John Birmingham on revelations from data-mining of the controversial My School website :

...underfunded, under-resourced and hugely unappreciated public school teachers are doing a much better job with what little they have than their colleagues in the fee factories.

It makes you wonder, doesn't it, what sort of results the taxpayer might get from the public school system, if it were showered with some of the treasure currently spent on elite private schools.

More Here

Don't Try And Lick The Screen

An Australian documentary on cane toads, in 3D no less, is getting some huge raves at the Sundance Film Festival :

Director Mark Lewis hopes his film -- "Cane Toads: The Conquest" -- will encourage the public to take a different view of the creatures, which are reviled as a pest and a threat to indigenous species in Australia.

It is the second time the Austalian film-maker has investigated the toads, which were introduced to the country in 1935 in a misguided attempt to control beetles ravaging sugar cane fields in the tropical northeast.

"For me, the 3D allowed us to get a point of view closer to the toads and to give a real perspective to the conquest," Lewis told AFP.

"In a way, it's my 'Ava-toads,'" he joked, referring to James Cameron's record-breaking science-fiction film "Avatar."

Avatoads! Brilliant. If those marketing this movie don't run hard with the Avatoads catch line, they're crazy.

What a stunning statistic of the ability of cane toads to infest a new environment - 12 cane toads were released in Australia 75 years ago. There are now estimated to be 1.5 billion.

The 3D doco's director, Mark Lewis, shares his thoughts on why cane toads are not a menace, here.

A reviewer from the LA Times :




I can't find a trailer for Cane Toads : The Conquest, or any footage online. Presumably there will be some soon.


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Cock Of The Walk

The Daily Telegraph isn't joking, this really is their top story :



The reason why you will never see Kevin Rudd parading down a public road in speedos is because he's hung like Matt Shirvington, and secret polls taken by his PR people have revealed that the majority of Australian males will never vote for a man endowed beyond the national average. One who has to kick, instead of tap.

True story.

Would I lie to you?



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Puzzle Man Liked By Elderly

Isn't it good to see the youth of today concerned about their future?

From the Sunshine Coast Daily, here are the tour promoters for world government conspiracy theorist Christopher Monckton's recent Australian romp :



It cost more than $120,000 to bring Monckton to Australia for a few media appearances and speaking dates. Well, he does call himself a Lord, after all.

Crikey claims Gina Rinehart helped pay the bills for Monckton's tour.

A mining heiress helped fund national tour by an anti-renewable industries activist....

What a coincidence!

Ten Global Warming Anti-Commandments


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Turnbull Disappears Thousands Of Comments From His Blog

Late last year, two weeks after he was Abbotted from the Liberal Party leadership, Malcolm Turnbull turned to his blog to get his message out about why he thought an ETS was vital, and why so many of his Liberal Party colleagues were fuckwits (obviously I'm summing up his opinions).

What was even more remarkable about very recent former leader of the Liberal Party venting on his blog was that he chose to leave the comments unmoderated. Visitors to his blog could, and did, say anything they wanted. For about six weeks. A few of his posts racked up more than 1000 comments each, probably an Australian personal blog comment record. There was plenty of support for Turnbull, but you rarely see a politician allow such a torrent of abuse at themselves to appear on their blog.

Recently, Turnbull cleaned house at his blog and deleted all the comments. Most of the comments from a post he wrote about climate change are still in Google Cache here.

This comment was up on Turnbull's blog for at least three weeks, read by tens of thousands of people :

Ben 12:23am :

The only reason Turnbull stuck to his guns in trying to ram through the ETS bill before the public had a chance to understand it was... Mal has vested interests.

As previous chairman of Goldman Sachs (who bank rolled Obama's Presidential campaign and will manage the global ETS scam), and with a 500 million dollar (including interest) joint law suit over Mal's head, in the wake of his dealings as GS adviser to FAI during the HIH scandal...

I'm sure you'll remember Goldman Sachs (under Turnbull's stewardship) cooked the books to make it look like FAI was worth millions when it was worth nothing? HIH subsequently bought FAI on the advise of Goldman Sachs and Turnbull for 300 mil.

Mal and his criminal mates, Larry Adler et al, (now banned from being company directors), brought on the collapse of HIH collapse and the downfall of many Australian businesses who depended on HIH for their insurance.

Goldman Sachs is due to settle this case against them very soon. Goldman's deal with Mal is that they will waive any claim on him of personal liability but his balls are owned by Goldman Sachs to the tune of hundreds of millions of $$$$$$$. But that’s chicken feed compared to the billions they’ll rake in from the management of the ETS scam.

THAT is why Turnbull was prepared to risk his political arse for the ETS. He could care less about the environment. He has no environmental scruples, demonstrated by his insistence on converting Tasmania's old growth forests into toilet paper with his GUNNS deal when he was environment minister.

This is all on public record, yet the details of this story haven't been exposed in any comprehensive way in the media. Why not?

Mal is a high powered corporate sleaze with his snout in the trough at the really big end of town.

The media has completely whitewashed this. I've never seen Turnbull questioned in relation to any of this. How does he manage to fly under the radar?

Because we reward criminals if they wear a nice smile and a suit.

Links:

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/hih-score-settled-for-malcolm/story-e6frg6no-1111119117953

http://www2.goldmansachs.com/services/advising/environmental-markets/business-initiatives/trading-and-cap-markets.html

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/malcolm-spared-a-grilling-in-hih-case/story-e6frg8zx-1111117525251"

It was good to see, if only for a few weeks, a prominent Australian politician so unfrightened of his past as to allow the above comment to be published at his blog, and read by tens of thousands of people.


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You're Either With Us, Or You're With The Greenhadists

By Darryl Mason

Moralising Hypocritical Pagan Watermelon Lefty Al Gore :

"This is a message to the whole world about those responsible for climate change and its repercussions - whether intentionally or unintentionally - and about the action we must take.

"Speaking about climate change is not a matter of intellectual luxury - the phenomenon is an actual fact."

"All the industrial states (are to blame for global warming), yet the majority of those states have signed the Kyoto Protocol and agreed to curb the emission of harmful gases."

"George Bush junior, preceded by [the US] congress, dismissed the agreement to placate giant corporations. And they are themselves standing behind speculation, monopoly and soaring living costs.

"They are also behind 'globalisation and its tragic implications'. And whenever the perpetrators are found guilty, the heads of state rush to rescue them using public money."

But wait! That wasn't Al Gore. It was that other famous global warmist hysterican Osama Bin Laden.

Wha-wha-wha-what?! I hear you say.

You heard me. Osama Bin Laden, or whoever makes those tapes, is reinventing himself as an anti-capitalist, anti-global warming green jihadist.

A Greenhadist, if you will.

Bin Laden hasn't finished with his greenhadist speeches. Oh, you know that's the truth. That was just an intro. This is going to be his Big New Thing.

I'd imagine we will soon hear 'him' delivering forth on how Islam demands respect for nature, and conservation of resources, and, presumably, he will deal away from demanding his followers strike civilian targets in the West and turn their attention instead to corporations. Corporations that cause climate change.

And, presumably, this will also mean that a lot of corporations that have been winding back their anti-terror security in the past year or two, because nobody much believes anymore Al Qaeda are going to charge in their lunch room, will now have to ramp it back up again, to deal with the heavily and seriously promoted new Greenhadist threat.

Laws to deal with eco-terrorism are already in place across most western nation, have been for years, so they'll be easily adapted to round up potential Greenhadists, with plenty of new prosecutions to pursue, and fresh hysteria for the old media and conservative blogs to whip up and froth over.

Put it this way, if you're a young Muslim male with a Naomi Klein-like anti-corporation bent, regularly attends a mosque, donates to Greenpeace, and owns copies of David Attenburrough, Bin Laden and Al Gore videos, you may soon be in a world of shit. Greenhadist!

Oh well, that should make things moderately more interesting for a short while.

Well, maybe. But it will play out like a written script, because some old media, and bloggers, and talback radio, and tabloidia, will not be able to resist, and anyway, they need the content.

The mind spins and surges with the myriad of ways Greenhadism will be devoured and promoted as the Great New Threat by the media, particularly those who adopt faux-conservative outrage because the base material to work from is so much more entertaining, plentiful. And no doubt Bin Laden will supply a steady 'Greenhadist Threat' stream of fresh content.

So, to save local fauxcons valuable brain time, here's some projected headlines and blog post themes for them to get started on. As if they could resist :

One Killer Faith Adopted By Another Even More Deadly

Islamic Greenism : Why Greenhadists Want To Destroy Your Coal Plants

Al Gore No Longer World's Biggest Green Terrorist

Islamic Extremists And Green Extremists Find More Common Ground

George Monbiot Doesn't Know Whether To Kick Bin Laden Or Kiss Him

Kevin Rudd And Bin Laden Agree : Green Terror Faith Must Destroy Our Industries And Your Jobs

The War On Whatever rolls on.



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1980s Prediction : Australia Will Become A World Power...When The Rest Of The Planet Has Been Nuked

This report, from the late 1980s, examines the expected immediate and long-term results of a full scale thermonuclear war.

Here's the local angle :

* Australia is hit by at least 12 warheads (from China and Russia)

* More than 3 million Australians, almost a quarter of the population, is killed.

* 5 out of 6 of all the nuclear weapons in the world are launched, or detonated.

A year after the attacks :

Surviving Japanese military forces have waged attacks as far as Australia in search of food sources.

Okay, so there's far north skirmishes over bananas and pineapples, but compared to the blasted, ash-blown, rat dinner hell hole much of the rest of the world has become, by 2040 things are definitely looking up down under :

Some of the surviving nations have emerged by now as major powers, including Australia...

Yeah.

The full report is a Dr Strangelovian nuke 'em all armageddon-soaked grimorama, occasionally sparkled with a dash of "Yeah, it's bad, but not everybody dies" optimism.

I'm not saying it's a fun read, but it is interesting, particularly as a relic of the Cold War.

"We Can't Use The Lift, Mayor, It's Stuffed Full Of Maggoty Bags Of Soiled Nappies"

The solution to the absurd plans by Penrith Council to only collect rubbish every two weeks is simple.

You don't need to freeze your rotting vegetables and meat scraps, like the Council recommends. Just wait until your garbage bags are full on off-collection week and then deliver them to the offices of Penrith Council.

If you can leave them in the foyer, all the better, but even leaving your uncollected garbage bags on the front stairs will get the message across nice and clear.

This kind of protest needs to be flash-mobbed. I wonder how quickly Penrith Council would change their minds if 1000 locals left their uncollected garbage outside the council chambers every second Monday night?

You Can See The Music

News.com.au commenters share their love of hallucinogens :

"...what's so surprising about LSD being found? It's one of the best and safest drugs out there."

"LSD is actually one of the 'better' drugs out there, alot of people have moved back to it after the Ice and Ecstasy explosions. LSD is extremely easy to create. It cannot be detected in current police enforced drug detection ways, and police sniffer dogs cannot pick a scent as it does not have one. the biggest plus side to the usage of LSD is that you can apply it to almost any type of paper or card and no one would be the wiser, so you could actually walk right past a police oficer with it in your hand"

"Compared to some of the other synthetic chemicals that are finding their ways onto the street LSD is quite easy to create, the hardest part is getting iso-lysergic diethylamide, once you have that its a small sip and a jump to LSD."

The story about drug arrests at the Big Day Out, which drew those comments, was notable also for this brilliant piece of boneheading :



Grumpy old Boltoids propose some solutions to deal with those whose drug of choice is not alcohol or prescription pharmaceuticals :

"We used to shoot feral dogs when they attack sheep, bit harsh I know but what is the difference between them and drug crazed idiots."

"....these “feral dogs"poisoning themselves with drugs all have a vote. Some things are grossly unfair. Those living long term off welfare or have never worked and contributed to the nation should be barred from the ballot box."

Shoot drug users and strip the unemployed off their right to vote.

Yeah. Get off my lawn.


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No wonder those with so much 'free time' to bombard blogs with hundreds of pro-war comments a week hate President Obama so much. He's got a very, very big mouth :

"The Government Accountability Office, the GAO, has looked into 96 major defense projects from the last year, and found cost overruns that totaled $296 billion....indefensible, no-bid contracts that cost taxpayers billions and make contractors rich; special interests and their exotic projects that are years behind schedule and billions over budget; entrenched lobbyists pushing weapons that even our military says it doesn't want and doesn't need -- the impulse in Washington to win political points back home by building things that we don't need at costs we can't afford. This waste would be unacceptable at any time, but at a time when we're fighting two wars and facing a serious deficit, it's inexcusable. It's unconscionable. It's an affront to the American people and to our troops, and it has to stop.

"...no longer will we be spending nearly $2 billion to buy more F-22 fighter jets that the Pentagon says they don't need. This bill also terminates troubled and massively over budget programs such as the Future Combat Systems, the Airborne Lasers, the Combat Search and Rescue helicopter, and a new presidential helicopter that costs nearly as much as Air Force One. I won't be flying on that."

We'll see how long Obama's desire to hack into wasteful but very profitable defence spending lasts.

China, Arab States Plan To Grow Food In Australia

Countries running out of water for their farmlands are now looking to buy vast farming properties in Australia to secure their food supply.

From ABC Tasmania :

Greg Mason from Queensland Department of Primary Industries....recently hosted a group of Chinese investors who were interested in seeing farms similar to theirs in terms of climate and crops.

A property adviser who works with an Arab state says his client is interested in buying farms in other countries that are culturally compatible; however Australia is in their sights.

The client wants to spend over one billion dollars on properties to grow grain, fruit, vegetables and live sheep.

...his client prefers to own and grow the food rather than contract Australian growers because it wants control over the food supply.

Read The Full Story Here

Reuters has a follow-up :

China has been buying Australian resource assets to secure supplies to fuel growth in the world's fastest growing major economy, and is now showing interest in agricultural and food companies.

Stories I've Been Reading Instead Of Writing Blog Posts Here :

Rudd's Nephew Throws On A KKK Hood To Protest Federal Government's Support For "Genocidal Regimes"

Martin Amis On The 'Silver Tsunami' : "I Can Imagine A Sort Of Civil War Between The Old And The Young In 10 Or 15 Years' Time."

Guardian Editor Says There Are Already New Media Start-Ups That "Begin Each Day With A Prayer Session For All National Newspapers To Follow Rupert Murdoch Behind A Pay Wall. That's Their Business Model."

The War On Iraq Was Illegal And "An Act Of Mass Murder' , Arrest Tony Blair For War Crimes

Whoever Was Assigned To Infiltrate 'The Tea Partiers' And Undermine Their Movement From Within Is Doing A Heckuva Job

Old Media Prays New Apple Player Will Deliver Rivers Of App Gold

I Think New Scientist Is Trying To Say That Non-GM "Bush Bud" Cannabis, Grown Under The Sun And The Moon, Is Still The Best, And Safest

Oliver Stone : Hitler Was "Enabled By Wester Bankers", Says Theory That JFK Was Killed By Oswald Alone Is "A National Fairy Tale"

Obama Vs The Birthers : "From Where I Am In Canada I Do Not Understand The USA. You People Seem To Be Doing Everything Possible To Undermine Your Own Country."

You must read all of this. I insist.

John Birmingham :

....if Australia Day is about anything other than pinching a whole continent off the black fellas, it has to be about making up for that original dispossession by creating a place where people are free to do as they damn well please, even if that means not buying into a bunch of increasingly commercial nationalistic bullshit.

It used to be patriotic, downright Australian in fact, to not give a shit about Australia Day.

Happy Orstrahyuh Day :



It's a few years old, obviously.

(h/t - @JohnSurname)

Or if you prefer your potential new national anthems slightly less ranty - One movement, One instant, One difference, One lifetime, One understanding, One Country :





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How the rest of the world used to see Australia in the 1970s :



Most of those cliches are dead and buried, and we're a better country for it.

Disguised As A Terrorist

If you've never heard of British satirist Chris Morris, you soon will.

The first clip from his forthcoming bungling jihadist comedy Four Lions :



Chris Morris On 9/11


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Cyclone Olga barrels towards Port Douglas and Cooktown :

If It ODs, It Leads

A Big Day Out news event :

A 27-year-old man is in a critical condition from a suspected drug overdose at the Big Day Out in Sydney.

The more interesting story would be the near total lack of violence across two days, in extreme heat, amongst 100,000 people, mostly youth. Or that there were so few drug casualties considering thousands, if not tens of thousands, gobbled down and gorged on their drugs of choice before they reached the police check points.

In the comments of this collection of Library Porn, someone complains that the State Library of Victoria was not included. Good call. It's a beautiful building.

The Shakespeare window from State Library of Victoria's stained glass collection :

Cat Plunges Nation Into Debt

Yes, the illustrations for Kevin Rudd's first children's book look innocent enough....



But while Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is fussing over his cat, outside two children are waving frantically to stop an ice-cream van, or perhaps a debt truck, from running them down :



Does Rudd notice? No he does not.

The book is not about those children, it's about Rudd's cat and dog's secret life as pro-Union Jack flag rescuers :

The Prime Minister's trusty four-footed patriot friends, of course, save the day. ''Quick Abby!'' said Jasper. ''You nab Chewy and I'll save the flag.''

In a curious piece of politically pointed satire, Senator Barnaby Joyce writes his own dialogue for Rudd's dog and cat :

Jasper – Well Abby, if we have to plan for our future we have to build on what provides for us cats now. For instance where do we cats catch mice, rats, frogs and other cat food? Where do us cats hang out and get down and dirty with other cats?

Abby – Generally derelict buildings!

Jasper – Spot on Abby! So I have been building a whole new portfolio of future useless buildings, some buildings that aren’t even needed today, so our kittens will never be short of food again. I have put them in schoolyards so they can fill up with scraps of food and old mats and furniture – and mice!

Abby – You crazy cat, you really are revolutionary. Your kittens will be so fat.

You sort of get where Senator Barnaby Joyce is coming from, and then think '.....What in all fuck? This is the shadow finance minister!' :

Jasper – I am a pretty major cat, Abby. You should see my plane and have a gander at my passport. I hang out with all the major talent and will fly anywhere in the world to do it and for absolutely any reason. No party is complete without me. You should pass by my alley and have a look at the photos.

Abby – But how did you pay for all this you crazy cat?

Jasper – Simple! Just borrow the money. I have borrowed more money than any other cat in the history of this alley, and I have made sure that we have stimulated the growth of the local tip with the purchase of a whole range of crazy cat consumables such as flat screens and toys and other electronics so if the school halls burn down we can head back to the tip.

Abby – You revolutionary cat! By the way what is the debt on the poor suckers account?

Jasper – About $120 billion and rising fast, but this cat is not the one paying for that. There’s no easier, more guilt free way to spend money, than by spending some other cats money on other cats!

Always blame the cat.