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.
I just got home from work and I'm too tired to stay up, so I won't ring, but I just wanted to wish you, Rhonda and Martine a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year before you disappear for the rest of the year. Hopefully you got my card. I was a bit late in sending it, but I sent it via Express Post so hopefully it arrived, but if it hasn't and you receive it upon your return in the new year, just pretend that I'm running 11 months early.
Anyway John, I'll leave you for the year with a really nice Christmas news story from a TV station in Grand Rapids, Michigan, which seems to have started an amazing trend all across America of people paying for stranger's layby orders. The story is copied in below for you.
Updated: Monday, 12 Dec 2011, 8:25 PM EST Published : Tuesday, 06 Dec 2011, 9:40 PM EST
By Dani Carlson
PLAINFIELD TOWNSHIP, Mich. (WOOD) – Christmas came early for three people in West Michigan when a stranger picked up the tab on some presents.
It happened Monday night at the Big Kmart on the 4000 block of Plainfield Avenue in Plainfield Township. A woman, described only as "being in her 30s," walked up to the layaway desk, pushing a shopping cart full of toys she planned to donate.
"This lady came up randomly and said, 'Can I, you know, pay off some people's layaway?'" said Dannell Goddard. Goddard works at Kmart in the layaway department. She told 24 Hour News 8 that when she first heard the request, she was a bit confused.
"I was like, 'Well, are you trying to pick them up? 'Cause you can't pick them up if you don't have an ID," Goddard said. "And [the mystery woman] replied, 'Nope, I just want to help people.'"
The woman looked through several of the about 800 layaway contract tickets at the store. She randomly picked and paid the bill on three of them. She paid about $500 between all three of them and left a $10 balance on each of the accounts.
The woman's only requirement was that there were toys in the layaway orders.
"It was really crazy the way she did it. She was so excited and so happy to do it," said Goddard. "She had a great heart, and I told her that I felt like she had a great heart, and she said she doesn't want to take appreciation for it. She just felt that she was blessed and she wanted to bless others."
One of the recipients of that kindness was Mary Chapin. She told 24 Hour News 8 the act of kindness "restored her faith in people."
Chapin had put about $200 worth of toys on layaway for her son, David, Monday afternoon. She said she hoped she'd be able to pay off the balance by the week before Christmas.
Then she got a call from Kmart that changed all that.
"They said that someone had paid $180 on my layaway and there was only $10 left," said Chapin. "I thought it was a joke."
Chapin wanted to say thank you, but the only clue to the woman's identity was a message on her receipt that read, "Happy Holiday from a friend."
"I thank her. It's the best gift that I ever received, and it's the gift of believing in people," said Chapin. "And believing that there's good out there, 'cause you don't always see that."
The entire layaway order was for 12-year-old David who has autism. Chapin told 24 Hour News 8 she was so excited she gave her son one of those toys, a brand new LEGO set.
Chapin has her own name for her family's Secret Santa. She calls the woman "an angel" for her family. She said that angel gave her family a far bigger gift than the toys themselves.
"Even though we're all in the same boat, nobody's thinking about anyone else, it's every man for himself," said Chapin. To have somebody come along behind, and just do something that's totally unnecessary but so appreciated, it just really made a difference."
—
The day after the story aired on 24 Hour News 8, another secret Santa went to the Plainfield Kmart and offered to pay off 13 more layaway bills — to the tune of about $2,000.
It was the largest layaway payoff in the history of the store.
I sent this email to 2UE’s John Kerr in the wee hours of Sunday morning
Hi John,
I’m at work at the moment, so I can’t call, but I’m enjoying listening anyway.
I just heard your comments about McDonald’s and I have to agree. Apart from having a decent product, the stores are all locally owned and provide employment for a huge number of people across the country, and not all of them are kids either. It’s a success story of the free market, providing services that people want, need and desire, and thriving as a result.
McDonald’s gets blasted for being unhealthy, and you might remember the so-called documentary a few years back “super size me”. Well multiple independent studies have followed the methods employed by that film to discredit McDonald’s and, to their surprise, the participants not only lost weight, but were deemed to be healthier by their doctors. I don’t endorse living entirely off McDonald’s food, but in moderation it’s fine.
A friend of mine, Casey Hendrickson, who hosts a breakfast radio program in Indiana, put together a video about the studies in to McDonald’s called “Using Their McSmarts”. It’s on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hj6imJNQXBY if you’re interested.
Changing subject, when you speak to Derek Dryden next, could you please say thanks to him from me. I ordered a book through his website a couple weeks ago. The book is out if print and was probably never sold in Australia. One if his staff, Kate, was able to track down the publisher and order a reprint for me. It should arrive in a few weeks. Fantastic service. Derek and his staff deserve a big thanks.
Have a wonderful week John!
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
For your convenience, here is the video to which I referred:
Also if you are wondering, the book which I ordered from Derek Dryden’s Better Read Than Dead is radio host Mark Levin‘s “Men In Black” which is about judges overstepping their authority. Amazon has used copies for sale, but Derek’s people were able to order a reprint which is preferable in my view. The book is topical today given that a judge in New South Wales is pushing for the abandonment of jury trials…again. The day we let the elites strip us of our right to a jury of our peers is the day that we can say goodbye to a civil society.
I’ve been listening to New Zealand radio for a while so that I can listen to them discussing the results of their federal election and must say that I am very pleased by the result.
John Key and his National Party, which is a conservative party, have been returned with greater numbers, and with the help of other conservative parties, will have a majority in parliament. Labor had one of their worst results in history with about 26% of the vote, and it seems that the Greens have picked up a bunch of Labor votes as the Greens got more than 10%…it’s similar to the situation here in a way with the Greens slowly but surely taking the more left-wing voters away from Labor.
They have voluntary voting over there and had a fairly low turnout by their standards…only 65% of people voted. I wish we had voluntary voting here John. It worries me that our close elections are probably decided by votes from people who probably couldn’t care less about politics or elections. I wonder how different our last federal election would have been under a voluntary voting system, especially seeing as the Coalition had more votes but ended up losing the election.
Anyway, I’m in awe of New Zealand and how well they seem to be doing in spite of the natural disasters which they have endured. It’s a testament to the success of John Key and conservatives in New Zealand, and I’m glad that New Zealanders are getting behind him.
Just quickly on the subject of a Melbourne Cup holiday. We tried that in Canberra and it failed miserably. Venues had to put prices up because of public holiday pay rates so people tended to stay home and the venues lost business. Work functions ceased because nobody was at work and caterers lost out as a result, and the general culture of the day, which promoted workplace harmony and added a bit of interest to an otherwise fairly standard work day, was lost. It works in Melbourne because the race is based there and people can go to the track…it doesn’t work anywhere else because everywhere else has an existing Melbourne Cup Day culture which mostly revolves around work and private functions.
An email to Larry Williams of New Zealand radio station NewsTalk ZB
Hi Larry,
I just wanted to say thanks to you and the NewsTalk ZB team for the great election coverage tonight. I’ve been listening from Australia and have to say a very big congratulations to John Key, the National Party and conservatives in general.
As an Aussie who is suffering from a Labor government, it’s great to see the New Zealanders have the common sense that Aussies seem to lack.
If I work out the time difference, I’ll be listening for a little while in the morning before I go to sleep. I’m on night shift at the moment so I think your show starts around the time my shift finishes.
An email to 2GB’s Warren Moore in response to an interview he had on the subject of children who continue to live with their parents well in to their adult years
G’day Warren,
I’m 24 and still living at home for both convenience and economic reasons. I get along just fine with my parents and enjoy their company, and it’s reciprocated…and then there’s the dog who I wouldn’t want to leave as she gets in to her senior years.
I’m paying board at a rate which is probably about what I would be paying if I moved in to a share house with friends…but I’ll be honest, I don’t really want to live with other people my age. If I were to move out, then I would be moving out on my own. I’m saving towards that goal and it will happen eventually, but I think this works both ways. My parents have been good to me and have allowed me to stay in their home…and one day if it’s necessary when they’re older, I will allow them to move in with me.
For the moment though, unless I leave town, it makes no economic sense for me to move out until I’m in a better position to get myself set up to at least a half-decent standard of living.
I'm not in the least bit surprised that Julia Gillard has had some speech therapy and training as it seems to be common practice amongst political leaders, and fair enough, their job is to communicate, and if you speak in a manner which makes people want to throw their TV in to a lake (as Julia often does in that monotone lecturing tone of hers) then a bit of training might help. Regardless of the message, it is important that it can be listened to without annoying people…it should be the content of the message which annoys or delights people, not the way in which it is spoken.
In recent memory, it is well-known that John Howard had some speech training to assist in removing a stutter, and I'm pretty sure that Tony Abbott has had some training to remove some of the distracting "uhhs" and scratchy back-of-throat noises from the middle of his sentences. As for someone who I wish would have some training…Barack Obama. People say that his is a "great orator", well I'm sorry but I think he is worse than Julia Gillard. He has three modes: louder and louder campaign mode; loud and angry; and quietly angry and repetitive. I can't listen to him for more than a minute, and even within that minute I struggle. I have to wait for the transcript if I'm to have any hope of digesting his message.
Anyway, enough of my thoughts…if I go on any longer then you might start to think that I have something against Barack Obama…and I can't have you figuring that out so quickly.
A government inquiry in to bloggers who support the views of shock jocks? I’ve long held the view that various governments have monitored my blogging activities…it’ll be nice to have the proof, and I’ll have some words about the inquirers as well.
By the way, the licence printing machine at the ACT Government’s Woden shopfront has broken down and could be down for another hour. People renewing drivers licences should avoid the Woddn shopfront and go elsewhere. Too late for me though.
I agree with you that giving kids a few days off school if they're really naughty is not a punishment, but I remember from my time at school here in the ACT that the "out of school" suspension was only used in extreme cases, and the "in school" suspension was used for most cases.
I remember a couple occasions in high school where I was given "in school suspension" for a day where I was placed in a small room for the day and was expected to still do any tests or other important assessment items that were due on that day. This was a fairly boring way to spend the day, although I did manage to entertain myself.
The out of school suspensions were usually reserved for cases where a teacher had a reason to consider that their safety was at risk. If memory serves, hitting a teacher was an automatic three days of out of school suspension with the possibility of the police being called.
I remember one occasion where I was accused of punching my English teacher, except that I had a classroom full of witnesses who saw that what happened was that the teacher lent over me as I was going to stand up and out heads clashed, resulting in her needing to go and see the dentist…the fact that she dragged me down the corridor after this probably helped my case a bit. In the end I just got a day of in school suspension for not obeying the directions of the teacher…but that's a whole other lengthy story which I might save for another day.
Perhaps one day you could have Rhonda on to talk about some of her more memorable moments as a teacher.
Anyway, on the so-called "sin taxes" on cigarettes and alcohol, I find it somewhat peculiar that they are linked to increases in inflation when the very act of putting the prices up adds to inflation. It seems a bit circular to me.
To answer the question about how solar panels work, the quick and simple version is that they convert light energy in to electrical energy. It is not based on heat or UV rays, although heat can affect the efficiency of the conversion.
That said, before solar panels which created electricity, there were solar panels which used the heat of the direct sunlight to heat water. In Braddon until recently, a nice elderly couple had the oldest solar hot water heater in Canberra. The solar panel was out in the front yard and water was pumped through it for heating. They eventually replaced it due to issues with the hot water tank which was based in the roof space.
A funny story about that couple. They live across the road from the editor of the Canberra Times. In the late 1990s the editor got a new dog which would regularly explore the suburb (it was a nice friendly, but large, dog…the name escapes me) and one of its favourite past-times was stealing the newspaper of the elderly couple and chewing it up.
Every time this happened, the elderly couple would ring the Canberra Times and request a new paper…The CT would usually say that they don’t replace papers chewed up by dogs, until they were informed that the editor’s dog had done the damage, and they would replace the paper with no further questions within the hour. Eventually it got to the point that the couple would merely need to ring the CT and a the people there would just assume that the dog had been at it again and promptly send a man around with a replacement paper.
Anyway, I’m looking forward to seeing the Czech President, Mr. Vaclav Klaus at the Press Club today. I believe it is being televised, but I’m eager enough to hear his views against the global warming nonsense and socialism that I’ve paid to be there.
Have a good day Mike.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
(in the fortified bunker of work again)
An email which I sent to 2UE’s Mike Jeffreys a little bit after 1am
Good morning Mike,
I’ve been following the US debt talks with some interest and have found Obama’s fearmongering and unwillingness to do anything useful quite frustrating.
I forget the exact figures, but as I understand it, if the debt limit is not raised and the US government has to rely on incoming funds from taxes etc, then they would not have to default as they would have enough funds to keep up their debt repayments, pay the social security and Medicare bills, plus the military payroll, and might have a couple spare cents left over.
Obama (and his colleagues, the detestable Senator Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader in particular) has been going on and on about how if the debt limit isn’t raised, the social security and Medicare bills won’t be paid, which is a blatant lie and pure fearmongering.
He has also been trotting out the familiar line about millionaires not paying enough tax which is even sillier because even if the US government was to seize the entire income of millionaires, they would still have a massive budgetary imbalance.
The problem is overzealous spending by the government. The Republicans passed a “cut, cap and balance” plan in the House of Representatives which would have cut wasteful spending programs, capped the government’s spending at a percentage of GDP and would also have required a vote on a constitutional amendment requiring the federal government to have a balanced budget like the majority of state and local governments, and would have raised the debt limit to give the government time to implement the plan. Not surprisingly, the Democrats blocked it in the Senate because they’re addicted to big government and spending.
I’m hopeful that something similar to cut, cap and balance does get passed as merely raising the debt limit will just push the problem further down the road when it’s harder to fix, and raising taxes will just further slow any economic recovery.
Have a wonderful day Mike.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
From the fortified bunker of work, Canberra
I'm glad to hear that you are feeling better this morning. I was a bit worried last week when you had some time off because you were unwell.
You asked at the start of the show whether I would prefer Tony Abbott or Malcolm Turnbull as leader of the Liberal Party. That is a very simple question to answer. Tony Abbott. I think Tony is doing a very good job as leader, and the polls are a testament to that. It is important to remember that when Mr. Turnbull was the leader of the Liberal Party, the polls showed that they were on the verge of being wiped out, and it was only after Tony Abbott took over as leader and took the party in a very different direction that they recovered and even surged in the polls.
Tony is also a closer match to my personal views than Malcolm Turnbull is. My biggest issue with Mr. Turnbull is that he supports an emissions trading scheme, something which I vehemently oppose.
I would be more than happy to have Malcolm Turnbull in the cabinet as I'm sure that he has plenty to offer, but I don't think I could vote for the Liberal Party if he was the leader.
Anyway, a belated happy new financial year to you. I hope to be able to give you a call tomorrow night and hear all about your recent holiday.
