We're Back

It's been more than a year since the last post.
You must be missing Painfree, terribly.
So much has happened.

I'm very disappointed that this segment has been cut from the Gruen Transfer.

this is the sort of discussion that needs to be in the public domain, but is consigned to the Google Machine, "cos it's too hard."

What do you think?

painfree

Geelong Broker goes belly-up!

Geelong-based broker Chartwell Enterprises ceased trading Monday (21 April), risking millions of dollars of investments of retail investors.

On 18 April, the Geelong Advertiser quoted the principal of Chartwell Enterprises, Graeme Hoy, describing the failure of his entertainment businesses; "I especially like to make it absolutely clear that these businesses have nothing to do with Chartwell Enterprises. In fact their passing on means I can re-direct all my energy and focus into Chartwell and its exciting international future."

Chartwell's exciting international future has lasted a further three days before going into receivership and voluntary administration.

The Age claims some investors invested their life savings with the promise of returns as high as 70%!

May be further proof that risk and return are related.

Current TV

If you would like to view some work from amateur film makers, CLICK through to "Current", formally "Current TV" which hosts some very interesting short videos of surprisingly high quality.
It is searchable, so you can usually find something of interest.

Looks What's Crawled out from Under its Rock!

Jo Ho, the very ex, ex-PM, has again slithered into the public arena.
He's still trying to rewrite history!

Read the report at Crikey.

John Howard's Forgotten Apology

APOLOGY MADE BY JOHN HOWARD ON THE 3RD OF JULY ON NATIONAL TV

Good evening. My name is John Howard and I'm speaking to you from Sydney, Australia, host city of the year 2000 Olympic Games.

At this important time, and in an atmosphere of international goodwill and national pride, we here in Australia - all of us - would like to make a statement before all nations. Australia, like many countries in the new world, is intensely proud of what it has achieved in the past 200 years.

We are a vibrant and resourceful people. We share a freedom born in the abundance of nature, the richness of the earth, the bounty of the sea. We are the world's biggest island. We have the world's longest coastline. We have more animal species than any other country. Two thirds of the world's birds are native to Australia. We are one of the few countries on earth with our own sky. We are a fabric woven of many colours and it is this that gives us our strength.

However, these achievements have come at great cost. We have been here for 200 years but before that, there was a people living here. For 40,000 years they lived in a perfect balance with the land. There were many Aboriginal nations, just as there were many Indian nations in North America and across Canada, as there were many Maori tribes in New Zealand and Incan and Mayan peoples in South America. These indigenous Australians lived in areas as different from one another as Scotland is from Ethiopia. They lived in an area the size of Western Europe. They did not even have a common language. Yet they had their own laws, their own beliefs, their own ways of understanding.

We destroyed this world. We often did not mean to do it. Our forebears, fighting to establish themselves in what they saw as a harsh environment, were creating a national economy. But the Aboriginal world was decimated. A pattern of disease and dispossession was established. Alcohol was introduced. Social and racial differences were allowed to become fault-lines. Aboriginal families were broken up. Sadly, Aboriginal health and education are responsibilities we have still yet to address successfully.

I speak for all Australians in expressing a profound sorrow to the Aboriginal people. I am sorry. We are sorry. Let the world know and understand, that it is with this sorrow, that we as a nation will grow and seek a better, a fairer and a wiser future. Thank you.

John Howard, July 3, 2000

"The Games"
ABC TV

Australian Budget Surplus

Collecting more taxes than is absolutely necessary is legalized robbery.

Calvin Coolidge, 30th President of the USA

http://www.budget.gov.au/

Doctor... The enemy within

2 Facts

1. Sometimes the doctor claims to be your ally, but is actually your enemy.

2. If you ask enough tricky questions, he will slip up..............


PROOF?

YOU WANT PROOF

OK



Brendan Nelson once famously declared that he would never vote for the Liberal Party.....



AND THEN

"The defence update we're releasing today sets out many priorities for Australia's defence and security - and resource security is one of them," he said.

"Obviously the Middle East itself, not only Iraq, but the entire region is an important supplier of energy, oil in particular, to the rest of the world."

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/07/05/1970275.htm

AUSTRALIA

IRAQ

OIL

GAME

SET

MATCH

Justice.... What Justice?

Mohamed Haneef, the foreign doctor charged with "recklessly supplying material support to a terrorist organization", has been released on bail and then incarcerated again as the Federal Government withdrew his visa.
The judge who heard his application for bail after more than a week in detention without charge commented on his release that Haneef had no known links to a terrorist organisation and that police were not alleging that his SIM card had been used in relation to the British terror plot.

The Australian government stopped Haneef's bail release by cancelling his skilled migrant visa and ordering him placed in Sydney's Villawood immigration detention centre.

Note:
Haneef has not been tried.

The case against Haneef appears weak.

The responsible minister, Kevin Andrews, indicated that Haneef would be detained and deported even if he is found innocent.




even

if

he

is

found

innocent





What the hell is going on.......................?

I feel sick....

Ausrock

Those who love Australian rock music might be interested in the Ausrock blog.

My Mac

So I did it. I ordered my iMac.

It's very exciting.

I haven't even seen one in real life yet, let alone used one.

My friend Dave (who I suggested get an Apple laptop two years ago) now swears by his.

It's been a week.

Is Steve Jobs building it personally?

Maybe he's been preoccupied, catching up with Bill.

WTF do these two talk about?

Bill: "What's with those insulting bloated op-system ads, Steve?"

Steve: "Oh, yeah sorry Bill, marketing, you know, that's all, nothing nasty"

Bill: "Well, OK, but I was a little hurt. You know my OS has 95% of the world market?"

Steve: "Yeah Bill, so you keep saying."

John's Diary

 

An excerpt from JoHo's diary entry for 1 June 2007

"So lets see, we've put a decision on carbon trading off till at least next year, but likely 2012, yep, OK.

"Hicks is home and holed-up till next year. Good.

"The AWB debacle has been put on ice till 2008.......and none of us got sacked...yeah go me!

"And we've erased Workchoices from the vernacular.........

"Tax cuts. Check

"Ad campaign. Check

"Oh. I'm hot. I'm smokin' "

Shane Maloney

I had the pleasure of attending a talk by Australian author Shane Maloney this weekend.

He was charming and funny and informative. He also signed a book for me!

Go Shane.

Buy his books.

 

 

 

 

Oh, he gave a very amusing speech at a Melbourne public school in 2001.

Government fails to bust AFL drug policy.

In a desperate display of grandstanding, the Liberal Federal Government has attempted to tackle the Australian Football League on its "out of competition" drug policy.

The Goverment Minister responsible, the silly Mr Chris Pyne, came away bloodied and bruised, claiming he wanted the AFL to adopt the government's "zero tolerance" drug policy.

Unfortunately, the bumbling Mr Pyne was unable to comprehend that the AFL policy was directed at player welfare and rehabilitation rather than criminality.

The government clearly thinks that there are some votes to be won in the charging of sportsmen for illicit drug use.

Andrew Demetriou, who has prior offences in regards attacking the JoHo Government, walked away with a 1-0 scoreline and plenty ammunition in reserve.

RIP Windows

I came home to find that the Microsoft Moviemaker2 (the easy to use, but slightly flakey video editor)won't work.

Easy fixed, I thought, probably just uninstall and reinstall.

.

.

.

.

Hmmmm, can't uninstall moviemaker2.

.

.

.

Google search.

Multiple conflicts between MM2 and other audio/video applications. Disable some codecs. Still wont run.

Clash with IE7. Uninstall. No better.

Must uninstall.

.

GOOGLE.

.

.

.

No-one can uninstall MM2 from XP. It's there, forever and won't run.

.

.

.

Beat (Sorry Fitz)

.

.

Bill, you lost me.

I'm off to the White Zealots Store.

I'll report back.

PM backflip, dodge, squirm

PRIME Minister John Howard has scrapped plans for a $540,000 extension to a private dining room in his Parliament House suite.

Concerned about an electoral backlash, JoHo has decided to pass on the renovations. The potential cost came to light as the quote passed through an senate estimates committee.

In more populist sneakiness, JoHo has avoided causing waves within his own coalition by effectively deferring the decision on the AWB wheat single-desk issue till after the next election.

This non-decision was dressed up as as a staged change to the wheat-desk system.

Don't be fooled, its status quo.

AWB, the great supporter of the Saddam Hussein regime , is being further supported by the JoHo government.

Reactive, populist snake.

JoHo bully and hypocrite

So on Monday JoHo is banging on about schools tackling the problem of bullying and being penalized if they don't toe the line.



Then this from the Telegraph on Tuesday.
The story regards a newborn abandoned at a hospital in Melbourne's outer eastern suburbs.
Note the indignant headline, for which the newspaper copped criticism from community groups including beyondblue chairman Jeff Kennett.






But not from our JoHo.

Mr Howard said the newspaper's headline reflected most people's reaction.

"In defence of the Tele, that's what most people say," Mr Howard told ABC Radio. "How could you abandon a little baby?"

How indeed JoHo? How distressed, confused and desperate would you have to be?

And....

How exactly do you think acerbic headlines and bullying comments from the country's Prime Minister is going to frickin' help?

Bully.

Turd.

Class Action

I've just found out I'm involved in a class action.This only came to light when I received an offer to "opt-out" from the organizing lawyers, a big player in class actions in Australia.

It seems I have a couple of options.

I can remain in the class action and incur no costs even if the proceedings are unsuccessful. If the matter is settled, the court will rule on a penalty and/or compensation.

I could opt-out.  This would be suitable if, for example, I regarded the action as a cynical, money-grubbing waste of the court's time.

If I remain as a plaintiff and the case is not settled, I will need to prove individual loss and damage, which may require me to have legal representation and risk the costs being in excess of the potential settlement.

 The organising lawyers have offered to represent me, by entering into a fee arrangement with them. I guess it will be a no-win, no-fee number.

Alternatively, I can organise my own representation, risking a loss and potentially incurring higher costs if the court needs to assess loss on an individual basis.

I know who the winners are going to be in this little legal merry-go -round.

Keating back in the fray

Ex-PM Paul Keating has re-joined the political debate this week calling PM JoHo a "pre-copernican obscurantist". I nearly fell over in my rush to consult the dictionary.

Oh yes, JoHo, you  deliberately vague flat-earther.

This, on ABC yesterday -

"The right to collectively organise pay and conditions of work is a basic civil right, it's the thing that cuts out the template on a democratic nation."

"When you say to people, 'you can't get together at work, you can't organise your conditions', you're back to the earlier part of the industrial revolution, and that's where Howard belongs."

"He's a pre-Copernican obscurantist. That's where he belongs, but let's not have all these turkeys in the business community saying, 'well isn't this shocking'."

"I mean, we've got a profit share in GDP today, like you couldn't jump over, that's why the stock market's so high, out of the last Labor government's IR policies."

Facebook

Facebook is MySpace for grown-ups. Discuss, citing examples.

WHO criticises Australia's indigenous health

A WHO report has taken a swipe at the state of aboriginal health.

The report labels indigenous health " a century" behind other Australians. Further, Australian aborigines fare worse "on all health indicators" when compared with New Zealand's native Maori population.

The report also criticises the Australian Government's failure to apologise for the past.