In serious trouble

Spin it any which way you like, the ships involved in the Okhotsk Sea crisis are in serious trouble. From just one source, Ria Novosti, we get the news that the Krasin and the Admiral Makarov (pictured together) are continuing with their attempt to lead the Sodruzhestvo out of the ice. But what comes over, though, is how painfully (and dangerously) slow this has become.

Towing actually started on Wednesday afternoon and, despite optimistic forecasts, soon ground to a halt when towing ropes snapped. And, although the extraction resumed on Thursday morning, since the very start of the operation the two icebreakers and the factory ship have only covered 17 miles.

They now have another eight miles to reach the Bereg Nadezdy fish carrier, which had earlier been "parked" in what was then looser ice, pending extraction from the ice field.

But such have been the delays that, in the sub-zero temperatures which have dropped to -27°C at time, the ice field has extended and thickened, and it will be now a best part of 100 miles before the ships reach clear water. And in between, there is "a very difficult stretch of ice floe", according to the fisheries company spokeswoman, Tatyana Kulikova.

Once the Sodruzhestvo is reunited with the Bereg Nadezdy, the plan is for the icebreakers continue towing the factory ship, while the fish carrier will attempt to sail on its own along the channel cut in the ice by Admiral Makarov and Krasin.

This is not much of a plan, considering that, to get her this far, the Makarov had to resort to a close-coupled tow to extract the Bereg Nadezdy (pictured above). But, given the resources available, they really do not have much option. With the added complication of the Makarov being short of fuel and weather conditions in the area deteriorating rapidly, it is no exaggeration to say that this rescue attempt is in serious trouble.

On the plus side, the Russians are enormously skilled and experienced in ice navigation, and there seem to be enough helicopter assets in the area to effect an evacuation if need be, so the continued protestations that no lives are at risk is probably true. But whether either of the two commercial ships will ever get clear of the ice remains to be seen.

UPDATE: As of 10:30 am Moscow time, TASS reports that the convoy comprising the Admiral Makarov, the Krasin and the Sodruzhestvo has been reunited with the "drifting" Bereg Nadezhdy.

The Admiral Makarov cleared a two-mile strip in the afternoon and returned to the convoy. Now, the coordinating staff led by deputy transport minister Viktor Olersky is "analysing weather and ice conditions for elaborating the tactics of the further operation." With bad weather forecast for a week, no estimate has been given for when the ships will break completely free of the ice.

COMMENT: OKHOTSK SEA CRISIS

Questions may be asked

The two "most respected" national weather services in the US, NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), agreed that 2010 tied with 2005 as the hottest since records began in 1880. So writes the tree-hugging Louise, in The Daily Telegraph, telling us that, overall, 2010 and 2005 were 1.12F (0.62C) above the 20th century average when taking a combination of land and water surface temperatures across the world.

That the fair Louise uses the words "most respected" is interesting. Most respected by whom, one wonders – especially when Hansen's GISS, masquerading as NASA, is an object of derision to the average "denier". This appears to be the classic reliance on the power of "prestige" to bolster a failing case.

Meanwhile, Bob Ward in The Guardian is asking why the UK media are ignoring "climate change announcements". Many commentators, it appears, would have liked to have given him an answer but, from the blizzard of deletions, it seems the moderators got there first. Questions may be asked, but answers are not permitted.

COMMENT: NEW GLOBAL WARMING THREAD

A crack in the façade

We do not stray too often into discussing Afghanistan these days. This is not for lack of interest – simply, our views are known and there are only so many times and so many ways you can write: "get out".

But it is worth noting a piece in The Guardian which records a "scathing attack" from Britain's "former top diplomat in Afghanistan" on the conduct of UK military operations in the country.

This is Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, who has accused the army of deploying "spurious" arguments, claiming that the war in Afghanistan gave the army a raison d'être it had lacked for years, and "resources on an unprecedented scale".

What is especially interesting is that Cowper-Coles, in taking on the Army, is also attacking the Dannatt legend, arguing that the real reason for the enthusiasm for the adventure back in 2006 was that, "In the eyes of the army, Afghanistan has also given our forces the chance to redeem themselves ... " in the wake of its dire performance in southern Iraq.

As to our initial deployment in Afghanistan, Cowper-Coles argues that Army dispositions were then dictated not by military logic (such things as defeating the "enemy") but to proof the Army against future defence cuts. Dannatt, he says, had told him in 2007 that, if he did not use the battle groups coming free from Iraq in Afghanistan, he would lose them in a future defence review.

Strategy in Helmand was thus driven as much by the level of resources available to the army as by "an objective assessment of the needs of a proper counter-insurgency campaign in the province". What Cowper-Coles calls the "supply-side strategy" was reflected in the policy of rotating entire brigades through Helmand every six months.

Recalling that time, when the attacks on the then government were sharp, and the narrative very much favoured the military Cowper-Coles offers some insight into what was going on. Ministers, he says, were reluctant to question military advice for fear of leaks to the press suggesting they were not supportive of the troops.

This, of course, reflected the culture of leaks within the military and the MoD, when senior civil servants and the military were briefing against their own ministers, supported by media defence correspondents and by the Conservative Party, who were happy to use the disarray as a stick with which to beat the government.

Distortions were manifest, with the RAF producing a paper arguing for Tornado bombers to be sent to Afghanistan, even when NATO "... made clear that the one category of weapons system [it] did not need more of was ground-attack jets."

And he says, the military blamed ministers unfairly for shortages of equipment in Helmand. Cowper-Coles asserts: "I cannot help remembering an RAF movements officer in Helmand showing me a pie chart of British helicopter movements in southern Afghanistan ... 27 percent of the helicopter movements were for moving VIPs around theatre. And most of those VIPs were senior military tourists from London."

I have my own sources which suggest that much of what Cowper-Coles asserts can be relied upon, despite strong rebuttals from Dannatt via the BBC.

The grouse, if there is one, is that this former diplomat was not more assertive at the time, when ministers and their advisors were struggling to make sense of the Afghan campaign, which was being comprehensively mismanaged by the military, and especially the Army.

The lesson for now, however, is to go back to the time and recall how the narrative emphasised that ministers should rely on the military "experts" for advice, when the Brass were in fact playing their own political games which had nothing whatsoever to do with conducting an effective counter-insurgency campaign.

We should remind ourselves of the bullshit we were then getting from the military and the bien pensants, and how very few people there were who were suggesting that the strategy was about as effective as a bag of bent nails.

And this is only one crack in the façade. As time goes on, more and more will emerge. Gradually we will gain a clearer picture of recent campaigns which will eventually be regarded as examples of military incompetence on a heroic scale.

COMMENT THREAD

Pity poor Brazil

Without the wealth or the attention that Australia is getting, the scale of the human disaster from the floods is in fact far greater. Rescue workers are struggling to reach the areas cut off by devastating floods and landslides, with at least 375 people having been reported killed in what is being described as "one of Brazil's worst natural disasters in decades".

According to the Reuters report, torrents of mud and water set off by heavy rains have left a trail of destruction through the mountainous Serrana region near the city of Rio de Janeiro. Houses have been toppled and roads buckled, burying entire families as they slept.

"It's like an earthquake struck some areas," said Jorge Mario, the mayor of the Teresopolis municipal area, where at least 158 people died. "There are three or four neighborhoods that were totally destroyed in rural areas. There are hardly any houses standing there and all the roads and bridges are destroyed."

This is, of course, not the first time in recent history we have reported on floods in Brasil, most recently in July 2010 and before that in April 2010. Yet this was the region – like northern Australia – which was supposed to be stricken with drought, and is now suffering from torrential downpours.

In fact, as we were writing in March 2010, drought is the least of the country's problems, as la Nina-induced climate patterns currently dominate the region. But, even the walls of mud and water currently destroying lives and property are not as dangerous as the walls of ignorance erected by the warmists.

Weather we can deal with. Stupidly is an altogether different proposition.

COMMENT: NEW GLOBAL WARMING THREAD

Without benefit of human intellect

In The Scotsman today, we see an account of the odious Huhne attending upon the Scottish parliament's energy committee in Edinburgh, to which venue he did so egregiously travel by carbon-emitting aeroplane.

Thence, recalling his time as a financial journalist, did he regale the wastrels with his recollections of Alex Salmond, telling them: "That's when I first became acquainted with the expertise of one of Britain's best energy economists, now doubling up as the first minister".

In like manner – i.e., in a zone of existence not encumbered by the human intellect - we have Greg Barker, minister for energy and climate change, who tells us:

I want the City of London to be the global capital of the new, fast-growing green-investment sector. That's why we set up the Capital Markets Climate Initiative – to dismantle the barriers to low-carbon growth and facilitate a new wave of green investment in emerging economies.

This, incidentally, is the same poltroon who was recently asked by Philip Davis for the latest estimate of fully implementing the Climate Change Act. Was there any advance on £400 billion?

Said Barker: "These are big figures and it is difficult to get one's head around them. No new data are available, but I remind my hon. Friend that the cost of not acting is far greater than the cost of prudent early action. Lord Stern estimated that the cost would be between 5 and 10 percent of GDP. Moreover, this is a huge opportunity for UK plc".

This is almost like an episode from the Twilight Zone. They are in this world, but not of it. We have a long way to go, and I suspect things will only start to improve when our politicians rejoin this planet.

COMMENT: NEW GLOBAL WARMING THREAD

Kill them*

Anyone in local authority "service" who sets up this job, and anyone who takes it, deserves to die. They take money from us by force – or under the threat of force - and we go to jail if we do not pay.

When a local authority is already having problems and they cut essential public services to pay for this obscenity, people die. Thus, if you ever meet any local authority Twitter and Facebook tsars, don't mess about. Kill them. This is not murder - it's self defence. And there is not a jury in the land which would think otherwise.

* And before the stupid left wingers (is there any other sort?) and other numpties start sounding off, read the comments thread, and then look up the word "polemic" in the dictionary.

COMMENT THREAD

Essex bobbies

Essex taxpayers had to spend £62,000 fixing vehicles after police officers had mistakenly put petrol in diesel cars - even those with "talking" fuel caps warning them not to. Officers used the wrong fuel 332 times in the past seven years and, despite yellow fuel caps and a warning system on each car at a total cost of £4,000, diesel police cars were wrongly filled with petrol 110 times in the following two years.

And they let these people out on their streets ... alone? Er ... actually they don't – they always go in pairs. But now we know why. One drives the car and the other tells him (or her) what fuel to put in. Even then, they can't get it right.

Possibly though, that is being a little unfair. What we have here is the typical problem of there being no penalty for failure (or, in this case, stupidity). If officers had to pay for their errors out of their own pockets (as indeed ordinary people and the self-employed have to do), then I doubt very much whether we would have seen 332 incidents - in one police force alone. Having to pay for one's own stupidity is the surest path to wisdom.

COMMENT: "BOBBIES" THREAD

Off and on it goes

The rescue operation in the Okhotsk Sea has now been resumed, but it was set back more than was at first admitted yesterday when the towing cables broke. As we now learn, the towing equipment was damaged as well. But, with little more detail, almost like the old days when the TV shut down every night and all you got was the station card, all the Russian media is offering are stock photographs of the Okhotsk Sea (above).

In fact, confusion abounds. We are now told that the Sodruzhestvo has to be towed 100 miles before it can be united with the Bereg Nadezhdy, a journey which, according to Voice of Russia "may take a total of 12 hours". That distance surely has to be wrong – unless the Bereg Nadezhdy has also moved – in which case the idea of towing the Sodruzhestvo a 100 miles (nautical or otherwise – there is also a confusion of units) in a mere 12 hours is absurdly optimistic.

If this was being carried out in Western waters, with – say – a tourist ship involved, there would by now be wall-to-wall coverage as the drama intensified and the weather forecast offered a deteriorating situation. But because those at risk are Russian and a long way away, this is all you get.

Having been fed one optimistic, unrealistic bulletin after the other, Moscow listeners must feel they are back in the "good old days" of the Soviet Union. But this time it seems as much the incompetence of the media as anything else, as the standard of reporting has been dire. But, there you go. Sodruzhestvo may be on her way out. She may not. Who knows? One thing is for sure though, the Western media doesn't really care.

COMMENT: OKHOTSK SEA CRISIS

It was bound to happen

Water has peaked at almost three feet below the level of deadly 1974 floods in Brisbane, giving the city some respite from the disastrous floods. However, this has not stopped the state premier's favourite warmist launching a pre-emptive strike claiming the floods for his own.

This is professor Will Steffen, the executive director of the ANU Climate Change Institute, who is forced to concede that there is "no direct link" between global warming and the flash flooding in Toowoomba, but he claims that climate change would lead to heavier, more frequent rain.

Never mind that the prevailing warmist orthodoxy has been for prolonged droughts – which is why, of course, the Australians have spent over $13 billion on desalination plants. Now, Steffen says that, "As the climate warms, there is more water vapour in the atmosphere ... This means that there is a probability that there will more intense rainfall events around the world".

Professor Neville Nicholls, an Australian Research Council Professorial Fellow at Monash University, is another one getting his oar in, saying that scientists would look at possible links between flash floods over the past 24 hours and global warming.

With the sort of weasel words we have come to expect from these people, he stresses that no "current link" can be made between them, arguing they were the result of a strong La Nina event. But he then goes on to say, "Is the La Nina that strong because of global warming, or is global warming exacerbating the effect of La Nina? Honestly, we don't know. But just because we don't now doesn't mean it's not happening".

"You'd have to be a brave person to say it [climate change] is not having some sort of effect," he adds. "I can guarantee you in the next couple of years people will start looking back at this event and asking was it so unusually strong because of global warming."

Matthew England of the Climate Change Research Center at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, is also getting in on the act. "I think people will end up concluding that at least some of the intensity of the monsoon in Queensland can be attributed to climate change," he says. "The waters off Australia are the warmest ever measured and those waters provide moisture to the atmosphere for the Queensland and northern Australia monsoon."

David Jones, head of climate monitoring and prediction at the Australia Bureau of Meteorology in Melbourne, then chips in. "We've always had El Ninos and we've had natural variability but the background which is now operating is different," he says. "The first thing we can say with La Nina and El Nino is it is now happening in a hotter world." That means more evaporation from land and oceans, more moisture in the atmosphere and stronger weather patterns.

And then we get US climate scientist Kevin Trenberth. He says the floods and the intense La Nina were a combination of factors. He pointed to high ocean temperatures in the Indian Ocean near Indonesia early last year as well as the rapid onset of La Nina after the last El Nino ended in May.

But the fact is that, within the bounds of natural variability, there is nothing exceptional about the intensity of the rains, and they accord entirely with a well-observed long-term cyclical pattern. Further, as always, the actual levels of flooding are nothing exceptional, as the historical record shows.

Local problems, though, have been exacerbated by urban development and the lack of sensible precautions, about which the Queensland government and the city council were warned a decade ago. Needless to say, with greed, stupidity and latterly the obsessive focus on "climate change", the warnings were ignored.

All of this was pre-ordained. It was bound to happen, but now it has, the warmists are going to be the last people on this earth to admit the flaws in their religion. This is, and has to be, another example of climate change. No other explanation is possible.

COMMENT: GREEN CATASTROPHE THREAD

Go for the lot

I can't decide which of the posts bests warrants a link, out of the first five, so I'm ducking out. Go and read them all on Autonomous Mind. No comments here ... comment on AM's blog.

The Loughner affair

Michelle Malkin is worth a look, on the Loughner affair, and "the worst sheriff in America".

We haven't covered it here, partly because the MSM are giving it saturation coverage but mainly because I don't know enough about American politics to be able to offer a sensible or informed comment. But, if you want to keep abreast of the issue, Michelle's site is one of the "must go" places.

COMMENT THREAD

Killing with kindness?

Now we get this: "Radio tags designed to monitor endangered penguins could be killing them, say scientists". It is feared that flipper bands, used to identify the birds, cause physical damage and drag under the water.

Furthermore, research published in Nature (which is pier reviewed, so it must be right) suggests birds with flipper bands respond differently to the climate by arriving later on Possession Island, off Antarctica, than those untouched.

Dr Yvon Le Maho, of Strasbourg University, and colleagues say the value of many surveys is questionable. They say: "Responses of flipper-banded penguins to climate variability differ from non-banded birds."

I'm sorry, I know you shouldn't, but there are times when you just have to laugh. Still, beats letting the polar bears have them.

COMMENT: NEW GLOBAL WARMING THREAD

This is what it has come to

After the faux rebellion yesterday, today we had the faux PMQs. Tomorrow we have a faux by-election, the result pre-ordained. Is there anyone out there prepared to tell us, with a straight face, what parliament is for, nowadays?

COMMENT THREAD

Just sit back and watch the chaos

An epidemic of chronic cubical syndrome.

Dilbert: "We people are smarter than we look"

Dogbert: "How hard can that be, really?"

COMMENT: "TROLL" THREAD

The dance of the trolls

As the flood situation in Australia continues to deteriorate, the Dellers article on the issue, prompted mainly by input from a reader (which triggered our piece as well) continues to attract comment – although not as many as usual.

Nevertheless, amongst the number is a goodly proportion of what could fairly be labelled "trolls", the nature and behaviour of which have been fully characterised, and discussed on a number of blogs, such as here and here.

The latter piece, headed whimsically, "How to be an Internet troll", starts with probably the most accurate and devastating definition – although there are many more. A troll, it says, is like the scum of the Internet:

The purpose of his existence is to challenge the hero and play pest / spoilsport / critic / villain / supervillain by constantly attempting to discredit, rubbish and criticise all of the hero's attempts. To be a troll, you need not have any argument or merit, just a string of abuses targeted towards your object of obsession does the trick, and gets you noticed. All a troll needs is attention. And, you should get it no matter what it takes.

Having tracked the Booker column comments to explore the phenomenon in more detail – and play with ideas for their containment – one notes that there is a particular type of troll emerging – the "political" troll, and for them the key word in the definition is "challenge".

The troll takes as its starting point that the author of the piece to which it is responding is wrong, that the piece should never have been published, and that it is his sacred obligation to address these defects, and warn off all readers who might otherwise be influenced by it. That, in effect, defines the troll – it opposes the premise being offered and has taken it upon itself to correct or negate it.

To achieve these ends, the troll will adopt a number of techniques and characteristics, the most potent of the latter being sheer persistence. It is always there, always ready to post, always ready to challenge unwary supporters, it will normally be able to wear down casual visitors, or frighten them off with the intensity of their peremptory demands.

Some identify in troll behaviour the evidence of Alinsky tactics, which is unsurprising as most trolls appear to be of a left wing or "progressive" demeanour, and have wide experience of these tactics. Others seem to pick up the principle intuitively.

In detail, one sees the tactics as primarily those of declamation and challenge. The writer (i.e., Booker or Dellers) will be accused of getting it wrong, of misunderstanding "the science", distorting it (always deliberately) and/or of missing out key details (which the troll deems important). This will invariably be served up in an insolent and offensive manner, and then the battle starts.

Anyone incautious enough to mount a defence gets picked apart.  References or "proofs" are demanded, any omission - real or imagined - is challenged, and even the slightest error - again real or imagined - is picked upon mercilessly. But this is a "game" that cannot be won. If the challenge is seen off, with a successful counter-argument, the troll ignores it, waits a while, and then repeats the same challenge or assertion, unchanged, ready to start all over again.

Since several people might join in, some trolls delight in picking up differences and inconsistencies - real or imagined, it matters not - in the arguments, and setting them against each other.  Other trolls simply turn the arguments round, adopt them and repeat them back.

As a result, some  say that the trolls should be ignored. You can't win - so "don't feed to trolls". Leave them to themselves and they will go away.  But the "political" trolls do not. Imbued as they are with almost missionary zeal, they will disrupt a comments thread, dominate it and eventually take it over. That is their aim.

Does that matter, still others ask. I have an open mind on this. I am not sure. Thus, this is a ranging piece, to open a proper discussion and see where we go. But the non-PC picture sets the tone ... you can already see the horror on their faces and the Moonbat scribbling away!  We have lost the moral high ground, they will say.  But, as Dellers might say, if you can't beat them, the least you can do is annoy them.

That, of course, begs the question of what you achieve by this, but there is obviously some form of "prize" at stake, as the trolls invest a huge amount of time and energy in seeking to dominate comments and forums.  They must think it is worth it.

COMMENT THREAD

Fail!

Further to our report earlier today, the Voice of Russia tells us that the Krasin and Admiral Makarov have failed to tow the ice-trapped Sodruzhestvo out of thick ice at first go today. According to Fishery Minister Andrei Krainy, the tow ropes broke, so the rescue effort will have to be repeated.

Why are we not surprised?

COMMENT: OKHOTSK SEA CRISIS

Fuel for thought

The Daily Mail is running a piece telling us how "millions of hard-pressed families are being further squeezed by punishing rises in fuel bills and food prices".

The tenor of the article is that you must look to the "energy giants" for the reason why fuel prices are increasing, the story lead being focused on E.ON, the "German-owned supplier", which is putting up electricity tariffs by 9 percent and gas by 3 percent. This will add an average of £62 to annual dual fuel bills for 4.3 million customers.

This is where it all gets very difficult. Internationally, the trend for gas prices is downwards, but in the UK, retail customers are being charged more and more. Some of that is undoubtedly due to green taxes, levies and other imposts. An amount is due to the need to build investment capital to expand and renew the production and distribution systems – although costs there are inflated by greenery.

Doubtless, an amount is also due to corporate greed, and the ability of semi-formal cartel status of the energy suppliers which allow them to rig prices, on top of a weak regulator which is happy to see the confusion as a cover for the rising cost of greenery, which it supports.

There are other factors, not least that the foreign-owned companies, which charge less for their supplies on their home market, over-charge British consumers, in this more "liberal" market, in order to recoup losses.

Thus, we end up paying more for energy than virtually any other consumer in Europe (and the developed world). No one knows why, and even the experts disagree. Different sections of the media have different explanations, but all are quite happy to use "corporate greed" to hide the cost of the greenery.

The outcome, therefore, is that we not only get fleeced – we know not precisely who is doing the fleecing and why, and thus know not who specifically to blame. At the top of the dung hill, though, is the government – with that odious creature Huhne nominally in charge. That is as good a place as any to start.

But that alone gets us nowhere. Tomorrow there will be a by-election in Oldham and Saddleworth, to appoint an MP as a replacement for the disgraced Labour MP, who broke the rules. Chances are, the electorate will go for another Labour MPs.

And today also, the Labour MP for Barnsley agreed to resign, after being caught with his hands in the till. In due course, there will be a by-election and, in due course, another MP will be elected. It will be a Labour MP – I can guarantee you that.

Therein is the heart of the problem. We are served by a bunch of crooks, gathered together in a party structure which is long past the sell-by date. Yet, at each election, the sheeple come out – albeit in reducing numbers – to vote them back in.

Yet, these same sheeple will be there amongst the rest of us, complaining about energy bills, and not one will join up the dots. We are the authors of our own decline.

COMMENT THREAD

Who plods the plods?

The plods are revolting - not about incompetent policing, or anything constructive. They just want more money to pour down the drain.

But, as a reader asks, "Who polices a Police demonstration? Who provides the brutality?" Profound questions indeed ... one supposes they can beat each other up ... and then fine a few more motorists to jack up the income (shucks, the government gets that now ... you can see why the poor plods are confused).

COMMENT: "BOBBIES" THREAD

Speaks for itself

"We stand for freedom ... a man must stand for something or he'll fall for anything".

COMMENT THREAD

A little local difficulty

Yesterday, the Russians were talking about the rescue operation moving into the final, crucial stage, as the combined force of the two biggest icebreakers in the region moved in to try to extract the 32,000-ton Sodruzhestvo (pictured) from ice captivity in the Okhotsk Sea.

The latest report informs us that the icebreakers Krasin and the Admiral Makarov have in fact reached the Sodruzhestvo, now confirmed with 348 crew members on board, and have started to lead her out to free waters. The route has been carefully planned, after extensive reconnaissance by helicopter. The pressure is on for a number of reasons, not least because meteorologists are predicting that the weather will worsen sharply in the next two days. Winds are expected to strengthen and visibility to drop.

Significantly, the ice shelf - which was only about 15 miles deep at the start of the crisis – is now about 100 nautical miles. Distances to safety, therefore, have dramatically increased as the ice field spreads northwards. But, more worryingly, in this shallow part of the sea, the icebreakers are finding that the ice has hit bottom.

Having yesterday "parked" the fish carrier Bereg Nadezhdy (pictured above), with 35 crew on board, the two icebreakers covered 25 nautical miles in 24 hours to reach the Sodruzhestvo, breaking through three big floes in the process. Later, when the two ships are re-united, it is planned to lead them to safety in a single-file convoy of four vessels.

Russia Today talks of temperatures having dropped to -27°C and of a ferocious northerly wind, which is driving the ice into the southern part of the Okhotsk Sea, to the Sakhalin Bay area, where the ships are trapped. Higher winds in particular will intensify the difficulties. Awaiting the ships at the ice edge, we are told is the Magadan icebreaker and a tanker, ready to refuel the Makarov, which is said to be low on fuel.

Meanwhile, as this little local difficulty is sorted out, WUWT reports that nearly 70 percent of the United States is snow covered (and almost all of Canada), with New York City declaring a "snow emergency". The "big freeze" also continues in India and China, in the latter causing considerable crop losses. But nothing of this contradicts the claim by the British Met Office's Julia Slingo that the world is getting warmer. These are all local events.

UPDATES: TASS is reporting that the operation to "pilot" the Sodruzhestvo to a loose ice area has started. But, says Tatyana Kulikova, head of the press centre of the Far Eastern sea shipping company, "The operation is proceeding with difficulty: the factory ship has large dimensions: 180 metres long and 20 metres high. It is very difficult to take it in tow."

The procedure described is that the Admiral Makarov "is busy breaking up ice to trench a channel while the higher-powered icebreaker Krasin will pilot the factory ship through it." That is a bit odd, as the two icebreakers are described as sister ships, with identical performance specifications. Meanwhile, the remarkable photograph shows what appears to be a double tow – the two icebreakers together leading out the Bereg Nadezhdy.

Ria Novosti is suggesting that the Sodruzhestvo can be extracted within 12 hours, the Krasin leading it out on "an anchor tow" (i.e., close, but not close-coupled). The vessels are said to have about 12 miles to go before they get to free water, including around three miles of the most treacherous ice. The operation is expected to be completed by Thursday afternoon (presumably Moscow time).

COMMENT: OKHOTSK SEA CRISIS

Mr Plod scores again

Simon and Kenny get the treatment from West Yorkshire's finest. Pity they were guinea pigs (Simon and Kenny, that is). Maybe they (the police) should stick to kerb crawlers or helping grannies. And will they get competency bonuses (the police, that is)?

COMMENT THREAD: BOBBIES

Why do we put up with this?

Bruno has a cracking story, picked up from the Dutch Volkskrant newspaper, although it has been widely trailed in the Dutch press - here for instance (use Google translate).

The story concerns Maarten Engwirda, a former Dutch member of European Court of Auditors for 15 years, who retired 10 days ago. He has alleged that abuse of EU funds was swept under the carpet by the ECA. "There was a practice of watering down if not completely removing criticism," he says.

Siim Kallas, the EU commission vice-president, responsible for anti-fraud measures from 2004 to 2010 (now transport commissioner) is accused of putting "heavy pressure" on investigators to water down findings of abuse.

However, Engwirda, who also describes an endemic "cover-up culture" within the court and wider EU institutions that had prevented the true extent of fraud from being disclosed, also claims that changes made to the system in 2008 meant that procedures were "drastically changed" and the same degree of obstruction is no longer being experienced.

One takes that with not so much a pinch as a shed-load of salt, especially as Engwirda tells us that: "All these abuses never came out into the open because of the Kremlin-style information we provided". The process may be different but the abuse most certainly goes on.

Meanwhile, MPs have overwhelmingly voted against amendments to the EU bill, as we anticipated, defeating them by 39 to 314, and the dismal Cash has rolled over with a promise from the government that it will re-write the explanatory notes to the Bill.

Thus, Cameron escapes with his tawdry, contemptible Bill, and the tawdry, contemptible EU continues to steal our money. Once again, therefore, the question emerges: why do we put up with this? The secondary question is one you can imagine. Its day must surely be coming.

COMMENT THREAD

A confusion of conspiracies

Autonomous Mind attempts to explain the growing confusion surrounding that famous Met Office forecast - or is it a smokescreen?

COMMENT: NEW GLOBAL WARMING THREAD

Another green catastrophe

Posted originally on the comments to Booker's column, Dellers has picked up a contribution from "Memory Vault" who lives in Queensland and, with increasing concern, is watching the devastation that has so far claimed more than 70 lives.

But the issue here – as it was with the horrendous bush fires in Victoria in 2009, is that the disaster could by and large have been prevented, or the effects reduced, but for Greenie intervention. And two individuals are particularly in the frame, the first being environment minister Peter Garrett, who took it upon himself to block a proposed dam that would have prevented the flooding of the town of Gympie.

But "Memory Vault" particularly condemns a second individual, Tim Flannery, a professor of earth and life sciences at Macquarie University, chair of the Copenhagen Climate Council, and the 2007 Australian of the Year. It is he, above all, who managed to convince the state government that the predicable cycle of droughts and floods will no longer happen, and that the state, instead of beefing up defences from the last major event 30 years ago in 1974, should prepare for long-term water shortages.

"Growing evidence," declared Flannery, "suggests that hotter soils, caused directly by global warming, have increased evaporation and transpiration and that the change is permanent. I believe the first thing Australians need to do is to stop worrying about 'the drought' - which is transient - and start talking about the new climate". It was input such as this that had the state government spending $1.2 billion on desalination plant, instead of flood defences, a plant now mothballed, as the flood waters mount.

This trend was well established four years ago in 2006, when the city of Perth opened the first large desalination scheme at Kwinana (pictured). Visiting the plant on 18 June 2007, Australia's minister for the environment and water resources, Malcolm Turnbull,was telling the world that Perth was the "canary in the climate change coal mine," a city scrambling to find other sources of water for a growing population.

In December 2008, Ross Young, executive director of the Water Services Association of Australia, was telling Discover magazine that Australia was "the canary in the coal mine when it comes to the impact of climate change on water resources." He added: "Many people thought there would be adequate time to adapt to less water. The lesson from Australia is that the shift has been very dramatic and has occurred in a very short period".

By 10 July 2010, the New York Times was reporting: "Arid Australia Sips Seawater, but at a Cost". In one of the country’s biggest infrastructure projects in its history, the paper told us, Australia’s five largest cities were spending $13.2 billion on desalination plants. And, with a startling lack of originality, Ross Young was repeating the mantra: "We consider ourselves the canary in the coal mine for climate change-induced changes to water supply systems," he said, describing the $13.2 billion as: "the cost of adapting to climate change".

Needless to say, the Queensland state Premier Anna Bligh is now talking of "exceptional events", and the BBC happily chirps about a "freak of nature" – an attempt to reinforce the subliminal message that nothing could have been done.

But the real story is bizarre, another classic example of the greenies forcing major distortions in policy which cost money we haven't got and eventually kill people. Increasingly we see that the obsession with global warming is not a risk-free option. It costs money we can't afford, and lives. This must stop.

COMMENT THREAD

Worrying

The BBC has served a Freedom of Information request (FOIA) on UK government "over weather forecast failures secrecy in worst winter for 100 years".

We are thus confronted with the spectre of the state broadcasting service actually doing something useful ... unless there is an ulterior motive. There has to be an ulterior motive.

COMMENT: NEW GLOBAL WARMING THREAD

Bobbies get bonuses

... for turning up to work. These are "competency-related threshold payments" for reasons "including good attendance and showing a willingness to learn". One has to admit, though, that finding the word "competency" and police in the same article is a bit of a wrench, and since when did evicting portly candidates from hustings meetings take any great skill?

COMMENT THREAD

More of the same (sort of)

It is now Tuesday evening in the Okhotsk Sea area, well after the time when the crisis should have been over and all the ships extracted. Instead, the news is virtually the same as it was yesterday .

The Krasin (pictured) and the Admiral Makarov are still attempting to lead the Bereg Nadezhdy fish carrier out of the ice, the sole difference being that they are reported to be half way to freedom. Monitored by an Emergencies Ministry helicopter – which suggests, at least, that the storm conditions might have abated - this is painfully slow progress. But it is at least progress, if we are to believe what we are told.

The Western media are largely ignoring the operation, the latest being a barely informative report from the UPI agency, giving no hint of the underlying drama.

Should the Bereg Nadezhdy be safely extracted – and neither the Russian authorities nor their media now seem keen to speculated when - it will have taken the combined efforts of the region's two largest icebreakers to get a 13,000-ton ship to safety. (The largest, nuclear icebreakers, are of course, over in the West, their precise whereabouts unknown to us.)

The icebreakers on station will then have to plough back into the ice, which at this time of year – and at the prevailing temperatures, as low as -23°C - is expanding faster than a man can walk. They then have to pull out a 32,000-ton giant, in circumstances that have never been tried before, in an attempt to save over 340 crewmen.

If this is not a drama worth reporting, then nothing is, but then there are so many more important things to write about.

UPDATES: The Voice of Russia is reporting that the Bereg Nadezhdy has been towed "to a safe place" and that the rescue operation has "entered the final, most complicated stage" - the extraction of the Sodruzhestvo.

This, according to Novosti, represents a significant change in strategy. The Bereg Nadezhdy has not been towed clear of the ice. Rather she has been moved to a safer place and "parked", saving time for the icebreakers, which can now turn back earlier than they would otherwise have been able, to reach the Sodruzhestvo.

That they are having to do so suggests an element of urgency, which could mean that the bigger ship is at risk of breaking up. The plan now is to re-unite the factory ship with the fish carrier and then the four vessels will move toward clear waters in a single-file convoy. No timescale has been given.

Voice of Russia meantime notes that "it is for the first time in the last few years that the Tatar Strait has frozen to the bottom ... the ice field is continuously enlarging. It was 25 miles wide only recently, while now the field's width makes up 45 miles".

Just another normal winter, it would seem, with global warming rampant.

COMMENT: OKHOTSK SEA CRISIS

The faux rebellion

Having abandoned his pledge to give us a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, Dave "Euroslime" Cameron has decided to give us a faux act of parliament which pretends to limit the further acquisition of powers by the EU, long after it has got most of the powers it needs.

Some of the Tory backbenchers, though, are entering into the spirit of things. Presented with a faux Bill, they are working on having a faux rebellion, led by that faux eurosceptic (who still thinks Britain should be in a "reformed" EU), Bill Cash.

The egregious Cash, whose ability to "bore for England" is reckoned to be able to clear the lobby of MPs faster than a fire alarm or an investigation into personal expenses, has tabled amendments to the Bill. This thereby ensures absolutely minimal support, as most MPs would rather poke their eyes out with blunt screwdrivers than support anything Cash put his weight behind.

This especially applies to Labour MPs. Although it was hoped that some might vote for the Cash amendments, Labour sources have dismissed that idea, saying: "We are not voting with the Tory Right". Instead, they will be voting for their party's own, weak as dishwater amendment, which is almost as meaningless as a Miliband speech.

So it is that Euroslime's Bill will get an easy passage through the House tomorrow. There will be some faux excitement from some faux journalists, and then it will all be over – treble gins all round and book a call to Barroso to tell him it's in the bag.

COMMENT THREAD

Barking mad

That nice Mr Cameron wants outside organisations "such as charities and banks" to run and fund various public services.

COMMENT: RUBBISH PIECE THREAD

Is this a disgrace?

Experience warns to be very careful when the BNP – or any political party – seeks to exploit a situation for propaganda purposes. But the idea of a candidate at a hustings, member of a lawful political party, being forcibly removed by the police at the behest of another candidate, is repugnant. And that is what appears to have happened here.

Outside, we are told, the police apologised to the candidate, Mr Derek Adams, saying that they "were just doing their job". One wonders whether any of the police involved were aware of the irony, and of the so-called "Nuremberg" defence?

But if this situation is as is presented, then it is an outrage, not least also the members of the audience who appear to have been shouting "out, out, out" when the police took their action, and the apparent quiescence of the other candidates, including the very visible Tory candidate.

UPDATE: Comments from the Saddleworth News. They make interesting reading.

COMMENT THREAD

And the betting is?

... that, when she gets out , in about 18 months, she will NOT be deported ... and will end up being supported on benefits - because of that Human Rights Act that that nice Mr Cameron said he would repeal.

And you and I, Mr and Mrs Taxpayers, will be paying the bills.

COMMENT THREAD

More corporate customer care

Doncha just love it.

COMMENT: RUBBISH PIECE THREAD

The fish rots from the head

Almost unbelievable - but alas, all too credible these days.

COMMENT: RUBBISH PIECE THREAD

The game's afoot

From the Inspector Gadget blog:

The long shields are being taken out of the PSU stores and cleaned & checked all over Ruralshire for the 11th and 28th January. We are already planning the back-filling of duties for the MAST (Mutual Aid and Support Tactics....Public Order) trained officers. Has anyone else noticed shed-loads of MAST kit being checked in the backyard of their nick?

They know it ... we know it ... something is in the air. And the politicians sail on, oblivious, in the gated communities of their minds.

COMMENT THREAD

Tar baby

The worse it seems to get with the Okhotsk Sea crisis, the less information we seem to get. But the latest bulletin (already some hours old) tells us that the Krasin has begun a rescue operation to release the Bereg Nadezhdy fish carrier and the Admiral Makarov icebreaker.

This is almost "tar baby" territory, where one ship gets stuck, another goes into to get it, and it gets stuck as well, with another then sent in after it. Then we are offered stock photographs (above), bearing no relation to reality, showing cheery scenes of icebreakers leading ships through the ice – which is precisely not what is happening,

The agency TASS, as always, is trying to put a gloss on it, advising us that Bereg Nadezhdy will "possibly be freed by Tuesday morning", presumably relying in short memories. The Bereg Nadezhdy was supposed to be freed Saturday, and the Sodruzhestvo was going to be brought out today.

What now seems to be going on is that the Krasin has been cutting its way to the zone of loose ice. Earlier, both the Krasin and the Admiral Makarov had coupled to pull out the Bereg Nadezhdy (type pictured above), but they only managed to cover the distance of 1.5 miles. With the Krasin now leading, the Admiral Makarov has the fish carrier under tow. The convoy has to cover 35 to 40 miles to the zone of loose ice before it can get free, sailing at a speed of one to three knots.

There is still much talk of the difficulties in extracting the Sodruzhestvo, with its 28 metre beam, which makes one wonder whether the public is being prepared for eventual failure of the mission. The weather conditions are still described as "adverse", with high winds and with temperatures having fallen to -23°C.

One report has two Mi-8 helicopters monitoring the rescue effort from the air, which is interesting. These are medium-lift helicopters, carrying up to 34 passengers (more in an emergency) and are not the type equipping icebreakers – which will more usually have the smaller Mi-2 or the Kamov-32. The Mi-8s, therefore, might be on standby for an evacuation, with the Russians preparing for the worst.

There is also some question of whether the Makarov needs to refuel, which could add complications to an already complex situation, although - presumably - it can take off stocks from Sodruzhestvo, which is the support ship for the trawler fleet in the area and should, thus, have supplies available.

COMMENT: OKHOTSK SEA CRISIS

Handmaidens to the government

Virgin Atlantic has said it is not going to pay its Heathrow landing and parking charges due from 1 January, to the tune of about £10 million, until it sees the results of an internal inquiry into the disruption during the snow last month. "Because while we accept, and indeed we did, step up to our responsibilities to look after our customers, we feel they should [the airport operators] also feel some of that accountability," the airline says.

Steve Ridgway, Virgin's chief executive, says: "We want this inquiry to really focus on what happened and when the airport reasonably should have reopened and then we want compensation for all the costs we unnecessarily incurred after that".

"We're going to do that by holding back the fees we pay BAA and when the inquiry comes out we will happily sit down and work out what the right numbers are."

Needless to say, the leaden corporate response from BAA's owners absolutely typifies the problem: "Heathrow's conditions of use do not provide any basis for Virgin Atlantic or any other airline to withhold airport charges," it says.

This is in response to one of its largest clients. You can imagine the problems a human being might have dealing with this monolith. Corporates? All the same, part of the problem, and handmaidens to the government in their insensitivity and insolence.

COMMENT THREAD

Gated minds

Yesterday, in the Mail on Sunday I accused the political classes of living in a "gated community" – behind their barricades and machine-gun toting police. But what is perhaps as significant is the comment piece in the Sunday Telegraph authored by William Hague, on the faux EU referendum Bill. What made it stand out from the other comment pieces of the day was a simple omission – there was no comment facility. (For a critique of the piece, you'll need to go to Autonomous Mind. I can't bear to do it myself.)

On a parallel news piece, however, there were comments permitted. One read: "I don't believe William Hague exists, I think he's a conspiracy theory. No one could be that stupid could they?" But one of the most pointed simply said: "I notice the Hague piece has comments turned off. What a disgrace; I would have loved to have given this sell-out a piece of my mind. He is obviously a coward as well as a traitor and a liar."

That is as good as it gets. It serves to confirm that which we already knew. Communication with our politicians, and especially Conservative politicians, is a one-way street. They talk, we listen. That, at least, is the theory. They are very slow in learning that, if it is not two-way, then it is nothing. People are in no mood to be lectured by those they despise.

Therein lies a serious problem. The politicians have not only retreated physically but spiritually. We are seeing gated communities and gated minds. And if the politicians don't yet realise how dangerous this is, they will soon enough find out.

COMMENT: RUBBISH PIECE THREAD

We must lose ours

Autonomous Mind has read my Mail on Sunday piece and takes it further. He draws the obvious conclusions. Raedwald also has some very interesting comments and his commentator makes a valid point or two. I really smiled at Ockham's Razor, and enjoyed hugely Wittering from Witney.

It is always interesting to see who links to you on these occasions ... and who doesn't - that tells its own tale.  To get an op-ed in the Mail on Sunday is a significant event, and the paper has given it good exposure, with also a link on the front page of the website.  Some bloggers, who might have been expected to have crawled all over a piece covering the issues I raise, are strangely silent. You don't have to be a genius to work out why ... or why so few seem to be linking to Booker's piece. But there is something rather "precious" and pathetically small-minded there.

Me, I was going to do a review on Hague's piece in The Sunday Telegraph, but reading it induces a sort of torpor that prevents any further action. There is nothing Hague or any Conservative politician can say to me, to which I actually want to listen.

So, what do we want from our political institutions? Well, I wrote the answer in July 2005. And note ... I am referring to the institutions. They have served their purpose. We need to move on.

COMMENT: RUBBISH PIECE THREAD

Rescue delayed

The rescue operation to free Russian ships trapped in the ice in the Sea of Okhotsk has been delayed due to bad weather conditions. It looks as if they haven't even got the Bereg Nadezhdy out. Why am I not in the least surprised?

Things are becoming serious amid the stormy wind, near-zero visibility and strong ice pressure, the Russian Ministry of Transport says. The icebreaker Krasin, which is sailing at full speed to assist the icebreaker Admiral Makarov, is expected to arrive at the site later today.

Earlier, TASS was saying that the Krasin had arrived in the Okhotsk Sea and was making its way through the ice fields of the Sakhalin Gulf in a bid to reach the Admiral Makarov. The Makarov was said to be towing the Bereg Nadezhdy (Shore of Hope) to clear waters, and the Krasin was just 9 miles short of that convoy.

That seems to have been rather over-optimistic reporting - something which TASS is prone to do. But with this agency now reporting delays in the operation, things must be very serious indeed.

COMMENT: OKHOTSK SEA CRISIS

A rubbish piece

Modesty does not permit me to pass comment on this piece but you might note the author and decide it is worth a quick visit over to the Mail on Sunday site to read the whole thing.

Nevertheless, there is praise indeed (above).

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