Webdiary - Founded and Inspired by Margo Kingston

On both sides of the Creation/Evolution debate there was character assassination, wilful misunderstanding, deliberate misrepresentation, unqualified intellectual arrogance, childish insulting, and all without much effort to really listen to the other side. So how does a person go about having a belief, and defending it, without falling into the moral quagmire of intolerance of another’s belief?" Origin of the species debate organiser Phil Uebergang

"It's individual human beings standing up in public on behalf of their fellows and urging us all to make the world the best possible place we can. Embracing their better angels openly and unashamedly in their public lives so that maybe we'll try to do the same in our private ones. It's called 'leadership', and the only kind that ever worked is leadership-by-example." Jack Robertson applauds our parliamentarians.

"[Harry] Evans asks: 'Can there be deliberation in cyberspace?' Then he answers: 'The Discussion Paper refers to the point that debate requires rules to make it orderly and thereby effective. Cyberspace has no rules of debate, and probably cannot have any such rules if the process is open to everyone with a computer. It is like an assembly in which everyone can shout at once, and does.'" Craig Rowley ponders an electronic future for democratic participation.

Senate Question time is fairer, more respectful and more information-based than QT in the House of Representatives - Senators even have to answer the question asked! - because the government doesn't have the numbers. Thus, though Senators vote for a Liberal President to be presiding officer, that person knows that he or she relies on the confidence of the Senate as a whole. Expect House of Reps rules and behaviour when the new Senate sits. From now on, if the Senate President is fair the government can sack him. This is the last Senate Question time of the era which closes tonight. The Rebel 4s compromise bill will also pass the Senate tonight. Fitting.

"A decade of irresponsible economic management - to help fuel the growth of the banks, big business and the real estate markets - eventually had to come to some end, whether a voluntary and controlled one or, as now seems inevitable, as the result of unavoidable system corrections. We are only in the early days of the 'adjustment we'll have to have', yet these are likely to be testing times for many households." Russell Darroch

"A recent New Scientist editorial sets out a handy scoring mechanism for energy sources: 'We want them to have a small environmental impact, yet be able to supply energy on a huge scale. We want costs to be low, the method of generation to be safe and for there to be plenty of available fuel. The International Energy Agency estimates that two-thirds of the extra energy demand over the next 25 years will come from developing countries, so whatever sources we choose must be tradable worldwide. Also, in the post-9/11 world, we want energy sources that cannot be abused by terrorists or rogue states.'" David Roffey with the latest on climate change and the future of energy.

‘Did the universe and life evolve, or was it specially created in six days?’ Here are the third and final arguments in the debate on origins.

"My godfather, Creation-v-Evolution debate is heavy going, arduous and torturous at times. I never realised there are so many Webdiarists going for a PhD. So in desperation and frustration, I am putting up my own “String Theory” for my fellow Webdiarists, namely about my favourite food, the NOODLES, and how to cook them. I declare the Club Chaos Kitchen open. Bon appetit." PF Journey's guide on what to eat between bouts of debating Creation versus Evolution

"An end to the hard line on asylum seekers is not yet to take them into our hearts and out of the arena of political point scoring. Like racing on a tight stretch of desert road we have seen the PM playing ‘chicken’ with the Georgiou gang of rebels. He dared them to blink and swerve to avoid a collision. But outside of this drama he is running from a debate in Parliament. He may swerve but we must not let him escape the need for a Royal Commission into the whole immigration mess." Stephen Smith

"Typically, a pork-barrel involves funding for government programs where the economic or service benefits are concentrated on the patronised constituency but the costs are spread among all taxpayers. When a government rolls out the pork barrel it is funding something that benefits a particular district, whose legislator thereby wins favour with local voters. Hence the great importance placed by political leaders on 'getting credit'." Craig Rowley

We are busily working on getting the past five years of Webdiary Archives into a user friendly format.  This is one of our top priorities and we will keep you posted.

The archives of the Sydney Morning Herald Webdiary site dating back to early July 2004 are available here at http://webdiary.smh.com.au/archives/margo_kingston/  where the original article and subsequent comments can be read.

"Having travelled from Perth to attend the people smuggler trial at Brisbane Supreme Court with three Iraqi men who lost family on SIEV-X, I can offer a unique perspective on this chapter of the SIEV-X story. It was unbelievably hard, they tell me, to sit for hours listening to detailed accounts of how the asylum seekers were moved across Indonesia by people smugglers and ferried by small boat onto the SIEV-X, for this is the journey their wives and children took in the days and weeks leading up to their deaths." Sue Hoffman