Yesterday’s protest in which Prime Minister Julia Gillard and Opposition Leader Tony Abbott were effectively held hostage in a cafe by Aboriginal Tent Embassy protestors was a disgrace. It confirmed virtually everything Tony Abbott had said about it being time to move on from this ridiculous ongoing protest shanty town.
While I respect the rights of people to protest peacefully, yesterday’s scenes proved beyond all reasonable doubt that the Aboriginal Tent Embassy is not a protest movement in favour of peace and reconciliation, but is instead a protest movement aimed squarely at highlighting and supporting differences between Australia’s democratic and “western” culture (which is supported and embraced by a large majority of Aborigines), and a perverted form of ancient Aboriginal culture where Aborigines want to live in violent, no-modern-convenience societies while still being propped up by the taxpayers in the society that they want to destroy.
I’ve been over this ground many times before, so I won’t go in to the whole argument about how wrong the Aboriginal Tent Embassy is, or my solution to the rift between some Aborigines and the rest of society. Instead, I’ll focus on yesterday’s protest, today’s subsequent protest, and where I think this is headed.
The Aboriginal Tent Embassy has been irrelevant for ages. We have barely heard from them in years and years, and yet yesterday hundreds of them were there to hold a protest. Yes, yesterday was Australia Day and yes, it is to be expected that they would hold their usual “invasion day” nonsense, but it normally doesn’t happen with the sort of numbers we saw yesterday.
It is not unusual in the slightest to see the Left come out in support of the Tent Embassy in the media…not in the slightest, but normally the Left don’t support violence or hateful comments against Julia Gillard, and yet, they are defending this:
Protester Gwenda Stanley of Moree almost tried the shoe [Julia Gillard's shoe which fell off in the altercation] on before changing her mind. “I don’t want to walk in the shoes of a dead woman!” Ms Stanley joked
.
(h/t Daily Telegraph)
That same shoe, which was for all intents and purposes, stolen, is now being auctioned off on eBay. Proceeds of crime? Death threat, joking or not?
And look who has the shoe and is auctioning it off…Tent Embassy elder Pat Eatock.
(Picture h/t Gary Ramage of The Daily Telegraph)
Now, thanks to a court ruling last year (the case that Andrew Bolt lost), I can’t discuss how much of Pat Eatock’s heritage is Aboriginal. In much the same way that it is illegal to camp opposite Old Parliament House, I can’t discuss Pat Eatock’s heritage…the difference though, of course, is that for one reason or another, the law seems to not apply to the Aboriginal Tent Embassy’s occupants, and they have very little respect for the law, or the country itself anyway, as today they went and burned the Australian flag outside Parliament House, because for some reason they can’t understand why people are upset with them over yesterday’s disgraceful incident.
But not everyone is against them. Leftist blog New Matilda (I thought it had shut down…apparently not) has come out in support of yesterday’s violent protest. They claim that it wasn’t violent (or that the police who were protecting Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott as they ran to a car, were the ones who were violent), and that it’s a giant media conspiracy to claim that there was any violence (the statements seem contradictory, but they’re both in there).
So, let’s look at what happened yesterday. There was chanting, which is acceptable.
There was an angry mob surrounding a cafe and banging on the windows of said cafe…the windows were for all intents and purposes the walls of the cafe and there was genuine concern that the glass would break at any moment. Intimidation…illegal. Property damage…illegal. Detaining people against their will…illegal. This counts as violence in my book.
Then there were the attempts to block the path of the police as they hurriedly escorted Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott to a waiting car…maybe illegal, maybe not, but definitely wrong and intimidatory.
Julia Gillard tripped during the scurry to the car and she lost a shoe. The shoe was then taken by the Aborigines and a death threat was made against the Prime Minister. Illegal.
The shoe is now being sold. Selling stolen property is a crime.
And despite all of this, the Left still support the protest.
This support is straight out of another playbook. The “defend Occupy” playbook which the Left used in the U.S. last year to defend the Occupy camps which turned violent, and to try to cover up the rapes which occurred at some of the Occupy camps, and to try to claim that it was all just some media conspiracy that was trying to make the Occupy camps look bad (as if they ever needed any help in looking bad).
I don’t think any of this is a coincidence. I think the plans were drawn up after Andrew Bolt lost that court case last year.
It’s pretty simple really. The Occupy movement has gone nowhere in this country. There’s a handful staying in Martin Place in Sydney just so that they can remain in the background of Channel Seven’s Martin Place studios, but elsewhere they are almost non-existent or in such small numbers that people would mistake them for homeless people (which reminds me, last year a large number of Homeless people in the U.S. said that they wanted to reclaim the parks from the Occupy crowd). To maintain a minor position in the public consciousness, the Occupy mob occasionally camp out overnight in a place where that is prohibited, so that the media will report on their arrest.
Here in Canberra, Occupy had perhaps a dozen people on the first day, but they didn’t stay for the night and didn’t bother to turn up the next day. Their biggest problem is that most areas near Parliament do not permit camping…but there is one site where a group who claim to have a particular ethnic heritage are permitted to camp illegally…the Aboriginal Tent Embassy. And the court case last year just gave every white person in the country the ability to claim to be of Aboriginal heritage without ever being questioned about it.
Both the Tent Embassy and the Occupy movement were increasingly irrelevant forces in this country last year, but with that court case last year, an opportunity arose for Occupy to set up camp outside Parliament on the same site as the Tent embassy. They couldn’t just move in though…that would be too transparent. Instead, a plan had to be drawn up.
Australia Day is always a day of protest for the Tent Embassy, so nobody would be likely to bat an eyelid if the protest was a bit larger than normal as it could be put down to people giving them more support, especially if you can get some left-wing academic to claim that flying the Australian Flag is a racist act, just a few days before Australia Day (The Sydney Morning Herald seems to have pulled that article, but the ABC still has it online…attempts to rewrite history perhaps?). It is also predictable that, on Australia Day, a politician would make a comment about Aboriginal affairs and the Tent Embassy. It’s not hard to twist any statement on the matter to suit the agenda of the Tent Embassy, and that’s what they did with Tony Abbott’s comments. The protest could then be about whatever comments were made by a politician on this “ever so sensitive day for Aborigines”.
What couldn’t have been predicted was how lucky the protestors would get. They would have known that Julia Gillard would be near their protest, and picketing her would have been a big news story by itself…but for the object of their derision, Tony Abbott, to be there too…well they really did hit the jackpot. They were able to set up a hostage situation while keeping just enough distance for it to not be considered as one. They then followed through on the rest of their plan of making inflammatory statements and letting the media run with it.
Today, the Left have come out and defended the Tent Embassy protestors, and we have had another protest. Shortly, I predict, the rest of the plan is for Occupy to come out in support of the Tent Embassy and join them in “solidarity” at the Tent Embassy. It gives both movements some relevance again, and allows the Left to use both movements to advance their agenda outside Parliament.
What happens after that will probably depend on how the rest of us react and how our politicians react, but have no doubt, this whole thing was heavily planned and orchestrated, and we have only just seen the start of it.
This could become a massive story with massive implications very quickly.
US Senator Rand Paul (Republican-Kentucky) has been detained by the Transportation Security Administration for refusing a full-body patdown after a screening determined that something needed further investigation.
Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul’s press secretary Moira Bagley tweeted on Monday that Transportation Security Administration officials were detaining her boss in Nashville, Tenn.
“Just got a call from @senrandpaul,” Bagley tweeted at about 10 a.m. on Monday. “He’s currently being detained by TSA in Nashville.”
[..]
Sen. Rand Paul’s chief of staff Doug Stafford told The Daily Caller the Senator “was detained by the TSA after their scanner had an ‘anomaly’ on the first scan.”
“He offered to go through again,” Stafford said in an email. “The TSA said he could only have a full body pat down. He would not consent to it. He offered to go through the scanner again. The situation is ongoing.”
Sen. Rand Paul has previously referred to the TSA’s use of full body pat downs as the “universality of insult,” and he called on the agency to end the tactic.
Apart from the fact that, from a PR perspective, detaining one of your most vocal political critics might not be the most sensible thing to do, this move by the TSA may very well be unconstitutional as Sen. Paul was on his way to Washington to attend a rally and a Senate session. Article 1, section 6, clause 1 of the United States Constitution prohibits the arrest of Representatives and Senators on their way to or from sessions of government:
The Senators and Representatives shall receive a Compensation for their Services, to be ascertained by Law, and paid out of the Treasury of the United States. They shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place.
And the Senate is indeed in session today, with a vote scheduled for 4pm, as the Senate’s website notes:
Monday, Jan 23, 2012
2:00 p.m.: Convene and begin a period of morning business.
4:00 p.m.: Proceed to executive session to consider the nomination of John M. Gerrard to be United States District Judge for the District of Nebraska.
Detaining one of your most vocal political critics is bizarre. Doing so in an unconstitutional manner is a really good way to get yourself abolished.
The TSA has denied that Senator Paul was detained, although I happen to think that they have contradicted themselves.
The TSA says Sen. Rand Paul “was not detained at any point” but “triggered an alarm during routine airport screening and refused to complete the screening process in order to resolve the issue.”
“Passengers, as in this case, who refuse to comply with security procedures are denied access to the secure gate area,” the TSA adds. “He was escorted out of the screening area by local law enforcement.”
(h/t again Daily Caller)
If he was escorted out of the area, I think that counts as detention. Asking him to leave and having him leave on his own would be fine, but escorting him out is, to my mind, a form of temporary detention.
Either way, he has almost certainly been prevented from attending today’s Senate session, so it could be said that the TSA has interfered in the political process as well as potentially breaching the constitution.
As I said at the top, this could become a huge story with huge consequences very quickly. Watch this space.
Update: It is worth noting that Senator Paul did eventually make his way to Washington D.C on a later flight, so he wasn’t entirely prevented from attending the Senate, however the issue of the unconstitutional detention of a Senator making his way to a Senate session still stands. End Update
Well I can't say that I'm surprised that Mike Carlton does not like any of the Republicans who are vying for the Presidential nomination. Mike Carlton is, after all, a strident left-winger and opposes pretty much everything those on the right believe in. I respect Mr. Carlton's right to hold his views, and his right to support Barack Obama, but I have to say that his portrayal of the Republican candidates was more than a tad untruthful.
I will agree with him on one point: Ron Paul is mad. That is not to say that Mr. Paul is wrong on everything as his views on reducing the size of government and on the UN being an unhelpful and dangerous organisation are right for the most part, but his other stances on such things as disagreeing with much of the US constitution, wanting to almost entirely eliminate the US armed forces, and a bunch of other peculiar stances and changes of mind over his long and bizarre career do point to him being unsuitable for the role of President and probably a danger to national and international security.
As for the other candidates, while none of them are perfect, I believe that any of them would be better than Barack Obama. Mitt Romney's private sector experience stands him in good stead (and unlike what Mr. Carlton attempted to portray, Romney was not a slash-and-burn CEO…rather he ran what we in this country would call an administrator, an organisation which is brought in to fix businesses which are teetering on the edge of total collapse. Wholesale sackings did not occur under his watch, and it has in fact been widely documented that the handful of cases where a large number of people were sacked occurred after Mitt Romney's people had finished their job and other people had taken back the businesses). That said, Mitt has his own issues…his own time as Governor saw him implement a scheme very similar to Obamacare…a scheme which he and other Republicans are fighting and vowing to repeal, and a scheme which is being challenged as unconstitutional in many courts. Mitt talks the talk when it comes to conservatism, but it's hard to work out how much of it he believes, and how much of it he says for the sake of politcal expedience…but there is no doubt that if he follows through on even a small percentage of his promises, the US will be on a much better economic track. The big problem Mitt Romney has though is that he has been running for the Republican nomination for as many election cycles as anyone can seem to remember, and yet still has trouble answering simple questions about his track record…it does him no favours and is now starting to impact his following to the point where other candidates have a realistic chance of beating him consistently.
Newt Gingrich is a very interesting case. His time as Speaker Of The House was incredibly successful, returning surplus budgets and implementing a lot of policies and plans which Republicans promised to do, despite opposition from a Democrat President (Bill Clinton). Newt has proven that he is capable of getting things done, but he can be a bit of a loose cannon, and his private life is an ongoing distraction bordering on a fiasco. That said, it should be noted that the ex-wife who has most recently made a bunch of claims about him was also guilty herself of cheating on him. Two wrongs don't make a right by any means, but the validity of her argument, and the timing of it, are questionable given her own actions in that relationship. The big question with Newt isn't whether he can do the job, but whether he and his administration would be sidetracked by having to put out fires relating to his personal life on a regular basis.
Rick Santorum is the most consistent conservative of the bunch, and has recently seen a surge in his standing, something which I put down to the departure of other strong conservative candidates Herman Cain and Michele Bachmann. Rick Perry has also recently left the race, and I suspect that this will help both Santorum and Gingrich as Rick Perry was seen as the "great conservative hope" when he entered the race and his supporters tend to dislike Mitt Romney with a passion. Santorum is not particularly well known outside of Republican circles, but has a pretty good track record and stands for pretty much everything that the conservative side of politics wants to see. If he can win the Republican nomination, then I'm sure that the party will do more than enough to make sure that everyone knows all that they need to know about him and his policies.
The way I see the state of play at the moment is that Mitt Romney will not get the nomination unless he does something which he will not do: announce that he wants to see everyone paying a 15% income tax rate. I think it's the only way he is going to be able to quash the latest round of stories about his investments, even though he has not broken any laws and is paying the normal tax rate for capital gains…a tax which is itself a tax on income which has already been taxed. Despite the legality of his actions, the way his tax rate looks to many people is going to cause him issues unless he addresses and neutralises the issue quick-smart.
I see the race now as mostly being between Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum. Newt is getting some big endorsements and his track record as Speaker Of The House is helping him immensely, even though his own words and deeds of the past are causing him some grief. Rick Santorum also has a good chance and continues to gain traction, which is quite an impressive feat considering that, until now, his campaign has been run on the smell of an oily rag due to (until recently) very low poll numbers. I hope that he gets the nomination because I think he is the right person, of those who are left, to articulate conservatism in a way which would completely blindside Obama and his radical socialist agenda. I did prefer Michele Bachmann and Herman Cain for the job, but Rick was always loitering in the background waiting for his time, and it looks like it may have arrived.
All this said, with the exception of Ron Paul, I would take any of the remaining candidates over Obama…in fact, I think the fate of the free world depends on it. As far as I'm concerned, four more years of Obama will result in the collapse of the United States as we know it, and eventually a world war to determine who will be the next superpower and what kind of world we are going to live in. With its enourmous debt and a growing dependance on government by its citizens, America is already in serious trouble…I can't be sure that any of the Republican candidates will solve the problems in their term should they be elected, but I am sure that they would give the country a serious shove in the right direction, with some candidates giving a bigger and better shove than others.
Anyway, I apologise for the length of this email. I'm sure that it is too long to read on the air in its entirety, but I feel very strongly about this and wanted you to know my thoughts on the matter…especially seeing as much of the reporting we see over here about American politics seems to be adapated from a select few news outlets (NBC, New York Times and American ABC in particular) in the US which are heavily in favour of Obama and do their utmost best to destroy and smear anybody who opposes him. Case in point, the singing which Obama did yesterday…he got praise from the media for singing to an audience in the middle of a speech, whereas only a couple months ago Herman Cain got ridiculed for days and days for singing to an audience in the middle of a speech. If you were to ask people in this country, based on the reporting we see about American politics on our news services, what they think Obama's approval ratings are, they'd probably tell you that he is very popular, when in fact that very opposite is true.
I'll leave this here for now because if I write any more I'll probably give you a headache and I'll work myself up too much to be able to get to sleep.
Have a lovely week John. I hope that Rhonda is enjoying her weekend away, and I hope to be able to give you a call soon. It would appear that I am not working next weekend, so that should help.
Like everyone else, I've seen the footage of it on its side, but this aerial shot still amazes me…it just seems to strange to see a boat side-on with the ocean behind it rather than the horizon. I can't begin to imagine how terrifying it would have been for those on board.
That said, it wouldn't stop me from going on a cruise…perhaps not with that captain, but one day I think a cruise would be nice, and this incident doesn't change my mind about this. The way I look at it, any time one uses any form of transport which is not controlled by one's self, there is an extra element of risk, but it is generally so minute as to not warrant concern…I'll be honest and admit that almost every time I get on a bus or a train or a plane or in a taxi, I wonder about the driver/pilot/captain, but it doesn't stop me from making the trip, and hopefully it never will. If that stuff ever bothered me, then I think I'd have to move in to an underground bunker and never come out lest some vehicle goes astray, and that's not a life worth contemplating.
Two of my favourite musicians singing one of my favourite songs. It’s a shortened version of the song, but still thoroughly enjoyable.
Now, blue ain’t the word for the way that I feel,
That old storm keeps brewin’ in this heart of mine.
This ain’t no crazy dream, I know that it’s real.
You’re someone else’s love now, you’re not mine!
Crazy arms that reach to hold somebody new,
But my yearning heart keeps sayin’ you’re not mine!
My troubled mind knows soon to another you’ll be wed,
Honey that’s why I’m lonesome all the time.
Crazy arms that reach to hold somebody new,
But my yearning heart keeps sayin’ you’re not mine! (not mine, not mine)
My troubled mind knows soon to another you’ll be wed,
Honey that’s why I’m lonesome all the time.
An email to 2UE’s Ron Wilson and Angela Bishop who are filling-in for George Moore and Paul B. Kidd
Hi Ron and Angela,
I’ve been enjoying having you both fill in for George and Paul, you work very well together, but I’m afraid that I do have a bone to pick with you.
You had a caller earlier who doesn’t have a fence around her pool and justifies this by keeping her backyard locked and not permitting entry without supervision. One of you wondered what would happen if a child climbed over the back fence and was then able to get to the pool.
Well I’m sorry, but if they can climb the back fence, then they would be able to climb the pool fence anyway, and kids who are too small to climb a fence are usually small enough to fit through the bars of a pool fence…I agree with the lady caller that a pool fence is no substitute for supervision and properly securing your yard. The rules requiring pool fences give people a false sense of security.
Thanks for filling in anyway, and please come back again some time in the future.
An email to 2UE’s John Kerr, who was accused by his second caller of the morning of being obsessed with Brussels Sprouts because he had made one mention of them earlier in the morning
Good morning John,
There was an article on page six of Friday’s Canberra Times which was brought to my attention yesterday and gave me a good laugh, so I thought you might like it. The first paragraph in particular was quite interesting.
“A soft-drink shortage is gripping Australia due to disruptions in supplies of carbon dioxide – the gas that puts the pop in soda.”
So, now we have a shortage of carbon dioxide? When we’re always being told that we have to have a carbon tax because there’s too much carbon dioxide? It certainly made me laugh.
And about Brussels Sprouts. I never really liked them as a kid but would eat them under protest with tomato sauce on them. Now I don’t mind them plain but still like to have the tomato sauce on them, not because I want to cover up the taste of the sprouts, but because I think they’re plain and don’t really have much of a taste of their own. People say that chicken has no flavour…well I disagree, it’s Brussels Sprouts which have no flavour.
Have a good week John. I’ll try to give you a call next weekend.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
One does have to wonder how the carbon tax will be calculated on factories which produce carbon dioxide as their main product…perhaps if they start recycling the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere they would receive carbon credits.
(h/t Tom White for bringing the Canberra Times article to my attention)
An email to 2UE’s John Kerr, who has just returned from holidays
Good morning John and welcome back.
I hope you had a good break. I know you only took two weeks off but it's amazing how long your breaks seem when you're only normally on for two days per week anyway. It feels like you've been away for a month! Anyway, it's wonderful to have you back. Thank you for your Christmas card too…I hope you got my card before you went away, but if not and you've only just received it, that's OK, I'm just eleven months early!
I would ring to say hello, but I've been a bit unwell for the last few days and I don't think my voice would hold up on the phone.
You mentioned Malcolm Turnbull earlier and you said that you don't think we hear enough of him. I have to disagree to an extent as it really depends on which Malcolm Turnbull we are hearing from. I'm not partial to hearing from the Malcolm Turnbull who is still bitter about losing the Liberal leadership and supports an emissions trading scheme, but thankfully we have heard much less of this Malcolm Turnbull recently. I do quite like hearing from the Malcolm Turnbull who focuses his many skills on helping the Coalition to advance their agenda and hammer the government's many odd plans…he is particularly effective in slamming the silly National Broadband Network, and I was very happy to hear him say that the government "could not sell fresh fish to starving seals" and, I think for the first time, support Tony Abbott as a viable option for the role of Prime Minister. I hope to hear more of this Malcolm Turnbull and hope to one day see this Malcolm Turnbull in a senior cabinet position of a Tony Abbott-led government.
A belated Happy New Year! Samuel Gordon-Stewart Canberra
It should be noted that Malcolm Turnbull also made a few other observations about our inept federal government which are worth repeating.
“Wayne Swan on the other hand always radiates anxiety and uncertainty and a lack of confidence.
“Now no matter how good the message he has to deliver he always appears to be somewhere between uncertain and slightly terrified.”
Mr Turnbull said it is “unfair and inaccurate” to say that people have yet to see Opposition Leader Tony Abbott as a credible prime minister.
“Tony is clearly seen as a credible, viable alternative prime minister because the party that he leads is well ahead in the polls.
I hope that this is a new leaf for Malcolm Turnbull and that he continues to support his party, because he can be very very effective in parliament and in government as long as he doesn’t spend his time undermining his team.
A quick note that Greta Van Susteren (whose first name I keep mistyping as “Great”, which may very well be accurate) will be interviewing Rush Limbaugh on her FOX News show for the full hour, starting in about 15 minutes from now. The show will then be repeated three hours later at 5pm Canberra time (1am US Eastern/10pm US Pacific).
It is days like this that the cost of my Mobile Foxtel subscription is justified.
The last Federal election saw over 500 cases in the ACT where a person may have voted more than once, according to official Australian Electoral Commission data.
1458 people across Australia actually admitted to multiple voting. Of those, 19 cases were referred to the AFP for further investigation, but at the conclusion of the investigation just 3 people were issued with a formal police caution.
The figures have been obtained by Senate Opposition Leader Senator Eric Abetz, a former Special Minister of State.
The 506 potential multiple votes from the ACT add to the national total of 29,920.
“In every one of the 506 cases in the ACT, not one was referred to the Federal Police – that to me is cause for great concern,” Senator Gary Humphries said today
“By the AEC’s own admission, a simple denial of multiple voting leads to no further follow up by the authorities.
“It is imperative that Australia’s voting system is robust and its integrity is upheld. If the net result of 29,920 cases of multiple voting is no prosecutions at all, where is the disincentive?
“We may need to consider better methods of ensuring voter identification at election time.
“It’s also clear that there needs to be a much greater emphasis on pursuing alleged offenders if we are to maintain confidence in our electoral system,” Senator Humphries concluded.
(h/t The RiotACT)
It’s just a shame that this is being brought up now, at a time of year when very few people will notice, because it is a real problem and it is probably changing the outcome of elections…and when you consider just how close the last election was, it’s a very real worry.
Of particular concern to me is this line from Senator Humphries’ press release:
By the AEC’s own admission, a simple denial of multiple voting leads to no further follow up by the authorities.
In other words, if you deny that you voted more than once, the prosecution will not be pursued, mainly because there is no real proof that it was actually you who turned up to all of those polling places.
Personally I am in favour of requiring voters to produce photo ID at polling places, although this still doesn’t entirely solve the problem as it does not stop fraudulent identity documents from being used and therefore does not provide enough evidence to prove that anybody has actually committed electoral fraud. Therefore I also support the idea of requiring that people have their photo taken when they have their ID checked…while this doesn’t stop the multiple votes at the time, it does provide actual proof for a prosecution, which in turn provides a real disincentive to cast multiple votes.
I elaborated on my thoughts and reasoning in a lengthy comment over at The RiotACT which is copied in below for your convenience.
It’s not just party hacks who vote multiple times; people who want more of a say in the process for one reason or another do it too, whether they be non-party affiliated ideologues (I count myself in this category, although I have not voted more than once in any election), angered with the status quo to the point where they think they have to take action, simply pompous enough to think that their view is more important, or some other reason, or perhaps a combination of the above.
At the last ACT election, a friend nearly gave me their vote because they weren’t interested enough to vote. It was tempting, but in the end I came to the conclusion that it was better for them to simply not cast a vote (by turning up and casting an invalid vote) than to give somebody more of a say than they deserve. The interesting thing about this though is that if it had worked the other way (ie. they couldn’t be bothered voting and asked for a copy of my vote so that they could submit an identical vote) there would be no way to track it as, for all intents and purposes, we would have both voted individually.
In the last federal election I considered studying the electoral roll and presenting to polling places as various people from the electoral roll…never twice to the same polling place and never twice as the same person. This way it would be difficult to prove that I, or any of the people I presented as, would have actually voted twice. Further, to assist in avoiding attending polling places as somebody who has already voted, I would map out where the people that I intended to impersonate live and avoid impersonating somebody at their nearest couple of polling places.
The biggest danger from this plan would come from, ironically, party operatives (ie. the pamphlet pushers and their supervisors) who circulate between polling places throughout the day and might recognise me in multiple places. It would also have been imperative to avoid any location which, at the time, contained a candidate, as appearing in the background of footage of candidates in multiple locations could pose a problem.
Again, I did not go through with this, partially because it would have been the wrong thing to do, and partially because I had to work on election day and would not have had the time or energy to make it worthwhile, especially seeing as the only way to make this worthwhile is to ignore safe seats and visit marginal electorates…and our nearest marginal electorate does not have the density of population or polling places to aide in the efficiency of such an operation.
I do believe that something should be done to try and stop electoral fraud, but branding people with ink is not the answer. Any ink can be removed with enough effort. At best such a plan would just slow down those who are keen to vote more than once. It certainly does not prevent somebody malicious from fronting to a polling booth as somebody else in order to prevent that person from voting, even if they then do not remove the ink and simply pay the fine for not voting themselves.
I do believe that requiring photo ID at polling places is the way to go. I do not believe that people with less identifying documents are more likely to vote for Labor or the Greens, nor do I believe that said people lack the resources to obtain valid identifying documents. My mum, for example, does not have photo ID and, quite reminiscent of a scene from ‘Mother & Son’ doesn’t quite understand what it is, thinking that an old photo of herself counts. This is something which can be overcome through an advertising campaign, and perhaps some assistance from a close family member or friend (I could take Mum to a government shopfront at any time and help her get a Proof Of Age card if she ever wanted one, for example).
The benefit of photo ID is that it proves that you are who you say you are and that you are not somebody else (something which ink can not do). There is still the small problem of identity theft and forged documents, although it is much harder to produce such documents these days due to the protection mechanisms in modern identity documents.
At the same time, I do not believe that a live electronic database tracking who has and has not voted, and checking people against that list when they present to vote, is a viable option either as it is too open to abuse, be it by somebody running around with fake ID or by a rogue electoral worker or by a hacker.
A potential solution would be to take a photograph of a person when they show up to vote and have presented their ID. Then, later on, any recorded instances of a person voting more than once could be checked against the photographs taken at the polling places and prosecution could be based on this evidence…the penalties might need to be a bit tougher than they currently are though, otherwise it might not be worthwhile chasing people.
Multiple voting is a problem which can be minimised, but not entirely eliminated in my view. Active checks of ID on the day, while gathering enough evidence (photos) for follow-up if necessary is in my view the simplest, safest and most-effective way to minimise the problem while still erring on the side of caution so as to not accidentally prevent somebody from exercising their right to vote.
For as long as I can remember, Carols By Candlelight has been an institution in my household, being absolutely compulsory viewing every Christmas Eve. For me, it has marked the turning point at which the busy-busy build-up to Christmas ends and the relaxation of the arrival of this most joyous of days arrives.
I’ll admit that, since Ray Martin decided to vacate his position as host of the show, the show has felt less and less special to me each year. It seems as if the show has become less traditional since Ray left, and the tradition of it is what really made it special…it’s what made me (and everyone in the house for that matter) eagerly watch the show or listen to bits of it on the radio if I still had presents to wrap.
This year that slow decline finally hit the point where I could no longer bear to watch. It started with Lisa reading “Dennis Walker” off the prompter without even thinking that it might actually be Dennis Walter, and then discussing with Karl the fact that this “Dennis Walker” is not related to Stan Walker…a clear and sure sign that not only was most of Karl and Lisa’s banter coming straight off the prompter, but they also had no idea what they were talking about or who was going to be on the show.
Then “Uncle Doug”, the eccentric head of the choir, was asked to lead the choir in their usual performance of “Ding Dong Merrily On High”. When Doug sings this song, he becomes quite animated, and it is tradition to see Doug get stuck right in to this song…but no, we got stuck with wide shots of the choir. Doug was in there somewhere, but was practically invisible. One of the highlights of the night each year was gone.
Then, the clincher. Every year for as long as I can remember, and probably longer, Humphrey B. Bear has been involved in the kid’s segment in which Santa comes to visit. In recent years Hi-5 became the main attraction here, and I could accept that given their popularity and prominence within the Nine Network, but Humphrey still had a key role, most recently as Santa’s helper. I was worried when I did not see Humphrey listed in the opening credits, but sat and waited patiently anyway. Hi-5 came on, and at this point everything was normal as Hi-5 always come on first and sing their usual array of songs…but then it got weird as a cross-promotion for a movie came on stage to help Hi-5 find Santa…The Happy Feet Penguins.
When I say “The Happy Feet Penguins” I really mean a bunch of creatures which only bore a passing resemblance to the aforementioned penguins. Santa then appeared, did his thing and left to carry on with his busy schedule. No Humphrey.
At this point I turned the television off in disgust. Humphrey is an extremely important part of the tradition of of Carols By Candlelight; he makes me extremely happy and mellows me to the point where I am nice and comfortable and ready to enjoy the rest of the night’s entertainment. The lack of Humphrey made me angry, and with the rest of the show having not impressed me up until that point, I could not carry on watching it. Others in my household expressed similar thoughts and feelings.
I was later informed that Humphrey appeared later in the night, which placated me to an extent (although he really should be on with Santa), but it turns out that his appearance later in the night was incidental and almost accidental. As David Knox as TV Tonight explains:
Humphrey was at the Bowl making appearances on the night and the Dress Rehearsal, but relegated to commercial breaks.
[..]
Humphrey finally came out during the curtain call, a fleeting glimpse of a bear without pants somewhere amongst the crowd….
Well I’m sorry, but I’m livid. Humphrey is an icon, a National treasure and an institution. Humphrey deserves better than to be relegated to warming up the audience. Excluding him from the television show is a disgrace. I can understand the incentive for having the penguins which didn’t look like the product they were promoting as a part of the show, but there was no reason to exclude Humphrey. Humphrey could still have made an appearance with Santa as Santa’s assistant…it didn’t have to be a big role, but he owns the Santa segment and, with all due respect to Santa (who also seemed to shunted aside to an extent to make room for the show-sponsoring almost-penguins), the segment does not work without him.
All I can say is that a Christmas tradition was ruined for me last night, and if Humphrey’s name is absent from the opening titles again next year, I shall not be watching.
To treat Humphrey in such a way is shabby at best, and I won’t allow my Christmas eve to be tarnished in such a way again. If that means that I miss out on Carols By Candlelight, then so be it…they’re not the only source of carolling, and I will get my fix elsewhere.
As David Knox says:
Christmas is one of the few times we get to see Humphrey -please sort this out for 2012
Hear hear! And if Nine can’t sort it out, then I hope that someone else picks up the rights to Humphrey and will treat him with the dignity he deserves. Icons who have entertained and educated generations upon generations of Australians deserve so much better than what Nine did to poor old Humphrey last night. Hopefully it is fixed for next year, and hopefully Humphrey is compensated with an enormous amount of honey…it’s the least he deserves, and about the only way that Nine will get me to watch Carols next year.
Good morning and Merry Christmas to all (and to all a good night if that happens to be your timezone).
I would like to wish you all a very merry and safe Christmas, and a joyous new year filled with many good things. Before we reach the new year though, I would like to offer you a Christmas present.
Over the years there have been many adaptions of the Twelve Days Of Christmas, but by far the best in my opinion is a BBC production titled “And Yet Another Partridge In A Pear Tree” starring Penelope Keith as the lovely and increasingly bewildered recipient of the many gifts of the twelve days of Christmas.
It is a comic delight, but it is also rare. Although the BBC do have it available to stream on their website these days, it has never been offered for sale to the general public, and the number of people on the Internet looking for an MP3 version of this marvellous production is nothing short of extraordinary. Today, as a gift to you, I offer an MP3 download of the best version of the Twelve Days Of Christmas in existence. Enjoy!
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Merry Christmas from Samuel, Nattie and Pebbles (who? The long-awaited announcement will explain this shortly…although who knows what the definition of shortly is on this blog).
And I’ll let your imagination work out what RIH might stand for.
North Korea’s menace of a ruler, Kim Jong Il, is dead. Good riddance to bad rubbish. Unfortunately his insane son Kim Jon Un will take over as leader, although one does have to wonder if the fact that Un is even more crazy than Il could result in a destabilisation of the family’s leadership in the future, and hopefully the end of an awful regime…although when I say “hopefully”, I do still worry about the fallout from such an end to that regime.
For what it’s worth, as this screenshot will attest (blurring added to protect the identity of those who “liked” my status update) I had this news up on Facebook at 2:21pm, mere moments after I received a mobile alert about the news from Matt Drudge’s excellent DrudgeReport.com, and before most (not all) of the Australian media had caught up…alerts from Drudge are very rare, so you know that something very big and very serious has happened when an alert comes through. On this occasion it was good news.
(update, image should appear now. Dumbo here typed “mp3″ as the file extension rather than “jpg”)
Casey Hendrickson posted about it at about the same time as me, and although he and I were both beaten by most US news outlets, we both beat CNN to the news…hardly surprising. Anyway, Casey noted something which amused me as well:
North Korean TV says he died from “Physical and mental over-work”.
Ahhh those communists, always claiming that work is bad for you.
Casey also muses:
His psychopath son, Kim Jong Un, will now take over. We’ll know soon if the world will stay the same, be better, or if we’ll see WWIII break out.
I’m tipping that it will stay the same for the moment, but when enough people in North Korea cotton on to just how nuts Kim Jong Un is, we will see a fracture in the country which will result in in-fighting, followed by some people defecting to the South to escape while the rest of the nutters keep fighting against themselves and eventually fire at the defectors, which will reignite the Korean war…whether that leads to a global conflict, I don’t know, but I think the markets are on the money with their fall in reaction to the news of Kim Jong Il’s death.
Casey has more information about this on his blog at http://caseyhendrickson.wordpress.com/ including information on why he thinks North Koreans will not rise up against their government (video not available in Australia…I’ll try and find a version which is later) for the most part I think he is right, but I also think a small number of people deciding that they’ve had enough will be enough to start a conflict there. It’s well worth a read.
But until a conflict breaks out, there is some time to celebrate the death of an evil man…and that is precisely what I intend to do.
Update: In the spirit of happiness, this made me burst out laughing, a website which is dedicated to photos of Kim Jong Il looking at things http://kimjongillookingatthings.tumblr.com/. Again, h/t Casey Hendrickson for the link.
I’m sure that I have given the award to Judith Durham before, but I saw her singing last night at Carols In The Domain and was moved by her performance, so this week’s award goes to the lovely Ms. Judith Durham and we have two songs from her from last night’s performance: “Hark The Herald Angels Sing” and a slightly modified version of “Morningtown Ride”.
(With thanks to YouTube user BrainyAlien1 who uploaded this video. I was going to upload it myself, but BrainyAlien1 has already uploaded one with higher video quality than what I would have uploaded.)
Thank you for all the interesting...