The Fillet Skillet: News and politics

The Aftermarth and What Do I Mean By Liberal?

Wed, 28 Nov 2007 07:55:36 GMT

Excuse me? Can anyone tell me what happened to the oh-so-stable Liberal/National Coalition? Just a week ago they were telling us they were the ones to trust because they were so stable but now look what's happened!

People are resigning and retiring all over the place. I with Peter Costello just took the job of Leader of the Opposition. Then the only problem would be who would lead the Nationals. I'll tell you what, the Coalition had better sort themselves out soon or we'll be back to having a country with no credible opposition. I just went through almost 11 years of that. I don't want to go through it again even if it is Labor who's in power this time.

Also, who won the senate? Did we figure that out yet?

*researches*

Ohhh. Interesting. The Greens now have 5 Seats. Bob Brown will be pleased. It looks like neither Labor nor the Liberals can control the Senate on their own. It looks like it's up to the Greens (and to a lesser extent the lone Family First senator and the lone independent) to tell the Government what to do. This has the potential to be messy, but it means that the Senate will actually perform its function this time around - a house of review - rather than just being a great big Liberal Party rubber stamp.

Also it's occurred to me that there may be some confusion as to what I mean by Liberal. I understand that in America this term refers to someone from the left of the political spectrum. In Australia it's the name of the not-quite-as-right-wing-as-the-Republicans-but-almost party. It's like in this sentence "The Vietnamese government is becoming increasingly liberal in it's economic policy." It means Vietnam is moving from a left-wing, communist style economy to an open(er) free-market, less government control model (which is a right-wing ideology). That is what Liberal means in Australia. (Alright Hendi, now tell me I'm wrong).

Sorry about this post. Next time I won't talk about politics. I promise. I'm going to Melbourne next weekend, so maybe I'll be able to talk about that.

Rudd In, Howard Out

Sun, 25 Nov 2007 06:47:09 GMT

Australia is set to begin importing barrels of ear-wax harvested from little Cantonese speaking children in China after Labor trounced the Coalition in the Federal election held yesterday. The new Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd is reported to be very pleased. In his first prime ministerial press conference Mr Rudd said he was "very straight up and down" about things and encouraged all Australians to be the same, whatever that means.

At the previous Australian federal election with Mark Latham at the helm, Labor lost in a big way - 27 seats behind the Liberal/National Coalition. This time around it looks like Labor will be the proud owner of 86 seats (give or take a few, counting in some seats is not yet over) out of our 150 seat parliament. The Coalition looks to hold 62 seats (and two seats are held by independents).

When looking at the election, I was most interested in three seats. I'll explain each one.

Solomon

The seat of Darwin/Palmerston usually goes to the party that will go on to win the election. It was also considered by the Labor Party to be one of the 16 seats they needed to gain in order to form government. It also doesn't hurt that it is the electorate I currently reside in (and voted in). Even though counting hasn't finished yet, it looks like Labor will pick up this seat, continuing Darwin's record of electing to Solomon who Australia elects to run the nation.

McPherson

It looks like my long-running grudge against the Liberal member for McPherson will continue. Margaret May (or more accurately, the plebs who work for her) refused to give me an important interview when I was doing a journalism assignment for uni so I resolved never to vote for her. As it turns out I never got the opportunity to not vote for her because the Northern Territory government got on my case about enrolling to vote as a Territorian, rather than me sticking with my old address. The irony is that after voting in the seat of Solomon, I'm going to up and leave for McPherson in a month's time anyway. Technically (although not legally) it would have been better and more accurate for me to have voted as a resident of McPherson, because I'll actually be spending the next three years living here. Margaret has held onto the seat of McPherson.

Bennelong

The (now ex-)Prime Minister's seat. The thing is the Prime Minister and the leader of the opposition need to get voted in the same, plain old way every other minister does. If they don't win their seat, they can't sit in parliament. After a redrafting of the electorates, Bennelong went from being a Liberal Party safehouse to suddenly becoming a marginal seat. John chose to stay in Bennelong rather than move to a safer seat which indicates to me that he was actually in the mood to retire sooner rather than later. Bennelong was also considered one of the 16 seats Labor needed to win to form government. John Howard lost the seat of Bennelong to former ABC TV presenter Maxine Mckew - but it was a close one. John Howard is only the second Australian Prime Minister ever to get voted out of his own electorate.

On the topic of Liberal Leadership, Peter Costello has - surprisingly - turned down the job! I'm gobsmacked to say the least, because Peter was always the one who was saying things about wanting to take over from John. Now it looks like Malcolm Turnbull wants to lead. Who would have guessed?!

So Australia went with Labor for the first time in 11 years. I can only just remember when John Howard became Prime Minister back in the day, and I cannot remember when Paul Keating took over from whoever it was who had the job before him. I'm totally unused to seeing a different face associated with the words "Prime Minister" so this whole 'Liberal Party not running the country' thing is a wee bit strange to me. Think of that, 11 years of conservative government at an end. I suppose now my biggest message to Labor is this:

"WHATEVER YOU DO, DO NOT SCREW THIS UP"

I'm technically a swinging voter, so I'll have no qualms stabbing you in the back and supporting whoever it is who ends up with Liberal leadership. If everything my Liberal supporting friends are predicting is comes true I'll do it you know.

Election. Finally.

Mon, 15 Oct 2007 05:53:17 GMT

The population of Australia breathed a huge sigh of relief yesterday as Prime Minister John Howard finally called the date for the upcoming Federal election - November the 24th.

He also put up this video on the Liberal Party '07 channel directly addressing the people on YouTube about the election, which was nice of him. Too bad it's so bloodly difficult to find. I had to actually go to the Australian Liberal Party website and find a link from there. The Liberal Party is doing a really poor job of making themselves visible on YouTube. They just get buried way under all the other videos about the Liberal Party. Most of those are negative.

Meanwhile, the Australian Labor Party was the number 1 most viewed sponsor of YouTube today, and a simple search for "Australian Labor Party" in YouTube channel search brings up their Australian Labor channel. However, Australian Labor hasn't posted a new video there for two months. In light of the election being called, I think Kevin needs to spend a bit more time putting videos there. I was going to post Labor's response to the Liberal's video here, but they just haven't made one.

Edit: Whoops! I was looking at their favourites box, which is more noticeable and not at their videos. Also, their videos are not set to reverse chronological order so their most recent one is at the top. They've really got to fix that. It's a press conference and doesn't directly address YouTube like Howard does. It's also less punchy than Howard's video. Here it is:

How did I find out about the election in the first place? A MySpace bulletin. Naturally.

Election Calculator

Wed, 26 Sep 2007 06:14:50 GMT

According to the ABC's Election Calculator we need a 3% swing nation wide towards Labor for a hung parliament (how messy) or a 4.2% swing for Labor to win outright.

In my own seat of Solomon, a swing of 2.9% is needed to turf out the Country Liberal Party (which is the Northern Territory branch of the regular Liberal Party). It is also (apparently) one of the key 16 seats Labor needs to win in order to form government. It looks like it won't happen though, because opinion polls have been showing a further 2.7% swing towards the CLP, making the hypothetical outcome for this seat a CLP margin of 5.5%.

We'll see how it goes when the election is finally called.

When are you going to do that, John? Soon, please, I think my readers are getting tired of me talking about the election all the time.

Apec Capers et al

Thu, 13 Sep 2007 02:45:50 GMT

Those Chaser's boys have done it again. The ABC rated the highest of any show last night when The Chaser's War on Everything aired featuring their infiltration into the Apec security zone in a fake motorcade, including Chas, dressed as Osama bin Laden. The entire group (consisting of drivers, cameramen and the entire Chaser's cast - about a dozen people) made it all the way to U.S. President Bush's hotel before they were actually arrested. In fact, I heard that it was only once they had turned around to leave that they were stopped.

They did it even though (according to the NSW police commissioner) there was a high chance of them getting shot.

Didn't see it? Don't despair. The ABC is good enough to provide the show for download, because that's what public broadcasting is all about.

Also, John Howard is retiring if he gets re-elected. It looks like my crystal ball was accurate after all.

(P.S. I know politics bores most of you, so I'll try and get something up about me soon - because we all know I'm so much more interesting)

News Bites Sometimes

Thu, 06 Sep 2007 03:24:06 GMT

So the Australian media is going ga-ga over President Bush's arrival for Apec, New York cabbies have brought the city to a standstill by going on strike and Apple had just overhauled it's entire iPod line including introducing the iPod Touch.

But petrol prices in Darwin jumped 15 cents per litre overnight. It cost me an extra ten bucks to fill up my car because I didn't do it two days ago. Where's the news report about that?

Linking to Newspaper Websites Does Not Make A Revolution!

Thu, 30 Aug 2007 04:16:41 GMT

toothpastefordinner.com

Some artist made Osama turn into Jesus! No way!

This calls for a moral panic. Today Tonight? A Current Affair? Where are you? You should be all over this. This is like your bread and butter.

Well I'm sure not going to do it, because I've always thought that Jesus kinda looked like Osama anyway, and not like that German hair model they've got walking around in the Jesus movie.

Oh wait, the Prime Minister and the Opposition Leader have already jumped in on the act. They're almost as good as A Current Affair at causing moral panics, so I suppose they'll do.

In other news, the UK Conservative Party wants to limit what kids can look at on the internet!

Ok, let me get this straight... they want to stop kids on YouTube... kids make up the majority of YouTube's clientèle... YouTube doesn't make enough money for Google as it is... the UK Conservatives hate YouTube!

Still, I can see some benefits in this. You won't be getting quite so many "rofl lols" people online (I'm making the broad assumption that these people are under 18).

I would, however, miss users such as whataboutadam, charlieissocoollike, and apehodet, all of whom are under the age of 18. So you could say that I'm not such a fan of the UK Conservatives new internet policy, if in fact that is what these mysterious "floated ideas" amount to.

The internet is a free, more-or-less unregulated space. I would like to see it kept that way.

UPDATE!

I only just found the article about Bush turning Aussies off the US.

What else can I say but "Duh!"

I think the real reason why Australians are so anti-US/anti-Bush is the perceived spinelessness of our own government. From what I recall of the invasion of Iraq, there was no discussion about whether or not Australia would be involved. If John's friend George was going, then Australia didn't want to miss out. We still feel like the puppets of the US government.

If we hadn't gone I think we would still think Bush was a silly idiot for invading Iraq, but we would be a bit more unconcerned considering we wouldn't be involved.

Washington probably would have made a few nasty comments about us at the time, though, saying we weren't committed to the war on terror et cetera. Barrack Obama had a similar point of view earlier this year.

Kevin Rudd - Secret Partygoer

Tue, 21 Aug 2007 06:49:57 GMT

I know, I'm a sloth-blog. So sue me I'm busy.

So our dear Kev got into some rather scandalous trouble back in '03 eh? Or did he?

Good grief, this mystery is more twisty than Tony, Pete, Linda and Bronson - without my pants. Somebody lied, but we just don't know who. Who's making this stuff up? Which is the made-up stuff? What? Why? Where? Strip club?

All we know for sure is that Kevin was well and truly blotto, because he can't remember what happened that night. I thought it was interesting he came right out and said it, rather than scooting the issue, even though it meant he couldn't deny that he had been forcibly ejected from the nightclub/strip club for bad behaviour.

Except now the owner says he wasn't ejected, and that Kevin actually asked the other Labor people to leave.

Except the other Labor people didn't say this when the allegations first came up - and lets face it, if they had it would have saved their leader a lot of trouble.

I can't say I'm happy that he did it - whatever 'it' was, but on the balance of things I don't think it will change my vote. I think it's fairly obvious that Kevin is a fairly upstanding guy, so unless it comes out that he seems to be frequenting strip clubs all the time, I won't hold it against him that he did something wrong three years ago. Particularly considering it wasn't on par with the AWB wheat scandal or anything. It wasn't a political wrongdoing.

And it seems that after some haughty laughter on the part of news-aware Australians, there has been no public outcry over this. To be honest, if there was, I would be lead to think that it was a slow news week or something, or that the media just need to get over themselves. This isn't some earth-shattering event, it just shows that the new golden child of Australian politics wasn't all that golden after all.

Sort of. I think.

Um... what? Who said...?

Ugh. Screw this. I think I'm going to turn off the telly and live in a hole with just a bed and an internet connection. They're so much more sensible on here. Like, really.

I think I need a lie down.

Fillet

Politics on the Internet

Wed, 25 Jul 2007 02:16:35 GMT

(This was a 'P.S' from the previous entry, but it just grew and grew...)

I posted the following comment to Kevin Rudd (aspiring Prime Minister of Australia) on Myspace. Seeing as he requires all comments to be approved before they are posted, I'm very interested to see what will happen. Here's what I wrote:

I heard that you speak fluent Cantonese. I also heard you can juggle. I also heard you can do a really mean impersonation of Freddy Mercury.

BUT THE QUESTION REMAINS! Can you impersonate Freddy Mercury in Cantonese while juggling?!?

Please post a video of this as soon as possible to your MySpace.

Thankyou.

If he actually did it I would be a Labor supporter for life, just for that one thing. Even if they got that psychopath in again... what was his name? The one who used to beat up all the journalists? The one that wrote that book A Conga Line of Suckholes? Oh yeah, Mark Latham. That's him. Even if they got him in again I would vote for him in full knowledge of his unstable mental condition.

The current Prime Minister is also trying to set into the internet-youth-friendly action. He posted an address to us on YouTube the other day but I didn't see it and I don't know where it is. (Actually that was this morning. Today I found it and the link is down the bottom). I read about it in the paper and it said that he was hammered by the Australian YouTubers in the comments section. Also, the Liberal Party MySpace, fronted by John Howard (as far as I can tell this is not a joke) only has nine friends - one up from when I read in the paper that he only had eight. Also, one of them is Tom.

His fake MySpace though, (I'm assuming it is fake because he has blogs with titles like "Citizenship: A Privilege, not a Right" and "We Know Best") has 12385 friends - most of whom tell him he is a... a... well I can't really say it; but it starts with a 'c' and rhymes with 'punt.'

So the Liberals are pretty sucky at the internet thing. Don't worry Liberals, we all know that computers are difficult for old people. Or perhaps we would be more sympathetic (Kevin has an almost-as-starchy video on his MySpace) if your policies ever properly addressed any of our concerns. Sure, you've been talking about climate change in the last few months but we all know that it's just a fluke that we actually are on track to be under our Kyoto Protocol carbon emissions limit. Oh, except we don't really have one because you refused to sign it. Don't crow about something you didn't support six months ago, John, it doesn't become you.

And what's with changing the laws on enrolling to vote? You know that was a bad move because to me (the public) it looks like you're trying to stop new voters from enrolling after the election is called. Also, those new voters are young people and immigrants who have just become citizens, so to me that looks like you're taking a leaf out of your friend George W. Bush's book.

I think politicians need to be aware that YouTube and MySpace isn't the same as talkback radio. With talkback a small handful of people can ring in and complain about you, but with the internet the entire audience can tell you what they think. Essentially, they are playing with a medium that can bite them back. Also, you don't have a sympathetic host there running the show that can somewhat protect you from what people say.

But there you go. Rant over.

Links! Links! Links! Links!

The YouTube Election

That video (after much Google searching, I finally found it! You can't find it anywhere on YouTube!)

UPDATE!

It seems Kev's web-goons allowed my comment through! It's sitting there, on his MySpace page. If he actually obliges with my request I'll let you know.

C'mon Kev! Don't let us down!

Last Weekend and Melbourne Shootings

Mon, 18 Jun 2007 04:41:59 GMT

This morning a man shot some people in Melbourne's Central Business District (CBD). I like how stuff like that doesn't happen very often here, so when a man kills someone on the streets it makes national and international news. I know that in New York and London stuff like this happens all the time and sometimes doesn't get reported. Australia is a good place to be (but I still want to go to Europe).

In other news about me, I went to a Deb Ball on Saturday night which was run by my church. I wasn't actually one of the debs making my debut, I just watched the actual debs dance and parade around the floor in their white dresses and tuxes. A video of me getting ready for the event will be on YouTube soon.

Also, I'm house-sitting at the moment. A friend of mine came back from his study in Albury for a holiday and is now going camping with his girlfriend and mother (who, I suppose, will be keeping a close eye on them) ;-) So I'm staying at his mum's place looking after a dog who had an operation on his leg. The dog is some kind of Bitsa who looks like a giant, not-fat version of how Clifford used to look. I think I'll make a video comparing them.

I'm getting a little bit obsessed with the videos. I don't know what I'm going to do when I move back to the Gold Coast and lose my access to free broadband internet at CDU. I suppose I'll do my uploading at home, but try not to do too much so as not to blow out the bill. *sigh* Why can't we have good, unlimited internet in Australia with no extra download fees? They have it in the States, why not here?

ABC Offbeat News: WangLiZhouLin, Dame Edna and Randy Thai Dogs

Wed, 13 Jun 2007 03:25:39 GMT

I've just added the RSS feed for the ABC's offbeat news into the top bar on Firefox. It's rather compelling reading actually.

Chinese Surnames

Apparently there are too many Wangs in China.

The Chinese government is allowing parents to make combined last names using the surname of each parent for the child because of the confusion this is causing. I think this possibly is the solution for their problem in the medium-term, but not in the long term. While in the next generation we are going to have people with the last names Zhouzhu (from 'Zhou' and 'Zhu'), what happens if Zhouzhu gets married to Wangxihua? Zhouzhuwangxihua? Or perhaps parents will decide which names to cut out of the surname so that it remains pronounceable.

I have a query concerning if two Wangs (the most common surname in China) are married. Would their child remain simply 'Wang' or would they make it 'Wangwang?' If they do I can forsee some dire consequences for the child should they immigrate to a western country. Wang has enough connotations on its own, let alone how silly that would sound if it was said twice in quick succession.

Dame Edna

Dame Edna, despite being made a dame by the Queen, is apparently both a Labor supporter and a Republican. She is also apparently into horticulture and has quite some skill. Dame Edna is simply brilliant. I maintain she is the epitome of Australian femininity. Who cares if she has to shave (but does not shave her legs)? Dame Edna is Australian royalty and I won't hear a word said against her.

Horny Sniffer Dogs

I'm not sure what else needs to be said here. You can imagine the adventures a horny sniffer dog would have. In Thailand no less.

As a side note, State of Origin II is on tonight.

Go Morons!... erm... Maroons.

Damn it!

Edit: There was a question as to who Dame Edna is. I'm a little bit surprised that the Pink Booted Philosopher didn't know who she is because she had quite a career in the UK. But for everyone's benefit, here she is and here is some stuff she said.

Left-Handed People

Wed, 23 May 2007 03:56:52 GMT

I used the computer of a left-handed person today and do you know what? I couldn't find the mouse anywhere! I looked all over for a good five minutes and couldn't find it. Then, when I had grunted in frustration and shut down the computer (using the keyboard) I found the mouse sitting next to my left hand.

This has lead me to the belief that we should deport all left-handed people. These left-handers are not fitting in with our right-handed society. Who wants to have to accommodate for a minority of left-handed extremists? Not me. I think that we should just send them out of the country if they won't conform to our right-handed ideals.

Also, we should be screen all our refugees for being left-handed, so that these left-handed people won't be taking our jobs and endangering our way of life. That is what I think we should be doing with left-handed people.

Ambidextrous people should be allowed to stay - so long as they use their right-hands. But we should monitor them strictly by sending government officials into their homes and making sure they don't use their left-hands for too many activities. Their children should be tested regularly too, to see if they believe in using the left or right hand.

I believe that my policy on left-handed people is tough but fair. After all, we don't want our children to be running around spouting left-handed propaganda do we? No! We need to show our right-handed allies that we are taking a tough stance on left-handedness!

Finally I think that we need to make the right-handed population aware of the left-handed threat that lurks in our country. They must be alert, but not alarmed. In keeping with this policy, we should distribute anti-left-handed leaflets through the mail, so that we don't get any left-handed sympathisers in our ranks of right-handed people.

Who is with me?!?

Fillet

The Oprah Effect

Tue, 22 May 2007 02:12:15 GMT

So I hear that Oprah is calling it quits (don't hate me for that link, it was just right there when I closed my Hotmail account). This news is quite a shock to me because, believe it or not, it will actually have quite some impact on my life.

I do not watch the Oprah show, I do not read in Women's Weekly about her yo-yo diets. But the very fact that Oprah is leaving the midday women's television business leaves me with a bit of a problem. You see, I work in a bookstore and the highest selling book that I have sold was Oprah-endorsed - that is, The Secret, something about some secret to making you happy.

Let me tell you, at $34.00 a book, I would be pretty happy if I were the author. The Secret just flies off the shelf. If it really was a secret to begin with, it certainly isn't anymore.

But apparently The Secret didn't help Oprah very much because she is decidedly very unhappy and has left her show (or so the gossip mag website tells me). Well I suppose that I would be very unhappy and stressed if I was a commodity like Oprah is/was. If she drops a product name, those middle-aged housewives will drop whatever it is they are doing, get their car keys and make sure they have said product firmly in their possession.

Such was the case with the book Night by Ellie Weisel. This book is not a new book, I studied it in highschool as a modern classic. I believe it was written in the 70s or something. But apparently Oprah read it one day and found it so moving (which I'm not surprised, it's a very confronting book) that she recommended it on her show. The number of women looking for this book wasn't as great as with The Secret but it was a lot of women. More than usually go for books about the Holocaust anyway.

I had to explain to them why it cost $22 for such a small book ("He is a very good author, straight to the point and doesn't mince words") and explain to them why the cover was different to the one that was on Oprah's show ("For older books there are usually a number of different editions which all have different covers. The one you saw was probably the American cover anyway and American publishing houses always put different covers on their books"). The four copies we had quickly moved off the shelves and we ordered in some more to fill the gap.

But now where will the women of this world turn when they feel the urge to buy this product or that but don't know exactly what it is they want to buy? Now that Oprah has removed herself from the world of commercial television who will sell The Secrets of this world? The Oprah Effect was quite profound but now it is gone.

What is this consumer society to do?

Values, Faith and Politics

Sun, 17 Dec 2006 13:41:55 GMT

I just watched (just then) a show about Kevin Rudd, the opposition leader in the Australian parliament. It's been quite an interesting time in Australian politics, particularly in the Labor Party because the old leader of that party, Kim Beazley, just got voted out of leadership by the other MPs. Now Kevin is opposition leader and on the next election, if Labor gets enough MPs into Parliament House, he will be the new Prime Minister of Australia.

I'm sorry my Labor peeps, I just sat on a thumbtack.

Now I must admit, before I re-viewed this show (I'd seen it before last year but forgotten most of the details) I had been a little bit concerned with him. Don't get me wrong of course, Kim Beazley was doing the Labor Party no favours with his... oh shall we say... stagnant style of politics. The reason why I was a little bit concerned with Kevin was because I thought he was constructing a Religious Left to somehow counteract the Religious Right that is forming in this country.

It's no secret that I am not a fan of the Religious Right. I think that the Religious Right in America has done more damage to the face of Christianity worldwide than anything else in the last decade. Instead, I take the view of THIS POLITICAL COMMENTATOR when it comes to the Religious Left. Having two groups of Christians having cat-fights in Parliament is only going to cause division in churches and will distract from what Christians really ought to be doing. Thankfully, this is not what Kevin appears to be setting out to accomplish.

But perhaps I should start on a tirade about why the Religious Right isn't good for politics or Christianity. First, politics. The most important thing here is that a conservative, religious, right-wing party does not represent the views of most conservative voters. Sure, many Christians vote conservative but if the only conservative party on offer (and, let's face it, Australia basically has a two-party system) starts making policies about things that conservative voters have no interest in, the voters are stuck. If they vote for the party they most agree with, even if they object to their long religious sideplots, they are going to be changing the country in a way that doesn't quite fit with their view. If they vote for the other party, they are voting for a party they don't agree with at all.

It may seem strange to people from the Americas that in Australia (so far) Christian does not equal conservative. Instead, the conservative voters come from all sorts of cultureal and religious backgrounds. They do, however, tend to be business owners. But that is fine, because that is what the Liberal Party in Australia looks out for. So in a Democracy, if most people want to be worried about business owners and interest rates, then they should vote for the party that is worried about that also. What I object to is a conservative party (be it Liberal or National) who dictates to the voters that Christianity will be important.

Second, Christianity. I object to a political party telling me that, as a Christian, I am to vote for them. I vehemently object to Christians not making intelligent political decisions about who to vote for, just because one party is supposedly the 'Christian one.' Christians should be using their consciences, weighing up the issues and deciding then which party best aligns with what that person thinks about them. Normally, this process will be influenced by their faith - and so it should be. The trick here is that not all Christians are going to feel a particular way about an issue and so ought to vote for different parties as their conscience dictates to them. I do not want to be called less of a Christian because I didn't vote Liberal in the last state election. That is a ridiculous notion.

Up until the last election, this was the political landscape. Christian and non-Christians politicians got on with politics and didn't really bother with wearing faith on their sleeves. Politics was fine, and Christianity didn't suffer for it either. There was an upset in the 1950s where a Catholic faction broke off from the Labor Party, forming another one that promptly crawled off to die, but besides that politicians were politicians and nothing more.

And so I come back to Kevin. Kevin is making some noise about the Christian Socialists, a worldwide group of centre-left politicians of which he is a member. He has the same view as I do (it seems) about religion and politics and is demonstrating that you can have a left-leaning attitude and still be a Christian. I'm still a bit suspicious about where this will go, whether he or another Labor politician will run off with this train of thought and begin setting up a fortress of Religious Leftism, but so far it's all looking good and I'm pleased with him. He is promoting a way of Christianity influencing leftism in a way that I like a lot - pulling the practical caring for the poor and looking out for the little man (which I find awfully lacking in today's conservative parties) out of Christianity and applying it to centre-leftism. It fits very comfortably there.

I am much happier voting for Kevin and Labor now than I was with the thought I would have to vote for Kim. And I'm certianly happier that the joke that is the Family First Party won't be the only party trying to secure the Christian vote. I would rather that no one attempted to garner 'Christian votes' though. Instead I'd rather they attempt to secure votes based on actual policy (as politics ought to), but it's done now - the Liberals, Nationals and certainly Family First have opened up a whole new way of doing politics. One that I've experienced in the States and wouldn't like to see the end result of here.

So far Kevin hasn't taken too much flack for standing up as a Christian. This surprises me a little bit to be sure, Labor is a strictly secular party. I think it's because he's not being such an arsehole about it, he's very humble about the whole thing. You never see him bashing people with Bibles and you never see him frothing at the mouth. Nor does he do 'religious' photo shoots of him praying or reading the Bible to show how 'pious' he is. But who knows? In six months time I might be pulling my hair out in frustration as Kevin, the Harry-Potter-lookalike-God-botherer takes it all too far. So far, though, it's ok.

Breathe deeply Rohan mmmkay?

Fillet

The Big Test

Wed, 13 Dec 2006 13:41:22 GMT

Well John Howard, bless him, has come out all guns blazing after Labor got a new leader. He reckons we need a test for immigrants to pass before they can become citizens. The only thing is, he never said what the test would actually involve beyond 'questionsa bout our history, geography, national anthem, or flag. That sort of thing.'

"Yes! I want Tim Tams!"

Well I'm going to save him a bit of work I think, by making my won list of questions: (answers are in italics)

1. What are the three colours on our flag?

Red, white and blue

2. When was Australia settled by Europeans?

1788

3. What is the Ocean located to our east called?

The Pacific

4. How many states are there in Australia?

Seven. New Zealand say they are seperate but we don't believe them.

5. Simon says stand up.

Immigrants stand up.

6. Ok, sit down.

Continue standing. Those who sit automatically fail.

7. Ha! You are very clever! All right, Simon says sit down.

They sit down.

8. Detention centres are...?

Neccisary. Those who laugh afterwards also fail.

9. The ABC is...?

An ungrateful nest of vipers who poison the minds of otherwise obedient citizens with biased media content. Bastards.

10. Which immigration test was used as a contol device by the Australian government during the years of 1901 to 1973 so they could keep non-whites out of the country?

The White Australia Policy.

Thankyou, thankyou very much. Did you notice the little punchline there at the end? I thought it was very clever. But just in case you didn't notice it, I put it in bold for you as well. Not that I'm insulting your intelligence or anything.

Fillet

(P.S. Phew! Just made it!)

P.P.S. If I get one, just one, New Zealander saying that they didn't like my crack at New Zealand, I'm going to bash my head repeatedly against a wall at your utter stupidity. If you can't take a friendly jibe, it only goes to show how sensitive you really are. *squints eyes*

Outrage. That Is All That Can Be Said.

Wed, 01 Nov 2006 13:53:24 GMT

Angry.

Angry angry angry angry angry.

You wanna know why? I'll tell you why. Here's why: I was watching my favourite batch of television tonight (The ABC, all night long. Yeah baby) and I discovered the most terrible thing. The ABC board, in it's infinite wisdom, has deemed it neccisary to cancel the one and only The Glass House.

Angry angry angry angry angry.

I can only assume that this decision to axe the show was caused by the new 'no bias' guidelines set out by the ABC board - Will Anderson had said a couple of things about it in the weeks following the decision. But, I mean, it's satire. It's supposed to be biased! And don't tell me that if the Labor party had won government in the last election that The Glass House wouldn't be busy tearing jolly old Mark Latham to bits. Goodness knows he would deserve it.

The fact is that these new no bias guidelines are really, really crappy. Really. Right now I would hesitate (at the risk of sounding like a militant civil libertarian) to say that they boarder on restriction of freedom of speech. Now I'm really worried about the state of the entire ABC network. Triple J radio is one of my favourite radio stations ever and I love it because they are not afraid to say anything on the radio because they didn't have to worry about making any sponsors angry and they have previously been protected by the government to say whatever they please. But now I don't know if they will be able to do that. They are restricting the points of view (and that is what it is, despite whatever intentions the people who came up with this rule had) that can be aired on government funded television and radio.

Sure, Will's a tool. But he's our tool. You can't take away our tool like that!

No, I don't think this is the end of democracy in this country. I'm not so sensationalist as that. But I do think that this could be a first step in breaking the ABC - what is one of the best (in my opinion, the best) channel on TV. Of course, the ABC doesn't end with the television, there's the radio and the website and all that. And that's all really top-notch stuff as well. I listen to Triple J because it appeals to my demographic but I also think that all the news and information radio stations that they have airing are really good too and I'm afraid what might happen to the content of these stations if this guideline is enforced too strictly.

I found it amusing that none of the presenters seem to be in favour of these guidelines. Of course Media Watch were against them - but then I always find it amusing how that woman manages to tear into every media owner in Australia, including the ABC where the show is aired. But when I was watching At The Movies tonight good old David, charismatic character that he is, had a go at the board as well: "And just so we can be completely unbiased and fairly showcase all points of view, here's Margaret so she can disagree with everything that I just said." Tee hee. I love you David.

Also, may I point you to The Age and their article on The Glass House. Ironically the only place I could find a report that wasn't sugar-coated was with a paper (web-site) owned by a giant multi-national news corporation. Go figure. Beforehand it was always the ABC (or the SBS, another partially government funded television station) that I went to for unbiased news. Now that everyone's worrying about bias in the ABC, I can't find unbias there at all!

To the politicians and complainers, grow up. That's all I can say. Of course there will be things on the ABC that you won't like. You always hate the ABC because it's the ABC's job to rip your guts out. Just know that just because we've been under Liberal government for 13 years doesn't mean that it hasn't forgotten how to take the piss out of Labor. Once they win the next election (and I hope against hope that will happen, even though the Labor party is the party with no backbone whatsoever) I know that the ABC will turn around and stab them in the back. It's what the ABC does. And it's why I love it. It's my ABC as well as yours. So don't crush it with your sniveling.

Let it grow.

Fillet. (Being overtly political in I don't know how long)

P.S. I really hope all that made sense! I'm kinda mad right now.

Democratic People's Republic of Korea

Fri, 13 Oct 2006 13:24:34 GMT

What better way to fill the evening of Friday the 13th than to look up North Korea on Wikipedia (I'm still not done with that one). Given the current political climate I think it's entirely appropriate.

I've always held a particular facination with the last remaining Stalinist state ever since Year 10 history. North and South Korea appear to me to be this archaic thing that shouldn't exist, yet does. Kind of like if East and West Germany still existed in 2006. Or North and South Vietnam for that matter. I know that there are currently moves to unify the two countries but seeing that the North Koreans seem to be commited to making themselves the biggest jerks in Asia I don't think that will happen peacefully any time soon. I mean, the regime could colapse at any time, thoroughly screwing up both North and South Korea for quite some time. The South Korean's know it, that's why they are the second largest contributor of aid to their northern neighbour even though technically they are still at war with one another.

So even though I have a very low opinion of North Korea, what with all their grandstanding and mistreatment (maltreatment? Or is that just Esperanto getting into my head?) of its civilians I've decided that I'm going to run a public relations campaign for the poor nation. After all, it's so very difficult to be a Communist in this day and age. Poor dears. I've made two ads for its new tourism campaign. I wonder if the People's Republic pays commissions...

I think they would be quite effective really. Actually, my Business Communication Technologies teacher from highschool's husband went to North Korea as a part of a teacher's conference or something. That's where I got the beautiful forests thing from because apparently it's true. Too bad we never saw pictures though. The North Korean army stopped the tour busses and confiscated all the film inside the cameras. They also wiped the digital memory cards. I guess it's because they didn't want the outside world seeing all the poverty. But hey, they can all read while they're starving to death. And that's a pretty good achievement.

Interesting note for any Christains out there, before the Korean war, North Korea's capital, Pyongyang was the centre for Korean Christianity. Now North Korea is one of the greatest persecutors of Christians (and other religions) worldwide.

So yeah, the potential invasion of North Korea aye? Well, I don't think it will happen. Even trigger-happy George is shying away from this one. Probably because of historical reasons as well as becasue they can now fight back with nukes if they feel like it. Of course, there are some super-Republicans who would love to invade, something I see as intense tunnel-vision on their part but for the most part, the world looks like they are going to stand around looking very worried until the North Koreans make the first move.

And potentially they will. North Korea has stated that it would perceive any sanctions on the country as an act of war and would reciprocate with "physical measures". I don't doubt what these measures are. I'm sure the North knows that, in reality, they're screwed if they make a military move so they're just going to take down as much of whatever they can. Namely South Korea. I think they'd also like to get their teeth into Japan too (even though Japan is North Korea's thrid largest trading partner if my memory serves me correctly). I don't know how much damage they could do but it is a concern. I'm very interested to see how this all plays out.

So yeah, go international diplomacy. If this all works out using the UN I will have renewed faith in that system of international governance.

Fillet

Terrorism

Tue, 12 Sep 2006 09:42:13 GMT

So I am essentially a sheep. I will be doing the obligatory 11th of September reflection. Except for me I’ll be doing it on the 12th of September, considering that that was the day it was in Australia when the terrorist attacks occurred (mostly, I think they occurred at 11:45 or something but I knew about them when I woke up on the 12th). I don’t know where I’m going with it – hey, I might not even publish it.

I was born in 1988, just as the threat of Communism was receding. I grew up in the 90s. It was supposed to be the beginning of an age of peace. The United Nations was supposed to mediate all further conflicts so that another Cold War would never occur again. We got about eight or nine years before the 11th of September 2001 in New York and the subsequent ‘war on terror.’

On the 12th, I had an exam. I forget for which subject – it isn’t important anymore. I woke up at 7:00 like I always did and as I stumbled out of ‘my’ end of the house where my room was Mum said to me simply, ‘America’s under attack’. I didn’t believe her but she motioned to the television where a plane was busy ploughing into a building that I vaguely knew was important to the world economy. I must admit, my first thought was ‘do I still have to go to school?’ Unfortunately I did. I got ready for school with a bit more adrenaline in my system than normal and when I arrived I walked into a different place than the one that I had walked into the week before.

I was standing around talking to people. That was different for an exam day, normally I’d be cramming like mad. The mood was sombre, there was an air of confusion and dare I say, panic. There were students sitting with worried looks on their faces, there were one or two in tears. There was even one girl genuinely convinced that we were all about to die. She had to be consoled by a teacher. The bell signalling the start of the school day rang and we trooped off to the library where our exam was being held. I was in year eight at the time so we were still basically children. We lined up outside the library and the dean of studies came to speak to us about it. He told us we were going to be fine for now and then he prayed with us (it was a Christian school). I did the exam. I don’t remember how well I did.

I could now go into a political commentary about terrorism and the war associated with it. But there are so many others who can do that so much better than me and with much more authority. I would, in fact, recommend that you don’t go anywhere near any blogger’s evaluation of the age of terrorism. They are just so irrational.

All I can say is that September 11 was a tragic event and astonishingly significant worldwide because of where and how it took place. It was a turning point in history and we shouldn’t forget it but neither should we dwell on it. It happened and now (for whatever reason) we have a number of problems associated with it which we much deal with. But let’s not become obsessed with it. We have lives we need to get on with.

Fillet.

Democratic Process

Sun, 10 Sep 2006 05:15:07 GMT

I voted for the first time yesterday in the Queensland state elections. I must say this voting thing isn’t as romantic as I thought it was.

After work I drove to the nearest polling booth armed with my letter telling me I had to vote and bring the letter. I strolled past the people in front of the school where the booth was who hassle you into voting for their candidate. They began to hassle me but I was very resolute that I wouldn’t endorse their indiscriminate waste of paper. Even the Greens lady was thrusting a flyer in my face. I was a little disappointed in her. The only thing the Greens are good for is environmentalism and she wasn’t really doing it all that well.

When I got to the actual booth I slapped my letter down on the table and told the booth lady that I’d like to vote please. She looked at my letter and crossed my name off the list but didn’t ask for any further ID. Again, I was disappointed, I could have been anybody bearing the letter of Rohan Salmond. Someone could have stolen my vote!

She tore off a little slip and told me to vote in a little cardboard booth. There were only four candidates on the slip, one for Labor, one for the Greens, one for the Liberals and one for Family First. The Nationals were noticeably absent – One Nation less so. I filled in my sheet in pretty short order and chuckled to myself about who I gave my second preference to (if you want to know just ask me but I’m not telling you here).

So after I was done I turned and saw the flimsy-looking cardboard box where the votes go and I put my paper in there. After I felt like I had missed something or like I hadn’t gotten something. I don’t know, what did I want, a medal? Anyway, I turned again and in the midst of my incompleteness feeling I said goodbye to the booth lady as that I’d have a feeling of resolution. She didn’t hear me though, she was too busy getting given Maltesers from the other booth official people.

As I left I came across the voter hasslers again. In my stubbornness not to listen to any of them I’d apparently missed what they were doing. In the back of my mind I guess I’d thought they’d be hostile to one-another but instead they were just standing around having a good old natter. I’d been hoping that I’d catch them throwing things at one-another or at least for stony, resolute silence. But apparently my hopes were too high. They were somewhat less interested in me this time, I guess my die had already been cast.

So I walked away having fully participated in the democratic process. I had to remind myself that people in other parts of the world die for this sort of opportunity – it was conducted with much less ceremony than I remember as a younger child watching my parents vote. But never mind, I thought, if it had gone the way I thought in my head I wouldn’t have been in humble Queensland at all but in America, land of the so incredibly free that you don’t have to vote if you don’t feel like it that day. And politics are a little crazy over there. I think I prefer our more lacklustre approach to voting. It’s more sensible somehow.

Fillet.

American Economy Shutdown?

Wed, 03 May 2006 06:24:21 GMT

A funny thing happened yesterday... one third, that's ONE THIRD (keep that number in mind) of American businesses couldn't open yesterday because they didn't have any staff. That's what I heared on the news anyway and I tried to varify it but everyone blogging about this is either saying 'F-you immagrants!' or 'VIVA EL SALVADOR! VIVA MEXICO!!!'. That's not very helpful to me when I'm trying to write about the irony of the whole situation so for now I'm going with one third. Just like I heared on the news.

So why did one third of businesses in America have to close?

Because the illegal immagrants went on strike. All of them. And the whole place shut down.

Does this strike you as ironic? The world's greatest economy, America, is not run by Americans. It's run by illegal immagrants who have snuck into that country working illegaly and getting paid almost nothing. Imagine what the world would be like if those workers were paid a decent wage? I don't think that America would be stitting at the top right now. I find it highly ironic.

But I also find it highly hypocitical. How does this country justify to itself its stand on personal liberty and democratic do-gooderyness when it doesn't excersise any within its own boarders?

I know this is coming off highly anti-American and to a certain extent I am. Not anti-American people of course, just their government and certian policies of theirs. I thought this story I heared on the news last night was a good example of what I mean by that.

It ought to teach the employers of illegal immagrants to pay them fairly but I know that the almighty dollar will prevail in the end and this whole protest of theirs will be a distant memory. It was a great symbol but hardly earth-shattering stuff buecause nobody will pay them any attention after today. Why should they? They're illegal immagrants with no power. If they make a fuss they get thrown out of "the land of the free" and have to slug it out in their home countries. Sure, they're illegal immagrants and if America wants to chuck them all out I suppose they're allowed to. But America doesn't because it brings the nation so much economic benifit. It may or may not be a government thing but someone is employing them and someone else isn't processing their applications for residency which is a very long and convoluted process anyway and while navigating it you get chucked out of the country half the time anyway because you are illegal.

I mean, fair enough, a country can't just open it's boarders and let anyone who wants to come in. That would just be chaos. But don't exploit illegals please.

Normally I hate conspiricy theories and perhaps this is one but honestly I think the whole situation is very unfair. For the underpaid workers that is.

There, I showed my true colours as a Communist. *titter* At least, that's what I'll be called from now on should an actual American find this site. That or a 'lefty' which is only a more endearing name for a Communist anyway.

I don't particularly like commenting on overtly political things but I follow politics in a sort of casual fashion so sometimes it slips in. Sorry if you are Jacinta (or a person like her) who's probably stopped reading by now because I know this bores her so much.

I'll write something humourous about my life next time.

Hlleluja (or however you spell that)

Fri, 18 Nov 2005 08:26:27 GMT

Well well well... stroy of the tree wells ha ha (that was soooo yuck) we (as most you you know) have finished school today. Well I can't say that I can be more releaved but I can't rest on my laurels (whatever that means... does that even apply here?!?) too soon because I'm off to the America (F*** Yeah) tomorrow.

But don't worry my faithful blog watchers I will continue to blog on until people tell me to STOP STOP STOP ALREADY. Here is the news since my last politically motivated blog.

Well it would seem that I (along with hundreds of thousands of other cynical Australians) have, to quote a Liberal senator "Egg all over their faces from head to toe". I don't actually think this is the cace but I'd like to dwell on that statement for a little bit.

Since when did faces have toes? Or heads for that matter? Next time I see a face with a head rather than a head with a face I must take a photo to show you all. Especially if it has toes too. (I do SO love off the cuff comments that stuff up all over the place, especially when the're made by politicians I don't like)

Thankyou.

Now in actual fact there WAS a homegrown terrorist threat growing in Sydney and Melbourne but that didn't really suprise me. Like I said I wasn't (and aren't) worried about terrorism but did think that we were fairly vulnerable. What did surprise me was how quickly this threat was declaired after the laws were rushed through. Apparantly the federal police were watching them for months and good on them. I'm glad to see the're looking after us. What interested me though was that a potential terrorist threat from this group was more than three months away, possibly more than a year. They hadn't even identified a target to blow up yet (which is why those provisions that were passed through were passed through). But I have one question.

Why did John Howard and the Federal Police work together to crack it now when danger (identified danger) was months away. Why not bust them later, say, at a quiet time when the party was losing support or during the perceived changeover of Prime Ministers so that support would gather around the new one (whoever that may be?).

The answer is (like I said before) that it was to distract voters from issues that threaten the Howard Government's approval rating now (IR laws) and to gain support for the new anti-terrorism laws (which I actually know bery little about so I won't comment on wheather they are good or bad).

But what I'm really concerned with right now is that I have finished High School forever and ever and ever and that I am going to America (F*** yeah) and that I haven't finished packing yet.

Being socially relevant sucks, it hurts my brain. Let's not do this any more.

Blog of Social Purpose

Sun, 06 Nov 2005 10:32:51 GMT

First things first. Ryan, your blog has never had social purpose. Although I agree with you on haloween, that's about as complicated as it gets. Oh yeah, and don't try and drag me into your so-called intelligent blog wars again. I love reading them but I don't want them here. This isn't the place.

Incidently I actually WAS going to write a politically motivated blog entry for those who would be interested because of some government statements that I take to be insulting to my intelligence but I didn't get around to it until today.

The first is Mr Howard's industrial relations reforms which are supposedly meant to help advance Australia globally. Unfortuneately it's all at the expense of Australian workers who get left in the dirt. Now although I'm annoyed at this (being an emerging worker myself) I am more annoyed (as an emerging tax-payer) at the blatant waste of tax-payer funds on saturating the media with uninformative propagada to promote the package. On the same note I'm annoyed at the Labour Unions for hardly kicking up a stink about it. What am I paying you for? (I am a union member, albeit a highly dissatisfied one).

The second relates to the first. What with the veritable storm of critisism being directed at Mr Howard and his industrial relations reforms he's tried to pull a swifty and distract us all with 'anti-terrorism' laws. Then, once everyone became worried about police being able to shoot the average Joe on the street ANOTHER wave of critisism was directed against him. Now, this would have been very clever of him (it almost distracted me) had it not been for two things. One was the constant nagging reminder of the new IR laws on the television, radio and newspapers and the other was Mr Howard's oh-so convienient 'terrorism warning'. I feel this warning requires another paragraph for itself.

Of all the stupidity. "Australia, now don't panic but I've been informed that you are at risk of a secific yet unidentified and undisclosed terrorist attack. I will not be raising the treat level matrix, nor will I call for an early sitting of the Senate to pass the neccesary laws yet you should all put your continued, unquestioning trust in me, your friend and protector, Mr Howard." Honestly. I have always suspected Australia is at risk of a terrorist attack as has the Federal Government (the treat level is on medium) yet this new "announcement" has done nothing to increase my concerns. Although I will not unequivically say that there will be no terrorist attack in Australia by the time the Melbourne Commonwealth Games is done I am no more worried about it than I was. Apparantly nobody else is capable of calling his bluff either just in case they are wrong (the political fallout would be huge) but in the end Mr Howard's ploy didn't work. We are all just as concerned for our civil liberties and our rights under industrial relations as we were. Be sure, Mr Howard, that even if Labor is as pathetic next time as it was the last election I will not be voting for you.

There was other stuff as well but I'm too tired to write about it and I've forgotten most of what I actually wanted to say but, looking back, I think I said enough.

Now I'm sorry to all those who found that utterly boring because (as you may have guessed) the purpose of my blog isn't to confuse everyone with overanalytical thought processes but to just let it all hang out (well not all of it) and create some fun and pointless writing. In my own head that's a kind of a protest against the rediculous essays we are forced to write in school but to everyone else it probably looks like be being an imbicile which is great too. I don't think I'll write another of these soon unless there is an outcry of support for my views in which case I'll feed the masses what they want.

Anyway, apologies for the lack of actual personal news and randomness on this blog, I'll serve you up a fresh, steamy batch soon.