I noted once before that it had become impossible to have a meaningful conversation with neo-cons or any of their bastard offspring, simply because their mental model of the world is so divorced from RealityWorld. Not only do they create their own version of contemporary events that has no moorings in the ocean that normal people navigate, […]

He’s at it again. No issue is too trivial to escape editorial comment by our prime minister if he can use it to bolster his shop-worn image as the knight in shining camo protecting mainstream Aussie values.
Were you a bit concerned by reports that Ian Thorpe might have tested positive to drugs last year? It’s OK, you […]

 UPDATE: ROBERT RICHTER lays it on the line in today’s Sunday Age.

Already incarcerated in the Guantanamo-Bagram system for 5 years and 4 months, ”Worst Of The Worst Terrorist”, David Hicks, was today sentenced to 7 years further imprisonment, of which 6 years and 3 months has been suspended. All of this means he’ll be eligible for release around the […]

So, Malcolm Turnbull and his boss the Rodent have suddenly come out with this policy to pay $200m to encourage developing nations in the southern hemisphere with significant rainforest, such as Brazil Australia and Indonesia, to stop logging them.
So why am I not giving credit where it it appears to be due? Why am I, […]

Listening: The Pogues. Always been a fan but happened to see a doco on Shane McGowan the other day and it had me cranking up the CDs. More about the documentary below but this is, what else?, Fairytale of New York:

Watching: If I Should Fall from Grace: The Shane MacGowan Story. […]

Jim Henley points the way with match and kindling:
Change of party control of the White House and Congress is a necessary but not sufficient corrective to the last six years. Somehow there needs to be an explicit and formal repudiation of Practical Bushism: “preemptive” war, the “unitary executive” and the counterterror torture-state. This is a […]

Aussie Bob’s given the prime minister’s plan to save the planet the raspberry it deserved in his post earlier today, and others have commented on Howard’s increasingly bizarre efforts to give the impression that he’s got some worthwhile policy intiiatives. I’m intrigued, though, by the extent to which his rhetoric is also revealing the man’s sheer desperation […]

UPDATE: It just occurred to me… since we’re “deciding” how to administer the money (even though the World Bank will be in nominal control) wouldn’t it be a perfect opportunity for an ex-environment minister like, say, Ian Campbell or David Kemp to take over the Director Generalship role?

Nick Stern, eat your heart out;
Move over, Bob Brown;
Peter […]

It would be a truly remarkable - near miraculous - thing if The Surge was able to somehow bring the roiling conflagration in Iraq under control. I very much want to believe that the infusion of troops, though vastly below what General Petraeus has previously argued was necessary, could tip the momentum in favor […]

WorkChoices - I wonder if, with the benefit of hindsight, Howard would want to give it such a catchy name? It would be harder for critics to keep talking about The 2006 amendments to the 1996 Workplace Relations Act. Anyway that’s by the bye.
It’s hard to have a rational discussion of WorkChoices because it affected […]