An open thread where, at your weekend leisure, you can discuss anything you like.
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Look at me Ma. King of the world!
It’s quiet.
Too quiet.
It’s 2:00am in the effing morning, on what was a Friday night. I would expect it to be quiet here!
[ominous drumming from the jungle].
Upper lip stiffens.
Why does everyone turn into an alcoholic when they go to a conference?
To avoid social awkwardness and escape boredom?
This morning (Saturday) Turnbull the Turncoat was on AM driveling on about the virtues of nuclear energy, clean coal and how renewables were not the answer.
He banged on about the support the IEA have given to nuclear in particular recently. What he failed to point out is that the IEA is a sub set of the OECD and like the OECD merely a creature of its constituent governments.
As pointed out at http://timeforchange.org/pros-cons-nuclear-power-global-warming-solution
Yet Turnbull the merchant banker (and I use that term in both its slang and literal meanings) suggested that IEA had endorsed nuclear as the saviuor of us all – which it really hasn’t and in any event IEA’s track record on predicting the future is poor.
I hate to but I have to admit it. The Monarchists were dead right about Turnbull – he can’t be trusted.
Conferences are a form of what Foucault calls heterotopia – places in time & space where the normal rules of life don’t apply, and that’s ok. They’re also quite carnivalesque – everyone performing, everyone watching. It’s no wonder we become alcoholic dance-all-night dags at them.
I’ve just re-read Giles Smith’s “Lost in Music”. If you’re a 30 or 40-something pop tragic, get a copy – it will speak to you. It’s also bloody funny. It’d have to be in my top 5 books about popular music, if I could think of 5 (Ian Hunter’s “Diary of a Rock’n'Roll Star”, “Shaky”, “Our Band Could Be Your Life”, ummm….)
Ah, I think Foucault’s chosen heterotopiae would have been a bit more lively and abandoned than what goes on at most academic conferences, with few fewer guided discussions, and a bit more amyl nitrate. Before you start, John Greenfield: I do the Foucault jokes around here.
Why do upper-middle class intellectuals get totally off the rails drinking cask red after the plenaries, when they’re a plane ride away from their homes? Cristy, I don’t think it’s to avoid social awkwardness or boredom, as both are pretty applicable to the ramblings of toasted dons. Why, they tie it on for the same reasons everyone else does: to feel the pulse-quickening sensation, rarely felt for most people outside Melbourne Cup day, of getting really carpeted when you should be at work.
If you don’t believe me, try it out this Monday morning and find out for yourself.
As Jello put it, because they’re halloween.
I would like to see Turnbull go head to head with Helen Caldicott over the contribution of nuclear energy to ameliorating the effects of global warming. That would make for good television.
Interesting spin by Mike Chaney on his read of the Rudd/Gillard situation. Suspect he may believe rudd has a limited shelf span with Gillard support.
silky, leave the good Doctor alone – Turnbull would eat her for breakfast and the only good television would be watching her rant & cant self-destruct when confronted with something other than an audience of admirers.
Can I just share, in a pathetic, despondent, quivering-lip kinda way, that I’m a bit confronted by the apparent arbitrariness of the moderation here?
My last two comments to the gay adoption thread have disappeared into a moderation black hole. The comments policy makes no undertakings to even advise that a post has been deleted, let alone explain why. Nor does it make any commitment to dealing with posts in moderation before the discussion has gone dead.
“Civil interchange” is what I posted. Frozen silence is what I’ve had back. What’s the story, guys?
Moderator Response: We have an automoderator and autospaminator. It’s not personal.
I notice that far right-wing site, a western heart, has dropped all pretensions about being anything other than a hate site. Several recent contributions by, Dr John Ray, inform readers about the primitive Blacks are floundering in society due to their genetically lower IQ’s. He makes similar claims about the Lebanese being troublesome due to their interbreeding.
Last week, a poster named, Tiberius, appealed to like minded souls to join with him to murder leftists. Isn’t there a law against that?
Making reference to Anna’s earlier post about what we cherish and wish to protect, I’d like to nominate a free and fair society. A society where hateful commentary is no longer tolerated – and I include sheikh hillbilly in my vision.
Yeah. Helen Caldicott should be left well away from any sensible debate on anything. Complete crank.
Goi back to sleep, dozer.
(…with a final puff of black smoke, clank of track on sprocket and a deep grumble, the behemoth comes to rest, turbochargers ticking slowly as they cool – the only sound now, apart from the faint, infrequent hiss of warm NQ rain as it strikes the hot exhaust…)
Speaking of our Malcolm, why is it that all the potential Prime Ministers are such insufferable, pompous wankers? Rudd, Turnbulll, Costello etc etc. I wonder if it was always thus? Was Ben Chifley a king size pain in the arse before he became PM? Was Alfred Deakin a precious tosser? Menzies a superior, born to rule prig? I suspect Fraser & Gough were pretty much the same before, during and after, but if we’re to evaluate this current crop on their performance so far, it doesn’t look promising. Or am I being overcritical?
“Why does everyone turn into an alcoholic when they go to a conference?”
Because the booze has been paid for a priori or is free.
“Orstralia,
you bloody beauty,
up the little red rooster,
and drink more piss!”
Mick, is your gravatar that of a young person from South Park, Colorado?
Enemy Combatant:
I’m in the wrong business, clearly.
Tony:
No.
For those of us who remember this story:
Nazanin has been exonerated, released and reunited with her family.
Not even executing a slut who dishonoured her family by seeking to promenade like a whore and thus lure some poor brother of islam into involuntarily succumbing to carnal desire, she then compounded her criminal behaviour by knifing the brother? The bitch should have been hung from a construction crane!
Instead she is released? (And as yet not even honour killed by her male relatives)
A few things have been breaking the established pattern in Iran lately. Wonder what is next?
Thank you Mr Nelson. Thank you Mr Howard.
Despite all the flowery words, it has finally happened. Today’s Rockhampton “Morning Bulletin” has a property ad for the auction of the historic 42RQR Barracks.
Stiff bikkies for community and volunteer groups, such as the Central Queeensland Military & Artifacts Museum, which have been trying to get the most historic buildings in the Barracks as a new home for their activities.
Link: http://ungrateful-troublemaker.blogspot.com/2006/09/more-of-australias-heritage-at-risk.html
Can anyone tell me what happened to the blog titled “Currency Lad” ?
The background of the blog is published at the following link:
http://thecurrencylad.blogspot.com/2004/07/return-of-lad.html
The author of the blog, Chris Shiel, identifies “currency lad” as a near-obsolete Australianism.
I myself was introduced to this Australianism some years ago in Mal Garvin’s 1987 book “Us Aussies – the fascinating history they didn’t tell us at school”.
I find it equally fascinating that despite federal government calls for a greater emphasis on teaching Australian History at school, I’m uncertain if most Australians will ever learn much about the story of our first colonial-born Australians – the currency lads and lasses.
I have included a link to the Pandora archive of the Currency Lad blog on the side-bar of my own blog.
I hope I get the opportunity to explore this portion of our history at some time in the future, perhaps as part of my Communication studies at Uni.
…From Justin
I don’t think Chris Sheil is the author of the Currency Lad’s blog, Justin.
Thanks for letting me know that Mark.
I will keep investigating when I have more time
Pretty sure you got that right, Mark!
Speaking of Doc Sheil, have you heard from him here recently? I’ve only been an intermittent visitor. Is he still taking time out?
Chris Sheil would surely explode if told he was thought to be the Currency Lad.
I’m glad that the real Iron Chef is back. The American version was simply awful. The cultured flamboyance was missed as was the breathless floor commentary.
What other show would translate French into Japanese then back into English and include an outrageous French accent?
Did you hear about the in-flight version of The Queen that had all references to God bleeped out? Qantas said on 31 Jan it “has been removed from Qantas flights” — only that’s not true. I saw it on my flight today.
Incidentally, it was better than I thought it would be.
I enjoyed The Queen on Qantas as well (several weeks ago though). I was very impressed, not just with Mirren’s much-lauded performance but with the ensemble and especially the screenplay: I know it’s been nominated (deservedly) for awards, but the underlying dry humour is not given enough credit in most commentary that I’ve read.
BIG win for Labor in the Peel by-election in WA (and, by extension, BIG defeat for the Liberals). Federal implications galore. Self-promotion alert: read all about it here.
Excellent result to the ALP, and a 1% swing TO the ALP to boot. This doesn’t look good for Paul “Elmer Fudd”* Omodei, and at present they have no-one who can replace him as leader (Troy Buswell was Mayor of Busselton when the Canal Rocks saga) which resulted Norm Malborough’s downfall, and subsequent resignation as Member for Peel.
I’m pretty sure the fact that the Mandurah Railway, which is nearing completion, had a lot to do with Peel staying in ALP hands, plus the fact that the BP Oil Refinery is also in the Electorate.
* I’ve referred to Mr Omodei as Elmer Fudd because he was charged with accidently shooting his son in the hand after Rabbit shooting on his family farm.
Hilarious. This was the result that was supposed to have Carpenter and Rudd shaking in their boots.
Shaun
What did they end up doing with the snails? I had to head out (reluctantly) just as it was getting going.
I know
I’m pretty sure Kwinana, Medina and surrounding areas have a large population of welfare and other marginalised communities, who wouldn’t vote Liberal in a fit, plus the fact that Workchoices would’ve played a part – despite the circumstances surrounding the demise of the local member.
Climate Change.
I wonder if readers of this blog have heard about the new song by Senator Amanda Vanstone, sung to the tune of Land of Hope And Glory.
Story and links here. This has got to be a joke, right? I feel like killing myself.
http://www.news.com.au/sundayheraldsun/story/0,21985,21164940-661,00.html
I heard a bit of the first verse, and yep, it’s as bad as it’s described, sounds like one of those Dirges written in the 60’s in praise of Joh.
Happy times.
GREAT MOMENTS IN ‘FOUND’ POETRY:
Enjambment in snarky late-80s rock n roll, Volume 6:
I ride my bike, turn
The corner, and go
Home. Walk on
The ground. Blink
My eyes, breathe
The air, and drink
Water, just like every day.
I’ll never forget
The day I washed my
Face in the sink, and I went
To the store.
– Camper Van Beethoven, ‘Ice-cream Every Day’
btw, where’s Liam been lately? This jernt is a sight less lively without his arse around.
Douglas Adams said it best.
Well yes, I do suppose there’s always that. On the other hand, there’s also always little gems like this…
‘You know you really shouldn’t take your-
Self so seriously.
If you wanna know why, it’s
Cuz no one else does.
Somewhere along the way, someone told you
You were deep and sensitive,
But you’re not.
No you’re not.
Came to your party,
Drank all the beer.
We’re a bad trip.’
– Camper Van Beethoven, ‘We’re A Bad Trip’
A cure for cancer?
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/health/mg19325874.700-cheap-safe-drug-kills-most-cancers.html
Southern Stars, Southern White Trash
To the tune of Land of Hope & Glory
Bung them Abos our name,
That way Whitey stays ‘First’,
Shining light for Freedom,
(Except for that gulag bit, at first).
Nation made of many,
Mother’s good the sky is blue,
Building for the future,
So the privateers can flog that off, too.
Free and Friendly Nation,
Free to see things our…friendly…way (ahem),
The SAS, the RAN, the Great Australian
Union JackOi! Oi! Oi!Keeping them Sand Niggers
in theat bay (amen!).Valiant into battle,
Any shit sandwich Sam hands us
Bending over for freedom,
BleedingSmiling as we take it up the ANZUS.Nature’s earthly heaven,
Let’s dig and farm it dry for fast cash,
China’s alone now those treasures,
Fiscal beads for southern white trash.
Yes, Land of the Bunkered-Down Xenophobe,
Shit-scared of the coming global crash,
Home to the Great Lost Opportunity,
Once Southern Stars, soon…southern white trash.
Actually I was quite surprised to read the Lyrics. I can’t seem to fit them to the tune of Land of Hope and Glory, but I was amazed that they read quite well. Sort of like the recent discovery that Brett Lee actually has a surprisingly good singing voice.
Amanda Vanstone has written a surprisingly good set of lyrics.
Pity it was written by a politician, or the song would have a good chance of getting off the ground.
Well, if it’s inspiring odes and anthems we’re doing:
Shirkin’ shirkin’ shirkin’,
Though they should be workin’ –
Stop those bludgers shirkin’
Sennerlink!
Don’t try to understand ‘em,
Harass and reprimand ‘em,
Get ‘em all workin’ for the dole.
We all want lower taxes,
So make ‘em break their backses,
Get ‘em all doin’ what they’re told.
Shape ‘em up, ship ‘em out,
Shape ‘em up, ship ‘em out,
Shape ‘em up, ship ‘em out,
Raw Prawn!
Shape ‘em up! ship ‘em out!
Shape ‘em up! ship ‘em out!
Shape ‘em up! ship ‘em out!
Raw Prawn!
I believe you all fail to understand the alluvian field of post-Heideggerian dynamics particularly as it relates to the field theories of flux bases interpretations of media grounded national foundation poetics. To be clear about this it should be stated that the elucidatory function of linguistic code systems designed to convey meaning is flawed in that is screened and distorted by the membrane of archaic gaseous expression of intentinal liquidity and furthermore is failed by the subterreanean complexities of overt and methodological synthesese of matrix inhibited tendencies to expository norm establishment via the tentae preambles of Marxian relationship based contingencies based on contigent vectors of post-normal trends in heteroxical allusions to preamblist socio-culturalism.
This is I believe you’ll agree the pertinent issue confronted at present by those who concern themselved with the essentialist dynamic.
Is that you, Glen? Mate, you musta had a good Saturday night.
A kebab with the lot, I’m guessing.
Oh yeah.
Well, no. It’s not interesting enough to be called awful.
It’s a perfectly adequate, technically quite well done, cooking contest show.
But that’s not why Iron Chef has become a cult success. For me at least, it’s the madness of the whole concept – some megalomaniac has chosen this weird martial-arts-movie-cum-cooking-genre-show as the way he wants to spend his money. And it’s actually fun to watch. E
I mean, that bit where Chairman Kaga bites into the yellow capsicum, leers maniacally at the camera and the shot zooms backwards to show you him surrounded by his retainers…genius.
Say Frank, will Mistah Fudd be available for a for a spot of hunting with JerkShot Cheney when Torture Dick condescends Down Under in a couple of weeks?
Prominent Sydney racing identity, Lennie MacPherson set the precedent for entertaining his high profile American Outfit pals some time back. Be a terrible thing to deny Cheney the chance of wasting a mess of wood-ducks at close range with his trusty Remmington before heading back Sep-Side to put the finishing touches on God’s great gift of Democracy for those pesky, terrorist enabling I-ranians.
Indeed I am not Glen however it is vital not to exclude certain chemical formulae from consideration when attempting readerly classifications of the contruction to discursive unities. I would suggest that the following is likely to invoke the clarity consistent with pre-Watersian Barretilism: C0H25N3O. Not to downplay the carboxamide consequences of pre-Foucauldian axioms however it is vital that the cultural industrial complex comes to terms with the heteromanxian hyrdromatic basis of Brodian typo-linguistic norms.
As a member of the post-Panean quasi genus Glen will agree.
“to put the finishing touches on God’s great gift of Democracy for those pesky, terrorist enabling I-ranians.”
Well, okay. But seriously, though. I think a perfectly sober, value-neutral case can be made that Iran is both “pesky,” as it were, and blatantly “terrorist-enabling” as well, yet you say it with a smirk as if it weren’t true. To admit the bare facts of the case is not to advocate anything as zany as an attack against Iran, but still. The Left rails and flails like this, then wonders why some of its more perfectly sensible recommendations tend to be ignored by swing voters.
Well now ya know.
Post-Panean, as in the mythology? I think not. Rumours of his death are much exaggerated; he’s out on the tiles with the Maenads, and he’ll be back soon. Sore, I imagine.
Indeed Devil drink I refer not to the mythology but to the biological taxonomy derived from same but equal to it. It is your limited understanding of pre-Watersian Barretism and the correspondingly related but not inextricably linked compund of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen that makes you fail to grasp my point.
Yeah but, no but, j_p_z.
Being sensible about the I-ranians anywhere near the earshot of Cheney-Scourge-of-Quail-and-Lawyers is likely to be interpreted as carte-blanche for some fool
crusadeflourishing of the beacon of democracy.And we all know what trouble the Chairman of the Waterboard caused the last time he was let off the leash.
This is no time to be sensible, it might be construed as compliance.
j_p_z,
it’s just like Iraq 2003, BushCo propaganda would have the less discerning believe that them I-ranians have got WMDs up the wazoo, with weaponizable uranium (supplied from from Niger?), and cooked up in those deep-bunkered reactors.
Only thing is, there is no proof.
Granted, Iran is supplying Iraq’s Shias with small arms and explosives to simmer the civil war along, but this is hardly a casus belli for nuking or shock-and-aweing Iran. My smirk was intended. The stroke of a presidential signing statement pen can make a “terrorist” or “enemy combatant” out of just about anyone, but this is not enough for reasonable people (exclude Howard here) to support a full scale shock and awe response upon Iran. Unless, one’s goal is complete destabilization of the M.E. uber alles, which is hard policy of PNAC, the Project for a New American Century ( worth a google if you’re not au fait with their members and objectives).
Or maybe you don’t think US Air Forces are going to whack Iran? If this is the case, I’d suggest a squizz at Scott Ritter’s “The US War With Iran Has Already Began”, June 20, 2005 in CommonDreams.org Ritter oozes credibility with his accurate prognostications up to and after the Iraq invasion and occupation by US military. What’s happening now is the sort of 100% bullshit that Colin Powell got up to at the UN when he sold his soul in 2003.
Furthur, Australian swing voters have have zero influence on American foreign policy.
A. The US foreign policy (sic) is not determined by Australian swinging voters.
B. The Left (sic), or perhaps the left, does not have a unified policy because it is not a homogenous group and it does not speak with one voice. Hence, it cannot have recommendations. I am continually being fingered as a “leftist” or even a “Leftist” whereas my position is clearly that of a Moderate assiduously working towards Slow and Steady Reform within the Bounds of the Law.
C. I myself am also very much a swing voter. For example:
1. Edward Kennedy Ellington
2. William Basie
3. Jimmie Lunceford
4. Fletcher Henderson
5. Arthur Shaw
PS: “Rails and flails” is a pejorative characterisation of what is often serious and reasoned argument. So much for value-neutral. “But seriously”? Don’t come the raw prawn, J_P_Z !!!
I believe the correct terminology is TEH LEFT.
“Amanda Vanstone has written a surprisingly good set of lyrics”
Steve I can only agree with your opinion on Amanda’s classic piece of work,the lyrics are deep and meaningful,and had I not known the well known bard Amanda had penned such beauty, I would have sworn the piece was written by none other than Bango Patterson himself.
It is rumoured that Elton John has cancelled his up and coming tour to Europe,and is on his way to Austalia to put the classic piece to music.Elton has advised Bernie Taupin to find another partner.
Sales of the final product is expected to exceed all expectations and enough copy’s should be available for every person in Australia.A special box set containg the song and Amanda’s memoirs will be mada available to Liberal Party members at the special cut rate of 17 cents, as against the normal 18 cents charged to other members of the public.
The product can be pre ordered through our normal outlets in Nigeria.
You’d think that after six years work, Mandy would have eventually realised that “far” and “stars” don’t rhyme and that “Under Southern Sun” neither scans or makes grammatical sense.
And who exactly are we a “Loyal Southern Friend” of?
And the second last line doesn’t bode well for our multi-billion dollar international tourism sector.
I’m with Howard here – a song about a suicidal livestock thief does just fine as our de facto national song. Either that or “Friday On My Mind”.
If Mandy gives you Vogon flashbacks in her poem or pulchritude then enable Flash in your browser and go to newbuffalo.net as an antidote.
Sir Henry C.: “I myself am also very much a swing voter. For example: 1. Edward Kennedy Ellington 2. William Basie…”
Bloody peers and royalists. Myself, being a good small-r republican, I may only pledge my vote to Lester Willis Young.
“the left does not have a unified policy because it is not a homogenous group and it does not speak with one voice.”
Yeah, true. But on the other hand…
“If you wanna end war and stuff, you gotta sing LOUD.”
–Arlo Guthrie, ‘Alice’s Restaurant Massacree’
j_p_z – it saddens me to see that you indicate it’s only the left that considers a US attack against Iran a very bad option. Why can’t you guys on the right ever make a good call and recognise that it’d only be another Bush/Cheney military disaster in the making? Why should this be a left-right issue? What does the average right-winger on the street, Stateside, see as the benefit to the world of unleashing the Westinghouse catalogue of horrors upon another oil producing country?
Is Iraq not enough evidence for the faith-based and the reality-makers?
I rather liked the four-part harmony version of this in Manning Clark: The Musical.
A Song of the Republic
Henry Lawson
1887
Sons of the South, awake! arise!
Sons of the South, and do.
Banish from under your bonny skies
Those old-world errors and wrongs and lies.
Making a hell in a Paradise
That belongs to your sons and you.
Sons of the South, make choice between
(Sons of the South, choose true),
The Land of Morn and the Land of E’en,
The Old Dead Tree and the Young Tree Green,
The Land that belongs to the lord and the Queen,
And the Land that belongs to you.
Sons of the South, your time will come –
Sons of the South, ’tis near –
The “Signs of the Times”, in their language dumb,
Fortell it, and ominous whispers hum
Like sullen sounds of a distant drum,
In the ominous atmosphere.
Sons of the South, aroused at last!
Sons of the South are few!
But your ranks grow longer and deeper fast,
And ye shall swell to an army vast,
And free from the wrongs of the North and Past
The land that belongs to you.
Poor old Henry. Good thing he never knew that 120 years later it still would not have come to pass.
Speaking of New Buffalo, as Zarquon was, everyone must go see her in March – click through to tours on the website!
http://newbuffalo.net/
i love your song Gummo.
Funniest thing i’ve read all day
wbb — Sorry, I guess I just wasn’t being very clear. I was speaking in broader conceptual terms, and since Enemy Combatant’s original comment was in part about Iran, I just used that as the thing that was ready to hand. Personally, I think any action against Iran would be quite mad; I don’t support it, I’d be enraged if it happened, and frankly I don’t personally know of anyone over here who would give it any sort of support. This doesn’t mean I don’t think Iran is an, er, problematic player in the region, but a large military action against Iran as things currently stand would be wholly unjustifiable, as well as just plain nuts. I don’t think it will happen, because Bush has discredited himself so spectacularly, I don’t know where he’d get support from. This has been an utterly catastrophic presidency, both for the world and for my own country. (A side problem is that Iran surely smells these things, and if they press for advantage too hard on that account, it could all become very very messy.) In general people I know are disgusted with Bush; but they also can’t find a Democrat to like.
So my broader point had to do with the anatomy of the catastrophe, in a way. Bush has been allowed to create such an unimaginable mess at least in part because of the lack of credible oversight and a competent opposition. I don’t mean to blame the Left for Bush (though I’d dearly love to blame the past 6 years on fucking Ralph Nader), but the fact is, the (broadly-speaking) left has failed at checking and balancing this nitwit at every opportunity til now. Part of the reason (not all) is that the margins have been so slim, and some critical swing populations do not like the smell of certain sectors of the left. BusHitler signs, giant puppet-heads, and facile dismissals of complex problems like Iran cause, let us say, perception problems for people who are not ideological hard-liners. I find it interesting, for instance, that you would identify me as being on the ‘right’; I’ve never thought of myself as a ‘rightist’, strictly speaking, in my life; I can’t recall the last time I voted GOP with a straight face; and so on. But certain aspects of the left as it’s currently constituted have pushed me away from them as well. If I vote Dem, it’s with a heavy heart. Now that the vast scale of Bush’s bungling becomes ever clearer, and it becomes near-impossible to put an alternate interpretation on things, the landscape is changing; but I don’t know if it’s changing enough.
Look at it this way. Considering the scale of disaster and disgrace the GOP has brought on this country and on others, I find it ludicrous that they can even continue to have ambitions to continue ruling. Why should anyone ever trust them, ever, again? Strictly on their record, they should be laughed out of town, and there should be landslide Dem victories in all categories for the next 50 years, to purge this stench. But this won’t happen; they will run a candidate in 08, and that candidate will be given perfectly serious consideration. All the Dems would have to do is put up a credible, coherent, plausible opposition structure and then point to the mess the GOP have made, and that should ensure victory. But instead it will be an actual fight, because they can’t manage something that simple.
Al Gore in 2000 had a fairly simple task: point to 8 years of extraordinary prosperity and success, and pull the rug from under a shifty, beady-eyed habitual loser who most people suspected was a Charlie McCarthy puppet for a horde of special interests. And he couldn’t do it.
I had a lot more examples but this is getting depressing, and anyway it’s too long. But hopefully you see my point.
Agreed. That election should never have come down to hanging chads in Florida and the Supreme Court. With that record against the puppet Gore should have had a lay down misere and won by a clear margin of five or six states. He couldn’t do it.
He’s loosened up amazingly over the last few years and is a much more expert and attractive media personality who could dismiss the “says he invented the internet” lie with a wink and a soundbite. A shame he wasn’t that in 2000.
j_p_z, appreciated your fuller exposition on Calamity Americana. Am in accord that Gore was a shoo-in without Ralph sucking his electoral oxygen and delivering us The Imbecile and his Outfit.
I’ll admit that I’m left-leaning to the extent that Im a moderate progressive within the bounds of the law, but don’t find the BusHitler bobbing heads nearly as offensive(yes, some will) as Rush Limbaugh mimicing Michael J.Fox’s Parkinson’s chorrea and saying that it was a MJ Fox stunt devised to get sympathy for a change in stem cell laws; or Ann Coulter in high dudgeon that the “9/11 widows” were a bunch of attention seeking phonies.
j_p_z you also write: “I don’t know where he’d get support from.”
About 28% of the polled populace at latest count, the MSM, and the MIC(Wall St. functionaries kow-towed when he visited the foor of the bourse last week). Bush doesn’t give a rats about popular support because he’s not up for re-election in 2008. Many GOP players had already distanced themselves before last November’s election.
The second aircraft carrier battle group has been deployed to the Persian Gulf. That’s a fait accompli. A known known. Bush is a Stratos dwelling Commander-In-Chief and a self proclaimed Decider in the war on an abstract noun. Dissent of any kind is dealt with by signing statements, eg, habeas corpus, unconstitutional spying (warrantless phone and email taps) and literally hundreds of others. Was a time when folk called behaiour like this tyranny.
Don’t get depressed, keep speaking out, maybe the bastard will be impeached. Plamegate is hotting up and the punters havn’t really started to take note yet. When they do, one would be unwise to have all one’s investment eggs in Stateside stocks or real estate. This is pure speculation on my part, but things could turn ugly very quickly.
Biggus Dickus is due to visit Sydney on Feb 22-27, and will meet with Howard and maybe Rudd, to talk about the US War of Terror. He should also meet with Turnbull, who after all is being groomed to be a future PM. Cheney and Turnbull can talk about Adelaide’s water problems and the drought affecting the Murray-Darling system. It seems Halliburton runs Adelaide’s water supply.
Halliburton are also involved in the planning of nucular waste dumps in South Australia.
It also built the infrastructure for the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne. I wonder if Halliburton plants trees around Melbourne to compensate for the increased greenhouse gas emissions they are responsible for.
http://www.yourdemocracy.net.au/drupal/node/3997
And while he is here in Australia, perhaps he can phone in his testimony to the Libby trial.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,461828,00.html
This is a very depressing story about pollution in China.It is difficult to impress on readers who live outside the country of the scale of the problem but this article makes a reasonable effort .
j_p_z – I wish that street marches were banned. For the reason you identify. They are a waste of time at best, but more often counter-productive. If you are going to go out on the street be prepared to go all the way (Romania, Prague). Otherwise stay at home.
However the power of entrenched interests in swaying public debate in the US is ignored in your anatomy of the US calamity. I realise that your knee violently jerks the other way every time you see a leftist knee-jerk, but you can’t let your aesthetic sensitivities blind you to realities like the power of corporatised media.
(Air Ranger Bush on the flight-deck is as gag inducing as BusHitler street theatre.)
wbb — actually, I think Bush in the flight-suit was vastly more offensive and ridiculous than any street theatre even Peter Schumann himself could concoct; it dangerously blurred a line between the military and the civilian. If we’d had a few laws concerning visual civic semiotics, it woulda been grounds for impeachment right there. Problem is, the war had already begun when he did that. The vastly disappointing and (at the time) unconvincing anti-war movement that had tried to stop it from happening, had already crashed and burned prior to.
Blind to corporate media? Nah, I just figured you guys already had that one internalized.
But really, Bushitler signs are the least of the problem; that’s just a more fun word to say. There’s been a basic failure of integrity and clarity that is the rot at the root.
For example, during the first Gulf War, the cry went up from the left all over the planet: “No blood for oil!” Were they shouting it in front of the Iraqi Embassy, since Iraq in invading Kuwait had quite literally initiated an actual “blood-for-oil” gambit? No; curiously, they were shouting at the US, like they always do, no matter *what* happens. So, when they cried “No blood for oil!” once again in 2003, who do you think listened to them besides the riot cops? Hey, I think Guantanamo is a bloody scandal, too, but when somebody likens it to the Gulags, I’m afraid I stop taking them seriously — which of course doesn’t help matters, either.
I watched Reagan and Thatcher being vilified throughout the 80s in every conceivable way, in the crudest, most ridiculous, most stupefyingly pompous terms, by the allegedly smartest people as well as the mob. Then, when their great project came to fruition in 89-91, the left admitted none of its own rather substantive errors; it grudgingly muttered something about how Gorby was a great guy, and went back to reading Adorno. Then they wonder why they can’t get Dukakis elected, or Kerry. Waiter! Check, please!
My problem is, the way things stand, I can’t bring myself to walk on either side of the street, so I’m stuck walking out in the middle of the road. Eh, screw it, I’ll probably just get run over by a bus.
Disappointing? Unconvincing? You thought it was an epsiode of American Idol?
Sorry if the banners weren’t literary enough for you. You are a highly sensitive soul to be so easily put off an issue just because the language and style offends your refined ear.
650K dead Iraqis down the track – you want to reconsider your judgement that the anti-war protest was unconvincing? Or you gonna stick with your original assessment that it lacked the necessary panache to win an opening night crowd?
William woz wrong. Not all the world’s a stage. There are at least a couple of spectators, here and there, apparently.
wbb,
Well that was a pretty serious remark, so I promise I won’t be flippant in reply.
I think you’ve confused the capacities of a spectator and, say, a juror. Not that I had an actual direct say in the decisions or the outcome regardless. But some of us were really trying to figure out where the truth might be; we were trying to act as l’homme moyen sensuel; we were trying to see if we could be honestly convinced (there’s that word!) about the good or ill of the thing, one way or another. Recall, if you will, that back in 2003, no one knew what the future would bring, rational predictions notwithstanding. I do not believe that America is always right; but I lack the special advantage of some, of knowing that America is always wrong.
At the time, personally, I opposed the war for two very simple reasons, neither very sophisticated, convincing or otherwise:
1) war is always a grievous undertaking, frequently wicked, which ought not to be undertaken except for the very best of reasons. Bush’s reasons, even if they were all true, weren’t good enough. He couldn’t even convince the French; God, I expect, is a tougher audience.
2) the damage to Iraq aside, the diplomatic recklessness with which Bush was proceeding would I thought cause greater long-term damage to the US than the ‘defense’ aspect would be a benefit, even assuming it was true.
At the same time, because of my very limited perspective, I frequently played the devil’s advocate among anti-war people, trying to probe their own arguments for their value. Although I was against the war for what might be called primitive or categorical reasons, I have to say that I also found a lot of the specific anti-war rhetoric that I encountered, as I say, stretching and unconvincing.
But who cares what I thought? Certainly neither Bush nor Saddam; maybe God might. What mattered in the impersonal, was whether an overall consensus against the war could bring to bear sufficient pressure to make Bush back off. This was lacking, sadly lacking. But then one can’t quite blame the protesters because Bush seems to be a leader immune to outside views. My comments in this whole regard are presciptive for the future, not vengeful over the past.
Still, try to see the question without benefit of hindsight, and from the standpoint of the undecided:
On one side was a group that had been in general right about many of the pressing geopolitical issues of the past decades; they produced photos of real dead gassed Kurdish bodies, a real giant smoking pit in lower Manhattan, and what they claimed, (but which couldn’t be known by non-experts) was evidence of real nefarious undertakings.
On the other side was a group that had been substantially wrong about many pressing issues and which had shown bad faith in the past, in my opinion; this group produced photos of George Bush with a Hitler mustache scribbled on his face.
Who would you tend to believe, if your mind hadn’t been already made up?
My own tendency was to think (perhaps wrongly) that nobody would deliberately lie about something this large and grievous; and that a guy like Colin Powell knew more about what satellite photos mean than I do. As I say, I still didn’t think that was enough to justify an un-provoked war; but nobody voted for me. And while I argued against it when I could, for rather primitive reasons, there remained in my mind enough issues far beyond my ability to know, that I did not participate in large-scale activities against it, because I didn’t think I could join in good faith with groups of very angry people whose views struck me as (I’m being diplomatic here) not superior.
Which goes to my point about integrity (on both sides). If the anti-war factions had mustered greater reserves of principled leadership, in Congress and on the street, more unresolved people would have gone over to them. Similarly, if the US had behaved post-invasion with unassailable integrity and good faith, the war might have been over swiftly and with far less wreckage and loss. Maybe not, but there was that chance. This is not to equate the two: having gone forward with a rash decision, Bush’s people had a far greater obligation to have integrity, than the protesters did.
As I say, I’m writing to the future, not the past.
It would be silly of me to desire your good opinion if it just wasn’t earned; but all the same, I’d like to hope that you don’t believe I’m a crazy person. Maybe this will go a bit of a ways in that direction.
Fair enough, j_p_z. My objections to the war were the same as yours. What you have described as the primitive reasons. These are still for me the prime reasons the war was wrong. Sadly those reasons were hardly even considered in all the kerfuffle about WMD, UN resolutions and 911 fit-ups.
So you are not crazy. Not unless I am as well. Which I might be – being up this late. Better go – leave u with Nabs – who’s bound to be firing up the PC about now.
Great news everybody! Ted Haggard is cured of Teh Gay! http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070206/ap_on_re_us/haggard_sex_allegations;_ylt=AlSXSg6QYV6lhp_6_XLJJqus0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3OTB1amhuBHNlYwNtdHM
Praise Jeebus!
Or not, say Iraq Body Count.
A new study has been released by the Lancet medical journal estimating over 650,000 excess deaths in Iraq. The Iraqi mortality estimates published in the Lancet in October 2006 imply, among other things, that:
Possibly right, possibly wrong, but some argument about the points they raise would be valuable.
IBC is against the war, BTW.
OK David, you give me a figure you’d prefer quoted when discussing the consequences of blithely going to war without just cause.
J_p_z I am inclined to think that this is something of a false dichotomy, although it is an understandable one given how vocal the hyperbole-prone and anti-American fringe elements of opposition to the Iraq war are and were.
The sensible critics of the Bush Administrations actions in Iraq based their critique either on the illegality of the war or the realist notion that such an ambitious, region-changing scheme was extremely unlikely to suceed and bound to produce massive unintended consequences.
It is this last critique that those who supported the war appear to have a big problem dealing with.
Thank you Chris.
“It is this last critique that those who supported the war appear to have a big problem dealing with.”
I for one opposed the war in a general way (on the “simplistic” grounds j_p_z outlined) but also because it seemed clear to me that in this particular case it would go to hell in a handbasket. And that no faith should be placed in the long-term strategic geo-politics of this particular group of leaders.
I don’t have a figure. I pointed out that the Iraq Body Count, who oppose the war, claim they have identified some major flaws in the 655 000 death figure that has been widely quoted after being published in the Lancet.
FWIW, IBC has confirmed a maximum of 61 369 deaths as of now, and the head, John Sloboda, has stated that he believes the actual death figure is probably twice that.
I think it would be good to discuss whether the potential flaws identified by IBC are in fact important. If they are important, that would mean it would be useful to stop using the ‘received wisdom’ figure of 655 000 excess deaths, and to question how and why certain assertions are uncritically taken up by both sides of the debate.
As an example from the other side of the fence, it continues to astonish me that right-wing supporters of the war continue to claim that WMDs were really the issue.
Well for my money the flaws lay pretty much with the Iraqi Body Count which relies on
There you have it in a nutshell. I’d place more reliability in the analysis of a peer reviewed publication like the Lancet.
And what about the five points that IBC raise, that I have quoted above?
The strength or weakness of those points neither stands nor falls on peer review.
Please don’t start a discussion of the Lancet study on this thread. These debates tend to be the most annoying and tedious I’ve ever read on the blogosphere. The issues have been thoroughly thrashed out. It’s unproductive to do it all over again as I’m sure exactly the same arguments will be made on both sides.
I agree Mark. I’m leaving it.
If David wants an argument, I’m sure Tim Lambert would oblige
Good news everybody! Socialism lives!
I must say that I’ve been a bit disappointed at the lack of comment on LP (Bourgeois Left), Leftwrites (Revolutionary Somethingorotherhatethepolicebuyjeffsparrowsbook) http://www.leftwrites.net/ and Lastsuperpower (Theonlyrealgenuineleftandalltherestofyouareapackofcounterrevolutionaryfascistcuntysoftcockswhodeservedtobehauledbeforearevolutionarypeoplestribunalandshot) about the great Venezuelan Project. http://www.lastsuperpower.net/docs/alcultrevdef
Well in case nobody has heard, president Hugo Chavez has just been appointed dictator. The Venezuelan National Assembly approved an enabling act granting Chávez the power to rule by decree for 18 months. According to Green Left Weekly’s twisted logic:
http://www.greenleft.org.au/2007/697/36215
So in case no one gets it, the future of the ’socialist project’ is more dictatorship.
Talk about your false gods. Absolutely pathetic.
Oh Mark. Those supposedly clever long word strings don’t come up so good, do they? Edit as necessary.
Kinda like it as it is!
But Comrade Keeler, your analysis omits the central fact that Venezuela is a swamp that must be drained! The false deviationist and splittist Chavez (trying to deceive the working class through having a hispanic name like Che!) fails to understand the true and historically materialistically confirmed mission of TEH LAST SUPERPOWER! When Halliburton take over the re-education contracts, he’ll be first up against the wall!
Listen mate, having just read Beevor’s Teh Battle For Spain I can pick your lot a mile off. Typical Trotskyite-Fascist-Fifth-Coulmnist-Counterrevolutionary-Treasonous-Activities.
You can try and pass this off as a trifling difference of opinion, but we all know you’re in league with various class enemies. Your demand for ‘proof’ is a ridiculous bourgeois concept.
Free Hicks.
Oh. And you’re under arrest.
And I bet you were shooting at the brave sailors on the Battleship Potemkin too, Comrade!
Eleven in the ay emm: time for a cold can and a break from work, comblogriotas. Anticipating tomorrow’s Saturday Salon, here’s the most exceedingly awesome photography I’ve had a look at in ages, and I find myself righteously displeased that it’s been around so long and I’ve never seen it before. Brisbanians might find the photographer’s old work interesting. Anyway, look up your city, and have a look at it from the underside.
http://sleepycity.net/index.php