Melbourne. Winter 1990 :

"This is for filthy, scumbag, degenerate, thieving, throwing up smackies everywhere. Rot in peace."


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"Catastrophic" Fire Conditions Expected In South Australia Today

The still-fresh horror of February's Victorian bushfire holocaust puts an extremely grim perspective on all such warnings now from the Bureau Of Meteorology :

Wednesday, 18 November 2009 is forecast to be very hot and dry for most of South Australia. Fresh northwesterly winds over the pastorals and parts of the northern agricultural districts will shift fresh southwesterly during the day.

Catastrophic Fire Danger [100+] is forecast for the Northwest Pastoral and Flinders

Extreme Fire Danger [75-99] is forecast for the Northeast Pastoral, Eastern Eyre Peninsula and Mid North

Severe Fire Danger [50-74] is forecast for the Riverland Total Fire Ban district.

The Country Fire Service advises that fires burning under these conditions are likely to be fast moving, unpredictable and uncontrollable

The BoM alert was issued at 4.25pm Tuesday afternoon.

ABC News reported last night that residents in Catastrophic Fire Danger regions of South Australia had only until this morning to get out :

CFS strategic services manager Mick Ayre says residents of the North West Pastoral and Flinders districts must decide whether they will stay or go as soon as possible.

"The best advice we can give you is to think very carefully about whether you can withstand or fight a fire on a day of catastrophic fire ratings," he said.

Mr Ayre says if people decide to leave, they must be gone by early tomorrow morning at the latest.

"In a catastrophic fire danger situation, no houses are definitely guaranteed to survive," he said.

"If you decide to stay you could die in the attempt to save your property... "

A volunteer fire fighter told the ABC two-thirds of the people who lived in areas under 'Catastrophic Fire Danger" were still not aware, by yesterday evening, that they might have to make a potentially live saving decision by this morning.



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"Imprisonment, Coerced Abortions, Embezzlement, Physical Violence, Blackmail"

Australian Senator Rips Into Church Of Scientology

Xenophon Vs Xenu

By Darryl Mason

The story breaks on Twitter, via journalist Latika Bourke :

(Senator Nick) Xenophon says claims of covered up murders, blackmail, torture, imprisonment and forced abortions within Church of Scientology.

Senator Nick Xenophon today, under parliamentary privilege :

Scientology is not a religious organisation. It is a criminal organisation that hides behind its so-called religious beliefs.

What you believe does not mean you are not accountable for how you behave.

The letters received by me which were written by former followers in Australia contains extensive allegations of crimes and abuses that are truly shocking. Crimes against them and crimes they say they were coerced into committing.

There are allegations of false imprisonment, coerced abortions and embezzlement of church funds; of physical violence and intimidation, blackmail and the widespread and deliberate abuse of information obtained by the organisation.

What we are seeing is a worldwide pattern of abuse and criminality. On the body of evidence, this is not happening by accident, it is happening by design.

These victims of Scientology claim it is an abusive, manipulative, violent and criminal organisation, and that criminality is condoned at the highest levels.

Senator Xenophon said he received eight letters from former members of the Church of Scientology after he first raised questions about the legitimacy of the church's tax exempt status. He has passed the letters alleging criminal activity onto the police and has called for more former members to come forward if they were witness to criminality inside the organisation.

Xenophon wants both police and parliamentary investigations into the Church of Scientology and a full review of its tax exempt status.

The Church Of Scientology quickly released a two page statement accusing Nick Xenophon of "Xenophobia".

Note the precise use of emotional trigger words throughout the statement :

"Senator Xenophon is obviously being pressured by former members who use hate speech..."

"Senator Xenophon's attempts to marginalise Scientologists....is fascistic and violates freedom of speech..."

"former members are notoriously unreliable as witnesses"

"this is a propaganda campaign that would suit a totalitarian regime, not Australia"

In a further attempt to cast immediate suspicion on the claims made by the whistleblowers and Senator Xenophon, the statement from the Church of Scientology also includes this lengthy quote from a British sociologist :

"The disaffected and the apostate are in particular informants whose evidence has to be used with circumspection. The apostate is generally in need of self-justification. He seeks to reconstruct his own past, to excuse his former affiliations, and to blame those who were formerly his closest associates. Not uncommonly the apostate learns to rehearse an ‘atrocity story’ to explain how, by manipulation, trickery, coercion, or deceit, he was induced to join or to remain within an organization that he now forswears and condemns. Apostates, sensationalized by the press, have sometimes sought to make a profit from accounts of their experiences in stories sold to newspapers..."

Presumably, Senator Xenophon is aware how far the Church of Scientology has gone in the past to foul the names of its critics, and those who accuse it of criminality, and illegitimacy.

The Church of Scientology should have taken up the suggestion of The Chaser's @DomKnight that Senator Xenophon is guilty of blatant Xenuphobia.

But the Church of Scientology don't like to talk about Xenu, in public :

(Xenu was) the dictator of the "Galactic Confederacy" who, 75 million years ago, brought billions of his people to Earth in a DC-8-like spacecraft, stacked them around volcanoes and killed them using hydrogen bombs. Official Scientology dogma holds that the essences of these many people remained, and that they form around people in modern times, causing them spiritual harm

This is John Travolta as Xenu :



The Xenophon Review into the tax exempt status of the Church of Scientology should, of course, be extended to review the tax exempt status of all Australian churches and religious organisations.

UPDATE : Comments from Prime Minister Rudd :

"Many people in Australia have real concerns about Scientology."

"I share some of those concerns. Let us proceed carefully and look carefully at the material he has provided before we make a decision on further parliamentary action."

Nick Xenophon's Full Speech

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Certified Punk Boffin

Dr Karl catches some awesome, with help from Frenzal Rhomb's Jason Whalley :



A brilliant example of how to get your message out, in song, without being a boring, evangelising trout.

About 30 seconds into the video, the words "believing silly things" appear over a copy of The Bible. And yet, Dr Karl recorded the vocals for this song wearing a Jesus t-shirt :



I suppose that's kind of punk....

More Immeasurable Hurt?

The Professional Idiot has admitted he obsessively reads Crikey articles, editorials and comments in a quest to note down every nasty or rude thing someone writes about his delicate self. He has a reputation to protect, apparently.

A letter from Andrew Bolt to Crikey publisher Eric Beecher :

Last week I drew your attention to comments and blog postings you had published over the space of just a few days calling me a “proven liar”, “nutty”, “unhinged”, “underhand”, “loopy”, “paranoid”, a “hypocrite”, a “racist”, “dishonest”, “hysterical”, “petty”, “evasive”, “deluded”, “irrational”, lacking in morality, someone guilty of “deliberately misrepresenting” people, “full of poisonous shit”, and a “notorious liar” who practices “lies, misrepresentations, and deceit”, “lies, distortions and smears”, “fakery” and “cowardice and dishonesty”, while giving “tacit approval” to “extremist sickos” and “playing the paranoid schizo’’, resembling in my person an “asylum for the criminally insane”. You conceded that these comments included a number of statements that were “untrue and unnecessarily personal in tone”.

Diddums.

Bolt was also very upset by this piece from Crikey's Pollytics back in April :

The Herald Sun's Andrew Bolt actually thinks Crikey contributors want to anally violate him with calculating devices. No, he really, really does :

I’m still considering how to respond to Crikey’s “quality journalism”, especially after this latest foul claim, and any lawyer should consider themselves free to advise.

Or does he mean "advise for free"?

Any Murdoch journalist considering taking legal against bloggers for allegedly causing hurt of the immeasurable kind should keep in mind Blair's Law :

As a blog war intensifies, the probability of lawyers being called in to protect the glass jaw of the more cowardly party approaches 1.

– Inspired by the precedent set by the aborted 2009 defamation case of (Australian journalist/blogger) Tim Blair vs Teh Left.

Someone in comments at Bolt's is suggesting they start a legal defence fund for their conspiracy-addled Guru Of Truthernessnessness.

Piffling pseudo-threats of legal action against Crikey by journalists and lawyers in the Murdoch empire make more sense when you remember that not only is Crikey a powerful and influential critic of the Murdoch media, but they are also online Australian news media competition in a crowded market.


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Clive James is massacred in a brutal book review in the Daily Mail. Highlights :

He tells us he is a frequent guest at Sandringham and that the Prince of Wales has dined at his house...we recall that what James remains best known for is showing us clips on television of Japanese game shows....James's fiction - Brilliant Creatures, The Remake, The Silver Castle - is total tosh...he seems to be making a desperate attempt to be associated, to be connected....Happy with the fact he has an 'ungovernable ego', James ought to be flung into the recycling bin with his drivel...at some curious, crass level the clumsy swagger humanises him - as if he's unaware of how awful he is...The reader cringes on James's behalf, wishing he wasn't such a prize prat....Television brought James the riches and fame he craved. But as far as his ambitions to have been an artist of merit are concerned, he squandered his talent, which is tragic. Then again, to witness how fatuous and conceited he has become is pure comedy

Jealous.

More Here

This Is Your Brain On Meep



A high school principal in Boston is attempting to ban students from saying, or yelling, or even wearing, the word 'Meep'.

He robocalled parents and threatened expulsion from school and possible police action for all students who refused to stop saying "Meep".

When a New York lawyer contacted the school with a simple message, 'Meep', the assistant principal told him his e-mail had been forwarded to police.

Meep


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November 2000 : Saddam Hussein announces Iraqi oil will be priced in euros, not US dollars.

March 2003 :




Mid-2003 : Iraq's oil goes back to being priced in US dollars, not euros.

November 2009 :

“The idea that an oil company was participating in the drafting of the Iraqi Constitution leaves me speechless”

100,000 to 1 million : Number of Iraqis estimated to have been violently killed during the War On Iraq.

5 million : Number of Iraqi children left orphaned by the War On Iraq.

6000 : Approximate number of coalition government and American private corporation soldiers and agents killed during the War On Iraq.

1 in 4 American soldiers returning from Iraq require ongoing medical and mental health care.

70% of Iraqi children are believed to be suffering trauma-related symptoms as a result of the War On Iraq.

(source)

115 billion barrels : Iraq's estimated oil wealth

340,000 barrels : Estimate of oil consumed by the Pentagon per day.

Possessing the world's largest fleet of modern aircraft, helicopters, ships, tanks, armored vehicles, and support systems - virtually all powered by oil - the Department of Defense (DoD) is the world's leading consumer of petroleum.

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Chuck Norris pontificating on how The Elites Are Faking Global Warming To Create A One World Government is the very definition of 'conspiracy porn' :



Good times.

Fox News is now The Alex Jones Show, but with a bigger budget and flashier graphics.

Cinema used to be such stupid fun.

Smokey October sunsets over Sydney

















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It's Still Shit, But We Like It Now

In April, 2009, Chris Mitchell, the editor of The Australian, compared 140 character messages on Twitter to acclaimed BBC TV dramas and Oscar winning movies and found that Twitter messages are lacking, in depth and detail and profoundosity.

Mitchell predicted the fast demise of the global message distributor, under the headline Time Is Up For Twitter.

Like swine influenza, technologies such as Twitter race around the world before spluttering out.

...the story it tells about the latest online fad is always the same. Like diseases that must mutate to infect ever more hosts, transitory technologies have an enormous impact until people build up resistance...

Twitter's 140-character message format is a content-killer, leaving most tweets with the compelling content of those "I'm on the bus" mobile phone conversations impossible to avoid on public transport.

Stupid, useless Twitter.

But wait!

Octoher, 2009 : More than 50 million people visit Twitter each month. One if five internet users are doing something Twitter-related on a regular basis.

And so, today :



Just in case..

Alf's 94 year old hand





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Why Are Murdoch Journalists Who Claim "Global Warming Is A Lefty Scam" So Afraid To Confront Or Challenge The 'Climate Change Propaganda' Of Their Own Boss?

By Darryl Mason

A collection of quotes from Rupert Murdoch on Climate Change and Corporate Green brainwashing via his massive world media empire :

"Climate change poses clear, catastrophic threats. We may not agree on the extent, but we certainly can't afford the risk of inaction.

"We're starting with our own carbon footprint. Not nothing. But much of what we're doing is already, or soon will be, little more than the standard way of doing business. We can do something that's unique, different from just any other company. We can set an example, and we can reach our audiences. Our audience's carbon footprint is 10,000 times bigger than ours. That's the carbon footprint we want to conquer."

"Becoming carbon neutral is only the beginning. The climate problem will not be solved by one company reducing its emissions to zero, and it won't be solved by one government acting alone. The climate problem will not be solved without mass participation by the general public in countries around the globe."

"Imagine if we succeed in inspiring our audiences to reduce their own impacts on climate change by just one percent. That would be like turning the State of California off for almost two months."

"News Corporation, today, reaches people at home and at work... when they're thinking... when they're laughing... and when they are making choices that have enormous impact. The unique potential.. and duty.. of a media company are to help its audiences connect to the issues that define our time."

"We need to push ourselves to make as many reductions as possible in our own energy use first.. and that takes time. But we must do this quickly.. the climate will not wait for us."

"While we reduce our own carbon footprint we will encourage the companies who truck our DVDs and newspapers, sell us paper, and provide an enormous range of products and services.. to all contribute."

"Some of our businesses use more energy than others, but our strategy everywhere is the same.. first, reduce our use of energy as much as possible. Then, switch to renewable sources of power where it makes economic sense. And, over time, as a last resort, offset the emissions we can't avoid."

"We could make a difference just by holding our emissions steady as our businesses continue to grow. But that doesn't seem to be enough: we want to go all the way to zero. Today, I am announcing our intention to be carbon neutral, across all our businesses, by 2010."

"We're not a manufacturer, or an airline, but we do use energy. Printing and publishing newspapers, producing films, broadcasting television signals, operating 24-hour newsrooms. It all adds carbon to the atmosphere."

"Climate change and energy use are global problems. News Corp is a global company. Our operations affect the environment all over the world."

"I have to admit that, until recently, I was somewhat wary of the (global) warming debate. I believe it is now our responsibility to take the lead on this issue."

Murdoch journalists like Tim Blair, Andrew Bolt and Piers Akerman, all well know that their own boss is the world's most influential distributor of what they call "global warming fearmongery", but they'd prefer their readers to get all shouty and hepped up about Tim Flannery and Al Gore and the ABC instead.

Why? Because they know if they did go after Rupert Murdoch's "climate change catastrophe" fearmongery, with the same venom and repetition that they go after scientists and academics and celebrity activists, they'd get fired.

Their silence, and credibility, has been brought. Willingly. Without a fight.

If Blair, Bolt and Akerman truly believe that climate change and carbon neutrality is now being used to introduce 'World Government' then why are they still taking money from Rupert Murdoch?


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With This Ring, I Thee Dead

Author Tara Moss, as the zombie bride, is ready for Halloween :



I had to extract some of my brain matter with a skewer in payment for that photo. I may be fuzzy for a few weeks.

In other Halloween related news, American Christian extremist Pat Robertson's website is warning Americans not to celebrate/have fun on Halloween. Why? Demon candy :

"Most of the candy sold during this season has been dedicated and prayed over by witches. I do not buy candy during the Halloween season. Curses are sent through the tricks and treats of the innocent whether they get it by going door to door or by purchasing it from the local grocery store. The demons cannot tell the difference."

Stupid demons.

"Halloween is much more than a holiday filled with fun and tricks or treats. It is a time for the gathering of evil that masquerades behind the fictitious characters of Dracula, werewolves, mummies and witches on brooms. The truth is that these demons that have been presented as scary cartoons actually exist. I have prayed for witches who are addicted to drinking blood and howling at the moon."

Fantastic!

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Powderfinger's new album, Golden Rule, is out November 13. Hope they give it a rest on all the ballads this time out. The 'return to hard rock' album is now a few albums overdue.

First single, All Of The Dreamers :





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Blair's Law RIP : 2002-2009

In 2002, pro-Bush, and enthusiastic pro-Bush Wars, blogger Tim Blair founded the term 'Blair's Law'. It caused brief excitement in the American pro-Bush blogstream, and was defined in the Urban Dictionary as :

"...the ongoing process by which the world's multiple idiocies are becoming one giant, useless force."

But in June 2009, the Urban Dictionary listed a new definition, and notes, for Blair's Law :

From The Urban Dictionary :

Blair's Law : As a blog war intensifies, the probability of lawyers being called in to protect the glass jaw of the more cowardly party approaches 1.

– Inspired by the precedent set by the aborted 2009 defamation case of (Australian journalist/blogger) Tim Blair vs Teh Left.

TB: “My girlfriend’s been fighting all my battles for me under a pseudonym, but we got caught out and now my tough-guy reputation is in tatters. How am I going to weasel my way out of this one?”

JB: “Only Blair's law can save you now, my chinless friend.”

However, if you Google 'Blair's Law' and click the Urban Dictionary link, you will find all definitions and even the listing itself has been deleted.

Disappeared.

Instead, you are taken to the Urban Dictionary listing for former British prime minister, Tony Blair.

Online fame can be so fleeting.

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ABC Gets More Complaints About The Chaser Than Its Alleged Bias

The Chaser's @chaslicc (Chas Licciardello) notes that The Chaser's final series of The War On Everything garnered the most complaints from viewers of any show aired on the ABC in 2009, so far.

As a testament to the extraordinary power of The Chaser to generate MoralOutrage! controversy, according to the below story from The Age, the show also pulled the most complaints in 2008, even though The War On Everything was taking a year off.



Ari Sharp, The Age :

The guerilla comedy program attracted a total of 4995 complaints....4286 of which were in relation to the Make a Realistic Wish Foundation sketch that featured children with terminal illnesses.

That featured actors portraying children with terminal illnesses.

ABC copped 32.130 complaints in the year, but only around 10 per cent of those complaints were for "bias." There are no breakdowns to reveal how many of those "bias" complaints came from Gerard Henderson, or readers of Andrew "World Government!" Bolt. You'd assume many.

And Ari Sharp reminds readers of a crucial fact to keep in mind the next time you hear endless bitching about "that's my bloody 10 cents a day they're spending so John Safran can snog a hot Swede!"

Newspoll found that 89 per cent of people value the broadcaster and its services to the community, up 1 percentage point, while those who believe quality programming offered by ABC television was steady at 82 per cent...

Remind commenters at certain other blogs of those stats the next time you see them whining about how the ABC "doesn't give Australians what they want!" or some other fringe minority grievance.


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Doogle

Google Australia is running a competition for school children to doodle up their logo. The national winner gets their artwork displayed on the Google homepage for 24 hours (it will be seen by millions) and wins $10,000 of tech gear for their school.

Here's an early entry, from Madeline Hunter, age 7 :


Madeline writes of her excellent doogle :

"I hope Australia will be sunny all the time and everyone will be happy."

More Doodle Google Entries Here

Therese Rein Challenges Corporate Australia To Sponsor Disabled Athletes

By Darryl Mason

Therese Rein, through her employment agency, helped thousands of disabled and work-injured Australians find jobs and build careers. Her new challenge :




I hope it works. My eldest sister has long dreamed of attending the Special Olympics one day, and she and her friends might get there, if the corporate sponsorship of disabled athletes picks up. It costs a lot of money to attend, because carers, travel and special equipment have to be paid for, mostly out of the pockets of parents or friends.

Therese Rein :

What Paralympians do is they don't focus on what doesn't work, they focus on making what does work, work to the max. And that's what my dad did. And I think I've learnt a little bit about how to do that from him.

An interview of Therese Rein by The 7.30 Report's Kerry O'Brien can be read, or viewed, here.

UPDATE : Here's the interview :



A reaction to Therese Rein's campaign for corporate sponsorship of disabled athletes from the Herald Sun's associate editor, Andrew Bolt (a regular guest of ABCs Insiders, Channel Nine's The Today Show and Channel Ten's The 7PM Project) :



Oh, how droll.

This is all this repulsive creature has got left now - encouraging his readers to go the wife of the prime minister because she devoted a substantial part of her life to helping disabled people, in honour of her paraplegic father, and wants to continue doing this important work.

You can contact the 7PM Report here

And Channel Nine's Today Show here

And ABC's Insiders' here

Feel free to let them know what you think of their decisions to include Andrew Bolt as a regular guest on their programs.

Or you can visit his blog, look at the advertisers and contact them, and suggest they sponsor disabled athletes instead of the empathy challenged, like him.

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