Readership - 2.5 million (April 2014)
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Wednesday, March 09, 2011
Professional idiot Andrew Bolt sees this photo of Prime Minister Julia Gillard and US President Barack Obama having fun in the West Wing...
and smells some kind of conspiracy! Or at the minimum, something suspiciously amiss :
Bolt : What an incredible coincidence, that a photographer was there to witness Julia Gillard kick a footy in the White House with Barack Obama.
Yes, what an incredible coincidence that the official White House photographer Pete Souza happened to be doing his job at the same time the leader of one of the United States' closest allies paid a visit to the White House.
Here's another Souza photo from the official White House photos & video site. It was so hard to find it was the first photo I saw when I visited the page :
Fact-checking, like spell-checking, has never been a priority for Bolt in his rush to get out his latest conspiracy soaked rantings, or yet another frothing demand for whoever happens to be prime minister to quit.
Interesting, though, that in all his daily blatherings about a carbon tax, Bolt doesn't mention that he works in a 'carbon neutral' News Limited workplace, and never discusses how much money his boss Rupert Murdoch is likely to save when carbon tax & trading for Australian businesses become a reality.
As ex-Australian citizen Murdoch's newspaper circulations plummet across the country and his dreams to get people to pay money to read his digital news sites fall apart, the tax benefits of running a carbon neutral corporation in a carbon currency economy will help pay all kinds of bills and keep wealthy non-stop whiners and intolerance spreaders like Bolt in paid employment.
But despite the hypocrisy, and deception, Bolt will keep railing against a carbon tax, knowing all the while that even if the Liberals were in federal power they, too, would be bringing one in, because that's what his readers want, and he has to keep those readers well pleased, and coming back, because Rupert still wants News Limited bloggers like him to convince their readers to hand over cash for iPad & iPhone apps instead of reading for free.
Desceliers got the outline of the Northern Territory of Australia down in surprising accuracy for the 16th century, particularly when you consider the first official recorded "glimpse" of the west coast of Australia by a European explorer didn't happen until 1606.
Detail :
Desceliers also included Australia on a far more detailed map four years later, in 1550, where he, well let's face it, he went a bit nuts. Or at least, his flight into cartographical fiction was encouraged. Hell, who knows, maybe he was just having fun :
Some of the detail of this map is too good not be given prominence. A selection of screengrabs from the above map follows.
The now rarely seen Australian giraffe camel :
A human sacrifice? Note the figure hanging/suspended from the tree :
Yes, Desceliers even included elephants as Australian land beasts :
Beautiful art, at the very least.
Saturday, March 05, 2011
Robert Manne has a lengthy essay in the March edition of The Monthly on how Wikileaks evolved from the Julian Assange's association with the first famous public act of hacktivisim in 1989 and the 1990s cypherpunks, a hackers information-sharing revolution that fought US government oppression of cryptography technology. The essay also goes into detail on the political philosophies of Julian Assange, which can be best summed up, in Manne's words, as "anti-establishment but genuinely beyond Left and Right."
Assange is often accused of being secretive himself, or vague at best, about what he is trying to achieve by leaking the secrets of both illegitimate and legitimate governments. But Assange has already revealed all on why's he doing this.
The Manne essay includes many excellent quotes from Julian Assange's past essays, interviews and emails, that tell you more about what Assange is trying to achieve with Wikileaks, the revolution he has mounted, his war against the war industry, his repeated calls for an uprising against government secrecy deceit, than ten thousand articles written about him by journalists who are more interested in the sex scandal angle and who've never bothered to go back to see what Assange himself has had to say; the ultimate, world-changing, mission he has so clearly spelled out over the past four years.
Julian Assange :
"The more secretive or unjust an organisation is, the more leaks induce fear and paranoia in the leadership and planning coterie. This must result in minimisation of efficient internal communications mechanisms (an increase in cognitive 'secrecy tax') and consequent system-wide cognitive decline resulting in decreased ability to hold on to power as the environment demands adaptation.
"Hence in a world where leaking is easy, secretive or unjust systems are nonlinearly hit relative to open, just systems. Since unjust systems by their nature induce opponents, and in many places barely have the upper hand, leaking leaves them exquisitely vulnerable to those who seek to replace them with more open forms of governance."
"Mankind has successfully adapted changes as monumental as electricity and the engine. It can also adapt to a world where state-sponsored violence against the communications of consenting adults is not only unlawful but physically impossible. As knowledge flows across nations it is time to sum the great freedoms of every nation and not subtract them. It is time for the world as an international collective of communicating peoples to arise and say 'here I am'."
It's not really that complicated. And it's already proving to be an enormously effective way of fermenting & inspiring great change in the world.
But Assange's mission, as outlined in his statements above, has clearly only just begun.
Look at what has already resulted from the release of just over 2% of the CableGate documents. Three months ago, most of the Middle East was regarded by "experts" as moderately stable. There has been a revolution almost every fortnight since, and dictators and self-appointed royal leaders have already fallen from power, or about to lose power, due to mostly non-violent acts of public dissent and street-clogging demands for democracy, freedom and reform.
If Assange makes the US embassies cables available at the current rate of release, it will take until 2017 before all they're all out there.
Friday, March 04, 2011
Aftershocks are still jarring what's left of Christchurch and after reading the papers & watching the evening news, many who stayed on were jarred further by a widely publicised prediction that another huge earthquake will hit the fractured city on March 20 :
Mr Ring, who lives in Auckland, uses the moon, sun and tidal activity for the basis of his theories, which have been dismissed by scientists.
His warning is clear.
"If I lived in Christchurch, I'd get out for a few days over that time, go camping, visit friends, just get out and keep safe," he said.
On Valentine's Day, he issued a tweet stating that conditions were "potent" for a quake in Christchurch between February 15 and 25.
A 6.3-magnitude earthquake struck on February 22, killing as many as 240 people.
Eerily, he warned people to watch for "special signs", such as silent birds or scared pets, and said "stay away from old cracked buildings".
The day when scientists can accurately predict the eruption of an earthquake below a city will be one of the pinnacles of our understanding of this planet's thin, unstable skin that we base our entire existence upon.
But you do have to wonder, if it was known, say, 10 hours before it hit that a magnitude 7 quake was going to rip apart Los Angeles or Sydney, would a city wide evacuation even be attempted? Could authorities cope with the evacuation of millions of people in half a day?
Will we see a day when city evacuations are rehearsed in anticipation of earthquakes scientifically, accurately, predicted to hit within the next year or two?
For tens of thousands still trying to live in Christchurch, life after February 22 quake has gone back to the 18th century. There is no electricity, water is fetched and carted home, toilets are backyard holes or a long walk to a communal commode.
Blogger Peter Hyde, who lives in the south-east of Christchurch, said he was living in "refugee city".
It was populated by 50,000 to 100,000 people who have been living on broken streets with little access to power, water, gas and other services, he said.
"Their houses may or may not be intact. Their streets may be clear, broken, or full of silt. Or sewage. There are no showers. Or ways to wash clothes. Or to wash dishes. Or to heat the "must boil" water that is available - assuming they can make it to the nearest water truck, day after day. No refrigeration. No working toilets, and precious few portaloos. No face masks to defend against the blown silt.
"They have no internet either, and usually no phones. And their radio batteries are dead or dying."
Monday, February 28, 2011
This incredible, very real photo taken in 2005 in the Kimberley Region of Western Australia is doing the rounds on Reddit again :
That's an olive python trying to swallow a wallaroo. According to a person who claimed to have snapped this photo, the python spent about an hour trying to drag the marsupial from the water and then gave up.
A closer look :
If you're not familiar with the beautiful Australian olive python, here's a video, but don't hold anything of value in your hands as you watch this :
Not exactly the kind of story you want to make such a massive headline error on.
News.com.au :
"Glitch" or successful hacking expedition? I can't imagine any financial institution would publicly admit they've been hacked, unless forced to do so. They certainly didn't admit to such things in the 1990s.
A ''colonel'' with the Libyan special forces, Al-Saadi was invited to visit the Swanbourne SAS barracks at the invitation of the former defence minister Robert Hill.
He also met the then foreign minister Alexander Downer for trade talks, and Australian investors from the oil, gas, tourism, agriculture, racing and cattle industries.
A chat with Alex and a tour of a military base. Nice.
Friday, February 25, 2011
Hackers' Challenge
Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade secretary, Dennis Richardson, has laid out an open challenge to hackers who want to try their skills at cracking firewalls the Australian government and intelligence agencies believe represent world class digital security.
The Department of Foreign Affairs has reviewed its computer security systems following the WikiLeaks saga to ensure classified documents are kept safe.
DFAT secretary Dennis Richardson has told a Senate estimates hearing that he is satisfied such a breach would not happen to the Australian Government.
"The breach in the US system - it beggars belief how they even had the arrangement they had," he said.
"In terms of the way our classified systems are set up, it would be very difficult to copy what happened in the WikiLeaks case."
Difficult, but not impossible.
The only truly safe digital file is one stored on a laptop or device that has no internet access and no CD or USB drives. Even then...
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Christchurch Smashed By Quake
A 6.3 earthquake struck Christchurch, New Zealand earlier today, and rocked the city for one solid minute. Buildings collapsed on people across the CBD during lunchtime. Bodies have been recovered from shops, office buildings and at least one hostel. The iconic cathedral in the centre of Christchuch has been destroyed. Aftershocks were still rattling Christchurch more than an hour after the first quake, people still trapped screaming for help inside collapsed buildings as rescuers struggled to reach them.
"It was extremely violent. I was sitting there with a friend and the building just like exploded. It was like a movie. It took two or three seconds to comprehend what was going on ... and then we ran onto the street and the front fell out of the building right in front of me."
"It was just scary. [The cathedral], it just came down, like shit, within about two seconds. Unbelievable, unbelievable."
"It was very, very strong, I was up on the top floor of the council building and I got thrown quite a distance. I got down to the street, scenes of great confusion, some very, very upset people, a lot of people crying. I know of people in our building that have been injured." -
"I was in the square right outside the cathedral - the whole front has fallen down and there were people running from there. There were people inside as well."
UPDATE : 4.30pm (Sydney time) : The death toll is likely to be beyond 70 by tomorrow morning, with serious injuries already numbering beyond 300, temporary morgues dealing with bodies that had been lain out in the streets & parks when ambulances were in short supply, water infrastructure trashed, roads shattered, dozens of buildings significantly damaged, many destroyed beyond repair.
How some Australian online media is covering the Christchurch earthquake, with an emphasis on, or overload of, interactivity & multimedia, including live video, maps, before & after photos of buildings where bodies are still to be recovered, plus now mandatory Twitter coverage, Facebook coverage.
The Herald Sun :
The Sydney Morning Herald :
The Daily Telegraph :
And the New Zealand Herald :
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Coming soon to SBS, quality new Australian drama :
UPDATE : Unbelievable. Channel 9's A Current Affair ran ads claiming the above clip was from "a reality show" and "a waste of taxpayers money." Dumber than a bag of hammers. It also shows what A Current Affairs producers think about Westies, doesn't it?
Housos is a comedy from Paul Fenech, the creator of Pizza.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
C.R.A.P
Senior Liberal Threatens "Bloodbath" If Joe Hockey Isn't Axed For Being Too Nice
How ugly and bizarre has conservative politics become in Australia when you can be lambasted and told to fuck off for being too popular and emphatic?
A senior Liberal Party staffer, who acts as an advisor to a minister of the Liberal Shadow Ministry (let's take a wild guess here....a member of Scott Morrison's staff?) posted this at the Menzies House website. It was quickly deleted, but not quickly enough (excerpts) :
The most interesting development in the Liberal Party of the last fortnight has not been the “silent pause gaffe” by Tony Abbott when confronted by journalist Mark Riley. It is, in fact, Joe Hockey’s decision to undermine his Liberal colleague Scott Morrison, and contradict official party policy on the issue of taxpayer funds being used to ferry asylum seekers across the country.
This is a day of remembrance of a tragedy, and we all feel great sympathy for those affected by the recent horrific events. Yet Hockey attempted to manipulate this and grandstand for his own personal advantage. And that is unacceptable. To take advantage of an event such as this to advance your own personal agenda is simply beyond the pale.
This is the demonstrated proof that Joe Hockey is completely ill-equipped to ever be a member of the leadership team of the Liberal Party. In fact, it is the last straw, after a string of gaffes and failures, and our parliamentary team is furious.
Joe Hockey has a teddy bear-like appearance and demeanour. He appealed to many viewers when he appeared on the Sunrise programme with Kevin Rudd. He no doubt enjoys a strong relationship with many journalists. To the average person in the street, Joe Hockey probably comes across as a likeable fellow.
It’s now well past the point of being an amusing joke. We are the Party that gave Australia Peter Costello as our Treasurer. We pride outselves on our economic managment. To say to voters that we propose Joe Hockey be the next Liberal Treasurer is an incomprehensible fall from grace - and a stain on our reputation that will not easily be fixed.
It is no secret that many Liberal MP's desire a new Shadow Treasurer who does not activly attack the Party line; Someone who does not seek personal attention at every waking turn; Someone who can stay true to Liberal values of small government when formulating policy.
We are beyond the point of backbencher despair - we are at the point of open revolt. While Shadow Cabinet can continue to put on a brave face, there can be no denying the panic that is spreading through the ranks as members view the destruction Hockey is causing. There can be no doubt that there needs to be a mechanism found quickly within the party to replace Hockey as Shadow Treasurer without resulting in a wider bloodbath...
After all, we have a far safer pair of hands ready in Andrew Robb - an MP with a proven track record of competence, combined with a consistent history of supporting Liberal Party values and fighting for smaller government.
The replacement might be messy, but the public have come to expect something a lot better from the Liberal Party in such a vital area.
Enough is enough. The Joe Hockey circus must come to an end. The Australian people deserve more. The Liberal Party deserves more. Hockey must go - and soon.
Here's what Joe Hockey said that has so infuriated so many of his Liberal Party colleagues :
"I would never seek to deny a parent or a child from saying goodbye to their relative.
"No matter what the colour of your skin, no matter what the nature of your faith, if your child has died or a father has died, you want to be there for the ceremony to say goodbye.
"I totally understand the importance of this to those families.
"I think we, as a compassionate nation, have an obligation to ensure that we retain our humanity during what is a very difficult policy debate."
That's it.
Wow. It's like the Liberals are trying to rebrand themselves as the Complete Fucking Arseholes Party. But why?
Did it even occur to this moron that one of the main reasons why the Coalition is (briefly) leading the Labor Party in (some) polls is because people are hearing a diversity of views & opinions coming from the conservative ranks, instead of the lock-step brain freeze infecting Labor?
UPDATE : A suggestion on a more practical rebranding for the Liberals : Complete Raving Arseholes Party (CRAP).
Tragically, young Rueben's mother was killed by a car and he was left with serious head wounds, but the Herald Sun thinks it's appropriate to report this tragic news with a punny headline :
Boom tish.
On Twitter, RacistWallaby vents his outrage and disgust :
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Mother Nature's War On Humans continues. Two cyclones now look to be threatening the Northern Territory. No emergency warnings issued for Darwin as of 1opm tonight, but schools and many businesses will be closed tomorrow, just in case.
The Northern Territory News. How could a newspaper that breaks such news be losing readers? Complete mystery :
Look, I know you want to know the rest of this story, but once you read it you can't erase the details from your memory. Think carefully if you really want to know how this sex toy was launched across a room before you click this link.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Global Warming Is The New Hitler, according to a letter in the Northern Rivers Echo :
The climate change debate is over! No more silly scepticism, half truths and quoting of supposedly impeachable sources, like some raving Lord lunatic, can ignore the facts as they continue to be represented by scientists of all disciplines and driven home by extreme weather conditions. The extinctions of species, caused by global warming, predicted by scientists, have already begun to be observed. Glaciers are melting exponentially, forests are dying. Recently the Amazon rainforest experienced the worst drought in recorded history killing millions of trees and threatening to alter the forests ability to scrub CO2 out of the atmosphere. In fact scientists are afraid that it will become a reverse situation where dying and decaying trees will actually increase CO714987860 in the atmosphere. Like a smoker, the Amazon, one of the Earth’s lungs, may suffocate from too much toxic gas.
Yet the she’ll be right mentality of the dozy Australian governments and its sceptical numbnuts continues to dominate the inaction we see on just about every front when the world is confronted by a glaringly implacable problem. When the Jews faced annihilation under the Nazis the world dilly dallied and six million were exterminated in the gas ovens. As we dilly dally on the action needed to act on climate change caused by global warming the entire human species and sundry animal stands to reap the same fate. This time the oven will be the planet we live on. We are the 21st century Jews. Our enemies are apathy and vested interests who refuse to change their ways.
It sounds like Mother Nature may be the real enemy here, unless this letter is utterly insane.
Mike Carlton points out that despite there now being 13 times as many vehicles on NSW roads as 1945, the number of people dying each year is almost the same as it was 65 years ago. Hysteria about road safety, Carlton claims, is generated by "the road safety industry" :
"(this industry) makes work for itself with conferences, seminars and workshops, learned papers, academic theories and blizzards of statistics, constantly devising new ways to coerce and punish the rest of us poor mugs behind the wheel.
"No politician ever dares pull the industry into line because road safety has become a sacred cow and transport ministers like to be seen worshipping it. In fact, our road tolls are lower than ever."
State election ads are usually worse than national election ads, so when even a mildly entertaining one comes along it should be enjoyed for the rare treat that it is :
Wednesday, February 09, 2011
The Only Shit In This Storm Is Channel 7 News
By Darryl Mason
This was going to be the lead news story on most Australian TV channels last night, an emotional tribute from Prime Minister Julia Gillard to the victims of the Queensland floods and victims of a nation-rocking run of natural disasters in the past few months, a tribute many Queenslanders, and victims of floods & fires in other Australian states, needed to see, a kind of catharsis, some kind of emotional release :
The stories Prime Minister Gillard recalled from the Queensland floods are pure tragedy, stunning, jolting tales of incomprehensible loss and sacrifice that still haven't completely settled into the Australian psyche yet.
Maybe you don't like it, maybe you don't believe her, maybe you think, like a cartoonist at The Australian, that it's all part of the New Julia Show :
But whatever it was,, it was necessary, and it should have been The News tonight & today. Opposition leader Tony Abbott seem quite prepared to step back from bitter fighting over the flood levy, if only for a day or two, to let Australians see their prime minister acknowledge their pain, their shock, their feelings of distress and loss.
To say, it's okay, it's time to cry about what happened, get it out and then get on with it.
A bizarre and revolting theme had developed that PM Gillard was somehow less than human because she didn't break down in front of flood victims, which is easy to imagine would have been far more upsetting to flood victims than the way she did deal with them. Who wants the leader of their country weeping in their arms after their state had just been smashed by both floods and a massive cyclone and tens of thousands have been left homeless?
She's wooden, she's unreal, some, many, in the old and new media have hissed for months, she doesn't show enough emotion. But how much emotion does PM Gillard have to show?
Here she is at the funeral of an Australian soldier killed in Afghanistan :
Isn't that enough stress and emotion in one face? Doesn't she look shattered by a death in a war she has supported in opposition and in government for almost a decade?
PM Gillard's speech and opposition leader Tony Abbott's measured reply was a moment of reflection at the start of a new year in Australian Parliament, a chance to acknowledge that the last couple of months have been emotionally draining, for all Australians.
That was the news Australians needed, deserved to see last night.
But by a few minutes after 6pm, news priorities across all channels had changed. And instead, we got this :
Mark Riley pretending he thought Tony Abbott was talking about Australian soldiers instead of himself was just plain pathetic, and an impossible to ignore alarm bell that this 'story' was more about Mark Riley's lust for attention and desire to be a press gallery journalist who could claim a political scalp than it was about Tony Abbott saying something "innappropriate" :
Abbott : "A soldier has died, and you shouldn't be trying to turn this into a subsequent media circus."
Riley: "The soldier's shouldn't? I shouldn't?"
Abbott : "Yes."
The first time seeing Abbott's 24 seconds of constant nodding, death staring and utter silence was cringe-inducing TV. The second time I saw it, I began to want to see Tony Abbott nut Mark Riley for being a total fuckhead. The third time, and the next time, and the next time, all the way through to Lateline, it was clear Tony Abbott's reaction to this offensive piece of We Make The News journalism was the right one.
The key question changed quickly from, 'Why didn't Tony Abbott say anything?' to 'In what dimension of irresponsible journalism is this even a fucking news story at all?' And 'Did Mark Riley even stop for a moment to think how the dead soldier's family and friends will feel seeing this blasted across the evening and tomorrow's news?'
I would also like to express our appreciation to the media for the very sensitive manner in which they have covered the tragic events of the past few weeks, and also their ongoing respect for our privacy.
We have reached the deepest depths of despair since we were told of Jared’s death, but we have also been helped and comforted by the support and extraordinary generosity of spirit of old friends, new friends, and strangers who cared.
Beckie MacKinney, and other family members, were contacted by various journalists and news media last night, seeking comment & reaction, on both Tony Abbott's "sometimes shit happens" remark and Mark Riley's story.
Beckie MacKinney released a statement late last night saying the matter rests, that she believed Tony Abbott's comments were taken out of context by journalist Mark Riley and she would not be commenting further.
...the Opposition Leader's comments were ''out of line'' and made him ''feel sick''.
''My attitude would be to ignore it, to give it the least amount of credence,'' he said.
He described Mr Abbott as thoughtless, ignorant and uncaring. ''It just shows how good he is, or isn't. I'm not going to let it bother me, but it just shows he's not very thoughtful. He doesn't care too much.''
Mark Riley's Wikipedia entry was updated last night :
The update, probably removed by now :
"He dishonours the memories of fallen soldiers and causes distress to their widows by trying to make cheap political mileage out of innocent comments by Opposition Leader Tony Abbott."
Hard to argue with that.
Mark Riley bet that Tony Abbott's comment and long silence (and Channel 7 news reporter boasted on Twitter that Abbott's silence actually lasted almost a minute and a half) would be The Story. And it was. For an hour or two.
Riley must have gone to bed last night absolutely stunned at how quickly his 'story' veered from 'Tony Abbott : Still A Heartless Bastard?' to 'Why Does Mark Riley Still Have A Job?'
