Sunday, August 17, 2008
Dear Kevin - week 5
Australian Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd repeated his claim that Australia is the hottest and driest continent on the planet on a surprisingly balanced report aired on Sixty Minutes tonight. All of which reminds me -it is five weeks today since I first wrote to him seeking evidence to back up this claim. Looks like being another long week by the letterbox.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
MM, 44% of Australia is desert, while 33% of Africa is, with other continents probably equal to or less than Africa (is Eurasia 2 or 3 continents?).
I'm not a Krudd fan by any means, but isn't that probably what he's referring to?
Sorry I didn't go back and reread your other posts on this, which I remember are quite detailed - just wonderin' is all.
It could be what he's referring to Bruce, but the key issue is the percentage of land mass in the tropics. The link in this post leads you to another link that will show you the temperatures in Africa and South America right now and will illustrate my argument.
A large part of the non-tropical parts of Africa are made up of the Sahara desert in the north and Kalahari in the south, so the argument that Australia is hotter because we have a greater percentage of desert won't win on that score either.
I reread that linked post with the map, and now you've convinced me.
Also you said:
"Technically speaking, Australia is the driest inhabited continent."
-That answers my desert doubts.
You're right, this is very sloppy stuff from the PM. One would think he has advisers who correct him, I know John Howard and Alex Downer had very competent advisers - but then they were humble and human enough to admit errors, unlike our typical ALP megalomaniac leaders (Why can't a decent chap like Martin Ferguson be leader?).
Post a Comment