Episode 46 of Stilgherrian Live, the Zeitgeist Edition, is now online for your viewing pleasure.
We had a strong field of nominations for “Cnut of the Week”, and it was tough selecting the shortlist. However we eventually saw Rupert Murdoch in 4th place (11%) for his insistence that we somehow pay for news online; Wynyard Baptist Church in 3rd place (22%) for their religious intolerance, and the Australian Football League came in 2nd (30%) for their legal attacks on a fan website which actually supports their sport.
The clear winner of “Cnut of the Week”, though, was Australia’s Prime Minister Kevin Rudd (37%) for delaying the introduction of an emissions trading scheme (ETS).
As my friends over at newmatilda.com point out, Monday’s announcement amounts to Rudd breaking his first major election promise. But apart from that, it’s a clear failure to take action on the most important long term issue facing this country and, indeed, the world.
Not happy, Kevin.
Meanwhile, congratulations to deanlk, who won a t-shirt from our friends at King Cnut Ethical Clothing via his nomination for the journos and obit writers who got duped by a fake quote in Wikipedia.
Stilgherrian Live will return at 9.30pm next Thursday night Sydney time.
As Mark Newton is wont to point out, the ALP also made an election commitment to change the date of Australia Day. And then, http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/01/26/2474310.htm
Whether this should be considered a “major election promise” is obviously open for debate, but still…
Maybe he should adopt Howard’s “Core/Non-Core” system :-Þ
Toejam: What I find interesting about that ABC story is that while Mick Dodson simply called for a debate, both Rudd and Turnbull essentially asserted without evidence that there was no need. Once more it makes a mockery of Rudd’s claim to be all about “evidence-based policy”.
I can understand that he might feel — rightly or wrongly — that there’s more important issues to focus on just now. The government and media only has so much attention span. But I think it’s about time that politicians of al flavours started to understand that we all decide what the agenda is.
Then again, Dodson could just get the debate going anyway, and the Prime Minister can join in or not, as he wishes…