Why, he's "a former senior adviser to Prime Minister Julia Gillard and premiers Steve Bracks and John Brumby"
Saturday, May 25, 2013
First-person plural possessive
COULD it be that there is still someone inside Fairfax with a little wit and a sense of puckish mischief? Here's the headline on Nicholas Reece's opinion piece in today's Age:
And who is Nicholas Reece, you may wonder?
Why, he's "a former senior adviser to Prime Minister Julia Gillard and premiers Steve Bracks and John Brumby"
Why, he's "a former senior adviser to Prime Minister Julia Gillard and premiers Steve Bracks and John Brumby"
Coming soon, the AFL's Wog Round
THIS weekend is the AFL's Indigenous Round, which will have to suffice until Andrew Demetriou can get the Gay Round off the ground. If precedent is observed, spectators will then be treated to all-male Rockettes in bottom-less chaps doing high kicks without benefit of a Sherrin, love of musicals being a revered tradition amongst same-sexers. If the goal umpires were to dress as Judy Garland and the umpires in nuns' habits, another proud tradition, that would be just perfection and a treat for all.
And after that, why not a Greek Round?
This would need to feature Demetriou in a multi-pleated, little white kilt and whatever bowyangs are called in Greek. The AFL boss has an Hellenic name, so surely that defines him -- and all anyone will ever need to know about him.
Demetriou would be up for it, of course. Why should he be any different from the black players the AFL is so keen to perform native dances and chant authentically made-up "indigenous" war cries?
And after that, why not a Greek Round?
This would need to feature Demetriou in a multi-pleated, little white kilt and whatever bowyangs are called in Greek. The AFL boss has an Hellenic name, so surely that defines him -- and all anyone will ever need to know about him.
Demetriou would be up for it, of course. Why should he be any different from the black players the AFL is so keen to perform native dances and chant authentically made-up "indigenous" war cries?
There used to be an England
These are the new rules, if we want to live by them:
Goat-bothering mullahs can fill acolytes' skulls with such poison that they go out and lop the heads of strangers and nothing happens to them.
A couple of kids write on the Facebook pages that they're not too keen on all this mayhem and the Muslims behind it and they spend the night in jail.
Goat-bothering mullahs can fill acolytes' skulls with such poison that they go out and lop the heads of strangers and nothing happens to them.
A couple of kids write on the Facebook pages that they're not too keen on all this mayhem and the Muslims behind it and they spend the night in jail.
The last of his tribe
THERE has long been doubt that Rupert Murdoch is an Aborigine. Sure, he looks
like one, if we are to go by the members of the Litjus-Mordie tribe, as does
everyone else these days. Anyway, all doubts are now settled and we can be sure he is an Aborigine,
albeit a naughty one.
How do we know? Because Martin Flanagan in The Age, a paper
once prominent in Melbourne, has written a column about him, and Martin only
ever writes about Aborigines and their wonderful, magical powers to kick
footballs while the Rainbow Serpent does the umpiring and the power of Country
pulses upward through their boot stops. Actually, that’s not right. Sometimes
he writes about his dog, but it is very easy to get confused about the subject
matter because the tone of indulgent condescension is very much of a piece.
Actually, that bit about the dog is also wrong, because if
Bowser gets crook, off to the vet! When an Aboriginal player
(no need to mention names) was newly arrived at a certain Melbourne club and inspiring Flanagan to cascades of gushing superlatives, the
fawning and expressions of admiration for the recruit's tribal initiation scars were
non-stop. How authentic! Surely he must know better than any how to snap a
goal, that being one of those Indigenous
instincts, akin to possums finding your rose bushes in the dark. That nonsense
stopped only when the club doctor took a closer look, diagnosed ringworm and
ordered up an immediate course of treatment.
Patronising wankery is the sort of stuff Flanagan serves up week after week,
habitually asserting in The Age, where farce and fact are interchangeable, that Aborigines
not only inspired the invention of football but play it better because they are masters
of time, space and place, whatever that means. They also make better TV
shows because, well, being Indigenous means the panelists cut straight to the
team line-ups, as Flanagan seems to think only a blackfella can.
But you knew Murdoch was prepared to walk through fire when he responded to the campaign to get rid of page 3 girls by thundering: ''Is anyone complaining about Page 3 pix a reader? Enough of this elitist nonsense!''
Many of the responses were predictably earnest. Then up popped Nad-I-Am: ''Rupes, I need to know the size of your testicles before I can engage with you. Come on, mate. 20p for a shot of your balls.''
Nad-I-Am is Nadia Kamil, an Iraqi-Welsh comic, and, as we say in sport, she had come to play. She bombarded Murdoch with demands that, as a man of conviction, he put his privates on the line:
''come on, a photo of your bollocks. All shaved & nicely lit. With a speech bubble next to them with some facile news. 20p.'' When Murdoch ignored her, she upped her demands - ''I WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOUR BALLS THINK ABOUT POLITICS'' - finally offering to settle for a similar photo of one of his sons.
All of which, in my opinion, is fair and reasonable comment on Murdoch's tweet….
All of which, in any sane person’s opinion, is a fair and reasonable indication that Fairfax, like Bennelong’s people, will go to its grave without ever quite appreciating the reality that has invaded its cosy, isolated little world of dreamings.
UPDATE: Spoke to soon. A further flick through the Age website reveals that Flanagan has published a second column, as always ooh-ing and awe-ing about the race-based wonderfulness of Indigenous players. Today, he thinks it a fine thing for Adam Goodes, a superb player and thoroughly modern man, to be leaping about as part of some ersatz, concocted-yesterday approximation of Indigenous tradition.
Goodes was the subject of a racial taunt while helping the Swans cream Collingwood last night. That was nasty, but being recruited to make an exhibition of himself for the amusement of the world's Flanagans is the greater insult. He had just better hope all the white architects of the Indigenous Round don't try for even greater authenticity by encouraging sub-incision.
Thursday, May 23, 2013
Nymphs of the green
It is far too fine a day to waste at the keyboard. Off to the golf course, where Doctor Yowie is waiting, in the hope that Suzann Pettersen is setting fashion trends for young and firm associates.
Mind you, the Professor's poor putting of late really doesn't need any further distractions.
Back later, when backlogged comments will be posted.
Mind you, the Professor's poor putting of late really doesn't need any further distractions.
Back later, when backlogged comments will be posted.
Goodbye, Ford. Now scrap the ADRs
Despite Canberra's largesse, the Ford Motor Company is apparently about to announce an end to manufacturing in Geelong and Broadmeadows (not yet confirmed). That it lasted this long is the wonder, not that it is ending. How many other nations of 23 million souls can support two manufacturers, plus local assemblers? Not many, as Sweden's Saab recently demonstrated by falling over and expiring. (This was poetic justice, by the way. No company that builds its engines in reverse, with the exhaust manifold at the front of the block and directly behind the radiator, deserves to survive. But back to Ford.)
The question now is just what this government and its successor might suggest to "save" the car industry. More money, no doubt, as what is another $100 million or so to keep Paul Howes' dues-payers at their posts. An Abbott government might even choose to take the same route, especially if September sees it takes the seat of Corrangamite, where many Ford workers reside.
Let us hope someone who likes cars has the ear of PM Abbott, because this would be a splendid opportunity to re-work the industry for the general good, especially for the benefit of those who actually like motoring and cars. In addition to subsidies, Ford and GMH have been protected from competition by the army of bureaucrats which spenda its flexi-ytimed days working, re-working and forever expanding the Australian Design Rules. Import an interesting vehicle from overseas and, before you can give it the stick, expect to jump through hoops in order to bring sun-visor specifications up to government-mandated snuff. Yes, there are public servants who do nothing but regulate the shape and anchoring of sun visors.
If the industry dies, the ADRs should be buried with it, opening the way for an after-market auto industry. Many jobs would vanish, but so would subsidies -- and whatever remains and is rebuilt might actually be able to pay its own way.
And we could just see fine vehicles like this on our nation's roads.
Zero to 60mph in 4.6 seconds, with a top speed of 130mph -- and not an ADR-specified sun visor to be seen.
* apologies for using that horrible and debased word.
The question now is just what this government and its successor might suggest to "save" the car industry. More money, no doubt, as what is another $100 million or so to keep Paul Howes' dues-payers at their posts. An Abbott government might even choose to take the same route, especially if September sees it takes the seat of Corrangamite, where many Ford workers reside.
Let us hope someone who likes cars has the ear of PM Abbott, because this would be a splendid opportunity to re-work the industry for the general good, especially for the benefit of those who actually like motoring and cars. In addition to subsidies, Ford and GMH have been protected from competition by the army of bureaucrats which spenda its flexi-ytimed days working, re-working and forever expanding the Australian Design Rules. Import an interesting vehicle from overseas and, before you can give it the stick, expect to jump through hoops in order to bring sun-visor specifications up to government-mandated snuff. Yes, there are public servants who do nothing but regulate the shape and anchoring of sun visors.
If the industry dies, the ADRs should be buried with it, opening the way for an after-market auto industry. Many jobs would vanish, but so would subsidies -- and whatever remains and is rebuilt might actually be able to pay its own way.
And we could just see fine vehicles like this on our nation's roads.
* apologies for using that horrible and debased word.
The Southbank Quisling
DOWN here in Melbourne, Jon Faine has just taken to the air on Their ABC, starting his programme with reference to the "inexplicably horrible" murder of a London soldier.
No mention of attackers' religion so far.....
....Now he has a Pommy accented reporterette, Barbara Miller, filling him in on the latest details....
Still nothing on the animals' creed....
...Faine wants to know what these ambulatory arguments for capital punishment meant by "our country"....
....reporterette is puzzled, alluding to "much speculation" about their nation of origin... Golly gosh, they're both stumped, absolutely baffled. Two media geniuses, and neither will announce the obvious: the killers were referring to, you know, Muslim lands....
Miller has toddled off after the conversation's first reference to the Prophet's disciples. It wasn't the London murderers, however, but an utterance freighted with foreboding of what prejudice and devilry the English Defence League might perpetrate in London's "Islamic areas".
"Whether or not it falls within the definition of terrorism is beside the point," Faine opines of the soldier's slaying ...
... Now it is a tame Melbourne Muslim who is ushered to the microphone. Much concern about what the attack will do to spoil the public image of Islam. There will be much beard-wagging in the mosques tonight as the faithful contemplate how best to endure the unenlightened view that Muslims are more likely to kill without reason than adherents of other faiths.....
First caller, Fred from Williamstown, wonders why anyone should be surprised... "We've been bombing the crap out of them for years" ... goes on to mention that Americans dropped "2000-pound bombs" on "crowded restaurants" in an attempt to kill Saddam's sons.
Next caller, from Altona, explains that English-accented Muslims killing English soldiers on London Streets is entirely predictable because "we" inflict terrorism on them and no lists of those killed by the West's bombers are ever published.....
.... finally, a female caller urges listeners to read the Koran and absorb the obvious truth that Islam is a violent creed....
Faine keeps interrupting, observing that "the Bible is full of violent passages too" and that there is something unsettling about all religions' texts.
By later today, Faine et al will have settled on their narrative: Once again, as always, the real perpetrators will be the victims.
UPDATE: Faine once again quoting Fred from Williamstown, "If we continue dropping bombs we can expect some blowback," he says, before moving on to the next topic.
No mention of attackers' religion so far.....
....Now he has a Pommy accented reporterette, Barbara Miller, filling him in on the latest details....
Still nothing on the animals' creed....
...Faine wants to know what these ambulatory arguments for capital punishment meant by "our country"....
....reporterette is puzzled, alluding to "much speculation" about their nation of origin... Golly gosh, they're both stumped, absolutely baffled. Two media geniuses, and neither will announce the obvious: the killers were referring to, you know, Muslim lands....
Miller has toddled off after the conversation's first reference to the Prophet's disciples. It wasn't the London murderers, however, but an utterance freighted with foreboding of what prejudice and devilry the English Defence League might perpetrate in London's "Islamic areas".
"Whether or not it falls within the definition of terrorism is beside the point," Faine opines of the soldier's slaying ...
... Now it is a tame Melbourne Muslim who is ushered to the microphone. Much concern about what the attack will do to spoil the public image of Islam. There will be much beard-wagging in the mosques tonight as the faithful contemplate how best to endure the unenlightened view that Muslims are more likely to kill without reason than adherents of other faiths.....
First caller, Fred from Williamstown, wonders why anyone should be surprised... "We've been bombing the crap out of them for years" ... goes on to mention that Americans dropped "2000-pound bombs" on "crowded restaurants" in an attempt to kill Saddam's sons.
Next caller, from Altona, explains that English-accented Muslims killing English soldiers on London Streets is entirely predictable because "we" inflict terrorism on them and no lists of those killed by the West's bombers are ever published.....
.... finally, a female caller urges listeners to read the Koran and absorb the obvious truth that Islam is a violent creed....
Faine keeps interrupting, observing that "the Bible is full of violent passages too" and that there is something unsettling about all religions' texts.
By later today, Faine et al will have settled on their narrative: Once again, as always, the real perpetrators will be the victims.
UPDATE: Faine once again quoting Fred from Williamstown, "If we continue dropping bombs we can expect some blowback," he says, before moving on to the next topic.
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