http://www.thepunch.com.au/tags/un/ Politics, political opinion, world news, sports news and the latest news and views updated live, daily on The Punch - Australia's best conversation. en Copyright 2012 The Punch penberthyd@newsltd.com.au penberthyd@newsltd.com.au Sat, 26 May 2012 20:00:40 +0000 Sat, 26 May 2012 20:00:40 +0000 Politics, opinion, world news, sports news, latest news, views, Barack Obama, Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard, Nathan Rees, Malcolm Turnbull, Peter Garrett, Barnaby Joyce, Australian, federal politics, opinion polls, election, The Punch, thepunch, punch ExpressionEngine 1.6.7 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss 15 http://www.thepunch.com.au/images/punch-logo-rss.png http://www.thepunch.com.au/ 144 70 Politics, political opinion, world news, sports news and the latest news and views updated live, daily on The Punch - Australia's best conversation. Search The Punch keywords http://www.thepunch.com.au/search/ http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/no-wonder-were-confused-about-climate-change-.-.-/ The head of the UN’s climate change panel (the IPCC) Rajendra Pachauri has released a novel that combines lessons on climate change with sexy story lines. The protagonist in Pachauri’s book is eerily similar to Pachauri himself: an environmentalist and former engineer who inexplicably has a lot of sex with women (I can’t say whether the last part as any basis in reality). According to The Times the book: “mingles lectures on climate change with descriptions of Sanjay’s sexual encounters, including frequent references to “voluptuous breasts”. Following last week’s visit from the Skeptic Dark Lord Mockton (who looks and sounds like an evil mastermind from a new climate themed Bond film) I can’t help but wonder if some of the increasing confusion about climate change stems from the eccentric oddballs who we’re told to believe. penberthyd@newsltd.com.au (David Penberthy) Article http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/no-wonder-were-confused-about-climate-change-.-.-/#comments http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/no-wonder-were-confused-about-climate-change-.-.-/#item2349 Sat, 26 May 2012 20:00:40 +0000 Just once I’d like to see a celebrity, the kind that make a lot of fuss about pledging money to a cause like Haiti, to follow through. It doesn’t matter which one. I just want to see them turn up again a few months-even a year- later to check how things are going. After the camera’s been turned off and around the time we’ve all started to forget how badly we cared about it. http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/we-will-forget-haiti/ Just once I’d like to see a celebrity, the kind that make a lot of fuss about pledging money to a cause like Haiti, to follow through. It doesn’t matter which one. I just want to see them turn up again a few months-even a year- later to check how things are going. After the camera’s been turned off and around the time we’ve all started to forget how badly we cared about it. penberthyd@newsltd.com.au (David Penberthy) Article http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/we-will-forget-haiti/#comments http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/we-will-forget-haiti/#item2313 Sat, 26 May 2012 20:00:40 +0000 Just once I’d like to see a celebrity, the kind that make a lot of fuss about pledging money to a cause like Haiti, to follow through. It doesn’t matter which one. I just want to see them turn up again a few months-even a year- later to check how things are going. After the camera’s been turned off and around the time we’ve all started to forget how badly we cared about it. http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/we-should-be-proud-of-our-response-to-the-haiti-quake/ As the rescue operation in Haiti begins to shift to one of recovery, the global community is now beginning to see the true scale of the disaster which has struck the tiny Carribean nation. Natural disasters such as the Haitian earthquake, the Samoan and Tongan tsunami of last year and the Asian tsunami of 2004 always bring out a truly astounding expression of a shared humanity. Natural disasters bring poverty to the fore but the fact is extreme poverty is a daily reality for far too many people around the world. 25,000 children will die today from preventable diseases, 900 million people around the world will go to sleep hungry tonight, and tomorrow 1.4billion people will be forced to survive on less than US$1.25 for the day – more than two-thirds of them women and children. penberthyd@newsltd.com.au (David Penberthy) Article http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/we-should-be-proud-of-our-response-to-the-haiti-quake/#comments http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/we-should-be-proud-of-our-response-to-the-haiti-quake/#item2220 Sat, 26 May 2012 20:00:40 +0000 Just once I’d like to see a celebrity, the kind that make a lot of fuss about pledging money to a cause like Haiti, to follow through. It doesn’t matter which one. I just want to see them turn up again a few months-even a year- later to check how things are going. After the camera’s been turned off and around the time we’ve all started to forget how badly we cared about it. http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/the-frog-and-the-tadpoles-ban-this-man-from-travel/ If Mr Sarkozy does not sack the French Culture Minister, Frederic Mitterrand, the international community should impose a travel ban on the Minister, tout de suite. Mitterrand has reportedly confessed to what he euphemistically describes as “offences against the idea of human dignity” – which is French, it seems, for having sex with young prostitutes in Asia. Part of his defence is that such offences are ‘commonplace’. Apparently the more commonplace an obviously objectionable practice, the less it has to do with morality. penberthyd@newsltd.com.au (David Penberthy) Article http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/the-frog-and-the-tadpoles-ban-this-man-from-travel/#comments http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/the-frog-and-the-tadpoles-ban-this-man-from-travel/#item1448 Sat, 26 May 2012 20:00:40 +0000 Just once I’d like to see a celebrity, the kind that make a lot of fuss about pledging money to a cause like Haiti, to follow through. It doesn’t matter which one. I just want to see them turn up again a few months-even a year- later to check how things are going. After the camera’s been turned off and around the time we’ve all started to forget how badly we cared about it.