Simple things

Simple mistakes in painful textbooks or other study resources, unless it distorts the comprehension of the learning process, should be considered mandatory so long as it provides humorous content to break the tedium, and to lower stress levels for the benefit of the mental health of students everywhere.

And by this I mean:

(b) Explain why the resulting fagmentation (EMP1, EMP2) does not fulfill the correctness rules of fragmentation.

Fagmentation indeed.

Just one of those weeks

You ever have one of those weeks, where you barely have time to sleep let alone blog? Man it sucks eh?

Adventures at Kirribilli House, Episode 01

Houses

Australian housing world's most expensive.

That's great, many Australian's can't afford to live here, that means only foreigners can afford to live here, which many Australian's don't want them to do...

A conundrum of the modern ages.

Simpson + donkey = Aus.

'EDUCATION Minister Brendan Nelson has bluntly told Islamists who do not want to accept and teach Australian values that they should "clear off".'

Simpson and his donkey apparently epitomize Australian values.

Simpson went around with his donkey providing what we now call an ambulance service in World War 1. Now, as this is representative of Australia, he charged a massive fee for this, unless they were a Simpson & Donkey Service subscriber, much like the ambulance service today. Also, quite often random other Australian’s wouldn’t like his gung-ho approach when transporting injured peoples, and would get in his way, or refuse to move if already in his way, as happens all too often for Australian ambulances.

Furthermore, once Simpson had reached the Medical Corps tents, they would be made to sit and wait, bleeding or not, for many numbers of hours, for no apparent reason. Unless they had enough money to invest in medical insurance, in which case they were considerably more valuable, as they obviously were rich, and were treated far more promptly. Also, continuing with the Aussie spirit, if they injured person was also a celebrity, say, the early 20th century version of Kylie, hospital beds were made empty, so the celebrity could have a little bit more peace.

Actually I just made up all the above, Simpson didn’t charge anything, he is a true Aussie hero, and I'd just like to apologize for suggesting otherwise, and there may not have been private military hospitals.

TT+ DTF Whinge

Media Watch exposes some crimes from Today Tonight, can we get this show renamed to 30-Minute-Hate or something?

Apparently TT is described as "Naomi Robson reports on the latest news and current affairs."

This is misleading. "Naomi Robson sits and announces reports that have been hacked up, rehashed and edited out of context to fit into a shock-jock agenda"

The Press Council needs teeth, nay fangs, to contain the rampant media. I would like a temporary suspension of license to any radio station, television station or newspaper that incites racial hatred and violence, mainly when it is claimed to be news, if it is entirely spurious. TT shows a clip inciting hatred, Channel 7 becomes snow for a week.

In fact, the Herald Sun should have been suspended for it's claims against the Greens before last election.

'The council described the article as "irresponsible journalism" saying the story included a number of false claims, it was "seriously inaccurate" and had "misled" readers.'

... so? And then what? Remove their ability to profit, slaps on the wrist don't appear to be working.

On lighter matters, has anyone seen Double The Fist?


Picture stolen from the ABC site, if I paid my taxes, I would say I have a right to do it...

Won ARIA for best new comedy or something, funny as hell, and vanished completely after it's first season. Damn you Auntie, BRING THIS BACK!

Tip

Here's a tip to all bloggers:

Don't edit your bloggages (if that's not a word, it should be) in the blogging window. Do it in Word, do it in OpenOffice, do it in friggin' notepad. Or else you might fudge up and lose it. Like I just did.

Also, Save as Draft comes in handy, save it every once in a while, but ultimately, it is best to compose in a word processor. Helps with grammar and spelling as well. The irony is that I'm still writing this in the blogging window, but that is because I never learn.

I had written an extensively witty retort to Costello's claim that hippy teachers were making kids hate America, as well as the Maribyrnong River pollution, and the immigration trap for hurt workers. But they are gone now, into the e-ether as it were, and it's time to let go.

Evolution renamed.

Campus Crusade for Christ Australia has announced modifications to the intelligent design campaign this week. “To design or create something as impressive as an entire world and critters to populate said world, you’d have to agree, is incredibly intelligent. Hence ‘intelligent design’ seems an adequate description.” Says Bill Hodgson head of CCCA.

“By the same token, evolution does not require any intelligence or even any intervention whatsoever; the name is ambiguous. A change is in order, and we will would like to announce we will campaign so that science classes around the country shall be taught 'intelligent design' and the more aptly titled 'stupid evolution' side by side.”

John Howard has stated yesterday that “recent Senate events have resulted in the coalition to become more reliant on Family First. The ‘stupid-evolution’ changes will be rushed through by the usual method, education funding blackmail against the states.” The events the PM is referring to could be the recent incidents involving Barnaby Joyce’s allusion that he could “shove his slimy head into his arse if he thinks I’m not going to block every Liberal party bill for the next 6 years.”

A leaked email to Barnaby from the Prime Minister urged him to toe the line, or else “I’ll have to suck arse to that bible basher”

Minister for Education, Brendan Nelson made an unscheduled doorstop interview, “I don’t know the facts of the situation, I don’t know what the PM has said or agreed to, but I completely agree with him.”

Unions Incognita

Unions are no longer required, society has changed. At least according to the rate of union proliferation in the workforce.

“People don't want to be able to vote for collective decisions within a union meeting where they pass a motion, get to speak and get to vote, as in a majority rules democracy, they want to be handed their wages and conditions on a like-it-or-lump-it basis, like communism” said head of Public Manipulation for the Australian Industries Group, Fay Uliandolopolis.

“One of the main factors left over from the 80s is the 'me' factor. People are increasingly selfish, pig-headed, thinking only of their own hip pocket, and like to be disillusioned about their own ability to bargain. They want to be able to say to the boss, "can I have a 5 percent raise this year?" and for the boss to say "you're fired, get out." I mean, who seriously doesn't want that? They no longer have their job, but at least they got to initiate the sacking themselves, they feel like they're a part of the process of mistreatment, it's all about individualisms.”

Katie Lahey, chief executive of the BCA agrees. “I agree. Another increasing situation is people think they're getting paid too much, or they have far too many conditions forced on them by unions they aren't even members of. This is obviously incredibly distressing, especially for young workers who want to just scrape by, starving artist style, if you don't have the right to choose poverty, where is your freedom? It gives them a sense of doing the hard slog; that they really are a battler. The sense of struggle has been lost, and these Industrial Relations reforms will help to curb this wave of comfort and low-stress.”

Union delegate and factory worker Steve Dliechk, also believes in the free-market ideology for labour units. “I thought when everytime someone, like, went to the office, and, fair or not, got told they were gettin’the arse, and they’d cry heaps and stuff, I thought it was ‘cause they were, like, sad, ‘cause they’d been real good most of ‘em, and that was all they needed to do, y’know? Work hard and be good and the boss won’t be a cunt. But I don’t think they was sad and cryin’ ‘cause they liked their jobs, or they’d get to have a say in their jobs, it’s ‘cause they were happy to be freed, ‘cause they was stuck in like a rut, and wanted to be a part of the drifting workforce with like, no fixed address.”

The culture of unions is out of date, they need to reform, claims the AIG. For too long they have been concerned wholly with the needs of the employees as a collective, and need to start pushing more for what the Australian public really wants, if federal politics is anything to go by, and that is to be concerned, and to work towards the financial dreams and goals of individual companies.

Greg Combet responded to the above commentary, but his words are not publishable under the Offensive Language in Media Act 1996.

News Really Limited

News Really Limited

Media mogul extraordinaire Rupert Murdoch came clean today as he announced the secret behind his print and television networks. “It’s satire,” claimed an exuberant Murdoch. “The whole kit and caboodle. It’s been going on since the 70s.”

“Satire is an art best dressed in subtleties,” Rupert explained further. “The transition was made up until early 1980, and from then onwards the enterprises I oversaw made a cunning jibe at conservative politics and the cult of personality (and) celebrity phenomena. This was achieved by converting prevalent media to mock-ups based around popular trash news and other non-newsworthy and biased garbage. The intent was to made it increasingly ludicrous, and I congratulate the team for achieving that.”

In front of a stunned press gallery he defended the strict editorial control, as “a necessity to maintain the delicately restrained angle we were aiming for. I am truly surprised that no one seems to have wizened up to it. It is arguable whether satirical larks can be considered to have succeeded when they are unanimously believed or when they are recognized in their true colors.”

One of the main points of the venture “was to poke fun at the incessant popular culture worship.” Initially, the late John Lennon’s remark about the worship of his bands in comparison to that of Jesus Christ was one of the sparks that ignited the idea. “I was surprised that the campaign was so successful, that came right out of left field. But, in hindsight, it coalesces with the initial point I was making, that this is what people want to hear, and we simply accentuated the absurdities of it. The worse it got, the more we sold.”

From sensationalist journalism to page three girls, from spinning political reports to blatant cross-promotion, his target set a wide net that swept up the very pop consumers it was designed to mimic the desires of.

New York Times journalist Judith Miller said: “Well, it does explain a lot of things.” Some News Limited staff were heard to be relieved. “Thank goodness we can now speak freely about it. Some of us liked to take it a whole step further than old Rupert intended” smirked Andrew Bolt of Australia’s Herald Sun news-pictorial. “It has been great fun antagonising everyone, never ceasing to entertain me that despite the absurdity of it all, not once did anyone click to the possibility that it could just be an elaborate prank.”

Later Mr. Murdoch referred to Outfoxed as “way off the mark”, and The Yes Men as “amateurs.” The press were left with one final comment: “I thought I almost gave the game away with the name News-Limited itself.”

Prediction

I predict Telstra will be bankrupt in the not too distant future.

There are a few reasons for this.

They've fired over 50,000 employees (that's 0.5% of working Australia) as well as over half their employees on non-negotiable AWAs already. Their rampant outsourcing has left them with the inability to increase profits in this manner. And people are getting a bit sick of those sub-continental phone invasions of privacy.

They will be privatised, and Barnaby's donation isn't going to help fiscal matters.

They're already in the sponsor-absolutely-everything marketing mode, and I doubt it's likely they'll be willing to taper this off to save money. Which sport doesn't have a Telstra logo somewhere?

They are making terrible expensive decisions, Sensis anyone?

The likes of Vizard in the ranks doesn't help the company.

They already use the cheapest possible hardware, and have cut back to bare bones in pretty much every area possible. Their cheap and nasty DSLAM hardware supplier went bankrupt for a while, whilst other up-and-comers are using Cisco.

The share price has always been a massive concern, and has resulted in the already disastrous push to cut costs everywhere, this is about to get a whole lot worse.

Their quality of service is the worst around, how many times have they lost peoples email? How long do you wait on hold? They take weeks to do anything.

They already charge other ISPs phenomenal amounts to use their hardware, and rely on this money. This is biting them in the arse because now other companies are fighting back because it is cheaper for them to upgrade their own broadband exchanges with their own hardware. This has the effect that Telstra loses its monopoly, which it so desperately needs to push ever-higher profit margins. One calculation claimed Telstra was charging other ISPs something along the lines of $300 per hour to use their contractors - when they have no other option but to use them. This money is going to start to vanish in the near future, this is money they rely on.

The only advertising they tried to cut back on was that help-line, which they had to retract.

Their marketshare is dropping rapidly, at least in broadband.

I make this post for the sole reason that I can link to it later on, and say "I told you so."

Raise the screen, give it a lamenting pat, and put Labor to sleep.

Was watching Question Time last night. I really don't see the point in the whole thing.

Theres Lib-to-Lib pretend questions, by some nobody backbencher to the front bench, who thanks them for their question, and complements them on various matters, their future, intelligence, hairstyle, whatever, all the while knowing full well they aren't allowed to have an opinion, only allowed to warm the seats and keep the background looking busy whilst the real team makes it show. "How much do we rock? And how can we rock more?" seems to be the standard question. Always reiterating a statement already made. Waste of dollars, waste of air time.

Then theres ALP-Lib (or visa-versa). These represent the biggest load of bollocks in Australian politics. The question is never answered. (Although I was stunned when John Howard answered a question a while back with the simple word "no" and sat down. I cheered.) The supplementary question is mostly a piddle on a stick as well, never answered.

"I have a question about Telstra privatisation"
"Nah, you'se guys privatised stuff too, Commonwealth Bank, etc"

"I have a question about monetary matters"
"You'se guys heaps sucked with money, you always lost it all and stuff"

Then theres the Greens/Dems-Lib (although the Democrats have managed to botch up enough to be a write-off), this is interesting. There is no simple "but you did this" rebuttal in most cases. The question has to be answer, or avoided. Of course it is mostly avoided.

But really, you only need to look at interviews on shows such as Lateline, or on the radio. They simply do not answer questions, at all. ALP is probably a tad better with the media, but not by much.

The ALP sucks dogs balls. The Liberal Party is not hindered by them, quite the contrary. If they're similar, which they are, there is little reason to chose one or the other. You can only be an apologist for so long, and I personally had given far too much credence to the ALP for far too long. If you defend the ALP and fail to win arguments, then maybe there is a problem with your position. And I'm not refering to Question Time as an argument, it is nothing of the sort, I mean a political discussion with peers.

Labors agreement to the FTA was my final straw, others have theirs. I fuckin' got petition signatures and everything, AND WAS A MEMBER AT THE TIME. People of sound mind, and by that I mostly mean lefties/middies/ignorants (but definately not actual right-wingers), need to wake up quite frankly. They are in the ranks of the Libs, ALP, Dems, probably even the Nats, and it is high time they stopped pretending. If you are more an apologist than supporter, you do not support the party that you claim to.

Rant rant rant, where was I?

Oh yeah, ALP is crap. The Greens are the ALP now, the Dems also have lost any credibility (to me). The Greens are what the ALP used to be in its finer moments, and what it should be right now. Their position on IR is what the ALP should be.

Let's look in the newspaper.

Shell accused of hiding benzene emissions from Geelong refinery - Greens would have made rampant corporate pollution economically unviable had they been in power.

Telstra sale, blah blah, Greens would never have allowed this stupidity. It is a disgrace.

Incorrect detention of citizens as immigrants - no such draconian knee-jerk detention would exist under Greens.

Oh I LOVE this one - Lib Malcom Turnbull wants a ban on corporations/unions/organisations funding political parties, or at least that there be a limit, it might corrupt the system. Can't believe The Age didn't make this comment at all really - GOOD POINT, here's a campaign that exists already to stop this - democracy4sale, hold the phone, it's a Greens initiative! And they refuse donations from big business ALREADY, whilst YOUR PARTY Mr Turnbull slurps up donations from whomever is willing to throw it at them like a cheap stripper. The ALP throws some of the money back, but only token amounts, and only when it gets it's knuckles rapped.

... and that's how we play "Man, we'd be so fuckin' set if we didn't have clowns running the shop."

You can play politics - you can do this and say that because that seems to be what the reporters want to hear, pick words carefully, do some branch stacking, ignore a reports findings because it's not what you wanted to hear, claim you haven't read that report and can't comment, spend time arguing amongst yourselfs, have party splits, demand unity and conformance, deny individual Senators the right to cross the floor, control others with threats, attacks, or con them with money for their particular area of concern, but you won't get my vote.

Or you could just respect democracy, do what you feel is the best thing to do, the right thing to do, and listen to your constituents votes and concerns. None of the other parties seem to maintain a grasp on this, and if they do, it is soon wringed out of them.

ALP=FTA
DEM=GST
ALP+DEM = FF
I want the parties split, because I think those concerned quite frankly want it to as well. No more in-fighting, just switch. Look at the policies and history, and judge for yourself.

Besides which, I don't imagine the right-wing parties will be around for much longer. It's easy to assume, with election results, that there is a shift to the right, there is nothing of the sort. Look around you. See where issues about the environment rank amongst Australians concerns, we have recycling bins, hard garbage, organic foods have never been more popular (except for several decades ago when there were no other options), shit even one of the big election stunts was about fucking old growth forests for fucks sake! (*cough* Go Bob *cough*)

Why do they win elections so well? They are desperate, a minority actually wants what they are planning to do, or believes in their ideology. Thus, they resort to dirty filthy disgusting tactics. They stem down into threats basically, we will protect you from these evil doers who throw children overboard, etc (if you don't vote for us, you will be in danger from these crazy people), if you don't vote for us you will suffer from higher interests rates, go bankrupt, become working poor. Someone in the party think-tank must have thought through "what is the biggest and most easily expoited vulnerability of Australians?" and been really excited when he got the idea and it was fleshed out. The same goes for the other rascist one.

IIRC 70% of Australians don't want the Telstra sale, 60% don't want the IR changes, 40% STRONGLY, 20% for. But when they voted, this is what they were asking for. That makes them idiotic, ill-informed, and about to learn the hard way why they should have be keeping up with politics.

Australians are mis-represented.

I feel so much better now. Ahh.. oh crap theres talk of a union related Labor split-type thing on Lateline. Why DOES EVERYONE STEAL MY IDEAS!?

Unintelligible design

Creationism, ahh the monkeys are at work again. Here + Now.
(Actually I've had this sitting in "Draft" mode for a while but thought I'd finally post it.

"insists intelligent design is science-based... and those who would seek to corral it off, really, they're just ideologically driven"

You fuckin' what?!

The.. idealo.. the desi... what the flying?!
Science? Ideology? I'm conflatulated.

Campus Crusade for Christ Australia.

CALL GOD:
[rings]

Hey God! I've been telling peeps aboutcya!

Fantastic, did you tell 'em to be really good to each other, and to the world I gave you?

Oh, uh.. a little.. I guess, but I spent heapsa time putting Intelligent Design, like the stuff you made, into science classes, 'cause it kinda is science y'know. Pretty cool huh?

Well, that's... Why?

I.. I just thought you would want that, and I sort of had an inkling, so I just guessed that was just you telling me to do it.

I told you to do it?

Yeah.

Through an inkling?

Yeah. Well, everyone was talking about it, and well, I guess, telling me to do it. Heaps, really.

Explain the inkling.

Oh, yeah, it was, um.. I was sitting, watching one of those Hillsong DVDs, you seen those?

No.

Well anyways, I was watching one, I think it was 'Church in Schools Volume 9', and I'd just got through the fifth disc, on the What You Should Be Doing section, when it suddenly struck me - and I had a feeling, an inkling, a sign from God, that this is what I should be doing.

...

Still there?

Always.

Heh.

So you want this Intelligent Design taught in science classes?

Yeah!

While it's also being taught in religion and philosophy?

Yeah!

As well as in church sermons?

Yeah!

And Sunday school?

Yeah

And on early morning television?

Yeah

As well as parents teaching the children themselves, and learning through the internet, music, DVDs, and books? And the bible, although there's not really much in there about that?

um.. I guess so. Yes.

OK. If evolution existed, would I have invented it?

Of course! You made everything!

So if I made everything, perchance I made the very theory of evolution itself? It's such an incredibly complex system - the creation of everything, so complex that from the Big Bang's universe expansion, to the separation of quantum forces, to the chosen collection of elements spewed from star matter collecting on a small blue-green planet, with the very elementary initiation of life from the primordial ooze being so unbelievably random as to have the first single celled organisms creation themselves been considered miracles, through to every mutated DNA strand by photon from this sun, from deep space, trillions every nanosecond, over millions of years, did it occur to you that causing evolution was all by my design? Or would you have me make the world in a couple of days, like some sort of a barn-raising? Does not that theory itself insult the intelligence of my design?


Oh, I.. I think you lost me there.

Tell me, why do you think I installed a brain into your skull?

So.. so I would have the mental capacity to recognise bad stuff, and then not do that stuff, and also so I can appreciate You.

Check the switch at the back, I may have forgotten to turn it on at my end.
[click]
Jesus, hold all my calls until they get a gay pope.

But Dad, that's 12 years away!