Kids in Cars

Its not often i write about depressing issues such as death, and the road toll, but last weekend, a group of teenagers got into a car and they never managed to get out. It was reported in the newspapers that speed played a significant part in their demise. A day before that horrific crash, a21 year old was luckily pulled over for exceeding the speed limit by a whopping 131 kmph.

A radio broadcaster was discussing these events this morning, seeking answers to questions such as "why do young drivers speed?" , "why aren't the TAC's messages(Drink and drive our a bloody idiot/arrive-alive/speed-kills) making a noticable difference to the road toll" , "what can we do to lower the road toll?" etc.

He sought far and wide for reasons, explanations and answers, but amongst his callers, i don't think he ever asked a driver between the ages of 16-25. Although it would seem quite pertinant to ask the so called "target group" for answers to the aforementioned questions, the general consensous amongst the so-called "older and wiser" is that they know what's best, and that they know what/when and why youngsters behave as they do. "I was once your age" they'd claim, but surely things have changed over the years, man-kind has progressed, Darwin called it evolution, some might call it regression(the fact that we are killing ourselves by abusing machines we created is ironic, like a plot-line out of the Matrix??)

Call it what you may, but the cold fact is that youngs drivers are putting themselves, and their passenger friends in dangerous, life threatening situations by driving under the influence of alcohol and /or drugs, and driving at excessive speeds. The preceeding situations that young adults find themselves in have hardly changed in over 50 years. Alcohol has always been an instrument of social cohesion and celebration. Responsible consumption of alcohol has always been a problem for modern western society. Thousands of people across many age groups have struggled to limit their alcohol intake to that which is considered a safe and responsible level.

Public figures have been shamed in the media for acting irresposibly after having more than one too many drinks. The problem is alomost endemic, and reversing the nations' drinking culture will no doubt help reduce the number of deaths related to alcohol abuse.

The "speeding culture" of many young Australian's is with out doubt an age related problem. Anyone who says otherwise is talking nonsense. It's not generational, its not a sign of the times, its prely age-related. History shows that ever since cars where affordable, the number of deaths amongst young adults where higher than the rest of the population. Young adults are by nature impatient, hurried and have more demands on their time than ever before. Driving fast is without doubt the simplest solution to getting to their destination faster.

While i don't condone such behaviour, i undersand it, and those seeking to have a positive impact upon the problem must do so quickly , or else risk missing the problem completely. Why young adults are driven ( forgive the pun) to speed from one destination to another is another underlying "fault" of the human condition. Its well known that young-adults think of themselves as invincable, reckless levels of over-confidence, mis-placed faith in their own abilities, both to drive and to consume alcohol turn a self reliant, self-confident, headstrong young adult into a dangerous liability on the roads.

A few years back, a spate of high-school shootings and classroom violence sparked an international debate over how absorbant children and young-adults are to violent video-games, music, tv-programming and the coverage of violent incidents by journalistsin the news-media.
Strangely, the interconnected issue of how absorbent young adults are to car racing games such as Gran Turesmo, Need for Speed etc etc, and movies such as Fast and the Furious, Gone in 60 Seconds etc etc .

In my humble opinion, the number of young adults, boys in particular, who are attracted to enourmously powerful cars, with exorbitantly priced customizations, which they showcase proudly to their friends at illegal, impromtu meetings has increased ever since the turn of the century. No coincedence I think, since 2001s premier of The Fast and the Furious , more and more action movies premised around street-racing have enjoyed box-office success.

Such cultures have to be firmly, but gently removed from the mainstream media, because driving them "underground" will only lead to the mess experienced overseas, a situation no well-wishing policy maker wants.

The Problems with Australian News-Media

The Australian news media love a good tale. Not unlike other news services, the australian New stations like a story that captures and engages their target audience. But how often do they actually report the news that matters.
The last month has seen some big news around the world. The furore over alleged voting irregularities in Iran, the upcoming elections in Afganistan, the continuing wars in Afganistan and Iraq, the world-wide spread of Swine-flu, the response to the Global Financial Crisis, and of course the seemingly out-of sight,out-of-mind human rights abuse in Dafur.
In Australia, the government has been making news with its attempts to get an Emmisions Trading scheme through both houses of Parliament, coupled with an equally controversial Clean/Solar Energy Bill. Indian students have been making their presence left over the last few weeks, after being a string of allegedly racially motivated assaults in Victoria and New South Wales.

But the news media, on TV, radio and the interent don't ever do any real analysis of the underlying issues. Why bother when you can lift a piece for a news scource like Reuters or AAP, and make bold headlines that attract attention without accurately representing the story. I'll give you an example. On Friday, the Age.com.au reported under its breaking news header,"Australia's First Swine-Flu Death". Without a doubt, it grabbed my attention, i was pretty relaxed about swine flu, as all the reports i had read from Mexico and the USA said that the people who had died from Swine Flu had died because of other illnesses and that the strain of influenza known as Swine Flu was virulent but had mild symptoms and was overall, not very dangerous. The story took some time unfolding on the Age's website, and after 10 or so minutes, it revealed that the person who had died, had Swine Flu as one of many other chronic illnesses, which caused complications leading to his demise. IN summary, a poor bloke living out in the middle of desert in Western Australia, miles away from any decent health care, had died from complications to his various chronic ailments, and he so happened to be diagnosed with a disease that's currently a buzz-word for news paper editors!

Another grievance i have with Australian News outlets is their lack of detailed analysis of the GFC, and what the world's governments are doing to try and reduce the severity, longevity and impact of Recession. Last night, World News Australia(SBS) ran a story on how the American Senate are complaining that Barack Obama is trying to "make a grab for power". They included a short clip of a senator addressing the House, using a strange analogy to question why Obama either needed the power to pass those reforms, without actually mentioning what those reforms are, why they are needed nor why Obama needs executive power to get those reformns passed.
Do they think the Australian public don't care? Or are we simply not smart enough to understand the complicated world of politics, finance and economics?
Isn't it the media's duty to make the complex understandable? To inform the population as to what is being done by governments to make the world a better place?

If the media can't do their job, how are the people of the nation going to inform themselves of the issues that matter. Especially in a year that may end up being an election year, after Rudd and Co's inability to bow to the overwhelming tide of logical arguement presented by the Coalition and the greens in against their "packaged" Emmisions trading scheme, the media should be presenting all sides of these highly politized stories. Portraying either side of politics in a negative light is wrong, and clouds the judgment of the population, who must be kept aware of the dealings of the Government, immaterial of the nature of the story. Developments should be analysed by correspondents, giving the viewer the neccesary background information to contextualize the incidents, and in time form their own opinions.

The current media coverage of politics in Australia is playing into the LAbor government's hands, the media is potraying the Turnbull and his Liberals in a bad light, and although they are demanding what is right for the country, the propaganda machine that is Kevin Ruddis spinning a great yarn to the media to cast himself as the victim. Watching the news, it seems like he's getting away with daylight robbery, and the population are none the wiser.

Northern Reds, why Manchester United are so much better than Liverpool

I'm hoping Chelsea drop as many points as possible, so that Liverpool start getting overconfident and sloppy again. Liverpool aren't a real threat to our full strength line-up. Line-for-Line we are better than them.

VDS, Foster, Kuzszack,Heaton Amos, Zieler >REINA, Cavalieri, Gulácsi,Hansen.

Ok, Reina may have won Golden Gloves a couple of times, and may make some great saves, but he's never won any important domestic silverware there, fluck that they won the Champs league after letting in 3 to AC Milan. VDS and Co. have a harder job of not falling asleep behind UNited's defence, and remaing alert to the one-or two shots that actually get past the back-four.

Rafael,Neville, Brown,Eckersley, Simpson, Rio, VIDIC ,Evans, Chester, Evra, O'Shea,Fabio > Dossena,Degen, Hyyypia, Agger, CARRAGHER, Skrtel, Arbeloa, Aurelio, Insua, Kelly Carby,.

Absolutely no doubt, UNited's defence is about 5 times better, both technically and physically than Liverpool's. Taller, Better Faster Stronger!!

RONALDO, Park, Nani, Tosic, Martin?, Giggs, Scholes, CARRICK,Anderson, Fletcher, Gibson,Possebon, Cleverley, Hargreaves > GERRARD, Alonso, Mascherano, Reira, Pennant?, Babel, Benayoun, El Zhar, Spearing, Plessis.

Other than Gerrard and Mascherano, we have them covered 2: 1in every depeartment, so much so, i'd even hazard a theory than Ando can keep Gerrard quiet, and Carrick, Giggs and Scholes can overpower Masch. Therefore, when we play them,a 5 man midfield will overpoer them easily, and win us the game.

Rooney, Tevez, BERBATOV, Welbeck, Macheda, King, Ajose, Brandy?,Campbell?, Manucho? > TORRES, Keane, Kuyt, N'Gog, Linfield, Ecclestone.

Hands down, Torres is the best forward there, but as a unit, United's Trio are more effective and more dangerous than Liverpool's. Now that Keane and Kuyt's careers as strikers have effectivly been killed by Rafa, the task of actually scoring weighs enourmously heavy on Nando, i don't think he'll cope, probably buckly under the pressure and tear his hamstring again.

With liverpool's title aspirations resting heavily on the shoulders of Reina, Carragher, Gerrard and Torres, they are paper thin and prone to failure, unless Alonso and Keane step up and deliver( which would require them to be on the pitch, in the first place, hint,hint, nudge,nudge, Rafa! ). Whereas SAF uses all 30+ members of his squad to win multiple trophies. Even though we all rode the Ronaldo wave(ably assisted by Rooney, Nani, Ando and the defence) last year, this year, everyone seems to be chipping in and contributing to a possble quaddie!

Man City's wealth, the death of Football

With City and Chelsea being bought by oil magnates, and other clubs being owned by somewhat-less rich billionaires and millionaires, football has become more than a sport, and has become wholely commercial. Kaka's transfer from Milan to City will hopefully be seen as a rarity, but with the possible transfer of CR7 to Real also being of that value, it may become commonplace to spend 100's of millions of dollars on players. 10years ago, a 20-30mil fee was seen as huge, and even now, people wonder whether Tevez and Berba are worth 30mil each. When Rio, Veron and Rooney were bought, 30mil was alot of money, but with inflationary pressures, tax rises and other costs involved with playing and running a club, the amount of money coming in has also increased, and deservedly or not, players and their agents have sought, and consequently been given, higher sums. These are being sourced from higher TV rights deals, and higher ticket prices, ( just imagine what the big-four would do if half their stadium were empty each week for a season. )

These creates commercial tiers inside the BPL, with City up there on their own at the top, Chelsea, United, Liverpool, Aston Villa, Tottenham, and Arsenal forming the rich clubs, of which Newcastle and Everton are hoping to become. This has formed gradually over the years, with only United, Arsenal & Liverpool , really deserving of their current financial stature, having won something significant before coming into wealth.This leaves the "rich" clubs in such a position so as to use the "poor" clubs as feeders. for example, if West Ham had had the resources to have kept Rio Ferdinand, Joe Cole, Michael Carrick, Glen Johnson and Frank Lampard, there is no doubt in my mind that they would be dominating the BPL. Just as United are once again looking to raid a smaller club for their talent, this time Wigan for Palciaos and Valencia, other smaller clubs have been forced to sell up and coming talent to stay in the black. Another club comes to mind in Southampton, if they were able to build a squad around Bale and Walcott, they may be progressing up the BPL instead of struggling in the Championship.

The problem with City's, and now to a lesser extent Chelsea's, large influx of spending money, is that it has forced the rest of the "rich" clubs to spend more on transfers and consequently drive up the asking price for any player. No doubt, Tottenham would have sold Dimi to us for 25mil if City weren't interested. Now that the world knows of City's spending power, any club can simply raise the price on any player by saying that City can pay more and hold a "hoax auction". Of course, City can't buy everyone, and some clubs will obviously realise that some players aren't wanted by City, but there is no doubt that City and Chelsea have been ripped off by smart sellers including United ( the sale of Veron to Chelsea), who made some money by inflating their asking price. remember these names? Shevschenko, Elano, Jo, all are signs of the bad business that top clubs engage in.Even United isn't foolproof, we bought Veron to england in the first place for 28.1mil and sold him to chelsea in 2 years for 15mil.

This leads to another problem, being the lack of pitchtime available to up and coming youngsters. Gone are the days of seeing a flock of up and coming, fresh-faced youngsters, playing for the super-rich sides. Middlesborough once fielded a side totally from its academy, and United have for a long time given time and space for their own academy graduates to flourish on the biggest of stages. However, recent history hasn't provided Old Trafford with young, home-grown talent, with the exception of Danny Welbeck and Jonny Evans, and before them Wes Brown, our home-grown players have increasingly been loaned out, then sold off, populating the 1st Division and Championship, as United have focused on winning and retaining trophies without the cyclical downturn. We have seen ex UNited players playing very well: Eagles doing very well for Burnley against Arsenal and Chelsea, rating as 7.8 and 8.3 respectively from Skysports, Danny Pugh against UNited for Stoke, McShane left after not featuring in 3 years. Simpson is making his precesnce felt at Blackburn, Campbell likewise at Tottenham and now Manucho is out on loan to Hull, along with Martin, Cathcart, Gray, Heaton and Brandy out to various other clubs. If this can happen to a club that utilises its academy to such an extent that it produced the Class of 92( Giggs, Scholes Neville, Beckham, Butt etc ) imagine the fear such riches has struck into the hearts of City's youth system.

I'm hoping, Richard Scudamore realises his "product" is killing football,or that the FA or FIFA introduces some tighter reigns on wages( club salary cap at 35mil per year) or at least on transfer fees,( capping them at 50mil per club per year) and forces clubs to operate in the black, instead of having clubs, including united, massively in debt to the banks, instead of allowing them to run on operating profit.

Finally, i think Kaka would flop at City, i really don't rate Kaka, and actually think he would flop everywhere in the world but Italy, such is the lack of defensive pressure in Serie A ( no wonder Italian teams need such good keepers, their defenders are so shiiite). Sparky will deliver City a great team if he realises that second rate Brazilians don't play well against top-rank defenders. How would Robinho and Kaka fit together without some seriously awesome central defensive midfielders? Already Hughes' side scores lots of goals and leaks just as many, so he needs to stem the flow at one end without effecting the other. Ireland plays similarly to Kaka, obviously not as good, but potentially better suited to BPL than Kaka ever will be.

Ricky Ponting's Weak Link ?

As all the cliche's say, a team is only as strong as its weakest link. What do you do when the team has more than one weak link? That is the problem facing Australian Captain Ricky Ponting. the past 5 days have highlighted Australia's weaknesses, Batting and Bowling, two seemingly crucial elements of the game. The problems stem from top and below, the top 3 not scoring enough runs, and the bottom 4 not getting enough wickets. Simon Katich is the only one who has been contributing at all to the cause, Ricky and Mathew have both been way below their best, and although Hayden has gotten some dodgy decisions and some brilliant balls, the best batsmen can grind out runs when the going gets tough, and they seem to make their own luck. Hayden's dismissal in the first innings showed how desperate he is to make some runs, such desperation aids no one, and if anything, creates too much pressure with which the human mind cannot function well enough to react to a ball approaching at 140Kmph. What it does, is muddle the mind, and confuse it to such an extent, that simple decisions, such as leaving a ball outside off, become 50-50, and you end up chasing, and edging balls you would normally leave 99 times out of a hundred. Matty Hayden has been plagued by uncertainty in his last few innings, no doubt the annoyingly incorrect judgements that keep cutting his innings, short weigh on his mind as much as the media's persistant rumblings that he has to be looking over his should at state-level players who are plundering runs with ease.
The team's problems aren't limited to Hayden's mental block, but it is symptomatic of the infliction affecting the majority of the squad. All jokes aside, the team is lacking that air of arrogance that literally won them year upon year of test match cricket games.

Addressing the nations Energy Needs

It's amazing how easily Mr Rudd and his 07 revolution have duped the public. With their large, headline gathering announcements and their future plans and investigation committees, but when it comes to actually doing anything productive, they debate, hold think tanks and summits, then stall for a period and then formulate plans and policy that don't address core problems. If your having a heart attack, its no help giving the patient a towel to wipe off the sweat. In a country where we are facing massive energy and water shortages, the feds are doing nothing but commisioning expensive reports and cuting back on vital funding to promote modern technological development to move into a greener energy producing future.

What we need: Jobs? Cash? Growth?

With the economic growth slowing, with a recession looming and consumer and wholesale spending decreasing, governments have been hard-pressed to find a solution to the financial madness that has spread from the sub-prime mortgage crisis. Having over-leveraged investment loans, governments and financial entities have found themselves in a unprecedented situation where they cannot liquidate their assets (as no one wants them at the price they would like to sell for), nor can they borrow from each other as the inter bank trust and credit ratings for most companies have fell as they revealed mismanaged debts and exposure to foreign markets that have failed them. Consequentially, major governments have sought long term solutions by "creating jobs" for trade-related workers, investing in infrastructure and manufacturing is all well and good, as they make up a large proportion of the money-spending population, but true economic stimulation requires that the whole economy gains from changes in monetary policy and government plans. Most, if not all changes in Australian monetary policy has resulted in the population tightening their back-pockets, putting the extra dollars that they save( via interest rate cuts and tax savings) in their bank accounts instead of doing what the government wants them to do, go out and spend it. Creating jobs for some sectors, e.g. their funding the production of Eco-friendly cars here in Australia, planning water infrastructure(desalination plant, piping to aid farmers/crop growers) and roads, isn't taking care of the whole picture. "Opening the coffers" for such extravagant, long term projects is good for nation-building, one of Kevin Rudd's election promises, but in the current financial climate, where the Government's future fund is loosing money, and the budget surplus of $22bn. is in threat of becoming a deficit, one must ponder whether the amount short term loss can be regained in the future.

Even before the "global credit crunch" and the "sub-prime mortgage write-offs" many sectors of the Australian workforce were being cutback and displaced as jobs were flying overseas to lesser economies as companies outsourced non-essential service jobs and the nations balance-of-trade swung to the side imports. Although we have seen a massive increase in the exported volume and price of Australian ores and minerals, the product life cycle brings back the raw material as processed and packaged goods and consumables. The meteoric rise of China, and the comparatively steady growth of India saw the spot rate of steel explode and Rio Tinto and BHP, amongst others, made bumper profits while companies in other sectors also benefited from the rise of the Asian powerhouses, not because those countries were buying in massive amounts from them, rather, the rise of China let manufacturing companies cut costs by importing goods, and let textile companies cut costs by hiring cheaper labour and using cheaper materials, which they then had imported for a lower total cost.

The government did nothing about those drastic developments in the employment of Australians, yet it feels that pumping money into the Motor vehicle Manufacturing Industry is part of a solution to "kill not two, but three birds with one stone". Their initiative aims to employ more people, by rewarding companies who definitively plan to produce vehicles that will emit less carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, which will in turn stimulate the economy by providing more people with disposable income(spending money). The glaring flaw in this supposedly sound plan are twofold.

Firstly, promoting the production of fuel efficient, Eco-friendly cars right here is only profitable for Australian companies if the trade agreements we have with our export countries allow reasonable profits to be made. Already, there is talk of decreasing the import tariff from 10 to 5 %, making it easier for foreign companies to import cars to our market, and sell them at "Australian market" rates, effectively letting them make an extraordinary profit margin, while not demanding that those trading "partners" agree to the same deal. What chance do companies like Holden and Ford have exporting to the world when they have to pay tax between 10 to 20 % just to export cars, when Hyundai and Mazda pay 5% to import to Australia.

Secondly, the economic benefits of such a plan will not be felt for at least two years at best, and even when it is, there is no guarantee that the Australian economy will be in such a state that the people with disposable income will go out into the markets and spend it. If nothing is done to stave off recession and stimulate true growth across the country in the short term,( latest figures show that NSW is a dead weight to Australia's economy) even the best laid plans have no chance of succeeding in the medium to long term.

K Rudd and Co. need plans that will promote growth across the board, whether it be by cutting taxes to citizens, reducing the tax burden on companies that start new IT and other commercial projects, subsidize the employment of Australians in call-centre jobs, or the promotion of infrastructure growth in the Health sector, the government must ensure that all sections of the population stand to gain by the measures they introduce, or else whatever growth is seen by those favoured sectors will soon dissipate in the overwhelming tide of recession.