Indeed not Dreadnought, I was just lax in not checking spelling - I had the word 'naught' in mind and was surprised to find the old battleship name spelt with the 'o'. As it turns out, I was born in Wales, so the epithet 'Cambrian Lad' fits just as nicely!

Following on from my earlier rant, I see Robert Watson takes home a shade over £135,000 for his labours.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11551683

I shall keep the uncharitable thoughts that surface to myself.

Cumbrian Lad

Was your dreadnAught a considered and measured response to my cAmbrian? I apologise for misspelling your handle in any case.

Dreadnaught, if that report is accurate, I'm flabbergasted. Stopping the guy's letters and treats unless they agree to be 'counselled'. Quite extraordinary.

When it comes to "apparently ‘molten, churning reservoirs of emotion are about to emerge from that mine’. And there’s no telling what this geyser of two months worth of repressed feelings will give rise to" I find myself considering my feelings this morning, contemplating the debts forced upon my kids before they can be educated, seeing the banking classes (spelt with a 'w') slicing more off the top of everyone elses efforts, and seeing the same 'bankers' angling towards gouging businesses and people alike over the carbon trading scam I can tell you that my reservoirs of emotion are very definitely molten and churning, and the next official that tries to put his hand in my pocket and relieve me of money that's due to feed the kids and pay the gas bill for the coming winter will get a full gushing geyser of repressed feelings straight between the eyes! And that's without having spent 68 days in a mine with a gang of loyal, hardworking mates, all fighting for the same thing. [Now that actually starts to sound attractive....]

Cambrian Lad

Let me through. I'm a therapist.

http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/9785/

See. The therapists don't just hold conferences on the psychology of climate denial. When duty calls they can put on their hardhats and steel toecaps with the best of them.

Just found this on Youtube whilst looking at the videos for Just Do It (not Nike).

It's the comment at 4:30 which I found highly amusing. Not sure she meant it in the way it sounds, but I won't speak for others.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7o-wg2c2ZU4&feature=related

Interesting comment - at least for us economists - by Jim Manzi here

http://www.tnr.com/blog/critics/78331/liberals-climate-change-economic-impact

It essentially says: why panic, IPCC estimates themselves do not show catastrophic consequences of global warming. See also Clive Crook in FT.

I found the coverage of the Chilean rescue rivetting and was up 'till the early hours both nights. It was possibly the first time I've watched BBC news coverage for more than a few minutes in years.

I see that one of the great greenies describes Cancun as the most important event of the century! My they can't get out much!

I'd say the correct amount of coverage for Cancun would be to send a junior reporter, with a few years experience under their belt to go and be present at the various PR events, collect the press releases, and send them back to Broadcasting House, where some new graduates can go through an exercise in identifying the underlying information (crossing out the platitudes), and then they can hand the script to a scheduler who can work out when to broadcast the resulting 30s of silence in each radio and TV news programme.

Hey Bish what is this about the Royal Society math blunder? See Climate depot.

It seems the BBC have blown their Cancun budget on covering the rescue of the Chilean miners. Well, I know which I'd rather watch.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2010/oct/14/chilean-miners-bbc-cancun-climate-talks

Pachuari to head IPCC until 2014:

http://af.reuters.com/article/energyOilNews/idAFSGE69D0I820101014