7pm: Evenings with Luke Bona
8pm: Highlights of Alan Jones and Ray Hadley
9pm: Night-time with Brian Wilshire
I could be certain that the 8pm show is a new addition, replacing an hour of the 7pm show.
True? Or am I imagining it?
Samuel
1 comment July 27th, 2009 at 08:17pm
The story of what will happen to people at 2UE. This week’s version, according to The Daily Telegraph, is that Steve Price and John Stanley will face the axe, Mike Carlton will move to a different timeslot, and Ben Fordham will replace Mike Carlton on breakfast.
2UE boss Graham Mott’s response? “I’m not going to respond to speculation.”
Probably not a bad response…if he responded to speculation, he’s never get the Tele and the Herald off his back…or other stations pretending to be the Tele and Herald for that matter.
When it comes to breakfast, I think they’re facing the same problem Seven News faced when Brian Henderson was anchoring Nine News…you just can’t beat ’em. Alan Jones is the Brian Henderson of breakfast radio. 2UE need to wait until Jones retires before making a move…although if they want to drop Carlton and his massive salary in the meantime to cut costs, they will get no argument from me. I’m not much of a Ben Fordham fan, but I’d much rather hear him than Mike Carlton any day.
There is one thing about all of this which I just don’t get though…why hasn’t the Tele or Herald asked 2UE’s Sunday night psychic Sharyn about this yet? Credible or not, her responses would make a great story.
Samuel
1 comment July 27th, 2009 at 08:06pm
Dear Hello and to all of the readings today.
I am doing write of this on the Sunday morning time as from request of Mr. Samuel for the early writings this week as for he does do need of writings early. I am now back from the good holidays of driving of around the Australia which was most wonderful and wonderful to be doing see of the country which is good lovely country of produd citizen. As did I am do write in times of recent I was did meet lovely farmer man and his lady wife of knittings and I was much happy and of surprise when I did do come home to find the letter of from them with also a card which I did drop of by accident at their house and they were much nice and kind to be doing send to me in the postals.
I am will be do bakery of cake for them to posting.
I have also been on the telephelone to Mother of Russia who is having the issues of email computer and can not be doing send of the emails and is though of do receive and I am did send the emails of from hodliday but was not doing hear of back and so was much lovely to do ring to Mother of Russia on thelephone and hear of voice and all is OK as Mother of Russia has been do of have some the healths in times of recent and is good to know that she is all OK and good and I was doing some of worry.
It was of sad to be doing hear of newses from Russia of big crashing from the buses in Rostov near village Samarskoye and does have me on worries as cousin Strodlichniv does do live in there and is not of answering the tephelphone and so is of worry but hope he is OK and is of possible that he is just on trips of which he does do disappear to do on sometimes and not of telling in before time.
Also of good is Mrs. Lesley of lovely neightbor from Next Door who does do say she was enjoying the times of with nice cat Slavcatchski and is much happy to recieve bakings in times soon. Nice cat Slavcatchski has been do naughty chasings of while I have been away on the hodlidays but is much happy to be doing see of me again and recieivincgngs the treats of tuna mango biscuits of the bakings.
I am must be do go now as I have lessons of the Englishes in week coming many times of catch up and have the exericises to write and practice for Mrs. Porrit in before times.
Please be do times of lovely in the week of coming and I am do hope to be do write again in next week.
From Maritz
Ms. Maritzkrozlavsky Throrglasnishozly
2 comments July 27th, 2009 at 10:42am
As some of you may recall, in April last year I visited Googong Dam and took a whole heap of photos as the start of a new series of photos of Canberra’s Dams, but didn’t publish them at the time. I did upload them to the photo gallery but didn’t get around to captioning them…well I have now finally gotten around the captioning them, and as such they are now publicly available.
Some highlights from the 45 photos.
Googong Dam information sign at wallside carpark
The dam, as seen from the dam-side carpark
The top of the dam wall. It’s great that the camera’s lens fits though the wire fence.
A newish sign
An older “no entry” sign. Funny that it’s from the ACT Conservation Service considering that the Dam is in New South Wales, and has only recently come under ACT Government control.
The old eroded spillway
The dam from the other side of the dam wall. It’s a slight hike up some fire trails to get to this side of the dam.
Queanbeyan River flowing through the rocks as seen from the cascades.
The right side of the dam wall as seen from the base of the “dry” side, plus what appears to be a door in the wall, and the pumping system feeding the environmental flow in to the Queanbeyan River. There is a powerline running from the substation near the pumping station to this pump. When I walked back from here, I noticed a sign saying that the path to the wall is not open for public access…oops!
The Googong Dam substation. It’s amusing that the dam is run by ACT water/electricity/gas utility ActewAGL, and yet the substation is run by Country Energy.
More photos of Googong Dam are up on the photo gallery at http://photos.samuelgordonstewart.com/GoogongDam20080426.
Samuel
July 27th, 2009 at 08:37am
Whilst reading through a story on livenews.com.au about comments Harvey Norman Chairman Gerry Harvey made on ABC TV’s Inside Business program about Australia being over the worst of the economic crisis, I was stunned to read the following:
Mr Harvey said the 16 Harvey Norman stores in Ireland were operating in a challenging economic environment, which was showing no signs of improvement.
“That economy has been absolutely battered so we’ve got stores over there that are down 10, 20, 30, 40 per cent on last year,” Mr Harvey said.
[..]
Mr Harvey said the Irish stores would lose millions as a result of the economic downturn.
Although I was surprised to learn that there are Harvey Norman stores in Ireland, I’m much more interested in something else…what would this sound like with an Irish accent?
[audio:https://samuelgordonstewart.com/wp-content/HN_30FullVox.mp3]
Download MP3
Would anybody like to record a version with an Irish accent?
Samuel
July 27th, 2009 at 03:56am
G’day Andrew,
The internet’s down…well that would explain why the main Windows Media webstream is down. The RealPlayer one is working fine though. Just thought you’d like to know.
Boy oh boy did I have a shocker of a night on Saturday night. That knock-on try I emailed you about was the highlight as my beloved doggies got thrashed in both the AFL and NRL. It’s a good thing The Bill was on to give me some respite!
I hope Archie gets better soon.
Best wishes,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
And as soon as I hit “send”, the Real Player stream dies. I’m gonna hold on to this one for the next time I’m told not to mention on-air that the Internet had gone down at radio stations I’m working at, because “it makes them sound really small”. If anything, I think it adds to the listeners’ experience and makes the whole thing just that bit more entertaining.
July 27th, 2009 at 03:41am
Due to a technical project, this blog is going in to “maintenance mode” for the next little while. Basically what this means from your perspective is that some things might not work as expected. At the end of it, the website should load more quickly and not have as many of the interesting little issues that it has had in recent times.
I was going to force comments in to the moderation queue during the maintenance period, but as I’m not sure how long it will take to complete the maintenance, and I will have to deal with some data inconsistencies later on anyway, I have decided not to bother. There will be a point in time when comments will be forced in to the moderation queue, but that will only be for a short period.
So, in advance, I apologise for any issues you have with the website during the maintenance period. Things should be much better once it’s all done.
Samuel
July 26th, 2009 at 11:56pm
It’s a rather interesting coincidence that when I went to Google Video to find the video clip for the feature song, the first thing to catch my eye on the Google Video home page was what appears to be the entire science fiction film TRON. This is a coincidence because the video for the feature song has a very TRONesque feel to it, and even steals the TRON Light Cycle. Until today, I had not seen the video for this song, so it was quite a surprise.
The feature song is “From Paris To Berlin”.
From Paris to Berlin
And every disco I get in
My heart is pumping for love
Pumping for love
‘Cause when I’m thinkin’ of you
And all the things we could do
My heart is pumping for love
You left me longing for you, you, youFrom Paris to Berlin
And every disco I get in
My heart is pumping for love
Pumping for love
‘Cause when I’m thinkin’ of you
And all the things we could do
My heart is pumping for lovePatience is a game
And every night I say your name
Hoping that you’ll answer
’cause I’m going insane
It’s quite along time ago
You brought me out of control
Hungry for your lovin’
Like I know what that might beFrom Paris to Berlin
And every disco I get in
My heart is pumping for love
Pumping for love
‘Cause when I’m thinkin’ of you
And all the things we could do
My heart is pumping for love
You left me longing for you
You left me longing for you
You left me longing for you
You left me longing for youTeasing was the thing
And now I just can’t let it go
Meetin’ you was something no-one else needs to know
I quess I’m thinkin’ of you
Like I would know what to do
If and when I found you, but I don’t
I’ve got no clueFrom Paris to Berlin
And every disco I get in
My heart is pumping for love
Pumping for love
‘Cause when I’m thinkin’ of you
And all the things we could do
My heart is pumping for love
You left me longing for you
You left me longing for you
You left me longing for you
You left me longing for youWho-hou-u
Who-hou-u
Who-hou-u
Who-hou-u
Who-hou-u
Who-hou-u
Who-hou-uFrom Paris to Berlin
And every disco I get in
My heart is pumping for love
Pumping for love
‘Cause when I’m thinkin’ of you
And all the things we could do
My heart is pumping for love
You left me longing for youFrom Paris to Berlin
And every disco I get in
My heart is pumping for love
Pumping for love
‘Cause when I’m thinkin’ of you
And all the things we could do
My heart is pumping for love
You left me longing for you
You left me longing for you
You left me longing for you
You left me longing for you
You left me longing for you
Samuel
July 26th, 2009 at 06:20pm
As promised, today I am starting to release the full copies of the audio tapes I created as a child. The tapes will be chosen at random from the collection, and one side of a tape will be released at a time.
Today we are starting with the tape “The Variety Of Samuel” which I believe I created in 1999 or early 2000 at the age of 12. Sadly the sound quality isn’t great due to a combination of downright awful microphone inputs on the stereo used to record it, and fairly dodgy microphones. I’ve cleaned up the audio a bit by reducing tape hiss and a buzz which I believe was coming from the microphones, and fixing the levels a bit.
This was my last tape, although I did produce a CD after this. By the time I produced this tape, I was old enough to put a bit of planning in to it, so it is quite clearly broken in to segments and the back sleeve of the cassette holder has a bunch of segment titles, plus whiteout, and a crossed out segment which I didn’t have time for on the tape. The segments on Side A are:
That’s the first side of the tape…the other side will be available in two weeks. Enjoy!
[audio:https://samuelgordonstewart.com/wp-content/SamuelsTapes/TheVarietyOfSamuelSideA.mp3]
Download MP3
You can also subscribe to the podcast of these tapes if you like, by copying the address https://samuelgordonstewart.com/category/samuels-tape-highlights/feed in to your preferred podcast receiving program.
Samuel
July 26th, 2009 at 06:45am
G’day Andrew,
Double Movement?? I’m with you…if you can get there, it should be a try…unless the Eels do it, in which case it’s NO TRY!
Go the Doggies and 10-4 Big Buddy!
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
July 25th, 2009 at 06:11pm
For the first time in Barack Obama’s reign as US President, more people disapprove of him than approve of him (51% to 49%).
(Click image to enlarge)
As usual I will provide the monthly poll graph early in the new month once all of this month’s data is in…this is a special “out of cycle” update to note a development which has been coming for some time. I’m glad that this has happened today and not later in the month as I would like to see how this pans out over the rest of the month on the graph, and as this is the first poll to contain responses taken after Barack Obama’s Wednesday night press conference, we will have some time to see where the three-day rolling average goes before the month expires.
These updates are based upon nightly telephone interviews and reported on a three-day rolling average basis. Most of the interviews for today’s update were completed before the President’s nationally televised press conference on Wednesday night. The first update based entirely upon interviews conducted after the press conference will be released on Sunday.
(text on linked page is updated daily…this text will NOT be on that page tomorrow)
So, basically, the post-Sunday polls will show where the national mood is going after the shock of the press conference has worn off.
Data courtesy Rasmussen Reports, LLC
Samuel
July 25th, 2009 at 02:17am
KXNT News brings word that the controversial “Cash for Clunkers” plan has kicked off:
The program is offering a 35-hundred dollar allowance to those who trade in a car or truck that gets 18 miles-per-gallon or worse for a new vehicle that gets 22 miles-per-gallon or more. As further incentive, the allowance jumps to 45-hundred dollars if the new vehicle gets ten miles-per-gallon or more than the old one. The Cash For Clunkers program is being embraced by most auto dealers nationwide but they must be registered with the program to participate. Full program details are available online at www.cars.gov.
The fact that it has started over there doesn’t really interest me one way or the other…what does interest me though is that I was intending on writing something about this back when it was proposed here in Australia, all the way back in March.
The government is being urged to introduce a $3000 cash stimulus plan to encourage drivers to crush their old cars, protecting the environment and the struggling car industry.
[..]
The Motor Traders Association of Australia (MTAA) has commissioned Access Economics to estimate the costs of reducing the number of cars older than 10 years on the nation’s roads.According to the MTAA, around half of the 15 million vehicles in Australia are more than 10 years old, with about 2 million worth less than $3000.
This idea was floated three weeks after my thirteen-year-old, less-than-$1500-worth car died and forced me to walk home from the other side of Canberra on a Sunday morning before the buses had woken up. Three weeks…I’d already sold the darn thing, and whilst this plan hasn’t gained any traction in Australia, the mere thought that I could have gotten $3000 for hoarding scrap metal, but missed out, was very very disturbing.
The best thing about it was that there was no proposed restriction on the use of the money, so I could have used the $3000 on another cheap car, and had money left over to use on some other useful things and widgets.
For what it’s worth, I’m not in favour of the Cash for Clunkers program…but that wouldn’t have stopped me from using it, if it had existed when my car died.
Samuel
July 25th, 2009 at 01:47am
The morgues of New South Wales are overflowing it would seem, and Canberra is picking up the slack.
Shocking new details have emerged about the shortfall of the State’s morgues, with revelations some bodies have been transferred interstate.
It’s no secret the State’s morgues are at capacity and the government is blaming a shortage of recruits for the backlog which leaves families often waiting for several weeks to bury their loved ones.
But it has now been revealed that four bodies have been sent to Canberra to be assessed during the last week, three of them travelling from Wollongong.
A couple points. Firstly, it’s good to know that Canberra’s morgues have room to spare, as I recall a story (which I can’t find online) earlier this year about a Canberra morgue being shut down temporarily due to a technical fault…if memory serves, Canberra Hospital was being used as the backup morgue in that case.
Secondly, is the New South Wales Government paying the ACT Government for use of the morgue facilities? The ACT Government had to pay for space in NSW prisons before they built a centre of respite for the criminally challenged, so I hope that NSW is paying for the space here which would normally be reserved for ACT deceased.
Samuel
July 24th, 2009 at 03:27pm
Sean Hannity’s daily email sums up the speech nicely in its subject line:
Obama Care: No Specifics…No Plan…
The speech was almost completely devoid of any details, which is amusing considering the 1018 page Obamacare bill is being pulled to bits by the media. The bill is available from the House of Congress website by clicking here, and I’ve mirrored it here just in case it disappears in the future. (Thanks to Heather Kydd for the link). Well worth a read if you want to see what an utterly ghastly, choice-and-standard-of-care destroying piece of legislation this would be if passed.
The Associated Press’ Calvin Woodward, Jim Kuhnhenn and Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar have put together an excellent “fact check” piece on Obama’s speech. I’m just going to quote the whole thing because it is brilliant.
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama’s assertion Wednesday that government will stay out of health care decisions in an overhauled system is hard to square with the proposals coming out of Congress and with his own rhetoric.
Even now, nearly half the costs of health care in the U.S. are paid for by government at all levels. Federal authority would only grow under any proposal in play.
A look at some of Obama’s claims in his prime-time news conference:
__
OBAMA: “We already have rough agreement” on some aspects of what a health care overhaul should involve, and one is: “It will keep government out of health care decisions, giving you the option to keep your insurance if you’re happy with it.”
THE FACTS: In House legislation, a commission appointed by the government would determine what is and isn’t covered by insurance plans offered in a new purchasing pool, including a plan sponsored by the government. The bill also holds out the possibility that, over time, those standards could be imposed on all private insurance plans, not just the ones in the pool.
Indeed, Obama went on to lay out other principles of reform that plainly show the government making key decisions in health care. He said insurance companies would be barred from dropping coverage when someone gets too sick, limits would be set on out-of-pocket expenses, and preventive care such as checkups and mammograms would be covered.
It’s true that people would not be forced to give up a private plan and go with a public one. The question is whether all of those private plans would still be in place if the government entered the marketplace in a bigger way.
He addressed some of the nuances under questioning. “Can I guarantee that there are going to be no changes in the health care delivery system?” he said. “No. The whole point of this is to try to encourage changes that work for the American people and make them healthier.”
He acknowledged then that the “government already is making some of these decisions.”
___
OBAMA: “I have also pledged that health insurance reform will not add to our deficit over the next decade, and I mean it.”
THE FACTS: The president has said repeatedly that he wants “deficit-neutral” health care legislation, meaning that every dollar increase in cost is met with a dollar of new revenue or a dollar of savings. But some things are more neutral than others. White House Budget Director Peter Orszag told reporters this week that the promise does not apply to proposed spending of about $245 billion over the next decade to increase fees for doctors serving Medicare patients. Democrats and the Obama administration argue that the extra payment, designed to prevent a scheduled cut of about 21 percent in doctor fees, already was part of the administration’s policy, with or without a health care overhaul.
Beyond that, budget experts have warned about various accounting gimmicks that can mask true burdens on the deficit. The bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget lists a variety of them, including back-loading the heaviest costs at the end of the 10-year period and beyond.
___
OBAMA: “You haven’t seen me out there blaming the Republicans.”
THE FACTS: Obama did so in his opening statement, saying, “I’ve heard that one Republican strategist told his party that even though they may want to compromise, it’s better politics to ‘go for the kill.’ Another Republican senator said that defeating health reform is about ‘breaking’ me.”
___
OBAMA: “I don’t know, not having been there and not seeing all the facts, what role race played in that. But I think it’s fair to say, number one, any of us would be pretty angry; number two, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home, and, number three, what I think we know separate and apart from this incident is that there’s a long history in this country of African-Americans and Latinos being stopped by law enforcement disproportionately.”
THE FACTS: The facts are in dispute between black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. and the white police sergeant who arrested him at his Cambridge, Mass., home when officers went there to investigate a reported break-in. But this much is clear: Gates wasn’t arrested for being in his own home, as Obama implies, but for allegedly being belligerent when the sergeant demanded his identification. The president did mention that the professor was charged with disorderly conduct. Charges were dropped.
___
OBAMA: “If we had done nothing, if you had the same old budget as opposed to the changes we made in our budget, you’d have a $9.3 trillion deficit over the next 10 years. Because of the changes we’ve made, it’s going to be $7.1 trillion.”
THE FACTS: Obama’s numbers are based on figures compiled by his own budget office. But they rely on assumptions about economic growth that some economists find too optimistic. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, in its own analysis of the president’s budget numbers, concluded that the cumulative deficit over the next decade would be $9.1 trillion.
I suppose it’s a tad unfair of me to call the speech laughable. From this distance it is laughable, but for the people directly affected by it, it’s downright scary…but not as scary as the bill.
Meanwhile back in Australia, New South Wales Government hospitals once again prove their ineptitude.
A Liverpool Hospital manager is refusing to say if his staff did the right thing by turning away a pregnant woman who later gave birth on her bedroom floor.
Natasha Ramirez was bleeding when she arrived at the hospital last Thursday, only to be told to go home because there was no room.
“She told me to go back home because I wouldn’t be in labour for another 24 to 48 hours,” Ms Ramirez told News Ltd.
She gave birth on her bedroom floor five hours later.
Sydney South West Clinical Director of Women’s Health Dr Andrew Child says the staff followed protocol.
“Many, many, many mothers every day present to obstetrics units and are assessed. They’re not in labour so they’re advised to wait at home.”
Ms Ramirez was already four days overdue when she went into labour at her Liverpool unit at 3am.
She and her partner Ricardo Hermosilla decided to call a taxi to take her to the hospital. When they arrived, Ms Ramirez claims she was taken to the birthing unit but was assessed by a nurse, not a doctor.
In her previous birth Ms Ramirez needed anti-D injections because of her o-negative blood type and was worried there may have been similar complications.
Despite this, she was told to go home.
When was the last time you heard of this happening in a private hospital? You can’t remember it happening…precisely. It’s about time that we privatised the entire medical system in this country. The increase in use of private healthcare would prompt an increase in the number of truly competitive health insurance funds catering to the needs of their clients, and hospitals would no longer be constrained by the limited (albeit large, but still limited) amount of funds available to them from the government, which would have the double benefit of freeing up a heap of taxpayer funds, and maybe even producing tax cuts.
Samuel
July 24th, 2009 at 12:59pm
Tony urges the Liberal party to vote for the Emission Trading Scheme so that they’re not faced with what he believes would be an unwinnable double-dissolution election. Tony, comments like that are what we call “out of touch”, and create unwinnable elections.
TONY Abbott has urged Liberal MPs to back the embattled leadership of Malcolm Turnbull and asked them to pass Kevin Rudd’s flawed emissions trading scheme in the Senate to avoid a double-dissolution election that they cannot win.
The one-time leadership opponent to Mr Turnbull has turned into his staunchest public defender and has appealed to Liberal MPs to “allow” the Opposition Leader to exercise his assessment on emissions trading and to save the Coalition “from a fight it can’t win”.
[..]
Mr Abbott’s strong advocacy of Mr Turnbull’s right to change the party’s position threatens to fuel divisions over climate change. Last night, the Liberal leader in the Senate, Nick Minchin, another conservative on the issue, told ABC TV’s Q&A program the Coalition would block the emissions trading scheme in the Senate next month.“We don’t think parliament should be presented with legislation on this subject until after we know the outcome of Copenhagen,” Mr Minchin said.
“We will vote against this legislation in August, as will every other non-government senator.”
Although Mr Abbott believes an emissions trading scheme won’t cut global carbon emissions and that it will cost jobs, the conservative Liberal frontbencher and Howard government minister has called for Liberals to pass the ETS in the Senate and avoid a double-dissolution election.
That’s a corker of a paragraph…Tony wants to pass legislation that he thinks will hurt the country, just so that he can save his seat in parliament for a few extra months.
Padders notes on his blog:
It’s about time the Coalition, and the Liberals in particular, grew some backbone, not to mention some common sense. They should not vote for the ETS. Thousands of conservative supporters and members of which I am one, want to see some courage from the opposition, not a betrayal of principles.
Don’t worry Padders, I think it’s just one self-important windbag. Any coalition MP worth a cent of their income, let alone their seat in parliament, will not side with his utter lunacy.
At least The Nationals are all on the same page, as Andrew Bolt noted on his blog.
We will not support a scheme that costs Australian jobs, we won’t support a scheme that delivers nothing for the Australian environment and we won’t support a scheme that is way out of kilter with what’s happening in the rest of the world. We have principles. We have issues that we stand up for and if we want the public to support us in an election—whether it be a normal, routine election in two years or some kind of contrived double dissolution—then the public will want to be sure we’re standing up for things and that we will deliver better outcomes for the country.
Precisely. Liberal Party take note and preselect somebody else to run in Tony’s electorate at the next election.
Samuel
July 24th, 2009 at 11:48am
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