US military not doing so well...

There is an article at the New York Times about suicide in the US Air Force in general, and talking about one case the writer knew about in detail.  I was surprised by this:

Today, I accept that I can’t change the actions that led up to Neil’s suicide, but I can control actions I take in the future. The Air Force is facing an alarming increase in suicides, with 2019 seeing a rise of about 50 percent compared to last year, and I want to do whatever I can to help do something about it. For instance, I recorded a podcast for the Air Force about losing Neil, as part of a push to teach people that it is normal and healthy to talk about stressors and to seek help. I’ve also had an active hand in the messaging for the recent Resilience Tactical Pause, the Air Force initiative that requires all airmen to stand down for a day to focus on mental well-being, resiliency and suicide prevention.

I wonder why the Air Force, in particular, would be having such an increase?  I thought - maybe the base rate is actually low, and this is just a reversion to more "normal" rate?   But no - it seems that the USAF is expecting perhaps 150 suicides this year, and has about 320,000 active members.   The general rate of suicide in the US is about 13 per 100,000

So yeah, the USAF really is running at a high suicide rate.  Odd.

Still waiting for the brillance of Boris to emerge

Can't say that I have detected any obvious sign of Boris Johnson "winning" at anything yet.

His performance has generally looked embarrassing:  another living example of the Peter Principle.  (His level of competence peaked out at being Mayor of London, it seems.)

Netflix and cultural export

I recently wrote that I liked the way Netflix lets us view a lot of good quality shows from other cultures, and I see that Axios has an article saying that investing in other countries productions is a specific strategy of the company.

This is a good thing, I think.

I think I'm in...

I've been watching various Youtubes of (parts of) the Ring Cycle, and I have to say, the music from Die Walkure (even before it hits the Ride of the Valkyries) is more exciting than I realised.   

As for versions to watch, I've been pretty impressed by the (very different) Copenhagen Ring.  

I'm pretty sure I'm now going to see it in Brisbane - and the only issue is whether I buy restricted view seats close to the action, or a nosebleed seat on the second balcony.   (There are not that many seats left in any category, by the way.)  

Don't see that every day

This story about a flipped cargo ship that transports cars seems not to have attracted much attention on the Australian news:

Four crew were rescued from the propeller shaft room by a hole being cut in the hull.

They got their "morning after", then.  :)

The dire state of water in Jordan

A report in Nature about how Jordan is caught in a real water supply mess:  depleting ground water; climate change affecting rainfall patterns; population increase and the refugee problem; and desalination solution complicated and involves Israel.  

The joke continues

Oh look, Sinclair Davidson has returned to the topic of climate change and carbon taxes, under a post referencing "climate hysteria".   He ends with his longstanding line that, if done right (that is, according to his value judgement that governments must have as little tax income as possible) maybe a carbon tax could be OK:

How did such a modest and potentially beneficial adjustment to the tax code become virtually undiscussable?

Simple answer: because that is not what actually gets implemented. When the carbon tax was implemented in Australia, for example, the revenue was used to expand the welfare state – not reduce the tax burden. Worse – income tax rates to lower income individuals were increased.


Now there is an argument to having a carbon tax where that tax is considered as part of the overall tax system. Then we would have to consider the dead weight losses associated with a carbon tax and the dead weight losses associated with the taxes that it replaces. This would involve an honest debate and evaluation of the technical merits and demerits of a carbon tax.  I have zero confidence given on what we have seen to date that such a debate could or would be possible.

That last line is so disingenuous as to be a complete joke.

How can a person who runs a blog that for years and years and years has been absolutely full of "climate change is not a serious issue, if it exists at all" content complain that it's impossible to have a "proper" debate on a carbon tax?

Does he think people don't notice his hand on the tiptruck pouring bullshit into the well of public discourse while simultaneously claiming that it's impossible to reason with people who want him to stop doing that but won't taste the water?

Looking at 9/11 again

I didn't plan to, but I ended up watching the documentary 9/11: 102 Minutes that Changed America on SBS last night.   (It's available on SBS on Demand.)   I hadn't seen it before, and found it very powerful and affecting. 

If you haven't seen it, it's a documentary made up of mostly amateur footage of what was going on that day, with no voiceover, and only the occasional break away from the chronology of the events.  (It runs for the same 102 minutes from the time of the first impact to the collapse of the second tower.)   It's a strong reminder of the sense of disbelief and anxiety that it induced (at one point, someone on the street says they've heard that there was a threat that a new building would be blown up every 30 minutes.)    It showed people in the World Trade Towers perched outside of windows, but has the good taste to not show people jumping or falling, although they did have some reaction from people who saw it happening.

A few reactions I had:

*  watching it unfold, it feels pretty surprising that the death toll was not substantially higher.   Like people watching in the street, it feels like it wouldn't be surprising if 10,000 had died instead of a few thousand.

*  it's hard to credit how people can possibly believe anything about "controlled demolition" when you watch the buildings burn with great intensity in "real time" before the collapse.  

*  I know people were saying "but they didn't come from Iraq" before the Iraqi invasion, but it's hard to avoid the felling that an invasion of somewhere was going to be inevitable outcome of the event, and Iraq was just the unlucky country.   (Who wants to try to control Saudi Arabia, anyway.)


PS:   Graeme - don't bother commenting your conspiracy stuff - it won't get through.

When things feel climate change-y

I think most South East Queenslanders will be sharing the feeling that when bushfires start burning down 90 year old timber lodges in a subtropical rainforest area not known, in our lifetimes, as being prone to fire at all, this feels like climate change.

I have only ever camped at Binna Burra; most memorably during a Christmas holiday period when a teenager in Navy Cadets, and it poured rain during the couple of days we were there.  With nothing else to do, we still trudged through the rainforest, finding interesting things coming out with the water and sitting in the middle of the path, such as the large, bright blue crayfish that normally stay in the creeks up there.  Also, an enormous variety of earthworm, about a metre long and more than a centimetre wide, if memory serves correct.   Of course, the leeches were out in force, and it was almost impossible to avoid at least one or two.   Some kids, not being as careful as they should, looked like their legs had been shot up when they returned and went to the shower block, as the blood flowed profusely (with the leech bite anti-coagulant effect) from multiple bites up and down their limbs.

Fun.   Feels very sad that the old lodge has gone, as I would have liked to stay there at least once.

Update:  an article at the ABC about how the rainforest in the area does not have a history of burning.

Heh

(Truth be told, I am not as down on George W as most observers, but this call was still obviously wrong.)

Fast takes

*  This Jackie Trad so-called scandal has always seemed to me to be a storm in a teacup.   Politics in Queensland has always been stupid, and there are no signs of it letting up.

* Isn't there something off with the claim that Labor is now the dregs of the middle class who shoot themselves in the foot by being too Green when the Unions that are pro-coal represent mine workers who probably all earn well over $100,000 a year?   In other words, it's not the middle class lording it over the working class - it's a fight within the middle class.

* Anti-coal protesters, if they were serious, would be making plans to superglue themselves to certain central Queensland rail lines, rather than to Brisbane streets.   Superglue 10 people at 200 m intervals to a coal train line, and see how long it takes to remove them would be an interesting start.

* Peter Dutton is now disturbingly weird looking.  Buy a hairpiece, for God's sake.  Some guys' heads can carry off bald:  yours doesn't.

* Donald Trump and the hurricane:  this is so weird, I don't think it is any exaggeration now to say he is mentally unwell.   And to anyone who doubts that - wait until he is gone and we get the true story from people within the White House as to his behaviour.     

* Speaking of which, this piece in Slate a few days ago was good, and accurate:

Governing by Owning the Libs:  When a president’s entire motivation is to antagonize the people who didn’t vote for him.

*  Once Upon a Time in Hollywood has just about topped out at making about $132 million in the US - not that big a hit, I would have thought, even allowing for another $150 million overseas.  For a (apparently) $90 million budget, it's barely making much money for the studio (if the rule of thumb that you have to make 3 times the budget to start turning a profit still applies.)   He's a director whose attraction to critics is not much reflected in actual bucks at the box office anymore.   (Interestingly, I see that Pulp Fiction made about $213 million, but on a claimed $8 million budget.)

Yet more Saturday pics

For someone suffering (what I think was) a bad episode of hayfever this week, Brisbane's weather is not helping.  It's under a dust cloud following a windy change last night: 

Well, you've probably seen worse, but we are used to pretty clear skies here.  The pool is the one on Gregory Terrace, quite liked for the modernist design of the building around it.

I went for a walk around Spring Hill, taking pics of old buildings. 

An old Masonic Temple that's been taken over by the equally mysterious Embroiderers Guild.   Or do the Masons still use the heavily curtained upstairs, I wonder.

A block of old flats (I wonder if strata titled now?) that is in good nick and I have always liked the look of.

Not sure if this is flats, but I only took the pic for the lions on top, as well as the mini flag pole, which makes it look a tad ship like.  

Next:

There are lots of these old workers cottage style houses in Spring Hill, and the latticed in porch is a common feature.  This one is rather extreme:  I get the feeling a Boo Radley character could be observing the passing children from in there, with no risk of being seen.  I always think that any lattice like this must make the house interior very dark.

I was surprised to walk down a side street to find a row of particularly old looking houses:

Maybe it was the open porches that made them look more attractive.  All seem occupied, and it reminded me a bit of some streets around Potts Point or Woolloomooloo in Sydney.

And finally, to ruin the ambiance, possibly the ugliest block of units in Brisbane:

The unit for sale, according to the sign, had "sophistication".  That's real estate talk for you.

Good one, Malaysia

Why would Mahatir be soft on this guy?  Makes little sense to me:

Zakir Naik is an Indian preacher of Islam who currently calls Malaysia home. Described by the Washington Post as a “rock star of tele-evangelism”, he is also a fugitive, having evaded law enforcement in his home country of India since July 2016, when he fled the country within hours of bombers from neighbouring Bangladesh allegedly citing ideological influence from his YouTube videos.

A proponent of austere Salafi Islam, Naik has a long history of provocative rhetoric, including claims that “every Muslim should be a terrorist” and that suicide bombings are a legitimate weapon in war. He has expressed support for the death penalty for apostasy and the belief that Muslim-majority countries shouldn’t allow other religions to build houses of worship.

His television channel, named “Peace TV”, has been banned in India, Bangladesh, and (soon after the 2019 Easter bombings) Sri Lanka. Zahran Hashim, the alleged mastermind of the Sri Lanka attacks, once posted a video for his YouTube followers asking Sri Lankan Muslims what they could do for the celebrity preacher. Naik’s so-called Islamic Research Foundation was banned in 2016 under India’s anti-terror laws for “extolling Osama Bin Laden’s views”. He was charged in absentia in May this year for money laundering, accused of acquiring US$28 million worth of criminal assets.

While many governments in Asia treat Naik with suspicion, Malaysia has given him the red-carpet treatment. Naik has been granted permanent residency status and has attracted crowds of tens of thousands on speaking tours around the Muslim-majority country.

During a sermon to a large audience in the ultraconservative state of Kelantan in early August, Naik questioned the loyalty of Malaysia’s ethnic and religious minorities. He referred to ethnic Chinese Malaysians – many of whose ancestors have lived in Malaya since the early 19th century and constitute around a quarter of the country’s population – as “guests”....

Asked about his opinion on Naik’s remarks, Mahathir claimed that the preacher faces being “killed” if returned to India. “So he is here today, but if any country wants to have him, they are welcome to do so,” the PM said....

 Many see the PM’s tacit support of Naik’s presence in Malaysia as undermining his “Pact of Hope” government’s commitment to progressive values and pluralism, upon which they were elected. It also provides a clear picture of the enduring strength of far-right political Islam and the Malay-dominated status quo – even in the renewed democracy of “new Malaysia”.
 

A dream recorded

Last night, I saw a photo of a tree full of flying foxes, which no doubt then contributed to a dream which involved one of these critters wanting to know what was written on a piece of paper I was carrying.  Yeah, it was talking to me, and flew down to the ground where it showed me a trick whereby it could hold its body in such a way that it resembled, kind of, a cat.  (It was a weird looking transformation.)  I was very surprised, but the flying fox said that they had always been able to do this.  I grabbed my phone to take photos, because I thought this had never been recorded before.  The conversation then moved onto the piece of paper, which had marks on it, but they weren't words.  It sort of petered out from there...

I think it amusing, or odd, that in such a dream it wasn't the animal talking that was the surprise, but what it could do to transform its body.   Dreams are weird...

Goose goes high

Well, I would never have thought this was possible:  

In 1953, a mountain climber reported seeing a bar-headed goose (Anser indicus) soar over the peak of Mount Everest. The nearly 9-kilometer feat—2 kilometers higher than any other animal has been known to fly—was thought physiologically impossible. Now, researchers who raised 19 of the geese—named for the black stripes on the backs of their heads—have shown the birds really do have what it takes to fly so high.

 What bothers me a bit about this is that even at a height just short of most cruising altitudes, aircraft engines could still accidentally suck in a goose...

The ongoing effects of Christianity

Tom Holland, writing in New Statesman:

Repeatedly, throughout Christian history, the communism practised by the earliest Church had given radicals their inspiration. Marx, when he dismissed questions of morality and justice as epiphenomena, was veiling the true germ of his revolt against capitalism behind jargon. The revulsion that Marx so patently felt at the miseries of artisans evicted on to the streets by their landlords to starve, of children aged before their years by toiling night and day in factories, of labourers worked to death in distant colonies so that the bourgeoisie might have sugar with their tea, made a mockery of his claims to have outgrown moral judgements. As with Marx, so with Corbyn: his interpretation of the world appears fuelled by certainties that have no obvious source in his model of economics. It rises instead from profounder depths. If it offers a liberation from Christianity, then it is one that seems eerily like a recalibration of it.

Let's see how the appeal goes

Don't think I ever commented on the Peter Ridd dismissal case.

I see that Anthony Watts and the IPA are all excited that he got a big damages award from Judge Vasta, who was the subject of an article "Could Salvatore Vasta be Australia's Worse Judge" in February this year, before the Ridd case.

Given Vasta's somewhat hyperbolic sounding words reported today...:

Outlining his final declarations and penalties, Judge Salvatore Vasta suggested the university's conduct bordered on "paranoia and hysteria fuelled by systemic vindictiveness" and Dr Ridd must have felt he was being persecuted. He found the academic's intellectual freedom had been undermined by the "myopic and unjustified actions of his lifelong employer"....

Judge Vasta ordered a payment of $1.09 million in damages and compensation for lost wages and superannuation. Another $125,000 is to be paid to Dr Ridd as a penalty to "deter both this university and any other employer from dismissing an employee for exercising basic workplace rights".

...I suspect that the IPA should not be popping the champagne until the appeal is finished.

Stupid Shapiro

Yes, Ben Shapiro is a twit.  I liked these tweet responses to his whiny Right wing complaint when a company makes a perfectly reasonable decision as to how it wants to run its business:

Some clean up

Two of the worst looking hurricane damage photos I have seen from the Bahamas (found at an Axios post):

Boris not so hot in Parliament

Before Boris Johnson got the top job, I was saying to his sympathisers here that it seemed to me that most observers long thought he was not a particularly good parliamentary performer.

Most journalists commenting on the situation now seem to agree that Corbyn has been sounding surprisingly good, and Johnson is continuing his underperformance.  

Good.