Another missive for Middle Australia

This one is dedicated to everyone who has ever purchased a bumper sticker bearing the legend “Fuck off, we’re full”.

There were some interesting studies released on the weekend. Let’s start with the findings of Kevin Dunn’s work Challenging Racism: The Anti-Racism Research Project.

40 per cent of Australians believe some ethnic groups do not belong in the country … one in 10 has outwardly racist views.

Fuck you, you inbred rednecked meat-and-three-veg-eating worthless steaming piles of shit. You know your second-favourite bumper sticker: “love it or leave it”? Guess what? People come to Australia because they love it. If you’ve got a problem with that, you should be the ones leaving. Fuck off back to the central coast with all the rest of the lowlife morons having sex with their 14-year-old cousins in the back seat of their mum’s Cortina, in the carpark of the local Eagle Boys.

Fuck you, residents of Camden. Fuck your combined intelligence which is barely high enough to spell “town meeting”. Fuck your anglo-centric attitudes and your McDonald’s diet which has rendered you so fat that you have to buy a Landcruiser just to haul your wife’s arse to the supermarket, to buy your weekly supply of Black and Gold instant coffee. Getting some decent lebanese cuisine in town is probably the best thing that could happen to you, short of being quietly put to death to raise the acumen of our collective unconscious.

Fuck you, white Australian flag-wavers. Fuck you for showing the world how fucking stupid we are. Fuck you, fuck your deadshit surfie haircuts, fuck your dead-end 9-to-5 jobs, fuck your fake-tanned, bleached-blonde girlfriends, fuck your chicken-burger-and-chips world outlook, and fuck your pathetic football team – 42 years without a premiership.

Ashfield … came out positively in nearly every aspect of the study, thanks to long-term encounters with diverse cultures.

“It could be one of the most tolerant areas in Sydney,” [Professor Dunn] said.

Fuck yeah. Inner west for life, motherfuckers.

Regrets…

I have been thinking a lot about perspective lately. We all should.

The world is an injust place. We cannot dwell on this, or we’ll all go crazy. At the same time, we can’t ignore it. We must acknowledge the injustice, do what we can to help, and move on. This is where perspective comes into play.

Everyone has problems. If your particular problem isn’t trying to work out how you are going to feed your family tomorrow, you’re pretty well off. With this perspective, I would certainly have to say that I have had an extremely good life to date.

A lot of people carry around a lot of regrets with them. I have never believed in regrets. Life moves forwards, not backwards.

That said, there is one thing that I miss.

Photo: Alan Ball

We’re not gonna give up now.

We gave up. The dream died, we all packed up and got on with our lives. For a long while, I floundered, but now it’s time to restart the show. Anyone know a decent singer who is looking for a dedicated rock and roll band?

What can you buy for US$700,000,000,000?

• Carbon offsets for the entire of the USA (22% of global emissions) for four years
• Enough food to feed every single person in the world for one year
• 12 years of education for 767 million Africans
• 26 solid gold Batmobiles
• Manchester United, Real Madrid, Arsenal, Liverpool, Bayern Munich, AC Milan, Barcelona, Chelsea, Juventus, Schalke 04, AS Roma, Tottenham Hotspur, Olympique Lyonnais, Inter Milan, Borussia Dortmund, Newcastle United, Hamburg SV, Werder Bremen, Valencia, Celtic, Everton, West Ham United, Manchester City, Aston Villa and Olympique Marseille, 50 times over
• A short-term reprieve for a fundamentally unsustainable flailing US economy

Tricks with photography

Let me preface this by saying that I’m not a big fan of Mahmood Ahmadinejad, however I have noticed a trend in the western media that I would like to talk about.

Firstly, let us consider the standard file photographs of some major world leaders (plus K-Rudd, just to keep up my quota of local content).

Now, let me bore you with a little bit of data analysis.

You don’t have to be Alfred Einstein to notice the trend here; the more “evil” a world leader, the smaller he appears in his file photo. It’s not too overt for Kim and Fidel, but the mugshot of Ahmadinejad is truly ridiculous. All the media is missing is a caption: “Small man syndrome”.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. The true beauty of this is that noone will ever pick the media up on selecting photos which reflect the way they wish their subject to be portrayed in the subconscious minds of their readers. Notice how our beloved western leaders are all deep in thought of making an eloquent point, while the “crazy dictators” all look like they are either on a disjointed rant, or addressing some kind of fascist rally.

I’m going to have to ditch my beloved ABC and start reading Al Jazeera.

Coltrane turns 2!

Exciting news on the dog birthday front: Coltrane is 2 today. This photo is of him at about 2 months. He is much bigger now.

Happy birthday, dog.

Opposition frontbench

That’s right readers, it’s time for yet another half-finished post on politics. This week’s topic is “what do I think of the new opposition frontbench”.

The Hon Malcolm Turnbull MP

The member for Wentworth delivered a boost to the Coalition’s poll performance this morning, and a boost to the general entertainment value of Australian politics with his attacks on Rudd’s penchant for jetsetting. I like it.

The Hon Julie Bishop MP

Ms Bishop becomes the first women in Australia to have her fingers on the purse strings. She was also the first female deputy leader of the Libs, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she becomes the first female PM one day. In government, she championed performance-based pay for teachers (a reasonable idea, in my opinion) and was widely critical of the communist syllabuses espoused by the states. A worthy match for Swan.

Senator the Hon Helen Coonan

Hubcap Helen. She deadset looks like a corpse in that mugshot. She played a major role in destroying media diversity in the Howard Government, and now she’s pulling on the fishnets and stepping into the foreign affairs portfolio. God help us all.

The Hon Christopher Pyne MP

The member for Sturt has been around for 15 years, and managed to creep onto the front bench during the death throes of the Howard Government. Elected at the tender age of 26, surely he’s had enough of politics by now! He’s got the tricky job of pointing out that Rudd’s “education revolution” has been swept under the carpet since the election. Oh wait, maybe that policy is in a committee somewhere. Get digging, Mr Pyne!

The Hon Tony Abbott MP

Tony has retained families, community services, and Indigenous affairs. Once an insufferable c***, always an insufferable c***.

The Hon Andrew Robb AO, MP

Andrew Robb has captured an interesting portfolio that encompasses infrastructure, COAG and carbon trading. This should be one to watch, as by the time the ALP’s trading scheme gets off the ground, we’ll probably have booted them out of office, so anything Robb develops has a strong chance of being implemented. Let’s hope he has the balls to push for something greater than a 5% reduction in emissions.

The Hon Greg Hunt MP

The man from Frankston continues to face off against Peter Garrett, but he’s been given some more responsibility in the form of water, plus he’s got a new secretary in the form of Nationals Whip Fiona Nash. I don’t think I’ve heard a peek out of this guy since the last election, but I could say the same for Garrett, so I guess they’re a good match up.

Right, I’m done for now. I’m not going to promise more to come this time. If you want to know more, just set your dial to ABC Newsradio, and enjoy the circus.

Barking mad

A gem from our R&D department (aka software development), emailed to me during a debate over whether the correct word is “preventative” or “preventive”.

If you really believe the terminology must change I believe you must spend a bit more time and get the approval from a University or some other authorised party that we will change the package name in contrary with other similar products in the market.

And people wonder why I struggle to retain my sanity at work.

Turnbull coup

In terms of excitement and general outrage, Australian politics has been pretty pathetic of late. The only real action we’ve had since the last election was the Cardboard Kev saga, and that was sadly cut short when the real Kev realised that “backbencher Fridays” were possibly the stupidest idea in the history of Australian politics.

Brendan Nelson did very little to entertain the general public during his stewardship of the Liberal party. With Turnbull in charge, I fell that we might see a change coming. The man is instantly recognisable as a toff: a Rhodes Scholar; a lawyer; a merchant banker; a republican. Despite this, he is somehow likeable, perhaps because he tends to tell it like it is. He appears to be fairly progressive on social issues, and also to care about the environment, but on the other hand has introduced crazy policies such as banning the incandescent light bulb, and also approved the Gunns pulp mill.

Interestingly, Rudd has taken Turnbull’s promotion as an opportunity to talk republic. Thankfully, instead of jumping into bed with Kev on this issue, Turnbull has used it as an opportunity to attack the PM, accusing him (rightly) of diverting attention away from actual issues such as the economy. In reality, the republic should be about priority number 497 at the moment – Rudd should be getting off his arse and developing roadmaps to a) save the Murray-Darling system and b) reduce our emissions by at least 20% by 2020.

Here’s hoping that Turnbull can bring some accountability to our all talk, no action government. Failing that, at least he’ll keep us entertained with his “rags to riches” life story.

Manly Council

There are 152 councils in the state. 104 of them are having a single paper at tomorrow’s ballot: the election of councillors.

43 councils are a bit more painful, and will either directly elect their mayor, or run a referendum or poll.

4 councils have gone a bit overboard, choosing to directly elect their mayor and hold a referendum or poll. Imagine all the extra work for the poor polling staff!

1 council – Manly Council – just has to be difficult, holding a referendum on whether to reduce the number of councillors, a poll on whether to introduce a 4.4% climate change levy, and directly electing their mayor. 4 bloody ballot papers!

Guess which council I have been roped in to working for tomorrow. For further information on what’s wrong with democracy, Manly Council, and politicians in general, please feel free to pay me a visit at All Saints Hall, Balgowlah between 8am and 6pm.

T minus 2

We are now less than two hours away from one of the most exciting events in the history of quantum chromodynamics – the flipping of the big switch marked “LHC ON”.

In order to prepare for the highly improbable event of a catastrophe, I ducked out at lunch and consumed three schooners. Apparently alcohol can cushion your system from the effects of:

1. Micro black holes
2. Rifts in the space-time continuum
3. Beings from another universe invading through aforementioned rifts
4. Concerned technophobes

If you require any further information, please visit this website.