Open Forum July 31, 2010 at Catallaxy Files

Open Forum July 31, 2010

789 comments

Written by Sinclair Davidson

July 31st, 2010 at 12:47 am

Posted in Uncategorized

789 Responses to 'Open Forum July 31, 2010'

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Oh fercrissakes, are these clowns on crack? Gillard sent in her bodyguard to a security briefing??? Can’t be true.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/people-in-politics/bodyguard-deputised-for-gillard/story-fn5oa9i5-1225899273242

This level of incompetence is beyond comprehension and this disgusting rabble must be chucked out.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 1:01 am
I’m contemplating remortgaging the house and plonking on Tone. This government is insane.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 1:04 am
Tony Abbott attends Essendon training. Essendon thump St Kilda. Coincidence? I think not.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 1:09 am
CL, CL, Wake the fuck up and get over to your computer. I’ve even stopped my stock prices coming in on one screen to get a handle on this.

The ALP is freaking insane.

I think Tanner could smell the burning carcass.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:15 am
The satisfaction I’d really get out of this is if Tone publicly fires Wombat-Henry after Gillers concession speech.

I’d hand over good money to the Libs if Tone fired him that same evening.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:18 am
I’ve been out, JC. Just got back to read about this latest scandal.

During a time of war Rudd and Gillard were sending their clerk and bodyguard, respectively, to represent them at security briefings?

Just wow.

This is one of the worst governments in the Western world in the last 20 years. They’re that bad.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 1:22 am
Call me an old fashioned gentleman. But I love the smell of napalm in the morning.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:22 am
Check your email CL.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:23 am
Yea?
The party faithful are unhappy about the lack of decency shown by a shady member of parliament

RIGHT now the anger is growing among ALP party faithful across Australia over the internal cabinet leaks designed to destabilise Prime Minister Julia Gillard in the middle of the federal campaign.

No one in the federal party should underestimate this anger.

These are ordinary Australians who joined the political party of their choice because they believe in the policies and philosophies of the party.

They are salt of the earth Australians who do not want public office nor gain for themselves, but seek to participate in the democratic process by giving freely of their time and often limited resources to support their beliefs. They are the foot soldiers who will be handing out pamphlets at railway stations, distributing candidate material, door knocking, and staffing polling booths on election day. These ordinary ALP party members simply want the re-election of Gillard and a Labor government.

Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar.

End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar.

They know the caucus chooses the leader, but they expect everyone to be loyal at election time regardless of who is the leader.

They also know politics is a treacherous business but election time is supposed to be a “bastardry” free zone until at least after the election.

At the moment, the party faithful know they are being betrayed and let down by one or more federal members of parliament who are putting their own egos and hatred before the best interests of the party: these MPs are people who should know better and who rose to high office on the back of the hard work of these party faithful. They will enjoy the perks of office until the day they die.

Why a shady MP/ It could be anyone and it could actually be a whistle-blower who has finally had enough of these douchebags trying on this stuff with scant regard to national security issues.

This stuff needs to get out and the people and party punished severely for these transgressions.

The party “faithful” and the “salt of the earth” types a messed in the head if they’re unhappy just because it’s destabilizing the Liars Party.

These are serious transgressions that need to be known by the electorate and punished severely.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:29 am
What a disgusting act of betrayal of duty. These arseclowns should befored from a cannon into the Pacific. Shameful.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 1:30 am
The party “faithful” and the “salt of the earth” types are messed in the head if they’re unhappy just because it’s destabilizing the Liars Party.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:31 am
I really can’t believe this shit is going on, Infidel.

This is serious shot and she sent a friggen bodyguard to high level national meetings?

What else do we need to know about these swine of a government?

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:32 am
CL – there is absolutely no dispute whatsoever now. No serious historian can possibly contest that that this is by light years the worst abomination of a government since Federation. None.

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 1:33 am
I bet this is the tip of the iceberg too, Fisk. There’s more to come. Watch as they disintegrate into a mud wrestle of accusations and bitching.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:35 am
At this rate we’ll be kicked out of the Commonwealth.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 1:36 am
We truly need to formulate a new code of ethics that permits physical retribution against anyone who continues to support the Rudd or Gillard governments. A kick in the face would be most appropriate although I’m happy to settle for a Birdian push-into-the-swimming pool compromise. I really don’t know what form or shape such a philosophy may take, nor how it would be reasoned, but we must allow for the possibility that it MAY be justified to use force against people who advocate the re-election of a fuckwit government.

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 1:39 am
Obama bows to Chris Christie!:

http://michellemalkin.com/2010/07/30/obama-bows-again/

The dude just loves bowing!

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 1:44 am
Okay … say you’re the CIA station chief and the DoD liaison officer.

while sitting down to breaky in the morning with the wife and kids you pick up the Oz and read the accusation.

You do the following.

1. You leave the breaky and jump into the car hurrying to get to the embassy so that you can send an immediate cabal to Langley and the Pentagon recommending that they cease transmitting all top secret intel to the Australians for fear of serious security leaks at the top level of government. You would also recommend that it shouldn’t be done in any dramatic fashion but in a way that doesn’t suggest any sudden reversal of policy, so that it doesn’t become too obvious.

or

2. Ignore it and keep sending your best intel.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:45 am
Here’s the other problem.

My thinking is that it’s actually incumbent on the Americans to cease all top secret intel because if the Australians compromised them it would have political consequences back home for not acting when they knew their stuff could get out after this accusation surfaced.

In other words they may not have a choice.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:51 am
This can’t be true. Seriously, if this is true, and I want more confirmation because extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, then game over.

Take heart chaps, if this is true it will be the end of this government. If this is true Gillard should not even be allowed to hold her seat, she should be declared professionally incompetent and reduces to scraping chewing gum off pavements.

John H.

31 Jul 10 at 1:52 am
This is the guy that Julia Gillard sent to attend national security meetings on her behalf:

Mr Stark, a former Liberal Party member, worked for Mr Downer as a bodyguard and security official when the latter was foreign minister. He was later hired as a bodyguard and security official for Ms Gillard after the Rudd government was elected in 2007, and subsequently became a junior adviser in her office.

No threat to confidentiality there. What a pack of clowns.

Homer. I know you support this government. Get over here and justify yourself at once.

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 1:52 am
John H – we have had this accusation made against BOTH Rudd and Gillard. I think there is something to it. If it were false, they’d deny it without qualification.

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 1:53 am
God I’d love to see the CIA dossier on Rudd and Gillard. It’d be as a flattering as a g-string and a spot light.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 1:56 am
This leak is probably coming direct from top military brass. They can’t risk it any longer.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 1:57 am
Homer. I know you support this government. Get over here and justify yourself at once.

You kidding Fisk. Homer would think this was a sign of competency and that the minister was using his or her time more productively.

I know how the intellectual insect thinks and what he would say.

Watch.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:57 am
The satisfaction I’d really get out of this is if Tone publicly fires Wombat-Henry after Gillers concession speech.

Tony has to fire the fuckwit. In fact, we need an Inquisition of the entire public sector. Any public servant who is suspected of having supported the Rudd/Gillard government will be keelhauled until they confess and apologise to the nation.

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 2:00 am
Obama bows to Chris Christie!

Hey, fair enough!

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 2:01 am
JC – this is a truly embarrassing day to be an Australian. It’s just shameful. I can’t find the words to illustrate the extent to which I hate these people nor how much harm I wish them, after what they have done to this country.

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 2:03 am
Hope! Coalition now leads in the polls.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/07/31/2969633.htm

John H.

31 Jul 10 at 2:05 am
I could never have believed anything like this , Fisk.

It’s just a bunch of clowns. The entire lot of them.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 2:09 am
The biggest surprise for me is that Rudd avoided these meetings. I would have thought this is what he lived for. It’s all quite hard to fathom.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 2:13 am
The biggest surprise for me is that Rudd avoided these meetings.

No cameras, no reporting of this meetings, no publicity. That is why Rudd avoided these meetings.

John H.

31 Jul 10 at 2:15 am
Fuck.

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 2:15 am
Sorry about the language, people. I don’t usually swear in writing. But today is not usual.

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 2:21 am
You’re forgiven Fisk. I never swear of course

JC

31 Jul 10 at 2:23 am
Fuck Fisk it is so fucking atrocious I’ll be fucking swearing until these fucking pricks are thrown out of fucking office.

John H.

31 Jul 10 at 2:28 am
Abbott still hasn’t sealed the deal, though.

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 2:34 am
No he hasn’t. You’re right, Fisk. He needs to do this now. This coming week.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 2:41 am
There goes a ton of anti-capitalist rhetoric:

Did the government cause the Gulf spill?

The Coast Guard has gathered evidence it failed to follow its own firefighting policy during the Deepwater Horizon disaster and is investigating whether the chaotic spraying of tons of salt water by private boats contributed to sinking the ill-fated oil rig, according to interviews and documents.

Coast Guard officials told the Center for Public Integrity that the service does not have the expertise to fight an oil rig fire and that its response to the April 20 explosion may have broken the service’s own rules by failing to ensure a firefighting expert supervised the half-dozen private boats that answered the Deepwater Horizon’s distress call to fight the blaze.

An official maritime investigation led by Coast Guard Capt. Hung M. Nguyen in New Orleans is examining whether the salt water that was sprayed across the burning platform overran the ballast system that kept the rig upright, changing its weight distribution, and causing it to list.

Thanks, gubbermint!

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 2:42 am
Oh dear.

Babyland turns against Julia Gillard.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 2:50 am
Great job if it’s true. So BP investors got a red hot pipe up them while the government was blaming their firm for causing the spill, which may end up having been caused by Government in the first place.

$67 billion loss in market cap and $30 billion losses in clean up and comp claims later……..

JC

31 Jul 10 at 2:51 am
And right on cue, George Megaidiot goes into “pox on both their houses” mode, which of course he never does when it’s the Coalition in trouble:

THE role of Mark Latham in this election campaign is humiliating for both sides of politics.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/polling-centre/spats-show-how-little-reform-is-at-stake/story-fn5asavh-1225899265570

I wonder how much The Australian pays people like this to write for them?

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 3:14 am
Lol at all the left wing commentary on the election betting markets not even a week ago.

Mitch

31 Jul 10 at 3:21 am
Phil reveals the truth of the holiday
http://graemebird.wordpress.com/2010/07/28/overlords-or-morons/#comment-31973
Who needs to travel? As Kafka wrote and I heartily agree:

“You don’t need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait. Do not even wait, be quite still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked. It has no choice, it will roll in ecstasy at your feet.”

Steve Edney

31 Jul 10 at 7:21 am
So the tour de lard was all crap. See jc thought s/he was bullshitting from the start and doing the commentary from the comfort of a food stained couch

Jc..

31 Jul 10 at 10:08 am
Andrew Bolt on the commentariat’s latest bizarre meme: playing the “family card.”

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 10:10 am
That’s an old journalistic standard from way back, Fisk. When the ALP is in trouble, “a pox on both their houses”!

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 10:12 am
Another Labor green policy disaster:

Energy star ratings in disarray.

LABOR’S push to cut greenhouse gas emissions through the use of energy efficiency schemes was yesterday dealt another blow when building industry heavyweights discredited the star ratings being applied to hundreds of thousands of homes.

Investigations by the building industry have found that the mandatory star ratings scheme is inaccurate and fundamentally flawed.

Worst government ever.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 10:19 am
Yea that’s true. You hear so oft now .

Jc..

31 Jul 10 at 10:19 am
These people have no shame
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/weve-bin-keeping-an-eye-on-you/story-e6frf7kx-1225899232423

tal

31 Jul 10 at 10:30 am
Good news:

Taxes on beer and alcohol to rise again on Monday.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 10:31 am
It is richly ironic that Lu Kewan is enjoying the dubious pleasures of the Qld Health Service receiving treatment for a leaking gall bladder.

Because in traditional Chinese medicine, the gall bladder is linked to resentment. Not hard to see how, from the traditional Chinese perspective, Lu Kewan has popped his gallbladder.

I suppose the ALP campaign squad are wondering if Bill Ludwig could pull a few strings and get Dr Patel out on license to do the bladder op on Lu Kewan

Myrddin Seren

31 Jul 10 at 10:31 am
Tal’s link:

HOUSEHOLD rubbish has come under unprecedented scrutiny, with Victorian councils filming bin contents and conducting secretive audits and inspections.

Privacy advocates are questioning the big brother tactics of waste authorities.

But councils, under pressure to cut rising landfill bills, insist surveillance is a vital part of their bid to educate residents about recycling.

We need to be explicit about this: leftist environmentalism is, without doubt, a mental illness.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 10:35 am
If they want to educate us why conduct secret audits?

tal

31 Jul 10 at 10:40 am
Cheryl’s Change!

“She will contest this election as an independent Senate candidate for NSW under the ‘Change Politics!’ banner.”

This just in: Kernot to preference Greens, Democrats.

Politics as usual from the sanctimonious idiot.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 10:40 am
They won’t build dams so people have water, Tal, but they are fitting cameras to garbage trucks to make sure you’re not throwing out any plastic milk bottles.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 10:41 am
“Educate residents about recycling”.

If you listen carefully to the Green zombies “re-education” is a term frequently used in their hectoring.

It’s actually not that far from the re-education attempted by Pol Pot.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 10:42 am
HAHAHAHAHA! Lamest spin of the day aaward goes to Small Business Minister Craig Emerson. Responding to accusations that Julia sent a bouncer to national security meetins and to a request for information about what really went on…

“Were there occasions when neither the prime minister Mr Rudd nor the deputy prime minister Julia Gillard were present?”

Small Business Minister Craig Emerson says the Government will not reveal those details.

“These are national security meetings that we’re talking about,” he said.

“I’m not at liberty to talk about the content or the attendees.”

Labor can’t confirm or deny that Rudd and Gillard bothered to attend national security briefings.

It’s classified!

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 10:48 am
Does Emerson have any integrity left. What an idiot.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 10:51 am
How would he know anyway?

Sinclair Davidson

31 Jul 10 at 11:04 am
Belated pillow talk?

DavidJ

31 Jul 10 at 11:10 am
Ohh bitchy

tal

31 Jul 10 at 11:20 am
Centrebet odds shifted only modestly:
Coaltion PM: $2.64
Labor PM: $1.46

Capitalist Piggy

31 Jul 10 at 11:50 am
If you can’t be arsed to attend an NSC meeting your attendance at a digger’s funeral is nothing more than sordid lie. The Ruddard government is a stain on the nation; they need to be taught a lesson at this election and be metaphorically beaten with electoral clubs.

dover_beach

31 Jul 10 at 11:54 am
Dear god. Will you all calm down?

BirdLab

31 Jul 10 at 12:07 pm
And in more important news: Prue, where did it all go wrong?

“KATE FISCHER, the former model, actress and Sydney socialite who once stepped out with actor Ben Mendelsohn and was engaged to James Packer, has been missing in action for some time now. The July 12 issue of Woman’s Day asked: ”Where in the world is Kate Fischer?” PS can reveal that she’s living in Beverly Hills, California, and now goes by the name T’ziporah Malka. The 36-year-old daughter of the NSW Liberal member for Goulburn Pru Goward has told friends she has converted to Orthodox Judaism.”

http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/people/kate-follows-family-to-judaism-20100730-10zlx.html

BirdLab

31 Jul 10 at 12:10 pm
Actually, ‘national security’ sounds important as a term, but in Australia, at least, is relatively trivial in reality. Australia has no threats to its immediate security, and the war in Afghanistan has nothing whatsoever to do with defense. Any PM ought to have better things to do than attend pointless meetings.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 12:14 pm
Conversion to Judaism is evidence everything went wrong?

Calm down.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 12:15 pm
“Her Facebook page is filled with loads of Yiddish expressions like ”vent my kvetch” ”oy vey!” and her enthusiasm for studying the Torah.”

Vent my kvetch? No doubt she’s now speaking with a Brooklyn accent.

As batty as Pam Atlas.

BirdLab

31 Jul 10 at 12:20 pm
NSC meetings are not just about imminent threats to the nation. They concern the activities of ADF personnel. THR is saying the Australian prime minister and deputy prime minister shouldn’t bother themselves with the details of what soldiers are doing in war zones.

Nice to see that the attitude of the British brass in the Dardenelles lives on.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 12:20 pm
Could swing the election campaign back Labor’s way, BirdLab. Everything could hang on the Pru Goward embarrassment factor.

Keep us posted.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 12:21 pm
They can get the details without wasting time in meetings. Australia is hardly in the middle of the Blitz, and our reasons for war are political rather than strategic.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 12:22 pm
THR, we have troops in Afghanistan and elsewhere. Pretending that these meetings are ‘pointless’ is a rather pathetic defense of their absences considering that at the time these meetings were held they are likely to be involved in other meetings.

dover_beach

31 Jul 10 at 12:22 pm
Speaking of AWOL women, could some kind person post Julia Gillard’s picture on some milk cartons?

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 12:24 pm
Ha, ha! Hear’s that “poem” Phil’s “friend” wrote.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMDKDAfnNFs

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 12:25 pm
You cannot possibly imagine the immensity of the fuck I do not give about this election.

BirdLab

31 Jul 10 at 12:25 pm
Fischer does appear to have gone batshit crazy, especially with comments about the ‘tragedy’ of inter-faith marriage. We’ll always have Kate to thank for cinematic masterpiece, Blood Surf:

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/blood_surf/

It’s so spectacularly bad that it really deserves a bigger audience.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 12:26 pm
Cherly Kernot? The Left’s very own Pauline Hanson!

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 12:27 pm
They seem to have attended meetings on “climate change.” Death toll: 0.

Australian men and women in war zones?

Nah. Send the bouncer.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 12:27 pm
Fischer does appear to have gone batshit crazy…

I’m sure she’ll get over it. They eventually do, these spoiled children of the political class.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 12:33 pm
That looks fantastic THR. Have you seen it?

BirdLab

31 Jul 10 at 12:34 pm
I saw it years ago. It has no redeeming features whatsoever. The acting makes fingerpuppets look like DeNiro. The script is so laughably bad that, at one pooint (IIRC), one of the female characters attempts to repel the killer crocodile by shaking her breasts at it. This is without a trace of humour or irony, mind.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 12:38 pm
It sounds the perfect fare for a lazy Sunday afternoon.

I’ve always been keen on a bit of random breast-shaking.

BirdLab

31 Jul 10 at 12:41 pm
Will any of them make it back to civilization!?

Love it.

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 1:02 pm
Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!

BirdLab

31 Jul 10 at 1:17 pm
I suspect the tittie-shaking is far from random. Gratuitous prehaps, but never random.

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 1:23 pm
You mean Kate wasn’t hired for her acting skills?

http://www.cultreviews.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/blood-surf-4.png

BirdLab

31 Jul 10 at 1:29 pm
Hawkie chaperoning yet another lightweight damsel in distress.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 1:45 pm
Just browsing the Herald Sun and was somewhat startled at the results of their online poll for preferred PM;
Gillard – 21.86% (8819 votes)
Abbott – 78.14% (31518 votes)

Not sure about the politics of Hun readers, but that is way out of whack with the “official” polls.
Could the Titanic be sinking faster than the pundits estimate?

Pedro the Ignorant

31 Jul 10 at 1:50 pm
Yaaaiirrsss…”Big Ideas” McWho will no doubt be a victim of the inevitable Surge to Terje (say Hey-Hey).

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 1:51 pm
Mckew needs a lot of help. Even the teleprompter won’t help.

But hey, look at the bright side. If she loses her seat she’s always got a job with the Liar’s Party media wing.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 1:57 pm
Pedro, while that poll is obviously silly, Nielsen now has Gillard leading Abbott 49-41 for preferred PM – an incredible result in itself given the way Abbott’s detractors whopped it up when he was appointed Opposition Leader.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 1:59 pm
Whooped it up!

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 2:00 pm
Pedro

There’s a lot of movement at the moment. Centrebet went from

3′s lib 1.20′s Lab yesterday afternoon to 2.64′s lib 1.46 Lab.

Shit’s happening in the blackblocks.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 2:01 pm
I see that Bird’s about to declare a jihad on bedding:

“I don’t like “fitted” sheets. I don’t remember them as a kid. I do not understand what problem there is that they are meant to solve. They are not forgiving as to the size of the bed. A slightly too-large normal sheet is fine for many sizes of bed. But the fitted sheet is to be fitted exactly. They don’t dry well on the line in the winter, when the drier is busted, since you cannot spread them out properly. I don’t see them as being any sensible sort of invention at all.”

http://graemebird.wordpress.com/2010/07/28/overlords-or-morons/#comment-31984

What a fuckwit.

BirdLab

31 Jul 10 at 2:39 pm
I disagree. This is surely a welcome return to form. The Avian Oracle’s raison d’etre is precisely to make such judgments for us all to learn and advance. Having said that, I am fitted-sheets man myself.

1. I tend not to upsticks every few weeks to a new bed for which my sheets were not built.

2. I try to keep more than one set of sheets in the house at any one time in case of drier downtime issues.

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 2:48 pm
Yes PP. I was born a fitted sheets man, and I’ll die a fitted sheets man.

BirdLab

31 Jul 10 at 2:51 pm
And surely a man reaches a certain age, a certain level of consumer maturity, where he knows which fitted sheets are juuuusst riiight for his own bedding needs?

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 3:02 pm
One would certainly hope so PP.

But we’re dealing with Bird here.

BirdLab

31 Jul 10 at 3:19 pm
Coles boss: Abbott’s paid parental scheme levy won’t affect prices. The big problem, says Ian McLeod, is electricity price rises of 20 percent (under Labor governments).

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 4:21 pm
“What a fuckwit.”
What is really pathetic is that Bird is trying to be witty.

pedro

31 Jul 10 at 4:24 pm
Gillard admits her bodyguard attended NSC meetings for her, then rehashes Angry Julia strategy.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 4:27 pm
He took notes, Cl. She sent to “bouncer” to the meetings to take notes.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 4:34 pm
I hope we don’t have to wait until Monday for another revelation as I’m kinda getting used to this leak a day thing.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 4:36 pm
Nice dissembling by the communist usurper. No one is questioning The Bodyguard’s competence. We want to know why you consider the security of this country so unimportant that you’d send Kevin Costner in your place.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 4:47 pm
From the body guard story:
“Describing herself as “a fighter” Ms Gillard turned to the economy as she pitched Labor’s case, arguing the government had created 450,000 jobs during the global financial crisis.”
If you were really really bad, you’d put up that quote with a picture of 4 headstones and mention the batts disaster.

pedro

31 Jul 10 at 4:50 pm
You can actually see how she’s beginning to lose her grip. Her feigned anger and attempt to change the subject are amateurish.

What until the next series of leaks hit. She’ll be saying the government created 800,000 new jobs.

By the time the election date hits it’ll be up 30 million new jobs.

Perhaps Shiny ought to teach her about compounding as he was compounding the Iraqi death rate at 30% per week.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 4:56 pm
Bird is now the nincompoop’s nincompoop:

This is so fucking callous and lame as an excuse by THR on behalf of Gillard. Because for starters he’s wrong about us not having a security problem. Our security problem is just fucking awesome. How do 22 million people defend an entire continent against invasion, or more immediately, subversion? Good question. Tough Gig.

Gillard can speak for herself. In any event, Australia does not have any security problem, much less an ‘awesome’ one. Nobody has threatened Australia with invasion for several decades, and there are no threats on the horizon. Nor is there any evidence of ‘subversion’. Our troops are in Afghanistan to appease the US and secure an alliance with them, not to defend Australian soil. Drop the paranoid fantasies, yeastpants.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 5:50 pm
It’s pretty funny really… there’s a bunch of leaks against Gillard – most presumably from Rudd. The response is a leak about Rudd not attending the meetings – which is pretty stupid given that she didn’t, as it was bound to come out.

Coalition now on 2.40 at centrebet (ALP at 1.54)…

Fleeced

31 Jul 10 at 5:53 pm
Crazy old Lil KIm is at it again
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/7918468/North-Korean-football-team-shamed-in-six-hour-public-inquiry-over-World-Cup.html

tal

31 Jul 10 at 5:56 pm
This betting is moving down faster than an Airbus in crash mode.

Can’t wait for next week’s leaks.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 5:59 pm
To go from $4.20 to $2.40 in 5 days takes a stunning amount of money. Labor are gonski.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 5:59 pm
tal

Oh, I thought you were linking to Lefty Kim!

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 6:00 pm
Yes, the feigned anger is something to behold. As someone said before… where was her fighting spirit to save our BER tax dollars. But now her lifelong ambition is slipping through her anointed fingers she wants to and is is ready to fight. Too fucking late.

DavidJ

31 Jul 10 at 6:00 pm
Jeez Tal;

That’s a real carrot and a stick management philosophy taken literally.

If you succeed you get a fresh carrot, but if you fail you get the stick.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 6:02 pm
So where the fuck was Gillard, how many meetings did she miss and who was guarding her?

DavidJ

31 Jul 10 at 6:05 pm
I support Kim’s decision to flog his soccer players. Considering how much tax payers dosh we give to our Olympians, it’s something I’d like introduced here.

“Ian Thorpe, report for your public flogging”.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 6:09 pm
Abbott’s playing this like a top orchestra conductor. He eggs on the media just so much without overdoing it and then stays quiet in case he takes up too much space than can be devoted to the Liar’s Party ripping itself apart.

Labor implosions are fabulous to watch.

I’m just getting ready, as we don’t know until the fat lady sings on election night.

I just called 000 asking to be put onto the Crisis Centre and explained to the person there that they have extra personnel ready for the large number of suicide calls coming in from Beta Central.

I’m even willing to man the phones.

That’s the sort of good natured, thoughtful person I am.

JC

31 Jul 10 at 6:12 pm
Stress and Cancer

http://healthycuriousity.blogspot.com/2010/07/2-enriched-environment-stress-inhibits.html#more

John H.

31 Jul 10 at 6:54 pm
Bird has a very good point, THR:

But supposing THR is right and that we ought not be in Afghanistan. Well you f*%#@*% c$@# THR. Then she ought to have been at the meetings trying to figure out how to make these guys safer/and-or brings these guys home, and/or to improve her understanding of military and security matters more generally.

But no. She is an idiot. And she probably thinks like THR does.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 7:16 pm
Bird is putting the cart before the horse. The decision to place troops in Afghanistan is political. They could be recalled to Australia tomorrow at the decision of the PM or cabinet, if the political winds were blowing the right way. You might imagine that Afghanistan is the centre of some heroic clash of civilisations, but it isn’t, and nobody can seriously believe it is. The economy, health, education, and indeed, the environment, are all of greater importance than Afghanistan, and there’s no reason why our bloated defence force should not be given the cursory treatment it deserves.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 7:21 pm
Great idea, Kimster!

Let’s see, who can we flog?

- First up: Little Leyton. (Reason: none needed – the cap if you insist).

- All soccer players
- the Wallabies if they lose tonight
- Israel Falau for embracing the gayness of AFL
- Matty Johns for having the Ruddian gall to be K-Mart Wally Lewis all these years
- Ricky Ponting (for general twerpitude)

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 7:23 pm
THR

You might well be right, given that tonnes more people have died under Krillard’s education and environment policies than have died in Afghanistan. However, your posts rely on a naive – no, silly actually – reading of Australia’s geostrategic interests.

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 7:26 pm
Not at all, PP. The purpose of Australia’s commitment to Afghanistan is to lend moral legitimacy and logistical support to the US, in the interests of securing the alliance. That’s about it. It’s nonsense to think a PM is required to micromanage defence. Attendance at meetings is a waste of time if the same info can be gleaned from minutes or a memo. In any event, it’s probably the ADF itself which is behind these leaks, since that’s the modus operandi of some of these parasitic fifth columnists.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 7:43 pm
Bring on the Republic
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1299099/Prince-Charles-My-duty-save-world.html

tal

31 Jul 10 at 7:46 pm
THR, you’re running an Homeric distraction strategy based on the conflation of your personal view of the Afghanistan War and Julia Gillard’s failure to attend to her duties. We’re only interested in the latter question. Your take on this – that other meetings are more important (which assumes she skipped an NSC briefing to attend a meeting on “climate change” or something) – is lame.

Attendance at meetings is a waste of time if the same info can be gleaned from minutes or a memo.

This assumes that Gillard herself – and Rudd himself – had nothing to say on the subject of national security and defence, and nothing to communicate to security and defence chiefs.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 7:54 pm
tal

Oh the man is surely a water-tight case for the reintroduction of public executions, a la Charles I!

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 7:58 pm
Public floggings and public executions,we are an angry mob tonight

tal

31 Jul 10 at 8:05 pm
I’m all about efficiency, tal, I tell you; efficiency!

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 8:07 pm
I’ll sharpen the pitchforks Peter

tal

31 Jul 10 at 8:11 pm
This assumes that Gillard herself – and Rudd himself – had nothing to say on the subject of national security and defence, and nothing to communicate to security and defence chiefs.

CL, Gillard would have about as much to say on so-called security as Abbott, in his capacity as health minister, would have said on emergency tracheotomies. These politicians are there for the broad brush strokes, and that’s all. Insisting, tokenistically, on their appearance at meetings in which such an appearance makes no difference is merely a personal fetish of some here. It’s comical to see such hardened enemies of the public service become weak-kneed, tax-eating sentimentalists when it comes to faux security concerns, 10,000 kms away.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 9:15 pm
A very tough neighborhood to our North. And we have to somehow secure the entire continent.

Pity poor Bird. Once a half-decent polemicist, now a senile conspiracy crank, reduced to licking windows at the Gosford RSL, and shrieking to passers-by that we must fear the Papuans and Western Samoans who constitute the ‘tough neighbourhood’ to our north.

Its one thing for Ron Paul to talk in this way.

So left-libertarians can but hint at that which right libertarians can say outright? This is sheer hypocrisy and idiocy.

The posture the great theorist of Statecraft (THR) hopes we project towards Beijing and Jakarta

No you are lying.

as well club to death an entire Australian family

That the murders to which you refer were probably done by Chinese does not mean the Chinese Govt was responsible, any more than the Aust Govt was responsible for bumping off your hero and doppelganger, Carl Williams.

Here we are not particularly strong, and yet we have sent a lot of our people to war. The wrong combination entire.

What an idiotic comment. Bird forsakes principle entirely, in favour of some aggressively stupid version of realpolitik. Please, GMB, stick to debates about how best to wear your fitted sheets on your head.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 9:23 pm
THR

So are you or aren’t you?

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 9:43 pm
I can confirm that I am, in fact, the great theorist of statecraft.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 9:48 pm
What about your sheets?

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 9:49 pm
I grew up with non-fitted sheets, but now have the fitted kind. Governance of sheet-related matters has long been ceded to Mrs THR in any case.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 9:55 pm
Perfect answer!

Peter Patton

31 Jul 10 at 9:59 pm
Sheets could be a personal thing, THR how’s the girlchild?

tal

31 Jul 10 at 10:00 pm
The girlchild is gorgeous, tal. She’s growing at what seems to be a rate of knots. She’s developing a bit of taste in food, after eating almost nothing solid other than pumpkin and banana. She’s also getting smart, and taught herself how to clap hands the other day. Ask her to say ‘mama’and she invariably says ‘dada’. On the down side, she’s got this habit of snorting all the time, especially when we pull a camera out. Hopefully, it’s just a phase.

How’s life with you, tal?

THR

31 Jul 10 at 10:16 pm
CL, Gillard would have about as much to say on so-called security as Abbott, in his capacity as health minister, would have said on emergency tracheotomies

The exact same thing can be said about the economy – none of the federal cabinet have anything particularly useful to say about economics that couldn’t be said by public servants – they should therefore not bother turning up to EEC meetings. If we really accept this line of reasoning, we clearly don’t even need a cabinet at all. Is that what you are really calling for?

The other point worth making is this – I wonder if you would have been equally flippant had Hugo Chavez, who faces no security threats from anyone and is in fact himself a security threat to Colombia, having sent his tanks to the border at least twice now, were the one neglecting national security council meetings.

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 11:28 pm
In other news, Gillard is now claiming that the government has created 450,000 jobs. Does anyone know from which canal she found those figures?

Michael Fisk

31 Jul 10 at 11:30 pm
I think that’s how many Chinese jobs were created manufacturing insulation.

Fleeced

31 Jul 10 at 11:32 pm
In other news, Gillard is now claiming that the government has created 450,000 jobs. Does anyone know from which canal she found those figures?

This includes all the jobs she and Kev created in China with the plasma TV handout and Pink Battathon.

Infidel Tiger

31 Jul 10 at 11:33 pm
Ask her to say ‘mama’and she invariably says ‘dada’

Much to the annoyance of mothers everywhere.

(and to the delight of fathers)

Sinclair Davidson

31 Jul 10 at 11:37 pm
The difference, Fisk, is that people genuinely care about the economy, and about health, and there are real differences between the parties, however small they are in practice. With national security, none of this is true. Nobody votes based on whether Australia goes to Afghanistan or not. There’s no broader practical significance at stake, since our army isn’t there for defence, but for political reasons.

As for Chavez – whatever one thinks of him, Venezuela is clearly at more risk than Australia. The US attempted a coup a few years ago, remain generally hostile, and have bases all over the region. Colombia is easily the most brutal, most aggressive, and least democratic nation in the area, and it borders Venezuela. I think Chavez should focus on the economy, not the military, but this shouldn’t detract from the real threats that exist.

THR

31 Jul 10 at 11:48 pm
The difference, Fisk, is that people genuinely care about the economy…

Where as they don’t genuinely care about hundreds of defence personnel in Afghanistan or the security of Australia.

Right.

You’re becoming Homeric, THR. Home incineration, now this. The apologias are becoming goofier.

…our army isn’t there for defence, but for political reasons.

This is also why the government wastes hundreds of millions dollars ‘defending’ us against “global warming.” It is not a threat to anyone, hasn’t killed anyone. We can do absolutely nothing about it – even if it does exist. So Gillard should also have absented herself from environmental deliberations.

I bet she didn’t.

C.L.

31 Jul 10 at 11:57 pm
Actually, THR, Colombia now has a significantly lower murder rate than Venezuela, which is now the only country in Latin America to be in a crashing recession. This is a truly embarrassing record of failure to have to defend. Venezuela also faces zero external security threats – the US does not pose the slightest threat to Venezuela – and Chavez has himself threatened Colombia by moving tank divisions to the border, that is when he hasn’t been tied up in his other important duties such as shutting down opposition media outlets.

Finally, national security is obviously one of the most important functions of government. Australia rightly maintains a military force capable of unilaterally defending the continent on which we inhabit. Sadly, Gillard, and you apparently, is extremely flippant about national security, at least in countries which have private property rights and freedom of speech – paranoid national-security-obsessed bunker regimes with terrible records on individual freedom and economic management are for some reason excused from this nonchalance. How come?

Michael Fisk

1 Aug 10 at 12:06 am
…which is now the only country in Latin America to be in a crashing recession.

Yep. And Brazil with no oil etc. is just absolutely rocketing along with a pretty decent administration that could be categorized similar to Hawke’s in terms of being left/reformist.

Brazilian stocks could still be great value.

JC

1 Aug 10 at 12:15 am
You’re wrong, Fisk, and your grovelling appeal to Bird is de facto proof of the falsity of your position.

Venezuela has higher crime than Colombia, but COlombia has more political murders than any other country in the region. Unionists and journos are still being shot, and Colombia remains a drug-funded dictatorship.

Comparing Australia to Venezuela is particularly foolish. If China has attempted a coup here, for instance, you may have a point.

As it stands:

Attempts to overthrow Chavez: One
Attempts to overthrow Aust Government: none

Incidentally, opposition papers are permitted in Venezuela, where the wealthy elite openly calls for armed insurrection against Chavez. That makes his regimes less paranoid than Australia’s, not more.

THR

1 Aug 10 at 9:31 am
Where as they don’t genuinely care about hundreds of defence personnel in Afghanistan or the security of Australia.

They’re professional volunteers. Withdraw them from combat tomorrow, and nobody will change their vote. Not that their presence in Afghanistan has anything whatsoever to do with Australia’s ‘security’.

THR

1 Aug 10 at 9:34 am
Yeah but that’s an Homeric dog that just won’t hunt, THR. You don’t like the left’s Good War – in Afghanistan. Fine. That has nothing to do with Gillard failing to attend to her duties as Deputy Prime Minister.

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 10:28 am
The economy, health, education, and indeed, the environment, are all of greater importance than Afghanistan, and there’s no reason why our bloated defence force should not be given the cursory treatment it deserves.

Defence is bloated, but that’s because it is run in exactly the way THR thinks a government department (or even a private company) should be run. Specifically, the fat cats are actually the middle management, full of an air of elitism from their arts degrees in Russian history and Beijing theatre, but with a very mediocre productive output. Those below them don’t necessarily need to do all that much; you can get by at that level through just attendance. And those above them are we constrained by political correctness and are keen to protect their positions by ensuring they say the right things and create the best photo opportunities. And of course, there’s plenty of unions, committees, equity and diversity training, welfare clubs, administrative actions and political correctness.

So THR hates it because it’s Defence. If it was the Department of Soy Latte Appreciation he’d consider it a model organisation that others should emulate.

Michael Sutcliffe

1 Aug 10 at 10:29 am
Strike a light, Rudd is the most insane and dangerous bloke you’d could possibly imagine as PM:

http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/downer_we_gave_rudd_the_bullets_he_fired_at_labor_foes/

Rudd the movie will be a cracker.

Infidel Tiger

1 Aug 10 at 10:44 am
Howard was worse.

/Homer

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 10:47 am
FrockWatch:

Photo of the Day: Hillary Arrives In Rhinebeck Wearing a Tent.

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 11:22 am
Is that a frock or a parachute that fell on top of her?

JC

1 Aug 10 at 11:23 am
I agree infidel. There seems to be something really unbalanced about him.

JC

1 Aug 10 at 11:25 am
That frock was standard issue during the Korean War.

Infidel Tiger

1 Aug 10 at 11:43 am
Oh. I’m going to show my bad taste and declare that’s not a bad outfit.

Sinclair Davidson

1 Aug 10 at 12:00 pm
It’s an Emelda Marcos hand me down

tal

1 Aug 10 at 12:08 pm
Oh God. I really don’t believe this. Gillard has flipped her lid with this Angry Julia routine. Get a load of this from the woman who planted an ice-pick between Kevin’s shoulder blades:

‘Disgraceful attack’ on Rudd riles PM.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard has accused the Coalition of a “disgraceful political attack” against Kevin Rudd after a story published today claimed he leaked against his own party.

My call? Julia is as batty in the belfry as Kevin.

“Meanwhile, Ms Gillard has not denied reports that Labor has been giving journalists lists of past quotes made by Mr Abbott on various subjects.”

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 12:16 pm
Ann Counter beats the living daylights over the nutty American left’s “racism” charges.

A marvellous demolition.

http://www.anncoulter.org/

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 12:25 pm
FrockWatch II:

Blimey. Chelsea Clinton needs to put on a few pounds. She looks unwell.

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 12:31 pm
Better pic here.

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 1:29 pm
Not that their presence in Afghanistan has anything whatsoever to do with Australia’s ‘security’

Stable Afghanistan = fewer refugees.
Non-psycho Afghanistan = one less anti-West safe haven and terrorism financier.

daddy dave

1 Aug 10 at 2:05 pm
You’re wrong, Fisk, and your grovelling appeal to Bird is de facto proof of the falsity of your position.

Venezuela has higher crime than Colombia, but COlombia has more political murders than any other country in the region. Unionists and journos are still being shot, and Colombia remains a drug-funded dictatorship.

Right, Colombia is a dictatorshop…except for the regular elections and the overwhelming popularity of the President (he has higher approval ratings than the increasingly unpopular econmomy-wrecker, Chavez). Venezuela is a much more violent place than Colombia and is rapidly turning into an economic shithole. You support this for some reason.

Comparing Australia to Venezuela is particularly foolish. If China has attempted a coup here, for instance, you may have a point.

As it stands:

Attempts to overthrow Chavez: One
Attempts to overthrow Aust Government: none

Yes, that was 8 years ago and we should consider it belated payback for Chavez the Great Democrat’s attempted coup 8 years before THAT – right now, Venezuela faces zero, none, zilch, threats to its national security.

Incidentally, opposition papers are permitted in Venezuela, where the wealthy elite openly calls for armed insurrection against Chavez. That makes his regimes less paranoid than Australia’s, not more.

Sorry, you’ll need to show where the opposition media (plural) calls (present) openly for armed insurrection against Chavez. I must have missed that one. As it stands, the opposition media is “permitted” in Venezuela, except when it is being forcibly shut down by the paranoid, tin-foil wearing security obsessive, Chavez. He has a terrible record on freedom of speech and an equally appalling record on economic management – worse than Cuba’s in fact.

This is a truly embarrassing regime to have to defend.

Michael Fisk

1 Aug 10 at 2:15 pm
So THR hates it because it’s Defence. If it was the Department of Soy Latte Appreciation he’d consider it a model organisation that others should emulate.

No, you’ve got this one wrong. He doesn’t hate Defence – he hates the Australian Department of Defence because he believes that countries that have private property have no right to defend themselves. He is a strong supporter, by contrast, of the Cuban and Venezuelan militaries.

Michael Fisk

1 Aug 10 at 2:18 pm
“I even promoted that imbecile Tanya Plibersek and that’s the thanks I get”.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bMXVA9qj5I

Yep, It’s Rudd/Hitler vid and really funny. It sounds like a ALP inside job.

JC

1 Aug 10 at 2:22 pm
Richard Fernandez with an Australian-relevant piece under a larger theme of PC-Gone-Mad and we will all pay the cost of this insanity:

http://pajamasmedia.com/richardfernandez/2010/07/31/el-gohary/#more-9922

I can’t help but think that Malcolm Fraser has a lot to answer for……

Myrddin Seren

1 Aug 10 at 3:17 pm
jc

I’m sure the South Park guys could do something with Krudd.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_m9qlV1UtCWA/S1nPk_g5xlI/AAAAAAAAAEk/ZXgSsef3d6w/s400/team+america.jpg

Peter Patton

1 Aug 10 at 3:40 pm
“Politics is about power. It is about the power of the state. It is about the power of the state as applied to individuals, the society in which they live and the economy in which they work”

Those are the first sentences uttered by the little turd in his maiden speech to parliament. Only fascist punk could say this.

Jc..

1 Aug 10 at 4:13 pm
Those below them don’t necessarily need to do all that much; you can get by at that level through just attendance. And those above them are we constrained by political correctness and are keen to protect their positions by ensuring they say the right things and create the best photo opportunities.

What rubbish. The ADF is basically a multi-billion dollar form of military Keynesianism. I’ve known individuals who’ve worked for the ADF, and the political correctness at play is precisely the one that involves collaboration between government funders and private parasites. This is in the context of Australia having absolutely no immediate threats to its security.

THR

1 Aug 10 at 4:35 pm
Who’d have thought Fisk would get so worked up at the prospect of a PM receiving info in the form of minutes, rather than attending meetings directly. Perhaps Fisky is some kind of would-be gestapo bureaucrat in his offline existence. In any event, yes, Fisk, Colombia has more political violence than Venezuela. Muggings are not forms of state oppression, believe it or not. Colombia’s armed forces have found their way into a number of countries in the region in recent years, and Colombia remains that number one recipient of aid from Venezuela’s avowed enemy, the US. Venezuela, as you concede, has been subject to a coup attempt within the past decade. Such a thing has never happened once in Australia’s history, yet you wish to claim that Australia needs more defence than Venezuela.

He doesn’t hate Defence – he hates the Australian Department of Defence because he believes that countries that have private property have no right to defend themselves. He is a strong supporter, by contrast, of the Cuban and Venezuelan militaries.

Liar, goalpost-shifter, and idiot. All countries have some form of private property. And I’ve not praised militarism in Chavez, or mentioned Cuba at any point.

THR

1 Aug 10 at 4:40 pm
This is dead set incredible. Rudd is so off his gourd I’m starting to think he might be good company:

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/election/full-transcript-of-downers-rudd-interview/story-fn5zm695-1225899657139

Infidel Tiger

1 Aug 10 at 5:03 pm
He would appear to be normal in the ALP. They wouldn’t bat an eye about that sort of behavior . It’s only a problem when they look like losing .

Jc..

1 Aug 10 at 5:09 pm
How in this digital age, in such an open democracy, can we the public, have been so shielded from all this? It all sounds just so incredible.

Peter Patton

1 Aug 10 at 5:13 pm
Not sure it was that good for the Libs to get involved in this argument…

Fleeced

1 Aug 10 at 5:18 pm
It’s hard to say. Up until now, the whole show has been so surreal – so Jerry Springer. A few more confirming interviews like this one with Downer must crucify Labor, surely?

Peter Patton

1 Aug 10 at 5:25 pm
THR

The ADF is basically a multi-billion dollar form of military Keynesianism.

Had you ever actually read/studied any Keynes you would realize what a LOL contradiction in terms this is.

I’ve known individuals who’ve worked for the ADF, and the political correctness at play is precisely the one that involves collaboration between government funders and private parasites.

This is non sequitur.

This is in the context of Australia having absolutely no immediate threats to its security.

This is a syllogistic fail. Remove the ‘military Keynesianism’ and see how you go.

I hope this helps.

Peter Patton

1 Aug 10 at 5:37 pm
Andrew Bartlett running for the Greens now?… The leaders who run the Democrats into the ground just won’t go away, will they?

Fleeced

1 Aug 10 at 6:02 pm
What a whore. Get a proper job.

Peter Patton

1 Aug 10 at 6:04 pm
But who else have the Brisvegas hillbillies got to vote for?

Peter Patton

1 Aug 10 at 6:04 pm
Nah, this Downer comment was unnecessary and therefore stupid. Gillard’s outlandish claim about suddenly caring for Rudd has Abbott on the back-foot.

DavidJ

1 Aug 10 at 6:05 pm
David,

So Rosa Klebb’s back in the saddle, eh?

Peter Patton

1 Aug 10 at 6:12 pm
I thought Abbott handled it quite well, Fleeced. He told Jabba

he understood that Downer had been misquoted,

Rudd is upstanding and also

sounded like he didn’t want a bar of it.

That’s good.

He doesn’t need to buy into it. You can be sure that the ALP heavies would be checking to see if Downer’s comments reconciled with what Rudd was up to at the time.

If Rudd’s the leaker he will make sure he gets really bad stuff out now to ensure they don’t make it back to power because of what Downer has said.

If the ALP heavies check Downer’s comments with what happened to Laurie Brereton and it stacks up Rudd has no chance of a senior ministry position. His best chance is to ruin them.

JC

1 Aug 10 at 6:18 pm
DavidJ:

The punters are captivated by this shit. They want to hear more. I really don;t think it hurts the libs provided they play their cards close to their chest and don’t buy into it. All they need to keep saying is that Kev is an upstanding former PM and was knifed by ALP heavies in a back room deal.

Assassinated is a great word to use.

JC

1 Aug 10 at 6:20 pm
I can’t wait for more dirt. I addicted to it.

My bet is that SwanDive cops a spray soon. Swandive is a sitting duck because I’m just guessing the leaker is either the Little turd or old rattlesnake Tanner and both would despise SwanDive.

Neither would be able to stomach the idea that he received a promotion having been the architect of the My Fair Share Tax and did his hardest to keep Rudd away from negotiating it all away.

There have been a few leaks about him but nothing has really held for long.

My guess is that we’re going to double back to the car financing fiasco with the accusation SwanDive lied to Parliament.

The hysterical thing is that it was basically true but that idiot Turnbull didn’t have any patience and went for the hail mary pass..

I think we’ll revisit the car financing thing this week.

JC

1 Aug 10 at 6:29 pm
oops…. I’m addicted to it…

JC

1 Aug 10 at 6:30 pm
I don’t think assassinated is the best choice of words… instead, they should keep referring to “The Rudd Dismissal”

I agree they should play cards close to chest, which is why I’m not sure this Downer story was a good idea – but we’ll see… I actually think Julia acting outraged on behalf of Rudd was hysterical… it was probably the stress from being knifed in the back that put him in hospital!

Fleeced

1 Aug 10 at 6:33 pm
nnaaaaa It’s not drinking enough water. Gallbladder problems are mostly associated with not enough hydration. The little turd wasn’t drinking enough.

Gillers is all over the road now. I think Punters are thinking she’s as loonie as the dude she replaced.

JC

1 Aug 10 at 6:37 pm
I doubt voters will buy Gillard’s unbelievably lame, feigned concern for poor old Kevin. In fact, I think people will find it grubby, batty, dishonest and even Ruddian. There are ample pictures of her smiling and laughing her head off on the very day she and the Ludwig gang ritually massacred – Romanov-like – the entire Rudd family before a live television audience, children included.

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 6:37 pm
In fact, if the Liberal ad team had a half a brain they’d be excerpting clips of Rudd breaking down at his last press conference – Terese and his son beside him – before disolving to shots of Julia whooping it up (with DC in tow).

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 6:42 pm
dissolving

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 6:43 pm
PP, perhaps her fat arsed younger sister. But you don’t want any opportunity to get her foot near the stirrup.

JC, we all are. It is spectacular. Every smarmy trick is turning to shit. Everytime single one of them. Quite frankly it is about fucking time, it went on for way too long. The Rudd and/or faction is doing great drip drip leak approach. Whoever it is they really want Labor to lose.

As for Swan I bet Rudd can destroy him if he wants to and Swan knows this. Rudd willl never let him get to be PM.

DavidJ

1 Aug 10 at 6:43 pm
There are ample pictures of her smiling and laughing her head off on the very day she and the Ludwig gang ritually massacred – Romanov-like – the entire Rudd family before a live television audience, children included.”

Turn it off, cl. I had tears running done my rosy cheeks after reading that.

Jc..

1 Aug 10 at 7:12 pm
To all you guy plugging Andrew leigh recemt

Jc..

1 Aug 10 at 7:14 pm
To all you guy plugging Andrew leigh recently . He was on one of the news channels saying that the liberals had previously decimated the public service in Canberra last time around suggesting how terrible it was.

Thank god he’s an economic dry… Lol.

I honestly don’t understand why he’s even bothering to campaign as the seat he’s running for is as safe as a politburo seat.

Jc..

1 Aug 10 at 7:18 pm
<a href="“>LOL. So much for the Christian concern for Kev.

Kevin Rudd’s Labor colleagues are apparently steering clear of his bedside at a Brisbane hospital…

Federal Transport Minister Anthony Albanese was campaigning about 45 minutes away in northern Brisbane on Sunday, spruiking Labor’s plan to build the Moreton Bay rail line, at a community forum.

Mr Albanese told AAP he had sent Mr Rudd a get well soon message but would not be paying him a visit.

“It’s not possible today,” he said.

“I’ve got full commitments today but certainly I have sent him a message of goodwill and I certainly hope that he overcomes these health issues.”

Mr Rudd’s spokesman would not comment on whether any Labor colleagues, based in Queensland or passing through on the election trail, had paid him a visit in hospital or sent him flowers and messages.

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 7:18 pm
It is the likes of Andrew Leigh who have ruined the Labor Party.

Peter Patton

1 Aug 10 at 7:24 pm
It’s a s simple as this; if you value economic or personal freedom, your only realistic option is to vote Liberal. They are far from perfect, but every other party is a sick joke.

Infidel Tiger

1 Aug 10 at 7:37 pm
In response to Downer, La Gillardtine says

Kevin Rudd is lying in a hospital bed…

Well then silly, take the mobile off him!

Peter Patton

1 Aug 10 at 7:39 pm
IT

Oh you dear poor ignorant child.

Peter Patton

1 Aug 10 at 7:40 pm
Name another party that values those freedoms more, PP?

Infidel Tiger

1 Aug 10 at 7:43 pm
He’s lying in a hospital bed that remains unvisited by Labor luminaries.

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 7:44 pm
Maybe Mal Fraser could offer a bed side vigil?

Infidel Tiger

1 Aug 10 at 7:46 pm
Not even Lefty Kim or luvvie MB? They are local yokels.

Peter Patton

1 Aug 10 at 7:58 pm
Not even Kate Blanchett

DavidJ

1 Aug 10 at 8:02 pm
Labor just had their anti-abbott ad. It’s pathetic. They’ve shot these bullets I think. They’ve demonized him so much that I don’t think it will work anymore.

Jc..

1 Aug 10 at 8:30 pm
THR, here is a useful resource comparing the fall in the homocide rate in Colombia with the rise in the homocide rate in Venezuela.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate

As we can see, Uribe has done a solid job in reducing the amount of oppression (i.e. violence) in Venezuela in spite of the Marxist insurrection he has faced, whilst being overwhelmingly reelected AND an all-round nice guy, a just God-fearing Catholic, and loving father to boot! This is terrible news for the FARC-supporting expansionist, Hugo Chavez, and other wreckers and spoilers who endorse him.

The moral of the story? Julia Gillard should take national security as seriously as Colombia does. Anyone who experienced the misery of living in a failed state or a near-failed state would rightly demand that their leaders pay attention to security in advance of any serious threat emerging. This means being present at all meetings where matters relating to national security are discussed and decisions are taken. Not to do so would be feckless and irresponsible.

Indeed, when we take into account the fact that private property-based jurisidictions are on average vastly more prosperous and morally legitimate than non-private property regimes, we should if anything redouble our efforts towards preserving the benefits and standards we enjoy, being well aware of how much we have to lose (the implications of this are that collectivist regimes which do not have said moral legitimacy actually have a moral obligation to neglect national security and ultimately to go out of existence; this is a double standard that all righteous Christians would uphold).

Michael Fisk

1 Aug 10 at 9:10 pm
You’re completely wrong on this one, Fisk. As I said earlier, as unacceptable as muggings and violent crime are, they’re qualitatively different to abuses by governments. I’d have thought this reasonably clear – a murder in Australia is not the responsibility of Rudd, Gillard or Howard.

Here’s a quick start for you:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Colombia

THR

1 Aug 10 at 9:46 pm
Wonderful things now happening in physics, lots of new ideas, interesting research.

http://www.physorg.com/news199591806.html
Model describes universe with no big bang, no beginning, and no end

“We view the speed of light as simply a conversion factor between time and space in spacetime,” Shu writes. “It is simply one of the properties of the spacetime geometry. Since the universe is expanding, we speculate that the conversion factor somehow varies in accordance with the evolution of the universe, hence the speed of light varies with cosmic time.”

John H.

1 Aug 10 at 9:48 pm
And just last week, yet another unionist was murdered:

http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR23/024/2010/en

Uribe’s wonderful democracy is fine, just as long as you don’t join a union or question corporate power in the country. There is a long history of corporations collaborating with Colombian dictators to murder activists. Nothing remotely similar happens in Venezuela, whatever its flaws.

In any event, this whole shambles of a debate began when you regressed into Birdian stupidity, trying to argue that PMs need to attend every single meeting in person, lest the rampaging Tongans and Timorese start bombarding Circular Quay.

THR

1 Aug 10 at 9:49 pm
How do you know Uribe ordered the hit, THR?

Jc..

1 Aug 10 at 9:58 pm
Uribe didn’t order the hit any more than Reagan was personally raping and mutilating Nicaraguan children. Since we know that government soldiers and/or corporations are behind these hits, all Uribe has to do is create the right ‘climate’, accept the US aid, turn a blind eye to military abuses, rig laws to suit the corporates, fail to investigate the murder of unionists, and so on.

THR

1 Aug 10 at 10:07 pm
THR , there is dead body. How do we know the columbian government is responsible?

Jc..

1 Aug 10 at 10:08 pm
Jc, government security forces are behind almost every murder. It’s incredible, really, that people who turn a blind eye to Colombia have the temerity to weep liberal tears of ditchwater over curtailed ‘freedoms’ in Venezuela.

For instance, more unionists have been murdered in Colombia under Uribe than in the rest of the world combined:

http://www.usleap.org/files/TalkingPointsApril08.pdf

THR

1 Aug 10 at 10:24 pm
Nurses’ Union opposes more aged-care beds.

Anything for their party masters.

Anything.

C.L.

1 Aug 10 at 10:48 pm
The Australian Nursing Federation (ANF) says a policy which pledges to make more beds available must also include measures aimed at boosting nurse numbers.

But of course. Let’s see how this round robin works.

1.Abbott Government hires more nurses.
2.These nurses pay more union dues to their Labor masters.

3. part of the union dues is used to advertise against the Abbott government through the next 3 years.

Yep, that sure works.

JC

1 Aug 10 at 10:55 pm
THR:

I don;t know much about Columbia except that FARC were killers and were trying to wreck the conntry.

I thought Uribe had left office and they had new elections, no?

JC

1 Aug 10 at 10:57 pm
Or we could just put our old folks in the clink
http://www.grumpyoldsod.com/a%20modest%20proposal%202.asp

tal

1 Aug 10 at 10:57 pm
THR – your link admits that under Uribe there are less murdered trade unionists than before and it provides no evidence that the government has murdered trade unionists. What it does say is that there is a backlog of cases prosecuting murders of trade-unionists. It provides no evidence of any conspiracy to subvert justice. So what? India has a massive backlog of cases – up to 466 years’ worth according to one estimate:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7883750.stm

Michael Fisk

1 Aug 10 at 10:59 pm
THR

I’m right. Uribe stood down as he was term limited. The new president is Santos who won with 70% of the vote after the May elections.

JC

1 Aug 10 at 11:05 pm
Hot damn. Got her.

WASHINGTON – A second House Democrat, Rep. Maxine Waters of California, could face an ethics trial this fall, further complicating the election outlook for the party as it battles to retain its majority.

People familiar with the investigation, who were not authorized to be quoted about charges before they are made public, say the allegations could be announced next week. The House ethics committee declined Friday to make any public statement on the matter.

Waters, 71, has been under investigation for a possible conflict of interest involving a bank that was seeking federal aid. Her husband owned stock in the bank and had served on its board.

At the rate ethics charges are being laid against Demolition party reps, we’re going to find that most of them will be running their re-election campaigns from behind bars or while out on bail.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100731/ap_on_go_co/us_waters_ethics

JC

1 Aug 10 at 11:13 pm
Julia Gillard, lax on national security.

JULIA Gillard’s decision to have her bodyguard report back from national security meetings was a breach of the Rudd government cabinet code.

Police officer turned junior adviser Andrew Stark would have breached the code by not destroying the notes he took for the then deputy prime minister before leaving the meeting room.

…

When asked on Friday about the claims, Ms Gillard’s office said she could not respond because she would be breaching cabinet confidentiality. But when asked yesterday in Sydney, Ms Gillard confirmed she had sent Mr Stark, an AFP officer with more than 20 years’ experience, to the meetings she didn’t attend to “take notes”.

“When . . . I have been unable to go, then Mr Stark from my office has attended . . . so that he can advise me as to what has occurred,” she said.

But the latest cabinet confidentiality guidelines of the Rudd government, which were revised last year, after a series of embarrassing leaks in 2008, say ministers must give priority to cabinet meetings and officials who take notes must destroy those notes after the meeting. The cabinet code also stresses that when a staff member attends instead, that person should normally be “the ministerial chief of staff”.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/adviser-breached-cabinet-rules/story-fn59niix-1225899753698

This is the problem with social democracy. It sounds like a decent and fair ideology that gives people more life choices than they otherwise would have, but it also comes with a lot of dangerous baggage. I have family members who are rank-and-file social democrats, always cheer the election of Labor, like Medicare and the welfare state, want to be decent to senior citizens, support good wages and conditions, etc, and then wonder why the ALP are in bed with the likes of Sheikh al-Hilaly and the Muslim Brotherhood. It’s very confusing for voters and there is no easy explanation for how this nonsense came about.

Whatever the true cause, what people need to understand is that you can’t just have a generous welfare state in isolation, even if that’s the only course you’d like to order. It’s a set menu. Other contents, which are served up whether you like it or not, are lax national security, ideological thought-policing, government incompetence and political extremism – which could include support for Islamic terrorism, Cuba or the Soviet Union. In fact, the creepy extremism is the true expression of social democracy. Only when people realise that fact will they reassess their priorities.

Michael Fisk

2 Aug 10 at 3:31 am
Hi Michael Fisk

You are correct.

Unfortunately support for Islam is support for failed states.

Denis of Perth

2 Aug 10 at 4:08 am
Mankinis at the Tour de France
http://news.xin.msn.com/en/silverlight-gallery.aspx?cp-documentid=4245603

tal

2 Aug 10 at 8:50 am
this year’s LDP candidates
looks like there is no representation for Dobell this year

http://www.ldp.org.au/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1227&Itemid=512

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 9:54 am
don’t you just love this Labor hatefest

http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/lathams-unpublishable-five-word-column-about-rudd/#item3680

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 10:07 am
“The moral of the story? Julia Gillard should take national security as seriously as Colombia does.”

Good lord. What kind of gibbering retard would you have to be to write a line like that?

FDB

2 Aug 10 at 10:19 am
New leak: Gillard’s own colleagues evidently think she’s a clown.

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 10:21 am
HA! Michael Kroger’s been on fire with his commentary.

Giving Paul Howes a slap:

http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/the_better_debate/

Infidel Tiger

2 Aug 10 at 10:47 am
Gillers is now saying she’s taking over the campaign and wants people to know the real Gillers.

Okay. But does that mean the previous one wasn’t real.

I love Labor hatefests. They’re the best haters.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 11:15 am
I see Graeme is pushing his “Obama is gay” line again, over Philomena’s objections that this is demeaning to his (presumably) otherwise intellectually rigorous blog.

steve from brisbane

2 Aug 10 at 11:17 am
THR, is this true?

“Graeme – I wouldn’t throw around accusations of idiocy unless you have evidence that THR is not intelligent. The fact is that he supports a specific agenda with strategic clarity and consistency. This agenda is, put simply, the destruction of property rights and the collectivisation of private capital. All policies and proposals are therefore assessed on the basis of whether they contribute to or erode property rights.”

Are you a Chinese spy?

BirdLab

2 Aug 10 at 11:17 am
No Birdlab you gullible fool
THR isn’t a Chinese spy, he’s an agent for the Association for the Revival of the Khmer Rogue

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 11:20 am
I thought that was Graeme’s gig.

BirdLab

2 Aug 10 at 11:23 am
steve
Fill has always been a bit touchy about this ‘Obama is living a double life’ thing from Birdy because in the daytime his name is Bob the builder’s labourer

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 11:24 am
Yea, he really seems to have it in for Obama being gay.

It’s not a new thing with him. He thinks he murdered the organist at Wright’s church, who Bird thinks was gay and was about to release this information on obama and consequently he had him killed.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 11:25 am
not just the organist, the entire church including Jeremiah Wright were participating in orgies that would make Oxford St clubbers blush, JC.

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 11:26 am
Jase,

Filled has a point there and I think it’s a reasonable one.

As Birdie’s trannie s/he obviously thinks Birdie is being mighty inconsistent laying it on Obama being gay when he (Birdie) seems to ignore his own proclivities that way and the fact Filled is a trannie. Birdie is disrespecting Filled here.

Filled makes a good point.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 11:28 am
Reading Bird always reminds me of that Fawlty Towers episode where a psychiatrist finally notes of Basil “Enough material here for a whole conference!”

steve from brisbane

2 Aug 10 at 11:31 am
A conference only? They could write the book. The entire discipline could be on him alone.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 11:34 am
Quite correct Steve.

I don’t think we should forget that Bird has accused Obama of travelling backwards and forwards in time and having his grandmother systematically killed and unkilled, while establishing a secret Communist government in Hawaii in order to produce fake Kenyan birth certificates.

BirdLab

2 Aug 10 at 11:39 am
Hey, maybe Jason or some other regular Bird reader knows – has he ever addressed the right way to explain the twin slit experiment (particularly when it’s run with single electrons, not just photons?)

steve from brisbane

2 Aug 10 at 11:40 am
Bird doesn’t believe in Photons.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 11:43 am
Yeah, JC, I know that – so the twin slit experiment with light shouldn’t bother him. But how does he explain the fact that single electrons fired at the slits also show an interference pattern on the other side?

steve from brisbane

2 Aug 10 at 11:46 am
JC is correct Steve. I think Bird would simply accuse you of lying and just being a fuckwit mate.

BirdLab

2 Aug 10 at 11:46 am
But how does he explain the fact that single electrons fired at the slits also show an interference pattern on the other side?

He doesn’t. You would be lying then. Bird thinks the entire physics discipline is a Chinese conspiracy.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 11:49 am
steve, steve

you still have so much to learn about the Tao of Bird

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 11:51 am
lol

steve from brisbane

2 Aug 10 at 11:51 am
From Bolt.

Hysterical exchange between Kroger and Little Paulie Howes.

KROGER: Wake up, son: everybody in the whole country is talking about what is going on. Now I’m not gonna use tonight your relatively young and youthful inexperience against you . . .

Howes: Well, grandad. Just have a think about the first term of the Howard government.

Kroger: You weren’t born then.

Howes: I was born. Don’t be so ridiculous

JC

2 Aug 10 at 11:52 am
LOL. The Real Julia!

So she admits she’s been pretending and lying hitherto.

Also at that link:

Evidently the real Julia has a broad Australian accent. Gillard’s normal accent made its return, in spades, during her live cross into Nine’s Today show this morning. Since her July 17 press conference announcing the election date, Gillard has been speaking in softer more mellifluous tones. Now she has reverted to her more familiar timbre.

Even Michelle Grattan is astonished by this latest weird spin.

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 12:05 pm
No kidding… but is labor the repository for mental cases.

They’ve had three leaders in row with sanity issues.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 12:09 pm
I’m wondering when PM Ludwig and his beautiful assistant Little Paulie Howes are gunna pull the plug on this experiment and go with the natural leader of the ALP: Wayne Swan.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 12:10 pm
I may be a spy, and a bank-loving communist, but at least I’m not a physicist.

THR

2 Aug 10 at 12:12 pm
Check this out:

Swindle nearer!

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 12:12 pm
Labor candidate trashes the Real Julia’s climate “policy.”

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 12:16 pm
“I’m wondering when PM Ludwig and his beautiful assistant Little Paulie Howes are gunna pull the plug on this experiment and go with the natural leader of the ALP: Wayne Swan.”

Please no.

Can’t I have Mar’n or Laurie?

.

2 Aug 10 at 12:24 pm
Abbott pitch-perfect in Cairns on the “Real Julia”:

Would the real Julia please stand up.

If you elect Tony Abbott, you get Tony Abbott. If you elect Julia Gillard you get the faceless men.

The trouble is that in the Labor Party you can’t sack the faceless men, because the faceless men run it.

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 12:35 pm
One brave woman. Converts an armed robber:

http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/christian_converts_criminal/

Infidel Tiger

2 Aug 10 at 1:06 pm
FDB – you need to stop with the hate-filled leftist routine. It’s not a pretty sight and it’s eating you up from the inside. Choose love, not hate, FDB.

Michael Fisk

2 Aug 10 at 1:09 pm
Umm IT no she didn’t.

He just went on to rob another store and got caught.

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 1:10 pm
I’m onto it, Fisk.

I’ve called the Crisis Centre hot-line and reported FDB in as a potential LP election crisis victim.

In fact there’s a dedicated hotline for them. When you call, just ask to be referred to the LP election crisis victim staff who are on call 24/7 for LPer’s with election loss issues.

There’s also an ETS victim hotline too where you can also refer LPer’s in case their special line is overcrowded.

The ETS victim hotline is there for anyone that feels a sense of loss over not having an ETS.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 1:21 pm
“If you elect Tony Abbott, you get Tony Abbott.”

And whatever policy he happens to come up with next, regardless of previously held opinion of said policy, that he thinks will get him over the line.

steve from brisbane

2 Aug 10 at 1:22 pm
Your starting to pack your dacks aren’t you, steve?

Infidel Tiger

2 Aug 10 at 1:24 pm
IT: the one good thing about an Abbott win would be that CL’s prediction was wrong.

steve from brisbane

2 Aug 10 at 1:25 pm
Goodness, what is happening in Queensland schools? The Flying Spaghetti Monster should demand equal time:

http://www.news.com.au/national/creationists-hijack-lessons-and-teach-schoolkids-man-and-dinosaurs-walked-together/story-e6frfkvr-1225899497234

BirdLab

2 Aug 10 at 1:31 pm
Jesus probably rode dinosaurs.

Fleeced

2 Aug 10 at 1:41 pm
And whatever policy he happens to come up with next, regardless of previously held opinion of said policy, that he thinks will get him over the line.

Yes, today he even brought out the old chestnut about getting tough on the unemployed. Idiot, what they should get tough on is the job network, but that doesn’t hit the right emotional buttons. We are being led by buffoons more interested in publicity than policy.

John H.

2 Aug 10 at 1:53 pm
The Real Julia admitted today that she’s been faking it.

ALP loyalist Steve responds with a swipe at Tony Abbott “and whatever policy he happens to come up with next.”

Citizens’ Assembly anyone?

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 2:01 pm
I’m onto it, Infidel. I’ve reported Steve to the No ETS victim hot-line. I hope I’ve done the right thing as I also asked them to take a looksee on Harry, as I’m worried about him. That’s all he talks about these days.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 2:02 pm
“Yes, today he even brought out the old chestnut about getting tough on the unemployed.”

Abbot doesn’t get it.

Get rid of poverty traps and wage regulation and lower on costs and contract regulation and unemployment would go down, with many permamently getting off weflare.

.

2 Aug 10 at 2:09 pm
He can’t, Dot, as he’s been pinned against the wall. I dunno if you saw it but labor was pushing ads last night that said abbott would re-introduce workchoices as soon as he got in.

I think he understands the significance of freer labor markets but he’s hamstrung by the ALP’s lies.

Unfortunately I also think he’s going to use it as a political wedge against the ALP if he gains office.

If the labor market deteriorates he’ll blame them and ask for bi-partisan changes. If they refuse he’ll leave it and then go for a mandate in the second term.

It’s a shitty proposition.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 2:14 pm
Unfortunately I also think he’s going to use it as a political wedge against the ALP if he gains office

I can see that.
Remember the GST? Labor thought that they could use that as a weapon forever. But they flogged it for too long and eventually their attacks sounded shrill. Howard decided to own it, and ran an election campaign on it.
Workplace relations reform could follow the same path.

daddy dave

2 Aug 10 at 2:22 pm
Laurie Oakes, did to his credit, decide to leave his excitement about being Rudd’s leak recipient to one side yesterday and had a pretty tough interview with Abbott. (Which, incidentally, didn’t attract any attention for the rest of the day). Highlights:

[After listing Abbott's different takes on climate change]:

LO: That’s four positions so far?

TA: We can go over all the history, but the important thing is…

LO: The important thing is that then you had another position where Malcolm Turnbull did negotiate a compromise, you pulled the rug out from under him and you became the leader and said no ETS now or ever.

[On parental leave and no new tax]:

LO: All right, but I’m interviewing you today, not Julia Gillard? Another weather vain example, you said that you would not have a new tax under any circumstances? A month later, you announced would be a 1.7 % tax levy to pay for the paid parental scheme. Weathervain!

TA: Well Laurie, the point is that paid parental leave is not only a visionary, social change, but it’s an important economic forum..

LO: You’re talking about the broken promise on taxes within a month. You couldn’t hold a position for a month?

[On immigration]:

LO: So you’re a small immigration man?

TA: I’m an appropriate immigration man. And I want a strong Australia. Over time, a strong Australia will be a bigger Australia, but not nearly as big as the kind of figures that recent levels of immigration would give us. We don’t need 43 million people by 2050.

LO: Well, in May 2008, you said, and this I’m quoting you again, not the Labor Party. You said, “One of the Howard Government’s greatest but least recognised achievements was to rehabilitate the immigration program, increasing numbers to record levels.” Woopee, big immigration.

[On IR]:

LO: Another weathervane issue WorkChoices. Your current policy is not to touch Julia Gillard’s industrial relations laws. You say that they deserve a fair trial and business deserve certainty. That wasn’t your view, only – what – two months ago?

TA: The point is that I have been absolutely crystal clear…

LO: About changing your mind?

http://www.australia.to/2010/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4132:laurie-oakes-interviews-tony-abbott-on-channel-9&catid=134:news-wire&Itemid=247

steve from brisbane

2 Aug 10 at 2:22 pm
Gillard adopts Abbott’s school autonomy policy.

In essence, he’s now running the country.

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 2:27 pm
Should we start referring to him as PM Abbott then? I think it’s the right thing to do.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 2:33 pm
THR

Or a lying gay gook wop c*** etc.

Peter Patton

2 Aug 10 at 3:21 pm
Abbott is the most influential opposition leader in Australian history, and he should to all intents and purposes be considered a member of our governing troika – the other members of course being Bill Ludwig and Paul Howes.

Michael Fisk

2 Aug 10 at 3:53 pm
Peter Brent (aka Mumble):

This isn’t just a temporary poll slump after a bad week. The Gillard government is in big, big trouble.

It is headed for a defeat, and probably a big one.

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 3:58 pm
Bill and little paulie now call Abbott when major government decisions are made.

Jc..

2 Aug 10 at 3:59 pm
Yes, Mumble is correct.

It is hard to envisage anything but a convincing Liberal win at present.

No benefit of incumbency, campaigning like an Opposition Leader and infighting like I haven’t seen before.

the ALP can thank those brilliant ‘strategists’ whose advice was priceless and now seen to be worthless.

Butterfield, Bloomfeld % Bishop

2 Aug 10 at 4:04 pm
Yes, Mumble is correct.

It is hard to envisage anything but a convincing Liberal win at present.

You heard it here first: Homer has predicted a Labor landslide.

Infidel Tiger

2 Aug 10 at 4:07 pm
I’m shocked. Shocked this was coming.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/david-jones-sued-for-35m-over-sex-case-allegations-involving-former-ceo-mark-mcinnes/story-e6frg6nf-1225900068765

She’s selling herself too cheap I think.

Jc..

2 Aug 10 at 4:08 pm
It is hard to envisage anything but a convincing Liberal win at present.

Oh no.

Thanks, Homer.

Three more years of Labor, then.

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 4:18 pm
I for one welcome our new old Labor overlords

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 4:20 pm
Jason:

http://graemebird.wordpress.com/2010/08/01/the-stupidest-prime-minister-ever/#comment-32032

BirdLab

2 Aug 10 at 4:26 pm
Talk about cultural imperialism.

The Beijing fascists are now trying to phase out Cantonese

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/08/02/2970823.htm

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 4:28 pm
CIA and NSA take note. An obese Kiwi is threatening your President. Echo, are you reading?

What I’d want to do is shoot him in the leg, and then give him a good talking to. Using hard kicks to the other leg, as punctuation marks.

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 4:30 pm
Jase:

You forgot the link so when the CIA and the Secret service go trawling around Web for presidential threats, they’ll find Bird and report to our Fed police.

Here:

http://graemebird.wordpress.com/2010/08/01/the-stupidest-prime-minister-ever/#comment-32036

The only downside is he may not be allowed to be board a plane for when he gets extradited back to Nu Zalan.

That damn Key said he’d send the prison plane over to pick him up and he hasn’t done it yet.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 4:37 pm
for once I agree with Homer.
(actually to be fair it happens from time to time).

daddy dave

2 Aug 10 at 4:50 pm
Careful Dad.

Dude, what the Homester is saying is that it wasn’t the policies of these ratbags that’s leading to potential defeat, but ancillary things.

Homester thinks their policies are brilliant.

He thinks their Lurch/Rudd insulation fiasco actually lowered house fires.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 4:55 pm
News of interest to Bird:

The investment arms of the CIA and Google are both backing a company that monitors the web in real time — and says it uses that information to predict the future.

The company is called Recorded Future, and it scours tens of thousands of websites, blogs and Twitter accounts to find the relationships between people, organizations, actions and incidents — both present and still-to-come. In a white paper, the company says its temporal analytics engine “goes beyond search” by “looking at the ‘invisible links’ between documents that talk about the same, or related, entities and events.”

Read More http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2010/07/exclusive-google-cia/#ixzz0vQhM2AkZ

The system might fracture when trying to work out the “invisible links” from Graeme’s blog.

steve from brisbane

2 Aug 10 at 5:03 pm
To be fair to Homer he did call the Bennelong result at the last election and we all pooh-poohed him.

Sinclair Davidson

2 Aug 10 at 5:05 pm
Anna Bligh follows Abbott’s lead with new law and order statement guaranteeing jail time for pedophiles. There have been demands for this for years but Queensland Labor only decided to respond this week. What a coincidence.

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 5:07 pm
Sinc;

It was a fluke. This time his delusional tendencies actually did correlate with reality.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 5:07 pm
Gillard government forgets (or neglects) to send a representative to Australia’s largest mining conference.

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 5:10 pm
“To be fair to Homer he did call the Bennelong result at the last election and we all pooh-poohed him.”

Even a broken watch is correct two times a day.

.

2 Aug 10 at 5:12 pm
Even a broken watch is correct two times a day.

In other words, Homer’s record is far, far, far worse than that of a broken watch.

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 5:17 pm
Which is (he is) actually a great indicator when you think about. Who else can you find with 99.9999999999999% wrong predictive powers. Take the other side of Homer and you’re 99.9999999999999% right.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 5:23 pm
Fancy that. Erica Betz had an uncle who was in the SS:

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-election/birth-notices-20100802-1120t.html

BirdLab

2 Aug 10 at 5:29 pm
In other words, Homer’s record is far, far, far worse than that of a broken watch.

Function of the set, all economists are the same.

John H.

2 Aug 10 at 5:34 pm
Anyway we should never lose sight of the fact that Homer is perhaps the most “fiscally irresponsible” person that posts here.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 5:52 pm
Poor Barnaby. Fill has a crush on him

http://graemebird.wordpress.com/2010/08/01/the-stupidest-prime-minister-ever/#comment-32067

Barnaby Joyce is on ABC 9:30pm tonight with Greens, ALP etc. I have to watch this. I must admit the little I have seen of him I find him rather cute. He and Magda Szubanski really sparked off each other a few Q&As ago despite the ideological divide and I thought at the time I’m sure they would’ve both happily continued the lighthearted if pointed spanking of each other with a feather off screen

jtfsoon

2 Aug 10 at 6:33 pm
I wonder if Barnaby grows olives?

Peter Patton

2 Aug 10 at 6:52 pm
The party that attacked ‘phony Tony’ was promoting a now self-confessed phony. This ventriloquist’s doll, that goes by the name of ‘phony Julia’, ‘spoke’ the following the day she became PM:

It’s these beliefs that have been my compass during the three and a half years of the most loyal service I could offer to my colleague Kevin Rudd.

I asked my colleagues to make a leadership change; a change because I believed that a good Government was losing its way and because I believe fundamentally that the basic education and health services that Australians rely on and their decent treatment at work is at risk at the next election.

I love this country and I was not going to sit idly by and watch an incoming opposition cut education, cut health and smash rights at work.

My values and my beliefs have driven me to step forward to take this position as Prime Minister.

Today I want to make some commitments to the Australian people. I want to make firstly a commitment that I will lead a strong and responsible Government that will take control of our future; a strong and responsible Government improving and protecting the essential public services and basic rights our people depend on including so importantly their rights at work.

I wish to make two acknowledgements. I take my fair share of responsibility for the Rudd Government’s record, for our important achievements and for the errors made.

I know the Rudd Government did not do all it said it would do and at times it went off track.

I also certainly acknowledge I have not been elected Prime Minister by the Australian people and in the coming months I will ask the Governor-General to call a general election so that the Australian people can exercise their birthright and choose their Prime Minister.

Between now and this election I seek their consideration and their support. And I seek that consideration and support as we emerge from the biggest financial crisis the world has faced since the great depression, with the lowest debt, amongst the lowest unemployment rates and the highest growth of the world’s economies.

This is an achievement we should be proud of, the working people, the employers, the employees, the trade unions, the small and big businesses, the employer associations who all made this possible.

I give credit to every hard working Australian for what has been achieved during these difficult economic days. I give credit to the Labor giants Bob Hawke and Paul Keating as the architects of today’s modern prosperity.

I give credit to John Howard and Peter Costello for continuing these reforms.

And I particularly give credit to Kevin Rudd for leading the nation in such difficult times and keeping people in work.

And today I can assure every Australian that their budget will be back in surplus in 2013.

Can anyone believe a single word that passes from wooden lips of this ventriloquist’s doll? Not at all.

dover_beach

2 Aug 10 at 8:11 pm
Q&A is hilarious. Fat Tony must have really fucked because they have a rowdy brood of Lib supporters in the audience.

Emerson was asked a question and in reply he said that he’s known Gillers very well since 1998 and the audience started laughing … there were wolf whistles.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 9:55 pm
It’s funny world now when libs are supporting/defending Rudd.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 9:57 pm
Barneby is asked a round about question about asylum seekers/boat people. He says we have to be careful about health issues like… “foot and mouth disease”.

He really is endearing is a stoopid sorta way and he has no self effacement. He just keeps coming back.

JC

2 Aug 10 at 10:32 pm
Obama back on The View.

No genital-crushing leg-crossing problem this time:

http://ace.mu.nu/archives/304164.php

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 11:27 pm
American Kevin: I’ll help you get re-elected by staying the hell away, if you like:

To Help Democrats in the Fall, Obama May Stay Away.

C.L.

2 Aug 10 at 11:36 pm
Tim Colebatch agrees with the Laurie Oakes “Abbott as policy weathervane” attack. I’m encouraged that journalists are finally making this point, and certainly I don’t understand why Labor is not running ads pointing this out.

But feel free to continue ignoring it, Catallaxians.

http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/blowing-with-the-wind-20100802-11392.htm

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 7:07 am
The problem with the Colebatch argument is that he does give examples. Take for example the opening story – Abbott on Aboriginal welfare. Colebatch makes the point that Abbott genuinely wants to do something better for Aboriginals. But then doesn’t show that Abbott has adopted a populist stance on Aboriginal welfare, but rather has adopted populist positions on immigration.

I wouldn’t think that its in the ALPs interest to run ads proving Abbott is a populist. If fact on IR they’re trying to argue that he’s anti-populist.

Sinclair Davidson

3 Aug 10 at 9:13 am
They don’t need to show he’s a populist; just that he has been changing his mind on major issues at a furious pace over the last twelve months.

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 9:54 am
Fashion tip for tal:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/fashion/7914122/Kate-Shapland-Recreating-the-pastel-eye.html

Going to give it a try?

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 9:58 am
Nah Steve I’m a “less is more” gal

tal

3 Aug 10 at 10:02 am
Steve – changing his mind isn’t going to do it either. That contradicts their argument he wants to bring back workchoices. He says he’s changed his mind and the ALP runs ads showing that Abbott changes his mind on major issues all the time? Don’t think that’s a winner.

Sinclair Davidson

3 Aug 10 at 10:03 am
I must say steve, your posts on abbot are just bloody boring. You have a one in two chance of being right. who gives a toss? Psephology is for the birds

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 10:05 am
Jason, I find half of the rah rah Abbott / Gillard is hopeless posts by JC and CL boring. And I take up a hell of lot less blog space.

As I said before, criticism of Abbott and his policies here tends to be mild, a shrug, and then let’s move on to attack Labor. I’m just trying to balance things up a bit.

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 10:15 am
Bullshit.

There were apoleptic fits here when Abbot announced his “money for rooting” policies.

He didn’t kill anyone though. The present Government arguably has.

Julia also has her own “money for rooting” policies.

.

3 Aug 10 at 10:23 am
Money for rooting? Have I missed something?

BirdLab

3 Aug 10 at 10:27 am
Yeah, I just want to know who’s offering the most and then I’ll root for them so to speak.

Steve Edney

3 Aug 10 at 10:29 am
Calm down BirdLab it’s not what you think

tal

3 Aug 10 at 10:30 am
Steve,

Face facts, you’re a crushing bore. You also mistaken me. It’s not that I love Abbott so much as I want these lowlifes out of the government. There’s a difference.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 10:32 am
I’m just trying to balance things up a bit.

No you’re not, Steve. You’re a dishonest, rusted on labor hack pretending to be conservative. You’re “trying” is more than transparent.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 10:35 am
I love you too JC.

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 10:39 am
Tim Colebatch agrees with the Laurie Oakes “Abbott as policy weathervane” attack. I’m encouraged that journalists are finally making this point, and certainly I don’t understand why Labor is not running ads pointing this out.

Steve from B, Labor is not running ads like that because Gillard is much more of a “policy weathervane” than Abbott has ever been, evidenced by her waiting for a consensus on action on climate change.

dover_beach

3 Aug 10 at 10:41 am
Steve, you’ve never been known to criticise your beloved Labor Part. That you’re now running the official ALP talking point about Abbott changing his mind on the day after the Real Julia admitted she’d been lying to the Australian people on the orders of her controllers is simply comedic.

It was even reported yesterday that the Real Julia has revived her natural Bogan accent to round up the Kath ‘n Kim vote.

LOL.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 10:41 am
They ask for it:

‘Sheer nonsense’ that children cannot consent, says Henson.

“… a 10-year-old consents to dental appointments…”

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 10:45 am
d_b: Gillard deserves the rubbishing she got over the climate consensus issue. On other issues, any inconsistency shown by last weeks leaks were, as Jason noted, actually in her favour from a “centre right” point of view.

If Jason wants boring, it’s the “your a secret labor operative” theme that any criticism I raise of Abbott and his policies gets in response.

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 10:46 am
“They ask for it”

You are scum, CL.

FDB

3 Aug 10 at 10:48 am
If Jason wants boring, it’s the “your a secret labor operative” theme that any criticism I raise of Abbott and his policies gets in response.

Hardly “secret”. You’re out n’ proud.

Infidel Tiger

3 Aug 10 at 10:52 am
Interesting revelation about infantile weathervane, the Real Julia:

Every now and then, during happier times, Julia Gillard’s office would have a ”dress-like-a-Tory day”. A string of pearls or other subtle accoutrement was worn as a bit of light-hearted fun by the deputy prime minister and her staff at the expense of the opposition.

These days as PM, Gillard is doing it for real. Barely a day of the campaign has passed without her appearing in a string of pearls. They were there yesterday, despite the shift to the new and real Julia.

She’s so sincere.

More reason to give Wayne Swan his turn:

“We have the extraordinary situation where Labor under Gillard is now a longer price than Labor was under Kevin Rudd when they got rid of him,” Centrebet spokesman Neil Evans said yesterday.

“Rudd was $1.52 when they put him out to pasture for Gillard. Now she’s a longer price.”

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 10:55 am
Dirt ball FDB backs Henson.

What a surprise.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 10:55 am
Calling you out for being scum doesn’t mean I support whatever you’re most recently lying about, distorting and misrepresenting CL.

Go on… explain what you meant by “They ask for it”.

What a godawful person. I feel dirty.

FDB

3 Aug 10 at 10:58 am
On other issues, any inconsistency shown by last weeks leaks were, as Jason noted, actually in her favour from a “centre right” point of view.

Really, in her favour? That she prefers to spending government funds only upon Labor voters, avoids attending NSC meetings, etc., counts in her favour from a “centre-right” perspective? She was the Minister that oversaw the waste that occurred as a part of the BER, has just confessed to have been a ‘phony’ since her ascension to the leadership. Steve from B, you’re Gillard’s Johnny Cochrane on the blogosphere.

dover_beach

3 Aug 10 at 10:59 am
HAHAHAHAHA! Gold.

Rudd family holding their own launch on the Real Julia’s big day.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 10:59 am
Talk about a plum job…

http://www.thinkers.sa.gov.au/

.

3 Aug 10 at 11:06 am
FDB, you haven’t ‘called anyone out.’ You’re simply a cowardly dirtball and liar who supports Bill Henson. That’s why you’re angry. I’m not surprised that you “feel dirty.”

What do I mean by “they ask for it”?

Ask Bill. He says 12 year-olds have full moral, legal and cognitive agency to participate in nude photo shoots. Ultimately, he says, it’s something they want.

‘Sheer nonsense’ that children cannot consent, says Henson.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 11:08 am
a book based on a dissertation by Ralph Raico supervised by Hayek

http://mises.org/resources/1212/The-Place-of-Religion-in-the-Liberal-Philosophy-of-Constant-Toqueville-and-Lord-Acton

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 12:03 pm
A few weeks ago, dover was arguing with me that the State of Israel is not based on any kind of narrow religious or ethnic particularism.

Apparently, Netanyahu explicitly disagrees with him:

http://www.theage.com.au/world/israel-to-expel-400-children-20100802-1139p.html

THR

3 Aug 10 at 12:07 pm
THR, the decision is appalling. Ms Ilan’s point was quite good in response:

The obligation to act with kindness and compassion to foreigners is the most frequently repeated commandment in the Torah.

BTW, it seems you’re verballing me. I don’t think I ever said that Israel wasn’t based upon “any kind of narrow religious or ethnic particularism.” I argued, if you care to recall, that Israel was no different to any other European state. and much better than the states who are it’s neighbours.

dover_beach

3 Aug 10 at 12:28 pm
I don’t consider it verballing, DB. I can imagine European states expelling people on civic grounds (for instance lacking citizenship status, lacking a visa, etc). I can’t imagine the Germans, for instance, expelling foreigners for being insufficiently ‘German’, and I think the developed world would be repulsed if they did.

THR

3 Aug 10 at 12:34 pm
FDB:

Try and understand real nuance. Cl was mocking that repugnant creep because of his views on child exploitation.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 12:45 pm
Jeez,

the bonny and Clyde of American politics (Bill and Hillary) are never more than one degree removed….

Chelsea married the son of a Congressmen who was just released from a five year jail term.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1298712/Chelsea-Clinton-s-future-father-law-revealed-man-crime-wave-just-days-3-2m-wedding.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

JC

3 Aug 10 at 12:52 pm
Jessica Rudd gets in on the media circus

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/empathy-not-anger-drives-my-father-says-rudds-daughter-jessica/story-fn59niix-1225899746188

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 12:55 pm
JESSICA Rudd has defended her father against people who “sledge him”, saying the former prime minister is driven by “compassion”, not anger.

A totally objective and dispassionate view. I’m now convinced.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 1:07 pm
Tim Blair: Swarm of Julias.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 1:15 pm
WTF:

Sidney Harman, the 91-year-old founder of a stereo equipment company, has agreed to acquire Newsweek magazine from Washington Post Co.

As the sale of Newsweek nears, Russell Adams discusses whether traditional newsweeklies have a future.

Mr. Harman beat out three other final bidders, including investment firm OpenGate Capital and hedge fund Avenue Capital Group, for the 77-year-old magazine. Terms of the transaction weren’t disclosed. However, little to no cash will change hands, people familiar with the matter said.

“Despite my years, I bring energy and a fresh approach,” Mr. Harman said. “And I’m an experienced and knowledgeable businessman. I have a fundamental respect for the role of journalism and I think it has done no harm when you bring discipline to it.”

At least he didn’t say he’s taking a long term view.

The Newsweek sale should be a lesson to all leftwhinge oriented magazines and newspapers.

If you follow a leftwhinge ideology and cannot offer reasonable views and opinions , you will go bust and the franchise vlaue will be worth exactly zero.

Meanwhile Foxnews is earning $400 million a quarter.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 1:20 pm
Reportedly, Newsweek was holding out for a lefty buyer so it could maintain its already trashed reputation for nutballery. I note that Harman is married to Jane Harman, Democrat Party member of Congress from California.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 1:31 pm
I can’t believe how incompetent the ALP campaign has been so far. The government-of-the-day want a second debate to scrutinize the economic record of the Opposition? The absurdity of it all is incredible. Anyone that votes for this rabble ought to be committed.

dover_beach

3 Aug 10 at 1:37 pm
Magazines are dead. Dead I tell you.

BirdLab

3 Aug 10 at 1:37 pm
A genuinely, stupendously stupid gaffe from Tony Abbott and it may cost him the lead.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 1:38 pm
Jeez, CL’s getting to be a complete bore, hey Jason?

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 1:41 pm
I’m not convinced, Birdlab.

There’s formula out there. If you look carefully the potential opportunities are enormous actually.

1. Distribution costs are now basically zero.

2. You can get writers for a song.

If you get the right formula by offering people what they want, charge a little and get ads the profit potential is bigger than it used to be.

The trick is to aggregate the product you’re offering in such a way that it makes it interesting.

For instance I stopped reading anything from Fairfax because they are predictably boring and dull with the same tired predictable writers.

Fairfax is going bust because they are dullards.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 1:43 pm
Agreed JC. You only have to look at how well the Guardian has integrated its digital media.

BirdLab

3 Aug 10 at 1:47 pm
JC – you don’t read anything at all from the SMH or the Age on line? I can understand people not buying papers because they don’t find them of value and predictable, but not looking at major papers on line I would find much harder to understand. (Or not watching the ABC on principle too.)

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 1:51 pm
We’re all abnormal …

http://www.newsdaily.com/stories/tre66q4bj-us-mental/

Citing examples of new additions like “mild anxiety depression,” “psychosis risk syndrome,” and “temper dysregulation disorder,” they said many people previously seen as perfectly healthy could in future be told they are ill.

“It’s leaking into normality. It is shrinking the pool of what is normal to a puddle,” said Til Wykes of the Institute of Psychiatry at Kings College London.
—–

Well at least, if there are any of ém left, the Freudians will be happy. Freudians love pathologising just about any behavior. Their error is common, it is that there exists an “optimal state” for human behavior. Twits. Freud left research and went into clinical practice so he could afford to raise a family. He invented psychoanalysis and we’ve been paying the price ever since.

Thank heavens their influence has not become too pronounced. I just finished reading “Great Feuds in Mathematics”. Godel was a sick puppy and many of these mathematicians would be classified as “unstable” and be treated. A little psychology is a very stupid thing. It is as old as the hills but well known that psychology students go through a period of pathologising everyone’s behavior. Worse still are the “bookworld quasi psychologists”. A few dodgy concepts and suddenly they think they can understand the deep recesses of our psyche. Twits.

I am very disappointed that the psychiatric profession continues to medicalise so much variation in human behavior.

John H.

3 Aug 10 at 1:52 pm
You’re a bore because you refuse to criticise your own side, Steve – the Labor side. You appear to post talking points direct from ALP headquarters.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 1:52 pm
I read the SMH online everyday, more often than I read the Oz actually, since I’m interested in more Sydney specific news. I can understand that JC might be put off by the Fairfax press in Melbourne because I have heard The Age is quite bad but I still think the SMH is a quality paper.

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 1:55 pm
Gisele Bundchen wants mothers to be forced to breastfeed.

Heck I’d like a law forcing Gisele to breastfeed …

http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/people/supermodel-gisele-says-breastfeeding-should-be-mandatory-20100803-1146n.html

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 1:57 pm
I welcome Gisele’s mammary authoritarianism.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 1:59 pm
I am very disappointed that the psychiatric profession continues to medicalise so much variation in human behavior.

There is an incentive to do so.

daddy dave

3 Aug 10 at 2:02 pm
Well at least, if there are any of ém left, the Freudians will be happy. Freudians love pathologising just about any behavior. Their error is common, it is that there exists an “optimal state” for human behavior. Twits. Freud left research and went into clinical practice so he could afford to raise a family. He invented psychoanalysis and we’ve been paying the price ever since.

CHrist on a bike you are moronic sometimes, John H. The ‘optimal state’ nonsense is not Freudian at all, but rather a byproduct of health care in the US, and its associated political economy. Psychoanalysis doesn’t pathologise people half as much as the other approaches, since it views neurosis as the ‘normal’ state of being, and sees dreams, jokes, slips of the tongue as being on the same continuum as symnptoms. Finally, the strongest opponents today of the idiotic medicalisation of people around the world are psychoanalysts, not biological reductionists like your good self, who boil depression down to the misfiring of a gland or some such. If you must wage polemic wars against psychoanalysis, do us all a favour and acquaint yourself with a few basic facts.

THR

3 Aug 10 at 2:39 pm
not biological reductionists like your good self,

I am not that, it is why I always assert: More than molecules. In fact only a few months ago I mailed this off to some US friends …

— On Sun, 4/25/10, John Hasenkam wrote:

One idea I’m currently wrestling with is whether or not causative processes initiated by emergent properties phenomena are of equal and relatively independent power as causes that give rise to emergent phenomena. Behavior is a very good example of that, I am increasingly of the opinion that behavior establishes causative processes that can never be deduced from examining the causes of behavior.

GS: Sounds intruiging, John, but I’m not sure I see what you are saying here. Are you talking about the relation between causation of behavior at the behavioral level and so-called physiological causes of behavior?
———

I don’t have wage a war against psychoanalysis, it was killed off long ago.

In the 60′s the American psychoanalytic association did a very large study on the efficacy of psychoanalysis. They suppressed the data for a decade but it kept being leaked – no benefit, some studies even find a negative results.

Dude, I don’t know where you get your information from but I get mine from 3 academics with collectively over 100 years experience in the field. I’ll trust them over you any day.

John H.

3 Aug 10 at 2:49 pm
There has been plenty of discussion of it before around here so I will mention that the ABC are re-running Deadwood for anyone that hasn’t seen it yet.
http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/deadwood-tuesday-august-3-20100803-113yy.html

Steve Edney

3 Aug 10 at 3:06 pm
that’s great. Deadwood deserves a wider audience.

Has anyone seen Rome? I’ve seen it selling in the stores and was wondering how good that is

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 3:16 pm
I can understand that JC might be put off by the Fairfax press in Melbourne because I have heard The Age is quite bad but I still think the SMH is a quality paper.

That may be true about the SMH. The Age however is a green zombie slop house with pseudo-intellectual pretensions.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 3:20 pm
Rome’s fantastic.

BirdLab

3 Aug 10 at 3:24 pm
Psychoanalysis doesn’t pathologise people half as much as the other approaches, since it views neurosis as the ‘normal’ state of being,…

A strange defense of psychoanalysis. How could you not help ‘pathologising’ people if you assumed that neurosis was the ‘normal’ state of being. Normalizing neurosis doesn’t end the practice of ‘pathologising’ this or that mode of thought or conduct; it just extends the realm of neurosis and its treatment to encompass even ‘normal’ modes of thought and conduct.

dover_beach

3 Aug 10 at 3:26 pm
Oh no. It’s the revenge of the italics.

BirdLab

3 Aug 10 at 3:27 pm
Yes, ‘Rome’ is great, Jason.

I see JC has been playing with italics again. Naughty boy.

dover_beach

3 Aug 10 at 3:28 pm
Steve from boreville says:

JC – you don’t read anything at all from the SMH or the Age on line?

As a rule, no, Steve I don’t. I really don’t know the SMH. The OZ carries national news so I really don’t need to know from the Age what the Richmond (inner burb) Greens party chapter is doing in their attempt to slow down toilet use at the local government offices for ‘vironmental reasons.

I can understand people not buying papers because they don’t find them of value and predictable, but not looking at major papers on line I would find much harder to understand.

Good point. That’s why I don’t buy the Age.

<(Or not watching the ABC on principle too.)

Sky news is good. And I watch Bloomberg and CNBC. I can assure you that my news is up to date, that’s unless you consider finding out what a bunch of anti-development doctors wives and dead enders think is important.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 3:28 pm
Alan Kohlor gives up on trying to use his iPad instead of a laptop:

I am now an expert on the limitations of the iPad. It only opens one application at a time; it won’t operate Flash so many websites won’t work; it doesn’t have a good word processor; forget about doing much typing without a keyboard dock; the mail application is both clunky and limited.

It is, in short, built for media consumption, not media creation. It’s basically a big iPhone without the phone.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/08/02/2970512.htm

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 3:30 pm
that’s what I thought steve

and since I never saw the point of an iphone I don’t see the point of an ipad with no phone function.

I still can’t believe people queued up for iphone4 which is just a marginal buggy improvement on the previous

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 3:33 pm
I have enough addictive/obsessive tendencies. I *don’t* need or want access to the Net 24/7

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 3:35 pm
Can we end the italics?? does that work?

Steve Edney

3 Aug 10 at 3:35 pm
It’s the look jase. It’s the smart look. I ordered one recently and although I was always up with technology I’ve actually regressed to the point where I only use my cell phone as a car phone and have a land line at home.

Recently i’ve stated to use Skype for overseas calls.

At one stage I couldn’t go anywhere without my Motorola.

I bought an Ipad and basically find it pretty useless over all.

However I read the papers and books on it these days.

Other than that I can’t believe you are unable to get flash.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 3:38 pm
Steve E
hahahahah That was me again I think although I blame steve. If he hadn’t posted that useless comment about how intellectual he is because he reads the Age and the Brisbane Times I wouldn’t have been forced to comment and therefore there wouldn’t be a problem. So blame steve.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 3:41 pm
From the same GMB thread Jason linked to on the “Its on” post.

It seems Bird can no longer identify fake philomena from real!

In response to fake-phil’s roman poem about olive groves and currency debasement!
http://graemebird.wordpress.com/2010/08/01/the-stupidest-prime-minister-ever/#comment-32078

Thats just bloody marvelous. And notice the date!!! The debasement of the currency comes first. Then the collapse of the country and the barbarian takeover.

Alaric, and his Visigoths, sacked Rome, later that very same year. You have outdone yourself Philomena.

Steve Edney

3 Aug 10 at 4:14 pm
so now Gillard wants to stop gay Australians from marrying overseas as well. ridiculous.

http://socialscapegoat.com/labor-tries-to-stop-overseas-gay-marriages/

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 4:27 pm
Has anyone seen Rome? I’ve seen it selling in the stores and was wondering how good that is

Mrs D and I just finished the second series last Sunday – fantastic.

Sinclair Davidson

3 Aug 10 at 4:33 pm
Fixed the italics.

JC – put the “i” after the “/” not before.

Sinclair Davidson

3 Aug 10 at 4:35 pm
Sinc

I do try. Sometimes it may not happen. Sorry.

Jacques should be able to fix that sort of bug. Ask for a refund on each bug he doesn’t repair

JC

3 Aug 10 at 4:37 pm
Steve E

That’s very funny. So the trannie is getting faked out of existence.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 4:39 pm
I just got my ipad today

I never expected it to be anything other than a large ipod touch, so I don’t think I’ll be disappointed. Books initially look prettier on the ipad, but kindles are softer for reading (no shiny/reflective surface). I’m not into comics, but many friends are – and they look sensational on the ipad.

Now I just got to write a killer app and make millions… I like Costanza’s iToilet idea

Fleeced

3 Aug 10 at 4:44 pm
Rome is excellent Sinc. Lots of gratuitous sex and violence.

BirdLab

3 Aug 10 at 4:49 pm
Yea the iToilet was great.But he then lost all his money with Madoff.

There was actually a thing going on about Madoff. Even people that didn’t lose money with him were saying they did, as it was carrying some sort of twisted prestige thingi in people’s minds.

I can’t for the life of me understand why. People are nuts.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 4:50 pm
That’s a terrific Rand quote on the right of the screen.

If workers struggle for higher wages, this is hailed as “social gains”, if businessmen struggle for higher profits, this is damned as “selfish greed”.

You gotta love Ayn.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 4:54 pm
Speaking of Rome, I must watch it again. Pullo was a favourite. And that scene when Servilia commits suicide at Atia’s front door is one of the most breathtaking scenes I’ve ever scene.

dover_beach

3 Aug 10 at 4:57 pm
Rome is another HBO association. Those dudes at HBO are really amazing.

They do better stuff than most films.

If anyone ever says we need the ABC to promote good TV programs just point them over to HBO for the real stuff as they obviously have no idea what good programming is.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 5:00 pm
I just got my ipad today

Then your name suits you. NEVER buy Apple stuff the year it comes out.

Adrien

3 Aug 10 at 5:01 pm
“so now Gillard wants to stop gay Australians from marrying overseas as well. ridiculous.”

Gays should not vote for the ALP. The LDP gets a mention in the Sydney Star Observer from time to time.

I hope the gay community notices the LDP.

.

3 Aug 10 at 5:04 pm
Rome’s been canned apparently. Too expensive.

The show I’m looking forward to is Justified.

An example of the dialogue: “Raylan Givens: Dear Lord, before we eat this meal we ask forgiveness for our sins, especially Boyd- who blew up a black church with a rocket launcher, and afterwards he shot his associate Jared Hale in the back of the head out on Tate’s Creek bridge. Let the image of Jared’s brain matter on that windshield not dampen our appetites, but may the knowledge of Boyd’s past sins help guide these men. May this food provide them with all the nourishment they need. But, if it does not, may they find comfort in knowing that the United States Marshal Service is offering fifty-thousand dollars to any individual providing information that will put Boyd back in prison. Cash or check, we can make it out to them. Or to Jesus. Whoever they want. In your name, we pray. Amen.”

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1489428/fullcredits#cast

Infidel Tiger

3 Aug 10 at 5:15 pm
So it wasn’t Lehman’s collapse that triggered the GFC

“The newly revised GDP accounts paint a very different picture of the recession. Instead of two quarters of steeply falling RGDP (2008:Q4, and 2009:Q1) there are now three really bad quarters. The third quarter of 2008 is now estimated to have seen a 4.0% plunge in RGDP. Nominal growth slowed abruptly from the roughly 5% norm of preceding years, to only 0.4%. And even that is probably overstated, as the nominal GDP numbers rely on rent imputation values for housing that almost comically overstate inflation during a housing crash (as I’ve discussed in previous posts.)

So now we know that the severe recession of 2008-09 began in the third quarter. Since Lehman didn’t fail until the quarter was almost over, there is simply no way it could explain why the recession got much worse during those summer months.”

pedro

3 Aug 10 at 5:16 pm
I am not that, it is why I always assert: More than molecules.

But isn’t this what all biological reductionists say? They all make some token gesture to the extra-biological, and then proceed with their inquiries as if the latter doesn’t exist.

I don’t have wage a war against psychoanalysis, it was killed off long ago.

In the 60?s the American psychoanalytic association did a very large study on the efficacy of psychoanalysis. They suppressed the data for a decade but it kept being leaked – no benefit, some studies even find a negative results.

Dude, I don’t know where you get your information from but I get mine from 3 academics with collectively over 100 years experience in the field. I’ll trust them over you any day.

This is misleading nonsense. First, your appeal to authority is ridiculous. Knowledge is about insights, not timeserving. 100 years, but no ideas.
Secondly, psychoanalysis was not killed, despite taken a secondary role in the Anglophone world. Psychoanalysis is still a major discourse within psychiatry and psychology in France, Italy, Spain, Belgium and Holland, and Latin America, and still retains a significant following in the Anglophone world, especially in settings which aren’t run by corporates or bureaucrats.
Secondly, the outcome studies don’t tell us much. Most of them are useless. To the extent that they tell us anything, it’s that drugs and CBT, the preferred approaches, work only a small proportion of the time. Even then, any comparison to psychoanalysis is useless, since psychoanalysis is playing a different game altogether to the druggists and slogan-mongers you seem to follow.
Of course, the common factors research has shown repeatedly that pretty much any talking treatment is superior to nothing, and that technique and theoretical orientation are less important than other factors.
Finally, many of the great minds of the past century have been inspired by psychoanalysis, and this remains the case today. Many contemporary philosophers take their cues from psychoanalysis, and neuroscientists such as Damasio and the Nobel-winner Kandel also regularly pay homage to psychoanalysis. All the same, you can sit there sneering in your dimly-lit ignorance, pretending that the human soul is the byproduct of the chemical properties of dopamine.

THR

3 Aug 10 at 5:17 pm
A strange defense of psychoanalysis. How could you not help ‘pathologising’ people if you assumed that neurosis was the ‘normal’ state of being.

To say that somebody is neurotic is, in effect, to say that something of their psychical life is structured by repression. Since repression is ‘normal’, it amounts to saying that neurosis is also normal. Hence, symptoms, dreams, and slips of the tongue show affinities among a rangge of people. There’s no pathologising here, since psychoanalysis doesn’t take the term ‘neurosis’ to be a moral judgment, and doesn’t see it as necessarily being something to be ‘cured’. This is somewhat less true of US psychoanalysts, who have tended to operate within a much more medical model than other nations.

THR

3 Aug 10 at 5:21 pm
You just gotta love America.

Blair has a pic of a cracker supermarket in South Carolina.

http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/timblair/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/in_australia_hes_only_allowed_to_have_sparklers/

JC

3 Aug 10 at 5:32 pm
It’s all very well until someone loses an eye.

BirdLab

3 Aug 10 at 5:34 pm
I thought Paul Ryan was the future of the GOP, but apparently he’s just a dill:

“We need to do things to free up credit. We need regulatory forbearance there. Right now, the policymakers and regulators are doing opposite things. So you’re right that there’s a lot of capital parked out there, and we need to coax it out into the markets. I think literally that if we raised the federal funds rate by a point, it would help push money into the economy, as right now, the safest play is to stay with the federal money and federal paper.”

pedro

3 Aug 10 at 5:35 pm
I thought birdlab was a guy, turns out its your mum!

pedro

3 Aug 10 at 5:38 pm
Well Lab, the idea is to keep crackers away from one’s eye.

I don’t for instance walk onto a busy road and expect cars to stop for me. I’m careful.

Sometimes we all need to take the bull by the horns and not expect the government to “protect” us by banning stuff because some of us a re too fucking stupid to keep a cracker away from you eyes.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 5:40 pm
I have fond memories of blowing up letterboxes as a callow youth in order to pay my respects to the Queen:)

BirdLab

3 Aug 10 at 5:49 pm
Speaking of ipad… the “Air Video” app is quite good. You run the server on your PC, and then just stream video to your ipad.

Any other “must have” apps?

Fleeced

3 Aug 10 at 6:16 pm
NEVER buy Apple stuff the year it comes out.

Very good advice.

(From Adrien?).

Those people who line up all night ought to be shot for the sake of the community’s gene pool and average IQ.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 6:17 pm
I bet Tillman queued up a week in advance

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 6:24 pm
He Fedexed himself to Steve Jobs house and refused to leave until given one. Then he asked for an iPad.

Infidel Tiger

3 Aug 10 at 6:27 pm
Not sure I’d say “the year it comes out,” but it certianly pays to sit back for a bit and see if any probs arise… I can’t believe people still queued up for iphone 4.

The fanbois really are a strange bunch… it’s like a cult.

Fleeced

3 Aug 10 at 6:27 pm
“Those people who line up all night ought to be shot for the sake of the community’s gene pool and average IQ.”

Nah, just play it smart and show up in morning then rob them as they leave the store.

badm0f0

3 Aug 10 at 7:26 pm
So who has been trying to sign up Bird for SheepMatchMaker.com?

http://graemebird.wordpress.com/2010/08/01/the-stupidest-prime-minister-ever/?replytocom=32091#respond

THR

3 Aug 10 at 7:38 pm
Rome is fun. Though if you are looking for something great, try Breaking Bad. It’s the best show on TV since The Wire finished. The first 2 seasons are out on DVD. The 3rd season should be out in the next few months.

AJ

3 Aug 10 at 8:01 pm
There’s no pathologising here, since psychoanalysis doesn’t take the term ‘neurosis’ to be a moral judgment, and doesn’t see it as necessarily being something to be ‘cured’.

Well, if the neurosis doesn’t necessarily need to be ‘cured’ then it does change the situation somewhat, but I’m nevertheless suspicious of the normalization of neurosis.

dover_beach

3 Aug 10 at 8:05 pm
So this is what my electorate looks like.

http://www.aec.gov.au/election/nsw/sydney.htm

No LDP candidate and no Sex party candidate. But there’s a Communist!

I’m gonna be voting 1 for the Secular party and 2 for the Libs.

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 8:46 pm
I see the LDP and Sex Party exchanged preferences. That would have been a fun meeting.

Sinclair Davidson

3 Aug 10 at 8:50 pm
Oh and of course LDP for the Senate

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 8:51 pm
Only after exchanging some fluids probably. Amber and pinot gris of course.

Infidel Tiger

3 Aug 10 at 8:52 pm
I see a physicist is on the Senate ticket for the Australian Sex Party. I hope he’s like one of the guys on Big Bang Theory.

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 8:53 pm
I’m more intrigued by the self employed trainer in the Sex party, Steve.

Training in what?

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 8:56 pm
BTW the poor reputation of physicists as Big Bang theory stereotypes may be undeserved. Both Einstein and Fenyman were ladies’ men

jtfsoon

3 Aug 10 at 9:04 pm
Leonard gets Penny. He’s got no problems!

.

3 Aug 10 at 9:21 pm
Marc A. Thiessen on WikiLeaks:

Let’s be clear: WikiLeaks is not a news organization; it is a criminal enterprise. Its reason for existence is to obtain classified national security information and disseminate it as widely as possible — including to the United States’ enemies. These actions are likely a violation of the Espionage Act, and they arguably constitute material support for terrorism. The Web site must be shut down and prevented from releasing more documents — and its leadership brought to justice.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 9:30 pm
That link via Ace. Meant to add that Thiessen goes so far as to argue that Julian Assange can and should be (lawfully) grabbed in a snatch operation if necessary.

In 1989, the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel issued a memorandum entitled “Authority of the Federal Bureau of Investigation to Override International Law in Extraterritorial Law Enforcement Activities.”

This memorandum declares that “the FBI may use its statutory authority to investigate and arrest individuals for violating United States law, even if the FBI’s actions contravene customary international law” and that an “arrest that is inconsistent with international or foreign law does not violate the Fourth Amendment.” In other words, we do not need permission to apprehend Assange or his co-conspirators anywhere in the world.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 9:33 pm
I hope that they wait until after the election, then ask for extradition.

daddy dave

3 Aug 10 at 10:02 pm
Is he even in Australia?

Note at Ace’s link that the horrible idiot has set up a mystery encrypted link on his website labelled “Insurance.” It’s thought to be thousands more documents that his geek squad will unlock and publish if he’s hauled off to jail.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 10:07 pm
Look at the jobs the LDP candidates have. What a gang of passengers. No thanks!

Peter Patton

3 Aug 10 at 10:10 pm
That link here:

http://ace.mu.nu/archives/304205.php

Ace also reports:

And if all this wasn’t reason enough to despise Julian Assange, it also turns out that he also writes poetry. I won’t bother excerpting any here but trust me it is teh horrible. And now I don’t feel so bad about sending the blog’s kick-murder squad out after him.

Gawker has the poetry.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 10:11 pm
In the Senate, I might vote for the Sex Party’s Asian physicist.

Peter Patton

3 Aug 10 at 10:12 pm
On my ballot, in the HoR, Labor goes last; in the Senate, Bill Heffernan goes last; even after Cheryl Kernot!

Peter Patton

3 Aug 10 at 10:15 pm
Birdie says:

“It can happen to anyone, even Givenchy”

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/3078350/Givenchy-model-is-transsexual.html

JC

3 Aug 10 at 10:36 pm
Head and shoulders: check out the GOP candidate for Governor of Oregon: 6 feet 11.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 10:43 pm
Woman farmer crashes into cow and is crushed by the beast, sustaining serious head and back injuries before being air-lifted for emergency treatment.

The urban Sydney Morning Herald sees the funny side:

Cow of a day for not so easy rider.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 11:04 pm
Julie was lovely on 7.30 Report tonight, I’m sure we all agree.

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 11:06 pm
Julia I meant. So sorry

steve from brisbane

3 Aug 10 at 11:06 pm
Which one Steve? There’s a couple from what I hear.

Tell me , did she anything about the fact that she was sending her bouncer to NSC meetings or were you just concerned if she looked like a real honey?

JC

3 Aug 10 at 11:09 pm
She wants to be known as Julie now?

Ho-hum.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 11:12 pm
The geniuses at LP has a guest poster. Let her tell you who she is.

Melbourne University has set up an election blog, with commentary from some of its staff and students. Among its contributors is Dr Lauren Rosewarne, a Lecturer in Public Policy in the School of Social and Political Sciences. Some of Lauren’s posts will be republished at LP during the election campaign.

and what do you get from our Social science Doc.?

“While I’m still bemused at how someone could watch Tone schlep his daughter around a fish market and think he’d do orright’ as a PM,”

Dr. Lauren has never gone to a fish market.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 11:18 pm
yea Steve… I watched it on the web. She looks great.

Did you listen to her reply to O’Brien’s question why she could even pick up a fucking phone and ask Rudd how he went after the operation?

Her reply? She was far too busy with the campaign.

This after they had worked intimately together for 3 years.

Charming isn’t she?

JC

3 Aug 10 at 11:30 pm
oops couldn’t pick up a phone…

JC

3 Aug 10 at 11:30 pm
schlep: To carry clumsily or with difficulty; lug: schlepped a shopping bag around town.

So Lauren is saying Abbott’s daughter:

1) has no independent agency or say in where she goes or what she does;
2) is a thing to be carted or carried like a bag.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 11:31 pm
Yep.. that’s what the social sciences Doctor is saying I think.

Dr. Lauren is doing her best to stay classy.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 11:34 pm
She’s pretty nasty, that Lauren. Imagine if a man wrote this (from LP):

Female politician plus a Women’s Weekly spread always equals Cheryl Kernot. Cheryl in (what a Texan man I once knew would call) “bordello red”. Cheryl, in an Old West brothel madam dress complete with a “spend… a little time with me” boa.

Ho means ho, hey Lauren?

She then links to a Facebook page: “I don’t do Facebook groups, but if did, Friends don’t let friends vote for Tony Abbott looks a little clever.”

Examples of its ‘cleverness’:

- Tony Abbott is a F^KHEAD!!!
- Can this sanitary napkin get more fans than Tony Abbott?
- Tony Abbott Get Your Rosaries Off My Ovaries!
- Tony Abbott is Evil.
- Tony Abbott is a F*%#wit.
- “this dickhead”

Look, I like the curvier ladies but if physical and straight-talking potshots are now OK according to Lauren, good luck schlepping her around the fish market.

C.L.

3 Aug 10 at 11:52 pm
She obviously doesn’t eat plain fish very much if the pic is any guide, unless deep fried and lots of chips.

I stay well away from her direct line to a couple of burgers and large fries.

Very clever almost academic examples there.

JC

3 Aug 10 at 11:59 pm
From her website.

Hello and welcome to my website. My name is Lauren Rosewarne and I am a political scientist who writes, researches and comments on matters relating to sexuality, gender, feminism, the media, pop culture, public policy and politics.

http://www.laurenrosewarne.com/

Of course she’d be writing about sexuality, gender, feminism…… what else is there for a social scientist to write about, especially a doc.

Cute couple of chins if I may say.

I’m shocked she’s a drummer too.

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2938791.htm

JC

4 Aug 10 at 12:05 am
Nothing wrong with being a drummer.

Sinclair Davidson

4 Aug 10 at 12:09 am
Sure I agree for the 1%, Sinc

JC

4 Aug 10 at 12:16 am
A Moslem woman wants to wear a burka while giving evidence in a Perth court.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/breaking-news/woman-asks-to-wear-burqa-in-witness-box/story-fn3dxity-1225900770408

Fittingly, it’s a fraud case.

Michael Fisk

4 Aug 10 at 12:19 am
This is yet another reason why the burka should be banned in public – we wouldn’t even need to force a judge to make a contentious decision on its use in a courtroom (which they never would need to do for a balaclava) if it were completely out of the question to wear it in public in the first place. Just ban it, and have a good night’s sleep.

Michael Fisk

4 Aug 10 at 12:21 am
Joe keep on acting like a sexist pig and you’ll never get on Emily’s List

tal

4 Aug 10 at 12:22 am
Oh Tal, I’m not in the least sexy..er sexist. Sorry

I’m equal opportunity with uppity fatties. Neither sex is spared.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 12:28 am
Michael have you read Nine Parts of Desire by Geraldine Brooks?

tal

4 Aug 10 at 12:29 am
Oh Joe you are such a sweetie BTW how’s your Mum?

tal

4 Aug 10 at 12:32 am
She’s fine, Tal. Extremely irritating but fine and as fit as a fiddle.

I love her to death but she really is the mum from hell. Lol

JC

4 Aug 10 at 12:35 am
Is the cousin still with her?

tal

4 Aug 10 at 12:41 am
Looks like quantitative easing- printing money is on.

http://www.newyorkfed.org/markets/opolicy/operating_policy_100803.html

Fed preparing the deck for reverse repo operations.

To those who aren’t aware, this operation by the fed would have them buy bonds from the open market and dole out cash.

The Fed would in turn transfer the bonds to the Treasury’s account who in turn would supply them with the credit for the cash/money.

……Printing money

JC

4 Aug 10 at 12:44 am
He’s gone to the old country for a holiday and coming back soon.

Australian winters are too cold and he wanted to warm up a little in the hot Italian summer.

She had the nerve to ask me to drive him to the airport and was taken aback when I told her he could catch a cab.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 12:45 am
God bless her JC

tal

4 Aug 10 at 12:48 am
Just another English tale:

FOUR men who set fire to the wrong house in an attempted ‘honour killing’ have been sentenced to life in prison after they were convicted of murdering a couple in northwestern England.

The men, who intended to torch the house of a man who was having an affair with the sister of one of the arsonists, targeted the wrong address in Blackburn and killed a married couple, Sky News reported.

Now note the bizarre comments of the sentencing judge – who seems to think the Islamic piety of the victims makes the crime worse:

Preston Crown Court judge Justice Henriques said it was “nearly impossible to imagine a worse case of arson than this. You have wreaked devastation on a blameless, devout family.”

Justice Henriques added: “It is a most cruel irony that two such devout members of the community, both deeply religious, should have lost their lives to such a perverted and wicked act.”

An English judge factoring in or, at least, essaying the religious devoutness of victims in his sentence.

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 12:49 am
Release the elephants Lad

tal

4 Aug 10 at 12:50 am
The Australian liars party is now stripping Medibank Private to pay for its mistakes.

It will have to start cutting programs, or benefits, to finance new election promises in the lead-up to the poll.

The government’s decision to strip a $300 million special dividend from Medibank Private has brought strong criticism from the private health industry.

The chief executive of Catholic Health, Martin Laverty, said the effects would be felt by the users of private health services.

“There is no lazy money sitting in the private healthcare sector at present for a $300m impost to simply be absorbed. It will either result in premium increases or cuts in payments to hospitals. Either way, patients are worse off,” he said.

The Health Insurance Association was constrained from commenting yesterday because the government-owned Medibank is its biggest member. Health insurance executives noted, on background, however, that Health Minister Nicola Roxon would not have allowed Medibank to lift premiums by 5.74 per cent this year if she had been advised by the Private Health Insurance Administration Council that it was carrying excess capital.

It feels like a century away when there were surpluses, hey?

These lunatics have basically run out of money.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 1:29 am
CL, are liberal judges now saying that it is worse to kill religious believers than non-believers? It certainly seems so.

Michael Fisk

4 Aug 10 at 1:40 am
You get the impression that if they’d accidentally torched a couple of lapsed Methodist boozers, it wouldn’t have been so bad.

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 1:52 am
There is something horribly, horribly disturbing about the story of missing girl, Kiesha Abrahams.

“It has also emerged that Kiesha was known to numerous government departments, such as education and health.

“But most of the harrowing details of her life cannot be reported for legal reasons.”

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 1:59 am
I don’t get this.

Centrebet has Lab 1.45 lib 2.45

I Went to the individual seats where the count looks different

I found Lab favored winning 64 seats. Ind 3 Greens 1.

Didn’t count the libs/nats so they must have 82

How can there be this variation in the betting?

JC

4 Aug 10 at 3:14 am
Oh dear. I see that William McKinley has been assassinated.

BirdLab

4 Aug 10 at 9:15 am
First two seasons of Breaking Bad are amazing. Third season was totally unnecessary. Unfortunately, they are making a fourth.

First two eps of Mad Men Season 4 are mindblowing, however.

Tillman

4 Aug 10 at 9:18 am
I didn’t mind season 3.

BirdLab

4 Aug 10 at 9:26 am
JC,

I haven’t looked at this specific case but this can happen (I think it did last election also) and be perfectly sensible if the ALP as favourite seats are on average safer than the Lib favourite seats.

Eg a three seat example. Libs are favourites in two seats with 55% change of winning and the ALP are favourites in the other seat with 80% chance of winning.

When you do the numbers here you find that the prob of ALP win is around 60%. Basically the safe seats are in the bag and the marginals will split down the middle.

Steve Edney

4 Aug 10 at 9:36 am
Good grief: this’ll keep Andrew Sullivan excited for days: Bristol Palin has broken up with Johnston – again.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/9204066

steve from brisbane

4 Aug 10 at 9:42 am
There is something horribly, horribly disturbing about the story of missing girl, Kiesha Abrahams.
Yes.
It’s going to be one of ‘those’ cases, I fear. And how about this:

Police yesterday confirmed Ms Abrahams and her partner Robert Smith were the only two people to see the child in the three weeks leading up to her mysterious disappearance

daddy dave

4 Aug 10 at 9:46 am
“I didn’t mind season 3.”

I guess I’ve just come to hate Walter and want him to get shot and/or arrested.

What I would love more than anything would be if Saul Goodman gets his own show.

The scene where he makes Jesse’s parents sell the house cheap because of the undisclosed meth lab absolutely killed me.

Tillman

4 Aug 10 at 9:53 am
Best lawyer ever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=938HlxWEx9A

Tillman

4 Aug 10 at 9:54 am
It’s going to be one of ‘those’ cases, I fear.

And only been to school for five days this year.

dover_beach

4 Aug 10 at 9:58 am
Sadly, whenever a kid goes missing, the first thought that runs through your mind is suspicion of the family. Sometimes these suspicious are founded, sometimes they’re not, but this case sounds very odd, to say the least.

Fleeced

4 Aug 10 at 10:03 am
Agreed Tillers. There are criminal lawyers, and criminal lawyers.

BirdLab

4 Aug 10 at 10:07 am
I liked this Saul Goodman ad:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFyB3UZlVDw&feature=related

dover_beach

4 Aug 10 at 10:07 am
Yaaaiirssss, the University of Melbourne is renowned for its employment of female Social Studies lecturers likely to succeed in persuading folks to greater empathy with the feminazi cause.

Take Sheilah Jeffreys. Professor Jeffreys’ latest tome titled The Industrial Vagina is her latest sensitive and thoughtful contribution to the world of arts and letters, published only last year.

http://www.ssps.unimelb.edu.au/about/staff/profiles/jeffreys

Peter Patton

4 Aug 10 at 10:13 am
Birdlab, what I think you meant to say is:

“There are criminal lawyers, and criminal lawyers YO”.

Tillman

4 Aug 10 at 10:31 am
Retraction: the New York Times surrenders to Andrew Breitbart on John Lewis racial epithets lie. (Uses new lie in retraction).

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 10:48 am
“So you do have a plan?! Yeah, Mr. White! Yeah, science!”

BirdLab

4 Aug 10 at 10:51 am
Real Julia latest: return of the stunt baby.

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 10:51 am
jesus
why the hell does Abbott keep coming up with crap like this? now he wants to pay companies to keep oldies employed.

if you’re going to throw money around like this why not adopt the LDP policy on negative income tax?

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/abbott-to-keep-oldies-in-workforce/story-fn59niix-1225900833391

jtfsoon

4 Aug 10 at 11:11 am
I like the title. The industrial vagina has a ring to it.

Professor sheila’s next book is titled the Rural Vagina.

Honestly, where do they get the freaking clowns?

JC

4 Aug 10 at 12:01 pm
My most recent book is The Industrial Vagina (Routledge 2009), which examines the industrialization and globalization of the sex industry. My previous book, Beauty and Mysogyny: Harmful Cultural Practices in the West (Routledge 2005) argues that western beauty practices such as makeup, high heel shoes, cosmetic surgery, should be included in UN understandings of harmful cultural practices.

I think the UN should take a look at blokes who leave the toilet seat up.

Also, it’s about bloody time the UN addresses the oppressive issue of plumber’s crack.

In fact it probably wouldn’t be going too far if the UN determined that farting in bed and holding your SO’s head under the sheets was a crime against humanity subject to the jurisdiction of the ICC.

Tillman

4 Aug 10 at 12:09 pm
by ICC, I mean Int. Crim Court, not the Int Cricket Council, although they may want to have a look at it also.

Tillman

4 Aug 10 at 12:10 pm
Looks like the People’s Socialist Republic of Victoria will save Gillard’s bacon.

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 12:40 pm
This is a fantastic read. A Parlour Game from 1941. “Who goes Nazi?”:

Infidel Tiger

4 Aug 10 at 1:07 pm
Link: http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/theanchoress/2010/07/25/the-game-who-goes-nazi/

Infidel Tiger

4 Aug 10 at 1:08 pm
Tillman

Isn’t she a real bundle of lovable joy? A liberal prophet and wet dream for sure!

Peter Patton

4 Aug 10 at 1:11 pm
59% ALP in Victoria? I wish they’d secede…

Fleeced

4 Aug 10 at 1:12 pm
I think beauty practices were tried and didn’t help.

No amount would, not even high heels and a face lift.

http://www.ssps.unimelb.edu.au/about/staff/profiles/jeffreys

JC

4 Aug 10 at 1:16 pm
I have sneaking suspicion as to why the US health system is bust. 23 doctors to deliver quintuplets:

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/mayorga-quintuplets-doing-well-after-birth-in-houston/story-e6frg6so-1225901053706

Infidel Tiger

4 Aug 10 at 1:22 pm
It really is two Australias, Fleeced. Queensland and WA are making all the money and the vegetables in the Mexican government and Canberra are spending it.

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 1:49 pm
Really feel sorry for this young woman. An horrific accident. But you have to ask: why can’t people simply enjoy the moment and the place and the vista? Why have they got to jump off things?

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 1:51 pm
Only 41% of those surveyed Tuesday through Sunday approved of the way Obama is handling his job, his lowest rating in the USA TODAY/Gallup Poll since he took office in January 2009

At the rate he’s going he’ll hit zero by the 12 election.

That’s hope and change we can believe in.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 2:05 pm
Paul Norton has a thread at LP saying Gillers wasn’t that bad of a commie in her student days. He claims Costello is inaccurate in SMH piece because he got the dates wrong by two years.

The claim that Gillard was “pro-communist” is also incorrect. I have commented on numerous other threads on this question, but put simply the Communist Party of Australia students were the most moderate force on the student left, and a moderating force within AUS, when Julia Gillard first became involved, and acted as a rallying point for many Labor and independent students of a moderate left or centre-left persuasion.

I feel better now that Paulie has cleared up that up and that Gillers was perhaps even a closet Hayekian liberal.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 2:23 pm
Can anyone explain WTF Bird’s blathering about now:

“Now I know what you were trying to say. You were talking about primary concepts that must be rendered to sense-experience in order that we make a composite concept, to have a picture of an object in our minds eye. We can see in our minds eye a purple mountain. Because we have in our minds eye a mountain, and we have the other primary concept of purple. Putting the two together renders an understandable picture. But a micro-waved coloured mountain? A moutain in hews of differently graduated shades of dark and gamma? We cannot do it right.”

http://graemebird.wordpress.com/2009/06/04/real-objects-and-shapes-in-a-place-known-as-the-littleworld/

BirdLab

4 Aug 10 at 2:32 pm
Sounds vaguely Kantian, sorry.

steve from brisbane

4 Aug 10 at 2:47 pm
Bird improves on the atomic model

f we accept that the positive and the negative want to hug eachother and the others want to repel, the obvious model is not the C-C double electron bond in the outer shell. Rather we ought to think of a fat electron contorted out of shape as part of it tries to latch onto a proton in the opposing nucleus, part of it latching onto a proton in its own nucleus, and much of this fat electron, being repelled by lazy fat other electrons, themselves similarly contorted, by the effects of the protons in both their own, and in other atoms.

Thats probably a more realistic view of what is likely going on.

But the Bohr deal is easy to understand when you are 14 first up. Then when this model is called upon to explain various subtleties, the model rapidly gets stupid.

The Niehls Bohr model rapidly becomes stupid, otherworldly and self-contradictory. That this model does so, is clearly the sign of an excellent working model that DOES NOT represent the reality. We see the clear fingerprints of a valuable model that IS NOT reality.

That this orbiting-electrons-model, works so well in simpletown, and then gets so complex when nuance is attempted….. Well these circumstances ought to be seen as the very symptoms of a great working model and not the characteristics of a model that explained accurately the way things are. Thats a wrong working model for you. The rapidity of how badly the thing “complexifies” is the giveaway.

jtfsoon

4 Aug 10 at 2:50 pm
Birdlab,

I think the argument of the whole Bird post is that the model itself should not be regarded as what is going on. We should be just using it to make predictions and actually working out how we can describe what is really going on.

We should ask John H as he says that it related to John’s epistimological approach.

Steve Edney

4 Aug 10 at 2:53 pm
is there nothing beyond the ken of this fat buddha renaissance man?

jtfsoon

4 Aug 10 at 2:53 pm
I for one eagerly await Bird’s advice on lifestyle and fashion.

BirdLab

4 Aug 10 at 3:04 pm
and medical science.

Birdie hasn’t got stuck into the cancer therapies yet.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 3:06 pm
Well we do know that fitted sheets are out.

Steve Edney

4 Aug 10 at 3:08 pm
drinking beer before cardio is in

jtfsoon

4 Aug 10 at 3:09 pm
Do you think I can take credit for these Birdian thoughts, with my question about the double slit experiment the other day?

steve from brisbane

4 Aug 10 at 3:23 pm
Steve:

If you’re expecting accolades for starting off the big fat Buddha on one of his intellectual rampages against human reason, save your breath, as it not hard to do.

Some of us achieve this on a daily basis.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 3:26 pm
Who doing this? Fess up.

My stats page reveals that some malignant fellow is trying to sign me up at a dating agency. One that I have never heard about.

This is just so wrong on so many levels I don’t know where to start. No woman deserves this.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 3:28 pm
I see no reason why not Steve.

BirdLab

4 Aug 10 at 3:29 pm
That was from Bird’s site.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 3:30 pm
It would be interesting to run the Chinese Room experiment with Bird secretly in the room.

steve from brisbane

4 Aug 10 at 3:30 pm
it’s not a tranny dating site is it?

jtfsoon

4 Aug 10 at 3:32 pm
Dunno, he doesn’t say. I wouldn’t be shocked if it was, seeing he’s well experienced in handling hyper-emotional, medicated delusional trannies after obviously having got over the crying game experience.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 3:37 pm
No Steve from B you can’t. His post was originally dated June 2009. Bird likes to highlight his best work again periodically.

Steve Edney

4 Aug 10 at 3:42 pm
it would be hilarious though if someone really signed Bird up with RSVP or match.com using his picture from the LDP site

jtfsoon

4 Aug 10 at 3:47 pm
Anyway I was reading that Bird and Phil have apparently pinged you as a Homophobe Jason.
http://graemebird.wordpress.com/2010/08/01/the-stupidest-prime-minister-ever/#comment-32029

Steve Edney

4 Aug 10 at 3:48 pm
Yes it’s true Steve. I choose to live in a part of Sydney that is filled to the brim with gays but I’m a homophobe.

jtfsoon

4 Aug 10 at 3:51 pm
and an agent of influence.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 3:52 pm
Isn’t Jason also a Chinese spy?

BirdLab

4 Aug 10 at 3:55 pm
‘sactly.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 3:56 pm
It is well know that SOON is a chinese operative who has single handly perverted libertarianism in Australia. He even tried to seduce Bird with Johnny cash and some mean blues harp.

Steve Edney

4 Aug 10 at 3:58 pm
yuck steve

‘seduce’ and ‘Bird’ are two words I don’t ever wanna see in the same sentence

jtfsoon

4 Aug 10 at 4:02 pm
Edney:

I have to agree with Bird here. Any time I’ve met up with Jase he seems to be on the cell phone whispering quietly in Chinese something about what we’re talking about. This obviously gets relayed back to the highest levels of the Chinese regime.

And his defense of freer markets is immedaitely suspect. I mean which agent of influence wouldn’t pretend to be for open markets and shit like cost benefits analysis.

Bird is of course on track right track here.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 4:11 pm
Maybe Bird can tell us if he saw a Red Phone at Jason’s house.

Steve Edney

4 Aug 10 at 4:14 pm
On a serious but light note.. Bird of course is right in that most likely there are Chinese regime spies here.

But like most big government type programs like that do is a big fat load of nothing. There’s no doubt in my mind there’s some desk jockey in Beijing humming and hawing at all the reports that come in about the number of people that visit the local shopping mall on a daily basis and shit like that that is completely useless.

I’m sure there are forms of industrial spying going on. But who the fuck cares. Firms do legal forms of spying all the time. They just hire the oppositions employees and find out what’s going on.

The level of information in our open society is next to useless because most things here are… ummm open.

So the intel they find here has about zero value although I’m sure the intel agency back in Beijing thinks they have big time scoops about what’s going on and thereby confirm their existence to the politburo honchos.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 4:21 pm
So you are now running interference for the CHI-com spies as well JC? The sure they are here but mean us no harm line. That should make Bird’s head explode although I am sure it is the sort of thing he expects from you.

Steve Edney

4 Aug 10 at 4:29 pm
Quite so Joe. Which makes his obsession all the more ridiculous.

BirdLab

4 Aug 10 at 4:29 pm
Bahnisch Alert! – he’ll be TV tonight on ABC News channel 24. I hope he wears the hat!

http://larvatusprodeo.net/2010/08/04/lp-on-tv/

steve from brisbane

4 Aug 10 at 4:33 pm
By the way, that ABC News channel has a hell of a lot of filler in it. I was hoping for something more like Sky News, with more analysis, but no such luck.

steve from brisbane

4 Aug 10 at 4:38 pm
hey steve
Bird has responded to you

http://graemebird.wordpress.com/2009/06/04/real-objects-and-shapes-in-a-place-known-as-the-littleworld/#comment-32104

jtfsoon

4 Aug 10 at 4:39 pm
That had to come. Kerry O’Brien, Fat Tony Jones has just met their match.

I’m sure that after his debut on the small screen the ABC will scoop him up and give mark either the 7.30 or Lateline slot.

Regulars of course will be Robert Merkal reporting the weather and new technologies in development that harness the power of human farts to electrify major cities.

Kim’s there on gender issues.

Paul Norton will also be a regular discussing economics and how enlargement of the public sector will raise Australian productivity to the stratosphere.

Tig Tog will also be a regular as the gardening expert teaching people to grow vegetables on roofs.

Brian will of course be the regular catastrophe reporter.

I hope he wears the silly hat. We’ll all get a kick out of it.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 4:43 pm
Well, that cleared that up!

Graeme, Feynman said of the experiment:

“[It] is absolutely impossible to explain in any classical way and has in it the heart of quantum mechanics. In reality, it contains the only mystery.”

It works if you fire single electrons: how do single electrons interfere with themselves?

steve from brisbane

4 Aug 10 at 4:47 pm
Hey steve. What time slot has our crack current affairs reporter this evening, as I want to watch.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 4:50 pm
I look forward to an ABC channel for insomniacs: The Nick Gruen Show. (It’s Gov2 all night long.)

steve from brisbane

4 Aug 10 at 4:51 pm
6.30.

steve from brisbane

4 Aug 10 at 4:51 pm
Birdy would be Australia’s answer to Howard Stern

jtfsoon

4 Aug 10 at 4:53 pm
goodie.

Can you video it and put it up on your site.

If you do that I promise to lay off you until August 31

JC

4 Aug 10 at 4:53 pm
Nah that is too techo for me tonight. Anyway, I can’t believe you can go 48 hours without calling me an idiot, let alone 3 weeks.

steve from brisbane

4 Aug 10 at 4:57 pm
I think you should be able to watch it whenever on iview.

Steve Edney

4 Aug 10 at 5:01 pm
Anyway, I can’t believe you can go 48 hours without calling me an idiot, let alone 3 weeks.

I’m very disciplined with stuff like that. It would be hard, but I think i can do it.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 5:12 pm
Bird has another collision with reality:

“What is your point? I’ve explained why the notion of the photon is untenable.”

No Graeme. You are lying.

BirdLab

4 Aug 10 at 5:41 pm
Someone ought to tell Bird about Maiden Lane I-III. For a larf.

.

4 Aug 10 at 5:50 pm
“Bahnisch Alert! – he’ll be TV tonight on ABC News channel 24.”

Luvvies On Plasma!

Peter Patton

4 Aug 10 at 5:52 pm
jeez Louise.

Where the f..k did Mark get that tie? I’ve honestly.. never in my life have I seen a worse tie than the one he’s wearing. He would have been better off with the stupid hat than that shocking tie.

Then he’s bopping his head up and down. What’s with that crap?

Nothing he said is worth mentioning as it was just junk.

Little Paulie Howes ia on with him at the same time. Talk about captured territory by these idiots. This channel is a 24 hour love in channel for leftwhingers we’re paying for.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 6:43 pm
Mark was introduced as a Drum Contributor.

Another Drummer. That’s all we need.

Is he a doctor? Of what exactly.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 6:45 pm
On the billboard at the corner of Swanston and Lonsdale there’s a Greens ad. It’s a slogan. Certain letters are highlighted in a different colour and they spell ‘Greens’.

Funny thing is the text is in green but the highlighted colours are red. The word ‘Green’ is actually red. The old Comm party stiffos at the centre of the green machine probably thik this measn the continuance of the Bolshie dream.

Adrien

4 Aug 10 at 6:48 pm
hey I got a couple of quotes from a colourful source that might work:

Communism doesn’t work because people like to own stuff.

and

Some people can do carpentry, some people can do mathematics, some people are brain surgeons and some people are winos and that’s the way it is, and we’re not all the same. This concept of one world-ism, everything blended and smoothed out to this mediocre norm that everybody downgrades themselves to be is stupid.

Adrien

4 Aug 10 at 8:38 pm
FFS, are these airheads going to go to the grave with this shit? Where’s that revolver?

I have commented on numerous other threads on this question, but put simply the Communist Party of Australia students were the most moderate force on the student left…

http://larvatusprodeo.net/2010/08/04/the-smirks-unauthorised-biography-of-julia-gillard-or-abbott-and-costello-meet-pol-pot/

Peter Patton

4 Aug 10 at 8:47 pm
Hope and change you can believe in.

http://article.nationalreview.com/438955/chris-christie-the-scourge-of-trenton/daniel-foster?page=7

JC

4 Aug 10 at 9:17 pm
While on that subject of hope and change.

Some of you guy were very positive about Andrew Leigh’s candidacy to the Canberra seat. The term candidacy shouldn’t be used as it’s more like an ascension to a soviet seat where the result is more or less known already.

Here’s what Andy thinks.

Protecting Canberra’s jobs
The Liberal Party’s promise to slash 12,000 public sector jobs is a direct threat to Canberra’s economy. Andrew will fight to avoid a repeat of 1996, when the Howard Government’s job cuts saw unemployment surge, businesses struggle and house prices tumble.

In all honesty does this guy actually think Canberra’s public service needs more protection than it already gets?

Protecting Canberra’s jobs? WTF?

JC

4 Aug 10 at 9:26 pm
Bring on the mass sackings.

.

4 Aug 10 at 9:27 pm
…saw unemployment surge, businesses struggle and house prices tumble.

In Canberra, that’s wonderful news.

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 9:32 pm
When you think about it, it’s actually a policy of cannibalism. He’s more or less advocating a policy not entirely dissimilar to the Argentinian ruling class where in some states/provinces the majority of jobs were with the state.

Contrast what he’s saying and what Christie is doing in new Jersey.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 9:32 pm
No Government has succeeded until Canberra is a shanty town full of bums and Salvation Army soup vans.

Infidel Tiger

4 Aug 10 at 9:34 pm
I don’t know what Patton expects of the LDP candidates.

I bet you each and every one of them is smarter than a Tanya Pilbersek.

.

4 Aug 10 at 9:37 pm
Hear hear.

Or, as lobe-endowed Julia might say: ‘Ear ‘ear.

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 9:38 pm
“We are a group of Australians who share common concerns about the way our politics and democratic institutions are (not) working and a belief that things can be different.

We want to reclaim our democratic processes from the grip of major parties that behave like private corporations blindly following opinion polls and focus groups in a short sighted bidding war for popular appeal and with little respect for the ultimate owners of our democracy, Australia’s citizens.

We want to reclaim our democracy from its domination by a narrow media script with its instant polarisation around issues, its obsession with gaffes and personal intrigue and its constant demonising and fear-mongering.

We want to restore the bonds of trust and loyalty between electors and those they elect and we believe that this is possible.”

You do that by joining the ALP eh Cheryl?

.

4 Aug 10 at 9:38 pm
Cheryl abridged: ‘I want back on the gravy train.’

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 9:40 pm
Kristina Keneally steals money from NSW taxpayers to promote re-election of Federal Labor.

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 9:46 pm
Dot’s Law:

You’ve heard of Godwin’s Law, now the Dot’s Law;

“Organised opposition to any left wing policy will be erroneously slandered as *astroturfing*, no matter how authentic and grass roots the opposition, and how manufactured and well funded the left wing policy proposition is.”

Example: “Those tea party nuts are astroturfing”

Example: “John Kerry and Kevin Rudd are grassroots campaigners with no family ties to Crassus like wealth”

Example: “The idea that ACORN were found on tape offering prostitution coaching is obviously an astroturfing frame up”

Example: “A wealthy union lawyer and ambulance chaser has the common touch”

.

4 Aug 10 at 9:47 pm
Hope and change you can believe in.

(I don’t think I’ll ever stop using that)

JC

4 Aug 10 at 9:48 pm
I love Dot’s law.

As of the Keneally theft.

More hope and change we can believe in.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 9:50 pm
9.48 one was referring to Shezz’s candidacy

9.50 to Keneally.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 9:52 pm
Hope and change we can believe in:

http://michaelscomments.wordpress.com/2010/08/03/zandi-claims-stimulus-didnt-do-squat/#comment-206386

“That’s right. According to Blinder & Zandi, we’ve spent $391 billion in stimulus money in “now” dollars, to get a GDP increase of $340 billion (in 2005 dollars), so we lost $51 billion. Lost $51 billion. If you adjust for inflation, it only cost us about $10 billion, but the point is that rather than spending the money in a way that has a big economic multiplier, it’s been spent with a economic multiplier less than 1.

They also tell us that their modeling predicts that the stimulus itself was responsible for 2.5 million jobs. If you simply take that at face value, and divide it into the $391 billion spent thus far, you find that each job cost us more than $150K. Yep – each job over that 18 month period cost us $100K/yr.

Liberals like to set up a strawman, saying that critics claimed that no jobs would be created. That’s nonsense – you can’t dump the better part of a trillion dollars into the economy and not create jobs. The real claim was that the stimulus was too slow, too inefficient, and would have adverse consequences in the long-term.

Here we are 18 months later, having spent $150K for every job created and seeing a negative impact on GDP. Not to mention amazingly high unemployment. I think we can be forgiven our criticisms.”

Here as well: Obama’s policy fails compared to doing nothing:

http://michaelscomments.wordpress.com/2010/07/02/june-2010-unemployment-numbers-theyre-real-and-theyre-spectacular/

.

4 Aug 10 at 9:54 pm
JournoList:

Tucker Carlson, who edited several of Strong’s articles about Journolist, wrote in a July 22 article: “Again and again, we discovered members of Journolist working to coordinate talking points on behalf of Democratic politicians, principally Barack Obama. That is not journalism, and those who engage in it are not journalists. They should stop pretending to be. The news organizations they work for should stop pretending, too. [...] I’ve been in journalism my entire adult life, and have often defended it against fellow conservatives who claim the news business is fundamentally corrupt. It’s harder to make that defense now. It will be easier when honest (and, yes, liberal) journalists denounce what happened on Journolist as wrong.”

.

4 Aug 10 at 10:03 pm
Epic irony:

Barnacled old prime minister, The Real Julia – refusing to name a finance minister – sticks to her controllers’ script that Abbott is a “big risk” and says this of Andrew Robb and Malcolm Turnbull:

“That big risk is by no way changed by the people around him, in fact it makes matters worse,” she said.

Speaking from experience.

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 10:08 pm
CL

Fair go. She isn’t able to say who will be the finance minister as PM Ludwig and Deputy Little Paul Howes have not informed her of their decision at the current time.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 10:16 pm
I love this “big risk” line about her opponent. It’s hilarous. Usually it’s used by prime ministers with years in the job.

RJ and her kitchen colleagues burned down 200 houses and killed four people and Abbott’s the big risk?

C.L.

4 Aug 10 at 10:19 pm
Rudd to campaign for Gillard:

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/rudd-vows-to-campaign-for-gillard/story-fn59niix-1225901326059

No stone unturned until she’s Oposition Leader.

Infidel Tiger

4 Aug 10 at 10:32 pm
Well Rudd just gave a 20 minute radio interview to Philip Adams insisting it is not all about him! Where do we sign up for these “operations.” What a gall!

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/08/04/2973718.htm

Peter Patton

4 Aug 10 at 10:36 pm
Bugger me drunk. Housing development stopped because of fears of rising sea levels:

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/fear-of-coastal-swamping-leads-to-unprecedented-ruling-on-property-dream/story-e6frf7kx-1225901323695

Victoria is officially retarded.

Infidel Tiger

4 Aug 10 at 10:41 pm
May I float a theory for comments by Catallaxians?

A lot of people on the left have said that the Rudd Government and , by extension, the Gillard Government deserve the credit for the fact that Australia had a relatively easy ride through the GFC.

WHether we think that credit is deserved or not, let us accpet for the moment that our ALP supporting friends are correct. Could this in fact be a Churchillian curse for the ALP in this election? Eevrybody agreed in 1945 that Churchill deserved much of the credit for Britain’s victory in the War, yet he was not seen as the man for the peace. Gratitude didn’t convert into votes for the Tories. Isn’t it the same with Labor now? The voters may feel a bit of gratitude to the ALP for steering them through the GFC, but also think that now that the crisis is receeding it’s time to go back to normality in which the Coalition delivers prosperity.

If I am right low unemployment and interest rates are not going to help the government, because these good indicators are co-exisitng with the fact that business is still slow and government poilcies are leading directly to massive increases in beer, smokes and energy.

Rococo Liberal

4 Aug 10 at 10:46 pm
No, RL, I reckon that’s totally backwards. If people really believed Labor guided them through the GFC they’d rant and rave about the new financial and political paradigms that will make everything right forever. But no one really believes that, not even Labor’s supporters. At best they believe the spending softened the blow and the pain now has to be borne by someone else, or they just don’t care so long as they get an easy run.

The old situation still applies. In times of trouble people will turn to the Libs to manage a difficult situation, and in times of milk and honey they’ll turn to Labor to get more of that economic cheer spent on them.

Michael Sutcliffe

4 Aug 10 at 11:00 pm
RL

I think the average voter has serious doubts that the spending kept us out of recession. They can’t quite put their finger on it but they feel deep down that it was trumped up bullshit especially when you take into account the waste and destruction such as the school dunny and the lurch Rudd insulation fiasco. They didn’t like that one bit.

I don’t think they even minded the spending because the person they trusted at the time (Rudd) was telling them they needed the stimulus and were willing to give Rudd the benefit of the doubt.

However they can’t stand the waste and therefore the spending doubles back on them.

They then took another look at Rudd and what they saw was a shallow little turd that sopke in different language and had a very strange personality with disturbing traits.

The final straw of the average voter was the way the mining tax was handled. I’m under no illusions that the average punter wanted more money, which is what Turd was promising them, however they feared that the milking attempt was going to cause mining to retreat and we would see a capital strike. Referring to the mining people as liars and cheats really set the rot.

By that time the average voter had enough.

Labor also miscued with the sleazy way the insiders got rid of Rudd. There’s a good reason the Libs keep mentioning it as the public is pissed off that the party rather than the voters themselves didn’t vote up or down on him.

Economic management is playing against them too. The Lurch Rudd insulation debacle, school dunnies… the whole kit and caboodle is working against the government.

Rudd is no Churchill.

Don’t forget that the public weren’t that thankful to Howard on his stewardship Good management is taken as a given.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 11:02 pm
When you spunk 50 odd billion up a wall, even the mouth breathing loons who make up the majority of the population expect something in return. And while it’s all very good guessing which one of your neighbours is going to be flambed each night, I think most people would have preferred new hospitals, train tracks, roads, sports stadiums and a free Elton John concert every week. We are a stupid people but we will not tolerate being bullshitted too. Not for too long anyway.

This is a get rid of the bullshit artists election. Tony’s off his bonce, but he’s an honest bastard.

Infidel Tiger

4 Aug 10 at 11:12 pm
I think we’re in a decade of very unstable government. I could very see the possibility that the libs get bounced next time around if they win.

I always said when the Turd won in 07 that it may not have been a good election to win.

It’s going to be another decade before we see normality around the world.

JC

4 Aug 10 at 11:16 pm
Are you ready for a new Julia?

Behold: Julia M. Nixon!

ALP website edits out Julia’s socialist past.

THE Labor Party has been caught posting an incomplete transcript of a recent Julia Gillard interview on her official website.

It excised its references to her youthful involvement in the Socialist Forum.

The party also excluded from its official record criticism of the Prime Minister’s proposal for a citizens’ assembly to seek a consensus on climate change policy, along with questions over whether Labor had made deals with the Greens in return for electoral preferences.

The Australian has established that a transcript on Labor’s website purporting to reflect an interview the Prime Minister gave on Sydney’s 2GB on July 27 excludes several minutes of the interview, the equivalent of seven pages worth of transcript.

The excised sections of the interview with Alan Jones include an exchange about how Ms Gillard worked as a typist for the Socialist Forum in 1998 as well as Jones, an outspoken right-winger, savaging Ms Gillard’s position on mining tax and climate change.

A Labor campaign spokesman said last night the omission — the exclusion of a single chunk of about a third of the interview — was the result of an oversight in the transcribing process. “It has now been fixed and replaced on the website,” the spokesman said.

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 12:44 am
Somebody in this government really needs to be jailed.

$50 bribes being sent to voters:

Householders given $50 for non-existent green audits.

HOUSEHOLDS are being offered $50 payments for green audits even though they have never received the inspector’s results.

In some cases, payments have been made for audits that were never performed.

The Australian has learned that the Climate Change Department has been mailing households across the country in the past week offering the $50 rebate, which was part of the government’s scrapped $175 million Green Loans scheme…

Brisbane woman Urith Shield said she had never had an assessment carried out on her house but had been offered a $50 payment this week. “I was shocked when I received the letter; they said I had an assessment on my home when I hadn’t,” Mrs Shields said.

“This is just another handout — all this free money, I’m sick of it. How many other people are getting this letter? I haven’t had anything done so why are they sending it to me?”

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 1:19 am
It seems to me that Harry Clarke doesn’t seem to think that much for an academic. He sprayed some venom Tony Abbott’s way on account of Abbott recently saying that a $40 per ton charge on carbon would result in doubling the price of electricity in Australia.

More often than not, it seems to me Harry gets it wrong. So did he got this right for a change.

Lets begin.

Harry cited someone else here for his facts and figs.

“demolishing Tony Abbott’s claim that a $40 per ton carbon tax will double the price of electricity. It won’t – the increase XXXXXX calculates at about 20%. I have been equally puzzled by people’s assumption that a $40 carbon tax on fuels would increase petrol prices dramatically”

Young Harold’s claim of 20% is based on the price of black coal output (2.5 tons of carbon = 2.5 megawatts). In other words the ratio is 1:1 when plants are fired with Black coal. Brown coal is up to 40% more carbon intensive. Electricity production in Australia is about 50/50 Black and brown according ABARE.

Therefore $40 becomes $48 on the black equivalent used in that example.

(40 x 1.2 = 48)

The average cost of electricity in Australia is around 11.5 cents per KWH.

Harry was relying on the cost of residential retail. However retail forms actually a small fraction of the energy used in Australia. Industry by far is the largest user.

4.8/11.5 = 42 %

Abbott is approximately right.

Young Harold should apologize to Abbott.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 2:38 am
God, what a doofus he is.

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 2:40 am
If he asks nicely I might actually try and spend some time with young Harold and teach him a little bit about clear thinking.

That’s just the sorta big-hearted, altruistic dude I am.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 2:54 am
I got the $50 offer and we never saw the audit, which was only done as a favour to a friend of my wife. Mind you, I was thinking about shooting for the interest free loan.

Nice summary of the essential problem with Abbott:
“In truth, Mr Abbott was often seen by colleagues to be “channelling” the economic interventionism of his old mentor, B.A. Santamaria, rather than embracing the small-government philosophy of the Howard years. In Barnaby Joyce and other Nationals, and indeed in Mr Abbott, there are worrying indications of old-fashioned economic views.”

pedro

5 Aug 10 at 7:41 am
The $50 post is here.

Sinclair Davidson

5 Aug 10 at 7:48 am
What are you spending yours on Sinc?

pedro

5 Aug 10 at 7:56 am
Don’t know yet. Maybe a new trigger nozzle thingy for the hosepipe or mulch for the veggie patch. That’s if I could be bothered.

Sinclair Davidson

5 Aug 10 at 8:17 am
Bird’s critique of the double slit experiment.

“A science worker tells you he’s fired a single electron. How has he singled an electron out? How has he observed a single electron?”

Birdian definitions –
Sciece Worker: Someone with a PhD working in a Lab conducting research.

Scientist: Some guy in his basement posting Youtube videos

Steve Edney

5 Aug 10 at 9:08 am
I think we may have to consider the very real possibility that Bird is in fact a crack-addict:

http://graemebird.wordpress.com/2006/11/05/ebay-approach-to-weapons-buying/

BirdLab

5 Aug 10 at 9:14 am
Oh. I see that Phil has an autobiography:

http://www.acashic.com/notaman.html

BirdLab

5 Aug 10 at 9:51 am
David Cameron and the Lib Dems are doing great work on the domestic front if this is any indication.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/04/time-to-organise-resistance-now

jtfsoon

5 Aug 10 at 10:03 am
US debt by state:

http://money.cnn.com/news/storysupplement/economy/state_debt/index.html

No surprises who the bums are.

Infidel Tiger

5 Aug 10 at 11:40 am
The unelected prime minister who knifed Kevin in the back while skulking dishonorably in the shadows says Abbott trying to “sneak” into power.

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 12:58 pm
I know it’s a lost cause, but for Graeme Bird:

Description of the single electron double slit experiment here, by Hitachi’s scientist who devised it:
http://www.hitachi.com/rd/research/em/doubleslit.html

His video on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJ-0PBRuthc

Interference pattern builds up over time, as it does in the single photon version (even though photons don’t exist, I know.)

steve from brisbane

5 Aug 10 at 1:28 pm
“Description of the single electron double slit experiment here, by Hitachi’s scientist who devised it:”

No you are lying. That is a science worker not a scientist.

Steve Edney

5 Aug 10 at 3:04 pm
Although since he’s posted it on youtube bird might believe it.

Steve Edney

5 Aug 10 at 3:04 pm
it’s SuperRudd to the rescue

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-election/i-cant-sit-idle-and-watch-abbott-become-pm-rudd-20100805-11jgy.html

jtfsoon

5 Aug 10 at 3:28 pm
Kevin Rudd: “As a former prime minister of Australia I cannot stand idly by and watch Mr Abbott slide into office without scrutiny,” he said.

You were sacked by your own party in your first term as PM, you complete and uttter Berkshire hunt.

This is like getting a dressing down on parenting skills from Josef Fritzl.

Infidel Tiger

5 Aug 10 at 3:54 pm
Good idea. Rudd’s intervention will now do two things.

1. It will remind the punters that PM Luftwaffe (Ludwig) and his fat little assistant, Paulie Howes got rid of the turd and not them.

2. He will remind the punters just what a little turd he is.

Yep, I fully support The Little Turd’s intervention.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 4:26 pm
toy guns to be licensed in Queens’ Land

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/lifestyle/the-other-side/toy-guns-will-have-to-be-licensed-in-queensland-under-new-firearms-laws/story-e6frfhk6-1225900910503

jtfsoon

5 Aug 10 at 4:35 pm
This country has gone stark raving mad.

Infidel Tiger

5 Aug 10 at 4:36 pm
While watching Mark from LP on the ABC’s 24/7 last night and dry retching as a result of the awful tie he was wearing I noticed that fat little Paulie Howes was on the program sitting around like he had a permanent gig.

Does anyone know if that’s the case, as I can’t stomach watching it to see if that’s the case?

He’s like Paulie Everywhere copying Eddie Everywhere McGuire.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 4:39 pm
Eltham is a muppet.

“Hockey seems to get just about every economic fact he mentions dead wrong. For instance, earlier this year, he made the astonishing claim that the cause of the US housing crisis was not lax regulation, widespread mortgage fraud or insane lending practices – but in fact US government policy to encourage home ownership.

This claim alone should disqualify Hockey from any serious economic role in an Abbott government. The greatest market failure in sixty years was not caused by government. It was caused by markets. ”

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2974473.htm

Err no Pal they legislated so that anyone could qualify for a loan.

Have these people ever considered why an unsubsidised lending firm with 20x leverage would willingly lend mortgages to those unable to service their loans?

They wouldn’t.

Eltham doesn’t have an argument, he ahs assertions.

.

5 Aug 10 at 4:54 pm
Eltham is qualified to speak. Look at his quals.

Ben Eltham is a writer, journalist, researcher and creative producer.

To be all those things he obviously has a phd in Economics.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 5:06 pm
Have these people ever considered why an unsubsidised lending firm with 20x leverage would willingly lend mortgages to those unable to service their loans?

To securitise the debt and make a killing. You seem to have drifted from a once-nuanced view of the GFC into cartoon economics (i.e. the gummint did it). Lenders were chasing so-called sub-prime borrowers, not the other way around. Predatory lending was rampant. Financial markets had been deregulated in the 1990s, and showed pretty clearly that they could in now way self-regulate. This idea that the GFC was caused by Government stooges putting guns to the heads of unwilling lenders is complete bullshit.

THR

5 Aug 10 at 5:48 pm
To securitise the debt and make a killing.

Take it one step further. They were securitizing and doing what with it?

JC

5 Aug 10 at 5:56 pm
Berlusconi has been a naughty boy again
http://news.xin.msn.com/en/world/article.aspx?cp-documentid=4257643

tal

5 Aug 10 at 5:58 pm
He certainly has chutzpa, Tal. He demanded a public apology from his wife for raising these sex issues in public saying she’s at fault and was always doing these things just before an election.

He said he was deeply hurt by her actions and demanded an apology.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 6:06 pm
And so she should Joe

tal

5 Aug 10 at 6:22 pm
Of course. Of course she should apologize, Tal. Who does she think she is spoiling his life like that

JC

5 Aug 10 at 6:25 pm
They were securitizing and doing what with it?

They were then selling it on the market, which is, among other things, the GFC can be understood as a market failure, as Eltham indicated above.

THR

5 Aug 10 at 6:27 pm
Selling it on the market to whom?

JC

5 Aug 10 at 6:31 pm
Look at this chutzpa Tal.

Asked if there was any chance of saving his marriage, the prime minister said: “I don’t think so. I don’t know if I want that this time. Veronica will have to apologise to me publicly. And I don’t know if it would be enough.

“It’s the third time in an election campaign that she has pulled a stunt of this kind. It really is too much.”

He’s not even sure he would forgive her even she apologized publicly.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/may/04/silvio-berlusconi-veronica-lario-divorce

JC

5 Aug 10 at 6:32 pm
How we got a financial crisis:

http://weeklystandard.com/articles/easy-credit-hard-landing?page=2

Had SFA to do with market failure.

Infidel Tiger

5 Aug 10 at 6:34 pm
“As a former prime minister of Australia I cannot stand idly by and watch Mr Abbott slide into office without scrutiny.”

LOL. You mean like you and the Real Julia did?

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 6:35 pm
Investment banks.

THR

5 Aug 10 at 6:36 pm
I wonder if he will still leak or if he figures that it would be worse for him labor not winning?

My guess is that the vengeance side is so strong he’ll continue to leak.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 6:37 pm
IT, your article pins the blame on ‘easy credit’, which is itself a part of the market.

THR

5 Aug 10 at 6:38 pm
It’s not the market if it’s a result of heavy government regulation.

Infidel Tiger

5 Aug 10 at 6:45 pm
‘Easy credit’ implies that lending risk is not priced into the interest rate. That’s not very free market.

Michael Sutcliffe

5 Aug 10 at 6:46 pm
IT’s article puts the blame on low-income borrowers and heavy-handed government, as if Bush and Clinton sent bankers to Guantanamo until they agreed to repackage loans into (highly profitable) financial products. The reason why credit was ‘easy’ in the first place was due to the dotcom bubble crashing, and the market being unable to sustain itself without a supply of cheap credit. As far as sub-prime loans go, lenders chased borrowers, used predatory lending strategies, offered honeymoon rates, etc, because they had every incentive to do so, independently of government.

THR

5 Aug 10 at 6:53 pm
Don’t be silly, THR. Grievance-hustling lawyers took banks and financial institutions to court for “red-lining” minorities. The Democrats in particular wanted the easy credit to roll – and roll and roll and roll – and anyone who questioned their ‘progressive’ outlook was a RACIST.

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 6:56 pm
There were shysters selling products with risk concealed but not declared. They are the same as any other con merchant. Sub-prime loans from Fannie and Freddie had the risk underwritten by the government. People selling their products were doing the government’s bidding.

Michael Sutcliffe

5 Aug 10 at 7:02 pm
Also, massive government programs encouraging uncosted risk should be expected to have flow on effects to markets, further encouraging mispriced risk and therefore shysters, and setting the scene for a bubble. If the government intends to undertake this risk on behalf of the people it has the duty to manage it (although it would be better if it didn’t). Just like if the government intends to undertake massive stimulus spending it has a duty to manage the risks in the massive artificial market it created, including the propensity for those things to create shysters. It is ridiculous to say that government has a right to do these types of programs, mismanage them, and the people have to wear the consequences.

Michael Sutcliffe

5 Aug 10 at 7:11 pm
Grievance-hustling lawyers took banks and financial institutions to court for “red-lining” minorities.

Yes, in 1977, not 2008. And I doubt you’d find it ‘grievance-mongering’ if you were denied a loan based on your skin colour, or neighbourhood.

People selling their products were doing the government’s bidding.

Sutcliffe, this was all less than 2 years ago, so the revisionist bullshit isn’t going to fly. Pray tell, how were Bear Sterns and co ‘doing the government’s bidding’?

THR

5 Aug 10 at 7:12 pm
You’re an idiot. I said Fannie and Freddie, and those selling their products, were doing the government’s bidding. Do you disagree with this?

Some institutions were taking risks they shouldn’t have. Those that failed should have been allowed to fail. Where they were selling products that weren’t what they claimed they should be prosecuted. Where people took high risks with their money they should accept the consequences.

Michael Sutcliffe

5 Aug 10 at 7:20 pm
THR

The I-banks were the ones doing the selling. They were packaging the securities and on-selling them to mostly “sophisticated” investors.

The I-banks were the aggregators.

This is how it worked.

1. Mortgage brokers round up a bunch of borrowers.

2. They would then send the bunch of loans (figuratively) to the I-bank.

3. The I-bank would then get a triple A stamp of approval from the rating agency.

4. The i-bank would package the loans into a master trust that complied with the triple A demands set by the rating agency

5. The I-bank sales force would then go out and sell these securities to what Americans call “seasoned investors” who were basically sophisticated enough to understand the risk.

In lots of cases the banks would also hold portions of these securities on their books because they would be able to earn a higher margin and were treated very softly in terms of capital requirements set by the prudential authorities. Why? A few reasons:

I saw this first hand in the early 90′s. It’s pretty surprising to me that I haven’t seen this discussed before and I seemed to be picking up on it.

In the early 90′s I was working at French I-bank that was deeply involved in the corporate lending business (I wasn’t). After the Savings and loans crisis the SEC, along with the international group responsible for the Basle accords on prudential bank management, came to the conclusion that bank balance sheets needed to be more diversified and that one way they could diversify was to promote securitization. They believed that if a bank got into trouble it could on sell its loan book and quickly meet sudden cash demands. They placed a much smaller capital requirement weighting on securitized loans to promote this strategy.

So the huge build-up of securitized lending came from the SEC and Basle. The market then took off for obvious reasons.

In the late 90’s the Clinton Administration came to the conclusion that banks were practicing “racist lending”, as a result of their what was called red-lining, so the various regulators including the FED mind you began the prod the banks into opening up their operations in those red lined areas.

I even recall Greenspan admitting to this horseshit in congressional testimony. I thought that from that moment on US banking standards were about to drop and that Washington and the Fed were sending all the wrong signals.

Couple all this with low interest rates that were kept down for too long and you end up with a clusterfuck.

Eltham has no fucking idea what he’s talking about and ought to spend more time trying to produce a movie with government handouts rather than talk about this.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 7:20 pm
No, a young lawyer called Barack Hussein Obama, for example, was part of a team that fought a redlining “racism” case against Citibank in 1994 “charging the bank systematically denied mortgages to African-American applicants and others from minority neighborhoods.”

The Democrats also militantly opposed reform of Freddie and Fanny – they wanted the good times to keep rolling. Hardly surprising given that the two biggest recipients of GSE “donations” in Washington were Chris Dodd and Barack Obama.

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 7:22 pm
Jesse Jackson was going around Wall Street in the 90′s collecting protection money from the banks by promising not to call them racist if the made a contribution to him.

Obama was just a low level operative for that fucking scam at the time.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 7:34 pm
oops I meant to say Rev. Jesse Jackson. He’s a man of the cloth.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 7:35 pm
Joe remember the shake down he did with the “Aunt Jemima”s” brand?

tal

5 Aug 10 at 7:44 pm
Perhaps the Reverend Jessie’s boldest stunt was lobbing at the White House to give spiritual counsel to Bill Clinton during Monicagate while one of his staffers was pregnant with his secret love child.

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 7:57 pm
Candid camera: a hammered Katie Couric. Jim Treacher brings the verse:

Twas the night she got $#!+faced, and all through the club,

Katie Couric was looking for guys to butt-rub…

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 8:10 pm
Bravo, and about time:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/08/05/2974827.htm?section=justin

Michael Sutcliffe

5 Aug 10 at 8:16 pm
Dunno what happened with aunt Jamima, Tal? I missed that one.

Yea Cl… I vividly recall that. he was ministering to bill Clinton and when jesse was caught out he too said he needed to take time off to revive his spirituality and publicly announced he was taking time off from his ministry.

Total time off, you ask? Or perhaps should ask?

Friday to Sunday. He was back at the office first thing the following Monday morning.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 8:22 pm
Thank God Michael

tal

5 Aug 10 at 8:22 pm
Yeah Tal. Really, why is it so hard for them? And why do they roll out Big Joe to make any announcement that might be vaguely relevant to the classical liberal side?

Michael Sutcliffe

5 Aug 10 at 8:25 pm
Maybe to get the Greens onside Michael?

tal

5 Aug 10 at 8:29 pm
Sure, it was to wedge Labor and it works. My point is why so late in the campaign? I’d like to think that the Libs would have a natural platform against censorship as part of who they are, but they sometimes seem to have difficulty with the most basic classical liberal values.

Michael Sutcliffe

5 Aug 10 at 8:37 pm
With the Libs blocking it, it’s basically dead (since it would need the Greens to get through). Perhaps they wanted Labor to continue with it for a bit?

Sadly I think it’s that many of them support filtering “in principle” – they believe this won’t work on technical grounds. This might be enough to get a few more Green voters preferencing Libs ahead of ALP – and may just push them over.

Fleeced

5 Aug 10 at 8:40 pm
That’s a good point, anti-censorship should be a given

tal

5 Aug 10 at 8:42 pm
My last comment was addressed to Michael

tal

5 Aug 10 at 8:44 pm
If the Libs were keen, they could have said, “We oppose the filter, and will trash it if we win… but if we lose, we’ll accept the will of the people – and the Labor mandate for a filter – and support it in the senate”. Keating used this tactic against Hewson’s proposed GST and it worked. It would be a ballsy move – basically making it a referendum on the filter… but perhaps the Libs were scared about losing older voters…

Fleeced

5 Aug 10 at 9:06 pm
You’ve got to laugh at the ALP policy makers. They’re spending $40+billion on a high speed porn downloading project and then erecting a gigantic speed bump in the form of a filter.

Infidel Tiger

5 Aug 10 at 9:12 pm
You’re an idiot. I said Fannie and Freddie, and those selling their products, were doing the government’s bidding. Do you disagree with this?

Next Sutcliffe will be telling us it was lefties who bailed out the banks in 2008. You moron, Sutcliffe. To the extent that F&F were a cause of the GFC, they were only ever part of a much larger problem, which, like it or not, market fetishist, had something to do with the failure of markets. Drop your religious devotion to markets that you’ve picked up from pseudo-philosophers and self-help writers and all this will be perfectly clear to you.

So the huge build-up of securitized lending came from the SEC and Basle. The market then took off for obvious reasons.

Here’s the problem JC – it’s not ‘obvious’ at all why the market ‘took off’, if government distortion was so rampant and ruinous. Sure, there was some blaant lying on the part of risk assessors, but this isn’t the full story. And none of this explains the market in financial products – this was a market which had been deregulated.

The reference to redlining here is a complete red herring. Does CL honestly believe that an Obama case in 1994 was the cause of the GFC? All of the red lining laws in the world don’t change the fact that banks chased subprime borrowers. They did this to manufacture financial products which the market apparently thought were invincible. That’s why we’re talking about a ‘global financial crisis’ here, not some crisis to do with black guys owning McMansions.

THR

5 Aug 10 at 9:14 pm
Does CL honestly believe that an Obama case in 1994 was the cause of the GFC?

No.

Does THR honestly believe these verballing distractions actually convince anyone of the veracity of what he’s saying?

Easy credit and GSE tentacles into Washington are part and parcel of the whole affair. In this, the Democrat Party and ‘social progressives’ figured extremely prominently. Barnie Frank and co. were no less culpable than Wall Street. Probably more so.

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 9:24 pm
Nonsense, CL. You’ve constructed a revisionist theory, wherein the GFc was caused by anti-discrimination Democrats, who then caused Barney Frank to get banks to sell dud securities. It doesn’t make the slightest bit of sense.

THR

5 Aug 10 at 9:30 pm
Here’s the problem JC – it’s not ‘obvious’ at all why the market ‘took off’, if government distortion was so rampant and ruinous. Sure, there was some blaant lying on the part of risk assessors, but this isn’t the full story. And none of this explains the market in financial products – this was a market which had been deregulated.

Up to $1 million of Interest is deductible on the personal home in the US. It’s the one major tax shelter people who earn a salary have available.

As far as I’m concerned it was the perfect storm, THR.

You had

1. the relaxation of lending standards by the regulators,
2. Capital haircut requirements that favored securitization
3. Make loans to the poor or you’re a racist money lender
4. A complete bi-partisan policy agreement from the right and left to encourage home ownership. The left agreed on equity grounds while the right thought home ownership would allow people to buy into the American dream and make them responsible.
5. Terrible intervention coming from Fred and Fannie
6. Low interest rate policy.
7. Fraudulent lending practices from the brokers.
8. Point 7 essentially divorced the old know your client thing that banks used follow
9. Very low interests rates.
10. Hubris in believing that residential real estate doesn’t fall because it had seen a fall of any large magnitude since the war.
11. Appalling risk management at the banks in senior people not understanding risk.
Couple of all in a market where prices a rising, you can deduct interest why wouldn’t you take a shot?

Out of these 11 points there are very few that the grubby hand of government wasn’t involved, THR.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 9:38 pm
BTW CL, love the new elephant

tal

5 Aug 10 at 9:40 pm
Thanks, Tal!

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 9:42 pm
one last point. Bank leverage is wafer thin.

Tangible common equity is around 7% and was as low as 4% before the bust.

For the life of me I can’t imagine why people would think it’s very hard to bust a bank.

In fact the reverse is true. IT’s very easy to bust a bank.

4% TCE means essentially that a bank can be 25 times leveraged to its equity position.

It’s quite common for industrial firms to lose 4% of their net worth through impairment charges. Who in their right mind would think it is hard for banks to do so especially when lending standards are relaxed.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 9:42 pm
Gillard the atheist using Mary MacKillop to win votes.

Lucky Tony Abbott didn’t do this or it would have caused OUTRAGEOUS OUTRAGE on the left.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/08/05/2974880.htm?section=justin

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 9:45 pm
“this was a market which had been deregulated.”

It wasn’t deregulated at all because it was never regulated to begin with. There was a push to regulate at one stage but major players got together & persuaded the Feds to abandon this path.

2. They would then send the bunch of loans (figuratively) to the I-bank.

3. The I-bank would then get a triple A stamp of approval from the rating agency.

4. The i-bank would package the loans into a master trust that complied with the triple A demands set by the rating agency

This is in the wrong sequence order; the agencies weren’t rating the loans, they were rating the securities derived from the loans.

Nor did they have lesser capital requirements due to their securitised nature; many of the derivative products were actually put together through off balance sheet vehicles specifically to get around capital requirements.

Too much easy credit certainly played a role in fuelling the issue at a number of levels. The investment banks were certainly pushing lenders to roll out more credit to build the derivatives, but the lenders were also extremely vulnerable to the approach because margins on traditional lending had reduced dramatically.

There was also at a basic level, increasing demand for housing credit. Some small part of this may have been due to government pushes to expand the benefits of home ownership to people lower down the income scale but I think part of it is just the contagious appeal of affluence.

badm0f0

5 Aug 10 at 9:48 pm
You’ve constructed a revisionist theory, wherein the GFc was caused by anti-discrimination Democrats, who then caused Barney Frank to get banks to sell dud securities.

As I noted above, THR, your baroque tendency to verbal your interlocutors as a distraction strategy doesn’t convince anyone of the veracity of what you;re saying. Politicised easy credit and GSE tentacles into Washington were part and parcel of the whole affair. As I said, in this, the Democrat Party and ‘social progressives’ figured extremely prominently. Barnie Frank and co. were no less culpable than Wall Street. Probably more so.

C.L.

5 Aug 10 at 9:54 pm
Bado

It wasn’t deregulated at all because it was never regulated to begin with.

The US banking system unregulated my fucking arse, dipshit.

Fuck right off. The US banking system is the most regulated on earth you dipstick. Don’t appear here using that raw prawn when you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about and only get your dense talking points some dark leftwhinging swamp of the web.

Lets go through the regulators we had, shall we?

1. NY state banking examniners – every state.
2. Federal banking examiners .. FED.
3. SEC
4. National association of security dealers.
5. Futures bodies.
7. Internal auditor
8 External auditors
9. Internal compliance officers
10. Whistle blower telephone number to the Fed made available to every employee and encourages to call about infractions.

The trouble with leftwhinging fuckers like you Bado, is that you wouldn’t know what the inside of a fucking bank looks like, usually only worked on a government stipend, read a couple of leftwhinge blog sites and you’re suddenly a fucking expert on the US banking system.

You see why I have very little patience for leftwhinge fuckers like you and I can sometimes be seen as a little rude?

You don’t get to say shit here and expect other fucking morons to nod in agreement because it somehow passes your ideological test, dipshit. You need to be on the ball and know your stuff.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 9:59 pm
Your 11 points are pretty much a good summary, I don’t think you can assign the blame to government so heavily (nor absolve them either).

10 & 11 are interesting as it not every player fell for this.

JP Morgan dipped their toes in mortgage based derivatives but couldn’t make the risk models work because there just wasn’t enough data. As there hadn’t been a major large scale downturn since the depression they couldn’t properly assess the risk of correlation in the debt (in the same way that they could for packaging corporate debt for which there is a lot of historical data across multiple business cycles/stages thereof).

They pretty much got out of the mortgages and spent a while wondering how the others had made the risk models work. As it turned out, it was by the power of wishful thinking.

badm0f0

5 Aug 10 at 9:59 pm
I thought the PM was a Proddie

tal

5 Aug 10 at 10:02 pm
“Don’t appear here using that raw prawn when you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about and only get your dense talking points some dark leftwhinging swamp of the web.”

You really are dumb. I wasn’t talking about the banking industry in general, I was talking about the proposals to include debt back securities within the capital requirements frameworks of the banks. I actually agree with you on many points (as I said in my second comment) but you just want to run off at the mouth.

The reason I have little patience with people like you JC because you try to act all muscular and bignote yourself but you don’t have much of a clue & you’re really just a whiney little bitch.

badm0f0

5 Aug 10 at 10:09 pm
lol…ok Bado, I did shoot off a little i agree.

But please don’t ever say the US banking system was unregulated, as that is a crock of swill and it gets me upset to birdian levels. At least though in this case I have an excuse unlike bird.

Please though no more of that swill.

JC

5 Aug 10 at 10:20 pm
“But please don’t ever say the US banking system was unregulated, as that is a crock of swill and it gets me upset to birdian levels.”

I’m not saying it wasn’t – I think the nature of the regulation & the compliance requirements for the sector as a whole were why the debt securities guys were so fearful of the Feds getting them in the frame & why they pushed back so hard against it. For a lot of them it would have killed off any innovation & screwed a lot of legitimate debt-based instruments where the risk could be properly assessed & priced.

badm0f0

5 Aug 10 at 10:30 pm
I think from memory it was in 2003 or so when the SEC decided in their wisdom that they would allow the I-banks to up the leverage from around 15:1 to (I think) 30:1.

The reason I believe was that they thought i-bank balance sheet were a work of art- a financial masterpiece with liquidity being ample.

There was mutual margining, little direct lending on their books with nearly everything they held either securities or stuff on which they could call for margin. Not all but most Assets.

Again, I think it was hubris and the blame for that decision lies with the government and the regulators.

(sorry for been too harsh earlier)

JC

5 Aug 10 at 10:46 pm
Gary John minster in the Keating government slams the Greens good and hard calling them immature. I call them dangerous lunatics.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/commentary/dont-believe-the-greens-well-be-running-on-gas/story-e6frgd0x-1225901307861

JC

6 Aug 10 at 12:23 am
The Dumbvirate.

Amazing day in Australian political history, in case you missed it. Kevin Rudd was appointed Co-Prime Minister – a new office hitherto unknown.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 1:18 am
Heh. No sooner did I christen the new modus vivendi than The Australian editorialises on a government with two leaders.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 1:22 am
Get ready for the biggest vote-buying fraud in history. Rumours that Obama is set to give Main Street its very own bailout:

Rumors are running wild from Washington to Wall Street that the Obama administration is about to order government-controlled lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to forgive a portion of the mortgage debt of millions of Americans who owe more than what their homes are worth. An estimated 15 million U.S. mortgages – one in five – are underwater with negative equity of some $800 billion.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 1:34 am
I can’t freaking believe what ahe’s done. Gillers has basically cooked her own goose here.

She can’t win even if she wins now. If she wins The Turd will take the accolades for winning election and he’ll be doing every thing he can to ruin her PMship.

She’s basically ruined herself.

And how is this going to look to the public. They get rid of him because he’s unpopular and now they ask him back to campaign because they need help as she isn’t doing to well.

What a disaster.

They should end up with two seats in the Parliament. Rudd and Gillers.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 1:35 am
Dennis Shanahan gives a brief history of the Dumbvirate:

In six weeks, Labor has dumped Kevin 07 as leader because he was unpopular, installed Gillard because she was popular, changed strategy and Gillard’s image to the “real Julia” because the false, campaigning Julia was unpopular and now turned to Kevin 10 because the real Julia was unpopular.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 1:44 am
The new Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG Gullwing Supercar.

Now that’s a car.

A bargain at $464,000.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 1:54 am
Yep, it’s a car alright.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 1:59 am
Lambert posts another thread on ummm Monckton.

Shiny is absolutely obsessed with the Lord. He just wants his attention all the time.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 2:34 am
My antelope is a screaming herd of cats.

BirdLab

6 Aug 10 at 9:10 am
God this shits me
http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.ssf/2010/08/portland_lemonade_stand_runs_i.html

tal

6 Aug 10 at 9:18 am
“The county’s shutdown of the lemonade stand was publicized by Michael Franklin, the man at the booth next to Fife and her daughter. Franklin contributes to the Bottom Up Radio Network, an online anarchist site, and interviewed Fife for his show.

“Franklin is also organizing a “Lemonade Revolt” for Last Thursday in August. He’s calling on anarchists, neighbors and others to come early for the event and grab space for lemonade stands on Alberta between Northeast 25th and Northeast 26th.”

Oh great:

http://inapcache.boston.com/universal/site_graphics/blogs/bigpicture/g20_06_28/g01_24093677.jpg

BirdLab

6 Aug 10 at 9:26 am
How’s that antelope doing BirdLab?

tal

6 Aug 10 at 9:34 am
It’s morphing, tal:

http://animalreview.wordpress.com/2010/07/11/tyrannosaurus-rex/

BirdLab

6 Aug 10 at 9:51 am
“Predatory lending was rampant”

You should be laughed out of town THR, as should Stiglitz.

To NOT have predatoraily lended would have been ILLEGAL.

.

6 Aug 10 at 10:20 am
The Coalition is ready to govern.

How do I know that?

Fraser says Coalition not ready to govern.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 10:40 am
Anyone read this PhD thesis?
“The Sex Pistols and the London mob”
http://arrow.uws.edu.au:8080/vital/access/manager/Repository/uws:6383?query=music

Just wondering if it will increase my understanding of modern culture. Or something.

ken n

6 Aug 10 at 10:40 am
Remember when we said there was no future? This is it.

BirdLab

6 Aug 10 at 10:41 am
what about this one?

http://arrow.uws.edu.au:8080/vital/access/manager/Repository/uws:1682

The aim of this study was to show how midwives cared for women from culturally diverse backgrounds. In-depth interviews were used to collect data from 12 experienced midwives who volunteered to participate in the study from a midwifery unit with a culturally diverse population. Study findings revealed that midwives preserved and accommodated the cultural preferences of women from a Chinese background by incorporating the forces of yin-yang into care, heeding the maternal hierarchy and women’s stoicism; and for women from an Islamic background by heeding modesty and gender preferences (Hejab), the place of prayer in daily life (Salat), and the imperative of visiting by others (Hadith). Hence, midwives negotiated care that was culturally comfortable for women and their families. Furthermore, triangulated studies addressing the partnership between the midwife and the diverse client are needed, as well as the development of aspects of the health service that are more culturally sensitive.

jtfsoon

6 Aug 10 at 10:43 am
This is damn scary
http://news.xin.msn.com/en/silverlight-gallery.aspx?cp-documentid=4258364

tal

6 Aug 10 at 10:43 am
When quizzed for his reasoning, however, Mr Fraser told ABC radio: ”Read my book.”

Pull up your pants, you prostitute loving prostitute.

Infidel Tiger

6 Aug 10 at 10:43 am
Was that the book David Smith demolished for its multitude of lies?

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 10:46 am
I missed that one Jason.
Then there is this
“Modified : cars, culture and event mechanics”
http://arrow.uws.edu.au:8080/vital/access/manager/Repository/uws:2394?query=car+modification

ken n

6 Aug 10 at 10:46 am
“Furthermore, triangulated studies…”

Gotcha Soon. Game over.

.

6 Aug 10 at 10:47 am
that’s beautiful Ken

This is an investigation of the enthusiasm, scenes and cultural industry of contemporary modified-car culture in Australia, based on fieldwork research with an online-based car club – where I participated as an enthusiast – and archival research of 30 years of enthusiast magazines and other texts. I develop a post-Kantian event-based conception of enthusiasm by drawing on the previous scholarship on modified-car culture read through post-structuralist theories of the ‘event’ and ‘affect’. The oeuvre of Gilles Deleuze is a key theoretical influence on this work, which also draws on the historical method and philosophy of Michel Foucault, the practical social theory of Pierre Bourdieu, and develops Theodor Adorno’s work on the cultural industry by examining its biopolitical dimension. Enthusiasm is often thought of as a charismatic relation between the enthusiast subject and the enthusiast object modified cars. But here, enthusiasm is understood as the event of a multiplicity of affects that exists on transversal scales from the personal to the scene and beyond. I argue that the charismatic relation of enthusiasm is a reduction that enables the enthusiasm of a given scene to become a resource for cultural industries servicing that scene. The event of enthusiasm is defined by the affects that circulate across bodies and which are actualised in the capacities of enthusiasts, the objects engaged with, and practices performed. The scene is defined by the character of the cultural events which populate it and the enthusiasts who participate in the events. The cultural events include cruising, working on cars, racing, showing, and consuming or participating in the enthusiast media. I draw on my fieldwork to examine the affective composition of some of these events. Transformations to the cultural identity of scenes and enthusiasms correlate with broader social changes exemplified by the processes of globalisation. The event of enthusiasm is repeated in different ways that make connections between the scales of the subjectively experienced affects of cultural events to the global-level transformations of the automotive industry and scene. The cultural industries and social institutions enable the enthusiasm by investing in the infrastructure of the scene and facilitating the existence of cultural events through sponsorship or practical support. Archival research on enthusiast magazines allows me to map the transformations to the composition of power relations (dispositif) between the state (governmental regulatory bodies), social institutions (online and offline car clubs, and federations), enthusiast cultural industries (magazines, event promoters, and later importers) and different populations of enthusiasts (from interested public to highly skilled and devoted enthusiasts). The periods roughly delineated include the militancy of street rodding era (the 1970s), the spectacle of street machining era (1980s through to the present), and the immanent online-sociality of the import era (mid-1990s through to the present). The power relations of the three eras of contemporary modified-car culture in Australia are contrasted and I argue that the current dominant set of relations involve spectacular cultural events. In the context of 1980s street machining, I examine the way elite level vehicles built by highly skilled enthusiasts following spectacular head turning styles of modification are used by event promoters and magazines to collectively individuate a population of the interested public. The ‘head turner’ is a singularity that organises the social spaces of the street and car shows and the discursive space of magazines. I argue that the emergent synergistic relation between magazines and event promoters is organised around the capacity of ‘head turners’ to mediate relations between different populations of enthusiasts so that enthusiasm is reduced to a charismatic relation and cultural events become spectacular.

jtfsoon

6 Aug 10 at 10:49 am
oops didn’t meant to copy the whole bloody abstract

but imagine the suffering of the poor bastard who had to read the whole thesis

jtfsoon

6 Aug 10 at 10:51 am
Does anyone wonder why I get annoyed with people who want to be known as “Doctor” when they get their PhD?

steve from brisbane

6 Aug 10 at 10:53 am
I’m dumb enough to try and finish mine and do a good job of it.

“The power relations of the three eras of contemporary modified-car culture in Australia are contrasted and I argue that the current dominant set of relations involve spectacular cultural events. In the context of 1980s street machining, I examine the way elite level vehicles built by highly skilled enthusiasts following spectacular head turning styles of modification are used by event promoters and magazines to collectively individuate a population of the interested public. The ‘head turner’ is a singularity that organises the social spaces of the street and car shows and the discursive space of magazines. I argue that the emergent synergistic relation between magazines and event promoters is organised around the capacity of ‘head turners’ to mediate relations between different populations of enthusiasts so that enthusiasm is reduced to a charismatic relation and cultural events become spectacular.”

Oooh yess the editors of Street Machine and drunken skirt chasing rev heads always are considering the implications of Marxian power relations.

I know how to make people never vote labour. Simply show them what their ALP MPs actually believe or think is worthwhile studying.

.

6 Aug 10 at 10:54 am
“Does anyone wonder why I get annoyed with people who want to be known as “Doctor” when they get their PhD?”

They deserve it. Don’t blame them. Blame Foccault.

.

6 Aug 10 at 10:55 am
I agree Steve.
‘Doctor’ should be reserved for the useful kind who actually save lives.

jtfsoon

6 Aug 10 at 10:56 am
that car one is Glen fuller who used to comment (maybe sometimes post I think but not sure) at LP. His blog was filled with that stuff.

http://eventmechanics.net.au/?page_id=1101

Steve Edney

6 Aug 10 at 11:01 am
Some catchy film reviewing there. David and Margaret better watch out.

http://eventmechanics.net.au/?p=1656

Most reviews of Up In the Air work hard to locate it in a romantic comedy framework, such as David Cox’s review at The Guardian. It is not a romantic comedy. Similar in some ways to Punch-Drunk Love, Up In the Air uses a constellation of romantic comedy tropes as a critical tool. Instead of romance and isolationist social relations like in Punch-Drunk Love, Up In the Air uses the romantic comedy tropes to problematise ‘loyalty’ in our privileged late-capitalist and post-everything cultural landscape.

jtfsoon

6 Aug 10 at 11:05 am
He sounds like a young Richard Neville.

.

6 Aug 10 at 11:08 am
Tal,

The problem is too many people will justify that kind of thing.

.

6 Aug 10 at 11:13 am
What’s a trope?
Wikipedia gives six usages, none of which fits that quote.
Is it like a paradigm?

ken n

6 Aug 10 at 11:14 am
My memory was tha he liked describing everything as a “violence” society does to people. Suburbia was a violence. Freeways were a violence etc.

Anyway he writes for Zoom magazine it appears. he’s quoted in the first article as “Our resident ‘hoon’ expert, Dr Glen Fuller”. http://zoommagazine.com.au/

Steve Edney

6 Aug 10 at 11:19 am
Fraser says Coalition not ready to govern.

Nice of the SMH to drown the upbeat story about Howard’s support for Abbott at a dinner last night with a negative by-line from Fraser. They really are shameless.

dover_beach

6 Aug 10 at 11:37 am
You should be laughed out of town THR, as should Stiglitz.

To NOT have predatoraily lended would have been ILLEGAL.

Classic right libertarianism on display here, folks. It’s personal responsibility all the way, except for the oppressed classes (investment banks, speculators, etc) who are the victims of sinister machinations of commies in government, and the mob rule of poor black folk. Back to Tom and Jerry economics, I see.

THR

6 Aug 10 at 11:47 am
Nice earrings:

http://weheartit.com/entry/3258884

BirdLab

6 Aug 10 at 11:58 am
She’ll end up with Julia lobes, though.

steve from brisbane

6 Aug 10 at 12:01 pm
I can understand why people are annoyed by those who insist on the honorific, Steve, yes. But historically, the idea of medicos calling themselves “doctor” (Latin: docere – teacher, to teach) is a very recent fashion. When I see dentists and vets calling themselves “doctor” I usually laugh.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 12:04 pm
Medico’s have been using it in the West for well over a 100 years, haven’t they?

steve from brisbane

6 Aug 10 at 12:10 pm
You’re an idiot THR.

It would have been ILLEGAL.

When they didn’t engage in those practices, the legislation made them liable to be sued by Alinsky agitators like a young BHO.

How the fuck do you balance personal responsibility against a court order you dissembling twit?

My views are the same. You can’t hack you were sold a dud.

.

6 Aug 10 at 12:12 pm
A hundred years?

Pffft.

Go a little further back and medicos and surgeons were ranked alongside barbers and butchers.

Look, I agree with you, Steve. Academic doctors who insist on being addressed as “doctor” are almost invariably wankers. But they do have a right to the title, pursuant to law. The degree is conferred by universities instituted by various statutes of our parliaments.

Why a doctor of anthropology or literature wants to risk being plucked from the passenger manifest to deliver a baby in an emergency, however, is beyond me.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 12:19 pm
Agreed C.L., but be nice to recent Ph Ds in real research areas.

.

6 Aug 10 at 12:22 pm
I will, Doctor Dot, provided they’re not from Women’s Studies or economics.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 12:25 pm
A baby delivered by Dr Bahnisch would get quite a fright.

steve from brisbane

6 Aug 10 at 12:27 pm
HAHAHAHA!

Leave Mark alone. He’s a nice man.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 12:30 pm
Chiropractors call themselves doctors.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 12:36 pm
Is Mark a mid wife now?

JC

6 Aug 10 at 12:36 pm
We live in a world where receptionists are now called “Director of First Impressions and Client Liaison Officers”. The constant need for validation is pathetic.

Infidel Tiger

6 Aug 10 at 12:37 pm
Infidel

Titles are cheap. Some people prefer them to money.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 12:38 pm
When they didn’t engage in those practices, the legislation made them liable to be sued by Alinsky agitators like a young BHO.

How the fuck do you balance personal responsibility against a court order you dissembling twit?

Graduate from the Rush Limbaugh school of Economics, dot is now flat-out lying. Banks had to make those predatory loans, on fear of hypothetical anti-discrimination lawsuits. This sort of explanation belongs in comedy.

This is what Wiki has to say on predatory lending and the GFC:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_crisis_of_2007%E2%80%932010#Predatory_lending

Predatory lending refers to the practice of unscrupulous lenders, to enter into “unsafe” or “unsound” secured loans for inappropriate purposes.[58] A classic bait-and-switch method was used by Countrywide, advertising low interest rates for home refinancing. Such loans were written into extensively detailed contracts, and swapped for more expensive loan products on the day of closing. Whereas the advertisement might state that 1% or 1.5% interest would be charged, the consumer would be put into an adjustable rate mortgage (ARM) in which the interest charged would be greater than the amount of interest paid. This created negative amortization, which the credit consumer might not notice until long after the loan transaction had been consummated.
Countrywide, sued by California Attorney General Jerry Brown for “Unfair Business Practices” and “False Advertising” was making high cost mortgages “to homeowners with weak credit, adjustable rate mortgages (ARMs) that allowed homeowners to make interest-only payments.”.[59] When housing prices decreased, homeowners in ARMs then had little incentive to pay their monthly payments, since their home equity had disappeared. This caused Countrywide’s financial condition to deteriorate, ultimately resulting in a decision by the Office of Thrift Supervision to seize the lender.
Former employees from Ameriquest, which was United States’s leading wholesale lender,[60] described a system in which they were pushed to falsify mortgage documents and then sell the mortgages to Wall Street banks eager to make fast profits.[60] There is growing evidence that such mortgage frauds may be a cause of the crisis.[60]

It’s perfectly clear that the reason banks were chasing borrowers was not, as you claim, due to hypothetical ‘court orders’, but because they wanted to make a quick buck repackaging and on-selling the loan. The market provided incentives for these practices, rewarding short-term gains very handsomely.

Grow up, and balance your market mysticism with a bit of logic.

THR

6 Aug 10 at 12:41 pm
It’s like the ongoing joke in The Office (which BTW is the best sitcom since Seinfeld) of Dwight Schrute getting a promotion to “Assistant to the Regional Manager”. No pay rise and no extra responsibilty.

Infidel Tiger

6 Aug 10 at 12:43 pm
More on the same:

During the boom period, enormous fees were paid to those throughout the mortgage supply chain, from the mortgage broker selling the loans, to small banks that funded the brokers, to the giant investment banks behind them. Those originating loans were paid fees for selling them, regardless of how the loans performed. Default or credit risk was passed from mortgage originators to investors using various types of financial innovation.[111] This became known as the “originate to distribute” model, as opposed to the traditional model where the bank originating the mortgage retained the credit risk. In effect, the mortgage originators were left with nothing which was at risk, giving rise to moral hazard in which behavior and consequence were separated.
The New York State Comptroller’s Office has said that in 2006, Wall Street executives took home bonuses totaling $23.9 billion. “Wall Street traders were thinking of the bonus at the end of the year, not the long-term health of their firm. The whole system—from mortgage brokers to Wall Street risk managers—seemed tilted toward taking short-term risks while ignoring long-term obligations. The most damning evidence is that most of the people at the top of the banks didn’t really understand how those [investments] worked.”[4][121]
Investment banker incentive compensation was focused on fees generated from assembling financial products, rather than the performance of those products and profits generated over time. Their bonuses were heavily skewed towards cash rather than stock and not subject to “claw-back” (recovery of the bonus from the employee by the firm) in the event the MBS or CDO created did not perform. In addition, the increased risk (in the form of financial leverage) taken by the major investment banks was not adequately factored into the compensation of senior executives.[122]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causes_of_the_financial_crisis_of_2007%E2%80%932010#Mortgage_compensation_model.2C_executive_pay_and_bonuses

Yet according to dot, those poor executives were forced, by way of non-existent government court orders, to make bad loans and cash in on those bonuses. LOL.

THR

6 Aug 10 at 12:44 pm
Once a scumbag , always a scumbag

Liberals not ready to govern, Malcolm Fraser says

JC

6 Aug 10 at 12:45 pm
Was there fraud? OF course there was fraud, THR?

But what’s your point?

JC

6 Aug 10 at 12:48 pm
JC, dot (among others) is arguing here that the only reason that banks made bad loans is because the evil, socialist government forced them to. This is false. No government court order was there to compel banks into tricking customers. Nor was any government court order in place to get banks to on-sell dud mortgages, thereby alleviating themselves of the risk.
The banks had huge incentives to chase these loans, and these incentives were market based, not some byproduct of government regulation.

THR

6 Aug 10 at 12:56 pm
Nor was there any court order for the GSEs to spend millions on bribes for Democrat Party congressmen like Barack Obama and Chris Dodd.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 1:02 pm
THR:

as to the first point… Dot is right. One of the Fed’s audit markings was to see if the banks complied with the various minority lending programs that had been set up. This isn’t bullshit. It was actually real and both political parties were part of this, although the Republicans did sound the alarms around 2005.

Yes, it’s also true that the banks had incentives to chase these loans and package them. Banks also have incentives to go chasing equity offerings too. I don’t see why this is a big deal.

The only bank I’ve read about that actually knew there was shady lending practices going on was Lehman bros when they bought some really dishonest outfit in California.

THR, if you don’t want people running around to speculate on real estate then don’t allow interest rates to get to absurd levels and keep them there.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 1:04 pm
“Titles are cheap. Some people prefer them to money.”

Yes:

http://thingsboganslike.wordpress.com/2010/08/04/163-executive-consultant-account-coordination-management/

BirdLab

6 Aug 10 at 1:06 pm
I missed the story the other day that Abbott has ruled out treasury and finance for Turnbull. Nope, Fraser’s right.

steve from brisbane

6 Aug 10 at 1:18 pm
I forgot to add: let my stoning begin.

steve from brisbane

6 Aug 10 at 1:20 pm
Steve;

If Abbott had rammed an ETS up the nation’s collective backside you’d of course be saying the opposite.

You actually think this current set of clowns are good.

You labor hack.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 1:21 pm
Fraser is a venomous loser who the party discarded for that very reason.

What Fraser hates most of all is that he’s ignored. Not hated but simply ignored by the party.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 1:23 pm
Turnbull can hardly get environment, and he’d be wasted in communications.

steve from brisbane

6 Aug 10 at 1:24 pm
Fraser sees criticism of Abbott as vicarious revenge against Howard – who has overshadowed him as prime minister in the annals of Australian history. (Malcolm being more or less universally adjudged a failure and a coward when in office). I also suspect that added to the Nareen Nong’s distaste for Sydney is a lifelong antipathy to Catholics.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 1:25 pm
He should get a finance job. I’ve always maintained that.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 1:26 pm
Anyway, it’s way, way too early to be calling this election. I’m expecting more drama yet.

steve from brisbane

6 Aug 10 at 1:29 pm
The generous left:

Hillary Clinton pushes flood relief for Pakistan, donates $10.

Why spend your own money when the very definition of “compassion” and “humanitarianism” is forcing everyone else to pay via the gubbermint?

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 1:31 pm
I’m calling. I think the libs by a couple of seats.

Abbott isn’t going to make any large mistake from now on and the last thing Gillers did in calling back the Turd looks horrible.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 1:31 pm
Abbott could be hit by a bus on an early morning ride. Rudd could dramatically on an election platform of a post-operative infection. That’s the type of drama is what we need for future telemovie material.

No one crap on about this, now, OK. An air traffic controller (somewhat older than me) once told me how, when the Sydney Opera House opened, pigeons were released at one point and there was some Air Force flyover, and straight away he imagined one of them being sucked into a jet which then would crash into the building and kill the Queen. Some people just like imagining drama.

steve from brisbane

6 Aug 10 at 1:42 pm
Rudd could die dramatically…etc

steve from brisbane

6 Aug 10 at 1:43 pm
Some people just like imagining drama.

Yes. Yes they do.

Infidel Tiger

6 Aug 10 at 1:45 pm
“Anyway, it’s way, way too early to be calling this election. I’m expecting more drama yet.”
Yep, you are probably right Steve. I just wish I could just turn it off and listen to music.

ken n

6 Aug 10 at 1:49 pm
Rudd could die dramatically…

I thought he had.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 1:55 pm
Sorry, Andrew. I don’t agree. (Except re the hypocrisy of magistrates). Hurt pride is no excuse for delicate police officers to arrest people. If the f-word is now an arrestable offence, police should start arresting themselves.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 2:02 pm
Interesting that Catholic schools have been found to have delivered BER projects at half the cost that state schools did. Another good reason to elect Abbott, Hockey, Robb and Turnbull.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 2:05 pm
You should be able to call a cop a fuck wit, but the cop should also be able to clip you around the ears for doing so.

Infidel Tiger

6 Aug 10 at 2:05 pm
Anyway, it’s way, way too early to be calling this election. I’m expecting more drama yet.

The ALP campaign is constructed to fail spectacularly. You have the two-headed beast (Rudd/Gillard); treacherous leaks (probably more to come); a wary public; and mid-course changes of direction (e.g., “real Julia”; last-minute calls for extra debates). ALP is screwed.
At this rate it will be a landslide.

daddy dave

6 Aug 10 at 2:13 pm
And the truly delicious thing is that everyone in the country knows that Itchy and Scratchy hate each other’s guts.

They’re not even phoning it in anymore. They’re texting.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 2:16 pm
Yes Steve, it’s a lost cause:

“You see the whole story is not real credible.

“Think of the opening sequences of Futurama. Think of the way the airborne traffic moves in these opening sequences. Isn’t it more likely that the electrons in this experiment are moving similar to the cartoon? This idea that these guys can cut out an individual electron. the way they claim, and fire it straight, so that it moves to the screen direct and without impairment …. This passes no test as a credible story.”

BirdLab

6 Aug 10 at 5:09 pm
Hahahahahahahaha!

“But I’ll still beat up Birdlab should I ever meet him. What a fucking stupid fucking cunt he is. I’ll provoke him by vomiting on him, and then exploit any feeble retaliation on his part.”

Graeme, you couldn’t puch your way out of a wet paper bag, you ignorant fat slob.

BirdLab

6 Aug 10 at 5:32 pm
Miranda Devine has bailed from the sinking commie tanker:

http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/timblair/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/welcome_back/

Infidel Tiger

6 Aug 10 at 6:11 pm
test

Sinclair Davidson

6 Aug 10 at 9:12 pm
Good to see. Androphobic National Union of Students sheilas tape their mouths shut.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 11:10 pm
More Obama/Keynes fail:

Jobs Picture Worsens With 131,000 Losses; 9.5% Rate.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 11:17 pm
That’s my kind of protest: Hot chicks who know to shut their mouths.

In all seriousness, how can anybody protest Abbott as some 1950′s wowser? This current government is trying to foist a Methodist’s nirvana upon us.

Infidel Tiger

6 Aug 10 at 11:21 pm
yep. The largest stimulus in history and the economy is about to take another dive again.

The multiplier sure worked didn’t it?

i reckon the Keynesian multipier must have been 25:1 to be about to obtain this result.

Christine Romer just resigned as head of national economic advisers.

As dishonest as she is, she obviously seeing the writing on the wall.

I say she’s dishonest because she and her husband co-authored a book on how useless stimulus spending is yet Romer took the job.

I think the country is fucked.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 11:23 pm
IT

Miranda’s a real hottie. We used to knock around together when we were both working in Boston, including weekend trips to Manhattan to stay at her old man’s sumptuous Park Avenue pad, which Murdoch supplied for Frank and his family while he was editor of the New York Post.

Peter Patton

6 Aug 10 at 11:24 pm
oops… to be able to obtain….

JC

6 Aug 10 at 11:24 pm
When was that Peter? Where in Park Ave?

JC

6 Aug 10 at 11:26 pm
I think the country is fucked.

I have more faith in the US than any other country, JC. They are the most indefatigable people on earth. There’s going to be a major comeuppance for the political class though. I can’t wait.

Infidel Tiger

6 Aug 10 at 11:26 pm
Frank Devine was a legend. They don’t make them like that anymore.

Infidel Tiger

6 Aug 10 at 11:29 pm
Fucked in the sense of the next 10 years or so. There’s a lot of freaking headwinds there. I think this loon is creating the same environment as the 30′s depression.

He’s frighteningly anti-commerce.

The Health bill is a fucking disaster. Small firms are not going to hire with a 1500 page bill that they don’t understand and then get kicked in the nuts.

The Fin Reg bill is 2000 pages and the banks having no idea what the fuck it all means. They can’t lend because they don’t know what the implications of the bill are in terms of capital allocation.

In a fair world he should be impeached for being an incompetent moron.

I really can’t even stand the sight of the fucker like I felt about Rudd.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 11:33 pm
Infidel:

There’s also the problem that the next president in 12 won’t have an easy time of it like Reagan… or relatively easy.

There’s far too much debt and he’ll spend his years with a meat cleaver and a butchers apron with blood splattered everywhere.

The next GOP prez will have a really hard time of it because of the fiscal retrenchment that will have to be made.

It’s going to be a horrible job.

I’m not even contending that this douche will be around as I’m just assuming he’ll be gone.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 11:39 pm
JC

In 1888/89 (from memory). Miranda was working for the Boston Globe. I can’t recall precisely the the cross street. About 59th I think, as I remember seeing the Plaza Hotel from the balcony, which I recognized from Crocodile Dundee and nearly jumped out of my skin. Frank had a meeting before dinner, so I grabbed Miranda, and said “we are going to the Plaza now, and getting smashed on Martinis,” which we did. Fortunately, Frank and Jackie (Mrs. D) enjoyed a tipple themselves, so by the time we got back they were just as merry as us!

Peter Patton

6 Aug 10 at 11:39 pm
Oops 1988/89.

Peter Patton

6 Aug 10 at 11:39 pm
Oh so it was closer to Midtown. i lived up a bit on Park Ave. We were on Park and 83rd for around 8 years or so.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 11:42 pm
Jumpiness in the Gillard camp:

ABC reports: “Prime Minister Julia Gillard nearly gets run over by a forklift during her campaign trail in Melbourne.”

Watch it:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/video/2010/08/06/2976092.htm

Doesn’t even go close to her or her screeching minders.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 11:42 pm
Yeah, it wasn’t that far up.

Peter Patton

6 Aug 10 at 11:43 pm
Good news. Government work begins on a new housing bubble and financial meltdown.

Megan McArdle:

If you want to know why us libertarian types are skeptical of the government’s ability to prevent housing market bubbles, well, I give you Exhibit 9,824: the government’s new $1000 down housing program.

No, really. The government has apparently decided, in its infinite wisdom, that what the American economy really needs is more homebuyers with no equity.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 11:46 pm
WTF?

The fork lift was 30 miles away. What’s with all the screeching?

Real friend of the workers hey? You can tell they know what it’s like to work in that sorta place.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 11:46 pm
Great anecdote, Peter. A visit to the Devines on Park Avenue. I know I’m a hick but… wow. Frank was a wonderful fellow.

C.L.

6 Aug 10 at 11:48 pm
I’m not even contending that this douche will be around as I’m just assuming he’ll be gone.

JC, have a look at this:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/president_obama_job_approval-1044.html

After sitting steady for a while, his ratings have just begun another run for the worse.

Michael Sutcliffe

6 Aug 10 at 11:49 pm
There are murmurings starting that Obama needs to dump Biden and take Ten Buck Hillary onboard as VP in 2012.

Infidel Tiger

6 Aug 10 at 11:54 pm
Byron Wienm is a good guy.

He used to be the chief equity strategist at Morgan Stanley and has quite a decent following on Wall Street.

He’s now chief strategist at Blackrock, the largest money management firm in the world.

He’s freaking amazed. He’s amazed the stock market is holding up in view of what the White House and its cabal of loons in Congress have thrown at American business.

The poor performance of the stock market since April has convinced many that the economy is going to slide back into recession. Some argue that over the years we have learned that the market often sees trouble coming before the weak data appears. While market valuations seem reasonable based on projected earnings, a resumption of the downturn would throw earnings estimates into question. Aside from the normal economic indicators, there is concern that health care costs will be increasing under new legislation, financial service regulation will be severe, taxes will be raised and the current administration in Washington is anti-business. The handling of the British Petroleum oil spill, the firing of General Stanley McChrystal and the uncertain progress in Afghanistan and Iraq have eroded confidence in the administration, and this has shown up in the decline in the President’s approval ratings.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 11:54 pm
C.L.

It was the most confusing thing for me. It was my first job our of uni. I was about 21. On my first day, two of us graduate intake were sent to US offices. I went to Boston, the other to LA.

The first time we went down to chez Devine, I was a bit apprehensive that they would be chain-smoking burping, farting “pig’s arse” types because he was editor of a tabloid.

But in this entire floor 5 bedroom apartment, they had a library full of the most high falutin’s tomes, poetry, great literature. The missus had a Ph.D from Duke. They were such fucking great hosts, bon vivants, hosts and EDUCATED.

You know Miranda had a full degree in Pure Maths, is fluent in Japanese, and masters in journalism from Northwestern in the US? I wonder how many Australian journos have similar qualifications!?

Peter Patton

6 Aug 10 at 11:54 pm
You know Miranda had a full degree in Pure Maths, is fluent in Japanese, and masters in journalism from Northwestern in the US?

Seriously? And she’s a yummy mummy to boot!

Infidel Tiger

6 Aug 10 at 11:56 pm
Infidel:

Hillary may be the front runner. He could very well be gone in 12.

I can only see his numbers go up if he does a Clinton and veers right after November.

But again it’s the debt that will kill him.

There’s a truly interesting situation going on at the moment. They have a gaping spending hole but they know that if they let the Bush tax cuts expire the economy will take a nose dive again.

So they’re talking about leaving them alone, yet if the leave them alone the deficit can’t close.

The fucking idiot is rooted. He’s absolutely rooted. This will be a good lesson to the American people. Don’t vote a loon in like this idiot.

JC

6 Aug 10 at 11:58 pm
Was Miranda mother American?

JC

6 Aug 10 at 11:59 pm
…I was a bit apprehensive that they would be chain-smoking burping, farting “pig’s arse” types because he was editor of a tabloid.

Frank wasn’t that (although I don’t know how much he used to smoke) but he still loved people who were. And that’s what made him a great journo and a great man, IMHO.

C.L.

7 Aug 10 at 12:01 am
No.

Peter Patton

7 Aug 10 at 12:01 am
Hillary’s not done, make no mistake. And neither is Bill. They want back and they’ll shove an icepick into Obama without batting an eyelid. I was thinking about this the other day. As contra-intuitive as it sounds, the worst things get for Obama, the more challenging things get for the GOP. That’s because if Barry goes on flatlining, Hillary can ride in as a common sense Democrat – an old-fashioned exemplar of what the party was supposed to be about before the Chicago socialists took over. Now, all of this is laughable bullshit, of course, but it could sell.

C.L.

7 Aug 10 at 12:07 am
Was he editor of the NY Post? Yep Wiki says he was.

NY Post is a great tabloid. It was my afternoon read non fail. The stories those guys dragged up were just fabulous. They could dig their way into Fort Knox and get the inside he-said, she-said scoop.

Frank really ran it well, as he seemed to know exactly how to run a paper; get out in the street and get the story.

JC

7 Aug 10 at 12:07 am
CL

I was extremely brash in those days, and fortified by the Plaza martinis, as Frank was showing me around me the library. As we came to Bloom’s Closing the American Mind,, I was berating him for being a “fraud” for acting as though he was common as muck by editing that “trash.” He reassured me that only the most cultivated could communicate to all walks of life respectfully.

I started on a marxist spree, and Frank yelled “Jackie darling, come quick, I’ve found a comrade for you.” He turned to me, “you have just won the coveted spot to the right of the hostess at dinner tonight.” Her thesis at Duke had been on Marx!

Peter Patton

7 Aug 10 at 12:07 am
Hillary could very well be prez in 12, CL.

To be honest I don’t think she would be that bad considering. Horrible person but an Okay domestic prez.

I also think she’s matured a lot more and isn’t as left wing as she used to be. This of course is helped by the fact that Bonny and Clyde are worth around $100 million

JC

7 Aug 10 at 12:10 am
Do you think Bill is still touching up anything with a heartbeat? You can’t tell me he’s stayed true to Hillary.

Infidel Tiger

7 Aug 10 at 12:12 am
Do you think Bill is still touching up anything with a heartbeat?

Well, that rules out Hillary anyway.

C.L.

7 Aug 10 at 12:15 am
Talk about your wishful thinking. ABC claims Gilludd has gained ground. Poll says – NO:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/08/06/2976289.htm?section=justin

Infidel Tiger

7 Aug 10 at 12:15 am
Of course he is. I read some gossip recently that he was moving around a lot with Ron Burkle , the California grocery store billionaire spending their time with getting introduced to young ladies by the dozen.

I think Burkle just runs his business and has sex several times a day.

Hillary heard about it and put a stop to it reminding him about their political future.

JC

7 Aug 10 at 12:18 am
Why does the OZ continue to employ Paul Kelly?

JC

7 Aug 10 at 12:57 am
Good question. He was at his stupid worst this week goading Abbott into a second debate. Said it was vital that he be kept accountable – an argument he didn’t make when Gillard chickened out of three debates. I’m guessing his reason was that he wanted Abbott to be mauled by the worm (and commentators like him) for ‘losing’ so as to re-boot the Real Julia’s campaign.

C.L.

7 Aug 10 at 1:08 am
A gallery of pics: the Mercedes SLS AMG Gullwing Supercar. Just look at that interior.

C.L.

7 Aug 10 at 1:11 am
Malcolm Fraser says, Mugabe ready for office, Abbott not yet ready to govern.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/liberals-not-ready-to-govern-malcolm-fraser-says/story-fn59niix-1225902025333

Michael Fisk

7 Aug 10 at 1:14 am
LOL. That’s right, Fisk. Bob was good to go. But not Tony.

C.L.

7 Aug 10 at 1:16 am
It’s a new series, CL, called “Malcolm Fraser says”.

The latest installment – Malcolm Fraser says, Suharto’s genocidal invasion of East Timor OK; Tony Abbott not OK.

Michael Fisk

7 Aug 10 at 1:30 am
#

Don’t use the car, use the chopper to travel 6 miles to talk about the state of the US labor market.

President Obama Friday flew Marine One from the White House less than six miles to Northwest DC.

He choppered to Gelberg Signs, the Washington, DC-based company where he’ll deliver remarks on the economy and July employment numbers. According to Google maps, the drive would have taken about 20 minutes from the White House.

By CBS News’ Mark Knoller’s count, this is the President’s 300th flight on Marine One.

As to why the President choppered to a company in DC, spokesman Bill Burton said, “Probably because it’s an easier than a motorcade through the city in the middle of the day.”

I never thought it possible, but he’s as bad if not worse than Rudd.

JC

7 Aug 10 at 2:58 am
[...] commenter THR made this comment in the Open Forum Graduate from the Rush Limbaugh school of Economics, dot is now flat-out lying. [...]

Robbing banks at Catallaxy Files

7 Aug 10 at 10:14 am
Don’t use the car, use the chopper to travel 6 miles to talk about the state of the US labor market.

You’re misreading it. He used the presidential chopper.

Michael Sutcliffe

7 Aug 10 at 10:21 am
http://catallaxyfiles.com/2010/07/31/open-forum-july-31-2010/#comment-83455

Jason, passed with minor corrections.

Trolls, I actually build on Kant’s brief comments about enthusiasm and update the concept so as to understand how enthusiasm is treated like a resource.

http://catallaxyfiles.com/2010/07/31/open-forum-july-31-2010/#comment-83480

Steve, violence? You mean like this unfortunate corner of the internet?

Glen Fuller

7 Feb 11 at 4:24 pm

Catallaxy Files

Open Forum July 31, 2010

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