Dickhead Frenzy

On self-aware awareness

2012-01-23T16:14:00.000-08:00

Awareness,like engagement, has become quite devoid of meaning in this golden age ofmarketing spin and social media experts. Rather than being about education,consciousness and action, more often than not is now more about who issignifying their "awareness" than actually helping to spread amessage.

Perhapsthe most common subject we are reminded to increase our awareness of is breastcancer. Not cancer in general, but specifically breast cancer.

Pinkbottles, pink chocolate, pink washing powder, pink eggs - are all there tocontribute to the awareness of breast cancer and involve consumers. And all ofwhich, in reality contribute an incredibly small amount of the purchaser'smoney toward breast cancer research, but remind us that our brands care enoughto contribute an infinitesimal, tax deductable amount of their profits to ourwellbeing.

Now,breast cancer (along with lung cancer) isthe most common cause of cancer-related death in Australia, and one in ninewomen under the age of 85 will be diagnosed with it at some stage in theirlives, but pink-washing is shameless; like green-washing it allows acompany to make a token donation or gesture and then posture disproportionatelyabout its contribution. Holly Hutchinson actually covered the discrepanciesbetween profit and donation in a Drum piece on "think pinkprofiteers" in October.

But I ambeing unfair on our corporate friends (corporations are, of course, peoplenow), because individuals are just as guilty of pink-washing; consciously orunconsciously.

InOctober 2011, a sea of pink washed into my Facebook News Stream as peoplechanged their profile photos pink to support awareness of breast cancer, an initiativeby CUA Bank, which had pledged to donate $1 for each changed picture. The totaldonation was capped at $15,000, which is completely fair and sensible, as anopen ended promotion such as this could potentially bankrupt a company if a capisn't set.

Thedonation itself was an admirable thing - and the pink tactic a clever one toengage people in the donation (and also, of course, let them know who wasbehind the chivalry) -

but thesea of pink didn’t stop; long after the cap hadbeen reached, people were still turning their profile pictures pink, most notgrasping the fact (or bothering to check) CUA that had actually met theirquota. You can, in fact, still click through to the Pink my Profile linkon the CUA Facebook page and join in on the fun.

Which isnot a problem in and of itself. But what does it really do? The first 15 000people held the bank to their donation, the others? Well realistically theywere only increasing their social capital.

Soundpetty? On face value, sure.

Who am Ito tell you you’re being mercenary for showingyour support?

But takeaway supporting the donation and what does the pink profile actually signify? Nothingbut “I’m a good person, look at me being good.” It’s a back-slapping extravaganzawith no actual benefit to cancer research, survivors or families.

Perhaps afurther step along this path are the semi-regular “women’s only” Facebook status updates. The standard format is a messagesent amongst women on facebook (women only, this is apparently important), withsome instructions about posting an obtuse status update that follows a specificformat. In the past this has been about bra colours, shoesizes, wherewomen keep their purses at home, and most recently, birth dates translatedinto fake plans for international trips (strangely not in-keeping with thegendered, vaguely sexual themes of previous years). The exact origin of thistrend is unknown, but the idea is that it sparks interest among the cluelessmale friends of the status poster, involves women in the game and supposedly,under the guise of an in-joke, spreads awareness of breast cancer.

It’s all very clever (at least to the extent that anyparticularly successful chain-letter is), but at what stage does it actually makepeople more aware of breast cancer? How does an in-joke efficiently andpersuasively disseminate information about self-examination to the women whospread the joke with a knowing wink, or encourage donation? Even if thisinformation is included in the initial chain-status instructions, the setup andthe play around the in-joke actually takes away from the seriousness of theissue.

Awarenessis about more than being reminded that something exists. A sea of pinkstatuses, or in-joke statuses for women only, don’tdo anything to increase people’s awareness of the issue orabout general prevention - in fact they actually actively promote disengagementand apathy with the key issue they are meant to be promoting awareness of.

It alsoplays into the stereotype of social media as a tool for time wasting andnarcissism. Social media can be a powerful platform when it engages people inreal world change, but if the "awareness" remains in the domain ofthe virtual it has no real benefit.

The bestway to spread awareness on the issue of cancer is to give people informationabout actual prevention, and avenues to donate. There are many good resourceson how to self-examine for both testicular and breastcancer (two of the most common, virulent and easily discoverable cancersthat affect young people) online, so do the right thing - tweet them, post themon your facebook, and check yourself.

And onceyou’ve done that, take a fewdollars, maybe just two, and put it in a Cancer Councilcollection tin at your local supermarket. Hell, buy a few raffle ticketsfrom Kids with Cancer (theyhave great prizes, you might even win).

And afteryou’ve done it, congratulateyourself. You’ve just done a lot more thanchange your status pink, or tell us where you keep your purse.

My prediction for 2012

2012-01-16T03:31:00.000-08:00

Oh, and the bloggers will be commenting on the commentary. Myself included. Turtles all the way down.

Nod politely at the moon.

2012-01-13T01:17:00.000-08:00

This wasn't meant to be a Friday 13th cartoon, I actually drew most of it yesterday. But here it is! Topical and shit.

The Book of Awkward

2012-01-11T04:09:00.000-08:00

I like to think of Jesus appearing to people throughout history, overwhelming them with piety, all the while just looking for a hug.

The Importance of Good Grammar

2012-01-04T02:22:00.000-08:00

Another little non-topical apolitical cartoon for the political off-season.

Jeremy

2011-12-29T14:55:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas Dickheads

2011-12-23T23:16:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas. Thanks to everyone who has read the blog posts and the cartoons over the course of the year - it's well over 50 posts now, which means I think I've been doing an average of one a week.

Thanks for the comments, the retweets and the shares - I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas, Chanukah/Hannakah, Festivus or Kwanzaa, and if I don't post again until the new year, New Years Eve too.

- Wes

A new hope

2011-12-23T01:32:00.000-08:00

Given the current state of affairs in the asylum seeker onshore/offshore processing debate (or lack thereof, it's a mad rush to a foregone terrible conclusion), I thought I would write the speech that I would love to hear Julia Gillard give on asylum seeker policy.

Sure, it's a pie in the sky thing, but when the mood is so low and the debate so craven, sometimes even the imagining of a better situation can inspire action from a tired and jaded audience.

It seems sad that we are such a level that even the concept of hope on this issue seems laughable. But follow me down that path to where hope might still live. It's not perfect, but it's a start.

Merry Christmas.

------------

Ladiesand Gentlemen, people of Australia.

Therecan be no doubt that in the past ten years, the dominant issue thathas been debated and discussed ad nauseum by media commentatorsand politicians on both sides of the house is the topic of thearrival of asylum seekers on Australian shores.

Australiais in a unique situation - a continent populated by the citizens of asingle country - bordered only by sea. We have no shared borders andthus we do not have the complication of policing, funding or debatingsecure boundaries with a less prosperous neighbour, as our friends inthe United States or many countries in Europe do. We are bounded by35, 877 km of coastline - natural protection from unwelcome visitorsand given this, the vast majority (so much so that we may as well sayall) of our arrivals, whether for tourism, business or migration,have been via plane since the dawn of the age of modern, cheap, humanflight.

Despite this, the emphasis on policy has been deterring thosewho would arrive by boat – we forget that the biggest deterrents ofall are the coastline, seas and remoteness that divide us from therest of the world; there is no path that any refugee can walk tocross the border into Australia.

Even in this period where thegovernment is accused of encouraging people across the sea, boatarrivals make up less than 5% of total asylum applications, andcountries like Italy frequently experience influxes of boat arrivalsover the course of two months that are double the the annual numberof boat arrivals in Australian waters. Overall Australia hosts just0.21% of the world's refugees, in comparison, more than 80% are housed indeveloping nations.

Whileit cannot be denied that “pull” factors have an impact in ourimmediate region, to some small extent – it is “push” factorsthat have the greatest impact on arrivals overall, and particularlythose by boat. Push factors that drive those whose lives are in immediate risk in countrieswhich have been ravaged by war, some of which we as a nation havehelped to fight while not thinking of the humanitarian issue of thosewho are displaced or endangered as a product of conflict.

Wethink of the recent tragedy of the shipwreck off the coast of EastJava, the loss of life, and the ravaged survivors, specifically Afghani asylum seeker Esmat Adine who has told reporters ofbeing directed by the Australian embassy to wait for the coming years to apply for asylum,despite immediate risk to his life in an established theatre of war.Esmat worked for a US humanitarian organisation in Afghanistan– he is an educated, moral and upright person with a clearknowledge of international human rights and a contribution to make,and yet our system failed him.

Faced with immediate danger, and theacknowledged mortal risks associated with sea travel to a potentialbetter life, Esmat of course made the choice that gave him a chanceof survival. It is a choice that those of us lucky enough to havebeen born into a country that has a stable democratically government,a bounty of resources, modern infrastructure, universal healthcareand a state-funded education system will likely never have to make,but one that I imagine all of us would make when confronted with thealternative.

Ratherthan breaking the people smuggler's business model, the currentpolicy of deterrence creates and reinforces it. If there was a lawfulway for those in danger to make their way to Australia, people likeEsmat Adine have shown that they would take it. The deterrent, andAustralia's reluctance to increase its humanitarian intake as itstands, encourages people onto boats.

Andwith the capsizing and running aground of the boat that Esmat Adinewould have arrived on, it becomes clear once more that the deterrentis not worth the cost to human life.

Theissue of boat arrivals may be one that divides our community atpresent; many feel that the problem is one of “protecting ourborders” - language brought into the debate in the Howard yearsthat conflates those seeking asylum with a fear of alien invasion notdissimilar to the impulse that inspired the White Australia-stylepolicy. Mygovernment, and the Rudd government before it, too, has been guiltyof borrowing this language. But the time for this language is over,and it is time that we revisited asylum seeker policy and itsemphasis in migration policy overall.

Wehave an ethical, and above all else, legal responsibility to thosewho seek asylum. This means not punishing them for their arrival, orfor the means in which they arrive. It also means creating viablemeans of entry so that those who have grounds to seek asylum are notencouraged onto “leaky boats” by our policy of deterrence.

Wealso have an economic responsibility to the people of Australia –this means not paying the exorbitant costs of offshore processing tomake a point that is ill-informed, unfounded and above all else, notdemonstrably beneficial to anyone concerned. The cost of processing asingle refugee in the Pacific Solution was more than half a milliondollars. During this time some refugees were detained for up to 3years, at what has been shown to be hugely detrimentalpsychologically. And of those who were detained at Nauru or on ManusIsland, the vast majority were subsequently found to be refugees –now bearing the scars of not just the countries where they have comefrom but also those of detention they did not deserve.

Whilethe Howard government claimed that the Pacific Solution reduced thenumber of arrivals drastically, these figures fail to take intoaccount the fact that asylum seeker numbers worldwide were at an alltime high in 2001, and had more than halved by the end of 2006. Thenumbers of refugees internationally was clearly the factor here, not the policy - at a massive cost to the Australian people, and to the people indetention.

The Opposition Leader speaks of wanting to protect those who would board a boat to get to Australia from the threat of death in transit, failing to see that there is often graver risk in not hopping on that boat if there are no other legitimate channels to seek asylum.

AsPrime Minister, I have the job, like Labor leaders before me such asPaul Keating and Bob Hawke, or even Liberal leaders such as JohnHoward and Sir Malcolm Fraser, of putting policy into place which maybe unpopular but serves the greater needs and wishes of this countryand its people.

Havingthe conviction to make these decisions, and to do what is best forthe country even if it may mean personal attack or insult, amomentary dip in polling or the loss of government is not just themark of leadership - it is the duty of the Prime Minister.

Realpolicy decisions look beyond the populism of those issues that willaffect voters on the way to the ballot box at the next election, andto those issues that will affect our lives in ten years time - tothose issues that will affect our children, and even their children.

Australiansare an intelligent, rational, overwhelmingly well-educated andaspirational people.

For too long, we have played to those among uswho would have opposed the emancipation of slaves in the UnitedStates in the 19^thcentury, to those who would have opposed the tearing up of the WhiteAustralia policy in the 20^thcentury, to those who fear international trade, essential toAustralia's current prosperity, on racial grounds – minority views that have been encouraged into the public's consciousness as being indicative of all Australians' position.

I believe theAustralian people are better, more moral and more intelligent, than that.

Given this, my government will not be taking up the offermade by Tony Abbott to change the Migration Act, to again moveprocessing offshore whether it is to Nauru, Manus Island or even Malaysia. TheHigh Court ruled against this decision in the past, and were right todo – offshore processing is wrong in law (both nationally and internationally), as well as ethics andlogic, and should remain that way.

Aregional solution is the answer, and my government remains committedto that, but wholesale swapping of asylum seekers with othercountries in the region, where welfare cannot be assured or duty of care overseen, is not thatsolution.

Wewill be moving to ensure that the channels by which asylum seekerscan arrive are safer, more open and more transparent - this means increasing the proportion of refugees in our migration intake to accomodate those seeking asylum at their country of origin. And for thosewho do arrive by boat or plane, processing will be conducted onshore, within the community. This process will be conductedwith transparency, and open to public scrutiny – bound by the conventions of the Australian public service, and not hidden behind securityclassification.

Forthose who fear for our infrastructure – though the numbers do notmerit this fear – we will provide it, and where necessary reinforceit. The Gillard and Rudd governments, and the Labor party as a whole,have shown that we are the party of infrastructure investment –something sorely lacking in the Howard government that preceded us.

Itis time that Australia took a stand, not in protecting or closing ourborders, but in meeting our international obligations to create afair and just environment for those who arrive on our doorstep inneed, no matter the means of arrival.

Let's show the international community what it means to be Australian.

Something fishy about the link bait

2011-12-19T16:25:00.000-08:00

Something(okay a lot) about this The Age/SMH article ("Survivors tell why the boatskeep coming") on the asylum seeker boat sinking on Sunday didn't sit wellwith me. It just fits the mainstream media narrative on the issue so well - itlargely skirts around the disaster itself, and jumps right to the"scoop" of finding an asylum seeker who apparently doesn't want to bean asylum seeker. Somehow, Esmat Adine's view on asylum seeker policy fits thecurrent narrative perfectly - he evenasks Australia to "close the borders". Paging Andrew Bolt!

But,clearly, it's not the whole story (in fact, quite literally). It's actually acut down version of another article by Tom Allard ("Rescuers find 13 onisland off East Java"), the correspondent, which seems to have been custombuilt for link bait on the front page.

With a quick Google search on his name, youcan see that Adine is the key course for virtually every story on thesurvivors. That's understandable, I imagine it's going to be hard to findsomeone in the group who wants to talk, especially given the circumstances oftheir arrival (to twist a Howardism). But more to the point, as mentioned herein the full piece, which also appears on the Age/SMH website, but is notfeatured, Esmat Adine is a fluent English speaker, and from what we can gathergiven the spread of his message, the only English speaker - meaning he'sprobably the only person most Australian journalists or correspondents couldeasily interview.

Themain thing here, though, is that the short feature article, omits to give usAdine's full message - the survivor is actually saying that he arrived by boatbecause there was no other viable channel:

''Wewill do again. Because we have nothing. If we are going to die, ourresponsibility will be with the Australian government.'' Mr Adine says he tried repeatedly though official channels in Kabul toapply to go to Australia as a refugee.

''Theyjust sent me an email that I should apply in 2013 or 2014. I cannot … my life was in serious danger but nobody wouldanswer me.''

Ratherthan claiming the government has culpability for not "closing theborders" and therefore putting lives at risk, Adine actually appears to besuggesting that Australia's attitude to seeking overall is the reason lives areat risk - ie. "the queue" doesn't work.

"Australia's policy towardsasylum seekers is unfair. Those who catch a boat to Australia are resettledquickly. Those who do not make it, or apply through official channels, aredenied."

Thecut-down version of the article also omits to tell us that Esmat Adine used towork for a US aid organization in Afghanistan - and thus is in a betterposition to comment on, and likely apply for, asylum.

Really,given this is what's actually appearing on the Age and SHM frontpages as a featurearticle it's a mean hatchet job. It also seems to be regurgitating theinformation for two separate articles: one to dishonestly forward an agenda,the other to actually educate and inform. Hedging your bets much, Fairfax?

Kim Jong Getty

2011-12-19T01:10:00.000-08:00

The real tragedy is that the final proper Bugle (hopefully for this year) was just last week.

But all joking aside, I don't believe in hell or heaven, so I hope that Kim Jong-Il's last moments were incredibly painful.

Hang on, this is a loaded deck!

2011-12-12T01:52:00.000-08:00

I intentionally didn't comment on the reshuffle rumours, because I've been wrong before (and I would have sid it was BS, to be honest), but I've quite enjoyed seeing everyone who was saying last week that it was nonsense covering it like they could see it all coming.

I guess this is Australia. Today.

------

Speaking of cards....

"They made me say it!" or how we learned to stop thinking and love the double speak.

2011-12-10T21:32:00.001-08:00

This is partly inspired by the lack of Insiders over the holiday period, and partly inspired by this argument I had with Latika Bourke on Twitter the other night (click to enlarge)...

It really frustrates me when journalists and commentators blame the tone of political discussion on politicians... Surely at least some of the blame must go to those whose job it is to educate and report. The tone and lexicon of political debate in parliament may set the agenda for what is reported, but going beyond the superficial is what journalism is all about.

If you're thinking I'm being unfair (and to a certain extent I am by just targeting Latika, for that I apologise, she's clearly not the only one, just the example I have at the moment), I'm wondering when we're going to start seeing journos on twitter giving regular updates of visa overstayers and the number of asylum seekers who arrive by plane.

If you're going to call the horse race, call the whole shebang - not just the horses that are easy to see.

------

Hey, it's almost Christmas! Why not buy some Dickhead Frenzy Christmas Cards to go on your presents?

A bet each way is the least worst policy

2011-12-02T23:38:00.001-08:00

It's kind of a sad state of affairs when Mark Arbib's cowardly and hollow bet each way becomes ALP policy. Marriage equality is now the ALP platform, and it's essentially a given that it will also be destroyed by a conscience vote. We live in hope that it won't, but that hope is bruised and knows to flinch when anyone raises their hand.

The even sadder thing is that this is one of those issues where the individual beliefs of those in parliament would appear to be out of step with their electorates. A completely disproportionate amount of MPs state they believe "marriage is between a man and woman" and a similarly disproportionate number of MPs are regular church goers. I'm not saying these things are definitively analogous, but it does show that the personal views of our MPs are often out of step with their electorate - and that the views of the electorate (which polls have shown are consistently in favour of marriage equality by a considerable majority) will almost certainly not be reflected in a conscience vote.

Don't even get me started on offshore processing...

Speaking of religion and religious holidays... would you like to support the Frenzy and delight your relatives in the process?

At last, a bipartisan decision

2011-12-01T02:57:00.000-08:00

And remember...

Dickhead Frenzy Christmas Cards are now available!

2011-11-28T02:59:00.001-08:00

Dickhead Frenzy Christmas Cards are now for sale!

Get all 5 cards in a pack - 5 for $15 (plus $2 for postage), printed on professionally on high quality satin card stock outside (just like the best commercial cards) and uncovered inside so you can write in it easily for the politically minded relative, friend or particularly intelligent pet.

All cards have "DHFrenzy" printed on the back, with the blog address smaller underneath - so your grandmother isn't staring across the table at "DICKHEAD" in bold type at the Christmas dinner table.

These will be a limited run - 20 packs in total. They should ship early next week (week commencing Monday 5th December).

Inside: I'd understand if you said NO!

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Inside: MERRY CHRISTMAS

You barbarian.

Inside: Don't make a liar of me.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Inside: Don't tell anyone, but it was my idea.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Inside: Having said that, let me say this...

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Deep Sigh Mining

2011-11-22T02:41:00.001-08:00

Also - Dickhead Frenzy christmas cards will be properly up for sale tomorrow! Here's a few more samples...

Inside: MERRY CHRISTMAS, you barbarian.

Inside: Don't tell anyone but it was my idea.

A very Dickhead Christmas

2011-11-17T03:02:00.001-08:00

I have been remiss in updating lately due largely to a spike in other drawing and writing work, and hugely busy working days.

I will start regularly updating again next week, but in the meantime, I have a piece on polling in this month's issue of The King's Tribune which you can read here (subscriptions are only $24 a quarter, and are well worth it - more art from me next month and you could win an iPad)!

I have also been working on some Dickhead Frenzy christmas cards, which should be ready to go this weekend. If you have friends, family or disturbed street individuals with an interest in politics, then these could be the cards for you!

These are just a sample of the five (click to enlarge):

Inside: "Having said that, let me say this...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!"

Inside: "Don't make a liar of me

MERRY CHRISTMAS"

Inside: "I'd understand if you said NO

MERRY CHRISTMAS!"

There will be a full set of five (including an Andrew Bolt and Bob Brown one to come), and they'll be $15 for all 5 (plus $2 for P+H), or $4 each. I will start selling this weekend, but if you're interested please feel free to hit me up on the comments and let me know.

Maybe we'll take the car

2011-10-30T01:38:00.001-07:00

If you haven't seen it yet, I also have a new satirical newspaper blog - This is Australia. Today. The only national newspaper which sets the agenda and then forgets where it left it.

The curtsy and the damage done

2011-10-20T02:13:00.000-07:00

Matthew Archer, deputy chair of the Australian Monarchists' League (oh, what a crazy time of Pimms and perfectly poured tea they must have at their meetings) has said he didn't think the Queen would be offended, "No, not really I think she's a pretty tough lady."

It takes a tough old bean to withstand the indecency of a handshake and a bow. Thank God she's such a hardy one, it's a world full of misplaced bows and unfortunately lopsided curtsies out there.

The horror, the horror.

2011-10-14T01:49:00.000-07:00

It's a brave look, being forced into a moral decision after exhausting every possible immoral/amoral option.

Carbon Price II: The Bloodening

2011-10-11T20:50:00.000-07:00

Spring 2013.

One man. Alone.

A pledge... IN BLOOD.

An unstoppable force. An immovable object. A question of strength.

CARBON PRICE II: THE BLOODENING.

Rated: Unrestricted (political warfare). Contains: Weaponised electricity. A controlled media.

He's been standing there for years

2011-09-29T03:36:00.000-07:00

After reading through numerous great pieces such as this and this, I agree that Justice Bromberg definitely made the right decision both under law and in terms of balancing freedom of speech with protection from racial vilification.

However I can't help but feel this is exactly the punishment Bolt has been waiting for. Page one opinion pieces! Nation-wide coverage! Brandis stepping in to say the Coalition would revisit the law!

In the year of our Bolt.

Now I know why they're called the Tonys

2011-09-19T00:43:00.001-07:00

Hang on, isn't this supposed to be the other way around?

How did we get here?

2011-09-17T02:08:00.000-07:00

Welcome to a time where Tony Abbott can hold the moral high ground on asylum seekers.

Please forgive us future generations, we were drunk on... I don't know... Xenophobia?

Maybe we were just drunk.

Let's play the game again!

2011-09-13T02:09:00.000-07:00

Let's not pretend there's really anything more going on at the moment than this. On both sides.

Strike-through

2011-09-07T03:54:00.000-07:00

Some times the strike-through is important.

This is probably beyond obscure if you don't follow politics on Twitter.

Credit Card Minimum

2011-08-29T03:27:00.000-07:00

Confessions of a Talking Potato

2011-08-26T00:36:00.000-07:00

He's quite eloquent. For a potato.

Zero Fucks Given

2011-08-21T06:10:00.000-07:00

So I have been reading a lot of Paul Keating quotes in the last few days. Recollections of Bleeding Heart is being reissued in a 10 year anniversary edition on the the 31st of August - which is great, because I've been trying to get a copy of it over the last few months, and it's now going to be much more readily available again. Don Watson is actually speaking at a conference I'm going to for work mid-next month, which I'm very much looking forward to.

As to Keating quotes - there are some absolute corkers; he's someone who not only could shoot from the hip with a wit that could kill, but also knew how to pick his speechwriters - see great selections here and here. This article around the launch of the anniversary edition from Fairfax is well worth a read - one gets the feeling that it's a hard job staying on the good side of the man, he works almost entirely for what he considers an objective good, and sees his job as to destroy anyone that gets in the way, and drag the public along with him for their own wellbeing. Oddly admirable, really, compared to what we see from both sides of politics now.

There are so many key quotes of bald-faced, love of the game, "I will play to win and I will drink from your skull after I remove it from your shoulders" (that's me, not him... he never actually said that... as such - see below) moments over his leadership, and since, that you can't really boil it down to one quote. The Robertson letter is an eloquent example of recent years. And there are some other brilliant ones on Howard both before Howard became PM, and throughout his leadership (particularly as it became clear in 2007 that the guillotine was slowly rising).

But, I think, this has got to be a highpoint of parliamentary honesty from history:

Hewson: I ask the Prime Minister: if you are so confident about your view of Fightback, why will you not call an early election?
Keating: The answer is, mate, because I want to do you slowly. There has to be a bit of sport in this for all of us. In the psychological battle stakes, we are stripped down and ready to go. I want to see those ashen-faced performances; I want more of them. I want to be encouraged. I want to see you squirm out of this load of rubbish over a number of months. There will be no easy execution for you. You have perpetrated one of the great mischiefs on the Australian public with this thing, trying to rip away our social wage, trying to rip away the Australian values which we built in our society for over a century.

How do you respond to that if you're Hewson?

Anyway, this is all a round about way of saying it inspired me to throw this together. T-shirts, posters anyone?

Update: Perhaps you would like a zero fucks given t-shirt, in either the original, or negative?

Paul Keating Tee by DickheadFrenzy

Paul Keating Tee Negative by DickheadFrenzy

Democracy ahoy on the roundabout stead!

2011-08-15T02:00:00.000-07:00

Yes, if you haven't heard it yet, Dr Peter Phelps, a member in the NSW Upper House (and Liberal party whip) argued today in the NSW Parliament that, "Traffic lights are a Bolshevist menace" and "roundabouts represent democracy at their finest", something that Roads Minister Duncan Gay sought to distance himself from, understandably.

Over the weekend, Tony Abbott also got caught in a bit of an Alan Jones trap, agreeing that farmers should have the ultimate right to say no about mining exploration of their land before flying to Perth to address a convention of miners.

Apologies about the lack of colour - I have acquired a magnificent new A3 scanner but in upgrading to Lion a few weeks ago I apparently lost most Wacom functionality. Something which Wacom doesn't seem interested in remedying anytime soon.

Time's up, pencils down...

2011-07-10T04:41:00.000-07:00

I can't taste the coffee anymore

2011-07-03T04:52:00.000-07:00

Re: Windsor successfully lobbies to have domestic petrol purchases exempted from Carbon price.

Not to be a prat - but exempt forever from a tax, but from the ETS?

Of Royals, Republicans and Relatives, a guest post by Kim Armstrong

2011-05-02T02:22:00.000-07:00

My good friend (and old Meating People co-blogger) Kim Armstrong (@kimridesabike) writes:

I’m kind of a hypocrite I suppose. I’m that upsetting, and probably very Gen Y, combination of a staunch republican who loves the royal family.

I like looking at pictures of them in trashy gossip magazines. I’ve devoured movies like The Queen, The King’s Speech, Elizabeth, The Young Victoria – should I go on? Needless to say I watched the Royal Wedding, surrounded as it happens by my English born extended family. I don’t remember how it came up, but as I have a tendency to do at family gatherings, I set a fox among the hens by mentioning that I think Australia should become a republic.

What with all the celebrity spotting, chip and dip eating, and baby admiring going on, I don’t think I presented my best case for Australia that evening, and was significantly undermined by stopping to say “ooh, Posh and Becks do look lovely”, “is it a rule to wear hats?” and most damningly “Prince Harry is definitely my favourite”.

I’d like a do-over. Here are my arguments in favour of an Australian republic, counter-arguments directed at the ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it’ school of thought, along with appropriate disclaimers about how much I respect my family, their views, and our shared English heritage.

Arguments against a republic:

If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.

Well, I think it IS broken. I don’t mean to say that the royal family are actively damaging the country, but I do think the idea of a family having the power to dismantle the government not only in their own country, but in mine, disturbing. Would they ever do it? Maybe not. But we update archaic laws all the time for our own peace of mind and to improve our system of government. Our currency wasn’t broken, but we changed it because it needed an update for a variety of reasons. This isn’t so different.
It will be expensive.

There are many things worth doing that are expensive, that’s the rub with taxes you see. Hospitals are expensive, sporting events are expensive, the environment is expensive…royal nuptials are expensive. We do it anyway.
We had a referendum and it failed, the people have spoken.

Firstly, this doesn’t change my view. Secondly, in the words of someone is who not one of my heroes, Sir Robert Menzies “to get an affirmative vote from the Australian people on a referendum proposal is one of the labours of Hercules”. Out of 44 referendums held as of 2010, only 8 have been carried. Changing our constitution is a big deal. The model must be right. And, sadly, the marketing must be better. Not as a sales pitch, but as an
explanation. The previous model was not clear.
This country will go downhill if we lose the monarchy.

Why? Do we really have so little faith in our own governing that we think the loss of a symbolic, inherited monarch will change the nature of Australia? I certainly hope not.
It’s part of our history.

Yes, it is. It will still be part of our history. A truly independent Australia will still have close ties with Britain, we will never forget the important role the Commonwealth has had in our history. Changing the future does not affect the past, you know, 'cos it’s in the past.

These are all arguments put forward during our wedding watching, they are arguments from smart and lovely people and I am not belittling them in any way. They are also arguments from people who have a very strong tie to our history and have every justification for that attachment. I just think they’re wrong. And I think we have to remember the fantastically broad variety of backgrounds that Australians now come from, not everyone still thinks of London as home.

Arguments in favour of a republic:

The monarchy is not relevant to modern Australia.

Sorry, but they’re not. See note above about our backgrounds. My 15 year old cousin who DOES have an English parent pointed out an older lady in startling yellow and asked who she was during the wedding coverage. You see where this is going? It was the queen. After I told her this, she asked what her name was. And you know what? Why should she know? I don’t know the names of any other country’s monarchy. The limited role the monarchy play here should be over. It many ways it already is.
My children.

No, I don’t have any, but when I do I want them to be able to aspire to be the head of state in their own country. Not just the political leader. But the figurehead, the person we believe exemplifies our values and can be a leader apart from other politicians.
Secularity.

Australia has a secular government. We are a nation of many faiths. Including the wishy washy agnostics which I call my people. So why do we have a family supposedly bestowed with the right to special treatment by one particular god held up above all others? I respect Christianity in its many forms but the church, any church, does not get to tell me who is my head of state.
Respect.

This one is pretty well up for debate but I feel that we will not be truly respected until we are independent, not just by default, but by design. The Australian people need to see themselves as an independent, grown up country that does not, and will not, except even the possibility of a family from another country interfering in our sovereign affairs. Yes, this is a symbolic difference for the most part. Humanity should know by know that symbols are important. Just ask the royal family.

I like the royal family for the same reasons I like books and movies, both fiction and non-fiction. I like stories, and they have some great stories filled with humour and tragedy and bravery. I’m also fascinated by celebrity, like a lot of people I like to see people with lives, clothes and friends I could never afford. None of those things is enough to tie the royal family to a country they no longer need play a role in.

I know why we like to believe that the royal family are a good thing, believing in these things is nice. But can’t we believe in something Australian? Justifying something as ‘traditional’ is just another way of saying ‘we’ve done this for so long that we don’t really remember why’.

I'm interested in apathy

2011-04-28T02:15:00.000-07:00

This tweet turned up on Thursday morning from Possum (@Pollytics), sparking a small rumble in the twittersphere. Not a huge one, considering it was a day where people were still commenting on the Chaser being refused access to the BBC Royal Wedding broadcast, (or were banned, or acquiesced, depending on you interpretation), and Obama releasing his birth certificate after several years of nonsensical whining from birthers and, lately, Donald Trump; one wonders how Glenn Beck feels about the fact that Trump appears to have been the one who finally pushed Obama to feed the trolls and release the full birth certificate).

But big splash or not, it got me thinking. This is the report (published today by the ANU here), and the key statistics that informed Possum's comments are below:

52.6% of people frequently or regularly feel that politics seems so complicated that they "can't really understand what it going on". If we include people who occasionally feel that way, that's 79.9%. But let's just concentrate on that 52.6%. That's just 0.1% less than the proportion of votes that won Rudd the 2007 Federal Election. In a country like America, where voter turnout is often around 60%, this would be worrying enough, but in a country where voting is compulsory, this is dire.

So, what's the problem? Well, as Possum implied with his #mediaFAIL hashtag - the media has a lot to answer for in this. When the extent of coverage for politics most days these past weeks consisted of coverage of what a celebrity horse owner thinks of the PM's common attire, an interpretation of Bowen's new temporary visa policy by both Fairfax and News Ltd that can only really be described as binary (Howard or non-Howard), the release of the HIP data from the CSIRO getting a cursory enough glance just to pull out the "oh shit, the government's burning down houses" line to continue the narrative (the data itself actually doesn't, but anyway - covered well here by Possum himself), ongoing Behrendt horse-tweet coverage (critiqued best by Tony Martin at Scrivener's Fancy), etc. etc. And so on, and so it goes, to quote my good friend Bob Ellis.

This "dumbing down" of political coverage and politics itself, or more to the point, only covering the simple politics, rather than the policy, would appear to be what Lindsay Tanner addresses in his book "Sideshow". Now, I haven't read it yet, so I'm not going to pull a Samantha Maiden (or 7:30) and verbal Tanner based on excerpts, or the words of others who have already read it (for the record, Grog's Gamut covers both of these very well), but it appears it's already ruffling feathers. Despite the fact that it would appear Tanner admits the complicity of politicians, and that he himself was guilty of following the headlines, Insiders (probably on iview about now) spent a lot of this morning suggesting Tanner would be best to point the finger back at himself, with the barest of acknowledgements of any flaws in press gallery coverage (oh, I'm pretty sure Gerard Henderson blamed a reasonable amount of it on left bias, but.. you know...).

I do look forward to reading Tanner's book in the next week or so.

But, I suppose, in the spirit of pointing the finger back on oneself, I have to ask, "are we the problem?" I don't mean the general public, I mean those of us who are actually incredibly interested in politics, policy and all. I love Annabel Crabb's pieces, for example, but there's no denying that she writes for us, the people who are knee deep in the political issues of the day like pigs in the proverbial shit - with a wry wink, a touch of humour and a polite distance; there's little attempt to clarify the policy (and we wouldn't expect there to be). On the polar opposite we have people like Steve Price, Alan Jones, Andrew Bolt et al who cover the superficial aspects of the politics of the day for the the emotions - and they capture the readers who most likely would fit into that 52.6% of people who frequently or regularly do not understand politics.

But for those of us who would slot into the "seldom" or even "never" column (I myself would never claim to be in the "never" spectrum - I'll research those things that aren't clear to me, but I'd never claim to completely understand every aspect of policy... if you do, I think either of the major parties would probably like to hear from you), does simply lamenting the lack of policy coverage while we enjoy the political argy-bargy (even enjoy whining about it) actually have any effect? I don't know. I don't want to go down the route of blaming twitter as a whole, it's a medium, and I have a deep-seated hatred of the juvenile attempts by organisations like News Ltd trying to tar and feather it (while simultaneously using it)... but it's hard not to wonder what the real contribution is as we makes jokes every monday night on #qanda, and lament the lack of debate as we simultaneously hyperbolise the responses of panelists.

I also won't agree with the "echo chamber" characterisation of twitter completely, as I've had some fantastic debates on it, and I think most of us often wait for an impassioned response to things we hay have tweeted, but there is an element of tweeting just to the political tragics. And, to borrow a tired cliche, if you're not part of the solution... well, you get my point. Where's the solution for that middle ground of people who don't understand policy, or aren't immediately interested in it?

From a media perspective, where's the middle ground between your Annabel Crabb, George Megalogenesis and Laurie Oakeses, and your Alan Jones, Steve Price and Andrew Bolts?

It's clear we need education, not just opinion, in political coverage if these figures are correct. This has to come from both the government (who manipulates the media) and the media (who should not cry manipulation whilst not doing their job).

52.6%.

It's sad that in a week when we were again debating asylum seeker detention and visas, and Bolt was suggesting that African migrants could not integrate, a piece covering figures from a largely unprecedented Department of Immigration report showing African refugees were the most likely to obtain a job, and that most refugees reduce their level of dependance on welfare over a period of five years, are settled in approximately two and can speak reasonable English in four, was published in the "Victoria" subsection of the Age's website, with no feature focus. Comparatively, the Melbourne Sudanese beauty pageant violence appeared in the top section headlines multiple times throughout the week - bouncing back to the top each time a small amount of additional information came forward.

Coverage like this is why long term newspaper subscribers (and tragics) like Malcolm Farnsworth (@mfarnsworth) are fleeing.

Sigh.

-----------

I was going to wax lyrical on the fact people are actually, believe it or not, crying foul at the anticipated cuts to middle class welfare in the upcoming budget, but then I realised I'd actually said everything I needed to say in my last post.

-----------

Anyway, this is something light hearted to take you through the rest of the weekend - Grand Spectacular's "Being a Dickhead's Cool":

It is pretty cool, I have to admit.

A Dickhead Frenzy lift-out: Wards of the Welfare State

2011-04-19T20:37:00.000-07:00

Bob Ellis and the Hot Lips Houlihan affair

2011-04-13T02:18:00.000-07:00

I think there are few times I've been so happy with the name of this blog.

Today the twitters were in a frenzy after Bob Ellis wrote a piece of unintentional satire for ABC's the Drum on the current ADF scandal, which could best be described as the work of a dickhead.

In a typically rambling piece, Ellis explained how the scandal had been blown out of proportion, that the ADF should have nothing to worry about, really, because TV shows such as M*A*S*H, Frasier, Seinfeld, Sex and the City and plays throughout history (oh, and the Bible, can't forget the Bible) had hinged on the concept on women being the victims of peeping Toms or gossips - whether in the shower like Hot Lips Houlihan, or over coffee like Carrie and the girls. This was counterbalanced against the concurrent debate running at the moment around women being allowed in high risk combat positions in the military, with Ellis conflating the two to suggest that the young woman's response to her violation at the hands of a fellow cadet as evidence that women are not really not ever going to be capable of handling the rigours of the battlefield. Oh, and the victim should just pull her socks up, and get on with life, because she'll get over it in "3 years, or maybe 10" or "as in a Tracy and Hepburn movie" (movies have so much to tell us about our lives, don't they Bob!) she may have "married the boy".

Sound like some batshit insanity I'm just making up? If you haven't read it yet, please do. You can't capture it second hand without losing that certain "ellisosity" (to quote Jonathan Green).

A lot of the debate on Twitter was around why Jonathan Green (editor of the Drum online), chose to publish the Bob Ellis piece. It's a legitimate question - as many people pointed out, the Drum, which often does republish blogposts that have particularly resonated with readers or captured an issue (just this afternoon a piece from Greg Jericho [@GrogsGamut] on pokies was featured), would most likely not have published this piece if it had come from another source. It's not particularly inspired, and to suggest it shines a light on the issue does a compliment to Ellis he has not earned. Green's response:

Now, you could argue that the almost universal response on Twitter questioning Ellis' piece being posted were calls for censorship, but as many have responded, isn't one of the main jobs of an editor to choose which pieces to publish? The pieces that you do publish reflect on the nature and quality of your publication, whether it be a newspaper, a journal or a generally respected opinion website, so to a certain extent you practice some caution on what you publish.

It wasn't so long ago that Green pulled Marieke Hardy's piece hoping for Christopher Pyne to be savaged by "a libidinous dog", and issued an apology on the site. And a much shorter period of time since the hoax perpetrated by someone using the name "Alene Composta" to claim that Barry O'Farrell was cruelly referring to Kristina Keneally as "the moose" in backroom campaign conversations (the foolishness of falling for this hoax was critiqued well by Media Watch's Jonathan Holmes on the Drum itself).

In that piece, Holmes refers to an e-mail from Green where he states, "Unleashed... is intended as a 'town square' public forum... If a piece is readable, meets legal and Edpol criteria then it can be considered". And maybe that's true, but as above, you have to wonder whether anyone but Bob Ellis would have been published for this piece. To his credit, Green did post this response from Michael Brull later in the day, which does add an opposing voice to the "town square forum".

And maybe, as Green argued in a conversation on Twitter with John Bergin (@theburgerman, director of Digital News for Sky News Australia), it's not his place to save Ellis "from himself", and to censor him from the site. Which would be all fine and well if Ellis wasn't being paid for his contributions, and the Drum wasn't continually providing Ellis with a paying outlet no matter what he feels like coughing up each week.

As someone who identifies as left (and generally finds the call of left bias at the ABC to be largely an indication of the bias of the accuser), I find it hard to believe that The Drum would continued to publish a right-wing commentator as they descended into insanity as Ellis did throughout the course of the NSW election, suggesting first that Keneally couldn't lose because she was beautiful and O'Farrell fat, then that she levy a banking super tax and give free dental checkups to the elderly, before finally praying for another national disaster or international civil war to eclipse the election itself to save the object of his affections. Oh yes, and after all this did not occur, and Keneally lost the election, he came out to say he knew all along it was going to work out this way, because Kristina did not follow his clear instructions for victory.

Perhaps I'm wrong, maybe we have the Gerard Henderson files to look forward to. But the fact that the ABC published these pieces allows people like Bolt (more on him later) to ask how long Ellis would last if he was a Liberal supporter, rather than dyed in the wool Labor, which is something Green shouldn't really be opening the Drum, and the ABC by extension, to.

Of course, as I said, Twitter did go a bit crazy in response to the piece. Dan Nolan (@dannolan) sparked a fire with #bobellislogic:

which continued throughout the day, with all manner of hilarious leaps of logic - I particularly liked this one from Nick Seymour (@nickseemore), continuing the TV show theme of Ellis' piece:

"Bob Ellis" is still trending in Australia at the moment, so whether or not you agree with Green's decision to publish Ellis' piece, there's no doubt it's probably driving the kind of traffic to the Drum that it never usually gets. And not just in volume - Andrew Bolt, the king of traffic generating bile himself, congratulated Ellis on the logic of his Drum piece today on his blog.

The last word, I guess, should go to the person who is perhaps Ellis' most adoring fan, with a tattoo of "and so on, and so it goes" and a dog named after the man, Marieke Hardy. I asked her at some stage in the morning what she thought of his piece, via twitter, as I couldn't see her point of view gelling particularly well with the one Ellis was championing today. Surprisingly (we don't actually know each other) she replied to me pretty much immediately, saying that she hadn't yet, but was going to right away. There was a rather long pause. And then this:

A call to remain armless.

2011-04-11T01:49:00.000-07:00

Over the weekend, Ted Baillieu announced plans to approve armed guards ("protective services officers") with arrest powers and semi-automatic weapons on Melbourne trains.

It's well established (or well reported, in any case) that Melbourne has a violent crime problem on the streets, or, at the very least, there is a greater awareness of that violence - particularly stabbings and alcohol related violence. Crime stats were at a 10 year high in the 2009/10 period.

The targeting of Indian students on public transport resulted in protests calling for greater police presence, and particularly a multicultural police unit. The greater awareness of stabbing crime has resulted in designated search areas in the city, and major advertising campaigns have been run to tackle both people carrying knives (one of these "Knives Scar Lives" posters is very cleverly up in the toilets at the boxing gym I go to) and to encourage people to avoid drunken confrontation.

So, it's understandable that a new government would respond to these calls, even where it's a case of stacking solution upon solution upon solution (before reviewing the 2010/11 crime stats), by siezing the chance to cement itself as tough on crime and increasing security on one of the key places identified by the public as "dangerous" after hours.

My question is - why move protective services officers (PSOs) onto the trains (something they have never previously been equipped to do)? Why would you not take the money you're using to fund the 940 new PSOs and funnel it into Victoria Police?

Given that it's only very recently been the case that Victorian Police Officers have been approved to carry semi-automatic weapons (they are still not fully deployed, and are not expected to be so until 2012), after much gnashing of teeth, and understandable resistance from Christine Nixon as the Police Association drove the change, it's understandable that the Police Association is none too happy about this announcement. After all, when you've had to fight tooth and nail to be eligible to carry the weapons yourself, as fully qualified police officers, it would be rather insulting to hear the the new transport police will be carrying them from the get go. And you'd also be right to be pissed about the suggestion of a second-tier police force taking funding that by all rights should be yours.

While there is a clear difference between Authorised Officers and PSOs, you can't deny that people's experience of Authorised Officers will inform their response to the PSOs on trains - both anecdotally and according to complaints statistics, many people have found Authorise Officers to be intentionally intimidating and to use undue force to detain fair evaders.

Will PSOs just be stationed to keep trains safe from violent crimes? Or will they also be transport police, expected to stop fare evaders? And given that people already see Authorised Officers as using undue force, one has to question what reaction people will have to the Baillieu government equipping PSOs with semi-automatic weapons. And that's not even addressing the actual (legitimate) safety concerns of these weapons being deployed, just the perception.

PSOs are state-government rent-a-cops. They are trained for eight weeks. They are not police. They are being given arrest capability and automatic weapons and will be patrolling amongst the public.

So, Mr Baillieu, I'm not suggesting you send your best qualified police officers onto trains, but if you want to "get serious on crime", you hire police.

Put the money into the police force, increase presence on the streets of Melbourne and rotate a roster of your newest police onto the trains at night (those police you can now afford because you're not paying for 940 people who couldn't make the cut as actual officers). This will cut crime. Putting loaded semi-automatic weapons into the hands of lightly trained mock-police and throwing them on the trains at night is likely to only create it.

And a crisis for a new government.

A ride on a wingless bird

2011-04-07T03:56:00.000-07:00

I know Rudd's utter incapability to deal with not being the life of the party is the big story this week, but I think it's been well covered. I think Grog's Gamut covered it best, seriously it's worth the read.

Late last year I read Slavoj Žižek's "First as Tragedy, Then As Farce" (actually, you could use that Marx quote on history to describe any vision of Rudd as PM again, but I digress). The premise of the book is that the early 21st century saw two events that signalled the failings and sputtering death (his implication, not mine) of western capitalism (and it's ideological trappings) - the tragedy being 9/11 (or September 11 for those pedants who don't want to use the US-centric term for their tragedy), the farce the financial crisis.

It's a good (and easy) read, regardless of your views. Žižek is a polemicist - I mean, in theory he's a philosopher, and critical theorist, but in presentation he's a Nietzschean madman; while he writes long, intoxicating flights of fancy with vivid analogies (that may or may not actually stack up), he rips into "the right" (read, anything right of his self described "radically left" position) without much actual thought for a solution to the problems he presents with the capitalism.

One of his central points is that the free market is a failure because no single "free market" has ever truly been "free". He points to agricultural subsidies in the American economic system championed by the same Republican party that argued for "trickle down" economics, among other examples in a similar vein. Ie. the thing that makes capitalism actually work in the biggest economies in the world is socialism. And he makes a compelling argument in this respect.

The problem is that while he's declaring the free market a failure on this basis - a bird that never truly got off the ground - he makes the argument that communism is the answer, and that far from ever failing, the problem is we've never implemented proper communism. Sure, I think Marx would agree with you on that one buddy, but the problem is, couldn't you make the same argument for capitalism, by your own reasoning?

Everyone knows that in real life, you don't get the model. You have to make compromises, and that's why you get things like Telstra involvement in the NBN (something that was meant to kill the current wholesale/retail monopoly), or to use an older example from the other side of the fence, basic food items (among other things) being exempt from the GST. It's the nature of politics, the nature of relationships, the nature of all human interaction.

But, maybe something worthwhile to take from those who lean hard to either side is that you have to know what you're aiming for to begin with.

There's been a lot written in the past few weeks about the imminent death of the "win at all costs" mentality of the NSW ALP right (see Keating's attack on the "shameless populism" of NSW ALP) , and factionalism as a whole within the ALP (including a very interesting post on open, monitored ballots in party decisions at the Drum), but it extends to the Liberal party as well (if anyone can tell me what Abbott's Coalition actually stands for apart from "win at all costs", there's a prize).

It's a mess. What do our parties actually stand for (beyond the next election? Is there a left or right party (even centre-left or centre-right)? Where is an ideology at all?

While the Greens do suffer and benefit from being able to write policies that will never be implemented (despite the claims of The Australian and Alan Jones), the amount of vitriol levelled at them for daring to have some convictions in a country where many champion the idea of "conviction politics" is sobering. (It should be noted that the Greens are more economically orthodox than either major party).

I'm not saying our major parties have to follow Žižek's lead (at all). But maybe a little vision of what, exactly, their version of an ideal Australia would look like would actually be nice.

Idealism need not be a dirty word, especially if you use it as a base for pragmatic discussion.

NSW State of Mind

2011-03-28T01:26:00.000-07:00

“What we have seen in NSW is not just the rejection of a Labor government, it is the rejection of Labor's style of government.” - Tony Abbott
“We're talking about a state election - after 16 years I don't think they made up their mind on the basis of events in the last few weeks. I think they made up their mind a long time ago...The message here, I believe, is people want to see you make progress, not play politics.” - Julia Gillard

There's no question that the NSW election was a "bloodbath", "landslide", etc. etc. But you know what it also was?

Inevitable. We knew this coming up to the election, we knew this when the election was called, we knew it every moment Keneally spent in the campaign. Keneally knew it too. She knew it when she clearly started working on her winning, gracious concession speech. She knew it when she wrote a letter to The Australian in the style of Raymond Chandler.

There's a reason everyone felt for Keneally when she took over the leadership - it was already done and dusted. She was the rider chosen to ride the dying horse into the ground, and she was expected to be happy about it and thank NSW ALP for the opportunity.

She's NSW's Joan Kirner. And just like Kirner, her personal polls remained high while the ALP's as a whole went down the drain. One might ask why the ALP likes to keep their most popular leaders (oh, they also just happen to be female, but I'm sure that's nothing to do with it) for the shit sandwiches they're no longer sure they can feed to the electorate. Especially when they apparently want them to eventually go federal.

Keneally knew this was the case, which is why the only "sad" pictures they can get of Keneally from her concession speech are a selection from a scant few frames when Keneally stopped to look down at notes or looked up. Anyone who saw the speech knows there was very little negative emotion in her concession.

And of course, because it tells the story they want, the media are using these one or two images at every given opportunity.

Speaking of shit sandwiches, even ALP MPs are saying it was ridiculously inevitable. So inevitable in fact, they're kind of happy it wasn't as bad as they thought it was going to be. That's right, the worst election result in the history of the ALP, "not so bad".

So, that's why it's laughable that Abbott suggests that the NSW election is a microcosm of the federal situation. He wants people to forget the fact that Gillard is actually ahead in the polls after the announcement of the Carbon tax, using the very recent memory of the Carbon Tax rally last week (which itself was a bit of smoke and mirrors to reflect "community concern" that is not widespread) to suggest that this is a wave of national disgust at Labor waste, taxing and levies. And eventually, Labor won't be able to handle the heat because THEY WON'T BE ABLE TO AFFORD TO TURN ON THE AIR CONDITIONER.

Am I doing that right? I'm not sure I'm going hard enough on the crazy.

But it's bullshit. And I think everyone (except maybe the staff at The Australian) know that's the case. Does it mean that NSW Labor Right is on the nose? Yes, and rightfully (pardon the pun) so. And that's been something that's been becoming evident in recent days to the federal government in any case (they're running just a little behind the rest of us).

But in NSW itself, Barry O'Farrell could have promised to kill first-borns and he would probably still have been in with a chance.

The only way that this becomes about federal politics is if Gillard lets Abbott make it about federal politics.

My only concern?

"I believe the people of NSW know the difference between state issues and federal issues" - Julia Gillard

I really hope so. But I wouldn't bank on it.

Who's the boss?

2011-03-24T02:03:00.000-07:00

"We took the name Liberal because we were determined to be a progressive party, willing to make experiments, in no sense reactionary, but believing in the individual, his rights and his enterprise, and rejecting the Socialist panacea."

Robert Menzies

Regulating the price of milk, the price of beer, bank reform (and regulation), "direct action", a "small Australia"... do any of these sound the acts of a "liberal" party?

We know the catch cry of the Coalition at the moment is that Bob Brown is the real Prime Minister (something that in itself ignores the fact that Bandt is the Green in the House of Reps), based on the policy direction of the ALP, but who is the real leader of the Opposition?

Based on the activities of the Coalition in the recent past, I'm going to suggest it's Warren Truss (or, to make a hypocrite of me with my earlier criticism of the Brown/Bandt difference, Barnaby Joyce). I know Turnbull is often said to be the ALP voter's favourite choice for Coalition leader, but I can't help but feel that he wouldn't have been out there yesterday in front of those signs at the No Carbon tax rally with Truss (edit: and this confirms Turnbull's position).

There's a certain flavour of "countrymindedness" (the old Country Party slogan) to Abbott's Coalition.

Bob Brown is not the Prime Minister. But who's leading the Opposition?

Own goals and cheapshots

2011-03-23T02:15:00.001-07:00

(Source: http://plixi.com/p/86175817)

The "No Carbon Tax" protest rally (or #noCTrally for those of us on twitter) was held today in Canberra (and allegedly across the country, but the focus was on those bused in to the capital).

I'm not going into the politics of the debate itself, except to say I obviously disagree with it, and I feel that it's another appropriation of Tea Party methods, and the Republican-esque milking of it by the Liberal party is a sad reflection on the states of politics in Australia at the moment. I don't think it's ever a good sign that someone who could potentially have been PM (as we're constantly reminded) stands in support of a crowd that carries signs claiming the current PM is a bitch, liar, communist or fascist, or where sections of the crowd are apparently making anti-semitic comments and tying them to the carbon tax.

There are echoes of the billionaire RSPT rally in this, and I think it's equally as (in)valid as a reflection of the Australian public.

What I want to talk about, though, is the problem of a lot of the comments in response to the rally today, and maybe it speaks to the state of politics on both sides at the moment.

It didn't take a genius to see the mean age at the rally was probably about 60 (I'm really not joking about this - the fact a 70-year-old woman had to be treated by a doctor on site is an indication this was not your typical protest rally). Numerous comments were made about this, and on a purely "news" level, it's important to note.

And then, people who were clearly in opposition to the rally (me included), started to make jokes about the age of the protestors. It was humorous at first, Ben Pobjie (@benpobjie) making a commenting that the government was spreading rumours of "Midsomer Murders" being on to dissipate the crowd, several people noting (something based in fact) that most of these people were likely to be dead by the time any impact of climate change was felt (or possibly before the policy itself was even implemented). I myself tweeted, '"attention #noCTrally: your demands have been met, the BBC is filming new episodes of the Bill, you can all go home." *disperses*"' (retreated by a few people - someone cleverly pointed out that ITV actually made the Bill, but I digress). @ABCNewsIntern (an account I generally find hilarious, and a real minor celebrity on twitter) started with an hilarious comment, 'This week, "No Carbon Tax" rally. Next week, "Increase the Pension (Don't Make Me Eat Dogfood)" rally. Same people.' - and then proceeded to post over ten tweets of retirement denialism (you kind of have to see the stream to see what I mean).

A few of these tweets, particularly those above, made me stop. I suddenly thought - how does this look? We are sitting here and lamenting the disgusting personal attacks of this crowd (which is a fair call), and at the same time we're attacking this crowd based on their age. And they're voters. I mean, they're idiots (I will happily argue with you on this if you disagree), but apart from the suggestion that some may actually never feel the effects of climate change, age shouldn't really be a factor.

The science holds up, and the logic of the argument for a tax and/or a carbon trade system holds up economically. So why play the man? It cheapens the argument.

More than that, it plays into people's expectations of the left, and of twitter itself as a medium: that we're all out of touch greenies, that we're latte drinking young professionals who live in the city, that we're only interested in ourselves (the irony of this is ridiculous given the protestors today) and are not interested in those people on lower wages or (specifically here) pensions and can afford to pay for our idealism where "average australians" can't. It's also harder, and a touch hypocritical to then slam the crowd for making personal attacks on Gillard, Bob Brown (who responded magnificently to some in the crowd's suggestions that Gillard was his "bitch" with this letter), Garnaut, et al.

It's a small (perhaps petty) point, but I think one that should be made. Australian politics, I would like to think, or at least hope, is better than Tea Party protests and a bitter twitter stream response. Even if it's for a larf. See also suggesting that Christopher Pyne is gay for a joke, as rightly slammed by Mark Colvin (@colvinius) when it appeared on the "Q and A" on screen stream.

Which, I suppose, brings me to something else that my tweet stream seemed to go a little crazy over today:

Now, there are many reasons to hate McCain, and many reasons he would have been a horrible President. This is not one of them. It's a tweet from August 2009, at a time when America was largely apathetic towards Qadhafi. I think an "interesting meeting with an interesting man" is diplomatic speak for "that man is a fucking basket case". And lets face it, if you asked Obama about Qadhafi on the record a month ago, you would have got a similar response. It's called diplomacy. And if we're going to pin the US for supporting Qadhafi through hands-off diplomacy over the years, the Democrats are just as guilty as the Republicans. It's just a cheapshot.

The left seems to have taken to heart the long spouted accusation that they/we just don't "want it enough" to fight dirty. That our politics has got a stage where that's what we have to do to move anything, we have to wonder what kind of political system we, the people, are really encouraging as voters.

For further reading/listening, listen to the Life Raft Debate segment from "Save the Day", a This American Life episode, where Jon Smith argues that the dumbing down of education to maintain waning student attention is analogous to the current state of political debate.

We (don't) need a hero

2011-03-21T02:48:00.000-07:00

This is the wonder, and shame, of the internet. A kid gets bullied, snaps, picks the bully up and throws him to the ground (thankfully not breaking the bully's spine or cracking his skull, more on that later), someone else records it all on a camera phone.

The video is uploaded to youtube and through this and various other channels goes viral. It builds hundreds of thousands, possibly millions, of hits across various mediums. It gets covered on Australian news, it gets covered on US news, it ends up on The View. The kid (Casey Heynes) ends up on a special event ACA. The bully ends up on an apparently competing Today Tonight.

Virtually every time the video plays, someone says "wow, good on him, what a hero."

And then comes the rage at the fact the school has suspended him for "standing up for himself".

He "snapped". The language around his "snapping" generally empathises with his response - the weight of the teasing was just so heavy that he finally reacted, without thought. And good on him! He's been teased for years, and this was the instance that finally made him stand up for himself, and show them who's boss.

But, as John Birmingham points out, he didn't just stand up for himself. He responded completely disproportionately to what he was facing. He picked a child three years younger than him up and threw him onto the ground, with force. And while this may (I don't remain convinced it will, either, try being the "crazy kid") stop him getting abused at school, what about the 12 year old who could potentially have been fatally injured in this response?

We have to put this in context - in how many situations as an adult would "I just snapped" be reasonable? And, in formative years, isn't it important that when children or teenagers overreact, or act in a way that is inappropriate, that we coach them this is not okay?

Hence the suspension. But who cares about a suspension when you're the king of every oppressed child everywhere (or their parent, or an adult who is apparently living through their teen years), right?

So while we all hold Casey Heynes up as a hero, we have to wonder what reinforcing this behaviour does in the wider community. If Casey intends to confront everyone who attempts to bully him in the future with this kind of force, then he's going to have bigger issues as an adult than a punch in the face from a twelve year old. He's either going to end up in jail, or he's going to bite off more than he can chew.

What happens when the next person being teased takes a leaf from Casey's book, uses their advantage and picks up a piece of timber and beats his oppressor over the head?

But, beyond all this, what about the bully? What if he'd had his spine broken in that reactive move? Would we still be championing Casey "standing up for himself? It wasn't very far from happening. Anyone watching the video for the first few times will breathe in sharply, then try and work out, as the bully hobbles around, if he's actually walking on a broken leg, or possible more seriously injured.

And that's a fair concern. The school has just as much of a duty of care for the bully, and the bully, while acting in a heinous manner, had every possibility of being seriously injured in that swift fall to the ground.

The very fact that we're talking about this in terms of "the bullied" and the "bully" is loaded. The "bully" is a kid too, a twelve year old at that, and I dare say he's got a reasonably long life ahead of him, and a fair amount of growing up to do. But hey, once a bully always a bully, hey? Life's over at twelve kid - just be glad it's not actually over - you were on the wrong side of the narrative.

So what's my point? There's not a person alive who won't have some experience of bullying - usually from both directions. Whether it's verbal, emotional or physical. It's easy to remember, and empathise with, the time we were the bullied, rather than the bully. But I'd like to think in those few times, pre-adulthood, where I was in the regrettable position of being the bully (I must say, never physical), that if someone potentially fatally injured me, that they would be reined in, and appropriately disciplined. And so should I be for being the instigator. But the threat of permanent injury should not be taken lightly.

So, does Casey Heynes deserve some understanding for the way he reacted? Damn right. Does he deserve a suspension to think about how he reacted, and for his parents to heed the warning signs? Definitely.

Is he a hero? No.

Unauthorised reincarnation is now prohibited in China

2011-02-28T02:44:00.000-08:00

Re: China Bans Reincarnation Without Government Permission...

I read this and the first thing I thought was...

Death of a Narrative: Part 3

2010-11-02T18:27:00.000-07:00

A narrative-less election

We heard all about how badly Gillard/Labor mismanaged the election. And, if the Libs are honest, they botched it too.

The Libs would have everyone believe that they were happy just to see Abbott almost topple a first term government, but to follow their argument to a logical conclusion, realistically Abbott should have won easily. Given Gillard's tarnished name, and the problems associated with her trying to take any claim for the goals Rudd had kicked, he should have been a shoe in.
Gillard, for her part, was so bound in her minders' tape she couldn't have sold beer at a pub (or a shandy to Abbott). This was a battle of two opposition leaders without a coherent new policy between them.

Neither side had a cohesive political narrative.

The best Abbott could muster was a bit of "you think Rudd was Howard-lite? Look at these policies!" accompanied with a healthy serve of apolitical "tough man" antics including his aim to not sleep in the last days of the election. Given Rudd was criticised for sleeping less than 4 hours a night and working pretty much consistently, not involving his colleagues in his processes, in hindsight it seems his goal may have been to out-Rudd Gillard.

If you want a clearer picture that this was an election where neither of the major parties had a narrative, look at the swing to the Greens. Whether you agree with their policies or not, the Greens are a narrative party - consistently. While I struggle with people who suggest that never having had power immediately equals policy weakness (hello everyone at The Australian), there' s some truth to this in the fact that the Greens have not had to be pragmatic - their policies are bold, and follow a clear direction because they can. Realistically, prior to the "rainbow coalition" any chance of any of their policies being passed was a pipe dream.

And the result? What happens when you tell a story but there's no actual narrative?

Well it's a mess; no one knows what's going on. An election is not an exercise in experimental prose.

Narrative found

Ironically, it may be Gillard has found her strength, and her narrative, in minority government. She is, to borrow Annabel Crabb's term, a fixer. She is presented now with a magnificent opportunity to play school teacher to a rag-tag bunch of new parliamentarians, or at least parliamentarians who are new to actual power.

If she plays her cards right, she can take the credit for their innovation as she remains the masthead for the activity of the government. In turn, she can also blame the failings of her government on the close numbers.

The knife-edge may provide a comfortable seat to a fence-sitter like Gillard.

The new paradigm, as it's been called, is actually a little bit more like the old paradigm of politics. Policy and its implementation should be at the forefront of political reporting. The personalities are important, as are the tactics, but it's the policies that should make or break a government, not foibles of its leaders - with the exception of actual ministerial culpability.

The media should be reporting when either party "plays the man" rather than the ball, not following suit for an easy story.

There's a new narrative, people, and a new paradigm; they're both more complex. Long live complexity.

--------------------------------------

Alright... now all that's done. I'm returning to the day to day. I hated that post by the end, but I feel like I had to get it off my chest.

Let's commence.

The Death of the Narrative: Part 2

2010-11-02T03:19:00.000-07:00

The death of the narrative

Initially, the wins came hard and fast. Rudd started by pretty much immediately setting the ball rolling to end the Pacific Solution, ratifying the Kyoto Protocol as his first official act as PM and formally apologised to the Stolen Generations in his capacity as the first course of order in the opening of Parliament after the election. Work Choices was virtually completely reversed, with some elements retained. A deadline was set for the removal of operational forces within Iraq (and followed).

But it was maybe a case of too hard and too fast. As time went on, it started to seem like Rudd had run the horse upside down. We got giddy on change.

And the easy change was all upfront, the hard wins were still to come.

The carbon-emissions trading scheme was already promised, and the Garnaut Report (a bed he'd made, or commissioned at least, before even becoming PM) fell in line with it, suggesting targets that would be achievable, but not without some stress.

Rudd had made the mistake of saying that climate change was "the greatest moral, economic and social challenge of our time" while in opposition. In some respects, unless you don't believe in it (in which case feel free to put your hands back over your ears and scream "not listening") he is right, but in hindsight it was a foolish thing to say. How many times have these words been parroted by the opposition to tar and feather Rudd?

The ETS/CPRS became an essential part of the Rudd narrative. It didn't get through parliament.

The Henry Tax Review fell out of the well-meaning but mostly useless 2020 summit. It was necessary, but it set another issue in the Rudd narrative. The Rudd government sat on the delivered report for almost 6 months before addressing essentially none of the items and delivering the RSPT. I should note, I don't disagree with the RSPT, but for a government that came into power telling a story, they couldn't sell this one to a nation that the polls suggested already agreed with it. It didn't get through parliament.

This was the problem with the mid-term big tickets for Rudd - they needed to get through parliament. When they didn't get through, they needed compromise. The problem with compromise in terms of something like the CPRS, is that if you compromise on the policy, you... well... compromise it. The CPRS was about as paper thin as it could possibly be to start with - it was hardly stringent, and if anything it read like a token gesture, at best a step (baby step) in the right direction (or this was how the pragmatists in the Labor party tried to sell it). To compromise further, unlike with a lot of policies, opened the door to criticism of its token nature.

The Liberal leadership spill happened. Support for the CPRS from Turnbull's Liberals dissolved into pig-headed "it's either too expensive to tackle or it doesn't exist at all so let's call the whole thing off" arguments from Abbott's Liberals.

The stimulus package was almost universally declared by economists as the reason Australia staved off a recession during the GFC. But Rudd was unable to sell the benefits of the short-term debt because the Australian public are averse to debt; for many it reconfirmed their concept of the Coalition saving money and the ALP spending it - and the opposition cynically pursued this angle for the politics, rather than taking a bipartisan approach when the economics stood up.

The Rudd narrative died a slow, prolonged death. The polls turned, dramatically in the context of a narrative where we had the longest honeymoon period for a PM ever, scoring into the 70s in approval records, but not so dramatically if we compared it to more realistic numbers experienced by governments in, say, any period of modern politics. Ever.

We can talk about what happened on the night of June 23^rd, and the reasons for the spill, etc etc. But the thing that killed Rudd, in the end, was the fact that a narrative had been built that couldn't ever be followed to its happy conclusion in a parliamentary democracy, or, realistically, had no planned end. The tide was always going to turn; it was only a matter of when.

The Death of the Narrative: Part 1

2010-11-01T20:25:00.000-07:00

Given that I've been away for pretty much the entire period from the Labor leadership spill through the election, the hung parliament and independent deciding of minority government, I feel like I've got a bit of space to wax lyrical about what I think happened in the past 6 months.

Though I don't know if my point of view will be entirely different to everyone else's. I have a slightly different take on what happened, and why, though, so allow me a little break from form to waffle a bit.

A narrative

Kevin Rudd's ascension in the Kevin '07 campaign was largely the product of a narrative of change and hope. I'm talking "Change" and "Hope" in that sense that Obama would later run with in his own campaign in the following year, the words capitalised, the personality of Rudd embiggened (sic) to an almost revolutionary size.

Rudd's image (and slogan "KEVIN 07") on everything was as important to the campaign as the words he spoke. Here was a leader who spoke Chinese, who had a diplomatic background, who was a Christian, but who spoke broadly to the electorate and went on Rove (man, was it really only that long ago that Rove McManus was a TV personality?). Shit the man used Twitter as a platform, before it was even de rigueur for public discourse.

It's hard to remember now, because once in the job for more than a year, Rudd started to revert to Ruddbot mode, but he was an affable, approachable, generally unflappable guy.

Howard-lite?

Sure, but in many respects he signified to people a significant break from the years of "same shit, different day" politicking that Howard played. The ETS, Murray-Darling basin, ratifying the Kyoto protocol, formal indigenous reconciliation, tax reform, overturning of Work Choices, means-testing the Private Health rebate, the end of the Pacific Solution - all of these things were big differences between the parties at the time of the election.

It was a cult of personality, in the traditional sense, and just like the communist leaders we associate with this term, there wasn't really a personality there, as such, so much as a construct that appealed in a narrative sense to every possible basis. The man was a prism of qualities designed to appeal to voters.

Realistically, it's a voter's fault if they believe that the personality of the leader really matters. The best you can hope for is someone who looks like they are actually the personality of the party at the time, thus giving an accurate indication of what you're in for. As Gillard's ascension reminded us, we don't vote for a PM in Australia, we vote for a rep who is part of a party, and we trust them in their vote for a leader that best represents their interests; which in turn should, ideally, represent our interests. Whether it's the "faceless men of the ALP" or Nick Minchin's "broad church" skull crushers, this is what you're really voting for.

Perhaps it's our fault, perhaps it's the media, perhaps it's the cynical nature or modern politics, but for better or worse, a modern political party needs a narrative. As I said, earlier, you need look no further than Obama (and his own imminent demise in the mid-terms) to see another narrative that won a leadership. We talk about pragmatism, but we want a story. We want a hero.

Howard was not a hero. I have never liked him, and I think I would have wept had he won another election, but he, and the Liberal party's "broad church", are about a pragmatic and ruthless surge for leadership.

"Stay the course", "battlers and bludgers" (this still means nothing, and either term can be applied to anyone) etc etc etc... hell, look to the fact that a supposedly "small government" party spent 11 years handing out middle-class welfare to stay in power and you'll see shameless pragmatic vote grubbing at work. Howard's narrative was "little Australia" and "I'm alright, Jack!" - you've earned the right to have a little more, as long as you're making money and don't need any infrastructure. As an example - we'll subsidise you having Private Health if you don't expect a working Medicare system, propping up a system that should be a luxury, not the standard, while simultaneously driving up medical costs across the board.

Sure, Howard was a "conviction politician". His conviction? Stay the fuck in power.

Rudd's narrative was change. Quiet, concerted, hard working change. We'll do the reports (like good public servants) and then we'll action them.

You want an ETS? You want a review of the tax system? You want means-testing on the PHI rebate? You want reconciliation? You want Work Choices gone? You want Kyoto? You want the Pacific Solution done away with?

Leave it to us.

Let the wild frenzy recommence...

2010-11-01T20:16:00.000-07:00

Well hello, Dickheads.

Long time no see. I've missed updating here, and I've tried to find a way to get enough time to keep updating.

The format of Dickhead Frenzy will change a little bit. I will still try and post comics as often as I can, but I will also post text comments a couple of times a week.

It will allow me to keep posting, and make the comments I've been wanting to make without having to guarantee a comic every time. It will also mean I can post comics that are complimentary to the text post, or a post in their own right.

You may also notice I have a new header, in keeping with the change of climate!

Sooo... let's get this show on the road. First stop? A summary of the last 6 months, in three parts.

Just a quick'un.

2010-06-30T23:08:00.000-07:00

I'll hopefully put up a colour version of this later tonight (it will also be bigger).

If you haven't read it yet, here's Turnbull's great farewell to Rudd.

#Spilled Milk

2010-06-23T07:07:00.001-07:00

Could tomorrow see a brand new vag-tastic voyage for Dickhead Frenzy?

Will it be a Non-Gender Specific Genitalia Frenzy from now on? Only time will tell!

The difference of a week

2010-06-03T06:12:00.000-07:00

Apologies for the delay this week. I have had a very busy week at work, and have been flopping once I get home.

Sad to see Petro Georgiou leave Parliament today. It seems that the Liberal Party's conscience is up and leaving in disgrace; first Fraser's largely symbolic (and long-time coming) exit, now Georgiou's pointed resignation.

Will it make a difference? Well, probably not.

I mean, hopefully it draws attention to the fact that the Rudd government is slowly devolving into a Howard-esque mess in its treatment of asylum seekers. Additionally, I hope it reminds voters that some of the Libs' own members could not accept Howard's callous treatment of asylum seekers, and that Abbott has promised to ostensibly return to the obtuse, hands-length, needlessly expensive (some $500,000 per asylum seeker processed), xenophobic Pacific Solution.

All that aside, it'll probably be a flash in the pan for voters. Political journos, columnists and political punters will remember this moment, and take note of what the Liberal party lost today.

But the voters? The people who kept Howard in power through the Pacific Solution years will probably register the name coming up on the News, forget it by the ad break and lament the days when all the people in their neighbourhood had names like Dave-o and Steve ("and no one was a POOF!").

Privacy in a glass house

2010-05-25T02:25:00.000-07:00

Re: 'Petulant' Conroy accuses Google of 'single greatest privacy breach'.

Seriously, does he think he's doing himself any favours trying to draw a comparison between the Facebook and Google privacy breaches and the state-sanctioned internet-wide filter he intends to introduce?

Beyond the fact that Facebook is participatory (even the extent of the details you disclose, with a few exceptions where there have been actual breaches), while the 'clean-feed' is mandatory... and, what? Wait a second.. isn't the clean-feed about restricting what you can view?

What the hell does it have to do with privacy breaches by Google and Facebook?

I mean, beyond the fact the black-list will be kept private from the public, and the fact you won't have the right to look at material you would be allowed to own in book, film or picture form in the privacy of your own home?

When is this guy losing his job, again?

Incidentally, if you're wondering about the a-cup thing, it pays to know what the classification board now thinks constitutes paedophilia.

Would you believe my dog ate it?

2010-05-20T18:55:00.000-07:00

The past week has been an exercise in "how to destroy a burgeoning lead" for the Coalition.

Abbott's admission that he'll happily say whatever it takes to win an argument (just don't expect him to actually act on it) whilst on a difficult holiday in 7:30-Report-Land and Hockey's massive media management screw up when launching the Opposition's budget response have pretty much made it a sure bet that the polls will not be anywhere as favourable for Abbott next week.

But I could be wrong. There seems to be some crazy, clearly apolitical thing going on where the more critical the media gets of Abbott, the more the polls love him. Shine a light, and we'll happily vote for the shadow.

In the stretch coming up to the election, however, surely the Hockey bungle cannot bode well. It's probably not a good idea to try and play the media (ie. by not providing them with figures, therefor dodging the hard questions in front of the cameras) so obviously. If that wasn't what he was doing, then that's an even worse omen. It's either media manipulation for dummies or just plain dumb... and it's pretty much symptomatic of the Opposition at the moment.

I yams not what I yams

2010-05-17T18:08:00.000-07:00

* Uploaded with ImageShack.us. Because Photobucket is being a pile of shit.

Re: This magnificent 7:30 Report interview. Seriously, what were you thinking, Abbott?

Don't trust me when I say something that sounds crazy. That's just me being crazy!

So we should let you tell us when to to listen and when not to?

But seriously, if you think Abbott's fair enough to mouth off whenever he feels and then fob it off as "the heat of the moment" or today, as his being "fair dinkum", here's something for you.

Blistering Barnacles! Rogering Gerbils!

2010-05-09T17:35:00.000-07:00

So, has anyone been else been a little stunned by the complete lack of response from Fairfax re: Miranda Devine's homophobic twitter insult, given Deveny's sacking last week?

I don't think Devine should be fired (at least not for this), but I think it's a little bit rich to not touch her at all after the Deveny debacle.

I think this blog post at An Onymous Lefty sums up my own views quite well. I do find it oddly worrying that most people think implying Gays = "sex obsessed perverts who get it however they can" is better than pointing out the sexualisation of Bindi Irwin as a child star (albeit haphazardly) or making poor taste joke about someone's dead wife.

But then again, the Deveny bashing and eventual sacking was a dickhead frenzy of escalating outrage of the highest order. The outrage machine churneth.

Mr Kettle

2010-05-06T20:17:00.000-07:00

Re: Burqa theft prompts Abbott to echo Howard's concerns.

But seriously, are we having this debate again? Has Howard been pulling some marionette strings so that Abbott and his cohorts race bait and play the asylum seeker/queue jumper word shuffle to win votes on fear?

This is poor politics. "There is understandable concern in the community about what former prime minister John Howard called a confronting form of attire,'' says Abbott, ie. "I'm basically saying I agree with the xenophobes in the audience, but I'll only imply it so that I can't get in trouble." Quoting Howard also beckons to the same voters who long for the days of the "Pacific Solution" - ie. the "don't let those people near my suburb regardless of their risk of death where they came from" brigade.

Everybody Loves Rudd

2010-05-04T20:38:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the delay. As you know, I'm in New York. I'm in a tiny room doing this on the side of the bed, as there's no chair in this room and Lily (my wife) is asleep on the other side of the aforementioned bed.

I considered doing today's comic re: this, but there's nothing funny about Abbott's comments; he's a dick.

I think we've all gone over the fact that it's not unlawful to enter a country to seek asylum. If someone is processed and found not to be a refugee (as around only 10% of asylum seeker are), then (and only then) you get to make the decision about whether to send them home or not. No heading them off at the pass, drawing lines about country of origin, mode of entry etc... it's international law.

If you haven't got that yet, well maybe you should be granted temporary residency. If you have got it, and you're milking public ignorance for votes - like Abbott - then your boat should be towed far, far away.

Here's a lazy one before New York...

2010-04-29T07:26:00.000-07:00

Yep, just a lazy 'un.

See you on the other side.

Going to New York!

2010-04-28T22:11:00.000-07:00

Alright people, there'll be a couple of day hiatus as I pack today and fly to NY tomorrow!

Ideally we'll have around three or so new comics next week, live from NY.

Have a good weekend, Dickheads.

We built this city!

2010-04-27T20:25:00.000-07:00

Re: Labor backed Windsor sham - The Age, 28/04/2010

Knee-deep in Politik

2010-04-26T19:11:00.000-07:00

Re: Emissions put on Back Burner, The Age 27/04/2010

Tea Cup Storm

2010-04-26T17:34:00.001-07:00

Okay, this one was actually done on Sunday, but not coloured, as I had a scanner screw-up. Hopefully will get a more current one done today or tomorrow

Super Jesus Plane

2010-04-24T22:52:00.001-07:00