Happy new year from all at LP!
An open thread where you can discuss anything you like. Though you may like to post any reflections on 2005 or predictions for 2006 on the dedicated thread.
Elsewhere: For our non teetotal readers (that should be just about everyone), you may find Don Arthur’s handy guide to hangovers useful reading on Sunday.
That hangover thing’s old news. You lefties would be better informed if you read ring-wing blogs more often.
For a discussion starter, try this.
Oh, I do love a good conspiracy theory. Not quite sure how the Trilateral Commission and International Jewry fit into this one, though.
Saturday Salons never or rarely show up on my RSS feeds. why?
Dying is a hell of a radical way to beat paying tax, naomi.
Kezza just packered it in!
Vee - I think that’s normally because I write them before I go out on Friday night and set them to publish at midnight - so the time at which they’re actually saved as a post by WP is before they appear. But I don’t really know.
Naomi - I thought I saw an article in the SMH yesterday (?) saying Packer wouldn’t have a state funeral.
KP could be spending a year dead for tax reasons.
“I thought I saw an article in the SMH yesterday”
So did I and I hope Iemma hasn’t changed his mind. It was the first sensible thing I had read about Packer for days. Can’t wait for the first daily paper next week that is not given over to ‘Saint Packer’.
Just found this in today’s Sydney Morning Herald:
“A state memorial service, which the Prime Minister offered to the Packers, is expected to go ahead in Sydney on February 17.”
Source
A salon is okay, but I’d prefer a saloon.
(Hoping that hasn’t been said before)
It’s a loony salon!
The Packers announced that they were holding a private funeral for him on the day after he died. A “state funeral” was never sought, desired or offered. I’m not sure what a “state memorial service” involves but it presumably involves a number of worthies getting up to pay tribute to the departed. It’s the premier’s call as far as I’m aware.
I don’t where you guys do your browsing but I ‘ve not read a single word about Packer that aims to “sanctify” him. The coverage has been pretty much warts and all. It certainly left me in no doubt that Packer was a multi-faceted character. The fact that he loomed large in our national life is undeniable and some form of public commemmoration of the guy is hardly unexpected.
02/$file/cover.jpg”>A sad testament to the continuing irrelevance of The Bulletin.
Well, that worked in preview… Try this one.
I think that should be “I don’t know where…” and I acknowledge an embarrassment of m riches in respect of commemoration.
Yeah, yeah, Bill. Wicked Tim Blair and all that shit. Did you actually read the Bulletin? No, I thought not. The coverage is far from hagiographic - and hey! The guy owned the magazine -but that’s not really your point, is it?
S’aloony salon.
I’ll settle for that.
I just want to say thanks to Mark and Robert for all their LP efforts in 2005. And cheers to Ron for his help onwards. I am glad to be part of the LP collective.
And while New Years is an arbitrary celebration it is a worthwhile one. There will be a bin outside for the broken resolutions. For the achieved ones a great well done.
A happy and prosperous 2006 to all LP bloggers, commenter,s readers, lurkers, lover, haters and casual fly bys. God knows how I am still standing (and typing).
Ahem.
He’d be stunned by the media frenzy? And what- from the Packer media too? Come on now! If there were no frenzy he’d be rolling in his grave - to kick all their arses!
See the endless pages of sycophantic hype about that 2nd-rater James Packer. I saw of speech of his on telly and he could hardly string two concepts together. Today we’re told he’s moving PBL more hevily into gambling. Great! Something even more socially useless than his old man. Are we supposed to be impressed?
I saw of comment of LE’s on a blogg: “I saw of speech of his on telly and he could hardly string two concepts together.”
Hope everyone had a great night last night!
Unfortunately Newman Campbell (or whatever the Lord Mayor’s name is) spoiled it for me and my friends by not having fireworks at Riverside - and so we traipsed up to the park overlooking the Story Bridge for a distant view of the Southbank fireworks obscured by city buildings!
But a few gin and tonics restored festive spirits!
Lefty Elitist looks to be a graduate of the Sheil School of Smug Superiority, Syntax and Spelling. He should go for the advanced degree in comment manipulation.
Nice to see the RWDBs in typical happy and festive holiday mode! The right really should practice being relaxed and comfortable!
Dear me, where are my manners! In all the excitement of new year I forgot it was politically incorrect to criticise Australia’s economic elites.
Anyway, Im sure I speak for all of us when I say I look forward to James bringing the same business acumen to PBL that he brought to One-Tel.
R H will nevver get ticked off for not speaking proper. Because he knows a professor is always watching.
And how strict professors are.
And how important it is to be a professor.
I know a few people who have met KP and I have only ever heard praise for his generosity nature. He made his own way, a successful individualist.
Why is it that the Left are collectively so ungenerous?
No Bill. Doing an index rundown doesn’t work. You’re actually supposed to read the articles. If you did, you’d find that each of them offers quite a broad range of views about Packer and none of them purports to sanctify the guy.
I think you’re confusing saturation media coverage - hardly surprising in the circumstances - with eulogy.
Listen, I tried the bite on KP once.
I wanted two bucks to get The Age and he told me to piss off.
So is that being generous?
John Quiggin has a good post on Packer, and this comment is a gem.
If you don’t think this is hagiography, then you didn’t read through to the end: