The Surrender of Granada, Francisco Pradilla Ortiz, 1882
You only have to ask him if he thinks murdering unborn children is wrong and you’ll immediately realise he’s no…
Open Thread – Tue 31 Jan 2023
- Open Thread – Weekend 18 May 2024
- Bumtree #15
- Bumtree #14
- Open Thread – Thurs 16 May 2024
- Bumtree #13
Greater Sydney Dam Levels are now at 100%. https://www.waternsw.com.au/nsw-dams/nsw-storage-levels/greater-sydney-dam-levels Come on down Tim Tam Flatulence. Your expertise and predictive powers…
Wrong answer? 😀 https://ace.mu.nu/archives/IMG_9126.jpg
Around certain parts of Margaret River selling up and moving south is practically as profitable as working for a living…
Well it helps the ratings on Home and Away. It’s worth a shot.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong has challenged the former great colonial power to share “uncomfortable” stories of colonisation with Pacific nations.
Does Wrong know that many older Pacific Islanders would love the British to come back and run this?
“When the British were here, the roads were good, the schools were good and everything worked!”
Not to mention Hong Kongers.
Lets start with that lot.
A decent start! Do we get to pick the type of cancer?!
After months of obnoxious pro-Ukraine jingoistic war propaganda, Welt suddenly admits to its centre-right audience that it’s “essentially impossible for Ukraine to win”
Odd how this happens directly after Olaf Scholz agreed to send irreplaceable German Leopard 2s to Ukraine.
Since the war in Ukraine began in February last year, Welt has relentlessly funnelled jingoistic Anglosphere war propaganda to its centre-right German readership. They reprinted this pro-Azov Battalion editorial complete with National Socialist symbols; they achieved a kind of ecstatic climax during the counteroffensive last September, when they announced that a turning point was at hand; and they have been among those predicting that Russia is on the verge of running out of missiles and artillery shells any moment now.
Well, no more. Readers opened the paper today to find these sobering remarks on why it’s all over. The problem, we read, is that “the United States, Germany and other NATO allies are more afraid” of escalation than of a nebulous “threat to Western security posed by Russia’s territorial conquests in Ukraine,” and have failed to provide adequate support.
Russia has so far destroyed 60 to 70% of the critical Ukrainian infrastructure. It’s unimaginable that Kiev will receive sufficient air defence systems … to stop the Russian orgy of destruction. … And Ukraine will prove less and less able to repair the destroyed infrastructure as the required material becomes scarcer and … the Ukrainian defence industry lacks urgently needed electricity.
Russia’s military is trying to counter Western precision weapons with volume, and has the resources to do so. This is especially true when it comes to tanks. According to the London-based think tank International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), Russia will soon have 4000 deployable tanks at its disposal – a crushing mass that not only poses a great risk to the Western Leopard tanks, but also puts Russia in a position to go on the offensive at any time.
I guess Russia isn’t facing weapons shortages after all; we can dispense with that tattered little fantasy now. Perhaps they were just keeping it alive until Olaf Scholz agreed to send our handful of irreplaceable Leopards into this impossible situation.
… The longer the war has dragged on, the more Ukraine is running out of soldiers. It is already … at least in its eighth wave of mobilisation, with men over 60 now being sent to the front. … Russia is likely to emerge from this war not only militarily … but politically victorious. … Membership in NATO will probably be ruled out for the foreseeable future following a ceasefire or peace negotiations, and Ukraine’s accession to the EU will take much longer than Kiev is currently demanding even in the best scenario. …
Understatements of the century, these.
The international community has done a great deal to support Ukraine. But it is still far too little to enable Kiev to assert its legitimate claim to territorial integrity. One can only suspect a strategy is at work here. Anyone who talks to Western diplomats hears more and more often about fear of escalation, worries of war fatigue in democratic societies, and hopes for a quick ceasefire.
Yes, a “strategy” is at work here. The German media has smeared anyone trying to talk about this strategy as a conspiracy theorist, but it’s clear enough:
This is a proxy war, in which the Global American Empire has chosen to financially and materially support a weaker ally in a destructive military adventure against a rival. The empire doesn’t care about Ukraine, or democracy, or anything else; it’s a blind expansionist borg, and the war was a simple opportunity to hurt an opposing power.
Now that this strategy seems doomed to fail, we’re allowed to be more honest about it, but there won’t be a moment of introspection. Not a single Western strategist or politician will ever ask whether peace should’ve been negotiated sooner, before Ukraine was so totally wrecked and before so many Ukrainians had to die. This was never about Ukraine.
Not to mention Hong Kongers.
There’s plenty of ammo available to shoot down this complete f’cking idiot. Had forgotten about poor old HK!
Mother Lode:
If there was, then in a year, they could have gathered an army of 10 – 20,000 warriors even if they’d walked from Qld and Victoria to Botany Bay and slaughtered the interlopers to a man.
I would wish not only cancer but, arse cancer on the following for starters:
Duk, I still wouldn’t wish cancer on them.
A rancid case of herpes? Yep.
Maybe a bout of shingles that takes forever to go away.
But not cancer.
ScoMo deserves to have a never ending UTI.
acting inappropriately towards the teenager in March 2022, while on long-term sick leave.
Living the degenerate import dream!
DAY IS DONE
Peter Yarrow -Silver Dawn Music – ASCAP
Tell me why you’re crying, my son
I know you’re frightened, like everyone
Is it the thunder in the distance you fear?
Will it help if I stay very near?
I am here.
Refrain:
And if you take my hand my son
All will be well when the day is done.
And if you take my hand my son
All will be well when the day is done.
Day is done, Day is done
Day is done, Day is done
Do you ask why I’m sighing, my son?
You shall inherit what mankind has done.
In a world filled with sorrow and woe
If you ask me why this is so, I really don’t know.
(Refrain)
Tell me why you’re smiling my son
Is there a secret you can tell everyone?
Do you know more than men that are wise?
Can you see what we all must disguise
through your loving eyes?
(Refrain)
I believe the preferred destination of those leaving last year was…the UK.
What I wish upon them is the realisation of what they’ve done, which they then have to live with for the rest of their lives.
But not cancer.
Cancer is appropriate.
It’s a nice analogy to their devouring of Australia.
And for Cat Lemon Lovers
LEMON TREE
Will Holt- Boulder Music Corp.-BMI
When I was just a lad of ten, my father said to me,
“Come here and take a lesson from the lovely lemon tree.”
“Don’t put your faith in love, my boy”, my father said to me,
“I fear you’ll find that love is like the lovely lemon tree.”
Lemon tree very pretty and the lemon flower is sweet
but the fruit of the poor lemon is impossible to eat.
Lemon tree very pretty and the lemon flower is sweet
but the fruit of the poor lemon is impossible to eat.
One day beneath the lemon tree, my love and I did lie
A girl so sweet that when she smiled the stars rose in the sky.
We passed that summer lost in love beneath the lemon tree
the music of her laughter hid my father’s words from me:
Lemon tree very pretty and the lemon flower is sweet
but the fruit of the poor lemon is impossible to eat.
Lemon tree very pretty and the lemon flower is sweet
but the fruit of the poor lemon is impossible to eat.
One day she left without a word. She took away the sun.
And in the dark she left behind, I knew what she had done.
She’d left me for another, it’s a common tale but true.
A sadder man but wiser now I sing these words to you:
Lemon tree very pretty and the lemon flower is sweet
but the fruit of the poor lemon is impossible to eat.
Lemon tree very pretty and the lemon flower is sweet
but the fruit of the poor lemon is impossible to eat.
From
https://www.peterpaulandmary.com/music/songlist.htm
I had no idea their song list was so extensive
What I wish upon them is the realisation of what they’ve done, which they then have to live with for the rest of their lives.
They won’t. They’re delusional. Everything is someone else’s fault and they’re the saviours.
Boambee John:
That’s why I wish it upon them.
“Why hasn’t one single MP or leader told anti-Pell protestors to stay at home tomorrow?”
Cowardice. We are governed by cowardly scum, on all sides of politics. Will Perrottet be there?
What I wish upon them is the realisation of what they’ve done, which they then have to live with for the rest of their lives.
Unfortunately, these people never realise anything, unless they’re forced to. Not only do they not learn about their own “mistakes” they refuse to pick up on the mistakes of others – see Jimmy Keating and his “new” values-based economy plans.
I think we can find common ground – how about arse cancer AND the realisation of what they’ve done, which they then have to live with for the rest of their lives.
Alice Springs mayor demands ABC retract ‘white supremacy’ claims
The mayor of Alice Springs has challenged the ABC to retract a report he said misrepresented a meeting of concerned Alice Springs residents as a gathering of “white supremacists”.
James Morrow
The mayor of Alice Springs has accused the ABC of “lighting the fuse to have a race war” in his community and demanded the broadcaster retract a report he said misrepresented a meeting of concerned Alice Springsresidents as being a gathering of “white supremacists”.
On Tuesday, ABC News Radio broadcast a report about an Alice Springs town hall meeting featuring several voices claiming the event was “a disgusting show of white supremacy” and “scary”.
One person told the reporter that “the tension and violence and anger was palpable and was clearly all around white supremacy”.
However Alice Springs Mayor Matt Paterson said the report “couldn’t be further from the truth”.
“The ABC should definitely retract this story, it’s a kick in the teeth to residents who have put up with this for far too long,” he said.
Mr Paterson said that while local ABC journalists were sensitive to the concerns of the community, this report was put together by what he called a “fly-in reporter”.
While hundreds of people attended the meeting, every single voice featured by the ABC was critical of the event, with many saying that it was driven by racism and white people concerned solely about their own safety and that of their property.
“It’s adding unnecessary anxiety when we are all trying to come together to address the issue and here you’ve got the ABC lighting the fuse to have a race war.”
Mr Paterson, who attended the event in question, said the coverage was “completely not true” and it completely misrepresented the way the meeting was run.
Since the ABC report went to air, multiple media reports have revealed that those who attempted to portray it as being about “white supremacy” were in a tiny minority.
One meeting attendee, Garth Thompson, said that when he listened to the ABC’s report he was “blown away”.
“If (the ABC) were really concerned about Indigenous affairs they would have actually portrayed that meeting in a proper matter,” he told 2GB’s Ben Fordham.
The ABC has been contacted for comment.
An abhorrent term. I knew what it was when I first heard it a few years ago, it’s icky.
Not sure I’ve ever heard the latter, the former yes, & its variants; Greek stocktake & Sicilian stocktake.
What’s wrong with the Australian term: The Red Steer. (as in “can’t make it pay? put the red steer into ‘er mate”)
Keep it up leftards. The case for defunding is being made by the ALPBC itself.
Would she give the French or the Belgians the same sage advice?
Bill Bishop, the China watcher who Krudd pinches most of his “insights” from, has published a note saying plans are underway for Xi to meet Putin in Russia later in this year.
I will believe it when I see it.
But if that trip was to happen, it would be monumental.
Salvatore
What’s wrong with the Australian term: The Red Steer. (as in “can’t make it pay? put the red steer into ‘er mate”)
How about “Up the old red rooster”? (A reference to flames coming through the roof.)
I heard some of that report and what I heard was clearly biased in the usual ABC manner.
One comment – I doubt from a local resident given the social justice jargon that was used – was that the meeting was trying to criminalise indigenous youth.
Seismic…unless he’s going to broker a peace deal, which would be quite something in itself.
While hundreds of people attended the meeting, every single voice featured by the ABC was critical of the event, with many saying that it was driven by racism and white people concerned solely about their own safety and that of their property.
Being concerned with your own safety and property is a nazi now..
Not a particularly high bar between attending a community forum and bursting out into the horst wessl and taking covetous looks at Poland apparently.
Zero chance of Xi heading too far west.
I’m thinking 4-6 flight max from Beijing.
Putin’s going to be heading a long way east.
If it goes ahead.
Lathe of the week in Violet Town, VIC. McPhersons branding, massive 2” spindle bore, $750:
https://www.gumtree.com.au/s-ad/violet-town/miscellaneous-goods/australian-made-metal-lathe/1307792080
Usually followed by a bellow of “Suck more pizz!”
The new Addams Family car is a 4WD
Why are photos of the latest Addams Family vehicle appearing on a website that’s dominated by off-road vehicles, you may well ask. Well, while the bodywork is modified 1938 Pontiac, the chassis and powertrain are Mercedes-Benz Gelandewagen 4WD.
Previous Addams Family vehicles have been Packards, but for the Tim Burton directed, epic, eight-part series, Wednesday that screened in late-2022 on Netflix to record numbers of viewers, the latest Addams Family car was not a Packard.
For those few who don’t know, the Addams Family is a fictional family created by American cartoonist Charles Addams. The characters originally appeared in a series of cartoons, about half of which were originally published in The New Yorker over a 50-year period from their inception in 1938.
The Addamses are a satirical inversion of the ideal 20th-century American family: a decidedly odd, wealthy, aristocratic clan, delighting in the macabre and are seemingly unaware or unconcerned that other people find them bizarre or frightening.
Beginning with the 1964 television series, the Addams Family consisted of Gomez and Morticia Addams; their children Wednesday and Pugsley; close family members Uncle Fester and Grandmama; their butler Lurch and Pugsley’s pet octopus, Aristotle. The dimly seen Thing (later a disembodied hand) was introduced in 1954 and Gomez’s Cousin Itt and Morticia’s pet lion Kitty Kat in 1964. Pubert Addams, Wednesday and Pugsley’s infant brother, was introduced in the 1993 film, Addams Family Values.
Lurch drove a variety of Packard vehicles over the history of the programs, but the one used in Wednesday was a departure. Our sister website, Historic Vehicles, was sure it was a 1938 Pontiac and our first thought was that the car was a Tour Custom Limousine that had been modified in 2008 into a stretch limousine and sold years later at auction by Trucks & Auto Auctions.
That car looked similar to what’s evident from footage of the car in Wednesday, but there were differences. The Addams Family car’s rear window was one-piece, where the standard 1938 Pontiac’s was two-piece, but even more surprising were reshaped front fenders that weren’t obvious in the three-quarter front and rear movie footage, but were clearly visible in the below on-set shot.
At this point we have to acknowledge the help of an Historic Vehicles subscriber, John C, who directed our attention to footage in the first Wednesday episode, where Wednesday was being dropped off at her new boarding school, Nevermore.
Inspection of under-car footage revealed that there was a front diff bowl on the Addams Family car. It was a 4WD!
Then, a post on the justacarguy blogspot, dated November 25, 2022, suggested that the bodywork was mounted on a stretched Mercedes-Benz Gelandewagen 4×4 2.2-litre chassis that dated back to the 1980s.
Since then, we heard from Alexandru Titus Ipate, action vehicles supervisor at a movie-vehicles manufacturing company based in Romania. This company sources and modifies cars for movies being filmed around Europe.
The Wednesday project required the company to provide all the vehicles for the Tim Burton series and Alexandru told Historic Vehicles that building the Addams Family limousine was a dream came true for him.
The shape of the car featured in the series was designed by production designer Mark Scruton, based on Pontiac 1938 Silver Streak. Incidentally, the car’s original build date of 1938 coincides with the first Addams Family cartoon appearance in The New Yorker.
The car needed to be stretched, heavily modified and reliable, as well as being able to handle the requirements for the various locations. It was decided to drop the modified Pontiac bodywork onto a robust Mercedes-Benz-Puch 220 stretched chassis. The 4WD powertrain was a bonus that gave the Pontiac additional mobility.
Alexandru said that the side panels were built up from sheet metal; the fenders were reshaped to accommodate the set-back front axle and the rear window was modified to allow for camera positions.
Everything on the car had to be easily removable in minutes, including the doors, false roof, seats and windows, to allow rapid change from one camera set-up to another.
“Air front and rear suspensions were installed for the specific shot where Thing is being dropped off at the Nevermore Academy,” said Alexandru.
We reckon it’s almost a certainty that we’ll see more of the 1938 Pontiac-Benz on Netflix in the future, because Wednesday racked up 341.2 million hours of viewing worldwide in its opening week, creating the best opening week for any English language series on the service. One week later, it clocked up 400 million hours in a single week. Netflix won’t ignore this record breaker.
Good photos on the Link
https://outbacktravelaustralia.com.au/announcements/the-new-addams-family-car-is-a-4wd/
and more photos including construction at
https://historicvehicles.com.au/historic-car-feature/the-addams-family-car/
Another one on the ABC biased story….
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11698675/ABC-accused-bias-claiming-Alice-Springs-crisis-meeting-filled-white-supremacists.html
Magnificent Tucker Carlson show today – and it’s not finished!
Miranda Devine on the Bidens
Doctor about bugs in food the affect on human health such as similar to shellfish
Pilot – Captain Bob Snow – about his heart attack 6 minutes after he landed his American Airlines A321 twin jet 9/4/22, from a vaxx injury
Jimmy Dore on the military-industrial complex
They held talks via video link on 30 December.
They held talks via video link on 30 December.
Macron & Putin are phone chums too.
Will Brittany get to keep the three million quid?
Look forward to a linky if/when available!!
From the “Daily Mail’ story.
That’s the only context in which I’ve heard “Up the old red rooster”
A quick straw poll just now of Australians on the staff here reveals they’ve all heard up the old red rooster lotsa times, however had absolutely no idea what it means.
Thank you Boambee John.
That’s the contingency fund to pay Sharaz’s legal costs and payout to Reynolds. sorry if spelling is wrong.
Drumgold however is the one who needs a rocket in the rear. He started playing the victim weeks ago.
Perhaps Wilkinson needs to be collateral damage of such wide latitude.
If all the non-indigenous people left Alice Springs there would be no food, grog, medicine or anyone to hand out welfare money. What a great idea, after about 7 days without non-indigenous people there would be a screams heard in Darwin for them to please come back and bring plenty grog!
”If surrogacy is bad, then the surrogate mothers should be punished as well. If a child is being sold and this bad under all circumstances, then who is selling it?”
You need to put down the pipe.”
It’s a very complicated matter, and like many things, best if we keep the law out of it.
For example (and this is hardly exhaustive):
If you are adopted, do you have the right to know who your biological parents are?
To approach them?
If you are adopted, do your biological parents have the right to know who you are?
To approach you?
If you are the result of donated sperm, do you have the right to know who your biological father is?
To approach him?
If you are the result of donated sperm, does your biological father have the right to know who you are?
To approach you?
For questions with “father” (sperm), replace with “mother” (egg).
Should the answer be the same, and if not why not?
What about where one parent “disappeared”, and now comes back or is found?
What if the “disappeared” parent has been “replaced” by a loving, caring person and everyone is currently happy?
Does someones right to privacy trump someones right to know their ancestry?
Their progeny?
Do they have to explicitly claim privacy, or is it assumed?
If it’s assumed, what if that assumption is wrong, and both “sides” want to meet but are worried about the consequences for the other?
It’s much more complicated than at first glance.
The ABC is appalling.
I watched the SBS news snippet on the meeting – quite measured and a fair bit of commentary from a local indigenous businessman who was equally concerned about the uncontrolled violence.
The transport and tanker command general on war with China in 2025.
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/usaf-general-warns-of-war-with-china-over-taiwan-in-2025
From the comments: USAF personal weapons training ” This is a gun. If you see one, quickly find an adult”.
“If you find yourself in a gunfight, give all your ammunition to the nearest Marine. Go for more ammo.”
You never commission an inquiry for which you don’t know or don’t want the outcome. She’ll be unlucky not to end up with more and the police who questioned the investigation lucky to keep their jobs.
One comment – I doubt from a local resident given the social justice jargon that was used – was that the meeting was trying to criminalise indigenous youth.
Criminalise indigenous youth? FMD they are real arseholes Their ABC.
But they can do crap like this with Albanese in charge. Racists, all of them.
Zulu Kilo Two Alphasays:
February 1, 2023 at 12:32 pm
Foreign Minister Penny Wong has challenged the former great colonial power to share “uncomfortable” stories of colonisation with Pacific nations
Would she give the French or the Belgians the same sage advice?
Benny Wrong might have a point. Should the British government immediately issue a public apology for the cultural arrogance that led the colonial authorities to ban the practice of sati?
Somehow this slipped past the editor at the SMH, surely someone will be for the plank?
But, overall, I think this criticism is off-base. Far from being too far left, arguably, it wasn’t nearly far left enough. And that’s coming from me, a guy who generally likes markets and is generally sceptical of government.
No, far more concerning than what the essay contained was what it didn’t. I don’t recall ever having read so many words – almost 6000 – that contained so little. No clear proposition, no coherent framework for thinking about the world, no tangible plan of action.
Chalmers’ “capitalism after the crises” looks an awful lot like the one before them.
I think we can find common ground – how about arse cancer AND the realisation of what they’ve done, which they then have to live with for the rest of their lives.
Im willing to bargain down to Fournier’s gangrene and ostracism, possibly being declared outlaw.
the realisation of what they’ve done, which they then have to live with for the rest of their lives.
Do you think they care about that?
It will only become a reality if we do nothing to stop it. You want to argue that we can do nothing to stop because you do not want it to be stopped.
It isn’t really. And the argument raised wasn’t a handwave. You can’t even raise an objection to the inevitable expansion I outlined which indicates that with regard to your hypothetical you are simply appealing to the emotions.
Heather MacDonald is stellar in her summary of colleges in US and the hate being bred therein
They may not even recognise what they did as wrong. You’re a bad guy Dr Duk and the ends justified the means.
I’m not sure they’re capable of recognising their wrong.
Old and busted: Placing citizens of Australias safety and wellbeing first.
New and hot: Mongrel mob patches, drug offences, kiddie fiddling and beating the missus.
Austfailure: Where “once were warriors” is considered as part of your visa application.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-02-01/new-zealanders-facing-deportation-new-assessments/101914758
Australia has deported hundreds of New Zealanders using laws made almost a decade ago that allowed long-term residents to be deported on character grounds, as well as those who had been sentenced to a prison term of at least 12 months.
The most common reasons for visa cancellations of any nationality were drug offences, child sex offences and domestic violence offences.
No I don’t argue this because you may be right.
Please explain how it isn’t a handwave now. I have explained why it is different to IVF.
Then you can get back to answering the question.
I seriously cannot fathom why me asking prior that a couple using an artificial womb when they can conceive but the mother cannot carry to term is an inappropriate use of that technology. It is the most inoffensive use of such a technology possible. We already do a less extreme form of it with premature babies.
Nor can I understand why asking the question is so offensive.
I seriously cannot fathom why me asking prior that a couple using an artificial womb when they can conceive but the mother cannot carry to term is an inappropriate use of that technology. It is the most inoffensive use of such a technology possible. We already do a less extreme form of it with premature babies.
As usual much of the morality of all this has long ago been examined in SF. See Robert A. Heinlein “Podkayne of Mars” and “Friday”.
In better days, ABC staff in the Alice would be arranging their removals right now.
Even if the scandelous reporting was made by a blow-in programmed by Labor’s Ultimo branch, you imagine that the local ABCers will be keeping a low profile for a while.
ABCcess, defamation factory.
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/feb/01/abc-defamed-former-commando-heston-russell-in-afghanistan-articles-court-rules
The former commando Heston Russell was defamed by the ABC in a series of articles that linked him to war crimes and alleged he left “fire and bodies” in his wake during his service in Afghanistan, the federal court has ruled.
Justice Michael Lee on Wednesday found a series of ABC articles and broadcasts defamed Russell by conveying that he was “the subject of an active criminal investigation into his conduct as a commando in Afghanistan” and “reasonably suspected… of committing a crime or crimes when he was a commando in Afghanistan”.
The judgment found Russell was also defamed by imputations in the ABC reportage that he “had behaved so immorally when deployed in Afghanistan that American forces refused to work with him” and that “Russell, as the commander of November Platoon, habitually left ‘fire and bodies’ in his wake when deployed in Afghanistan”.
Russell, a former major in the Australian special forces who served four tours of Afghanistan, had consistently denied all wrongdoing and allegations against him, and that he was the subject of a formal investigation.
The ABC has pleaded defences of substantial truth, contextual truth, and argued its reportage was in the public interest.
The court will now hold a hearing to consider the defences mounted by the ABC.
Can we refer to their ABC as “notorious defamer, the ABC” from now on?
After all the court has spoken.
Can we refer to their ABC as “notorious defamer, the ABC” from now on?
After all the court has spoken.
Will the budget of Their ABC be supplemented by AnAl, to cover the costs of any court-ordered payout and the associated legal costs?
Assuming you are serious (I am, 100% serious), I am not a bad guy, just a 58yo father who spent enough time in the real world to understand how nasty it is, and how fragile what he have (had) here was.
This is why I fight for my childrens future: https://patriotpost.us/memes/94528-exceptional-peace-2023-01-30
And here is a bonus meme https://patriotpost.us/memes/94531-our-daughters-played-with-caltrops-2023-01-30 BTW, I didnt have to look up what a ‘Caltrop’ was.
This is why they must be punished, then eliminated, ‘pour encourager les autres’
I don’t think you’re a bad guy.
“Im willing to bargain down to Fournier’s gangrene and ostracism, possibly being declared outlaw.”
Mole, I’ll second that.
To back up Duk.
Because there have been no consequences for shit behavior for decades, the eventual consequences (societal breakdown, and repressive measures to try and stop it) may end up on the cards.
There have been effectively zero.00 consequences for anyone involved in the sheer bastardry of the last 3 years of Spicy cough lunacy.
We are about to institute a 3rd house of parliament based on race, with the eventual race based aristocracy so close the grifters can taste it.
All the mongs responsible for this are insulated from the outcomes.
When comes to defamation, Michael Lee appears to be a lot more rational than the judge handling the BRS case.
+1
Observation from the Latrobe Valley:
A very small proportion of the populace still clings to their heartfelt, yet residual belief in covid.
It is predominant in the old, the henpecked, the socially awkward, the nervous and the insecure.
It is not predominant in the tyre joint I am currently in, waiting for a couple of new back boots to be put on the chariot.
How do US forces refuse to work with an Aussie chap?
Is it like Mean Girls?
Or like the Batchelor handing out roses & the Aussie doesn’t get one?
It’s all to do with pernicious and vicious arse-covering by the bureaucracy.
In 2015 I went to the launch of Jeremy Sammut’s excellent and thoroughly researched book The Madness of Child Protection in Australia. Debra Lee Furness (wife of Hugh Jackman) was there with many others who want adoption laws changed in order to allow for more children to be adopted – it is however the intransigence of bureaucrats, embarrassed by historical abuse of children in the past, determined to ensure children continue to suffer abuse, damage and worse by enforcing ‘family preservation’ at whatever cost and usually it’s a cost borne by the unfortunate child.
It’s like how Dylan Mulvaney is a woman.
Why Ukraine Hasn’t Been a Boon to U.S. Defense Companies
Soaring demand for munitions hasn’t translated yet into big sales for arms producers suffering from supply chain snarls, labor shortages
The quantities of arms the U.S. is sending to Ukraine are eye-catching: thousands of artillery shells and missiles, and hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammunition, just to name a few. The total security assistance package, now worth more than $27 billion, should in theory mean a big payday for major weapons producers.
Yet the largest ground war in Europe since World War II isn’t translating into boom times for U.S. defense contractors. Hobbled by supply chain disruptions, a tight labor market and a Pentagon procurement process that can take years, arms makers have been struggling to respond to the soaring demand.
Lockheed Martin Corp.the world’s largest defense company by revenue—and whose Javelin antitank missiles and Himars rocket launchers have been central to Western support for Ukraine—said last week that it expects annual sales to shrink for the second year in a row.
Weapons suppliers, like Lockheed, and Raytheon Technologies Corp., which coproduces the Javelin and makes Stinger antiaircraft missiles, don’t expect a bump in Ukraine-driven sales to emerge until 2024.
That contrasts with investor’s views early in the conflict. Lockheed Martin shares rose around 20% in the two weeks following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24. Other defense companies experienced similar surges as global defense stocks rose 32% over the course of 2022.
“While defense moves in years, the equity market moves in seconds,” said Rob Stallard at Vertical Research Partners, an equity consulting firm.
Sentiment later cooled as investors waited for Ukraine-driven demand to turn into orders and profits and repositioned themselves for a potential economic recession.
The defense sector is down around 6% so far this year, underperforming the broader stock market by 12 percentage points. Lockheed shares have fallen around 4%, while those of Northrop Grumman Corp.—which is building the new B-21 bomber—have lost almost 20%
Fears over federal U.S. budget wrangling with a split Congress have weighed on defense stocks, with investors growing concerned that five years of rising Pentagon spending are coming to a close.
Recent share price retreats for U.S. defense contractors contrast with the trend among European arms makers. Rheinmetall AG, which coproduces the Leopard tanks headed for Ukraine, is one of the European defense stocks that remain around record highs. European governments responded to the Ukraine invasion with plans for higher military spending, with Germany pledging to double its own defense budget over the next three years.
A big challenge for U.S. weapons makers is the gap between what the Pentagon has said it plans to send to Ukraine, and what it is actually spending to buy new armaments from defense companies. While the Pentagon has pledged to send nearly $30 billion in military supplies to Ukraine and refill its own stocks, less than $10 billion has so far been awarded in contracts to defense companies, according to the Defense Department.
The sheer amount of weapons being used in Ukraine surprised Pentagon leaders. “One of the big lessons learned for the U.S. defense industrial base is the significant consumption rates,” said Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the nation’s highest-ranking military officer.
Many of the arms being sent to Ukraine have been drawn from existing inventories, and the production lines for those weapons had gone cold or weren’t equipped to respond to a surge in new orders.
When the Pentagon ordered new Stinger antiaircraft missiles—widely used in Ukraine—in August, it was the first U.S. order from Raytheon for the weapons in 18 years. By December, Ukraine had burned through 13 years of production, said Greg Hayes, chief executive of Raytheon. Five years worth of Javelin missiles had also been used in the conflict.
Raytheon was still making some Stingers for an overseas customer before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but found some suppliers had gone out of business and had to redesign parts to boost production.
“You have to recreate this entire system that was basically shut down and went scattered to the winds,” the Pentagon’s chief weapons buyer Bill LaPlante said.
Mr. LaPlante said industry and the Defense Department needed to rethink the way it buys weapons. In peacetime, some of the money budgeted for bombs and bullets was routinely cut to make way for more exotic purchases, like hypersonic missiles or airborne lasers.
Over the past 20 years, stocks of munitions were deemed to be adequate as the U.S. focused on conflict in the Middle East that required more air-launched weaponry and initiated huge programs including the F-35 combat jet.
With munitions orders down, companies pulled out of the business, factories closed and the U.S. was often left with one supplier for key parts. For example, the metal cases for artillery shells are produced in a single plant in Iowa.
When Covid-19 hit, defense companies secured exemptions in the early days of the pandemic that kept their factories open, avoiding many of the supply chain challenges facing the wider manufacturing sector.
That lasted until the fall of 2021 when cracks started to appear. Some workers became burned out amid the pressures of working during Covid, which required protective equipment and caused frequent staff shortages due to sickness, said executives.
Also, the rebound in air travel saw firms that had pivoted to making mechanical and electronic parts for defense equipment switch back to supplying Boeing Co. and Airbus SE jetliners.
Defense companies started to report delays in deliveries. Then in February 2022, Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Lockheed Martin Chief Executive Jim Taiclet has been one of the most vocal proponents of the need for defense companies and the Pentagon to react to the cracks that have appeared in the defense production and to ensure the U.S. can make what it wants, when it wants.
Following Russia’s invasion, Mr. Taiclet said he went to the Pentagon in March with an offer to invest its own money to boost production of some weapons and systems, even without contracts, he recently recounted. Last week, he said talks are ongoing.
In May, Mr. Taiclet hosted President Biden at Lockheed Martin’s Javelin assembly facility in Troy, Ala.
The company pledged to double Javelin production, but estimated it would take two years to reach that rate, in part because it won’t have enough rocket motors until 2024.
Lockheed Martin started the expansion of its production facilities and has since been rewarded with contracts. Lockheed Martin and Raytheon share around $4.2 billion of the $7 billion in weapons and equipment contracts so far awarded by the Pentagon to arm Ukraine and replenish U.S. stocks.
By the summer, however, defense companies were struggling to keep up with existing orders, much less increased demand from the war in Europe, said Neil Mitchill, Raytheon’s chief financial officer, in a July interview.
Labor shortages throughout the supply chain—everything from computer chips to glue – also hobbled efforts to boost production even before demand from Ukraine skyrocketed.
As the conflict in Ukraine has continued, Pentagon officials have also grown worried that equipping Kyiv has shrunk the U.S. military’s own inventories.
The Pentagon has said it is awarding contracts at a faster clip, and is now working to step in with contracts to address the industrial capacity issues. The Army awarded General Dynamics Corp. a contract to build a new production line for 155 mm howitzer shell parts at a plant near Dallas.
Douglas Bush, the Army’s acquisition chief, said last week that more big contracts would follow in February and March.
“I believe American industry can and will respond,” Mr. Bush told reporters. “It doesn’t mean it’s easy.”
It’s long overdue that we started 3D printing babies.
Lord alone knows what bad habits they pick up in the womb 24/ 7 listening to mum burp and fart and snore and gossip and guzzle down beers and curries.
Total isolation with Mozart, Bach, and Enya at full blast, and Richard Dawkins slowly intoning differential equation piped in at night to optimise outcomes.
That’s what we should be aiming for for all children.
Fkn getting them before they’re seven years old. Get them before conception, I say. This utopia ain’t gonna build itself.
The strawman cometh.
Trump’s Best Foreign Policy? Not Starting Any Wars
He has my support in 2024 because I know he won’t recklessly send Americans to fight overseas.
By J.D. Vance Jan. 31, 2023
A few days before America’s 2022 midterm elections, Ukraine’s President Volodomyr Zelensky accused Russia of firing a rocket into Poland. It was a claim with extraordinary implications. Poland, a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, benefits from the alliance’s mutual defense pact—an attack against one is an attack against all. The U.S. would plausibly have an obligation to respond militarily to a Russian attack inside Poland. In making the accusation, Mr. Zelensky was pushing on the dominoes that could start the world’s first war between nuclear powers.
The rocket attack, it turns out, came not from Vladimir Putin’s Russia but from Ukrainian air defenses.
Even after NATO made that assessment and acknowledged that Russia hadn’t fired the rocket, Mr. Zelensky continued to deny Ukrainian responsibility. The story faded from the headlines, and Mr. Zelensky enjoyed a hero’s welcome in Washington in December. American taxpayer money has continued to flow to Ukraine.
A wiser foreign policy wouldn’t have let such conduct go unnoticed.
Bipartisan foreign policy consensus has led the country astray many times. Leadership in both parties supported the invasion of Iraq, the decadeslong nation-building project in Afghanistan, regime change in Libya and guerrilla war in Syria. All of these policies cost a lot of money and killed many. None of those conflicts has served the nation’s long-term interest. Very few were ever challenged by a leader of national significance.
That is, of course, until Donald Trump came along. American partisans view Mr. Trump’s record primarily through a domestic lens. To my fellow Republicans, Mr. Trump lowered taxes and worked hard to deregulate the federal bureaucracy. To Democrats, Mr. Trump was a corrupt narcissist who earned his two impeachments.
Yet neither party acknowledges perhaps the most important part of Mr. Trump’s legacy: his successful foreign policy.
My entire adult lifetime has been shaped by presidents who threw America into unwise wars and failed to win them.
I had just started high school when George W. Bush was elected president, and his presidency is the first I remember with any detail. Mr. Bush allowed a just war in Afghanistan to turn into a nation-building quagmire and then started an unjust war in Iraq. His successor, Barack Obama, doubled down on nation building in Afghanistan and launched a new war of his own in Libya, with the enthusiastic support of then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
In Mr. Trump’s four years in office, he started no wars despite enormous pressure from his own party and even members of his own administration. Not starting wars is perhaps a low bar, but that’s a reflection of the hawkishness of Mr. Trump’s predecessors and the foreign-policy establishment they slavishly followed.
But Mr. Trump did more than simply keep the peace. He brokered the Abraham Accords, a historic agreement between Israel and Sunni Arab states providing the best hope of a long-term counterbalance to Iran. He began the long, slow process of decoupling the U.S. from its economic reliance on China. He opened diplomatic talks with North Korea after a half century of stagnation. And he pushed hard—to much derision—for Europe to take more responsibility for its own defense, precisely so that the U.S. wouldn’t be drawn so deeply and dangerously into a conflict like the one in Ukraine.
A common critique of Mr. Trump, even from his ideological allies, is that he lacks “statesmanship.”
Even people who like his policies wish he exercised more verbal restraint. Fair enough. But there’s an implicit critique of America’s leaders hidden below the surface of that accusation. Why is it that the people the U.S. trains for leadership are so careful with their words yet so reckless with their actions?
Why does America devote billions of dollars to recruiting and training its best young minds for leadership, only to have those minds orchestrate one foreign-policy disaster after another?
The answer is that, from grand-strategy seminars to the State Department, our entire notion of statesmanship is broken. For many, statesmanship means having a polite social-media presence and throwing out slogans about “freedom” and “democracy” while starting world-historic catastrophes in the Middle East.
I prefer a different kind of statesmanship: one that stands athwart the crowd, reminding leaders in both parties that the U.S. national interest must be pursued ruthlessly but also carefully, with strong words but great restraint.
Donald Trump’s presidency marked the first real disruption to a failed consensus and the terrible consequences it wrought. That fact, more than any single accomplishment, is the enduring legacy of Mr. Trump’s first term.
But there is much more to do, and I’m supporting him for president in 2024 because he’s the only person certain to do it.
Mr. Vance, a Republican, is a U.S. senator from Ohio.
feelthebern
Conservatives should consider how artificial wombs might be a very hard obstacle to pro abortionists to argue away against.
They may even have utility in cases I don’t even feel comfortable in mentioning. That is to say they might refute virtually all abortionist arguments.
Dot, the good news is post the Younger Dryas 2.0 we won’t have to worry about such things.
Michael Malice was on Jimmy Dore today for about an hour.
I haven’t listened to yet, but I’m pretty sure Jimmy isn’t going to like a lot of Malice’s views.
What I fear is that society is now so psychopathic that the weirdo babies incubated without human contact will fit right in and no one will think them strange no matter what the result of the experiment.
Let do it.
Hey, shit, we just injected everyone with some random RNA jizz. Whatever.
From what iv been told. Only if both parties seek contact.
This is how it should be I recon.
Quite of few comments in the Oz referencing issues in Alice Springs and calling out Tennis Albo.
Im a bit slow so its the first time ive seen this term and it warranted a chuckle. The moniker might stick.
Perhaps at next election time instead of Unions handing out anti Scomo Hawaiian Ukelele shaped flyers, Libs could do anti Albos with tennis racket shaped flyers.
Yes, me too. That terrible realisation of guilt, where your tongue feels too big and sticks to the roof of your mouth, your heart beats wildly and your stomach churns and it’s all because of you. And it never, ever goes away.
And all you want to do is fix things but you know you never can.
That type of feeling.
I look forward to Penny Wong talking about Chairman Mao’s famine and Xi’s breaching of Hong Kong handover deal during her next visit. Plus the Uyghur’s and Tibet.
No longer the ABC. It has grown to the ABCD.
After Defamation, can we hope for an additional letter, say, Extinct?
Probably when hell freezes over.
Chuckle.
His Repulsive Magnumness.
Taree has a big aboriginal population, I passed the local Red Cross Blood Bank and the have a large picture on the front, a smiling young black girl. The thing is that she is African probably Sudanese. I don’t get it.
“Perhaps at next election time instead of Unions handing out anti Scomo Hawaiian Ukelele shaped flyers, Libs could do anti Albos with tennis racket shaped flyers.”
It’s a nice thought, but such a good tactic would mean that the Liberals would have to grow some cojones and that is simply not possible.
Our magnuminous leader shows uncommon tennisity while searching for his Voice.
*public service announcement*
For any granny-kittehs and pa-cats who have littlies staying over and have the house lit up like Luna Park because horrid, scary darkness… Just purchased a couple of cute little night lights at Aldi, a puppy and bunny that change colour while emitting a soft glow. Very noice and the price was right.
Normal arguments may now resume.
Duk
Question: you mentioned the AFP cops hitting you on false traffic charges. I vaguely recall you said you were found not guilty.
How would a bunch of traffic idiots have any idea who you are if they just stopped you on traffic infractions?
I’m not doubting you but it really sounds implausible that a couple of idiots would know you were prominent in the anti-vax scene.
Can you explain it please?
I think the wheels are beginning to fall of the Albo train. He’s had a long honeymoon thanks to a biased media but the Alice Springs mayhem, the Chalmers’ manifesto, and his tennis outing are not good looks.
The thing is that she is African probably Sudanese. I don’t get it.
They are all the same, dontchaknow?
/Caberah parasite off.
Taree has a big aboriginal population
There’s some history there regarding Taree & Purfleet.
Oh boy.
Mother Lode says:
February 1, 2023 at 3:02 pm
His Repulsive Magnumness.
Our magnuminous leader shows uncommon tennisity while searching for his Voice.
JC you have to watch the original video. It was highly suspect what happened to duk. Who was the bloke that stood up hit duk’s car on the bonnet?
Was he ever identified?!
Albo is in the same cosy position as that old fraud in the WH. With added super glue – he can’t be toppled by his own party. Thanks RGR.
The only answer is voluntary retirement due to accidentally breaking his kneecaps in the kitchen.
Speaking of arse cancer, where’s Monty.
On Duk. They probably ran his plates and it came up “troublemaker”.
That would be sufficient.
Cats
CX5 top model.
Diesel or petrol?
To grasp the reason why the NDIS has grown from a seemingly modest concept to the behemoth that it has become, read the rationale from the earliest days:
https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/rp/rp1617/Quick_Guides/NDIS
It was never an “insurance” package. It was deliberately refashioned from an original “welfare” package, dependant on availability of funds in the annual Budget – to a scheme whereby individual requirements were to be taken, if necessary, from the Medicare Levy, mandated into the Budget, or via annual borrowings.
LOL Frank!!! 😛
CX5 top model.
If you’re looking at one of them, why not the Range Rover Evoque.
Dad was involved in building the high school at Taree. The guys from Purfleet would register for work as labourers and do a day. Next day, another would turn up with the first guy’s name, another day working. Rinse and repeat. They’d just rotate the work for beer money.
The houses in Purfleet make great firewood, don’t you know. Start with the doors and skirtings and finally the frame. Hard yakka deconstructing a house, but someone’s got to do it.
Bar Beach Swimmersays:
February 1, 2023 at 11:18 am
The problem is not the lack of kids or the lack of parents, it’s the determination by the state to stuff both sets of lives by refusing(?)/making it extremely difficult(?) to adopt.
Indubitably . Still it is not an excus to ban surrogacy. Banning the exchange of mony apart from medical expenses I do support.
Only if you love handbag dogs or cats, Dot.
Cassie of Sydneysays:
February 1, 2023 at 3:05 pm
I think the wheels are beginning to fall of the Albo train. He’s had a long honeymoon thanks to a biased media but the Alice Springs mayhem, the Chalmers’ manifesto, and his tennis outing are not good looks.
A wonderful thought, but major elements of the media will react in the same way that m0nty=fa has to the Twitter Files. Initial contemptuous dismissal, followed by a stubborn silence (of Omerta).
FFS it is for a female family member, cool it with the anti gender confused comments.
“Let’s see what car Paul Allen drives”
The Beloved had a CX5. Great car, excellent finish. His was petrol, but he’d probably go diesel if he had the choice again.
Dot, you either need more DMT or you haven’t had enough DMT.
Sort yourself out, will you.
When I get to Paul Allen’s place, I use the keys I took from his pocket. There is a moment of sheer panic when I realize that Paul’s car is obviously much more expensive than mine. I calm myself and move into the bedroom, where I find his suitcase and start to pack.
With Quattro all wheel drive and anti-lock braking. It’s the most sophisticated four door sedan on the planet. It’s a 1973 Chevrolet Malibu.
The Beloved is definitely not female! A number of my friends have them too, reliable, easy to drive, the programming written by someone intelligent (in contrast with hideous clunky Toyota).
Dot says:
February 1, 2023 at 3:12 pm
Cats
CX5 top model.
Diesel or petrol?
https://autoexpert.com.au/posts/2020-mazda-cx5-review-buyers-guide
Conclusion
The Mazda CX-5 does so many things right it’s hard to justify to any rational human being why “luxury” brands get to keep such categorisation.
It puts the comforts of 2020 motoring within conceivable reach of mere mortals like you and I, without having to be given the reach-around by brands seemingly disconnected with reality.
CX-5 certainly puts style and plushness before ruggedness and dirt-road prowess, but for the majority of the car-buying public, that’s exactly what you need – and the sales results prove that.
It isn’t perfect, and certainly things like the 360-degree camera and the space-saver spare need rethinking, but if you want to tow more than most and do it from the leather-wrapped grace of a top-spec Akera, you should do that. But if it’s kids and budget first, grab yourself a Touring or maybe GT if you can step up to that level cash-wise.
But that’s what Mazda has done very well here – even if you can’t reach a Touring or GT in affordability terms – the base models still pack plenty of bang-for-your-buck.
Either way, you’re getting a brand with historically good customer support at the dealership level too, and Mazda definitely takes pride (not arrogance) in its products as far as I’m aware.
And when it’s all said and done, at least you can stand back and think happily, “Yeah, it is better-looking than the RAV4, and I didn’t have to spend Audi money”. So that’s nice.
Cage match
The gravitational pull of the big German Wurstküche is hard to look past, an Audi draws your eye like cocaine on a size 8 derriere. But it’s a slippery slope into the toothed sandworm’s jaws when it comes to value for money.
Audi Q5:
from $65,900 to $99,990 before ORC
Diesel 2.0L: 140kW / 400Nm (power-to-weight: 69.5 kW/t)
3.0 diesel 210kW / 620Nm /
petrol: 185kW / 370Nm
Boot space: 550L / 1550L
Length: 4.66m Wheelbase: 2.8m
Towing capacity (braked): 2000kg
Lane-keeping assist, adaptive cruise control, parking sensors, rear-view camera, rear cross-traffic alert, cyclist alert all standard
Forward/reverse autonomous emergency braking
Tri-zone climate (in a five-seater)
Fuel: premium 95RON or higher (petrol 45 TFSI)
360-degree camera (optional) $884
Cargo rails $350
Panoramic sunroof $2400
Metallic+pearl paint $1530
Heated, folding door mirrors; electric front seats w memory (comfort package $2500)
Heads-up display (tecknik package $2500 incl paddle shift, 8.3in display)
8 speaker stereo: (Bang & Olufsen 3D Sound System, 19 speakers optional)
Mazda CX-5 Akera:
$53k driveaway
Diesel: 140kW / 252Nm | turbo-petrol: 140kW / 450Nm (power-to-weight: 98.8 kW/t)
Boot space: 442L / 1342L
Length: 4.55m Wheelbase: 2.7m
Towing capacity (braked): 2000kg
Lane-keeping assist, adaptive cruise control, parking sensors, rear-view camera, rear cross-traffic alert, cyclist alert all standard
Forward/reverse autonomous emergency braking
Dual-zone climate for five-seater
360-degree camera
Fuel: 91RON unleaded
Metallic+pearl paint $495
Heated (and cooled) seats front driver & passenger, heated steering wheel
Heads-up display
Sunroof
Heated, folding door mirrors; electric front seats w memory
Auto, adaptive LED headlights
10 speaker Bose stereo
1:40 for Elbows enormous magnitude.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lydiy-VcB_4
I would read and definitely buy a well made Patrick Bateman fan fiction, particularly if it was only a monologue.
Sure!
Chuckle
CX5 top model.
If you’re looking at one of them, why not the Range Rover Evoque.
If you want reliability, buy Jap. Out top line CX-5 is petrol. Local lawnmower/gardener guy (he’s 85) has had 3 CX-5 diesels and loves them.
Range Rover – barf.
Dot,
FWIW, for a similar size engine I’ve heard Diesels generate more torque than gasoline version, but this is a rule-of-thumb which could be tested by viewing the manufacturers spec sheets for the 2 models.
If you aren’t going to tow anything, nor drag race anyone, this won’t be of much value.
I don’t know what bespoke would suggest in its place, but to dismiss a mid size AWD SUV with good Japanese engineering and a decent price simply because some yellow avatar on the internet made shallow tribalistic coolness rhetoric about driver self-image and peer pressure would not be a sound decision.
Bret Easton Ellis has a new one out, The Shards.
I’ve downloaded it but can’t see myself getting to it for a bit.
I know a bloke, wot knows a bloke, who had the contract to build houses in a certain outback community. He took to photographing each house , as it was handed over….
How dare you!
Over the years, Ellis has said that Patrick Bateman is an amalgam of various people but heavily influenced by Donald Trump.
That was well before DT rode the golden escalator.
Eyrie says:
February 1, 2023 at 3:36 pm
CX5 top model.
If you’re looking at one of them, why not the Range Rover Evoque.
If you want reliability, buy Jap. Out top line CX-5 is petrol. Local lawnmower/gardener guy (he’s 85) has had 3 CX-5 diesels and loves them.
Range Rover – barf.
Our Outback Travel Australia restoration project, rebuilding and modifying a LandCruiser 75 Series tray-back, is an ongoing exercise.
Our OTA project vehicle could hardly be more different from our first. We’d tested the revolutionary Land Rover Discovery 3 and reckoned it was the best wagon on the Australian market, so we bought one and drove it outback for three years and just under 200,000km.
It never let us down in the bush, went through trackless deserts without major issues and was the most advanced 4WD wagon in our estimation –
soured by lousy quality control and computer-related issues that Land Rover Australia wasn’t interested in curing. If the Japanese or Koreans had built it we’d probably still have it!
Should I Buy a Range Rover Evoque?
Buying an Evoque – you’re kidding, right?
If you had more money, I would say ‘go for it – if you really want an Evoque, go nuts’. But you don’t. For $50k the Range Rover Evoque you buy is just a nasty shitbox – and also represents a lousy choice on both technology and value. And Victoria Beckham helped design it – so it’s about as blokey as a pair of Jimmy Choo shoes. These base models are just price leaders – designed to get you in the door for $50 so the sales guy can go to work on you and sell you one for $75k.
For objective comparison, let’s look at two $50k vehicles: The base-model Range Rover Evoque and the range-topping Mazda CX-5 Akera diesel.
Finally there’s the issue of potential reliability. Take a look at the JD Power 2014 Vehicle Dependability Study results in the image on the right (click to enlarge).
Ie, Ellis isn’t retconning.
Out biking/op-shopping earlier and picked up a hardcover, JOHN STEINBECK omnibus edition ..
5 of his bestsellers, complete & unabridged, in one volume for $2 ….
The Grapes of Wrath
The Moon is Down
Cannery Row
East of Eden &
Of Mice and Men
Might even get round to reading it .. some day .. LOL!
Salvatore:
One of Mums favourite sayings…
Fresh ginger $1.20 kg in Mysore market.
Wouldn’t it make you sick.
Yeah yeah, don’t get your carbon chains in a twist, Greta.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/polls/2023/jan/31/should-us-send-fighter-jets-ukraine/
Poll: Should the U.S. send fighter jets to Ukraine?
Yes, whatever they need – 24 (23%)
Yes, but just jets – 4 (4%)
Unsure – 9 (9%)
No, just small arms – 16 (16%)
No, stop all aid – 50 (49%)
Terry McCann in the Oz on Chalmers
Oh dear and I thought our only ‘problem’ was that we had yet another trainee treasurer – given to shooting off his mouth, with unwise, and utterly untrue, pronouncements like “inflation is out of control”.
Now we discover – heck, he’s chosen to shove it down our throats – that he’s a trainee with teenage-style, Thunberg-level, delusions of grandeur and profundity.
Heck again, ‘delusions’ doesn’t begin to capture it: why our very own Jim Chalmers knows how to completely remake our entire economic system and way of life to deliver something that’s defeated generations
Almost literally Nirvana on Earth, or at least Australia.
Chalmers aims to take us enthusiastically back to 1789 and 1917 and 1958 futures, all wrapped up together in embarrassingly simplistic 21st century naiveté, breathtaking ignorance and utter lack of even a smidgen of self-awareness.
Drawing on his vast knowledge and even greater experience – why, he’s spent over 20 years, almost every day since he emerged from university, in the backrooms and bowels, plenty of bowels, of the Labor Party and even ministerial offices indeed.
Remember our greatest-ever treasurer – until, I have to add, Sunday May 22 last year: Wayne ‘Four Surpluses’ Swan?
Well, what you probably didn’t know, is that Chalmers was ‘a’ and even ‘the’ principal advisor to Swan through Swan’s entire six years of mastery of our economy, the federal budget and the myriad of deep and complex challenges an ugly world threw at us.
It’s a good thing that second rate economists like Friedman, Schumpeter and even the (formerly) great Keynes are not still alive; to say nothing of political and philosophical (former) greats from Plato and Socrates, down through the Humes and Hegels and all the rest.
Why, they’d all have to, symbolically, hand in their pens, in supplication to the arrival of ‘the master’, with ‘the answer’; all wrapped up in 6000 words of turgid, trite, embarrassingly yet terrifyingly, verbal fairy-floss.
There’s no point, and I certainly have neither the time nor the interest, to deconstruct what Chalmers purports to offer.
Although, it’s clear he doesn’t have the most basic clue of what he is actually proposing – all the clichéd ineptitude of every totalitarian, of Soviet left and Fascist right, and the odd well-meaning Utopian fool, down through history.
Other than to note that the combination proffered by Chalmers – the government will spend more of your money and direct how you will spend what’s left – has always ended in tears, both metaphorical and indeed literal.
The great non-economist Abraham Lincoln captured it best: “it’s the same old serpent that says you work and I eat, you toil and I will enjoy the fruits of it”.
There are more immediate questions; they must be directed at our peripatetic PM, if necessary between flights of fancy overseas and visits to sporting events.
Incidentally, who says our PM needs a ‘Melbourne residence’?
Why, he seemingly has one in the plush executive, sponsor and general free-loader confines of Melbourne Park, taking up residence there from last Friday afternoon through to Monday morning?
Nevertheless, starting with question one: has the Treasurer just enunciated official Albanese Labor Government policy, starting with the ‘renovation’ of the Reserve Bank?
If so, whatever happened to ‘The Plan’, referred to repeatedly – at least 100 times by Albanese himself – through the campaign?
Is ‘The Plan’’ now, in that famous word from Nixon’s press secretary, Ron Ziegler: “inoperative”? More bluntly, defunct?
So, were we all lied to through the election campaign? Was it always intended that we be ambushed by this enthusiastically childish but dangerously toxic soviet-style command economy, with 21st century Dark Green and tech tinges?
Or is it all just another one of those ’good ideas’ – at no time, never – dreamed up by Chalmers over a summer holiday, Kevin 07-style?
On Duk. They probably ran his plates and it came up “troublemaker”.
That would be sufficient.
They actively spied on anti-vaccine people.
Its not hidden.
100% likely Ducks numberplates were enough to get him bagged and tagged.
(I cant dodge this paywall)
ASIO watching anti-vaccination, anti-government protesters: Director-General Mike Burgess
Considering the Pomgolians efforts.
The army has mobilised an elite “information warfare” unit renowned for assisting operations against al-Qaeda and the Taliban to counter online propaganda against vaccines, as Britain prepares to deliver its first injections within days.
The defence cultural specialist unit was launched in Afghanistan in 2010 and belongs to the army’s 77th Brigade. The secretive unit has often worked side-by-side with psychological operations teams.
Leaked documents reveal that its soldiers are already monitoring cyberspace for Covid-19 content and analysing how British citizens are being targeted online
https://autoexpert.com.au/posts/new-cars/qa/should-i-buy-a-range-rover-evoque
Jerry 2 years ago
Unfortunately I didn’t read this report back in 2015 when I purchased an Evoque.
It should be noted that anyone purchasing an Evoque should budget to outlay a further $6k after the (extended pay extra $2K) Warranty expires on a new Differential after it has failed. All service history in the Warranty period was undertaken by ULR and despite no reference to servicing the Diff in service reports, both ULR and JLR have decided that this is normal for a car to need a major new component after just 6 years. Servicing of the Diff isn’t mentioned in the service handbook either.
Buyer beware!
Welp, I guess one way to distract everybody from the imminent neofeudalism is to gasbag about the colonialist past.
Good value, Shatterzzz! First Steinbeck I read was The Pearl, in the Third Form.
Now you have me wanting to revisit some of my favourites. I cried at the end of The Grapes of Wrath. Old softie.
For any granny-kittehs and pa-cats who have littlies staying over and have the house lit up like Luna Park because horrid, scary darkness
I’m a cheap-skate, I guess, whenever I have grandees stay over I just let ’em stay up until they nod off .. usually ensures a late lie in for them, as well ..!
Cardinal George Pell protest to take place at same time as Sydney funeral after compromise
Key points:
The rally will go ahead on Thursday morning
The alternative route for the march will go up to College Street, but will not go down it
Cardinal Pell’s body is lying in state at Sydney’s St Mary’s Cathedral today
Petrol vs diesel. Diesel gets better economy but at current prices I’d say it is a wash.
LOL!
Not to be outdone by Chalmers, Husic pops up saying Aussies sacked as part of the US tech lay-offs should head home.
He’s calling it the “Brain Re-Gain”.
The ALP bench is deep with talent.
“E” for explosion, or preferably the past tense “exploded”.
Cassie of Sydneysays:
February 1, 2023 at 3:05 pm
I think the wheels are beginning to fall of the Albo train. He’s had a long honeymoon thanks to a biased media but the Alice Springs mayhem, the Chalmers’ manifesto, and his tennis outing are not good looks.
It’ll take a few more things such as the lights going out and maybe belated VD from his rub and tug days.
How about a Lexus SUV.
Are they any good.
They seem to last forever.
But first, the news: The House of Commons in London was sealed off today after police chased an escaped lunatic through the front door during Prime Minister’s question time. A spokesman at Scotland Yard said it was like looking for a needle in a haystack.
– Ronnie Barker
@ zipster:
“….rainbow serpents”??
Are they like LGBTQWERTY “pubic serpemts.??
Have definitely encountered a few of those over the years..
A few years ago I watched a marvellous documentary called Backtrack Boys (a NSW charity) about troubled boys (mainly indigenous although not all). It chronicled a group of juvenile delinquent boys who were all from dysfunctional homes, many who live and have lived on the streets, their lives are out of control, they truant from school, they’re barely literate (every second word was “eff”), and many of them had spent time in juvenile detention and were almost sure to head off to jail at some stage unless there’s intervention. The documentary focuses around how the boys meet up with a jackaroo, Bernie Shakeshaft, and how they travel with Bernie’s legendary dog jumping team. Bernie runs Backtrack Boys. His aim is to nurture in the boys responsibility, boundaries, and respect.
The documentary was a joy to watch, to see the boys interact with Bernie, his team and the canines. The boys receive much needed attention, schooling and the most important…..discipline. I loved watching the relationship between the boys and dogs, it was inspiring. The dogs give the boys unconditional love and the boys respond in kind. The dogs were made up of an assortment of kelpies, cattle dogs and other muts. The boys were truly transformed, they became focused, they learned responsibility, and their delinquency dissipated. The charity is about channelling the boy’s masculinity, and so what happens? The boys blossom, their masculinity blossoms. But the thing is, they go home and what happens? Many of the boys fall of the wheel again. It’s tragic.
I’ve been thinking a lot about Backtrack Boys over the last few days, the footage of what’s going on in Alice has prodded my memory. Last night on Sky I watched some utterly disturbing footage of a brawl between indigenous youth and it was like seeing something out of Lord of the Flies. These indigenous boys lack everything, a safe home, meaning, responsibility, education, discipline and so much more. As far as I’m concerned, this has all been caused and nurtured by a catastrophic culture of chronic welfare, which is a drug worse than heroin. Chronic inter-generational welfare absolutely and utterly destroys the very meaning of human existence. This welfare dependence and accompanying social decline and breakdown suits the left, their aim is to destroy society, and quite frankly they’re doing a very good job. When you watch what’s happening in Alice (and elsewhere, it’s rife in remote indigenous communities and towns), I think to myself, wouldn’t it be nice to have one…just one…politician speak bluntly about the problems and speak bluntly about what might help the communities? But no, all we have in this country, minus a few exceptions such as Price, Liddle, Antic, Hanson and a few others, are politicians who either revel in the dysfunction because it’s suits their progressive narrative or politicians who are too cowardly to speak up about answers because they’re worried that the ABC or scum on Twitter will smear them as racist. No Voice will cure what’s wrong in Alice.
All of this has reminded me of what happened during the Russian civil war between 1918 – 1920. Because of the revolution and the ensuing societal breakdown, across Russia there were hundreds of thousands of young boys and men roaming about, homeless, lost, adrift, aimless, lacking family, and delinquent. It took Trotsky to round up these boys and enlist them in the Red Army. The Red Army provided them with discipline, focus, boundaries and responsibility. It made men out of them. Perhaps in this country we need a “land army” or something similar for these young indigenous boys, to provide them with discipline, focus, boundaries and responsibility. Oh yes, I can already hear the squeals and screeches from the left but I don’t care what they think. And don’t worry, I already know my idea will never happen because this country no longer has any will to fix these problems, instead we now live in a country that prefers to see delinquent indigenous boys roaming, rioting and destroying communities and towns. But I guess that’s progressivism and it’s the future.
Here is one morally relevant way it isn’t any different. You propose that there is no ‘waste’ or surplus embryos created and then implanted into these artificial wombs. Now tell me how you are going to get through the experimental stages of this process without embryos being destroyed? There is also the manner in which this could effect the mother-child relationship, the problem of commodification, and so on.
With this example, I, on first blush, have no problem. If the child is procreated in the normal fashion, and complications during pregnancy make continuing with a natural pregnancy a threat to the life of the child and/or mother, I have no objection to the child being situated, when the above diagnosis is made either, in an incubator or artificial womb. That is why my first entry on this topic I wrote, “except the latter in extremis”.
Sure thing, here are the dots to join:
1) Was already on SAPOL database as a dangerous anti-vaxxer, dangerous enough to have the SA State Attorney General send a police Sgt to my house to warn me to pull my head in previously.
2) Went to Canberra to protest mandates. This was in the lead up to the Federal Election and the AFP were running a special policing operation to keep a lid on things.
3) Was on the way to Canberra airport, along with other dirty protesters, aiming to wave our upside down red ensigns at our wise leaders as they returned to Canberra for resumption of parliament. Was then randomly stopped at a (totally unmarked) civilian ‘traffic control’ just being set up to stop said dirty protesters reaching airport.
4) Said stop consisted of (unidentified) civilian traffic worker jumping out from hiding behind his work ute into my path as I approached said traffic control at walking pace, causing me to stop. Traffic worker then smashes both hands into bonnet of my vehicle, denting it, and starts abusing me.
5) 3 x AFP Officers who were (coincidentally) working on the ‘COVID management taskforce’ at the time just happened to be miraculously parked 50m away, watching this, and immediately attended.
6) Initial convo with AFP was relatively low key: “you nearly hit that man… you nearly ran him over”. My response, “no thats not what happened” Their response ” can I have your drivers licence…… please remain in the vehicle while we run some checks…. you can keep the engine running if you wish” (ie NOT the action you would take if you had just seen me deliberately assault and injure said road worker with a weapon – my Landcruiser).
7) After 30 minutes of multiple officers walking around the scene making phone calls, am suddenly arrested for ‘reckless driving’ (ie after they had run their checks and decided I was worth making an example of).
8) After half a day sweating in the cells, am offered bail on the condition that I cease protesting and leave Canberra.
9) When I refused this, was jailed for a week with NO CONTACT WITH THE OUTSIDE WORLD and no ability to arrange legal representation etc (this despite their prisoners ‘rights and responsibilities’ stating that prisoners can meet with legal representatives at any time.
10) Bailed after a week , but ultimately charged with 4 serious criminal offences, including ‘assault occasioning actual bodily harm’ – aggravated by the use of a weapon, my vehicle… total potential jail time over 10 years.
11) Finally got to court after 10 months on bail, where my own film proved the AFP case was bogus (they had 3 Officers all give tightly scripted stories about how they all saw me deliberately crash through a well signed roadblock and ram the road worker) – they forgot I have vision of the scene showing NO signage at all, and moreover that the first AFP Officer on scene stated ‘nearly hit’ twice.
12) Despite me (twice) on scene filming them agreeing their body cams were running and that they would preserve the film for my defence, they ultimately said in court that the camera(s) were flat and no vision was available (this vision would have shown the scene was unmarked and the first officer admitting no contact occurred). By ‘losing’ this evidence of my innocence, they were able to conspire to manufacture their own ‘eyewitness testimony’ of my guilt.
This was the icing on the cake after all the other bastardry I was subjected to for refusing to ignore the Hippocratic oath, medical ethics and the principles of the Nuremberg Code, and to ‘follow orders’ and submit myself (and others) to a state mandated medical procedure for which informed consent was impossible.
ALWAYS.FILM.THE.POLICE
No further questions your honour.
You propose that there is no ‘waste’ or surplus embryos created and then implanted into these artificial wombs.
It worked for the God-Emperor.
How else would we have Primarchs?
& the Primarchs are role models for us all.
Maybe apart from Sanguinius…a little gay…but he did redeem himself at the end.
I’ve never seen it on the menu.
aiming to wave our upside down red ensigns
You were at sea?
You old pirate you.
The last time I heard this hyped-up talking point that went nowhere, it started with “The walls are closing in…”
Reason does not seem to prevail in auspol, so all reasonable talk of an Albo derailing are premature.
What…the…duck!! That’s shameful behaviour… I didn’t realise the ACT pigs are just as bad as VicPol…
It’s already happened though, by people who simply don’t care.
The problem is studies that examine similar sorts of problems often don’t look at latent variables. It could, but so can so many other phenomena.
It depends on how early the matter is. There is a lower limit on incubators.
Now what about transplanting embryos as an alternative to abortion?
Relatives of mine were serving in the A.D.F., and were part of John Howard’s much abused “Intervention.” The Aboriginal soldiers served as role models for some of the youth in the “Communities.” “Well, yeah, you can join our mob, but you’ve got to be able to read and write, and we won’t take you, if you’ve been in too much trouble with the cops..”
We’re allowed to dream!!!
Silver lining in the COVID cloud is that a whole cohort of society had their eyes opened regarding the police.
If you plan to become a cop now, you must have issues.
This is the most ridiculous part.
Tinta:
Heather MacDonald is stellar in her summary of colleges in US and the hate being bred therein
I suggest that everyone watch the video if you haven’t yet done so.
It reminded me of the Cultural Revolution in China – a mindless, hysterical period that arose from unquestioning acceptance of Maoist thought, and only solvable by the harsh treatment of the Leftist revolutionary forces by the Pinochet Regime in Chile.
I thought St Ruth would have been there to lead the way at the protests.
Oh…that’s right.
♫ It’s alright, we told you what to dream. ♫
Been done and secsesfull to some extent. Keeping a low profile is the key to stopping the autocrats from taking over.
Flyingduk:
That subclass of people who are here only to provide examples of what not to do, and to give us something to point at and laugh.
I just sold my 2011 Kia Sportage Platinum Turbo Diesel, 150 000 km on the clock, never a murmur from engine or gearbox, including hammering it over the Kimberley.
Bought a … surprise … 2019 Kia Sportage GT-Line turbo diesel. Why? I love the torque, which comes into its own matched with the 8-speed auto. Just returned from a week down south (WA). One the way home, sitting on 115 km/h, I was getting 5.6L/100km. Overall, it used 6.2L/100km.
Our friends were there in their Mercedes AMG GLC63, twin-turbo 4.0L V8, which did 19.2l/100km on average, up to 31L/100km one afternoon when we were in a hurry. And that’s on premium unleaded. (But I do like it :-D)
My impression is that NORFORCE has been an excellent initiative from the ADF for a long time. They would be a potential core to expand from, if Canberra had any brains.
This group is very active in my district – “Boys to the Bush”
i will attempt to link but I usually stuff up :
Nah, can’t do a link, anyway, they are in our local paper a lot, and it seems to help some.
IMHO there is no way that Biden will not be a candidate for the next Presidential election.I cannot see him standing down for Harris.
If both of them stood down then hey presto Kevin McCarthy is President.
No way the Democrats would agree to this.
Cop this you greenies.
In every short warm era like today’s Holocene, the warming oceans expel enough carbon dioxide into the atmosphere to support the abundant plant and animal life that currently surrounds us. But never has this “global warming” prevented the cyclic return of the ice. The Holocene warm era in which we live has already passed its peak and long before we reach Net Zero Emissions, the cold will return.
When blizzards blow and glaciers grow, the great ice sheets will spread again. Carbon dioxide will be removed from the atmosphere into the cooling oceans and most of mankind will be threatened by frosts, droughts, crop failures and starvation. A lucky few living in equatorial regions or clustered in shelters and hot houses around coal or nuclear power stations may survive.
Those still able to extract uranium, coal, oil or gas may manage to generate enough warmth and carbon dioxide plant food to partly offset the cold sun, the permafrost and the dry, barren atmosphere. And a few with appropriate skills and tools may become hunters and gatherers again (but most Neanderthals did not survive the last glacial cycle).
We should celebrate, not fear, the Modern Warm Era and give thanks for the many benefits gained from using those marvellous natural stores of hydro-carbon and nuclear energy to warm our homes, pump water, recharge batteries and feed our animals and plants.
These good times will not last forever.
When the ice returns, derelict wind turbines and snow-bound solar panels will remain as stark tomb-stones in the graveyard of the failed Green religion.
Viv Forbes
1 February 2023
+1
The infamy of conducting a protest at a funeral. These people are sick and deranged and yet they are being egged on by the media, etc.
OldOzzie at 3.52 pm
Has my vote.
the first artificial womb facility, entirely run on renewable energy, therefore definitely in the fantasy realm.
Keith Payne, V.C., tells the story in his memoirs, of being posted to the cadre of “NORFORCE.” He was asked what experience he had had working with indigenous soldiers……he cited “some experience of working with the Vietnamese…..”
Cassie of Sydneysays:
February 1, 2023 at 4:15 pm
We had this on the shearing teams i was on.
One chap in particular, nickname “asshole”, was a station owner (marginal place) who shore most of the year.
He repeatedly took older boys out from juvie to work on the teams and it invariably followed the same routine.
1: Dressed in “street” clothes, acting tough, trying to take up space in order to be acknowledged.
2: Bloody hell, saggy pants and hoodies are crap for working in, t shirt & shorts/jeans/greasies.
3: starting to get the hang of it, people arent grumpy at me when I stuff up because they see Im trying
4: Get good at running the board- most were quick learners
5: Just part of the team now, there is a hierarchy and Im on the bottom, but Im still important.
6: I ask to try and shear- Im awful and its the hardest work Ive ever done.
7: The shearers, now they have seen I have heart and are trying are offering me tips and teaching me how to do it.
8: Ive shorn my first full sheep – took me 20 minutes and Im rooted…
9: Get on the piss- try to work the next day- spewing out the chute all morning – think i will moderate my drinking for a bit.
10: Im a valuable team member and people treat me pretty darn good.
This takes about 2 weeks to a month.
And 9 times out of 10 its lost when they return to their “peers” back in the big smoke.
A few stay on and become good shearers.
They are still rough around the edges, not many shearers cut the crusts off their cucumber sandwiches (my grandmother did, cucumber sandwiches for morning smoko) but they arent making others lives a misery anymore.
Its one of the things that drives me spare is when its touted as a bad thing to remove juvies in particular from their “peers”.
Its often a completely shit peer group that teaches them to be scallywags and rotters.
“But you understand the concept of ministerial responsibility?” Mr Greggery asked.
“In the broad scheme … yes, but to say, the way that you put it, that I was responsible … I don’t think is right,” Mr Tudge said.
Why not come out and ask “Turgid” the obvious question, “Did your pastime of shagging the hired help help or hinder your overall control of ROBODEBT” ..
..
Libertarians?
duk:
Have you commenced a civil action against the ACT plod yet, given the beak’s remarks and that they deprived you of your liberty? This is mid-five figures of cash in your sky rocket, no problems at all.
There are any amount of legal types, particularly in Canbra that will work pro bono for this sort of thing in the current climate.
Shirley, if these folk identified as OS uni students the problem would be solved? .. seems the unis have lists of plenty of ’empty” apartments waiting for their OS influx …
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-02-01/rental-costs-rise-regional-victorians-experience-homelessness/101915344
I don’t know what device you are using but on a laptop there are three bars at the top. Go to the address bar (second from the top) and highlight it, click on copy. You can past this directly on to the page here, or you can highlight the word in your comment, press link then post it there.
‘Boys to the Bush‘
Old Ozzie:
That lesson was obvious 40 years ago facing the Soviets in the Fulda Gap.
WTF have they been doing in the meantime?
Strange! .. when Paul Keating had interest rates up around the 17% mark the media didn’t show much interest … but now it is, apparently .. A CONCERN!
“We understand that some people are finding the rise in interest rates difficult to manage and others will have to cut back on discretionary spending,” she said.
Gallup Poll – Gov’t is Our Greatest Problem
From Armstrong Economics –
“Gallup has just confirmed what our computer has been forecasting especially since 2011. The majority of Americans now say that a lack of leadership from President Biden and Congress is the country’s biggest problem and that means the entire world. Perhaps aliens should have a right to vote for the decisions of the Biden Administration are destroying lives around the world.
The Gallup Poll shows that it is the collapse of confidence in a government that is now viewed as the greatest threat even more so than inflation, ?the immigration crisis, and the state of the economy. Despite Americans suffering economically with higher taxes and inflation reducing the standard of living, they have cited that “the government/poor leadership” is now in the No. 1 spot taking that place from inflation over the past year. Gallup has reported that 21% of Americans name our incompetent government as the “most important problem facing this country today?” compared to the 15% who said so last year, a Gallup Poll found.
?Inflation and the economy ?came in last year as the top two issues — tied at 16% each — followed by the government (15%), immigration (8%), and unifying the country (6%). ?However, over the past year, Americans’ concerns with the economy fell 6% to 10%, with ?inflation falling one point to 15%, and immigration rose 3 points to 11%.”
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/uncategorized/gallup-poll-govt-is-our-greatest-problem/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=RSS
Probably a similar result for most Western style Democracies……………………
The toilets at a local police station have been stolen. Police say they have nothing to go on.
– Ronnie Barker
“When we had the farm”, one of the local Indigenous started that way. He became quite a competent and well regarded shearer, but had the problem of “humbugging.” Another lad, who started that way, also became a competent shearer. He fell afoul of whitefella’s law. He drew a suspended sentence when a group of evil, debbil debbil whitefellas argued that it was hard enough to find good shearers, and putting him in goal would be a waste of every bodies time.
All cut from the same cloth from beginning to end.
When discussing Geyer’s death and the hip replacement with a friend, Cardinal Pell’s name came up too. “Thank God for that!” was the comment about his death.
This was from someone I thought I knew and liked. How casually friendships die.
It’s not just military supplies going to Ukr;
https://twitter.com/DC_Draino/status/1620570457186656258
Or did Biden order the files destroyed? Quid pro quo?
Arkysays:
February 1, 2023 at 5:09 pm
Its often a completely shit peer group that teaches them to be scallywags and rotters.
..
Libertarians?
Settle down, I didnt call them cads.
Old Ozzie:
There’s no optional roo bar?
Why not?
And the media, politicians, big pharma, big health, doctors, epidemiologists and ‘experts’ of any ilk…. and of course, the great majority of our fellow citizens.
Dot, here’s a car for you.
I mean, your family member.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pw9gaEiQAxY
Duk
That’s freaking outrageous.
NOPE, I only won last time (despite the considerable power of the forces arrayed against me) because
1) it was a criminal trial with a rigorous burden of proof (beyond reasonable doubt)
2) I I had irrefutable video evidence of my innocence
3) The forces of darkness took me for granted and didn’t put much effort into their prosecution – they forgot I had my own film and thought that ‘losing’ theirs would allow them to present a unified, 3 Officer, story which the beak would accept.
Despite this, I have ZERO confidence in the law now, and do not wish to spin the wheel again.
I *did* write to Senator Antic (who was aware of my case) asking him to regard it as an example of the critical need for ALL police to use body cameras at all times – or have their cases dismissed by the courts, and to introduce the relevant legislation. Sadly, that was 6 weeks ago and I did not receive a response 🙁
Also worth mentioning “asshole” went on to a short lived career as a Lib politican.
This chap, who spent 90% of his life surrounded by Aboriginals, and was doing more “practical” one kid at a time than whole government departments was shat upon because he uttered the words (from memory) something about “the cure for Aboriginal disadvantage is a job” which was enough to see him pilloried in the Worst Australian as a pin eyed fanatic who hated Abos.
Foul stuff.
How is this an effective retort? You could say the same thing about murder, etc.
It could is enough for me, and given the other problems, and the very likely abuse and expansion of the technology suggests its best not pursued.
This is one of the problems with technology like this. It weakens and undermines what a mother should feel and think regarding her own child. The former is less worse than the latter, but still, the idea rankles. Do you propose it as a choice between or as the only alternative to the mother having the child herself?
Compare and contrast with our Australian of the Year:
Holocaust survivor and TikTok star Lily Ebert awarded MBE for services to Holocaust education.
This beautiful 99 year-old lady received the award from King Charles himself. The King also wrote a foreword to her book and personally sent her flowers and a card during a recent hospitalisation.
The King’s stocks have gone up bigly in my eyes.
Lily on Good Morning Britain: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxTL3AAatZk
Ukraine will receive 120 to 140 tanks in a “first wave” of deliveries from a coalition of 12 countries, Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said on Tuesday.
Calli:
Or holder of a firearms licence – same thing – Troublemaker.