Dreading September 15th…

I was going to write a little tribute to Tony Abbott.  He’s ever such a good sport providing so many faux pas and such meaty fodder for the social media mill.  He’s given us almost as many episodes of foot in mouth disease as His Royal Highness, the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Philip, but in all fairness good ol’ Phil has another 40 years of sound bites on Uncle Tony.

By the looks of it, he’s going to make a fabulous Prime Minister!  He’s against women… homosexuals… immigration… indigenous Australians… climate change (for fucks sake he’s against climate change!)… equality in the workplace…  the disabled…  super for low income earners…  sigh.

This is Australia in the 21st Century, we don’t need none of that equality shit here.  In fact, it’s getting kinda hard to see through all the things he opposes to see what he actually stands for.  So far, it looks like he’s all for getting elected and throwing money at people who don’t need it.

abbott runner runs from parliament

But turns out… I don’t have to write a tribute to him.  I was just driving along in my car this morning and heard this song come on directly after the news which was dribbling on about something that Abbott’s response to the budget (oh my god, the Australian economy is so bad, it’s a wonder any of us have survived the GFC) … and well, it’s perfect!  And who would have thought such a befitting tribute, that could have been written directly to Tony Abbot himself, would come from the most unlikely of places – that most erudite of political commenters, Lilly Allen!

http://vimeo.com/27579323

“Fuck You (Very Much)”

Look inside

Look inside your tiny mind
Now look a bit harder
Cause we’re so uninspired,
so sick and tired of all the hatred you harbor
So you say
It’s not okay to be gay
Well I think you’re just evil
You’re just some racist who can’t tie my laces
Your point of view is medieval

Fuck you
Fuck you very, very much
Cause we hate what you do
And we hate your whole crew
So please don’t stay in touch

Fuck you
Fuck you very, very much
Cause your words don’t translate
And it’s getting quite late
So please don’t stay in touch

Do you get
Do you get a little kick out of being slow minded?
You want to be like your father
It’s approval you’re after
Well that’s not how you find it

Do you
Do you really enjoy living a life that’s so hateful?
Cause there’s a hole where your soul should be
Your losing control of it and it’s really distasteful

Fuck you
Fuck you very, very much
Cause we hate what you do
And we hate your whole crew
So please don’t stay in touch

Fuck you
Fuck you very, very much
Cause your words don’t translate and it’s getting quite late
So please don’t stay in touch

Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you,
Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you,
Fuck you

You say, you think we need to go to war
Well you’re already in one,
Cause its people like you
That need to get slew
No one wants your opinion

Fuck you
Fuck you very, very much
Cause we hate what you do
And we hate your whole crew
So please don’t stay in touch

Fuck you
Fuck you very, very much
Cause your words don’t translate and it’s getting quite late
So please don’t stay in touch

Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you

Solid work from Ms Allen.  And just to refresh everyone’s memory on just how fabulous Tony Abbott is, and how deserving he is of such a worthy tribute, here are some of HIS greatest hits:

Famous gaffes regarding women:

  • ‘The problem with the Australian practice of abortion is that an objectively grave matter has been reduced to a question of the mother’s convenience.’
  • ‘I think it would be folly to expect that women will ever dominate or even approach equal representation in a large number of areas simply because their aptitudes, abilities and interests are different for physiological reasons’
  • ‘I think there does need to be give and take on both sides, and this idea that sex is kind of a woman’s right to absolutely withhold, just as the idea that sex is a man’s right to demand I think they are both they both need to be moderated, so to speak’
  • ‘What the housewives of Australia need to understand as they do the ironing is that if they get it done commercially it’s going to go up in price and their own power bills when they switch the iron on are going to go up, every year…’
  • ‘We do not educate women to a higher degree level to deny them a career, if we want women of calibre to have families, we should give them a fair dinkum chance to do so.’

Thoughts on immigration and indigenous Australians:

  • ‘Jesus knew that there was a place for everything and it’s not necessarily everyone’s place to come to Australia.’ (There he is, leaving his religion at home again).
  • ‘These people aren’t so much seeking asylum, they’re seeking permanent residency. If they were happy with temporary protection visas, then they might be able to argue better that they were asylum seekers’
  • ‘Now, I know that there are some Aboriginal people who aren’t happy with Australia Day. For them it remains Invasion Day. I think a better view is the view of Noel Pearson, who has said that Aboriginal people have much to celebrate in this country’s British Heritage’
  • ‘Western civilisation came to this country in 1788 and I’m proud of that…’
  • ‘There may not be a great job for them but whatever there is, they just have to do it, and if it’s picking up rubbish around the community, it just has to be done’

Ideas about rights at work:

  • ‘Bad bosses, like bad fathers and husbands, should be tolerated because they do more good than harm’

Tell us what you really think about Julia Gillard:

  • ‘Gillard won’t lie down and die’ (we will remember to accord him the same respect should Australia suffer the misfortune to end up with him as PM).

*head desk* TA on climate change:

  • ‘Climate change is absolute crap’
  • ‘If you want to put a price on carbon why not just do it with a simple tax.’

His not religiously motivated thoughts on homosexuality:

  • ‘I’d probably … I feel a bit threatened’
  • ‘If you’d asked me for advice I would have said to have – adopt a sort of “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy about all of these things…’

And there you have it… I’d like to say a big Lilly Allen style “Fuck you, fuck you very much” to Tony Abbott.  Now if only the MSM were a bit less bought off and the average Australian a bit less apathetic.   🙁

 

 

DIY Rainbow

Last week, NSW Roads Minister Duncan Gay decided to rip up the Rainbow Crossing that was installed for the Sydney Mardi Gras Parade allegedly because it created a public safety hazard as people were stopping to take portraits on the colourful landmark.  Oh no. We can’t have people actually enjoying a public art installation can we?   Gay (ironic, huh) knowing how popular the decision to get rid of the Rainbow Crossing would be, had it ripped up in the middle of the night and without consulting the local community.

sydney rainbow crossing destroyed

 

As expected this has been a very unpopular decision, but has caused a significant and still ongoing ‘backlash’… if you can call it that.  Most public ‘backlashes’ that rail against bad government policy or unpopular community decisions tend to lead to acrimonious accusations in the news, social media outrage and sometimes protesters taking to the streets shouting their cause and holding hastily created placards.  This ‘backlash’ has taken on a very different form – it’s a very warm and fuzzy supportive sort of backlash if we can still call it that.  People are indeed taking to the streets to rail against this particular unpopular decision, but in a totally unique and totally cool way…

DIY rainbow 4 Diy rainbow 5 DIY rainbow 12 DIY rainbow 13 DIY rainbow 14 DIY rainbow 15 DIY rainbow brisbane DIY rainbow soho DIY rainbow st louis Sydney wants to keep its rainbow road crossing celebrating gay and lesbian heritage DIY rainbow6 DIY rainbow7 DIY rainbow8 DIY rainbow9 DIY rainbow10 DIY rainbow11 DIY rainbowsemaphore DIYRainbow FNQ DIYrainbow DIYrainbow2 DIYrainbow2NY DIYrainbow3 DIYrainbowB105

 

People around the country, well around the world actually, are grabbing chalk and making their own pavement rainbow crossings in a huge DIY Rainbow Crossing campaign to show support for Sydney and their lost Rainbow Crossing.  Small and large chalk rainbow crossings are appearing all over the world and pictures of them are turning up all over Twitter and Facebook.  It’s really heartwarming to see such a peaceful protest having such a powerful impact.

 

Slow down, you move too fast… and get it wrong!

What a morning!  Woke up ready to study Latin (well as ready as anyone can be for such an endeavour) only to find out about the tragic bombing at the Boston Marathon… and then I watched the complete media clusterfuck as it unfolded surrounding the event.  It seems technology is working against us now.  There were reports that all the cellphone towers were shut down as a preventative measure to stop any further incendiary devices being set off remotely using mobile phones… this was incorrect.  The cellular networks were over capacity and failed, so people lost signal and connection and were encouraged to use text or email to send info to friends and family.

Then there was The New York Times coming out with a (obviously unverified) report that a 20 year old Saudi national was being detained as a suspect in the bombings.  This was rapidly refuted by the Boston Police Department as being untrue and that they had as yet not identified any suspects… The New York Times slinks off with their tail between their legs but it’s too late, the ever simmering ‘Merican Racial Hot Pot hath been stirred.  FFS, if you can’t trust the NYTimes, who can you rely on?

screen grab nytimes boston bombing

With the ‘information’ (and I use the term loosely) coming out at a rapid rate of knots as each news service is determined to beat their competitors to the punch line, sees a situation come to pass where NOTHING in a crisis is reliable.  People need to wait for the dust to settle before the lay of the land can be assessed, and this is just not happening.

President Obama gave a speech which was immediately hosted on the White House Youtube Channel (yeah, there’s a sentence I never thought I’d be writing ten years ago while spending hours watching West Wing re-runs), giving what some have described as a dispassionate and robotic speech to the people about yet another tragedy affecting the American people and their sense of security.  To be honest, I think President Obama just looked like a guy who is sick and tired of giving these speeches after every mass shooting and every domestic or foreign terrorist attack.  These speeches must take a toll and would definitely be one of the worst parts of his job.

President Obama’s Address Boston Marathon Bombings

But he makes his speech, and they make it immediately available to the public to comment on, though the ‘why’ of that completely escapes me as there tends to end up with about a 8:1… political and inane vitriole : sympathies and condolences, ratio.  Some of the real corkers I’ve copied in here and I’m sure it only got worse as they fed off each other like ravenous hyenas picking over a carcass that turn on each other once they’ve ripped the speech apart…

Andres Pereyda:
Inside job. the Onion has better actors than you rich “leaders”

JoseCleveland:
I had to go look into animation cats and to see if I could find the thin Pink Panther like cat …I saw in the clouds. I couldn’t. I did find Yogi Bear when I looked up Warner Bros, Hanna Barbera, MGM, Schultz, etc…. then the storm in N/South Dakota area is
called Yogi.
Ok.

Kevin Garcia 5:
You forget that this is MERICA! We do what we want to get where we want and fuck you!
MERICA!

cplasko:
North korea with out a dought

PresidentTerrorist:
USA without a doubt

Listenbuddy1:
I’m sad for him that it had to happen on the most sacred day of the year for him and his kind, April 15th.

RidlerThe:
They are going to say its Iran and evade… Just like Iraq with 9/11. This is to make the US citizens hate a country so they get a green flag to do whatever the fuck they want.

loooooooo65432:
If Romney was president this would not have happened!

WoWSmirv:
“On days like these there are no republicans, or Democrats, we are Americans united and concerend for our fellow citizens” Really? how about having that philosophy, idk, ALWAYS? why should it take the death of many to come up with that statement? Also, he says they have no idea who did it or why? how about telling us the truth, You did it as a way to continue your fucked up agenda on taking away all our rights and privacy? You know it was you. I am sure Satan will welcome you to hell w/open arms.

Theodore Kaczynski:
Obama, you can have our guns but please leave us our bombs♥♥♥♥♥♥

Twostones00:
Obama’s speech sounds just like the speech Bush gave after the 911 incident. Next FEAR, HATE, LIES, RACISM, PROPAGANDA, WMD’S, COLOR CODED FEAR CHART AND WAR OF AGGRESSION. Thousands of innocent people will die in an OPEC country just because they have brown skin and oil.

SODMGYGRN:
THIS WAS A FBI DRILL PLANNED OUT BY THE U.S.A GOVERNMENT!!!!

zatorith:
Best laugh I had since 2001. More bombs please, I love watching murikans die. You fucking faggots blow up children in the middle east every fucking day, and now some low tier firecracker goes off in some shithole and I am supposed to care? I hope there will be more bombs, fuck America and this fucking world we live in.

cmadd bro:
the goverment prolly paid some 1 to do it so they could blame north Korea

nmnn95:
IT WAS THE GOVERNMENT TO BLAME NORTH KOREA AND GO TO WAR JUST WATCH ITS GONA HAPPEN

Arc Zie:
USA invasion of Iran, here we come.

p money:
if u take away americans right to bear bombs, obama will impose sharia law and communism, theres always that guy on these vids

blake2341000:
Im telling you it was north Korea it all makes sense now the threats in weeks it all adds up to this planes are next bridges towers we need to take action these people have been preparing for this #getkoreanow

Tman2010001:
It will probably be blamed on a group of Patriots who believe in the constitution. Like in the shows they’ve been using to prepare everyone for this. They plan to blame it on the people who support the 2nd amendment and constitution to make all of those people seem bad… Just a theory

cody Strauss:
This bombing is really suspicious it will probably be blamed on other country and make war

UAL8658:
Whoever did it, the United States will find you and wil end your reign of terror on the American people and the free world.

HcccAcsClub:
I am a PROUD GAY American.. And I agree with this Speech.

ahmad baswedan:
LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL

SuBZeR0TeMP:
Why are Americans so fat?

jonethot33:
This event took place in America. We are living in America. We are Americans. I’m sure foreign countries don’t care at the moment.  Shut up.

FREEDOMSPRICE1:
Oh good grief, you could give a shit about the people in Boston it’s just another operation smoke and mirror bull shit !!!

bass109:
activate anti terrorists and anti retaliation riots forces across cities in america. Stabilize the nation under peace of the lord and president. God love you all.

Nicholas Miller:
on tax day not many injuries compared to 911 this was a domestic group boston tea party or people who dont wanna pay taxes deff some one from the united states

Gjergj Kastrioti:
But the people dealing in the name of YOUR BOOK of hatred call you are brother in faith. So GET RID of islam or GTFO

TheisticWisdom:
Poor families affected. But you should GET ANGRY, because… BARACK IS AN ACTOR, look at him! ! ! FAKE SHIT.  What a SHOW. This is a SCRIPT. Another FALSE FLAG to have laws changed and agendas pushed. ‘MERICAH! !!

Ulvenkai:
I love how, no matter the degree of the tragedy, even while the tears are still fresh in our eyes, you can always rely on YouTube comments to remain a steady constant of people calling each other queers, dumbasses, brain-dead and the usual rhetoric.
My heart goes out to you, America. Your loss is felt all over the world.

…  …

Hmmm.. And that was just some of the inane responses from idiots commenting on the President’s address to the nation via the White House Youtube Channel.  It gets so much worse:

“In response, and utterly without any evidence, frequent Fox News contributor Erik Rush tweeted out a message blaming the bombing on Muslim terrorists, saying “Everybody do the National Security Ankle Grab! Let’s bring more Saudis in without screening them! C’mon! #bostonmarathon.”

That prompted another Twitter user to chastize Rush for making such unsupported accusations, which prompted Rush to respond with a call for all Muslims to be killed:

RushBostonTweet

So in the wake of this tragic event a few things become exceedingly apparently…

  1. Social media and the mainstream media are in a race to get information to the public asap, and as a result of this race, the mainstream media have defenestrated source integrity in favour of rapid dissemination times – ’tis better to issue an apology than wait for confirmation perhaps?
  2. American’s call themselvs ‘Merrica, ‘Murrica, and ‘Merika just like we do WHEN WE ARE TAKING THE PISS OUT OF THEM!  I did not know that.  I would have thought many would consider this a slight to their oft God Blessed, United States of America.
  3. There appear to be more conspiracy theorists per square inch in the US than anywhere else on the planet, the tenor of distrust and suspicion for their own government is unbelievable!  Attributing the government with the ability to bomb it’s own people to justify invading *insert unpopular foreign nation of choice* is just madness.  Who thinks like that?
  4. The US really needs to do something about its public education system… it was everything I could do not to go and correct the rampant spelling and grammatical mistakes in those comments and most of them, even the sensible ones not included here, made me twitch!And finally…
  5. Regardless of whether it turns out to be a psychologically disturbed individual or a well organised and politically motivated terrorist group that is responsible for this reprehensible attack… one thing is clear:  In ‘Merrica, there is plenty of hate to go around.

Two cow economics… E-cow-nomics!

SOCIALISM
You have 2 cows.
You give one to your neighbour

COMMUNISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and gives you some milk

FASCISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and sells you some milk

NAZISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and shoots you

BUREAUCRATISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both, shoots one, milks the other, and then
throws the milk away

TRADITIONAL CAPITALISM
You have two cows.
You sell one and buy a bull.
Your herd multiplies, and the economy
grows.
You sell them and retire on the income

ROYAL BANK OF SCOTLAND (VENTURE) CAPITALISM
You have two cows.
You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by
your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with an associated general offer so that you get all four cows back, with a tax exemption
for five cows.
The milk rights of the six cows are transferred via an intermediary to a Cayman Island Company secretly owned by the majority shareholder who sells the rights to all seven cows back to your listed company.
The annual report says the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more. You sell one cow to buy a new president of the United States , leaving you with nine cows. No balance sheet provided with the release.
The public then buys your bull.

SURREALISM
You have two giraffes.
The government requires you to take harmonica lessons.

AN AMERICAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You sell one, and force the other to
produce the milk of four cows.
Later, you hire a consultant to analyse why
the cow has dropped dead.

A GREEK CORPORATION
You have two cows. You borrow lots of euros to build barns, milking sheds, hay stores, feed sheds,
dairies, cold stores, abattoir, cheese unit and packing sheds.
You still only have two cows.

A FRENCH CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You go on strike, organise a riot, and block the roads, because you want three
cows.

A JAPANESE CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce
twenty times the milk.
You then create a clever cow cartoon image called a Cowkimona and
market it worldwide.

AN ITALIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows,
but you don’t know where they are.
You decide to have lunch.

A SWISS CORPORATION
You have 5000 cows. None of them belong to you.
You charge the owners for storing them.

A CHINESE CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You have 300 people milking them.
You claim that you have full employment, and high bovine productivity.
You arrest the newsman who reported the real situation.

AN INDIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You worship them.

A BRITISH CORPORATION
You have two cows.
Both are mad.

AN IRAQI CORPORATION
Everyone thinks you have lots of cows.
You tell them that you have none.
No-one believes you, so they bomb the ** out of you and invade your country.
You still have no cows, but at least you are now a Democracy.

AN AUSTRALIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
Business seems pretty good.
You close the office and go for a few beers to celebrate.

A NEW ZEALAND CORPORATION
You have two cows.
The one on the left looks very attractive…

two cow economics e-cow-nomics

What’s good for the Goose…

It was Clean Up Australia day yesterday, which you’d think would have something to do with looking after the country’s natural resources and doing something positive for your local environment… but of course, it’s really just another opportunity for political hacks to get out there and make hay. Tony Abbott, of course pulled out his best ‘man of the people’ hi-vis vest and went out to give a hand (with a swathe of photographers of course – but we can’t really fault him too heavily on that one as this particular event has always been a bit of a media circus anyway).

Anyway, I hope he actually did spend a few hours picking up rubbish and didn’t just turn up smile for the cameras putting some carefully vetted trash into a bag and then grab a wet wipe and walk away as soon as the cameras were away.  But the interesting bit about his little photo stunt, is that poor Tony took a bit of a tumble down a slippery slope (no, I’m not talking about his dodgy as all hell climate change policy, I mean a literal section of damp grass covered terrain).  Fortunately Mr Abbott appears to be unharmed.

Tony Abbott Leader of the opposition LNP LOTO falls over

 

What I want to know is, why is it that Mr Abbott falling on his arse is turning up in the blogosphere and all over the twitterverse but the media appear to be largely ignoring his decidedly ungainly and unmanly stumble.  Whereas not so long ago, our Prime Minister, Ms Julia Gillard, had the misfortune to trip on some uneven ground in her heels, and it was plastered about everywhere!  Ad nauseaum.  For days.

Julia Gillard trips high heels PM falls over

 

What’s with that mainstream media?  Why does our female Prime Minister tripping inelegantly deserve intense media scrutiny and endless replays for days on end, while the man vying for her job, falling on his arse down an embankment, barely rates a mention so far?

Is it some sort of strange discriminatory sexims at play here? Or are Australia’s mainstream media outlets letting their political petticoats show?