ASIO : You Can Find All Of Us Right Here, Now Check Out Our Trippy Ad

By Darryl Mason

While Australia's most public spy agency, ASIO, advertises for new recruits ...



....on the same Sydney Morning Herald page as a story finely detailing the public service history of the ever more curious fake email-linked Godwin Grech....







....the ground is about to be broken in Canberra for ASIO's spiffy new headquarters, or 'Central Office'. Here's the exact location of our chief spy agency's new HQ :






Both of those images come from ASIO's own website.

Some more screengrabs of the tall, wide ASIO's recruitment ad in the Herald, reminiscent of William Burrough's word and sentence cut-ups :





William Burroughs on the cut-up method :



I wonder if you get a special prize from ASIO for deciphering, or re-arranging, the sentences spread across those three ads?

You Can Tell A Lot About A Man By The Size Of His Palm Tree

By Darryl Mason

Sniggling, giggling Murdoch journalists "expose the private life" of Australia's most nervous public servant, Godwin Grech....well, if by expose they mean quoting neighbours talking about what a really nice, hard working, generous guy he is, then yes, consider Grech's private life exposed.

We could all do with having our private lives "exposed" in such flattering terms.

But what the fuck is up with these journos fixation with the palm tree in Godwin Grech's front yard?

...known for living in a house with a big and amusing palm tree in the front garden...

...the palm tree was planted before he moved in.

Are they trying to tell us something they're not legally, or ethically, allowed to say about Godwin Grech's private life?



And if Godwin Grech was attracted to his Canberra home because there's a massive phallic-shaped palm tree dominating the front yard, what the hell does that have to do with his possible involvement in e-mail fakery and a supposed mole leaking to Turnbull & Friends from inside the Treasury?

Well, nothing.



Neither Malcolm Turnbull, Wayne Swan or Kevin Rudd are likely to step down over this Ute & Emails related scandal now consuming five or six hours a day of sitting time in the Parliament, but somebody will have to pay.

It seems increasingly likely that somebody will be Godwin Grech, particularly now Liberal politicians, off the record, are trying to out Grech as 'The Mole' who the Australian Federal Police appear to believe has been leaking info to the Libs for years from inside the Treasury :

The Treasury official at the centre of the OzCar affair, Godwin Grech, has supplied unofficial information to the Coalition, dating back to its days in government, the ABC has learned.

The revelation lifts already intense pressure on Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull to explain how much he knew, and when, about the email forgery that has backfired so spectacularly.

Several Liberals have told the ABC they believe Mr Grech has been supplying information to Mr Turnbull, and one says he knows it to be the case. However, the nature of that information is not known.

***********

The Australian Federal Police yesterday raided Mr Grech's home, uncovered the email and declared it a fake. They suspect Mr Grech was involved in creating it.

The ABC understands that Mr Grech will also be questioned about other leaks from Treasury.

The AFP has been "quietly watching Treasury for a while" and senior Government ministers are convinced there is at least one mole in the department.

If you think this Ute & Email related scandal has been nasty so far, you haven't seen anything yet.

Political careers are on the line, and the hysteria in Parliament will be even worse today, particularly after Joe Hockey's woeful, sweaty-lipped interview with Tony Jones on Lateline last night, where he demanded that journalists should reveal their sources if politicians like himself are expected to reveal theirs.

Tony Jones sliced up Hockey like sashimi, and it was only halfway during the interview, when the sweat began to concentrate on his upper lip and he had trouble swallowing, that Joe Hockey apparently realised that AFP officers would be watching Lateline and noting down his reaction to everything Jones hit him with about Liberal-friendly leakers inside the Treasury and his decade old association with Godwin Grech. And Jones hit with a lot (I'll come back to this when the transcript is up), but probably not everything Jones already knows. Why blow tonight's lead story on Lateline on an interview with Hockey?

Godwin Grech will not be sleeping easy.

Unlike prime minister Kevin Rudd, who is no doubt keeping his wife and neighbours awake with his endless, howling laughter at just how spectacularly, hilariously, this whole scandal has blown up in the face of Malcolm Turnbull.

Media Watch has a very short, but detailed, round up of the scandal so far, focusing it as should on the one element most of the media has shied away from so far : the role of the media in this scandal, and in particular, Sydney's Daily Telegraph.


Correction : an earlier version of this story said Malcolm Farr was responsible for the Daily Telegraph piece about Godwin Grech's "amusing palm tree". He wasn't. The story's byline now reads 'By Janet Fife-Yeomans and Alison Rehn'.

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Gillard : Democracy Via Guns & Bombs Doesn't Work

Deputy prime minister Julia Gillard speaking in Israel :

We have learned from Iraq and Afghanistan that democracy cannot be imposed by force, however strongly its proponents believe in its ideals.

Instead, the rule of law and the rights of conscience and free participation must emerge, guided and shaped by leadership, by exchange in all its forms and by institutions built to be fit for purpose.

The Australian government won't be backing any military action against Iran, and Gillard appears to have told Israel's leaders this is the Australian government's position, as another 'colour revolution' heads towards inevitably greater violence and death in the streets of Tehran.

When Police Beating Protesters Is Funny, Right And Entertaining

By Darryl Mason

As thousands of videos from nine days of protests in Iran flood YouTube and news sites across the world, showing horrendous scenes of the vicious beatings of those who feel cheated out of democracy, it seems like only yesterday that The Daily Telegraph's Tim Blair's droogies were happily, enthusiastically, celebrating police state violence against peaceful protesters :

Paco of Occupied Northern Virginia - "It looks like that policeman gave the fellow a juicy one, right on his ugly map. And he seems to have enjoyed doing it. Bit of all right, I say "

Sonny Fabich - "Giving them PLENTY OF TRUNCHEON! Good to see - it’s a pity our gutless coppers won’t do the same"

Winston Smith of VRWC Pty Ltd - "Excellent stuff, sir! These protesting idiots are behaving as if they are above the law. Right up until they cross the line and meet the cold hard wall of reality. Then some w***er says they have the right to behave in this fashion. I know a fifth columnist and their supporter when I see one, jail the bloody lot"

Daniel Lewis - "Yep. And when arrested, they will always scream at the top of their lungs, 'Ow, you are breaking my arm, stop it, stop it please' for the later benefit of Youtube. Naturally what happened before the arrest is missed. You know, because the camera wasn’t on yet. It’s straight out of the Indymedia playbook and pretty pathetic. If you are going to get into a punchup, you should at least be hard enough to cop it."

Ann J. - "The presence of the media, particularly the photographers, did a lot to encourage the mayhem."

Mitch of Massachusetts, USA - "I believe the euphemism for this type of police work is “informal sanctions.” In other words, it is not worth anyone’s time or trouble to cuff and book the clown, so the police find a way of discouraging any repetition of the behavior without creating a lot of paperwork. It all happens off the books, so to speak, so the recreant is properly admonished but does not have a permanent criminal record. Assuming the procedure leaves him with as many teeth as he started with, he should be grateful. It works wonders when administered wisely."

Carpe Jugulum - "....hope he followed up with a suitable bodyshot.....just to be sure. It’s always good to see a fellow enjoying his work."

They must be really getting off on all those scenes of women being beaten by truncheon-wielding police and security forces in the streets of Tehran.

If Only Kevin Rudd Was Carrying A Plastic Turkey

No journo at the Daily Telegraph was willing to put their name in the byline of this asinine fluff :

The sideways glance can speak a thousand words.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has had a trying few days as he and Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull have engaged in an ugly political scrap resulting in both calling for the other's resignation.

Therese Rein is a woman clearly committed to her husband's long-term success. But did her composure slip for a few seconds on Sunday as she left her Canberra church? Did we glimpse an expression that said she was stressed, weary and unimpressed? Is Utegate - the issue of whether or not her husband helped out an Ipswich car dealer - wearing a little thin on her?

The Daily Telegraph 'story' doesn't bother to answer any of those questions.

Here's a couple of more pertinent questions :

Was that absurd guff from the Daily Telegraph some kind of hopeless attempt to ferment speculation that 'Utegate'-related pressure is causing problems in the prime minister's marriage?

Is the Telegraph really that desperate to try and distract from the fact that its promotion of fake e-mailery has helped to further destabilise and will probably, ultimately, lead to the destruction of Malcolm Turnbull's leadership of the Opposition?

A sideways glance may "speak a thousand words", but even with copious fluffing, Therese Rein's bored look at her husband was only worth 165 words to the Daily Telegraph.

We're Not As Stoned As We Thought We Were

Even Media Watch has noticed that stories about cannabis, and cannabis users, pull the eyeballs - half-closed, slightly bloodshot, reality-redefining eyeballs.

They take a look at the statistics behind these extraordinary claims from a recent story in the Sydney Morning Herald :

"One in three people have used marijuana and about one in six are addicted..."

"...up to a quarter of people aged over 30 were smoking cannabis weekly and one in five were smoking it daily."

Media Watch rewrites the lead, based on a more accurate interpretation of the 2004 National Drug Strategy Household Survey statistics the Herald used for its story :

"The 2004 National Drug Strategy Household Survey found that one in 25 people aged between 30 and 39 were smoking cannabis weekly and one in 30 were smoking it daily."

Well, that reality check isn't going to help the daily commuting, daily stoned paranoidians to mellow out now, is it?

When they thought One In Six Australians Were Addicted To Cannabis, and were smoking it daily, they knew could relax on the bus or the train, even when they were forced to sit facing the rest of the commuters, because, well hell, the odds were that out of the 30 or 40 people sharing the train carriage or bus, there had to be at least six or seven pot junkies struggling not to giggle or become overwhelmed with brain-freaking revelations just like they were.

But now they know, thanks to Media Watch, that their original paranoia was in fact correct. They really might be the only one in that bus or train carriage, after all, who is blasted to the Kuiper Belt, and everyone really is staring at them, and knows, yeah they all know, just what kind of 'special cookie' accompanied the morning coffee.

More From Media Watch

There Might Not Be Enough Terrorists To Go Round, But There Will Always Be Plenty Of 'Extremists'

By Darryl Mason

Animal right extremists, anti-coal extremists, green extremists, anti-war extremists, Islamic extremists, anti-abortion extremists, the list of Extremists popping up in our media is growing long.

And the list just got a new addition :

Anti-Flouride extremists have threatened to kill a Victorian Government minister and blow up a regional water authority.

A death threat was left with a bottle of water on the verandah of Ms Neville's house on Saturday night, a Government spokeswoman said.

Anti-fluoride activists have also threatened to blow up Barwon Water's treatment plants as the authority today begins adding fluoride to the water supply in Geelong, 70km southwest of Melbourne.

There is always the possibility, one that you'd expect police to be also pursuing, that a legitimate campaign against the flouridation of Geelong's drinking water is being discredited and sabotaged by provocateurs and infiltrators trying to associate those opposed with violence and death threats.

It certainly wouldn't be the first time.

It's Like The Start Of A Great Horror Movie....

From the news.com.au front page :



That headline might lead you to believe that a crocodile leapt up and grabbed hold of a helicopter's skid and dragged it to the ground.

But no.

The pilot messed up trying to give his sight-seeing passenger a better look at a crocodile they spotted on mudflats 60kms from Darwin.

The War On Iraq : We Won....Wait, They Won...Someone Won....Did Anybody Win?

By Darryl Mason

In November 2007, The Professional Idiot declared :

The War In Iraq Has Been Won

Now, finally, Iraq MP Nuri al-Maliki agrees with The Professional Idiot :

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said Saturday that the U.S. troops' withdrawal from Iraqi cities and towns by the end of this month would be a "great victory" for Iraqis.

"It is a great victory for Iraqis as we are going to take our first step toward ending the foreign presence in Iraq," Maliki said during a conference in Baghdad for leaders of ethnic Turkmen minority.

Hmm, probably not exactly the kind of victory declaration The Professional Idiot was counting on al-Maliki to announce. But then, The Professional Idiot was always living an absurd NeoCon fantasy when it came to Iraq.

This from The Idiot when it seemed, briefly, so many years ago, that President Bush was right, and the War On Iraq had been won almost as soon as it began :

"The war happened, all right, yet there were no refugees, and no huge casualties."

And here's "second stringer" Tim Blair, all but declaring victory before the War On Iraq even began :

John Hawkins: If and when do you see the United States hitting Iraq? How do you think it'll work out?

Tim Blair: It all depends on Iraq’s fearsome Elite Republican Guard. Why, those feisty desert warriors could hold out for minutes. Dozens of US troops will be required. Perhaps they’ll even need their weapons.

Wouldn’t expect it to last long once it happens.

No. not long at all.

Six years, a couple of trillion dollars, 4500 dead CoW troops and a few hundred thousand dead Iraqis.

At least they got rid of Iran's main enemy in the region.

Perhaps one day Tim Blair will get the chance to talk to some of the hundreds of young Australian soldiers who had their minds and emotions fucked by what they saw and experienced in Iraq. I'm sure they'll love to hear his explanation for why it was all worth it, and why he was so keen, all those years ago, to perpetuate the myth that the people of Iraq would cave in so quickly to foreign occupation.

"...those feisty desert warriors could hold out for minutes."

Or more than 3.2 million minutes, and counting.

Oh well, at least Blair got a job at the Daily Telegraph out of it.

Aaaaaaaaangeeeeelsssss

This is more of a Monday morning song, but it can equally apply to a Saturday, if the Friday night is ugly drunk and long enough and family commitments and stupid early rising pets guarantee no sleep in :



And this, I've never seen :



The Angels are back on the road, hitting most states through mid-July to mid-August. All the dates are here.

It May Never Be Fashionable, But It May Save Your Life

When I was a kid, a $5 flanno from Woolies was all you needed to stay warm through an average Western Sydney winter's night of generally running amok. Scarves? Wimp. Gloves? Nancy. Jumpers? Pah.

Apparently the remarkable anti-freeze properties of the basic flanno can still offer life-saving chilly weather protection well in old age :

Search crews say they are "thrilled" and amazed that a 71-year-old man wearing just track pants and a flannelette shirt has been found safe and well after three cold, wet nights lost in the bush.

Bruce "Dick" Ludbrook, 71, who suffers mild dementia, got lost in dense scrub north of Wollongong during his regular afternoon bushwalk on Tuesday.

The fit former coal miner - who was used to walking long distances - endured pouring rain and bitterly cold weather before being found today by a group of motorcyclists near Mt Ousley.

Dr Giordian Fulde, St Vincent's Hospital emergency director, said Mr Ludbrook was "very, very lucky" to have survived his ordeal and risks like hypothermia.

"Somebody being out in flannelete shirt and trackdacks should get into trouble," he said.

The risks for Mr Ludbrook were even higher because maintaining body warmth was even more difficult for the elderly, he said.

Dr Fulde believed Mr Ludbrook's regular long walks would have been crucial to his survival.

Okay, maybe it wasn't just the flanno that saved him from hypothermia. Some credit must go to his fitness level. Ironically, the same wet weather that could have killed through a heart attack brought on by hypothermia supplied the water that stopped the also very dangerous risk of dehydration.

Dr Fulde believed that in order to survive, Mr Ludbrook must also have sought shelter from the rain to keep warm and drunk water from sources in the bush, such as rainwater puddles.

"I think he must have done something sensible," he said. "The most important thing to human beings is water - you can go quite a few days without food but you can't go a long time without water."

A pretty remarkable survival story. It could have easily had a tragic ending.

I've written a bunch of new stories recently over at Your New Reality :

Iran : A New Reality Dawning Fast And Hard

"There Are A Lot Of People Who Lie, And Get Away With It"

How To Kill Bloggers : Take Away Their Anonymity

Richard Nixon On Drugs

A Robot With "Predictive Powers" Will Be Able To Anticipate A Human Being's Reaction To Just About Anything

An American President Manages To Make An Entire Speech In The Middle East Without Using The Words 'Terror" Or "Terrorists" - "Extremists", However, Sure Did Get A Workout

That Freaking Old Hippie Raised HOW MUCH?

By Darryl Mason

There's something much scarier for the Liberal Party than imagining a future without Peter Costello.

It's this :

Senator Brown's so-called Wielangta forest fund had already raised $739,000....

Bob Brown announced, after losing a legal battle against a logging corporation, that if he was unable to pay more than $240,000 in court costs he could face being expelled from the Senate. In less than a week, Brown raised more than three times that figure through thousands of donors.

The Liberals couldn't raise $739,000 through donors that fast, even with a series of dinners starring John Howard and Peter Costello

No wonder the Liberals are so pissed :

Liberal senator Eric Abetz has accused Greens leader Bob Brown of misleading the public over claims he was approaching bankruptcy and could have been expelled from the Senate.

Senator Brown was more likely to be "ethically bankrupt'' than genuinely bankrupt, Senator Abetz said.

"Clearly the senator does not abide by the same accountability rules he so self-righteously insists being imposed on everybody else.''

The Greens leader must now disclose all amounts he has received, when he received them, to whom they were paid and how much money was involved, Senator Abetz told the upper house.

"Be accountable. Immediately disclose to the Senate ... exactly how much your fund raised prior to last week's appeal and disclose and substantiate your progressive and personal legal costs.''

And Bob Brown will do it. They've got nothing on him. It's one of the reasons why Liberals like Abetz hate him so much.

Brown is too clean, too honest, with too little, or nothing at all, to hide.

The Liberals have spent a lot of money over the years trying to get dirt on Brown that they can use against him in the media, or behind the scenes. And they found fuck all.

Abetz is making himself look like a jealous, petty arsehole, while providing Bob Brown with yet another opportunity to show why he is one of the most honest, respected, and quietly admired, politicians in the country.

The Harsh Online Reality For The Corporate Media Is That There Simply Isn't Enough Commenters To Go Round

By Darryl Mason

As I've said here before, probably a bit too rudely, this blog doesn't exist for the sake of comments. It doesn't matter to me whether there's 0 comments or 26, the posts will still be written and published.

But what if your online media business model, your basic plan for profitability, relied deathly on having dozens or hundreds of commenters spilling their thoughts and opinions on every story or opinion piece posted on your website?

The Murdoch Online Experience has already launched The Punch, and now, as Mumbrella reports, Fairfax are going to have their shot at creating an online aggregator site for its stable of digital newspapers, with a steady stream of commenters being seen as essential to push those daily hits into the five and six digit page view counts that advertisers like to see.

Unlike The Punch, however, who've made the effort to recruit writers who aren't already writing for other Murdoch media, The National Times is expected to fill itself out with opinion pieces already published elsewhere in Fairfax's digital newspapers.

As usual, I found it easier to put my thoughts together on this while commenting at another blog. So here's the comment I left at Mumbrella :

The Punch has had some interesting columns so far, but nothing that has set fire to the comments boards. It seems overall quite safe and pedestrian. For now at least. Nothing controversial, nothing that you don't already see in mainstream newspaper columns and op-eds. If the aim is too have a "national conversation", the convo has been damn quite with most posts in the past week pulling 0 to 6 but rarely 10 or more comments.If people who visit can't be arsed to comment, why will they want to eventually pay for it?

A huge turnover in comments, in the hundreds for each or most posts, is what The Punch needs to ramp up the hits, obviously. But how are they going to do that? Where is that hardcore crowd of a few hundred who will burn up the boards like they do at Piers Akerman's or Andrew Bolt's blog going to come from? .

The problem, as Fairfax will soon find out, is that there are a limited number of Australians who bother to comment on any story or column or blog post anywhere online, particularly when the content is centred around politics or culture or news events.

Even if you do like to comment on what you're reading, there are so many places to do so elsewhere, from Facebook to YouTube to Twitter to ten thousand more fun to read and riotous blogs elsewhere in the world.

The Punch has discovered that regular commenters for blogs and news sites that aren't stirring up racism and xenophobia and general hate, or raging about Israel and Palestinians, are pretty thin on the ground in Australia.

There might even be as few as three or four thousand in Australia who will write comments on local political/cultural blogs and news sites most days, as a habitt, not including those who are paid to professionally comment by PR companies and political parties.

There's no shortage of places to Have Your Say on Australian blogs and news sites now, but there is most definitely a shortage of normal everyday Australian commenters. The Punch now knows this, the National Times will most likely learn that too, very soon.

There are a few good free ways for corporate media sites like The Punch and National Times to pull quality and volume-high comments to their sites, but why give away good ideas like that?

Australian Troops Have Shot, Killed Dozens Of Civilians In Iraq & Afghanistan

According to this story, more than $350,000 has been paid out by the Australian government to Iraqi and Afghan families who've had family members killed or wounded by soldiers :

Dozens of non-combatants have been shot by Diggers since the Iraq campaign began in April 2003.

Rapid "act of grace" payments can prevent revenge attacks. Defence refuses to divulge how much is paid to each family but has told The Daily Telegraph $126,442 had so far been paid out to Afghani families.

The amount covers more than 20 individuals for an average of about $6000 each. The overall figure for Iraq is $216,417 for about 10 incidents and could climb before Australia's combat involvement in Iraq finally ceases next month.

The Full Story Is Here

If It's Not Swine Flu, Then What The Hell Is Going On?

By Darryl Mason

Why are so many people having so much trouble breathing normally?

The president of the Australian Medical Association Victoria, Harry Hemley, said doctors had been overwhelmed with people suffering respiratory infections in recent weeks.

"I would say about one-third of the population has some sort of upper respiratory infection right now, but I can't say how many of those have swine flu," he said.

So if it's not swine flu, and pollution levels in Australian cities are not causing this, then what is responsible?

The Australian government likes to boast about its 'one of the best in the world' stockpile of anti-virals, gloves and facemasks, but it seems reluctant to let them go to the front line Australians who need them the most :

Dr Hemley said many GPs had been exposed to the virus while caring for patients because protective equipment released from the Federal Government's stockpile had not yet arrived.

More than 1500 Australians are officially categorised as having been infected with Influenza A H1N1 by Monday morning, but the real figure is expected to be many thousands more.

The New Flu has already spread so far and wide across Australia that Health Minister, Nicola Roxon, has announced they're bailing on widespread testing and hardcore quarantine measures. They're not going to stop the spread, they know it, as the American Centre For Disease Control knew and admitted more than a month ago. Quarantining rugby league players and cruise ships was just "buying some more time", no time at all as it turns out.

The Great Hope that the Rudd government will sell this week instead is the August release of a supposed vaccine against swine flu. Well, a vaccine against the swine flu virus that is rapidly spreading now, and it may well mutate further by the time August rolls around, which would render the prepared vaccine not so effective, or downright useless.

Those with pre-existing health conditions, children and the elderly are expected to be the more likely to suffer seriously from the New Flu, though many of the deaths already reported from the virus in the US and Mexico seem to centre around people aged between 5 and 30 years old.

Nicola Roxon said that infected Australians who were now in intensive care were mostly those who were already suffering "respiratory illnesses."

And doctors are reportedly overwhelmed with "people suffering respiratory infections".

So, you have all these people apparently already suffering from respiratory problems while a fast-spreading previously unknown influenza virus seems to be hitting the hardest those already having trouble breathing normally.

It's a hell of a way for a country to head into Winter, and its peak flu months.

We are now only entering the second week of a new pandemic reality, one that may take 18 months to two years or more to unfold.

While the Rudd government will try to be seen as doing Everything It Can, the curious new influenza strain will do whatever it's going to do, mostly unhindered, for the next few months at least, by vaccines and containment measures.

How do you go to war against something that can spawn three generations of itself in under 60 seconds?

If you can't get your hands on pharmaceutical anti-virals, star aniseed is better than nothing, and some would argue far better in fact than the side-effect addled Tamiflu.

Who Can We Ban Next?

You can imagine the NSW government will be very happy with the first headline from this Daily Telegraph graphic. The bottom line? Not so much.



If the NSW government, as this story claims, really does end up spending $4 billion or so on local businesses for government contracts that would have previously ended up overseas, then it's obviously good news.

But do you think they really had a choice?

The NSW Liberals and independents, along with the unions, would have been hammering Labor all the way to the next election if they still allowed police and fireys uniforms to be made overseas while local clothing manufacturing is hitting the skids.

As for NSW Bans China, well, what a surprise, the story itself says no such thing at all. Not even close.

But the Daily Telegraph gets to serve up its daily dose of xenophobia, along with a nice big Fuck You to China on behalf of the boss, who is still smarting over his failed efforts to grab a major slice of Chinese media action, a business experiment that cost him more than $1.4 billion.

He's Right, Suede Desert Boots Do Need Little Pendulums

Liam Gallagher, just about the best thing that happened to British rock in the 1990s, fashion designer and president of The International 'Sideburns Are Still Fookin Cool Innit?' Movement :



This story about Liam's love for Spinal Tap, from his brother Noel, is classic :

Liam thought Spinal Tap were real people.

We went to see them play in Carnegie Hall. Before they played, they came on as three folk singers from the film A Mighty Wind. We were laughing and he said, 'This is shit'.

We said: 'No, those three are in Spinal Tap. You do know they are American actors?'

'They're not even a real band?'

'They're not even English! One of them is married to Jamie Lee Curtis.'

'I'm not fuckin' 'avin that,' he says, and walks off right up the middle of Carnegie Hall.

He's never watched Spinal Tap since.

How much more Tap can you be? The answer is none, none more Tap.

Just clouds, in the skies above Sydney on Friday and Saturday. We don't look up anywhere near often enough.










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It's Not A Wonder Drug, Merv, It's A Wonder Vaccine

By Darryl Mason

As I wrote here on The Orstrahyun, June 4 :

Joel Fitzgibbon's resignation is just another curious example of Ruddlife imitating The Hollow Men, instead of the other way around. The episode where the PM's staff battled to decide whether it looked better for the prime minister to sack his defence minister, or accept his resignation, was only repeated on the ABC a couple of weeks ago.

The Budget episode of The Hollow Men, aired a week before treasurer Wayne Swann delivered the real one, was also full of key phrases and words that were put to good use when Swann and Rudd and Julia Gillard stepped in front of the media to sell it.

You'll know some sort of Evil Lefty ABC conspiracy is afoot if the Wonder Drug episode of The Hollow Men airs a week or two before the Rudd government begins seriously trying to sell the swine flu Wonder Vaccine

The instant classic 'Wonder Drug' episode of The Hollow Men aired again last Friday.

Next week begins the hardcore Big Sell by the Rudd government of a claimed swine flu vaccine.

RuddLife imitates The Hollow Men again.

The Rudd government has already committed to buy some 10 million doses of swine flu vaccine, even one that only has had, maximum, ten weeks of clinical trials :

Novartis, which has its Australian headquarters in Sydney, announced it had successfully completed cell-based production of the first batch of A(H1N1) vaccine.

"Based on that success, the company expects to be able to achieve rapid production," a Novartis spokesman said.

"The vaccine is in clinical trials now.''

Australian pharmaceutical company CSL said it would continue to develop a vaccine in Australia. Spokeswoman Dr Rachel David said CSL was conducting clinical trials of vaccines to determine the ideal dosage.

Nothing yet on possible side effects, and how the side effects compare to actually enduring and getting over a bout with swine flu.

No Australian deaths related to swine flu yet but the first fatalities blamed on the virus must only be a few days or a week away at the most. If not, Australia will be a curious anomaly as it will have some of the highest infection rates per capita but the lowest death rate.

The following numbers are of confirmed cases of infection, but the true numbers are probably far higher.

The government has confirmed 1441 cases of swine flu, including 1011 cases in Victoria, 160 in NSW, 90 in Queensland, 59 in Western Australia, 47 in South Australia, 41 in ACT, 17 in the Northern Territory and 16 in Tasmania.

I've been out of it for a few days with some kind of nasty bastard flu. That's why it's been quite around here. First time in a couple of years I've had anything that shut down the mini-writing factory for more than a day, or two. Don't like that. Forced to stop because the brain is too fogged out to function properly makes me very angry.

I went to the local medical centre to get checked out on Thursday, but it was standing room only. and they were only seeing "emergency cases", outside of those already booked in. First free appointment is Monday, 11pm. The only other two doctors within walking distance are likewise booked solid.

Either there are a lot of people around here feeling as utterly crap as I am, or a lot of locals have simply decided to exercise caution and headed to the doctor's when symptoms manifested they felt uneasy about.

There must be many other towns across Australia this weekend where it is next to impossible to find a doctor or medical centre that isn't fully booked.

Not much about swamped medical centres in the news yet. Maybe my neighbourhood is filled with hypochondriacs.

I knuckled last Monday, in spare hours, to finally finish the long overdue rewrite of the ED Day : Dead Sydney novel I published online in 2007 and 2008. It's a strange thing indeed to be working on a novel about life in Sydney after a flu pandemic at the same time a real pandemic is declared and then coming down with a flu that is fairly debilitating, heading for the local medical centre, finding it all but over-run with other flu patients....

I thought I became slightly obsessive with the hand-washing over the past few weeks. Didn't stop me from catching whatever this flu is.

I'd have to be feeling a hell of a lot sicker than this, however, before I volunteered to take a vaccine only a couple of weeks old, and fresh out of very brief clinical trials.

Obviously, there will be more on all this when the old energy levels return, and if I learn anything interesting from the doctor visit on Monday, I'll write it up here.