Saturday, June 20, 2009

What's wrong with this story?

Scientists fear pollution may have killed off up to 6000ha of mangroves in Moreton Bay _ trees vital in maintaining fish and healthy foreshore areas.

The loss over five years equates to as much as 20 per cent of the bay's mangroves.

Stark forests of dead mangroves range from North Stradbroke Island in the south to Redcliffe in the north and the city's edge at the Port of Brisbane.

As trees die, the soil sinks around them, causing foul ponds in which nothing regenerates.

University of Queensland wetlands specialist Norm Duke said yesterday it was first thought drought was the issue but it appeared the cause was far more complex.

One theory was that cancerous pollution or chemical spraying for mosquitoes was killing tiny fauna such as crabs, molluscs and worms that lived in the soil around the trees. Mangroves need the creatures to aerate the soil and transfer nutrients.

"As a result of this change, we might be getting faster breakdown of root material," Dr Duke said...

What is wrong with this story? We don't know! But there must be something wrong with it because Murdoch never publishes anything without an ulterior motive. We are left with conjecture.

Perhaps Brian Williams has been let of the leash to shore up Murdoch's enviro-hating image? Perhaps it's a kind of extortion (bank bashing = cash for comment) type of tactic by News Limited? It is highly probable on past experience that it is a bizarre segue into some greenwashing of one sort or another, but we are 99.9% certain of one thing: it is never genuine journalism when "fair and balanced" Murdoch is involved.

Murdoch's hordes all survive because they rely on the tendency of decent people to tolerate, and politely accept, obscene and vulgar members of their own circle. These people are NOT your circle, they are a bunch of fascist enablers and they have no in place honest discourse, as they have proven over and over again.

Murdoch's people are exactly like the child molester who is well known to the family, tolerated despite his outrageous behaviour, and ultimately completely destructive. They deserve their place in society as much as the pedophile, mass murderer and terrorist does, but they must also be treated accordingly.

Murdoch's people have given up any right to be heard as decent voices. Sure, they will still be heard, but are always tainted by association.

Wait and watch to see how this atory unfolds.

1 comment:

  1. This is a variation of what Canadian anti-war activist Barrie Zwicker describes as 'bait and switch'. This is a technique employed by the phony American dissident Noam Chomsky who has led many to believe that ex-President George W Bush told the world the truth about 9/11.

    The 'bait' is ideas which appear to serve the interests of the environment, democracy and economic justice. The 'switch' is other ideas packaged in with the 'bait' which serve powerful vested interests.

    In fact the Courier Mail has been playing this game with the issue of privatisation. On the one hand, the Courier Mail has been savagely critical of the fiasco of the privatisation of the retail arms of the state electricity utilities Ergon and Energex, but on the other they still insist that privatisation is necessary now. Interestingly, they avoid use of the term 'privatisation' in their discussion of the Ergon/Energex fiasco, rather they refer to 'deregulation' which they insist, could have been handled better.

    By avoiding the use of the term 'privatisation' in reporting the electricity price rise fiasco, they can more easily make the 'switch' to clamouring for other privatisations.

    In fact, this technique does seem to work. I know at least one otherwise very intelligent person who was completely taken in and perceived the Courier Mail to be an anti-privatisation and on our side on the strength of its posturing over electricity price rises on the weekend of the state Labor Party conference.

    If the Courier Mail never published any good articles such as the one you refer to, then a good many fewer people would be fooled by it.

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