trust will be a more full and frank account of the address.

Samuel

July 26th, 2011 at 04:01pm

Solar panels, dogs, and (unrelated) Vaclav Klaus addressing the Press Club

An email to 2UE’s Mike Jeffreys

Good morning Mike,

To answer the question about how solar panels work, the quick and simple version is that they convert light energy in to electrical energy. It is not based on heat or UV rays, although heat can affect the efficiency of the conversion.

That said, before solar panels which created electricity, there were solar panels which used the heat of the direct sunlight to heat water. In Braddon until recently, a nice elderly couple had the oldest solar hot water heater in Canberra. The solar panel was out in the front yard and water was pumped through it for heating. They eventually replaced it due to issues with the hot water tank which was based in the roof space.

A funny story about that couple. They live across the road from the editor of the Canberra Times. In the late 1990s the editor got a new dog which would regularly explore the suburb (it was a nice friendly, but large, dog…the name escapes me) and one of its favourite past-times was stealing the newspaper of the elderly couple and chewing it up.

Every time this happened, the elderly couple would ring the Canberra Times and request a new paper…The CT would usually say that they don’t replace papers chewed up by dogs, until they were informed that the editor’s dog had done the damage, and they would replace the paper with no further questions within the hour. Eventually it got to the point that the couple would merely need to ring the CT and a the people there would just assume that the dog had been at it again and promptly send a man around with a replacement paper.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to seeing the Czech President, Mr. Vaclav Klaus at the Press Club today. I believe it is being televised, but I’m eager enough to hear his views against the global warming nonsense and socialism that I’ve paid to be there.

Have a good day Mike.

Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
(in the fortified bunker of work again)

July 26th, 2011 at 02:03am


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