Saddam Hussein's Death Is A Disgrace

We've hanged the bastard. Yay. The world is suddenly a better place, Iraq is magically safe and terrorists will cower and flee.

Or...

We've hanged a deluded old man who was securely locked away and unable to exert any influence. We've denied him the chance - his right - to defend himself and his right to life, no matter how much a prick he was.

It strikes me as so massively hypocritical that a US government and an Australian government that refuse the right to a woman to safely abort a child through safe means such as RU486, saying that human life is sacred even if it's four cells-worth, will happily hang a man and call it a victory for deomcracy.

The Australian government claim it's Iraq's right to hang him (Source) as if Iraqis in general had a say. Foreign Minister Downer also added that it meant he 'will never come back to lead them again.' Is that on the cards? Would he ever have got back in?

The Age also reported that Bush slept while Saddam hanged (Source). Whether it's true or not is immaterial - the casual attitude to knocking someone off that our governments are taking is quite disturbing.

Kevin Rudd, leader of the Australian Labor Party, got it right - it's hypocritical for Australia to support the death penalty as long as it wasn't on our soil. Capital punishment is moronic at best, misguided at worst. We know Saddam did what he did - he was a complete bastard - but killing him is as stupid as smacking a child for hitting another. We won't go in to the long catalogue of posthumous 'oops, he didn't do it after all' moments.

It was Saddam's right to live a natural life, banged up though he may have been. The US were much better off showing him as a pathetic, Doritos-addicted misanthrope than hanging him and making him a martyr. It also does the US no favours to allow a camera crew in to show his last moments. Seeing photos of the former Iraqi leader with a noose around his neck is sickening.

The West keeps presenting itself as a shining light for the rest of the world when in reality we display nothing but contempt for human life if their skin isn't white and their values not identical to our own.

Pissed But Not Responsible

Drunk surgeon naked on letterbox

How I love this nation's acceptance of bad behaviour under the influence of alcohol. Here was a man, so drunk he went to an old address and decided to hop up on a letterbox and have a quiet wank while leering at two women, he was apparently so, so drunk a magistate - a man, of course - let him off.

Yep. Read it and weep.

"He didn't even know what he was doing. What's society got to achieve by a convicting this man? Nothing," he (Magistrate Maloney) said.

Bollocks.

He's a medical practitioner who decided to take it upon himself to drink so hard he got delirious and did several rotten things. My belief is that whether you do something straight or pissed, you're responsible either way because you chose to act in a way that is detrimental to those around you. Being drunk is no excuse.

He should have made it worth his while and killed somebody while he was at it.

Blogged with Flock

Howard Shows Some Backbone

On something that really matters.

Howard demands tougher line (source: The Age Online)

Howard, for once, is showing a bit of backbone. It appears he has been stung by recent criticism that the Government had bowed to Indonesian pressure over the West Papuan affair when the processing of asylum seekers was offshored once more.

Howard is in Batam meeting Indonesian President Yudhoyono in what is said to be something of a make or break between the two countries. The relationship's prickliness goes back a long way and really went pear-shaped in 1999 with the East Timor debacle and earlier this year again when the West Papuan issue came up.

What's interesting about the relationship between the leaders is that they are both so media-driven. Howard's relationship with the right-wing media is well-known here and Yudhoyono has backed himself into the same corner in Indonesia. Yudhoyono always panders to right-wing xenophobia, (the acceptable kind, the one where epithets are absent to give the guise of respectability) the same way Howard does and conveniently ignores facts when they get in the way of a good political gain.

So these two guys understand each other and their problems. They probably don't believe in half the things they do, they just do what they're told by populist media outlets to maintain the vote. Will Howard stick with his anti-Bashir line? Publicly, you bet. Privately, who knows. Will Yudhoyono ever publicly denounce the infamous, pathetic and tasteless cartoon of Downer and Howard as rooting dogs wanting to take over West Papua? Nup. That would lose votes because it wasn't anti-Muslim.

It will be an interesting few days. I'm very curious as to what the Indon media will dream up to try and force Yudhoyono into something publicly unpleasant. Meanwhile, the sight of Howard with a backbone will surely catch some of us by surprise.

technorati tags:john, howard, indonesian, president, yudhoyono, batam, meeting, australia, politics

Blogged with Flock

See? I Told You.

ALP vote falls after Beazley vow

That is all.

Blogged with Flock

Don't Get Sick In Australia

As part of my undercover day job, I went and visited a part of the Health Department of Western Australia.

I grew angrier and angrier as the meeting went on.

It wasn't that they wouldn't buy the software we sell. It wasn't the incredible ignorance of the people sitting before me and their irritating attempt to catch me out (which, by the way, failed).

What made me really, really angry, was this - doctors in hospitals in 2006 in a country as fabulously wealthy as Australia are using computers from the mid-90s, running Microsoft Windows 95 (an operating system no longer supported by its makers), with minimum security measures, to look up patient health records.

Let me run that by you again, but this time in English.

Doctors in hospitals in 2006 are using the technological equivalent of a hammer as anasthetic. This isn't a discussion about Windows because if it were Windows XP or 2000 I wouldn't mind. I also wouldn't mind if the hardware had been purchased in the last three years.

Picture this. You've been admitted to hospital suffering from a strong headache, so strong you are unable to respond coherently to requests. That's ok, says the doc. Suddenly, you go into anaphylaxis. The doctor will rush to a computer to look up your records. The computer is running on what is basically as powerful as a modern PDA but an OS that requires rather more than that. You've just gone into cardiac arrest. The doctor has to make a call because your records still haven't appeared.

You are now clinically dead. Your records still haven't appeared. The staff begin to resuciate. Your osteperosis sees your ribs smashed to pieces and another medical problem means that their attempts to jumpstart your heart, which is stricken by cardiomyopathy means you stand no chance.

You are now dead.

What would it have cost the government to give you a greater chance of survival? Probably around $450. You read that right.

The people I was meeting said there were anywhere from 600 to 3000 computers of this ilk floating around a mere four hospitals in the area. What about the other ones? Not sure...no budget to fix. None of your business, there's nothing wrong with it.

It wasn't just that these computers were still out there, it was the fact these cretins were responding with (at best) a shrug of the shoulders, at worst they were defending this position.

I am so angry about this. We can host Commonwealth Games and piss all manner of money up against the wall on frivolities and I bet you any money that kids on recycled computers in the Congo have more computing power than doctors in Australia in the 21st century. The hand-cranked computer for the third world has more grunt.

I kid you not. This country is going to hell in a handcart and more people are being sent to hell early for the sake of a couple of million dollars in a country swimming in money as a result of a resources boom.

ACT Gay Marriage Vote Fails

(Source)

This has been a classic example of the media purporting to know what Middle Australia thinks.

I am not going to get into a religious discussion about this. Whatever you believe, you believe and if you don't believe gays should marry, that is your right. Unless it's because of blind hatred in which case you're just an idiot who shouldn't be allowed to breed.

Anyway.

The front-pageiness of this entire story is so dubious I just had to have a go. We already have a really good idea what Middle Australia thinks and apart from Big Brother-watching teenage girls, Middle Australia either a) doesn't give a toss b) doesn't want them marrying or c) holds a belief that they shouldn't marry.

How do I know this? John Howard has seen fit to fairly brutally and brazenly crush the ACT laws, swiftly advising the Governor General (who it seems has the constitutional power to roll Territory laws) to bin the law.

He hasn't shown an inkling of understanding, hasn't pretended that he cares about the issue, he has stuck to the family values line and pushed on. The public are largely not talking about this despite the media pushing it as hard as it will go.

Predictably the ABC and SBS have gone hammer and tongs just to make sure and rounded up every gay-friendly member of parliament to say their piece. Without bothering to ask they've done the usual trashing of the Family First guy. This brings me to another point - the media love an independent only if they're a screaming leftie or a jackboot fascist. The media has made up their own mind on this bloke and expect us to follow along.

At no time has the media attempted to educate the Australian people about what this law is about. Whether your gay or straight, atheist or Christian (or whatever), allowing these relationships to be recognised is probably a good legal thing. Many of these relationships are stable and loving whether you like them or not and if they end through death or 'divorce' there should still be protection for both parties. These are the only people in our society where a partnership is not enshrined in law.

I don't believe in gay marriage and it is a contradiction in terms. Gay activists love appropriating heterosexual traditions to try and fit themselves into a society that is often extremely unwelcoming of difference.

When you choose to gay, and for many it is a choice, you choose to participate in a minority and have to live with what that means. Instead of trying to educate and encourage difference, minorities often try and make themselves fit.

This bill was about wedge politics, a way to start levering themselves into a position where adoption of children, access to IVF etc. will become a right. A right they want despite choosing not to be a part of the way things work biologically speaking.

I think the ACT bill should not have been crushed but the endpoint that the gay lobby were after was the reason it was enacted in the first place. If you find that unpleasant, I'm sorry. The religious argument will have to come another day.

The media beat this thing up because the media has a powerful sense of sympathy towards the gay community because so many in the media are gay or have close friends who are. It has been hysterical, ridiculous and in many ways ignorant of the beliefs of those who opposed the eventual intent of the law. And it wasn't good enough. The media is supposed to report on what is going on, not try and shape our views to their own personal ends.

That's what blogging is for and rightly so.

technorati tags:ACT, gay, marriage, law, overturned, middle, australia, australian, politics

Blogged with Flock

Michelle Grattan Reckons Howard Is Having A Hard Time...

...if only...

"One month ago, Mr Howard was on a high, feted in public and private by George Bush. The euphoria was short-lived."

(Source)

If only. Grattan makes a number of terrific points about why she thinks he's having a hard time. I'm going to contradict myself and say that he is. But guess what. Nobody in the world of voting, at least not enough of them, thinks so or cares. So by his standards, he's having a top time, as per usual. Party bickering, a stoush over the oh-so-important gay marriage bill and he'll sail on. Easy.

I long for the day when this Government is dropped on its arse by the electorate. The only problem is my sentimental favourite won't be responsible and, again, in another contradiction, I hope he isn't. Because Big Kim has lost the plot.

I scoffed when I passed a headline this morning that said Beazley was worse than Latham (The Australian) but you know what? They might be right. The unilateral decision by Beazley to roll back the repugnant IR laws that Howard government recently passed was poorly received by his own party, effectively attacked by the deeply ordinary Kevin Andrews and the now-standard Labor sniping fired up. Do I want these people in charge? Today?

Nope.

That sucks. Howard is going to romp the next one in and hand over to one of the chief architects of the IR laws, Peter Costello.

We're in real trouble. Howard isn't. Howard 7893495960, Us, Nil. As usual.

Blogged with Flock

Apparently We Don't Get Paid To Work In Australia

...we get paid to slack instead.

On a day where PM John Howard tells Opposition Leader Kim Beazley that his promise to toss out the new IR laws is because the unions had bullied him, there are actually newspaper articles about public figures being implored not to come down on people who don't bother turning up for work after watching World Cup matches.

Sorry?

How come I'm not allowed to roll in late when I've been up watching the second biggest sporting event on the planet (after the World Cup), Formula 1? There's an Aussie in that. I recall being paid to work, not roll into work. Crikey. This country is completely obsessed with bloody sport...

Democracy Is Alive And Well, 'eh?

'Instead of picking fault, the Federal Government should be congratulated for listening to the people and pulling out of the sale of the Snowy (River Hydro Scheme.'

Oh, really? There's an interesting tack. This came from none other than the Victorian leader of the National Party, Peter Ryan. This (slightly paraphrased) sentence poured forth when 774 ABC morning presenter, the incendiary Jon Faine, had suggested that Mark Vaile is left looking dumb as a result of the Government pulling out of the scheme's sale. The Nationals' own Peter Hall, member for Gippsland in the Victorian Parliament himself said this: 'At the end of the day, the three governments involved have listened to the community and backed away from the sale which the Victorian Nationals said was unnecessary and unacceptable from day one.' (Source.)

Right. Anyone see anything amiss there? The party is congratulating itself for pulling out of something they didn't believe in. Excellent. Faine had taunted Hall by saying that the Nationals clearly didn't believe in the sale from a grass-roots level so why had they gone along with it? Ryan got extraordinarily narky and ended up looking a complete tool. Which isn't hard, it's not like he needed Faine's help.

The Federal (Coalition) Government owns 13% of the Snowy River Hydro-Electric system. The main shareholder, the NSW (Labor) Government, owns about 58% with the balance owned by the Victorian (Labor) Government. Now, of course, the Labor Party doesn't own it, but the government does, but if anyone really thinks that the PM has pulled out (to be closely followed by similar jelly-backs, Bracks and Iemma) because he had 'listened to the people' then they are sorely mistaken.

Because, you see, the PM is still going to sell Telstra and Medibank Private and despite nationwide opposition to the Industrial Relations disaster, he still went ahead with that. The sale of the Snowy was going to provide a large chunk of funding for the NSW and Victorian Labor Party to be re-elected. What bothers me most is that Bob Brown thinks that this proves democracy is alive and well. Has he not seen the link? Bracks and Iemma probably did but got on the bandwagon immediately, pulling out of the sale and grumbling that it probably shouldn't have happened in the first place.

A large part of the argument against the Snowy sale was emotional - Australians are rightly proud of the scheme, despite it's fairly hefty but acceptable environmental impact.

That impact - the near destruction of the Snowy River - was another of the hot topics and the one that has hurt the rural-focussed Nationals the most. Going back to the previous outburst, Faine had suggested that the PM had brow-beaten Federal National Leader Mark Vaile into the sale and this backflip made the increasingly hapless Vaile look weak on top of stupid (ref. AWB). The grass-roots opposition to the idea had a lot to do with a very, deeply, practical reason - water.

To have put what would undoubtedly have been a foreign interest or, worse, Macquarie Bank, in charge would have left many farmers in deep trouble indeed. To have a corporate entity control the flow of water down the Snowy is like handing a nuclear weapon to Iran. You're just giving them the opportunity to do something dumb.

And the rubbish that poured forth from pro-privatisation interests was extraordinary. They stick to the line that privatisation means operations are run more effectively and at no extra cost to consumers.

Oh, really? Victorians who use gas, power and public transport will disagree vehemently. NSW people who use roads will also be less than pleased with that construct. To take one companyo often used as a bright and shining example, QANTAS, all they've done is fire people and cost-cut to the point of ludicrousness. Fly them to LA and you'll see what I mean. You get a kids ice cream instead of a full-size one and planes that are feeling and sounding very old indeed.

Putting the Snowy in the hands of private interests was always going to be a hideous idea. The scheme makes money for all of the governments and should remain there. Likewise Telstra, Medibank and countless other businesses the government wants to unload should stay in our hands.

It's not about having nothing left to sell, it's about the preservation of services at reasonable prices. And the high likelihood of power prices being pushed north and farmers being pissed on was too great a risk for everyone. For once, we will benefit from Howard's game-playing but no-one will remind him of his words when he next refuses to back down on something he should.

Australians To Pay More To Fly!

This is obviously government policy.

For some reason, the media has gone very easy on the government for its at first mystifying decision to bar Singapore Airlines from flying the Sydney-LA route. QANTAS are in the news this week for planning to offload its heavy maintenance into Asia but the government claim that to allow Singapore (or Emirates) to fly that route will cost Australian jobs. Apparently allowing Air Canada to do the same is neither here nor there.

Um...won't it all be the same? I mean, QANTAS will move 2500 jobs offshore in any event (any way they can) so Singapore Airlines, who will have to create a maintenance operation here to service the aircraft after that long flight, will obviously have to employ people to do so. So that's one furphy the media swallowed without a hint of discussion.

The Age (www.theage.com.au) ran a straight-faced story about the decision and towards the end of the article that mentioned Government back-bencher and close friend to Geoff Dixon Bruce Baird, also runs the Government party's Friends of Tourism committee. My my my. This was the same Bruce Baird who tried to link Singapore Airlines' bid to the execution of convicted drug-runner Van Nguyen. Right. He said that a barbaric act should be punished by barring SIA from the Sydney-LA route. Again, the media let this one pass with barely a blip.

SIA are obviously getting upset and have blamed protectionism on the decision. Well, that one takes the PKB (Pot, Kettle, Black) award for February. Singapore's government-owned airline talking about protectionism after its frankly shameful treatment of JetStar Asia's applications.

Geoff Dixon should shut his mouth. He's got what he wants and now he's gloating. Well, punk, as a long-suffering QANTAS customer, I think you ought to sit down and review the last couple of weeks. QANTAS is seeding the media and Coalition politicians with the 'jobs will go' story while at the same time engaging the unions in a battle over dumping 2500 jobs into Asia in the name of cost-cutting! You've still got your poor-man's duopoly of QANTAS-United with cute little Air Canada thrown in. You've still got your outrageous margins, excuse for poor, self-interested scheduling and a government telling you to merge with SIA even though you're wildly profitable and doing well. All of which affects us as customers because you continue to pursue cost-cutting by dumping staff and pissing off the ones you have left.

Here endeth the lesson.

Video Game Banned...

...because you could paint some graffiti!

The following is a story that appears on Australian gaming website www.gamepower.com.au. I'll leave it to them.

It was sort of coming. There had been some chatter of the Mark Ecko's Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure being refused classification for the Australian market. There have been a number of frankly questionable and downright stupid decisions in recent times but this one has to be the one that takes the cake.

Consider, if you will, games that got through without drama. Manhunt, which is a game that I couldn't finish. It just made me ill. The OFLC allowed it to breeze through, stating that it fell within the boundaries laid out by the OFLC. After the traditional sales cycle of the game was over, in fact, nearly a year after its release, the OFLC revisited the MA15+ classification, and withdrew it. By then sales had dribbled down to a few units every now and again and the 'damage' was done. The question is, what the hell are these people on?

In a perfect world, nothing would need banning because the people who use violent or sexual images to excuse their dreadful behaviour wouldn't exist. Because it's not a perfect world and there is some nasty stuff out there, we have a rating system to inform our choices. The problem is, that rating system is inconsistently applied across different media. Games are by far the most poorly treated because there is no R18+ because of the incredibly naive assertion that games are just for kids. Are you a kid? Thought not.

In a country like Australia, you can sell a book that says the Holocaust was invented, you can pollute people's minds with all sorts of trash (Australian Idol, X Factor, Hot Dogs from Big Brother) but if a game contains images of people creating graffiti, or worse, a female nipple (gasp!), you're out.

Australia is a free country and probably the best country in the world to live in (and I've been around), but boy do we have a government that is trying to nanny us into submission. Governments have dug themselves an insanely deep hole where they refuse to introduce an R18+ rating for games. If they were serious about restricting games that are not good for impressionable young minds, there would be an R18+ rating to push many MA15+ games up to and the protection would be there. As it stands, banning the game just does what prohibition of most things does - makes people want it more. All this will do is help companies like Amazon as they deliver planeloads of the games to Australian customers. That is incredibly difficult to control.

Australian gamers should draw the line here and now. We should contact our state attorneys general and write them a letter. Write a letter to your local member of parliament. Write letters to the OFLC. Be cool, be calm, be collected. Express your support to Atari Australia who are taking the OFLC to court. Tell all of these people why you play games and that banning them is a ridiculous knee-jerk reaction. The banning of this game is politically driven and clinically insane. And the people who did it should hear about it, loud and clear.

(Source: http://www.gamepower.com.au/, used by permission)

Keep Your Ignorance Off Your Shirt

The usual circus that surrounds anything to do with abortion in Australia (and every other Western nation it has to be said) was dragged to new lows this week when Kerry Nettle paraded in front of the cameras at Canberra's Parliament House wearing a shirt with the the idiotic slogan 'Keep Your Rosaries Off My Ovaries.'

Can't stand Kerry Nettle. She's an oaf, a classic reactionary leftie who isn't particularly interested in issues that interest most Australians. Granted, everyone has something to say about abortion and that is informed by a number of things - upbringing, religion, political leaning, whatever.

I support her right to say what she likes but it was offensive. Just because you're Catholic does not automatically place you in the same group as Tony Abbott. This constant ignorance by atheists such as Nettle (actually, I'm not sure what Nettle is, but atheist is probably pretty close) about the way Christians think is classic. Every Christian dresses badly, every Christian bible bashes, every Christian...and so on. She's being as judgemental as any cliched Christian.

Whether he likes it or not, Abbott's decision is informed by his religion. His stance on abortion is on the harder side and is not supportable or sustainable. He has no idea that some women have no choice but to abort, whether for health, social or economic reasons. He has no right to make the decision for anyone about a drug as important as RU486. This concept that Howard has been pushing stating that elected leaders are somehow able to make that choice anymore than a non-elected leader is mystifying to say the least.

Abbott is clearly part of the population who thinks that the only reason a woman aborts is because she couldn't be bothered wth contraception. I oppose that style of abortion - it seems like the long way around for a start and only puts the woman in more danger in the first place. But apart from that, every abortion is a tragedy because it just isn't an easy decision. I know. We had to make that decision very recently and it was absolutely no fun. If you doubt that, come back to me when we've shaken off the effects of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Anyway.

Nettle should think before she prints her stupid shirts. It doesn't become a member of Parliament to be so spectacularly ignorant but it also makes her look as dumb as the people who stand out the front of abortion clinics harrassing people - she's making an assumption that just isn't true.

When Attention-Seeking Behaviour Goes Bad

You have to laugh at this.

Peta Bull, 36, mother of two from Mackay in North Queensland, was forced by the crew of a Jetstar flight to wear a jacket over a tattoo that depicted a naked (presumably adult) couple in recline. The tattoo is on her right shoulder and was exposed by dint of a strappy singlet-ey type top.

Now, before I get stuck in, let me say that I think everyone behaved poorly in this situation.

You would think that at some point, if you have naked people tattooed on your back, someone is going to say something. Tattoos that are clearly visible when normally clothed, as Ms Bull was, are attention-seeking devices. If you want one, fine, have one, but when you put nude reclining people on your back, you have to live with the consequences.

It's like the goose who drew those cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed. If there's one thing you don't do, it's annoy people in a religion not known for its tolerance of blasphemy (intended or otherwise).

In this case, a woman in a public place with a tattoo of naked people on her back got an adverse reaction. And she never saw it coming! She's either spectacularly naive, spectacularly stupid, or wants even more attention for her tattoo which personally I reckon is ugly and tasteless.

Nudity in itself is not offensive but you know what people are like. So the Jetstar crew, in an effort to avoid dramas from people like my Aunty Betty, they asked her to put a crew jacket on (Aunty Betty called my father one Sunday morning to complain about the Pizza Hut stuffed crust campaign which was amusingly titled 'Get Stuffed' and asked him to preach against it in his next sermon).

Except, they did it all the wrong way. In my many years of travelling, I have discovered that QANTAS and QANTAS-related companies foster a particularly narky type of flight attendant and it appears that Little Ms Nark was unable to tactfully handle the situation. So she didn't even try. She stuffed the whole thing up and embarrassed Ms Bull.

Ms Bull, however, went screaming to the media about it. I reckon she's making herself look like an idiot with statements like:

"It was humiliating. I couldn't see the problem. [Because of the straps] nobody could have worked out what the picture was. I was very embarrassed." Well, they did work it out, sweetheart.

"I felt like I had been singled out. I have never experienced anything like that before." Well, as I said earlier, you have an attention-seeking drawing on your body. You got the attention you want. It's on your back, by the way, so you can't see it, so it's obviously for others.

"It's not sexual." This one is debatable, I suppose. Like I said, nudity itself is not offensive and it has only become so because of irritating puritans like Aunty Betty. But what little could be seen of it certainly looked it, even if on very close inspection it wasn't. The question 'but why?' screams loudly, however.

The lunatic from the Council of Civil Liberties weighed in.

"Cameron Murphy, president of the NSW Council for Civil Liberties, said it was a censorship issue. He said staff should be encouraging people to fly rather than policing body art.

"I think the operators of Jetstar should be more sensible," he said. "It's really an issue of freedom of expression. There's no particular reason why something like that could cause any problem for people."

(Source: The Sydney Morning Herald)

Again, he's right, but he's wrong. Freedom of expression, speech, whatever, brings responsibility. You have to wear the consequences of your expression (like the cartoonist) as long as those consequences are in line with community standards (riots, clearly, are not). Community standards currently do not allow public nudity or public display of nudity. Hell, if a female nipple is depicted in a video game it is refused classification on the grounds it contravenes these same standards (that's another argument for another day).

The Jetstar crew handled the situation appallingly, citing children and other passengers may be offended rather than stating it was part of their job and they were just trying to avoid hassles, both for Ms Bull's and their own sake. Simon Westaway, Jetstar's pugnacious and aggravating spokesman, summed it up for the airline:

"Our cabin crew aren't the social police," Mr Westaway said. "[But] at the end of the day the comfort of all the passengers needs to be taken into consideration. Our cabin crew clearly felt that they needed to ask her to cover up a little bit."

(Source: The Sydney Morning Herald)

Ms Bull sparked the media interest because a complaint call was batted away with the standard 'send a letter.' She sent the letter on Friday but didn't get her public apology by Monday night so off she went. Jetstar reckon they haven't got the letter.

What a bunch of idiots, the lot of them.

But what started it was an example of attention-seeking behaviour. People get these tattoos to gain some attention - 'Oh, what a cool tattoo.' 'Oh, wow, that's a bit risque...'

She got the attention she didn't want and kicked up a stink. I have spiky hair and wear weird sunglasses. People poke fun at me and I take it with good humour because I have made that choice to look a little different to most people. I don't go crying to the media when I get a reaction contrary to what I want.

I Love It When A Plan Works Out

Democracy. Funny word, funnier concept.

You see, the Americans love it. Except when it delivers the 'wrong' verdict. I speak of Palestine, well, the bits that the Israelis haven't unilaterally annexed/invaded without fear of recrimination or backlash.

Anyway, you may have heard they had an election and the hardline nutcases won. Hamas.

Now, I don't know a heap about Middle East politics really, but I know that nobody, apart from the Palestinian people, wanted Hamas in charge. Since Arafat's untimely death Fatah have gone nowhere. By Middle East standards, Fatah were moderates and were at least chatting peacefully with the Israelis despite turning down deals from the likes of Ehud Barak which may just have brought a semblance of peace - by dint of a good slice of Jerusalem - and some stability for the area.

And stacks of tourist bucks into the bargain.

Anyway, the West have now stepped back and said that there was to be no more cash for the Palestinian Authority as a result of Hamas' fairly unpleasant view of Israel (wipe 'em out) and generally fundamentalist Islamic overtones. Oh, and they keep sending kids strapped with bombs into crowded buses and markets. Allegedly.

The new right-wing German Chancellor has told the EU not to fund them, the Americans via Conaleeza Rice have backed off and pretty much anyone is in a flap. At least for Westerners, this is a no-brainer. They're Islamic, a bit naughty so we can't fund them.

Here's a tricky one - What if you're Egypt?

The Egyptians have been pretty patient with the Palestinian Authority for reasons known only to themselves. Egypt, while Islamic, is a pretty easygoing kind of place but have stuck up for the Authority. This might have something to do with the Israelis inflicting a pretty humiliating defeat in their Barak-led invasion, but that's probably only part of the story. Basically, the Egyptians aren't going to put up with Hamas' crap.

Except the Islamic countries are banding together with each other no matter how nutty some of their members are. The foot-stomping Western rhetoric that greeted the Iranian President's absurd utterances about wiping out Israel was not really accompanied by the more moderate Muslim countries either taking him aside and giving him a swift kick in the pants or a public, 'Well, er, his comments have been taken out of context'-type utterance. They said 'ooh-eer' but that was about it.

They just kept quiet. It's unlikely they agree with him because the Americans will preserve Israel seeing they had a big hand in starting this whole mess (albeit via the UN) and they also let Israel get away with routine murder and pillage. I can't see the Egyptians subscribing to either the Iranians' or the Hamas view of the world.

They're being backed into a corner now because if Hamas get a bit funky with the Israelis (and they'll get funky back) there is going to be a huge battle. And the Islamic countries will have no choice but to join in, at least in a supportive sense and make the American countries cranky. Think about it - American troops might be having to blast Egyptians, Indonesians, Afghanis and Malaysians. Unlikely, but possible.

The Americans and the Egyptians are surely going to have to get themselves into a room and start to talk about this. Hamas are unlikely to talk to the Americans and the Americans themselves will have to break their own 'We don't negotiate with terrorists' rule.

This one is going to get interesting...

Sydney Light Rail Debate: Amusing

Sydney's love affair with arguing about something they clearly need has always been entertaining, but the Sydney Morning Herald's 'City In A Jam' series has been particularly so.

Stupidly, I can't remember all of the names involved and therefore may not be called upon to reliably remember actual facts, but the argument began to get quite heated on January 17 when a pro-bus lobbyist-type person called John Lee jumped on the 'buy more buses' bandwagon. He said buses only take up 1% of CBD traffic (ha!) and that buses can carry more passengers per hour than light rail. Obfuscation of statistics can be fun and he really took that ball and ran with it.

Lee also says that trams aren't any better for the environment compared to buses because they move the emissions back to the generation source. Well, yes, but power stations extract a better burn from their coal than diesel buses (remember those CNG buses? Yeah, me neither.) and it certainly removes the airborne particulate problem that is blighting Sydney. Well, part of it anyway.

Lee also cited problems with ticket integration and most amusingly, cited a 1908 (!) report into trams on city roads.

'A 1908 royal commission into city improvement recommended that Sydney's trams be replaced with buses. It concluded trams were inflexible, expensive, and took up too much room.'

1908? He went on to give some ridiculous costing and failed singularly to miss the point - by giving outlandish costings of pricing trams vs buses, prattled on about Euro III emissions buses (running at about 120db, making Sydney inordinately noisy) and failing to account for all the technologies in place in countries all over the world, some of them technically third world, where people have use one ticket.

Priceless. Who is John Lee, you ask? He's the CEO of Sydney Buses. His background? Communications...as in spin...hmmm.

The very next day, the guy who runs Metro Transport (they run the Monorail and the SLRT), Kevin Warrell responded.

'Travelling on the light rail in the CBD would not cost more. The CBD light rail proposal put to the NSW Government involves no increase in overall fares to passengers who would purchase a joint bus-light rail ticket. When light rail is implemented in the right place, the cost per passenger is lower than bus or heavy rail. Compared with, say, a bus transitway, light rail is exceptional value.'

'As for passengers changing modes, it works in Singapore, Paris, London and virtually every other major city in the world. Many Sydney commuters interchange every day, and CityRail is introducing more interchanges as part of its clearways proposal. The key is designing the interchange to work efficiently for passengers.'

Naturally, he would err on the side of light rail considering he's going to be front and centre if a tender ever gets handed out. Note, however, he mentioned having light rail 'in the right place.' Lee reckons light rail is no good at all. You ask a Melbourne-ite who lives in the inner city about trams and most will say they are terrific.

In an article published in the Herald on January 10, Garry Glazebrook, a transport consultant, predicted that there will be another 2000 buses on Sydney's roads by 2021. The same story said that the Opposition Leader, Peter Debnam, promised to put light rail down straight after he wins the next NSW election.

Fat chance.

Sorry, that wasn't fair. Good on him, but only if he actually does it. He's a big L Liberal, not small, so I can't see him going all gooey and environmental that quickly. I smell a rat when I read on and he talks about positively Communist ideas by extending light rail out to Parramatta and the Northern Beaches. And, bizarrely, Wollongong. He did prevent a riot by not mentioning Bondi. The residents would have gone ballistic.

Government Transport Minister John Watkins immediately went on the attack, saying, 'I'm not convinced that whacking light rail tracks down one or two of our major city streets is the answer to congestion in Sydney because it means you would have to ban motor vehicles from those streets.'

Ahem. John. Next time you're in your chauffeur-driven limo reading the paper, say, 'I say, James, take me to Melbourne this instant. They have trams, you know, and damn it all, I want to see a city with no motor vehicles on the streets.'

Good grief, man, are you an idiot? Nobody says you have to ban cars from the city (it would help, though) and why not put a congestion charge on to do just that? Oops...sorry...can't do that, can you? That would decrease the toll take for those public-private partnerships.

And therein lies the problem. The NSW government, current and past, has got so deep into these ridiculous public-private partnerships that they're stuck. In a response to a blog post on the same SMH website, a reader asked why NSW politicians can't open their mouths without sounding like they're applying for a job at Macquarie Bank. Sydney desperately needs light rail to reduce its dependence on buses and to improve the efficiency of not just the existing bus and heavy rail networks but the entire city. The CBD is coming under increasing pressure as more trips to the city by people (up 32% by 2020) for business and pleasure place the already staggering network under more pressure.

Watkins again: 'We haven't closed the door to light rail … but my priority as Minister for Transport has to be getting the heavy rail system running correctly because that is how you move the majority of people in and out of the CBD.'

Rubbish. His priority is to build and maintain an integrated transport network to avoid the staggering annual losses calculated to be $18bn as a result of an entire city that is virtually gridlocked. Heavy rail is not the only answer and he is indeed part of a government that abandons heavy rail projects that will do just as he wants - get people in and out of the CBD. The Parramatta-Chatswood line would have kept thousands of daily commuters out of the CBD and therefore out of that part of the network, but they bailed at Epping, of all places. So more people having to drag their sore feet through the CBD.

Sydney's problem is that the Government keeps building roads and the people of Sydney fill them while the rail network is awash with angry, often stranded, passengers. The buses are caught in the traffic and light rail is just a dream. Running a light rail line down George and looped back up Castlereagh would be of immense use to Sydney. It will get hundreds of buses off George St, be an opportunity to build spangly new ticketing and interchange systems and reduce both air and noise pollution (why do those buses have to be so loud?).

What is the Government priority? Who knows. But it's not getting Sydney moving.

Howard Government Reshuffle

How the talentless have fallen...

Senator Hill's resignation from politics and Senator McGauran's supremely self-interested 'defection' to the other side of conservative Australian politics had some interesting effects on the Howard Government's new ministerial line-up.

I'm constantly amazed by the way such an organisation as the Parliamentary team conducts themselves. Nobody really seems to know what Howard thinks and it's as though he operates on a different plane (well, he does literally...nice jet, John) and hearing Downer say optimistic things about keeping Foreign Affairs is extraordinary. Why would he be sacked? Why was he worried? Despite thinking he's an insufferable prig, I reckon he's a passable Foreign Minister and Hill was a passable Defence Minister despite shipping people off to other people's wars.

Anyway, the pugnacious Kay Patterson has bitten the dust. Good. Her response to Jackie Kelly's attack on the Government's child care 'policy' was arrogant and ill-thought out. 'Ms Kelly is not privy to Cabinet discussions.'

No, and neither are the child-care using public. Does that mean we aren't qualified to sink the size 12s into the Government's shocking mismanagement of such an important sector? Patterson's attitude seems to mirror that of the Government's - you voted us in, now sit down, shut-up and do as we tell you (don't blame me, I voted for Labor, despite Mark Latham).

Malcolm Turnbull has been strategically moved to Parliamentary Secretary (yawn) and spokesman for Water Policy (ah-ha, now we're talking). Turnbull is about to make the hapless NSW Premier Morris Iemma wish he hadn't been born. Again, Turnbull is insufferable, more so than Downer, but he has a good line on water. He seems to understand the issues in both urban and rural areas and hates the NSW Government's decree to place a desalination plant at Kurnell in Sydney's south.

The desalination plant was announced by former Premier Bob Carr days before his resignation. I reckon his resignation had much to do with the backlash that accompanied this ludicrous idea - he had, for the first time, completely misjudged the reaction. Before that, he knew when stuff was going to be unpopular and took measures to ensure the people of NSW were going to like it. He had nowhere to go with this one, it was a total stuff-up. Like the arrogant Federal Government, this arrogant State Government wasn't interested in debate or input. He copped it good and proper and resigned shortly after his return from the United Arab Emirates.

Anyway, Turnbull is going to heap large amounts of ridicule on anything Iemma and his cruddy government suggest to do with anything, but particularly water policy. Turnbull loves Sydney with an unnatural passion and anything the car-loving, pollution-encouraging NSW state government announces will be greeted with the calculated derision for which Turnbull is famous. It was a shrewd decision by Howard - he hasn't been around long enough to really be given a senior ministerial position, he's got a big, well-educated mouth and, crucially, a score to settle with the NSW Government who effectively booted his wife out of the mayoral position in Sydney in a failed attempt to wrest control of the City of Sydney. It will make Costello happy because he'll have to stop agitating about tax reform (he's quoted on SMH as saying he can only talk about his portfolio) and that means that Howard's leadership will be under slightly less pressure as a result.

Mr Teflon strikes again. Jammy git. So Howard comes out smelling of roses, will no doubt name yet another sportsperson as Australian of the Year [edit: ok, I got that wrong. It was funny, though...], continue to use the Government's Boeing Business Jet as his personal limousine and sip tea and sup scones on the verandah of Sydney's Kirribilli House. It's good to be the King. Pity he's a mindless populist who listens to the opinion of Alan Jones...

Various Boring Whinges

...that no-one else will listen to.

Here you will read me ranting on about the governments of the day, both domestic (Australian) and international.

There will be some informed and uninformed belligerence towards the decisions of corporates, NGOs and government organisations. Mostly I hope you will be amused into thinking and eventually acting if you have the capacity to do so.

Bear in mind that these are my own opinions and, unless I say so, are based on hearsay, media reports and personal experience.

Enjoy.