There it was yesterday. A plethora of Australian journos standing mic in hand in front of the Champs Élysées or the Eiffel Tower reporting on the French presidential election.
The trouble was what they were doing was not reporting. Or to be more precise, they started with a little reporting and then moved quickly on to speculation and opinion.
Welcome to Australian media’s version of the Kon Tiki tour. With elections looming in the UK and the French National Assembly in June and elections in Germany in September, it’s all aboard the bus. When you get there, don’t worry so much about factual reporting. Tell us what you reckon.
On last night’s ABC News at 7.00pm, the ABC’s European correspondent, Lisa Millar, spent the first five seconds repeating the result and then moved full steam into divination. To be honest, it wasn’t her fault. She faced questions posed from the desk in Sydney from newsreader, Juanita Phillips, all of it demanding a “What do you reckon?” response.
Ms Millar spent the bulk of her report waxing on what might happen by Christmas and beyond.
Full column here.
>>Jean-Baptiste
I found your earlier link ‘rank’ with ‘cymbalism’. http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/film-world-mourns-man-who-banged-the-paper-gong-for-rank-5330072.html
I recall the opening to many J. Arthur Rank films and all featured this man. I’m vaguely apprehensive that you posted a link showing a lean, well oiled and muscular man in a loincloth swinging his gong beater about. (Friendly advice – beware of people approaching with lemon meringue pies.)
As long as you remain only vaguely apprehensive G Whizz I shouldn’t worry too much. If your feelings evolve into vaguely “unnatural” ones or stronger you might consider counselling.
On a closer examination I realise you are quite correct, that is a lean well oiled muscular man! I confess my immediate impression was just some bloke whacking a gong with a dexterity and beat indicative of a musical instrument possibly within the capabilities of a chap who cannot manage a bass guitar.
If the lean and muscular Swantoon enhances a loin cloth and oils up tolerable well, a musical career should not be excluded from his ambitions.
Warning. Alleged competent bass content.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WGVgfjnLqc
Great clip, and a great bass line. I heard this was a song to protest the slaughter of Harp Seals. Drury was a polio victim, which led him to write another great song ‘Spasticus Autisticus’. I’ve gleaned Mr Swantoon is a fire fighter, a lean and muscular lot if ever there was, and would doubtless attract many admiring eyes if apparelled in a loin cloth, or the modern version, the Budgie Smuggler. Remember how lean and muscular that Mr Abbott looked in his? If Mr Swantoon has any musical ability he’s on his way to being a Rod Stewart, or maybe a Mick Jabber.
That should be Mick Jagger not Mick Jabber.
Heres your lot G Whizz
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPvRsLWlDXw
It wasn’t a pie, it was a tart.
Thank you Carl. I had never considered what the difference might be. I searched the internet for some answer but found nought. This morning I asked the baker while I was collecting the morning loaf, and the answer is simple. Generally speaking, a pie has a pastry top, but might not have a case, where a tart may have no top, or a top made of something else, like meringue, but must have a base, pastry or biscuit. I delight in chasing down bits of trivia like this. I once spent two days of spare time trying to find the name for the metal end on a bootlace.
And thank you G. Regarding spending time on trivia, I believe a Swiss chap invented Velcro because he wanted to save time tying his bootlaces?
I’ll look into Velcro Carl. I’m not sure who ‘invented’ Velcro, but I’m sure I’ve read somewhere that the ‘design’ came from bird feathers and was something to do with NASA sticking pens to astronauts.
One of the funnier stories to emerge from the space race was the invention of a ballpoint pen which could write in zero gravity. I forget the development cost now but it was a bizarre amount for a pen. When a visiting Russian official was shown one of these ‘pump’pens, he smiled and quipped ‘We just use pencils’.
Velcro was invented by George de Mestrel, a Swiss inventor, in 1941, so nothing to do with NASA. He was mystified by how the cockle burr (my mistake about bird feathers; confused by the name; I recalled it as ‘cock bird’ instead of ‘cockle burr’) attached itself to his pants and his dog while out hunting. He discovered the hooked barb of the cockle burr snagged in the fibre of his pants, making it difficult to remove. Nature provides the inspiration again. Velcro is a joined word for ‘velvet’ and ‘crochet’ (French for hook). It was patented in 1955.
**To avoid further confusion with the G’s Whizz, Whiz, Wizz and Wiz who post at the Oz, and occasionally here, I’ve changed my screen name to my surname. I’ll be Wissendorf from here on.
I thought the kiwis invented velcro to stop the sheep getting away…
While you’re looking into it G, spare a thought for the late great Justus von Liebig.
this from John,
“IMO most people have lower incomes relative to cost of living, and poorer economic security, than they did in the 1980s. The property class, on the other hand, is doing very nicely, for now.”
i don’t spend any time in Aus these days, six days for the daughters wedding at new year, ten days in 2015, etc, but this would surprise me.
Do people really believe that most aussies are worse off than the 1980s?
The “IMO” bit of that paragraph is the important part.
I probably should rephrase that. Obviously people who were young in the 80s are better off now as a group than they were back then, but I’m talking about the nation as a whole into the future, not just my peer group. People who are young now are worse off than their parents were, and that will only get worse unless something changes. The less well-off in older age groups are also becoming locked out.
You don’t need to live here to know this, in fact research is far better than anecdotes, and is available from anywhere, eg:
https://grattan.edu.au/report/the-wealth-of-generations/
That 2014 report was written before the housing bubble was officially recognised, and deals mainly with income and wealth, but there are plenty of others that look at the bleak employment prospects for younger Australians as well.
John, cutting one’s coat according to one’s cloth is obviously not in vogue nowadays.
Yes if only those whining millennials would stop eating so much toast they could buy a bedsit in about 570 years. And get off my lawn.
They’d get there earlier if they didn’t use smashed avacado as a spread.
the report seems to be talking about 2004 to 2014, which is a very different thing to saying that people today are worse off than we were in the 80s.
30 years of economic growth have been good.
The bleak employ,ent prospects of young Australians is directly related to the mechanisation of the workforce and the resources slump. Nothing more nothing less. I never used to believe in the whole ‘living wage’ thing but I am starting to come around. Interestingly the idea started in Silicon Valley. They could see where things were heading.
True in many cases. I’m a mechanic and I always had an apprentice until about 9 years ago. I realized then that cars as we know them and use them will probably disappear in the next 10 to 20 years, and my trade will become a boutique occupation, along with coopers, wheelwrights, and saddlers. Cars as we know them will go the way of the horse. I could paint a bleak picture of motoring’s future, and the diminishing opportunities for young people in the motoring trades. Mechanics, panel beaters, spray painters, all heading for the scrapheap. Auto electricians alone might survive with the rise of electric cars. The looming future of motoring will have a knock on effect across all of society that will be absolutely profound, the transportation equivalent of the internet. It would take too long to detail here and block up the blog, but here’s a glimpse of what I see.
Private ownership of daily use vehicles will end. The trades I mentioned will vanish. Traffic police will vanish. Traffic lights and other snarls will disappear. Accidents will cease to happen. There’s a lot of positives there, but the downsides will be marked.
I employ one other mechanic, a coach builder and a panel beater/spray painter. We are all old tradesmen, well beyond re-training as baristas. A few years back I had to change the direction of the business or go to the wall. The changes were a success and I’ll bat on to retirement. We are riding a wave of interest in older and classic vehicles as investments and this will keep us busy for another couple of years, maybe, but then it will be curtain down.
I agree, but the outcome of that process depends on the political setting. In a free market economy, automation results in a society of employed haves and unemployed have-nots, with all the misery and social upheaval hat entails. By contrast, in an economy properly managed for the benefit of society as a whole, the remaining work and the wealth generated by automation is fairly distributed.
Lovely start to Mother’s Day, got woken up by an SMS from the ANZ at 5am this morning saying they had noticed unusual activity on my credit card and they had stopped it.
Rang them when I got up and was told someone tried to have a lovely shopping spree, clothes, electronics and a Dominos pizza card (among other things) lucky only a couple of hundred bucks got through which they’ll re-imburse, hope the little git paid more for the card details than he got out of it.
An abrupt start to the day, Tracy but a pretty good result. A mate of mine lost eight grand under similar circumstances before his bank twigged. They reimbursed him but not three months.
It works both ways. I bought diesel from a commercial port last year . The bank was so sure it was fraud when I rang to get them to allow the payment through they told me the police were already on their way to arrest me!
In an ideal world the bank will ring up and say some good Samaritan paid off your bills and topped up the account considerably.
Chelsea!!!
I certainly paid their Vodaphone bill Milt.
They started $1 EBay, $2 Netflix then ramped up the amounts, it was picked up because I rarely use that card, probably hacked at a self serve machine in the supermarket.
I really struggled with that (actually I’ve no idea!), Tracy but cool you’ve been covered and hope the perp will be named and shamed on q&a. Hope the kids or the old boy kept your drink topped up today. Probably have to work in shifts -hehe! And your mob let me down against the Broncos.
Chelsea…
And I note that us old school girls are keeping close in one of the comps…
Cheers ol’ girl.
Ooops, had a check and I can’t keep up.
We at the Church of The Sacred Cur are often subject to that experience Milton. But we work at it, God helps those who help themselves and we robustly encourage Good Samaritans.
Big Kimmie of North Korea finally gets one up, Mr Insider, what is believed to be a Ballistic Missile as he plays the “game” with POTUS Trump. This only has 2 endings, good and bad, so for the World lets hope its the good one.
http://tinyurl.com/lmhprye
Happy Mothers Day to all,the mums, grand mums and great grand mums out there. There’s something about seeing four generations together, alive and well.
Meanwhile, the Port ferals who’ve made their way to Shanghai for the historic footy match have themselves been shanghaied. Authorities have decided no alcohol in the stadium unless you’re in a corporate box. Kotchie would be one of the few Port supporters in such luxury. The rest will no doubt get loaded beforehand.
an english mate from here in HK is up there covering the match for his mag, his first exposure to the two distinct tribes of Port supporters, quite something.
They’ve got a few watching at the ground. Port smashing the Suns.
he says the crowd is mostly aussie, maybe 1 in 4 chinese, the aussies are 10 to 1 Port fans.
the chinese are loving the radio callers playing live at the ground, a lot of shouting seems to amuse them.
he thinks the callers are playing up to the crowd a bit.
AC-DC blaring out from the PA after a goal I noticed on the coverage. 10 million people wondering WTF is going on here?
Port ran away with it JTI, not a good demo for the uninitiated. Then again,the stadium holds around 10,000 and was supposed to be a sellout. Garbage, empty seats everywhere, maybe the alcohol ban had an impact.
Commentators suggested 5,000 Port fans made the journey. Interesting structure on the wing boundary, looked liked a little piece of the Great Wall.
Happy Mothers Day to all the Mums, Mr Insider, bless them all they are special.
Indeed, where would we be without ’em, Henry?
My five year old wanted to know in all seriousness when Kid’s Day is coming!!
Priceless!?!? Good luck to your kid and I hope that the uncelebrated kids days last long, but are soon appreciated.
Tell them it’s every day TO.
May 13 2017 – mark the date, folks; Jean Baptiste has given us ten years to borrow as much as we can and have the party of our soon-to-be-curtailed-by-hot-air lifetimes. I’ll be raising a glass on May 13 2027 and toasting JB, Paul Ehrlich, Al Gore and all those other fabulous fantasists who won’t be paying the interest on the silliness they brought.
I’ll also be thanking all the gods I don’t have grandchildren to whom I might have to explain why they’re spending their lives paying off the cost of grandpa’s good teeth and fast internet all those years ago . . .
You can now add Professor Ross Garnaut to the list BLS. He’s bobbed up as Chairman of the company building the playing field sized battery bank so South Australia doesn’t have another power fade come next summer. Money in the bank as they say.
And there’s a skip-load of money in it, too. Al’s done tremendously well from scaring the Bejabbers out of silly people, along with a lot of others.
I’m sure all those research grants and speaking-tour fees make the $30 trillion-odd that the fossil fuel industry stands to lose look like chicken feed.
Difference is, the hot air the fossil fuel industry produces is largely for the purpose of making the lives of ordinary people a bit more comfortable. Al’s in it for Al.
Just leaving Al aside for a moment, ascribing a motive of self-interest to the world’s scientists, and one of altruism to the fossil fuel industry, is one of the loopier propositions from an already well-loopy denial narrative.
No doubt you get about on horseback, see your evenings in by candle-light and whale-oil lamp and mow your lawns with a scythe.
Good point Swantoon. Mea culpa as well. While making a conscious effort to keep my carbon footprint low I too am a terrible hypocrite.
Hence I shall sit on my arse, do nothing and pile scorn on the hypocrites who try to raise awareness of AGW.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZVDcB-vIdw
We is ruined, Bowie – party hard!
Some reading for those that can be arsed.
https://fractalplanet.wordpress.com/2014/02/17/how-guy-mcpherson-gets-it-wrong/
Just another shill Milton.
https://guymcpherson.com/2014/12/how-scott-johnson-gets-it-wrong/
why not make it 10 days?
Hell, why not 10 minutes? It all makes just as much sense.
The well, the shaft, the burrow, things you can fall down. The other is where you’ve got your head.
Never mind ten. Lets see what you’ve got to say three years from now. Active graph, right hand side bar. Is there something you don’t get about that?
https://www.skepticalscience.com/water-vapor-greenhouse-gas.htm
“Water is the most powerful greenhouse gas”.
Seriously JB, you are going to hurt yourself if you keep attaching yourself to some of these accelerating train wrecks.
I’ve put down some lovely wines that will be drinking at their best in ten to fifteen years. Tough shit, you’re not invited.
Your level of ignorance is astonishing.
Warmer surface equals more water vapor in the atmosphere equals more heat trapped and absorbed equals……………………………………….
https://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/vapor_warming.html
You know something Lou O Tod? If people didn’t habitually sedate their brains with their “best wines” (you poseur!) they might free their neurons sufficiently to take on new information.
Not even going to waste the microseconds required to click on it mate. I know you’re a flake, along with all the other flakes. And I know that when three years comes and goes, and then five, and then ten, and then twenty, and we’re all still waiting for Armageddon, you and your ilk will have another whack theory about why it’s all just around the corner and conservatives and capitalists are to blame.
Been listening to it for decades, mate. Time to stop crying ‘wolf’?
No Swantoon, the reason you don’t click onto it is because you lack the intestinal fortitude to face up to something you cant deal with. Your posturing reinforces that observation.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/out-the-darkness/201504/the-psychology-denial
Oh and pass on the message I forgot to add to Lou O Tod. If he thinks missing out on an invitation to share an evening with some half witted posing plonkos is a bad thing he is living in Hyacinth Bucket land.
nah your a flake
smoke. “nah your a flake.”
Well done smoke! Let’s skip over “your”, apart from that a mighty effort far exceeding expectations of your ability to formulate a reasoned argument.
You deserve two links.
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/how-climate-change-will-lead-to-death-2014-10?r=US&IR=T
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/scienceshow/david-suzuki:-changing-climate-the-ultimate-crisis-for-our-spec/8132944
Your input is welcome anytime.
Ah well. Cool. We’re all f*cked. At least it means we won’t have to listen to the shrieking of gob-shite left-wing hysterics any more. The universe will once again be at peace.
Swantoon! You don’t have to listen to anything! You have choices! You don’t have to listen to the gob shites or hysterics, you don’t have to listen to Mongolian reggae or Finnish debates on halibut recipes.
And I don’t have to listen to you, but I choose to because in your useless way you’re quite useful.
You don’t HAVE to open this link. (Really annoying hysterical gobshite people)
But you don’t HAVE to open it! What a divine relief you must feel now eh?
https://patrick.net/1305573/2017-05-02-only-idiots-and-villians-deny-climate-change
Reminds me of Bertrand Russell’s Inductivist Turkey, who woke up every sunrise of his short life without having died the day before, and so came to believe this was a law of the Universe, even as he rose on Thankgiving morning.
……. debt that can’t be paid…….
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/may/12/theyve-lost-the-lot-how-the-australian-mining-boom-blew-up-in-property-owners-faces
excerpt.
“The choice that we have been given for some clients is that they surrender the property, the bank will sell the property and then the bank will waive the deficit,” Williams told Guardian Australia.
“These people move into a rental property then, which often costs them far less than the mortgage repayments. In one case, the client had three properties and the one they were living in, and they lost all four. There was still a deficit after all four were sold and the bank waived that deficit.”
I note that not a one has had a punt on Carlton, and at 1/2 time there is a mere 4 points in it.
I shied away from them just at the bounce and went with Saints. Blues have played a good half of footy. I think I might regret being faint hearted after boosting them all week. Looking like the Hawks over Brisbane in Tassie..
Blues played a great game. The score doesn’t tell the story. Carlton have lifted in the last few rounds. Freo might get a fright next week.
There’s nothing like a good priced loser Milt. Hope your online betting account has a limit.
G Wizz says:
MAY 12, 2017 AT 10:41 PM… The Kanun looks an INCREDIBLY difficult instrument to learn and play. That
Guy seems a master of it. Never looks at his hands or fingers!
The $10billion railway:-no cost benefit analysis.The Looters only like them when they are in Opposition. When the Productivity Commission analysed Mad Barnaby’s movement of the Pork Barrel Pesticides factory to his electorate, they rated it a total waste of money. Smells of Looters get their new airport so we gotta have something for the bush.
It would be a nightmare to tune too I think. Three strings per course. I’m not sure it has been mimed. The delay is consistent right through the clip. If it was mimed you’d think it would match at some point. A mate suggested it has been converted from another video format that wasn’t quite compatible.
Reminds me of the NBN Bassy – only difference is that the railway will be used and get a bucket load of trucks off the road.
Goodness me, BASSMAN, here is humble me trumpeting Barnaby as an ideal Aussie PM and you say he’s “Mad Barnaby”. This is a BaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaD government all up though for sure but worse if one T. Abbott was ever allowed to make a comeback!