Open Thread – Wednesday 23 Mar 2022
1,772 responses to “Open Thread – Wednesday 23 Mar 2022”
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Why does autocarrot add grocers apostrophe’s ?
I’m on a mailing list for Noni B (must have given them my email in a weak moment). Anyways, the copy writer must have been watching all the Ukraine and Covid shock and awe on the tv. Because this is what I recieved in my inbox this morning:
It’s time for TRIPLE Threat Thursday
I now have to make a decision. Do I open the email or contact a bomb disposal squad?
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Thought Police: Germany Conducts Mass Raids over Online ‘Insults’ Against Politicians
When I were a kid in school, we were taught that in an electric circuit conventional current flows in the opposite direction to the electron current.
It seems when the Berlin Wall came down the convention was to believe West Germanies governance flowed into the East, but in reality…
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“Because Germany failed to sufficiently replace energy output from nuclear with renewables, its coal consumption increased. Its non-nuclear options were slowed by budget constraints and even protests, such as strong opposition to wind power lines.”
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Quick trip to Melbourne yesterday, off the ring road, Banksia St to Eastern Fwy, down Eastlink to Keysborough then back along the eastern to Alexandra Pde and through Collingwood, Brunswick etc.
I’m astounded at the amount of graffiti everywhere I went. It’s almost everything, particularly bad in the trendier, greenie suburbs but still everywhere. Graffiti has always been a problem but compared to a few years ago it’s exploded. I can’t see how the problem can be fixed. It would take a small army working constantly for months just to get rid of what is there.
Melbourne is a cesspit.
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In the smh, Savva says ScoMo should butt out of the whole Kitching affair.
What a surprise.
Seriously, after the Danby claims today how can an inquiry not be held?
I’m surprised Labor didn’t immediately announce one when the bullying claims came to light.
It would have defused it until after the election & they could have released fake results from a fake inquiry.
Looks like the Mean Girls had too much pride to allow that to happen. -
This’ll be fun for EV fans and the big battery boosters.
Lithium Prices Have Nearly Doubled In 2022 Amid Insane Commodity Rally (23 Mar)
After more than quadrupling in value last year, lithium carbonate continues to soar in 2022, according to Benchmark Mineral Intelligence. The mid-March assessment by the battery supply chain research outfit shows that battery-grade lithium carbonate (EXW China, ?99.5% Li2CO3) is averaging $76,700 a tonne, up 10% over just two weeks and 95% since the beginning of the year. A year ago, the commodity was trading at $13,400 a tonne.
So only a 472% rise in a year. You can replace the more exotic elements like nickel and cobalt in Li-ion batteries but you can’t do without lithium. The prices of EVs and grid support batteries are going to rise substantially you’d think.
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Looks like the Mean Girls had too much pride to allow that to happen.
I’m surprised it hasn’t been turned on its head and they claim that Kitching was bullying them, and that they are the real victims here.*
A typical MO for crybullies.
* could be a bridge too far to blame their former colleague. More likely to be a surrogate like “certain right wing media” and the ever-useful soshul meeja
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Insider blows whistle on Australia’s greenhouse gas reduction schemes
Professor Andrew Macintosh is the former chair of the Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee.
He has decided to go public with his concerns about the hundreds of millions of dollars the government is paying to projects designed to cut emissions.
And he’s pulling no punches.
“This is little more than a wealth transfer. People can think about it as welfare payments for the undeserving.”
“Payments are being made to people to not chop down forests that were never going to be chopped down, to grow forests that are already there, to grow forests in places that will never sustain permanent forests,” he says.
A big bucket of money left unattended, with a sign saying ‘Government Money, Please Take Some‘. And thieves come and take it?
Shirley not.[Note: Their ABC doesn’t want this theft to stop, just to be done with ‘greater integrity’. And by Albo.]
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sfwsays:
March 24, 2022 at 7:54 am
Quick trip to Melbourne yesterday, off the ring road, Banksia St to Eastern Fwy, down Eastlink to Keysborough then back along the eastern to Alexandra Pde and through Collingwood, Brunswick etc.I’m astounded at the amount of graffiti everywhere I went. It’s almost everything, particularly bad in the trendier, greenie suburbs but still everywhere. Graffiti has always been a problem but compared to a few years ago it’s exploded. I can’t see how the problem can be fixed. It would take a small army working constantly for months just to get rid of what is there.
Melbourne is a cesspit.
I was in a very trendy inner city suburb a couple of years ago, and looking around at the graffiti, bottles strewn over the streets, and the drunks walking by I made a comment about it being a better dressed Frankston. At least with Frankston people were comfortable with being bogans, unnamed trendy suburb had their noses in the air.
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In Ratfucker news:
Former PM Kevin Rudd’s chilling China warning
Former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has raised the alarm over the prospect of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.
According to Mr Rudd, few in the West realise the extent to which Chinese leader Xi Jinping is eyeing a return of Taiwan to mainland control.
“It’s right up there next to Xi Jinping‘s desire for the party to remain in power and for him to be the predominant leader within the Communist Party of China,” Mr Rudd told ABC’s 7:30 on Wednesday.
Lu Kuwen warming up the relevance.
Y’know, you don’t get them there insights off the back of of a cornflakes box.
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So, it is being announced this morning that Moderna is establishing a facility in Australia. The MSM is falling over itself in reporting what they think is a massive bonus for Australia. No discussion of the massive fall in Moderna’s share price recently. And no discussion of why the Commonwealth Serum Laboratory does not perform in the way it’s title would suggest. Oh – & should we expect any outgoing pollies at the next election to be appointed to the Moderna Board? Of course not!
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Graffiti has always been a problem but compared to a few years ago it’s exploded.
Personally, I have always thought that graffiti really diminishes a place and makes it feel dingy and dilapidated. When it is done on public property the attitude seems to be there has been no property damage since it is public property. So no great effort need be made.
They make an effort near some infrastructure but not because they want to prevent graffiti, but because graffitists have a rare talent for being mangled by trains, cars, frazzled in HV power boxes, drowning in drains.
It is funny to contrast the puffed up buoyant shit-grinning politicians standing in front a plaque slowly revolving in a euphoric state before the cameras on opening a pristine highway or train station, with the prematurely aged sepulchre to their own egos a mere year or two later.
Perhaps a page in the newspapers dedicated to matching pictures of pollies with the gaudy ravaged shambles their erstwhile glories have become. Seriously, if they are going to let them become to defaced, why the hell do taxpayers have to foot the many times multi-million dollar bills for exciting facades and outdoor art installations. You will have seen some of the extravagant designs of bridges that could have been planer at a much lower cost.
And we are not talking about an underground trying to rally the people to rise against invaders or dictators grinding the people into the dust. We are talking about nobodies who need proof that they exist so they paint their names in as elaborate a fashion as they can, with improbably elastic stylised characters of who they wish they were and tags they have given themselves while confusing unique for special.
And this is just public property. Crank it up to eleventy for private property.
For crimes against aesthetics, both for what they damage and what they create, they should be dipped in paint stripper and their bodies used as rags to clean up their mess.
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Gateshead, born & bred ….. it’s hard to be humble .. LOL!
https://ibb.co/JvFyDRW -
Former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has raised the alarm over the prospect of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.
Whoa!
No one has thought of that!
Poor fragile heart. He thought by now he would be the main act in the great opera of the UN, where adoring diplomats faces would be glow softly reflecting the limelit radiance of the diva KRudd, like the moon does the sun.
Instead he finds himself standing on a blanket in front of Wynyard station kitted with a marching drum on his back operated by his foot, an acoustic guitar, and a harmonica held in front on a frame, singing other people’s songs for pennies.
I am just glad his dog Jasper isn’t here to see it.
Sod his wife and daughter – they both cashed in when they could.
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I was impressed how some structures on the Monash managed to be hit by graffiti even as the construction work went on around it.
One further down the hill on the Monash says “Dank Draw” on the sign that spans the opposite carriageway. Those guys get around. I saw the same name on the back of a smaller sign at Cape Patterson this summer.
Anyway, whenever I see the sign, I can’t help but think the K looks like a pistol pointing to the left. Is that wrong?
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twitter now putting warnings stories that are critical of Jackson.
There is a Twatter account called Defiant L’s which uses only actual quotes from people or from MSM sites like WaPo, NYT, MSNBC etc. It is a great read.
They got suspended for while recently too.
Apparently saying back to people the very words they have uttered, usually dripping with hate and malice, is a hatecrime.
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Here’s Newsweek putting their own spin on what Gonzalo Lira has been saying for weeks.
Putin’s Bombers Could Devastate Ukraine But He’s Holding Back. Here’s Why
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Russia to switch gas invoicing to roubles for European buyers
Gas sales agreements don’t usually have optional currency convertibility provisions – for obvious reasons.
So, unless Gazprom has snuck one over on wood-duck European gas buyers, this must be a direct market intervention by Putin over the top of contracts.
And a pretty unguided one given the daily complexity of revaluing Euro-denominated purchases against an appreciating/fluctuating/thrashing minor currency. The scope for unexpected outcomes is eye watering.
Plus, I’m not sure how deep the rouble market is to allow €275m/day to be picked up for commercial settlement – so this will be very interesting.
All that aside, however the war in Ukraine turns out, the Poot has permanently fucked over the Russian €100bn pa export market to Europe and forced the Brussels cockheads to wake up to themselves.
Well played that man.Emperor Xi’s winged monkeys will be waiting at the bottom of the hill with a win-win deal of Everlasting Golden Friendship.
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So there IS still such a thing as a safety signal, for everything except the Covid vaccines, from which thousands, tens of thousands, of people are officially known to have died without any reaction at all.
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The weaponisation of the DOJ has reached a new level.
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The Bee got put in twitter jail until they take down the offending tweets.
Bee said get stuffed.
So twitter then banned the editor personally too.
Such a charming bunch.Babylon Bee Defiant 24 Hours After Twitter Lockdown for Calling Rachel Levine a ‘Man’ (21 Mar)
Seth Dillon@SethDillon
We’re not deleting anything. Truth is not hate speech. If the cost of telling the truth is the loss of our Twitter account, then so be it.
9:37 AM · Mar 21, 2022Twitter Now Suspends Babylon Bee Editor Following ‘Joke’ About Satire Site Being Suspended (24 Mar)
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Rudd has raised the alarm over the prospect of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.
According to Mr Rudd, few in the West realise the extent to which Chinese leader Xi Jinping is eyeing a return of Taiwan to mainland control.
“It’s right up there next to Xi Jinping‘s desire for the party to remain in power and for him to be the predominant leader within the Communist Party of China,” Mr Rudd told ALPBC’s 7:30Gee, I’ve never seen Rudd state the bleeding obvious in such a succinct manner*. Relevance deprivation syndrome really does terrible things to people.
*As opposed to stating utter codswallop in a lengthy excruciating and invariably incomprehensible manner, which was previously his forte.
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Lithium Prices Have Nearly Doubled In 2022 Amid Insane Commodity Rally
And herein lies the risk for wannabe lithium producers.
Lithium resource occurrences aren’t particularly rare. But the investment in defining bankable reserves sufficient to support the capital for a lithium carbonate plant is a stretch.
Punters love the price spike in speccy exploration stock holding ‘world class spodumene deposits’. But not so much the reality of laying out the big money to prove up large-scale JORC reserves and a mine – while 100% risk exposed to a stupidly volatile commodity they don’t actually understand.
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Did the thought enter his brain (he is a knuck, after all) that Australia actually has large reserves of oil, and we could pump and refine our own oil?
I doubt it. I know the guy who was in the job after him. He actually made Chief of Air Force and is no fool but also was a fighter pilot. So was John Boyd who turned out to be pretty smart. -
Why does anyone care if someone they don’t know is having booster 3, 4, 5 or even 10?
I think it’s become a way of virtue signalling for some low iq idiots on the right.
Because it comes with a “Nazi Pass”
And the booster will most likely, from all we are witnessing Kitchens them into a coffin quicker than need be.
But this will probably be blocked again so you can go on deluding yourselves , all in desperate agreement.
Talk about a “bubble”
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But the investment in defining bankable reserves sufficient to support the capital for a lithium carbonate plant is a stretch.
Faustus – Add that the process is very energy intensive and emits vast amounts of CO2. Also ends up with huge amounts of acidic or alkaline tailings. Nimbies and bananas would be coming out of the woodwork like termites.
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Eyriesays:
March 24, 2022 at 8:37 am
Retired Air Vice-Marshall Blackburn says renewables would help in the event that our oil imports were interrupted!How did this moron ever make AVM and why is anyone listening to him? It’ s a worry.
Both a knuck and a test pilot, a sure fire winning combination!
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In Spam news:
$400M budget boost for inland highway
An inland freight route tipped to be a second Bruce highway will get an extra $400 million funding boost in the upcoming federal budget.
Upgrades to the more than 1100-kilometre route – running from Charters Towers in North Queensland to Mungindi on the NSW border – aim to move trucks off existing highways, making it safer and more efficient to transport freight across the two states.
With extra benefits:
The inland route will also be used as an alternative to the Bruce highway in wet weather events.
So, next time the Bruce is cut at Gympie, I’ll just pop 500k West to Mungindi and then up to Charters Towers and then 300k back to the coast.
Job done.
I’m voting 1) Beetrooter. -
Shock As Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky Declares Martial Law, Seizes Control Of All Media And Outlaws All Political Opposition To His Own Party
The country is at war. Remind me, would Japanese, German and Italian internment at the outset of WW2 be similar (ish) to what’s going on in Ukraine as I read these groups were pro-Russian. Yes, no?
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Shock As Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky Declares Martial Law, Seizes Control Of All Media And Outlaws All Political Opposition To His Own Party
The country is at war. Remind me, would Japanese, German and Italian internment at the outset of WW2 be similar (ish) to what’s going on in Ukraine as I read these groups were pro-Russian. Yes, no?
Remind me. Did England ban all political activity during the war? Did they turn their own country into a total dictatorship? There is more at play here This was linked yesterday or the day before.
Warning: Ukraine is the Great ‘Enslavement’ Reset Laboratory of the Global Tech Elite
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The struggle is real, reduce Russian reliance, limit economic pain and cut carbon emissions
Especially as energy costs on Spain, for example, were high before Putin came along.Europe split on how to share consumers energy price pain, at Hellenic shipping news
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A cartoon for the times.
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The country is at war. Remind me, would Japanese, German and Italian internment at the outset of WW2 be similar (ish) to what’s going on in Ukraine as I read these groups were pro-Russian. Yes, no?
The news outlets? It may be that the news being reported within Ukraine is not as uniformly glorious as martial rage stirring as is being reported in the West.
Now there is a shock. (Not)
I have heard it said (and seen it written) that in WW1 the hatred of Germans by the civilians back in Britain shocked the soldiers sent back to recover from their injuries. In the trenches there was no room for weaving fantastical monsters out of the enemy. Your best chance of success was to know them for what they were – the enemy, sure. But people like you.
It was the press that stirred up the rage in Britain. At the war’s end, the soldiers just wanted to go home. The civilians wanted Germans punished to the full extent of their worst imaginings.
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Reaffirming that supporting the man made climate change agenda is a hobby reserved for the polo playing Aspen skiing rich and assorted loonie tunes
Greenpeace; reasons why nuclear energy is not the way for a green and peaceful world -
rosiesays:
March 24, 2022 at 5:28 am
important message from the hillsong board—
Hillsong Church was birthed out of Brian and Bobbie’s obedience and commitment to the call of God and we are extremely grateful for all that Brian and Bobbie have given to build His house. We ask that you continue to pray for them, and the entire Houston family, during this challenging time.
My gut tells me that appreciating the big buy was not the first priority.
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The single biggest reason why the Liberal Party in Victoria will never get anywhere. At the exact moment they begin to gain traction, this or something very much like this happens (the Hun):
Liberal MP Wendy Lovell has come under fire after comments made in parliament about low-income families being placed in the “best street in Brighton where the children cannot mix”.
Victoria’s upper house was last night debating a homelessness Bill put forward by the Greens when Ms Lovell made the comments about affordable housing.
“We also need to make sure that we put those properties in areas where families are accepted and where families can flourish,” she said at the time.
A bit vague, but fortunately she clears it right up:
“There is no point putting a very low income, probably welfare-dependent family in the best street in Brighton where the children cannot mix with others or go to the school with other children or where they do not have the same ability to have the latest in sneakers and iPhones et cetera.
“We have got to make sure that people can actually fit into a neighbourhood, that they have a good life and that people are not stigmatising them because of their circumstances.”
Naturally, she was then chopped to bits by all assembled except the rest of the Libs, who probably wondered what the problem was with keeping po’ chillen in Tarneit or Jacana. Labor’s Mark Gepp, walking through the wide open door:
“Go back and read the transcript. If you want to know what you said, go back and read the transcript, because everybody in this place heard it loudly and clearly,” he said.
“Because those people are different. Yes, they are different. They do not wear the right shoes. ‘Oh, we don’t want the kids to be teased because they have got a Samsung phone instead of an iPhone.”
Richard Wynne:
“This is an appalling example of the Liberal Party’s postcode snobbery.”
Postcode snobbery. Never, ever heard of it. Can there be such a thing?
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The Ukrainian troops were really horrid to us, took our toys away and called us awful names. The Russian troops came along with their tanks draped in flowers, spoke softly to us and gave us kittens and lollipops.
Heard reports from Greeks lately in Mariupol that are not flattering about the UKR soldiers.
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A recent study from Stanford published in Cell might shed light on this phenomenon. Researchers observed a decreased immune response to new variants among those vaccinated for the original strain because the shots are teaching the body to respond improperly. “We find that prior vaccination with Wuhan-Hu-1-like antigens followed by infection with Alpha or Delta variants gives rise to plasma antibody responses with apparent Wuhan-Hu-1-specific imprinting manifesting as relatively decreased responses to the variant virus epitopes, compared with unvaccinated patients infected with those variant viruses,” observed the Stanford pathologists. They note that the extent to which this causes original antigenic sin “will be an important topic of ongoing study.”
Just fucking terrific. So, you’ll need a vaccine for every strain of the chunk virus, which mutates as fast as stormy’s tits. What a business model the vaccine manufacturers have. God bless the chunks.
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Blam.
Stark comparison with Sweden where women refugees are afraid of being attacked by people of no describable ethnicity, religion or gender. Ok not the gender bit: they’re male. Maybe someone could ask Judge Jackson if she knows what a man is.
‘We Are Afraid’ – Ukrainian Refugee Women Fear for Safety in Multicultural Sweden (21 Mar)
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Eurotrash and the UK learning the lesson about energy:
In Australia we’re about 2 years behind them; so Liddell and Eraring will close and blackouts will occur before we wake up, hang a few greenies and start the coal plants back up.
Every time I ring the radio I’m told coal is finished and over. Sometimes I get the reply in that if coal is finished why do we export 85% of the coal we dig up but are going to use none here? Fucking idiots.
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Finally:
Ketanji Brown Jackson Can’t Define What A Woman Is: “I’m Not A Biologist”This skank will be trouble.
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Gray Connolly
@GrayConnolly
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4h
Latest French Defence Ministry map (day 28)
– assesses RUS’ Kharkov and Donbass fronts almost/have married-up
– RUS advance N from Crimea up either side of Dnieper to Kryvyi Rih and Zaporizhzhia … does RUS assault Odessa?
– Again: RUS’ Kiev encirclement seems the last priority -
“Suggestions of bullying, nepotism, and sexism are also unfounded. In particular, we have been delighted to announce an excellent lineup of women as candidates across the country, all of whom were selected on merit.”
____________________Gee, I wonder.
I wonder if a cat champion or few, of the Lib Dems, are examples of others amongst the Lib Dems.
When you think of their natural readiness to bullying (including threats & libels), & teaming up with Mean Girls, if any of that behaviour is experienced by others within the party, well …
… oh, and all those with ‘old’ Labor connections …
… and the desperate back peddling from the proudly, “Well what are you gunna do about it! That’s right nuthin’, cos we got all the power!”, to a pathetic pretence of possessing the character they enjoy trashing … funny how both stories have melded into one 🙂
No wonder everyone’s desperately, madly whistling past the graveyard so clearly described by Gonzalo Lira –
The USA is Committing Suicide
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVbVwFPgSk4The USA Is Committing Suicide Part II
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16C4CTZNKQc -
They note that the extent to which this causes original antigenic sin “will be an important topic of ongoing study.”
From John Button’s autobiography:
“”You’ll be pleased to hear, Minister, that we’ve commissioned a study on the effects of high interest rates on investment.”
“You mean”, I asked, “that you’ve been advising us all along that high interest rates are necessary, without understanding their effect on investment?”
“Well,” he said, “we’ve commissioned a study, which could be important.”
After they’d gone I talked to some of my staff. “We have”, I said, “fallen among fuckwits”.”Fast forward and it’s being done with people’s lives.
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34-Yr-Old Mom and Loving Wife Dies of Rare Brain Bleed One Day After Getting COVID Jab…Coroner Blames COVID Vaccine
Heavily pregnant neighbour and daughter dropped past yesterday to say a quick hello. She said she had just finally got the vax, her Doctor had said it was now ok to get vaxxed. What fucking rock does her Doctor live under? Thoughts and prayers are with her. People have to much trust in their fucking Mong GP’s.
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““This is an appalling example of the Liberal Party’s postcode snobbery.””
Hmm, so why do so many Labor ex and current pollies choose to reside in “snobbish” Liberal party postcodes? Such as Richo, Keneally, Whitlam, Keating, Hawke, Dreyfus and many others. They don’t waste any time, post politics, quickly moving to more salubrious areas.
About eight years ago I was invited to a boutique fashion night here in Woollahra (I live in Sydney’s eastern suburbs). Anna Bligh was there. It wasn’t long after she’d lost office in a landslide. She and her hubby hadn’t wasted any time fleeing QLD for sunnier shores here in Sydney. Our stupid Liberal lite premier at the same, Fatty O’Farrell, had installed Bligh’s hubby in some senior bureaucratic role…..coz mates look after mates. Anyway I digress. I remember asking Anna where she was living and she remarked around the corner, in Woollahra, so in one of Sydney’s toffiest areas. I said to her…oh so post-politics you’ve moved on from the hoi polloi, how very convenient. She didn’t engage with me after that.
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