Picture: Colin Murty
As Neil Young says:
"comes a light feelin's liftin'
lift that baby right up off the ground.
oh, this old world keeps spinning round
it's a wonder tall trees ain't layin' down
there comes a time."
Today's Newspoll is tremendous news. We have a strong lead over the Coalition, more people are now dissatisfied with Howard's performance than those who are satisfied, 68% are satisfied with my performance, I now have a big lead in the preferred Prime Minister poll and importantly, 83% of people either want the government to set an exit date or bring the troops home now.
John Howard is awash in bad numbers, bad press, and bad vibes.
(Oh, and by the way, 51% are against nuclear power stations in Australia, including 57% of women)
People of Australia, there comes a time.
1 comment:
The polls may be linked to the dissatisfaction with the state of our education system (amongst others).
The figures used in the three documents, ("The Australian economy needs an education revolution", "New Directions in Early Childhood Education", and "New directions in Math and Science") are certainly interesting.
They tally with the concerns raised in correspondence on several occasions with the Vice Chancellors Committee in relation to the increasing constraints placed upon academics through reduced public funding. A view that is shared by the VCC one might add.
I also welcome the emphasis on math and science as a vehicle to foster critical thinking. A lack of science education entails more than teacher numbers.
In fact, as disturbing as all those statistics are, they do not highlight a feature of dynamic systems in general: the higher the level of development, the greater the number of possible results as a consequence of the current state. In other words, falling behind does not merely mean catching up with a certain figure, it actually means having to catch up with an ongoing acceleration.
On another topic, may I refer to http://www.otoom.net/NotesOnTheISG.htm, dealing with the Baker-Hamilton report on the Iraq war. The principle characteristics of the engagement there are comparable to that in Afghanistan. It is high time we allow ourselves an objective analysis when it comes to large-scale initiatives affecting not just Australia but the West in general.
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